Category Archives: Bible Thoughts
Sins of Scripture V: Child Abuse
Even though the next section of his book is about child abuse, there is very little argument in the next section of The Sins of Scripture that actually has to do with child abuse. Instead, Spong focuses on what he calls the ultimate act of divine child abuse: the Atonement. Of the Atonement, Bishop John Shelby Spong says the following:
Let me state this boldly and succinctly: Jesus did not die for your sins or my sins. That proclamation is theological nonsense. It only breeds more violence as we seek to justify the negativity that religious people dump on others because we can no longer carry its load. We must rid ourselves of it. One can hardly refrain from exhorting parents not to spare the rod lest they spoil their child if the portrait of God at the heart of the Christian story is that of an angry parent who punishes the divined Son because he can take it and we cannot. (173)
In this, Spong stands apart from every great thinker of Christian past, as well as from Scripture itself. There is much evidence from Scripture that the Atonement is how God intended us to interpret Christ’s death. But Spong uses those very same reasons to deny the vicarious Atonement. The Jewish feast of the Atonement prefigured Christ’s death; Spong simply asserts that this feast is where the imagery of Christ’s death is drawn from. Not that the feast prefigured the sacrifice on Calvary, rather the followers of Christ found meaning in his death by the feast of the Atonement.
No divine inspiration played a part in this, says Spong. This was grieved followers searching for a meaning in a tragedy. This would also be a veiled denial of the Resurrection, since the death of Christ was only temporary according to both the Bible and Christian tradition.
The assertion that the feast of the Atonement doesn’t prefigure Christ’s death directly contradicts the main thesis of the letter to the Hebrews. Since, however, Spong denies that the Bible is the inspired Word of God, it is no surprise that he completely re-thinks entire portions of Christian theology, no matter how essential to salvation that portion may be. And one’s Christology is central to Christianity, as the Bible teaches:
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. (Jn 3:16-18)
Sins of Scripture IV: Homosexuality
Former Episcopal bishop John Shelby Spong (or is it bishop emeritus?) writes next about the treatment of gays in his book The Sins of Scripture. I agree that the church has treated gays and lesbians unfairly. But I disagree with Spong that homosexuality is no sin. Clearly condemned in multiple places, the sin of homosexuality has become some sort of “super-sin” to evangelicals.
The only “super-sin” is blaspheming the Holy Spirit.
Homosexuality, therefore, should be treated as any other sin. The sinner should be confronted about it, and walked through the Scriptures that condemn the practice. If he or she refuses to repent, I don’t think that ostracizing the poor chap is the answer–although a case could certainly be made for it. I think that prayer is the answer, like we would do for any other sin. Of course such a person would be excluded from church leadership, again, the same as with any sin.
Bishop Spong, however, believes that homosexuality is an inborn characteristic and as such is perfectly acceptable. What Spong fails to deal with, however, is that rage and alcoholism are also inborn characteristics. But no one would ever seriously argue that those two things are good, so why is homosexuality any different?
I also happen to believe that we are born with our sexual orientation. It fits perfectly with Jesus’ teaching to deny ourselves in order to follow him. Everyone has sin in their lives that they must deal with. The homosexual person has an orientation that is offensive to God, and he or she must deal with that sin just as the rest of us deal with ours. They shouldn’t get a free pass just because society is coming around to accept homosexuality for the first time in 10,000 years of human history.
Spong deals with three texts of the Bible that are used to condemn homosexuality: the holiness code of Leviticus, the story of Sodom, and Paul’s letters. Throughout his treatment, Spong uses emotionally loaded terms like “bigotry” and “homophobia” to describe people that hold to the Bible’s clear teaching that homosexuality is a sin. He often states that Bible-defenders get angry or upset when confronted with arguments in favor of homosexuality. What he never does is present an argument, or even a concise summary of his opponents’ views.
Sins of Scripture III: Women
In his book The Sins of Scripture, John Shelby Spong echoes almost every sentiment of detractors of Christianity in his own beliefs, and gives them credence by declaring himself to be a committed Christian. He believes that Mary Magdalene was Jesus’ wife according to Scripture, and that her place at Jesus’ side is his model for the new place that women should occupy in church leadership. I believe that women have been mistreated not by a literal reading of Scripture (as Spong believes), but by a misreading of Scripture.
Women share with men the distinction of being made in the image of God (according to Gen 1:27), despite Spong’s claim that the Bible subordinates women to men. This was never the original intent. That came after the Fall, which distorts the original intent of God’s creation. Women are now functionally subordinate to men, but they are still made of the same stuff and therefore ontologically equal to men.
