A QUICK WORD ON THE DANGERS OF MEN LIKE HENRY BLACKABY.

If you haven't read my last post, Part VII in the series AMERICAN EVANGELICALISM IS A MENTAL GHETTO, I' really like you to, please. It's hard reading, but more important than just about anything I've ever said. I wrote about what I believe is the most insidious and successful attack on sola scriptura in MEism. The attack is the emphasis on "feeling" the truth, instead of knowing the truth. MEs substitute their feelings by "listening" to emotions during personal devotions and group worship and judge one another based on how they make each other feel while interacting.

A man who did much to popularize this sin is Henry Blackaby. His starting point, as I pointed out in that post, is that the ancient Hebrews didn't consider they knew anything unless they had an intimate, personal experience with it. I pointed out this is a lie and we can know so easily by just a quick reflection. That is to say, the Hebrews, like anyone else, had to have lots and lots of things they knew, not by intimate, personal experience, but simply by being told verbally. For instance, if a shepherd asked a merchant the price of a tent, the merchant simply answered with the number of shekels, homers of wheat or what not. He wasn't likely to ask the shepherd to roll around in the folds of the tent and surmise the price by feeling the qualities of the tent.

I want to give one observation about this whole situation and then ask three questions.

The observation:

The problem isn't Blackaby. Anybody could be Blackaby and anyone could have written a book that promoted feelings as the primary way of coming to an intimate knowledge of God. The condition that made it possible for this man to make millions of dollars hoodwinking the church is the MENTAL GHETTO conditions in the pew. How is it that so many Evangelicals could listen to someone in a Sunday School class say that the Jews didn't know anything simply by reading it without being at least disturbed enough to raise a hand in class and ask some pointed questions? We have been trained to receive uncritically. Criticism and questioning is judgmental and bad (unless, of course, you're questioning and criticizing the one asking the critical questions--then, JUST LIKE MAGIC--it's okay). The attitude that we're in a ghetto, receiving from on high and questioning is bad allows nonsense like Blackaby's to be said regardless of the fact that there's no biblical evidence for it. Indeed, in Blackaby's case, there are boat loads of evidence against it. Common sense ought to have taken over when folks read or were told in Sunday School class that they couldn't know anything until they had a mystical experience. The teacher should have been laughed out the door. Indeed, he would have been if the class had to do with stock investing, chemistry, or calculus. Only in matters of the spiritual are we supposed to become mental slugs, feeling our way alone the sidewalk of life until we find something that makes our antennae wiggle just so, hoping we don't get stepped by the boot of truth.

The questions:

1. If the ancient Hebrews didn't think knowledge could be had simply by cognitive study, why did Moses and others write the Bible or pass on God's words to others, spoken or written? (In fact, why speak or write at all, since the deconstructionists are right?)

2. If real knowledge is possible only by direct personal experience, why did Blackaby write a book to read and study?

3. If, as Blackaby pretends, his teaching is biblical, then he came to this knowledge of God by studying the words of Scripture. Isn't this trying to have it both ways?

Just asking,
Phil Perkins.

AMERICAN EVANGELICALISM IS A MENTAL GHETTO--Part VII The Sin of Subjectivism

SPEAK, GOD! SPEAK! Sinning the sin of subjectivism.
I want to announce to the world that I've been having some queasy spells, intermixed with giddiness and even a little euphoria. So if God hasn't been speaking to me, He's at least mumbling a little. Anyway, just last weekend I felt something running up my leg and whatcha know! Just like Jesus gave the disciples the Lord's prayer, He gave me the Pastor's Prayer. It's to be prayed on Saturday night. Here it is:

Speak, God, speak. No, don't roll over. Speak. I have a sermon to give tomorrow and, well...I need to spice it up, so I need You to say something profound or at least funny. Come to think of it...funny actually works better. All I've got is the passage I said I'd preach about last Sunday and, well...it's all doctrinal. Why in Your Name did You have to put so much doctrine in the Bible? Don't You know how hard that makes my job? I need funny and I need it now.--The Pastor's Prayer.

Oh, yeah--um--ingeezusnaymuhmen. Huh--almost forgot.

If someone actually acted like that, it'd be fairly blasphemous. Lots of MEs do act like that.

There was a time when, unless you were in a seriously pentecostal church, never would you hear any preacher say "And God told me...yadda yadda yadda..." The reason's simple. The Hebrew Scripture makes it clear that anyone who claims to have heard from God who hadn't actually heard was very evil. He was to be killed at the hands of the first folks who heard him say such things with stones. The entire nation was to witness the execution. God sees this sin as so heinous that the OC (Old Covenant) called for death and the NC calls for expulsion and shunning. We aren't even to eat with someone like Pat Robertson.

Now, however, not only do preachers claim this sort of thing all the time, but folks in Sunday School classes and Bible studies stake their little plot of turf in God's revealed truth all the time and no one even challenges them. The goal of this post is to get you to tell anyone who sins this heinous sin ever again in your presence that they are no Christians at all and they are to leave your church, Bible study, or small group because they will infect the rest of us with a filthy slime that isn't welcome here--ever. They sin the sin of subjectivism.

WHEN GOD SPEAKS, HE DOESN'T MUMBLE.
Among the many sins of my generation in the ME movement, it's hard to pick the worst, but this has to be close to the top of the list: Devotions. It is one side of the quadripartite sin of subjective practices made popular by my generation--subjectivity in personal worship, subjectivity in group worship, subjectivity in personal relationships and subjectivity in determining truth (actually a devaluation of truth--as in "doctrine isn't important"). Devotions as practiced today isn't a biblical practice and I doubt that it ever was. Even if "devotions" was practiced as the biblical habit of studying and memorizing the Scripture, the name "devotions" is a name that seems to indicate something else. It seems to deal with the emotional, not the intellectual. It's like the term "inspirational". "Inspirational" side steps truth for the emotional. "Devotions" doesn't deal with truth. Just as one can be inspired by anything true or false, one can be devoted to anything, whether true or false.

