Josiah Concept Ministries

There are several notable difficulties in replying to Dave Armstrong, not the least of which being his uncanny ability to ramble on and on about nothing in particular. The fluff in his posts is absolutely unreal.

In responding to his argument that the Vicar of Christ is not a blasphemous title, I have come across a gross example of fluff. DA claims that “disciple” and “vicar” are “not far in meaning” from each other.

Looking at the same dictionary entry that DA was using, Merriam-Webster online, we can see that the definition of “vicar” is as follows:

1: one serving as a substitute or agent; specifically : an administrative deputy2: an ecclesiastical agent: as a: a Church of England incumbent receiving a stipend but not the tithes of a parish b: a member of the Episcopal clergy or laity who has charge of a mission or chapel c: a member of the clergy who exercises a broad pastoral responsibility as the representative of a prelate (source)

The definition of “disciple” is as follows:

1: one who accepts and assists in spreading the doctrines of another: as a: one of the twelve in the inner circle of Christ’s followers according to the Gospel accounts b: a convinced adherent of a school or individual 2capitalized : a member of the Disciples of Christ founded in the United States in 1809 that holds the Bible alone to be the rule of faith and practice, usually baptizes by immersion, and has a congregational polity (source)

These two words have nothing in common. A disciple is someone who is a convinced pupil of another, while a vicar is someone who shares in the authority of a prelate. They are different concepts and I hardly see any similarity between the two.

But this is the type of fluff that becomes a convincing argument in DA’s mind. This is one example of the voluminous chaff through which a person responding to Mr. Armstrong must sort to get to the meat of the argument.

Words in English are precise, and are chosen to convey something specific. No convergence was ever meant or implied between the words “vicar” and “disciple.” Dave needs to head to the book store and get himself a copy of On Writing Well by William Zinsser and carefully read the chapters on Simplicity, Clutter, and Words before he constructs his next “paper.”

Elizabeth Schmitz left a comment on my blog that was a verbatim repost of her latest entry.  I decided to check out what she had to say, on the off chance that it might be interesting or informative. Her blog was plain, and no different than any other anti-Christian social issues blog I’ve ever seen. I dug a little bit on her blog and found this post, which bears commenting on.

Elizabeth says that this is one of her favorite passages in the Bible:

But Ruth said, “Do not urge me to leave you or to return from following you. For where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there will I be buried. May the LORD do so to me and more also if anything but death parts me from you.” (Ruth 1:16-17)

Her thought, shallow and unsophisticated though it is, on that verse is:

That is one woman speaking to another (Ruth to Naomi to be exact). The religious right tries as hard as it can to demonize the love between two individuals of the same sex, but this passage shows that it was alive and celebrated in the Bible, as I wish it only could be today.

First of all, no one demonizes love between the same sex, particularly if it is the same sort of love that Ruth is demonstrating to Naomi. There are a few things that Elizabeth is neither telling us nor considering into the context of this passage. There is also at least one underlying assumption she betrays that is false.

First, Elizabeth is skirting the issue of who these women are. Ruth is Naomi’s daughter-in-law. I really don’t see a romantic relationship developing between these two women. Naomi is older, too old to find a husband (1:12). Later in the story, Naomi helps Ruth find a husband, Boaz (Ruth 3). They marry and bear a son, Obed (Ruth 4) who is the grandfather of King David (verse 17).

The rest of the story shows that this statement made by Ruth is one of loyalty, not romantic love. Were these two lovers, would Naomi really have helped Ruth find a new husband? More importantly, would Naomi be as bitter as she was when she first returned home with Ruth (1:20-21) if the two were lovers?

The underlying assumption that Elizabeth betrays is that she thinks that all outward shows of love must be romantic love. Why can’t this be simple loyalty? Naomi was the family that Ruth was close to, so it make sense that she would cling to her mother-in-law after the death of her husband. Why return to her own family if they weren’t close? Choosing to stay with Naomi in this case isn’t a case of romantic love, but one of family loyalty.