Women were not the source of sin, as Spong proclaims. The Bible teaches that it was man who was that source: “Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned” (Rom 5:12, emphasis added). It was no sin for Eve to eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, it was only a sin when Adam ate the fruit, since God gave the command not to Eve but to Adam.
I am not going to dispute Spong that there is a history of sexism in the church, nor am I going to dispute him that some of the Mosaic laws make no sense in regard to women. But we are not bound to the law anymore; we are free in Christ. Spong hits on the one verse that is very important for this discussion–Galatians 3:28. This verse means that the arguments over gender and sex roles are worthless, for we are all one in Christ Jesus.
It isn’t necessary to cast Scripture aside in order to arrive at these conclusions; instead one only has to read the Scriptures for what they say. Spong isn’t doing that. But one wonders why Spong attempts to recast Scripture at all since he is on record as believing that it is not the Word of God.
The Sins of Scripture II: Ecotheology
John Shelby Spong’s first sin of Scripture is the environmental havoc that we have wrecked on this planet. I agree with him here that it is a tragedy how we have treated our fragile environment, and share with him a desire to see humans correct this awful behavior. What I don’t share with Spong is a conviction that the Bible as it stands encourages this sort of behavior, nor do I believe that an entirely new concept of God is necessary to effect this change.
Spong believes that the Bible’s command to be fruitful and multiply is at the heart of the overpopulation. I think not. I think that the heart of the problem is irresponsible sexual behavior, a thing which Spong shows no desire to curb in human beings. Instead, he’d rather throw birth control at the problem.
Now don’t get me wrong. Birth control is a part of the solution in my point of view. But only when combined with solid morality. That means that sex is reserved for marriage. Spong seems to join critics of Christianity in believing that the only solution to this problem is to surrender to our urges because of better available birth control technology.
Spong wrongly believes that a solution to the pollution problem lies in reinventing God. As commenter Bradford pointed out:
To him [Spong] the bible is sexist and homophobic, and we should not judge sin or reprove the sinner; no, we shouldn’t judge at all just love and tolerate and never say sin is wrong especially if it disagrees with anything a woman wants to do with her body or any alternative lifestyle one wants to live.
Spong has already created an idol for himself; a deity who doesn’t judge anyone and for whom sin is not a problem. Reinventing God is Spong’s solution for every problem. So what sort of deity does Spong conceive of? The answer is a nature deity, or rather, Nature Itself. Spong would worship Nature Itself as a deity rather than a deity outside of nature. In Spong’s mind, a deity outside of nature–in whose image we are made–creates the impression that we are somehow above or around nature. That we owe the environment no allegiance since we are above it.
This is a wholly false picture of Christianity. True, we are created in teh image of God, and therefore outside of nature. But God owns everything; ultimately we are just stewards. Therefore, in that frame of mind, we should be responsible stewards and turn the planet over to him in the same condition that he gave it to us.
It isn’t necessary to invent an entirely new concept of God that denigrates him to become part of his own creation. He transcends creation according to his Word, and we should revere him that way. It is only necessary to properly frame our understanding of God’s relationship to man–that we are stewards over his creation, and that he is coming back and expects to find it in the same condition it was left in.
With Spong’s weak and judgment-impaired deity, it is no wonder that he needs to create a new concept of God to give us incentive to control the environment. They say that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of both knowledge and wisdom (Ps 111:10; Prv 1:7). Since no one can fear Spong’s “god,” it is no wonder that Spong has neither knowledge nor wisdom.
The Sins of Scripture
It wasn’t long ago that I tossed aside my copy of Why Christianity Must Change or Die after reading only to chapter three, never to pick it up again. Author and former Episcopal bishop John Shelby Spong remains a person of interest to me, if only to answer the question, “Why does he still call himself Christian?” Spong denies all of the essential truths of the Christian faith, yet calls himself a passionate believer.
I’ve started to read another Spong book, The Sins of Scripture, figuring (incorrectly) that I would agree with Spong on a few points. I’m curious to see how he presents the Bible, because the inside flap promises a new way to read Scripture. It is this curiosity that will keep me reading to the end, even though I already have the desire to throw the book into the fire where it belongs.