True doesn't care if you're inspired or devoted. True's true whether you have a shimmy up your leg or not.

Stop having devotions. Crack the Book and start learning.

WHAT IF GOD SPEAKS TO ME?
Get over it.

What is often called a "word from God" isn't. Unfortunately, today's MEs believe that God's word comes to us in feelings we get at special times, like devotions or group worship. This idea isn't an ancient idea from the Bible, but a recent idea from men who failed to obey Scripture as final. The man who popularized this sin most recently was Henry Blackaby in his famous book, Experiencing God: How to Live the Full Adventure of Knowing and Doing the Will of God. This idea wasn't all new with Blackaby, but he did a lot to popularize it among MEs in the 1990s.

A BIT OF HISTORY CONCERNING SUBJECTIVISM.
I wrote earlier that the practice of claiming that a feeling contains a "word from God" is new and not biblical. That was only half the story. This sort of thing is dealt with severely in the Old Testament. Deuteronomy 18:20 says, "But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in My name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die." Notice four things about this passage.

1. The first act is to presume. The Hebrew zud means to act presumptiously, rebelliously, or proudly. If one of us is to speak a word that God hasn't given we first must decide that it's okay to act in proud rebellion against God--take the authority of a prophet just because we want it. So, while you may think you're innocent reporting to the folks at your Bible study that God said something to you with a feeling you got last Wednesday at the park, perhpas you may wish to slow down a little and think.

2. The message is always verbal. Let's be precise. "Verbal" in the English doesn't mean spoken. It means having to do with words. Verbal communication is communication in language, spoken or written. "Oral" means having to do with the mouth. Hence, an "oral" exam is one taken face to face with an instructor who asks questions and expects spoken answers and "oral" surgery happens at the dentist's office. The false prophet presumes to speak a word he hasn't received. Both "speak" and "word" are from the same root. Dabar means a message or individual word and the verb form means to speak. God isn't in the business of communicating with feelings. Never in Hebrew Scripture, to my knowledge, do either of these have to do with anything other than communication in words. I read the Hebrew Bible in the Hebrew once a year. Dabar may mean a matter or thing. But when it means a message, that message is in words, not feelings.

So was Moses really taking on subjectivity here? Not entirely, but it's included. Let's look at some background. During the rebellion of Miriam and Aaron, this pair challenged Moses. The complaint was that Moses had married a Cushite, but God didn't address that. Instead, He addressed their desire to be as important as Moses. Moses was the law-giver. Evidently, they wanted to speak for God, too, with a law of their own about the Cushite lady, though God had said nothing about the situation. They presumed. In Numbers 12:6, God tells all three of them how to know if you're a prophet and speak for Yahweh. He said, "Hear now My words: If there is a prophet among you, I, the LORD, make Myself known to him in a vision; I speak to him in a dream."

Visions and dreams are times when God is actually seen and/or heard. Notice, too, "Hear now My words..." WORDS. Not feelings. And notice "I speak to him in dreams." If God doesn't speak to you in actual words, you're not a prophet.

If you have a tingle down your spine, tell your chiropractor.

3. Those who spoke for Yahweh without specific, verbal communication from Yahweh, were to die just like other false prophets who spoke for completely different gods. Notice the two kinds of false prophets--the one who spoke presumptuously for God and the one who spoke for other gods. No difference. If you speak for God based on a feeling, you're no better than a Buddhist priest, a Scientologist, a JW, a shaman, or the oracle at Delphi. You're a false prophet.

Think THAT over. And while you're thinking about that, think about this: If we shunned all who did this sort of thing, how many ME books would be on the market? How many ME televangelfrauds would still be on the air? How many ME book stores would be in business? How many pastors would still have a job?

4. Notice the word "commanded". The prophet is to speak only the word Yahweh has commanded. A feeling isn't a command. A command is verbal. With a man's life on the line, one would think that man would be certain before he spoke. How can you be sure of a feeling? Wouldn't that man wait for a clear command? Today, one says God said this. Another that. Is God really contradicting Himself or is someone pretending to be sure of something no more solid than a feeling?

Despite the clear teaching of Scripture, seeking something that can be called a "word from God" has a recent history, too. Friederich Daniel Ernst Schleiermacher (1768-1834) was the grandson of two pastors and lived at a time when philosophical rationalism, resulting from the Enlightenment, was dominant. In reaction, he turned to a group who emphasized the mysterious, imaginary, and subjective. Schleiermacher attempted to find a middle path between the philosophical rationalists and the Reformers, who based their doctrine on Scripture alone. Naturalistic philosophers wanted to reach a knowledge of God by way of nature and human reason applied to nature. They called this natural theology. Schleiermacher's "positive theology" was an attempt to ride the fence. As in our time, critics of the gospel disliked the miraculous. So Schleiermacher decided that the Bible wasn't an account of actual acts by God in history complete with miracles and resurrections, but a record of internal religious experiences. The experiences were important. Facts about actual historical events were unimportant. Thus, Schleiermacher could keep the Bible, flawed as it was in his opinion, and avoid the harsh criticism of those who would call believers intellectual obscurantists. The essence of true religion was in the religious experience, not the facts of the Scripture. It was emotive, not cognitive. Subjective, not objective. (1)

Clever huh? Haver you ever heard someone say that Christianity is a matter of faith, not evidence and reason? Sound familiar? This is why in the 1800's and 1900's we see words like "inspirational" replace words like "true".


The next really big name among those who normalized the sin of subjectivity is Karl Barth (1886-1968). Barth was learned in the tradition of classical religious liberalism in which the Bible was regarded as a collection of religious writings to be criticized, not believed. Barth wasn't satisfied with liberalism. Liberals talked little of God and much of man. He had a breakthrough when reading Romans which dealt harshly with man as a sinner.