So, who is Elizabeth Schmitz? Well, her About page is very mysterious. However, I have noticed the similarity in tone and opinion to someone I’ve taken on before. That is Eliza from DefCon. I think that Ms. Schmitz and Eliza are one in the same.

It seems as though our atheist friends possess a real tone of intellectual superiority.  They never try to talk to us creationists, they only ever talk down to us.  The latest example of snobbery is in the form of Mark Issak’s Counter-Creationism Handbook, which I picked up from the library this week.  I really haven’t read a detailed critique of creationism and intelligent design from the scientific viewpoint.  I’m definitely not reading one right now.

The snobbery, narcissism, and alleged scientific, academic, and intellectual superiority are all present in the author’s tone.  So far, he has taken great pains to attack creationism rather than to defend evolution and scientific naturalism.  Normally, I wouldn’t take that so personally, but he actually says in the introduction that that is what he sought to do by writing the book.

An example of the snobbery is evident in the very organization of the book.  Isaak numbers his chapters and subheadings based on the McBee Keysort System for Mechanically Sorting Folklore Data.  He says that this is appropriate since creationism is nothing more than folklore.  Yet, I thought that one of his goals was to write to creationists to show us the flaws in our arguments.  It seems doing something like this would offend many people, the same way Bill Nye offended people when he said that the Bible was false based only on the fact that the moon refracts light from the sun.

All said, the book has created (pardon the pun) a desire in me to read more about evolution and scientific naturalism.  Not because I believe in it, mind you, but because I read in the book itself that no Christian who speaks against evolution has ever studied it, and that fact is obvious by the arguments that are used against evolution.

So that makes me curious: What are we missing out on?  Is there something to evolution, or is it so much babble and double talk?   As in the Bill Nye example, stating the God created the two lights, the greater (the sun) and the lesser (the moon) in no way contradicts that the moon refracts light from the sun.  The text only says that God put them there.  The science merely shows us the mechanics of the light itself–on which the Bible is silent.

So, if God formed mankind special out of the soil–then that is true.  Perhaps, then, there are intermediate steps (shown by evolution) that are not discussed by the Bible since the Bible isn’t pretending to be a science textbook.  There is truth in it, certainly, and we can’t ignore the truth it contains.  But understanding the mechanics of the nature that God created isn’t sinful, and certainly brings Him glory.

This isn’t an endorsement of evolution.  This is a sincere believer wondering what the natural world can teach him about his Creator. 

This is the strangest TV wedding I have ever watched. I’ve seen it so many times, but it still makes me laugh every time. Joey really bungles the entire ceremony. But that’s just his character.

I posted this video because of a recent news item I read on people I call “Internet ministers.” I don’t know if that is the official name for these guys, but I’ll define the term now so that there is no confusion.  There are many organizations that offer ordination to anyone who applies for it.  No seminary education is necessary.  No training is necessary.  In fact, in many cases, you need not affirm even the basic doctrinal statements of the church (assuming that they even have one).  Like me, I figure that some people would see the sideline plot in season 7 of Friends where Joey is ordained online and then is able to perform Monica and Chandler’s wedding (and later, Phoebe and Mike’s wedding) and assume that it was only for TV.  Not the case at all.

In fact, this is a real thing that some people do.  Churches that exist only online offer ordination to anyone who applies (some ordinations are guaranteed,  while others stipulate some minimal and simple prerequisites).

Now, however, some of the weddings that have been performed by the so-called Internet ministers are being ruled as invalid by judges.  The officiator, according to the court, was not legally accredited as a person who solemnizes marriages.  That means the marriage isn’t valid, and thus the couple needs to go no further with divorce proceedings.  They aren’t married.

Had the show Friends continued, it would now be in its 13th season.  Monica and Chandler would be celebrating their sixth anniversary.  Almost time for that seven-year itch to kick in.  Maybe they introduce a love interest at Chandler’s office.  Then, Monica and Chandler find out that Joey’s ordination wasn’t legal, and thus, their marriage is not valid.

Time for the new love interest to swoop in.  Does she get Chandler?  Or does Monica win (again)?

What problems could this cause for Phoebe and Mike?  Remember that Mike never wanted to get married in the first place.  Maybe he’s unhappy and can walk away.  Time for David the scientist guy to reappear!