In chapter two, a chapter that would make any atheist proud of Spong, the former bishop dissects a claim that cannot continue to stand: the claim that the Bible is the inspired word of God. He says:
My religious critics say to me that there can be no Christianity apart from the authority of the scriptures. They hear my attack on this way of viewing the Bible as an attack on Christianity itself. I want to say in response that the claim that the scriptures are either divinely inspired or are the ‘Word of God’ in any literal sense has been so destructive that I no longer want to be part of that kind of Christianity! I do not understand how anyone can saddle God with the assumptions that are made by the biblical authors, warped as they are both by their lack of knowledge and by the tribal and sexist prejudices of that ancient time. Do we honor God when we assume that the primitive consciousness found on the pages of scripture, even when it is attributed to God, is somehow righteous? (18)
He goes on to ask a few questions between pages 18 and 19 that I thought I’d address, as they are seriously misguided. I wonder how someone like Spong can study the Bible so much and yet learn so little about it, or the claims of the religion that he claims to hold dear.
The questions, along with my answers:
- Do we really want to worship a God who plays favorites, who chooses one people to be God’s people to the neglect of all others?
- When we portray the God of the Bible as hating everyone that the chosen people hate, is God well served?
It is true that God preserves for himself a people out of each generation, and he lovingly predestines those people to conform to Christ’s image (Eph 1:4-5, 11; Rom 8:29-30). It is further true that God chose the Israelites first, and that he hated others.
But this fundamentally misunderstands the Biblical definition of “hated.” In the sense the word was used, it described only people that God did not have a covenental relationship with. It revealed nothing of his disposition toward such people.
The rest of the Bible is pretty clear that God loves all people; cf. Jn 3:16; Acts 10; Gal 3:28, 5:6.
- Will our modern consciousness allow us to view with favor a God who could manipulate the weather in order to send the great flood that drowned all human lives save for Noah’s family because human life had become so evil God needed to destroy it? Can we imagine human parents relating to their wayward offspring in this manner?
This question betrays Spong’s concept of sin. Spong obviously doesn’t view sin with the same seriousness that God views sin. Sin isn’t just a sickness. Sin means death for the human race. The Bible teaches that the wages of sin is death (Rom 6:23).
The verses preceding the Flood story paint mankind as corrupt and vile. “The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen 6:5). In light of this, I don’t see how any serious student of Scripture can see the Flood as anything short of a deserved punishment that man brought upon himself.
- Can we really worship the God found in the Bible who sent the angel of death across the land of Egypt to murder the firstborn males in every Egyptian household in order to facilitate the release of the chosen people?
- Can the Bible still be of God when it portrays Joshua as stopping the sun in the sky for the sole purpose of allowing him the time to slaughter more of his enemies, the Amorites (Josh 10:12-15)?
- Can the Bible be the “Word of God” when it has Samuel order King Saul in the name of God to “Go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have; do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass” (1 Sam 15:3)?
The God that Spong is describing has no absolute right to judge his people as guilty of sin, and therefore no absolute right to pass judgment on his people.
- Is it the “Word of God” when the Psalmist writes about the Babylonians who have conquered Judah: “Happy shall he be who requites you with what you have done to us! Happy shall he be who takes your little ones and dashes them against the rocks” (Ps 137:8-9)?
All I have to say to this question is: Just because it is in the Bible, doesn’t automatically mean that it is condoned by God. The Psalms express the full range of human emotions, from happiness to despair, from joy to sadness. But that’s just what they describe-human emotion. This isn’t divine righteousness like the passages described above; this is a very human emotion. Anyone should be able to see the distinction.
In all, I think Spong paints God as a lightweight. One who doesn’t sit in judgment over sin, but instead tolerates and accepts it as human behavior. This isn’t the God that I worship.
The Nature of Sin
I’ve been reading on the nature of sin in John Stott’s Basic Christianity, and it has set me thinking. Then I read this post by a good friend, and I knew that I must post something on the nature of sin.
Sin is fun. Let’s face it: sin is more fun than the Christian lifestyle. But the pleasure sin brings is only for a season; and then the consequences set in. Yes, there are consequences for every sin, some more severe than others. No matter how much fun sin might be, it never outweighs the consequences.
At its heart, sin is loving self more than loving God. A healthy life is lived to please God, a selfish life is lived to please yourself. Only others-centered people are able to please God. The greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven are the servants, after all.
Despite what atheists think, good works are a central tenant of Christianity. The love of God will manifest in the life of the believer, and it will do so as the fruits of the Spirit, and inevitable good works will follow.