Yet, Barth couldn't make himself believe Scripture. Barth's god was a transcendent god who was "Wholly Other". The problem came, though, in Barth's rejection of the reliability of Scripture. His god was so high He could have nothing to do with anything on earth, not even the words of Scripture. Thus, the word of Barth's god came down to man as a revelation that this god gave as a personal experience a human had while reading the Bible under the influence of the "Holy Spirit". Sound familiar? (2) Barth's ideas initiated the school of thought called "dialectical theology" or "neo-orthodoxy". (3) Eventually, Barth fell into an actual apathy toward factual reality, whether physical reality in the present or historical reality. The mysterious revelation of his god was all that really mattered. Both his god and his experience were personal and untestable. (4)

Of almost no intellectual significance is Henry Blackaby and his book, Experiencing God: How to Live the Full Adventure of Knowing and Doing the Will of God. However, this book made the rounds of ME churches with the same sort of dependence on the subjective that Schleiermacher and Barth advocated, but in popular, not scholastic, form. So for that reason Blackaby is important. Churches, schools, and denominations who would never have been guilty of teaching the subjectivism of Barth or Schleiermacher embraced the Evangelical language and style of Blackaby. He was a Southern Baptist preacher, so most couldn't imagine that he was liberal. But he was heretical.
Most Southern Baptists are cessationists. In other words, they don't believe the "sign gifts" are for today. These "sign gifts" include tongues, healing, and prophecy. This is why it's so amazing that Blackaby's teaching was accepted. It was a true watershed moment when non-Pentecostal Evangelicals adopted the belief that God was still speaking today outside of the verbal revelation in the Scripture. Whether MEism had fallen so low that sola scriptura was passe and the teaching of a heretic like Blackaby was welcome, or whether the teaching of Blackaby provided the push to send MEism down the stairs isn't important. Just realize the idea that our feelings are a major source of revelation from God is recent, not biblical.

Experiencing God sold 4 million copies and was translated into 45 languages. (5) And if you think only I and other Blackaby critics see Blackaby as a mystic, read this gushing article by a fan. The first paragraph calls him a mystic in disguise--an accurate assessment.

Blackaby's main influence was to convince many that God was revealing His will to folks right now in the same way He spoke to the Old Testament prophets. (6) However, what Blackaby taught as God's method of speaking wasn't what the Old Testament describes. It's mystical; it's internal; it's non-verbal. So, Blackaby's disciples don't have a clue about how God spoke to the prophets. Just why it's assumed that God spoke through the mystical isn't explained. It's just an assumption.

And a bad one.

Remember the passages we looked at? Well, here's the common pattern found in the books of Moses: "And God spoke to Moses, saying..." He spoke, saying. No mention of feelings. God didn't say, "And God gave Moses a back rub, making Moses feel this way or that..." or "God sent a warm, wet, goose-bumpy tingle up Moses' right arm and down his left..." Please check to make sure I'm not lying. Pick any page in Exodus, Numbers, Leviticus, or Deuteronomy. That is always the pattern and it happens once or twice every chapter or two. "...spoke...saying..." What could be more clear?

How did we decide that a feeling was "speaking"? We didn't get that from the Bible. Do we ever speak like that when involved in any other subject? Do we feel the truth about history, biology, or math? NO! So why do we shelve our brains for knowing God? Is it any sillier to do that for chemistry than for studying God's revelation?

While many MEs see the feel-talking god as a spiritual enhancement, it's not. That idea and Blackaby's teaching made a frontal assault on Scripture. Read what he said in the first few paragraphs of his book:

...for a Hebrew person--like Jesus--knowing something entailed experiencing it. In fact, you could not truly say you knew something unless you personally experienced it...So it is significant that, when Jesus spoke about knowing God, He was speaking like a Hebrew. (7)

There is only one problem with this reasoning. It's a lie. Hebrews weren't genetically different. They were perfectly capable of knowing intellectually, just like you and I. They had scribes, didn't they? They communicated with words, didn't they? The ladies exchanged recipes, didn't they? Indeed, personal, intimate knowledge of God is the goal, but faith comes by hearing, according to Paul, not by feeling. Cognitive, academic knowledge precedes and is a necessary element for intimate knowledge. You can't intimately know a friend until you are first aware that he exists and is present to BE experienced. Even salvation depends on hearing words and understanding them with the mind. Then the Holy Spirit brings the intimate knowledge.

I'll end with a question. If I test my feelings to find out what's true in the spiritual realm or to find my future, how is that significantly different from a witchdoctor who throws chicken guts on the floor or reads tea leaves? Tell me the difference.

Think it through.

Be holy,
Phil Perkins.

(1) Brown, Colin; Philosophy and the Christian Faith; Intervarsity Press; Downers Grove, Illinois; 1968; ISBN0-87784-712-6; pp. 109-111.
(2( Van Til, Cornelius; Christian Apologetics; P&R Publishing Company; Phillipsburg, New Jersey; 2003; ISBN-10: 0-87552-511-3; pp. 170-172.
(3)ibid.; p. 32.
(4) Brown; pp. 250-260.
(5) http://www.churchcentral.com/article.php?id=2100
(6) http://www.rapidnet.com/~jbeard/bdm/BookReviews/exp_god/blackaby.htm
(7) Blackaby, Henry, Blackaby, Richard, and King, Claude; Experiencing God: Knowing and Doing the Will of God, Revised and Expanded; B&H Publishing Group; Nashville, Tennessee; 2008; ISBN-10: 0805447539; p. 10.

UPCOMING E-BATE--Frank Turk Defends Gender-Altered Bible Versions

And I'll present the biblical view, God-willing. Mr. Turk has defended the practice of lying about gender references in translations of the Bible as just another translation "philosophy". Look for further announcements as this debate will start in three to four weeks.

AMERICAN EVANGELICALISM IS A MENTAL GHETTO--Part VI Sliding Down the Lexicon Into the Gutter.

WHAT'S IN A NAME?
Meditate. What does that mean to you? If you've been in the American church for more than ten years it doesn't mean what it used to mean for most of us.