What if Joey had married Ross and Rachel?  I don’t think it would shake those two up a bit.  They’ve already been through enough together.  They would just get remarried after taking the news in stride.

It looks like we’ll never know the answers to these questions.  There isn’t a virtual seasons project for Friends on the web.

These are the kind of posts that happen when bloggers stay up late and get slap happy!  Don’t let this happen to you.  Go to bed at a reasonable hour.

Haven’t we seen signs like that? Jeff Haws has written an interesting commentary in response to this entry from Dan Goldfinch. The reasoning behind that sign underlies Jeff’s entry. Although Dan has already rebutted here, I wanted to take a moment to examine some of the errors that Jeff has committed, since his position is actually typical of Christianity’s detractors. Christians who are true to Scripture must take a stance against homosexuality. For this, we take much heat. We should expect that when we stand up for truth against a culture that hates it.

I understand that most Christians have interpreted certain passages in the Bible to say homosexuality is a sin and all that. I think it’s yet another example of cherry-picking which parts of the Bible to adhere to and which ones not to, but that’s really beside the point. What I don’t understand is why a Christian (no, wait, a “Christian” because Christians like to call the messenger into question when they don’t like the message, like when they say someone isn’t a “true” Christian because they did something bad) would not just say this person is wrong but that his statement is “beyond offensive.” (emphasis added)

First of all, this isn’t a matter of interpretation. As I thought I had made clear here, the passages that rail against homosexuality are abundantly clear. No honest Christian can say that these five passages say anything but “Homosexuality is a sin.” Let’s take a quick peek at those passages now, just for clarity:

Leviticus 18:22: “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.” This is from a book of priestly codes, so men would be the target audience of this command. This sounds pretty straightforward. Some gay theologians have argued that this refers to temple service only, based on its place in the book of Leviticus. But, in context, this verse is in a section that begins with the Lord telling Moses to explain these precepts to the people of Israel, not the Levites.

Leviticus 20:13, “If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.” This second passage actually provides a penalty for the action, and it clearly specifies men lying with other men. This is in the section that follows the infractions; it is in the penalty section.

The New Testament also has several passages that forbid homosexuality. The first (and most famous) is Romans 1:26-27:

For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.

Before, in the Old Testament, there was only be condemnation for men. Now there is condemnation for both men and women who commit the sin of homosexuality. Paul was all about removing the distinctions between gender and class, a subtlety that most people seem intent on ignoring in the apostle’s writings.

Finally:

Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. (1 Cor 6:9-10, emphasis added)

And:

Now we know that the law is good, if one uses it lawfully, understanding this, that the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who strike their fathers and mothers, for murderers, the sexually immoral, men who practice homosexuality, enslavers, liars, perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine, in accordance with the gospel of the glory of the blessed God with which I have been entrusted. (1 Tim 1:8-11, emphasis added)

The two “list” references have come under some attack by the gay Christian movement as there are two references to homosexuality in each list, though the ESV (which I quote here) combines the two references as a singular one.  Paul uses two words, malakos and aresenokoites, to mean “homosexual.”

Some people think that Paul was describing a practice for which we have no modern equivalent.  These same people, all of them part of the gay Christian movement, say that there is divided scholarship on aresenokoites, and that modern etymologists have no idea what that word means.  This is misleading at best, a lie at worst.  Scholarship is fairly unified on that word: they believe that it refers to the manly male participant in homosexual sex.

Some think Paul was inventing words.  I think that he was attempting to be as precise as possible.  Do the words “top” and “bottom” hold any significance to any gay readership?  It should.  Last I heard, this is what modern gay culture calls the “type” of partner.  Tops, the more common among gay males, are the “manly” partner.  They do the penetrating.  The bottom takes on the role of the “feminine” partner. They are penetrated.  Usually, a gay man only likes one or the other.

This connection becomes crystal clear when a person studies the words malakos and aresenokoites.  Malakos means “soft.”  Aresenokoites is a compound word; areseno- means “lift,” is a male verb, and implies an act of strength or aggression; -koites implies a marriage bed, synonymous with the act of consummation.  This means that malakos could refer to the “bottom” and aresenokoites could refer to the “top.”