Which brings me to an interesting point. Why do some people draw close to God, while others don’t? It is a simple matter of lifestyle choices. The closer that one draws to God, the more aware of sin one is. This can become extremely uncomfortable for the sinner who loves his sin more than he loves God. As the sinner exposes his sin to himself, he becomes squeamish, realizing that in order to continue the journey closer to God, he must rid his life of this sin that he loves so much. Either he must continue down this road, shedding the sin, stall where he is and keep the sin, or turn tail and run the other direction, away from God.
The third option is what the atheist does. He invents 1000 intellectual objections to God, while the real reason he rejects God is that he couldn’t stand to see himself from God’s point of view. He couldn’t part with his sin.
Why are some able to draw near to God? Because they love God more than they love their sin. Those that can’t draw near to God love their sin more than they love God. These people want to live life their way instead of God’s way, assuming (pridefully) that their way is better.
Make no mistake: living in sin is much more fun than the Christian lifestyle. However, the long term consequences spell disaster for your life. It will lead to an early grave, for the wages of sin is death. Scientific studies prove that religious people have less stress, less depression, and more self-discipline than the nonreligious. Maybe this God guy knows what’s best for us after all!
Chapter Two of Velvet Elvis
I’m reading Velvet Elivs: Repainting the Christian Faith by Rob Bell, one of the leaders of the Emergent Church. Bell brings up several problems with sola scriptura in the second chapter of the book, titled “Yoke.”
At first, I wondered why he chose such an unusal name. As I figured, it’s named after Matthew 11:30 where Jesus tells his disciples that his yoke is easy and his burden light. But there’s a deeper meaning to the name. The Bible, Bell argues, is a very difficult book to grasp. When you’re wrestling with it, you bring your own experiences and interpretations to it. No one reads the Bible for what it says, Bell insists, all you’re doing is giving your interpretation of the words. It was no different in ancient times.
Every rabbi had his own interpretation of the Bible. This was called his “yoke.” Every once in a while, a rabbi would come on the scene with a brand new yoke. Before anyone would take the new yoke seriously, the rabbi would have to have hands laid upon him by two established rabbis. That, Bell argues, is the significance of the passage where Jesus has both John the Baptist baptize him, and the voice from Heaven declares that he is the Son of God.
That, Bell says, would be recognized as the two established rabbis laying their hands on Jesus, and that Jesus’ new yoke was legitimate. The problem inherent in this Bell’s interpretation of the facts is that this seems to relegate Jesus to the role of teacher or role model. It doesn’t declare that Jesus’ “yoke” is the yoke; instead, this description allows for it to be one yoke among many.
What are Doctrinal Divisions Really About?
Doctrinal divisions that permeate the church so profusely, at their core, aren’t about what Scripture says. Only the King James Version Onlyists dispute what Scripture says. We’ve taken them, and the famous NIV Quiz, on before. The divisions are over what Scripture means.
Case in point is the recent informal blog debate between Matthew Bellisario and the pseudonymous “TurretinFan.” The crux of the debate is whose interpretation of Romans 14 is correct–Mr. Bellisario, or TF. Mr. Bellisario insists, and correctly I believe, that Romans 14 is aimed at the Judaizers of Paul’s day who would impose the Law on Christians. Further, such a passage doesn’t remove from the Church the authority to impose new holy days and bind Christians to obeying them.
I agree with Mr. Bellisario’s assessment of the passage. I agree that it is aimed at the Judaizers of Paul’s day and I agree that it doesn’t preclude the Church from imposing holy days upon Christians.
However, the imposition of new holy days goes against the spirit of the passage, and indeed the spirit of the Gospel. Jesus died and rose again to free us from the legalism of the Jewish Law. This is TF’s primary point. However, Mr. Bellisario doesn’t see the Catholic Church as imposing a new legalism on Christians. This is why the two are talking past each other–Mr. Bellisario is unable to empathize with TF’s position. Mr. Bellisario sees the Catholic Church as the sole infallible authority for determining Christian morality and living, rather than giving Scripture that place.
So, what is my opinion of Romans 14? I believe that it applies to all holy days, new or old. As TF points out, Scripture is like a fine gem with many facets. It is important to look at all opinions, past and present, to get a feel for something that you might miss. I also agree with Mr. Bellisario that Romans 14 doesn’t preclude the addition of new holy days, however there is no authority anywhere in Scripture that confers the power to bind Christians under threat of mortal sin to observe these new holy days.