Butchering words...
It's said that a rose by any other name is a rose. The flower stays the same whatever you call it. But what if it wasn't the name that got changed? What if the name stayed the same, but the flower was changed? Then what? Is a meat cleaver dulled and softened if we called it a pillow?

When dealing with ancient literature like say...the Bible...one must be aware of a phenomenon I call lexical slide. When reading a word in an old text, one should be careful to remember it isn't what the modern speaker or reader means by that word, but what the author meant. For instance, if my great grandfather said he saw a line of cars go by, he was probably standing by a railroad. That's not what I mean when I say "car". "Ah, but we don't read the ancient texts. We read modern translations and the translators worry about that so we don't have to," someone might say.

Here's the problem: Modern English translations are stuck in a quickly changing religious culture and the religious language is changing rapidly. For instance, we used to talk about being "evangelistic". Now we want to be "missional". We used to want "sanctification". Now we want "spiritual formation". "Love" used to be fidelity to God and our brothers and sisters. Now it's not hurting anyone's feelings. So too, biblical meditation isn't the "meditation" currently taught in ME churches, seminaries, conferences, and books. All these changes are negative. Paul warned of wrangling about words. but my topic here is a deviation that has lead to a divergence in doctrine and practice.

Let's start with a lexical study. First, the Hebrew and Greek. The verb "meditate", in its various forms occurs much more often in the Hebrew Old Testament than in the Greek New Testament, and that's not just because the Old Testament is much bigger. The Old Testament comprises about 72-73% of Scripture, but contains all but a handful of references to meditating.

Two Hebrew verbs are commonly translated "meditate". First, is hagah. It is a word that attempts to sound like the activity or thing it denotes, like "yip" is used to denote the bark of a puppy. It's supposed to sound like the growl of an animal or the sound made by a man under his breath as he mutters or groans while considering something vexing, deep, or difficult. Holladay defines it as to growl, to moan, to read in an undertone, to ponder, to plan, or to speak. The noun forms are haguth, which means the act or process of thinking or planning and higgayon, which means talk or mockery or the act or process of thinking or planning or the act of playing an instrument. The second word is siach and it means to become concerned with or to give one's attention to. It's noun form is sichah. It means the occupation or concern of one's thoughts or mind.(1)

Brown, Driver, and Briggs says essentially the same thing, but adds to muse (to think reflectively) and to spell a word to the lexical range of the two verbs. (2) But even more important than what the dictionaries say is what the Bible says the word means. The Bible does define it for us, but I want to get into the current misunderstanding of what "meditation" is.

...in order to slaughter the innocent.
The BIG NAME in bringing the new "meditation" into MEism is Richard Foster. His book Celebration of Discipline, the Path to Spiritual Growth is the classic textbook used in seminaries and Bible colleges across the nation to inseminate young preachers and missionaries with practices such as unbiblical meditation. Foster doesn't stop there, though. He also instructs young heads full of tapioca in the fine arts of using the palms of one's hands to achieve certain inner spiritual states,(3) the use of the imagination to "experience God",(4) and studying the writings of heretics like Thomas a Kempis and Brother Lawrence, equating their writings with Calvin's Institutes.(5) First copyrighted in 1978, it hit with such a jolt a new category of seminary and Bible college courses was invented to make room for it. These are usually called "spiritual disciplines" classes. Don't send your son or daughter to a college that has one. The more conservative among us disliked the book and later editions were pruned back to appear less unorthodox. Still, the 1998 edition is heretical. While I was still teaching in a Southern Baptist college, it was being used to my great dismay.

Foster has two defintions for "meditation". They are contradictory. The first definition is almost biblical but leaves two loopholes he'll later use. The second one, just two pages later, is heretical outright. But if someone's going to lie to you, he'll start by getting your trust first, right? That's why they're called con(fidence) men. Imagine a man ready to cut your throat in order to rob you. "I've got a good sharp knife here. Could you lean your head back and loosen your tie a bit so I can get to your neck?" "Sure! How's this?" It doesn't happen like that.

The first definition is on page fifteen. He even starts with the two Hebrew verbs I listed for you. He wrote, "These two words have various meanings: listening to God's word, reflecting on God's works, ruminating on God's law, and more."(6) Reading this innocently and not discerningly, it seems great. It's not. Meditation isn't listening. That's significant as we will see. It's in there for a devilish reason. And the "and more" opens all sorts of possibilities. Foster has more, for sure, but not for better.

His second defintion says, "Christian meditation, very simply, is the ability to hear God's voice and obey His word."(7) Take a look at this definition. Nothing Foster does seems accidental. Notice "God's voice" is different than "His word". I don't believe this is redundance with different terms for color or clarity. It's a difference he'll use like a prybar.

Contrast biblical meditation against Foster's meditation in these ways: 1. Biblical meditation is an activity. Foster's "meditation" can be a state of being--an "ability". 2. Biblical meditation has as it's object only God, His Word, and His works and these are seen as objective things--real things, not imaginary. Foster's "meditation" can be imaginary, ideally seeking "God's voice" by means of the imagination without any objective input through the senses. He even calls finding God through one's imagination "more humble" than studying the objective revelation God has given us in Scripture.(8) So not only is Foster writing to stop us from thinking, but he counts on us not thinking much in the first place. He actually expects us to believe depending on God's Word isn't humble, but exalting our imaginations to the office of prophet and oracle IS humble. Can someone explain this to me?

I will cover, God willing, the problem of objective vs. subjective perceptions of God in the next installment. Look for the Pastor's Prayer.

BIBLICAL MEDITATION DEFINED BY THE BIBLE.
If we're going to argue about what a term in the Bible means, shouldn't we listen if the Bible is actually nice enough to tell us what it means? The following are some passages in which the Hebrew uses the words hagah and siach: Gen. 24:63, Josh. 1:8, Ps. 1:2,4:5,27:4,63:6,77:6,77:12,104:34,119:15,119:23,119:27,119:48,119:78,119:148,143:5,145:5, Is. 33:18.