So, first and foremost, the Bible is very straightforward as to the sinful nature of homosexuality.  But, some people still like to throw out the sign that I reproduced at the start of this post as so-called “evidence” that Jesus may have, in fact, condoned homosexuality.  After all, He never specifically said anything about it!

Well, He never explicitly called corporate embezzlement a sin, either.  No serious Christian would excuse Enron from responsibility on the basis that Jesus didn’t specifically say that what they did was a sin.  I think we can agree that it is.  Jesus affirmed so much of the other Scriptures, we can infer that He upheld homosexuality is a sin as well.

For example, Jesus told the Pharisees that marriage is between one man and one woman, and that marriage is indissoluble, in Matthew 19:1-12.  This affirms those famous words in the book of Genesis: “Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh” (2:24).  If Jesus agreed with that statement, if follows that He would agree that homosexuality is a sin.

Tomorrow, I’ll touch on more errors in Jeff’s post.  I’ll also specifically address the most often-repeated argument against the last statement: “Jesus accepted so many other sinners.  I’m sure He’d accept homosexuals, too.”  My answer will surprise you: I agree!  He would accept homosexuals. In fact, He calls them home to the Kingdom!

DA, as he is affectionately known to my fellow “anti-Catholic” apologists James Swan and James White, has now made two posts, here and here, in reference to this one post from me.

Two posts for the price of one?  Shucks, I don’t know what to say.  This post has quelled my fears about this little item, cited on Swan’s blog:

To the extent that I deal with anti-Catholics at all, I’ll stick to at least influential ones like James White. He affects a lot of people, and so, needs to be countered and refuted. But Swan is a lightweight in the anti-Catholic apologetic world. Let him write posts like this, then. I have better things to do than to waste my time reading them, let alone responding.

I was worried that DA wouldn’t respond to me anymore, even once I post my reply to the Vicar of Christ fiasco from the previous week.  Since, after all, if James Swan is a lightweight, then I must be sub-atomic-particle-weight.

But, I see that my mini-feud with Mr. Armstrong is still alive and well.  Perhaps it is because I’m keeping it more friendly and less drenched with sarcasm than Swan is?  Friendly theological debate is far more edifying and both parties stand to benefit from the interchange.  After all, I’ve learned about perichoresis from this debate and that has placed me in greater awe of God than I already was.  Concepts like perichoresis make me all that much more devoted to Him, solidify my trust in the gospel, and make me all the more willing to proclaim my faith to others.  Perichoresis shows how infinite God really is.

The fact that He is contained by nothing, but in fact contains everything, just leaves me in perfect wonder.  And I suppose I have Mr. Armstrong to thank for starting me on this journey, because if I had never happened upon the information in his blog, I would never have researched it to provide a proper response to his other musings.

I hope that I have, or will, benefit him in some small way as well.

Although this lawsuit is filed with a specific political agenda in mind, it is interesting for its theological considerations as well.

I thought that I’d take a moment to ruminate on the possibility of actually suing God and winning. The reason is that, by necessity, I have been studying the philosophical aspects of the Trinity in order to write a much more serious article in response to Dave Armstrong than this humorous and philosophically entertaining one. The primary concept that I’ve been looking into is perichoresis–the inherent coexistence of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and their indwelling within the elect. It is this indwelling that creates God’s omnipresence. This lawsuit states that, since God is omnipresent, He is therefore present in Douglas county (which is the venue of the suit).

That is very true. God created the universe, so He is not contained by it. In fact, the universe is contained within Him, and it is in Him that the universe takes its identity and in Him that the universe finds its being. He is the only reality, our reality is only at His will and pleasure. As a result, to borrow a simpler way of putting it from my brother-in-law Nate, “God is the only reality, and we are ‘less real’ by comparison.” Truly, we can only define ourselves in relation to Him.