Does that mean that we are free of the Sabbath day? By no means. As TF reminds us, the Sabbath goes back to creation and is therefore binding on all people. The obligation to reserve a day of worship for God alone was not erased by the cross, since it predates the Law. The Cross is the end of the Law.
While I agree that new holy days aren’t out of the realm of the church’s authority, binding them on all Christians under penalty of mortal sin is out of the reach of the church.
I highly reccommend reading the informal debate. The links above are to the start posts of the debate.
What Do Christians Have to Live For?
A while back, Vjack of Atheist Revolution asked, “What do Christians have to live for?” He then proposed three ideas. First, he posits that we live for God. This is an excellent suggestion, though Vjack has no idea how it would be accomplished. Second, he thought that we might live for either the Rapture or the afterlife. This offers no incentive to take care of the planet since we are only on it for a short time. Third, he asks what incentive that there is for a Christian to be moral if all of his sins are paid for by Christ. Let’s address all three points.
First, how would a Christian go about living for God? One of the cries of the Reformation was soli Deo gloria, for God’s glory alone. The apostle Paul offers this as a suggestion in Romans–“Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.” Living for God is simple: place God first in everything that you think, do, and say. Everything that you do should be an act of worship.
The second suggestion, living for the Rapture or the afterlife, is a terrible idea. Vjack nails the problem inherent in it; namely, that there is no incentive for taking care of this planet, since the Christian isn’t going to be around long enough for it to matter. But that overlooks that we are stewards of this planet and have been charged by God in Genesis to take care of the planet (Gen 1:28-30).
Finally, Vjack wonders why Christians don’t rape and murder at will because all of their sins are paid for by Christ. The apostle Paul anticipated this sort of mentality when he wrote to the Romans. After building his case for salvation by grace without works of law, he asks if we should go on sinning so that grace may abound all the more. He answers with a resounding NO! Then asks, “How can we who died to sin still live in it?” (Rom 6:2) If we are in Christ, we are dead to sin and alive to God (Rom 6:11). We are a new creation (2 Cor 5:17). People who are alive to God demonstrate the fruits of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control by the power of the Holy Spirit (Gal 5:22-23). Therefore:
Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions. Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace. (Rom 6:12-14)
Jewish Approach to God
I’ve been reading Rabbi Neil Gillman’s interesting book, The Jewish Approach to God. My initial impression was that Jews and Christians approached God in much the same way. Jews believe that God is echad, which is a Hebrew word meaning “one” or “unique.” God is, as his name suggests (YHWH, Hebrew for “I AM”), uniquely one. This is definitely similar to the Christian view of God as eternally self-existent.
Here the similarity ends. First, Jews don’t view God as sovereign over the natural world, nor over human free will. Where the Christian view is that God is always in control, even over our free will decisions, the Jewish view is closer to open theism in God having no control or even knowledge of our free will decisions.
This has stunning implications for understanding early Christian philosophy and theology. Were the early Christians open theists? This throws conditional election out the window, since God can’t know the free will decisions of his creatures ahead of time that means that he can’t know who would choose Christ. That means Arminianism is wrong; but stripping God of his sovereignty over human free will decisions means that Calvinism is out as well. That leaves either open theism or Molinism as the two main alternatives.
Second, the Jews don’t view God as omnipotent. They view him as self-limiting. They believe that he has limited himself by not affecting human free will, that he is limited by his “public image,” and that he is bound to his covenants and promises of the past. This is consistent with open theism.
So, what to make of all of this? If I am to stay true to early Christian philosophy, it means that I must renounce Reformed theology and look more seriously at Molinism or open theism. It also means that I may have to finally admit that Beowulf2k8 is right–original sin simply doesn’t exist.
Am I ready to admit that I am wrong about Reformed theology? Well, I have been slowly swayed toward the dark side of Arminianism for some time now, since all of my friends and family are proud Arminians, and my church actually preaches against Calvinism. Let’s just say that, for now, I’m ready to admit the possibility exists that I’ve been dead wrong this whole time, and that much more serious study is required to find out what God has revealed about himself.
In the coming posts, I will attempt to find out just what it is that I believe in a systematic theology. I will attempt to run out the implications of open theism and Molinism in early Christian philosophy and try to arrive at a systematic theology that is true to the original intent of the New Testament writers.
I want debate and interaction with my Reformed readers as well as my Arminian/open theist readers. E-mail me, challenge me, and debate me. I want to learn what God wants me to learn, and I can’t do that without friendly discourse from the people of God.
Back Rome Again 