The following are some verses in which the Hebrew uses the noun derivatives of the two verbs listed above: Job15:4, Ps. 19:14,49:4,104:34,119:97,119:99.

In none of these passages, is there any hint of dreaming or imagining. All these passages have a real, tangible object of the meditation--God, His laws, precepts, judgments, and Word in general, or His works ranging from nature to His miraculous judgments and deliverances.

Furthermore, due to the nature of Hebrew poetry, there are passages in which the terms are listed as synonyms with the following:

1. Fear of God in Job 15:4.
2. Looking at in Psalm 119:15.
3. To delight in in Psalm 1;2.
4. To behold the beauty of in Psalm 27:4. Additionally, the word translated "meditate" in this verse is baqar. It means to search, seek, or inquire.
5. The fountain of godly speech in Psalm49:3.
6. To remember in Psalm 63:6 and 77:6.
7. To ponder in Psalm 77:12.
8. To regard in Psalm 119:15.
9. The result of godly understanding in Psalm 119:27.
10. To love something in Psalm 119:97.
11. The source of great knowledge in Psalm 119:99.
12. Something to look forward to with great anticipation in Psalm 119:148.
13. To ponder in Psalm 143:5.
14. A source of evangelistic fervor in Psalm 145:1-6.

So where's the imagination in that? There isn't any at all. In addition the meditation of David's heart was a concern for him. He was worried that it should be acceptable to God in Psalm 19:14. If meditation is about imaginary things how can it be deemed acceptable or unacceptable. There is no objective standard in imagination.

THE BIG LESSON.
The big lesson is this: Today's love of spirituality without content leads away from thought. It leads to the ghetto. Biblical meditation leads to a solid knowledge of God through cognitive activity in and around His Bible, His Person, and His Works. It is objective and cognitive. Today's meditation is imaginative and subjective.

Today's meditation isn't Christian.

THE BIGGER LESSON.
Foster isn't the main story here. He's just an example. MANY are subverting the faith by introducing new, unbiblical language or changing the old definitions of biblical language to introduce unbiblical concepts. Beware. The words may be right, but the concepts can be very, very wrong.

Stay holy,
Phil Perkins.

(1) Holloday, William L.; A Concise Hebrew and Aramic Lexicon of the Old Testament, Based on the First, Second, and Third Editions of the Koehler-Baumgartner Lexicon in Veteris Testamenti Libros; E. J. Brill and Wm. Eerdmans Publishing Co.; Grand Rapids, Michigan; 1988; ISBN 0-8028-3413-2; pp. 76 & 551.
(2) Brown, Francis, Driver, S. R., & Briggs, C.; The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon; Hendrickson Publishers; Peabody, Massachusetts; 1996; pp. 211 & 967.
(3)Foster, Richard J.; Celebration of Discipline, the Path to Spiritual Growth; HargerCollins Publishers: New York, New York; 1998; ISBN 0-06-062893-1; p. 31.
(4) ibid. p. 25.
(5) ibid. p. 72.
(6) ibid. p. 15.
(7) ibid. p. 17.
(8) ibid. p. 25.

AMERICAN EVANGELICALISM IS A MENTAL GHETTO--Part V Size and Scope of the Problem in Four Categories

CATCHIN' UP.


Today's post is part of the series, AMERICAN EVANGELICALISM IS A MENTAL GHETTO. Find the first installments here. I describe the ME (Modern Evangelical) "church" in America as a Mental Ghetto because, like most American ghettos, the folks who stay there are able to get out, but staying is easier than getting out. Watching TV and getting high is more fun than taking a shower and doing job interviews. Going to the soccer game with the kids is easier than studying for an hour and sitting the kids down to tell them a Bible story. And many clergy actually like it that way because they get something out of it, too. I call them the Mental Ghetto Pimps. And I am going to use the example of a Pastor Dan Jarrell and the crew at Family Life Today as the Mental Ghetto Pimps.

MORNING SICKNESS.
This morning I had some around-town chores to do. So I did something I should probably do more often just for general information, but it's painful. I tuned to the local religious radio station and my ears began to bleed. I hate that such stuff is called "Christian". The first thing that turned my stomach was an ad for "Our Daily Bread", the monthly devotional booklet whose purpose seems to be to sooth our guilt for not reading our Bibles by means of little, three-paragraph essays with a Bible verse for a pretext and a witty quote at the end--all of which takes 45 seconds to read top-to-bottom. And that's if you go REALLY SLOOOOOW. But what the heck? You've had your "devotions", right? No muss, no fuss.

And no God.

The ad ended with the invitation to come along with them and "explore the world of spiritual meditation". That's right--spiritual meditation. I suppose the folks selling it think it'll raise fewer eyebrows than selling Ouija Boards or prayer labyrinths.

Radio Bible Class gives us this little gem. Once orthodox, RBC is now pushing mystics. (1)

Keep in mind, here, that I only listened to the station a total of probably less than five minutes total, intermittently between stops. It was certainly less than ten. Yet there was another incident during that time. The second was hearing a "Pastor Dan Jarrell" bludgeon the parable of the talents from Matthew 25. From the snippet of the conversation I heard, it seemed that Pastor Dan applied this somehow to marriage. That parable has nothing to do with marriage. It's about obedience to do God's work with the time and resources God has given each of us.

But that's just the start.

Here's the really ridiculous part: In verses 26-30 the fate of the servant who did nothing with what was given him was assigned to torment. It reads, "...and cast out the worthless slave into the outer darkness; in that place there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Pastor Dan told us that the place where there is "weeping" is where you "feel sorry for yourself", and the place where there is "gnashing of teeth" is where you "blame everybody else".

Here's the question we MUST answer:

WHY DOES ANYONE CONSIDER THIS SORT OF THING EVEN REMOTELY CHRISTIAN?
The depth of the problem makes this possible. It is in each of us individually, with a few exceptions, and it is in our institutions. I believe the depth of the problem comes to flower in four categories of collective sin.