This is God’s Sovereignty. The Bible makes it clear that we derive everything from Him (Gen 1:26): our identity, our dominion of land and animals, our likenesses. Everything was His first, and He gifted some of it to us. As I’ve often said, “We owe Him everything; He owes us nothing.”

So, if He is the perfection that we aspire to become but cannot attain, if He is the only way by which we can define ourselves and the Ultimate Cause of Everything, how are we able to properly obtain an injunction against that which is His divine work? More importantly, how could this injunction possibly be enforced?

We are gifted with a limited sovereignty over God’s creation–He gifted that to us. He defined the relationship we have to the rest of the earth, and we use His Ultimate Sovereignty as the model for the limited sovereignty He gave us. The point is that He is the One who defines these rules–in fact, our laws are only a model of the divine laws He gave us in His word, the Bible. We don’t just exist because of Him, the way we live is defined in relation to Him.

He shouldn’t be subject to our laws or even our ideals of Him. Doing so is trying to contain Him. But we don’t contain God, He contains us while penetrating and surrounding us–that is the essence of perichoresis (which, according to Wikipedia, is Greek for “envelope”). This model of creation is derived from the Trinity itself: each member of the Trinity surrounds, penetrates, and contains each other member. All are God, and God is all. But each has a unique ministry that the others are present and take active roles in as a consequence and extension of their identity as a Trinity. This is the same way creation is expressed: God is in and through all of it as a consequence of His identity as God, the creator, container, and sustainer of this all.

It is as beautiful as it is mysterious, and it gives me a greater sense of wonder as I worship God, my Creator (Father), my Savior (Son), and my Helper and Comforter (Holy Spirit).

Check out the new banner on the top of the site.  Let me know what you think.  Drop me a comment or an e-mail.

My wife really likes this one, but I might see about one more before I make a final decision on the banner.

Were I a full-time apologist, I would already have finished my reply to Dave Armstrong’s posts on the Vicar of Christ.  But, since I have very limited time on my hands, I haven’t yet even started.  My printer is broken, which means I’ve had to borrow my in-law’s printer to even print out the material.  And, Dave’s blog is a case study in how not to design a website, so printing the material I wanted became an exercise in finding it within the HTML code and snipping out what I didn’t want.  It cut the final printed document from 22 pages to 11 pages.

I should have the final reply ready within a few days, and edited by Friday at the latest.  Thank you all for your patience.

It seems to me that Roman Catholic apologists build around a certain motif that I like to call personality cult apologetics.  The most obvious example is this article from Jimmy Akin, which at the time of writing has 796 comments.  Most of these comments are just people writing one or two lines of agreement with Akin’s post and a few “atta-boy” comments from the usual cast of JA.O regulars.  For Jimmy’s sake, I hope that TypePad manages comments better than WordPress, because I couldn’t even begin to imagine trying to sort through 796 new comments with the way WordPress handles them.

All of the comments were centered around James White and the graphics he posted with a humorous intent.  The comments served to prove Dr. White’s point that charity is severely lacking from that bank of the Tiber, however we on this side are expected to maintain this charity at all costs.

This issue is near and dear to my own heart right now because I’m the target of Dave Armstrong’s personality cult for my comment that Dave is misrepresenting what the “Vicar of Christ” title implies for the Pope.  My favorite, from Jordan Potter:

On which bank of the Tiber will I remain? The one that represents truth and doesn’t have to resort to name-calling and dishonesty . . .

Wonderful news! See you at the next Easter Vigil!

I read that twice yesterday and I didn’t get it.  I just got it when I re-read it today.  That’s actually funny.  I am so slow on the uptake sometimes.

Now here is where I have to give Dave some credit.  I got targeted by a hit-and-run guy not so very long ago who didn’t bother to read everything I wrote on a particular topic and started to go on and on to convince me of a point that I not only accepted, but articulated in a previous post.  Dave has read this post, and his commenters are (rightfully) all over it:

And my record remains unbroken. I have never– and I don’t mean almost never or 99.999% never and one or two exceptions–heard a former Catholic correctly articulate Catholic teaching. (Scott W.)

