Tuesday, May 26, 2009

On Modern Wishy-Washiness

  • “The biblical story of the perfect and finished creation from which human beings fell into sin is pre-Darwinian mythology and post-Darwinian nonsense.
  • “The miracle stories of the New Testament can no longer be interpreted in a post-Newtonian world as Supernatural events performed by an incarnate deity.”

As I was searching through Wikipedia, I stumbled across these tenets on the bio page of an influential American bishop. His bio page read like a catechism would-- if you crossed out each doctrine with a red pen. In summary, this bishop openly proclaims that the Resurrection is a metaphor, the Cross comes from a “barbaric” and “primitive” concept of God, prayer is impossible, and the Ascension of Christ back to Heaven is “not capable of being translated into the concepts of a post-Copernican space age.” What’s then left of Christianity? I don’t know. You tell me.

What struck me as I read this man’s list of “Things Not to Believe,” was how many statements he made based on the fact that we live in the 21st century. Supernatural events are impossible in an era following the life of Isaac Newton. The story of the Cross was the fairytale of a primitive people (something we modern people cannot possibly be). Heaven is a dumb idea, now that Copernicus taught us about space. Since Charles Darwin, Eden has become nonsense. Apparently God needs to be replaced with “Deity 2.0.” We have evolved past Him.

Strangely, after reading through the bishop’s statement of faith (or lack thereof), I was not motivated to rebut him. I didn’t want to research an opposing argument. I didn’t even care to try; because there was simply no competition between the man’s religion and Biblical Christianity. He touted a sanitized, anemic version of Christianity, drained of hope in the eternal and more about not knowing anything for sure than anything else. The man proposed Christianity only after doing away with Christ. Who wants that? What kind of attraction does that kind of religion hold? I don't get it.

Really, if you think about it, the man’s creed is just what Christianity would become without the Bible. If we take away Scripture, we pull out the carpet from beneath our faith and end up sounding plain ol’ ridiculous. Without a high view of the Word, we lose all the reasons for believing in Christianity in the first place.

But the Bible, applied rightly, changes everything. It can make run-of-the-mill sinners into passionate, grateful worshipers (a supernatural miracle in itself.) Plus, He promises that His word "shall not return to Me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose..." (Isaiah 55:11) Everybody else may follow fads of post-Newtonian and post-Darwinian thought, inevitably wearing out like an old pair of socks, but He is "the same," and His "years have no end." (Psalm 102:26.)

Only the words from Him will last; and only His words can transform men. As Spurgeon exclaimed in a sermon,
"Such a man never has a cold heart or a slack hand who is much in meditation with his Lord Jesus; his heart comes to be like a mass of molten lead. …if this man should be a preacher, he will preach with holy power; his heart being hot, his words will burn their way into his hearers' hearts. Nor will it end there, but this hot heart will soon make a hot hand, and the man who once has his soul full of Christ will not have his hand empty for Christ. Now he will work; now he will preach for Christ; now he will pray, now he will plead with sinners; now he will be in earnest; now he will weep; now he will agonize; now he will wrestle with the angel, and now he will prevail; for, as the fire burneth, his whole being gets into a glow; and the man, like a pillar of fire, warms those who are found about him, burns his way to the glory of success, and gives his Master fresh renown.”
There really is no competition, is there?