CATEGORY ONE: BIBLICAL IGNORANCE.
How can Dan Jarrell say such things and still be taken seriously by anyone who calls themselves "Christian"? The short answer is the folks who take him seriously probably aren't Christians themselves or they'd know better because they'd have spent lots of time pursuing God through the Scripture. But that discussion is too big to get into here.

In order for Dan Jarrell to say such a thing, he has to have practiced, not just innocent ignorance, but the sin of outright aphronism. Being a "pastor", he's had time in the study to read the book of Matthew and if we give the benefit of the doubt (I wouldn't and if someone wants to know why, ask in the comment thread, please.) and say that he didn't actually lie purposely, then one can only imagine just what mental tricks this man has done to come to the interpretation of Matthew 25:30 he presented. It had to be purposeful ignorance, not innocent ignorance--lying to himself. I call it "aphronism".

In addition to Dan Jarrell's efforts to make the fantastic sound reasonable, he has to have accomplices. The people running the host program, Family Life Today, have to turn their heads to the lie. The folks at the local radio station, KURL, in Billings, MT have to turn their heads, too. I've contacted both Family Life Today and KURL in the past about such things and both have responded with anger.

So, there are Dan, FLT, and KURL, but there's someone else that has to remain in biblical ignorance for all this to work. THE AUDIENCE. There have to be enough MEs (Modern Evangelicals) out there who don't know their Bibles for this to be sold. It's a Mental Ghetto, where everyone is happy to remain ignorant. And they all get something for their ignorance. The audience gets to feel religious without actually dealing with God, studying His Word, or dealing with their own sin in light of His commandments and the threat of hell. As long as the audience stays stupid, KURL has an audience and can sell air time, FLT gets to "give the gift of hope" at $200 a couple (2), and Pastor Ignorant gets paid to spread his heresy.

Recently, forty-five students of Wheaton in their SENIOR YEAR were asked to list the ten commandments in their words (NO EXACT RECITATION). Only one could do it. (3)

This is raw sin.

CATEGORY TWO: IGNORANCE IN GENERAL KNOWLEDGE.
What does general knowledge have to do with biblical knowledge and what place does it have in the church? Aren't we supposed to be guided by faith?

No, we aren't to be guided by faith. At least not the kind of faith of MEism. I'm not writing about the content of faith, but the kind of faith. The content of a faith is what is actually believed. The kind of faith is how and why one believes. Christianity is a faith, but not ignorant faith. Obscurantism isn't biblical faith, but that is a discussion for CATEGORY FOUR.

Apply all the knowledge you have to your faith. Taking the example of Mental Ghetto Pimp Dan Jarrell, he counts on the fact that no one in his audience would apply even a tiny bit of literary interpretation or common horse sense to what he was saying. He counted on the fact that most of his audience wouldn't ask the simplest of questions concerning his claim about Matthew 25:30. How is "weeping" interpreted specifically as feeling sorry for oneself? How is "gnashing of teeth" analogized into blaming other people? What are the clues in the text or the context? How does this fit with anything I know about biblical doctrine? Was Jesus really thinking about self-pity and antagonizing others? Where are those subjects first taken up in the text so that we can reasonably read them in here?

Pimp Jarrell has to assume that his audience is of a mindset of switching off all their general knowledge about anything at all when engaged in things of the "faith". This is both moronic and unbiblical. It's moronic. In what area of human endeavor is progress made toward truth by means of purposely being mindless? It's unbiblical. What happened to all the reasoned arguments of the epistles and Jesus' request for Thomas to examine the evidence? Or Paul's commendation of the Bereans for examining all they heard by the Hebrew Bible or its translation, the Septuagint?

Not only should Christians strive to be logical and apply their knowledge, it's a part of Christian tradition to achieve intellectual excellence. Yet, we actually hear preachers say things like, "I'm just a simple preacher."

Then resign from the pulpit. You aren't qualified. You're in sin. And your sinful attitude has infected the entire church. Shame on you. May God deal with you for what you are.

For an example of how ignorance of general knowledge often leads to direct sins of other sorts as well, consider the following bumper sticker I got off of a "Christian" web site (4) this morning:

Puritanism: the haunting fear that someone, somewhere may be happy.

And what is the sin? NO. What are the SINS here? Gossip, cowardice, and bearing false witness. The Puritans, by way of the strong connection between "Puritanism" and "Puritans" are falsely said to be unhappy about others being happy. Curmudgeons. Since the Puritians are dead and gone, they can't defend themselves. Hence the dual sins of cowardice and gossip. And actual history tells us the Puritans weren't anything like that. If the author of these words knew better he was lying about the Puritans. If he didn't know any better, then he lied by pretending to a knowledge he had not.

And if confronted with this, I'll bet dollars-to-doughnuts, the reprover will be accused of being picky. But how would the author like it if he was so slandered?

CATEGORY THREE: IGNORANCE OF HOW TO THINK.
Jesus disciples were tax-collectors, carpenters, and fishermen, with a doctor thrown in. I wonder if they were even literate when they met Jesus. Nevertheless, they became men of oratory and letters. Remember Peter? A blustery fisherman became the author of biblical books, capable of recognizing that Paul's writings were divinely inspired Scripture.

Why?

Why did blue-collar men become educated in ancient literature? Because that's how God communicates. The gospel is spoken and written, not felt and grunted. Nor is it communicated by a stirring chorus repeated ad nauseum. Most MEs believe that truth can be measured by how one feels. And my generation is the one who perpetrated this lie. If you think me wrong, simply go to some of the ODM sites. Find a comment thread and read. A heretic named in the post will be defended by a commenter on the basis that the commenter "knew" the figure named. No facts will be brought to bare by the commenter except one. He "knew" him. In other words, they had a simpatico. Feelings.

