Josiah Concept Ministries

Of course my title is facetious, but my first thought upon reading this news item is how my side of the debate is going to misuse this paper as “proof” that evolution is crap. Two or three.net, which is a Christian living blog I follow, offered this piece on the story which goes to show how our side really does misuse these pieces of evidence.

I don’t believe that evolutionists are being honest with themselves. I believe that they are denying God’s creative role in their life, and thus, His sovereignty over His creation. But, I don’t think that Christians are being intellectually honest with themselves when they attempt to dispute evolutionary claims.

I have already made clear in my continuing series of posts on the foundations of Geocreationism that I’m fairly agnostic about things like a real age for the earth (I don’t believe that it is dateable). There is ample convincing evidence for a young universe, but one must admit that the evidence for an old universe is equally powerful.

Perhaps we’re meant to forever debate the question of origins. Maybe the debate serves God’s purpose better than a clear-cut fossil record and a perfectly preserved history of the beginning.

Of course, I have to give props to my old friend Brian for his list of both sides on this extraordinary find. Though I seriously doubt that this find will even slightly diminish evolutionary theory, I hope so for Brian’s sake especially. He’s an evolutionary biologist, so that would kind of kill his career.

Of course, if something ever were to completely kill evolutionary theory, I’m hiring closers at BK.

As reported on Moonflake’s Blog, Fred Phelps and company is at it again. The Westboro Baptist Church plans to protest the funerals of the victims of the I-35W bridge collapse because “God made the bridge fall because he hates America, and especially Minnesota, because of its tolerance of homosexuality” (source).

This is completely left field of John Piper’s assertion that we must seek God’s will in this tragedy. Of course the difference is that John Piper is an honest man of God, while Fred Phelps is a hatemonger who dresses his venom in the cloak of Christianity.

Moonflake warns us that his blog contains opinions but the comments contain nuts. I rather think that may be the other way around. His statement, “I believe Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church are the perfect argument that God is either non-existent, or an utter bastard” is way off the mark.

I am not about to do the usual claim that Fred Phelps and his cult aren’t true Christians, lest I am accused of perpetuating the No True Scotsman Fallacy. Instead, I will demonstrate through the power of Scripture that their message is wrong. Whether or not they are saved is immaterial. Fortunately, I need only one Scripture to do this.

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. (Jn 3:16)

Yes, that is a Bible verse beloved by millions. It shows that God, in His infinite love for us wayward humans, would offer a sacrifice that would forever bridge the gap we created between Him and us at the Garden of Eden when Adam first partook of the forbidden fruit.

Just to drive the point home, let’s look at this passage:

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. (1 Jn 4:7-12)

Of course God is wrathful and passes judgment upon humanity: look at Deuteronomy 7:9-10, 32:35, 42; Job 34:11; Psalm 50:4; Matthew 16:27; and Revelation 22:12. To focus merely on the loving aspect of God is to miss the very reason for Christ in the first place: God must satisfy His own necessity for vengeance (Heb 9:22) since we can never do it (Rom 3:22; Heb 10:4). God did for us what we were utterly unable to do: He sacrificed His own Son, and appeased His own wrath. Thus, our sins are now forgiven through this sacrifice, offered once for all (Heb 10:1-14).

The Westboro Baptist Church does not preach this message. The Gospels contain dozens of examples of Jesus eating with tax collectors, healing the demon-possessed, eating with sinners, and forgiving the sins of anyone that reached out to Him in faith. Jesus lived and ministered among the worst of the sinners. His was not a message of hate, but one of repentance and acceptance into God’s kingdom. The message preached by the Westboro Baptist Church is not in line with this, not at all. The apostle John can sum it nicely:

If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother. (1 Jn 4:20-21)

I’m not here to argue Fred Phelps’s salvation. I’m not here to say that Fred Phelps isn’t a true Christian. These are for God to judge, not me. I believe that I have offered ample evidence that Fred Phelps’s message is not consistent with the Gospel.

However, one lonely avenue by which someone could attempt to destroy my argument still exists. 1 John 4:2-3 states that “every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God.”  I think that Fred would readily confess that Jesus Christ came in the flesh.  This is a serious problem.

But look at that statement carefully, and notice that it isn’t a very big problem as one might think.  Fred would confess that Jesus came in the flesh, yes.  But I much doubt he would confess Jesus, that is, I don’t believe that Fred allows Jesus to be Lord over his life and his ministry.  He is not teaching us in the Spirit.  Yes, according to Paul, someone who is in the Spirit produces certain fruits (Gal 5:22-23).  And, in His famous Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said that we would be able to know a false prophet by the fruits he is producing.

Do we see the fruits of the Spirit (love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control) in Fred Phelps, his ministry, or the members of Westboro Baptist Church?  I can confidently say no, and I much doubt that anyone is prepared to search Fred’s entire career in ministry for a single example of any of that fruit.  It isn’t a matter, therefore, of Fred’s proclaimation of Jesus coming in the flesh or not.  It looks as if his fate may be described in Matthew 7:23: “I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.”

Fred Phelps is a false teacher by the biblical definition.  God has warned us that these people exist in His word, and so that means that Moonflake’s statement that Fred is evidence against God, or evidence that God is something I care not to repeat, is very misguided.