Then:

Oh, he’s a former Catholic turned anti-Catholic fundamentalist? No wonder he doesn’t accurately represent the content of the Catholic faith. (Jordan Potter again)

But my personal favorite in this set:

I forgot that I used to worship Diana and Isis. Whew! What a long strange trip it’s been! Pretty soon we’ll have all of the rest of the trillions of female-deity-worhippers in our ranks and then, watch out! (Mike Burgess)

Now I have a sense of humor.  And I can also admit when I’m wrong, and most of all, I can admit why I was wrong.  The statement to which they refer is not something I’ve ever (or would ever) teach if I were lucky enough to become an apologetics instructor.  I don’t even believe that I made such a glaring error, but there it is in print, so I said it.  I will own up to it, and I admit that I was wrong in making that statement.

I am ashamed of the reason why I made the statement: It was targeted at a specific person, whom I now regard as a false teacher, to impress upon her that I was on the “right side.”  Her opinion of the right side and my opinion of the right side, I now realize, are very different.  Incompatible, actually.

The person to whom I am referring will undoubtedly recognize herself if she still reads my blog, however I am confident that she has already guessed what I’m revealing.  I am shying away from using names or providing links because a very dear friend of mine almost wholly subscribes to this woman’s teaching.  I have no desire to alienate him again, which is why I have never said anything about this.

I, still relatively new to apologetics, wrote that post specifically because this false teacher accused me of being one primarily in light of this post where I express interest in reading Pope Benedict XVI’s Jesus of Nazareth.  As this false teacher is very anti-Catholic, that post caused her great concern and so I wrote the very lame-brained post to calm her mind.

I stand behind the fact that there are saved people within the Catholic Church because of their faith in the sacrifice of the cross, not because of what the Church teaches.  In other words, they are saved in spite of what the Church teaches, not because of what the Church teaches.  The statement about Mary equating to goddess worship is not true, it never was, and I should never have expressed the sentiment.  It isn’t what I believe, and I have done the gospel a great disservice by voicing it.  And worse, I did it to advance a relationship with a false teacher.

I do not still communicate with her.  I spoke with her about my belief that salvation can occur within the Catholic Church, that regardless of whatever apostasy may be in it that God can and still does use it as a vehicle for salvation of His elect.  I pointed to my own grandparents as an example.  She expressed discontent with the notion that anyone could be saved within the Church, and that was the last time we spoke.

I’m fine with that.

But now that I’ve admitted to my mistake, I would like to return briefly to the idea of personality cult apologetics.  I seem to see much of it in the Roman Catholic apologetics circles.  It’s obvious with Jimmy Akin.  Less so, but still present, at Dave Armstrong’s blog.  I don’t think that Robert Sungenis has it anymore after putting out the book that argues that earth is the center of the solar system.  Gerry Matatics had to postpone his 300 city tour, so I don’t think that he has a personality cult.  I’m not so sure about Scott Hahn.

This personality cult apologetics takes the shape of the apologist making his claims on his blog, and then his commenters descend on the post and leave 40, 50, or 60 comments, most of which are just “atta-boy” comments or e-nods ™ of agreement.  This is unfortunately similar to what I see done on atheist discussion boards, such as the Rational Response Squad.  The mentality is certainly the same: the Rational Response Squad has won every debate they’ve ever been in.  Just ask them, and they’ll tell you it is so.  It’s the same thing with this crowd, except I haven’t seen anyone Catholics say “Ha, ha, you got pwned!” yet.

Maybe they’re waiting for the Pope to infallibly define a pronunciation for “pwned.”

Anyway, I digress.  I suppose that it is good that I don’t have a personality cult following me, or else I would have to start a campaign for better comment-handling in WordPress.  Because I assure you, if I ever wrote something that garnered 796 comments, I wouldn’t even be able to read half of them.

I suppose the bigger picture is, Do I want a personality cult?  Of course, I’ve always wanted to lead a cult.  It would be fun to be the unquestionable leader of a group of people.  I’d try to outdo King Solomon on wives and concubines.  Forget a tithe: I’d have people pay all of their life savings.

But now, I’m more than happy to let God be the center.  I’m periphery.  Soli Deo Gloria!