In the seventies CCM (Contemporary Christian Music) came into being. The emphasis seemed to be on the music, not the lyrical content. Some exceptions are worth noting, such as Keith Green. But the same generation who started CCM is the generation who said doctrine isn't important. And the distinguishing characteristics of CCM were the new style of music and the fact that it was mostly content free.

In fact, some songs actually advocated the sin of aphronism. Not only was this a doctinal position--can't we all just get along?--but it was good marketing. For Corporate Christianity to work, sales can't be limited to just the Reformeds or the Charismatics. We need the whole enchilada to make a prophet.

Chuck Girard is a prime example of pimping for a prophet for himself and the record companies. Read the opening lyrics from his 1974 song, "Think about What Jesus Said":

Think about what Jesus said
Before you let your mind reject Him
Listen to your heart instead
And you will accept Him (5)

Get that? Thought bad. Feelings good. In fact, it's worse than that. Thinking will damn you. Feeling your way along like a slug on the sidewalk of "faith" will save your soul. Is that a biblical view of man? Is that a biblical view of epistemology? How is it that Chuck was considered a Christian? He disobeyed Christ's words severely. Chuck hates knowledge. Jesus said He came to bring light to the world. Don't these two oppose? Yes, they do.

Which brings me to the fourth category.

CATEGORY FOUR: IGNORANCE ABOUT THE BIBLICAL COMMAND TO PRACTICE PRECISE THOUGHT.

Stop having devotions and don't meditate anymore. Replace devotions with serious study, not a quick time of going through religious activity, hoping you can "feel the spirit". And stop having moments of silence. Instead, take what you learn in your study and think those things over and over during your work, during your evenings, at night, in the morning.

Current private practices aren't biblical. The ME "church" is returning to mysticism, contrary to biblical injunction. While my generation passed the mystical baton, previous generations were running hard, too. For instance, the word "inspirational" has been used for decades to stand in for the word "religious". Inspiration can be anything that engenders positive religious feelings. A devout Mormon can feel inspired. It has to do only with the feelings and nothing to do with the content that was used to achieve those feelings.

My generation used to argue with itself about being too feelings-oriented in worship. Biblical content lost the argument.

And this generation is paying the price.

In Christ,
Phil Perkins.

(1)http://www.lighthousetrailsresearch.com/blog/index.php?p=924&more=1&c=1
(2)http://www.familylife.com/site/c.dnJHKLNnFoG/b.3204559/k.F5BB/Attend_a_conference.htm
(3)http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1817838/posts
(4)http://www.chuck.org/jokes%20bumper%20stickers.htm

(5)http://www.delusionresistance.org/christian/chuckgirard/1974%20finaltouch/ft04.html

COMING IN PART VI OF THE MENTAL GHETTO. What is biblical meditation? And the biblical commands about our minds and our thoughts.

MAKING GOD GO FETCH--Would You Like Modern Evangelicalism or the Bible?

I despise those ads. Those ads are the ones being run by Interstate Batteries. You've probably seen them. The ad I remember most clearly has two cartoon men trying to park in the same parking spot. Both are mad, then one gets a goofy look and cute little hearts start floating through the air from his chest to the other man's chest. Immediately, the other man gets the same goofy look. The two cartoon men are drawn much like one would expect the characters in a Bambi cartoon for preschool children to be drawn. The constant smile, and eyes the size of dinner plates. Interstate Batteries is run by a fellow named Norm Miller and if one goes to the website promoted on the ads one ends up at a linked site that supposedly gives the gospel. Sounds great, right?

Buuuttt.....maaybeee.....nooottt.......

The ads don't say the gospel and when one follows the links one won't find the gospel there, either, except in a very distorted and disguised form that isn't the gospel found in Scripture.

If one starts with the ads, they are effeminate, speaking only of "love" and not the sort of love spoken of by Scripture. It's a sappy, emotional "love", the sentimentality characteristic of bed time stories for very small children or stories for very young girls. This sort of distorted "gospel" is, in my opinion, why we see so few men in the "churches". And why most of the males there are often effeminate in both manner and personality, unable to get angry about evil, but ready to flash mad at anyone who dares defend biblical orthodoxy, because anyone who does such a thing isn't very nice.

There's a reason for their distorted "love" in the ads. The reason is their effeminate, quasi-Christian doctrine. And such doctrines are the fruit of the constant wish for a god incapable of anger, but always anxious to nurture.

If one follows their links to find their "gospel", you will find this heresy: "What's the problem? ...that God-shaped emptiness..." So then, according the Norm Miller and Interstate Batteries, the reason we should turn to God is "that God-shaped emptiness". Man, then, isn't a sinner. He's just lonely.

This contradicts the Bible and Jesus' message. Jesus told us to repent because the Kingdom of God was at hand and in Matthew 4:17 we see that is the heart of His message. Who gave Norm Miller, Interstate Batteries or anyone else permission to change the gospel once bestowed? Norm Miller doesn't tell anyone to repent, but only to pray a particular prayer he gives for us to repeat--an idea NOT FOUND ANYWHERE IN SCRIPTURE.

When I saw the ads, I wasn't sure if the company was run by Modern Evangelicals or by Mormons. I thought probably Mormons. The reason is simple. The ads say nothing that the Mormons (or Joel Osteen, or Christian Science, or Seventh Day Adventists, or Jews, or Oprah Winfrey) might say. And Mormons run very similar ads about family "love" or God's "love" and it's always the same content-free pablum. And when one follows the links one finds a "gospel" that is the same "gospel" one will hear from Mormon missionaries at the first meeting--Mormons love to quote John 3:16 and tell you to "accept Jesus", just like Billy Graham. Even Jehovah's witnesses present much the same thing, except that they won't say Jesus was God. The Mormons will.

Do you see the difference? If not, you're probably a typical Evangelical, as I once was. And these ads are typical of the Modern Evangelical "gospel".

Now you may object. You might say, "But the site does mention sin and God's perfect moral character as the real problem."

If you reread the link, the problem isn't sin. It's the emptiness. Sin and God's perfect moral character is mentioned as a problem, but it's not the main problem or the motivation to turn to God. It is mentioned late in the presentation as a problem, not the problem. Sin is presented only as a problem because it might keep us from getting our empty hearts filled.

This approach is done because some see it as a good reason to get folks to listen. Truthfully, though, it gets very few. It gets only a few because it smells like a pitch. And it is. Adults, especially men, don't listen to this much because it's such a juvenile approach. Even the kids don't listen much. They're too busy being kids to spend ten minutes experiencing existential angst. Face it; they can't even spell existential angst.

As odd as it sounds I always find that I get more ears on the street if I go straight to the meat: Repent. Judgment is coming, because you won't live forever. More important you won't find the sticky-gooey approach in Scripture. In all of Scripture one cannot find this let's-all-have-a-good-cry-together-cuz-we're-all-so-lonely-snd-forlorn approach. It's here's a righteous God. He's coming for you. What are you going to do about it? Take up your cross.

Which brings up another way that Miller and most pastors lie to folks. The Scripture says we're supposed to suffer for Christ and if we don't we aren't His. Yet, this corn-syrup-and-brown-sugar "gospel" says, "Come ta Geezus cuz yur lonely." No talk of cross-bearing allowed.

I have to admit the Scripture does indicate God fulfills us. It's a major theme of Scripture. It's just not the gospel. It seems to be the feature the salesman didn't mention, but you found after you got the car home.

Even worse, if one follows the link to the Interstate Batteries website to find their "gospel", an outside link is recommended. Follow that site's links for men and one gets here. It's blasphemous. There one is encouraged to "give God a try"!!!!!!

WAIT! This is the Sovereign of creation! You're going to give Him a try? Is He supposed to be happy that you picked Him to play on your team? And what if He doesn't meet your test? That's blasphemy and the only reason it doesn't make us recoil in disgust is that it's just the sort of heresy we've been swimming in inside the Evangelical "church" for the past 50 or so years. You won't find this sort of stuff in Spurgeon or Henry.

Most important, you won't find it in the Bible.

This idea of "trying" God out makes salvation a work of man, to be undone by man when man decides God's performance fulfilling us isn't up to man's expectations. Thus Miller blasphemes against the God Who said, "For this reason I have said to you, that no one can come to Me, unless it has been granted him from the Father," and, "Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father, comes to Me." John 6:45 and 65.

More blasphemous still, the concocted notion that one can "try" God, puts man in the catbird seat, deciding if God is good enough in His role of providing personal fulfillment for me. Since when did God say we are the judges? Isn't that the very essence of sin itself? We get to judge God's commandments to see if we think we'll obey them. Now Miller, and much of the Evangelical "church", has extended the dominion of man. We can now determine if God's commandment to repent and follow Him is appropriately satisifying to us by way of fulfilling our wonderful little hearts.

How nice of God to try so hard for us, don't you think? Pat Him on His little head. Fetch, God! Fetch! Atta boy, God! Maybe a little faster next time, okay? And see if you can't let up on the slobber some. It's kinda gross.

This is filthy stuff, but I used to believe it. And I spewed it, too. So, if I ever act like I'm not guilty, hit me on the head. Hard. It took a lot of time swimming in Scripture every day and slowly my mind began to be different.

Now if you've read much of my palaver lately you know one of the things that's been on my mind is the "aphronism" of our age in the "church". What I mean by that is the tendency to not think and the dislike for rational, biblical thought. (From the Greek "aphron".)

Could it be that a movement which majors on the emotional and sees a particular emotional state as the greatest goal, or at least a sign of spiritual achievement in the eyes of its god, might under value rationality?

This is the true state of Modern Evangelicalism. For instance, one will often argue with a "Christian" about a biblical doctrine or ethic and be met with "the Spirit hasn't convicted me of that yet". That is to say the objector is willing to reject what is plainly written in the Scripture they claim to obey for something else which they claim is indicated by their inner state. And they see no contradiction or, worse yet, they see the contradiction intellectually, but prefer to ignore it in order to preserve the tingles they have gotten by serving their own emotional appetites. At other times a speaker or "service" will be valued over another, not on the basis of the actual doctrinal content of the "service" or the speaker's sermon, but on the emotional response experienced.

If Jesus or Paul came back today, they would rail against Evangelicals. Neither of them ever presented the "gospel" in the syrupy manner Miller does, which is the manner it usually is in most "churches".

Thought has consequences. And so does its absence.

In Christ,
Phil Perkins.

WHICH KINGDOM?

With Americans celebrating the election of our first Marxist president, perhaps it's time to reflect on just how we, as saints, ought to relate to the nation in which we live. On Fox News just this morning a video clip of the celebration outside the White House showed young folks with American flags and hammer-and-sickle flags.

That's right. The communist flag celebrated at the White House by the supporters of our incoming president.

This new day was the subject when I wrote THIS to a couple of fellows this morning:

Stan and Sola,
I've not yet read much from either of you concerning what this means to the kingdom of God. Almost all your concerns have to do with the US. (And you're both right--this is a tragedy for the nation--and it makes me very sad.)

I believe one of the great sins of the "church" is our love affair with and faith in this country. (Instead of depending on and loving the God of Israel.) Another great sin of the "church" is a disbelief in the biblical doctrine that we ought to suffer persecution or else face the fact that we aren't His. In fact, since the seventies, the youth in the "church" have been drowned in the syrup of "success"--the idiotic assumption that if one is doing the right things in the right way (read the effeminate way) folks will like them--a false teaching that has lead to silence on matters of sin and righteousness in and out of the "church". This is not only unbiblical, but can only be believed if we continue in the additional sin of non-evangelism. Thus the "life-style (or friendship) evangelism" movement (more correctly called life-style NON-evangelism). If we had actually gone out and told folks that the kingdom of God is at hand and that they ought to repent of their sins in order to avoid hell, we'd all have understood that hatred by the world is the proper experience of God's people. (Anything less is a result of sin--the cowardly sin of denying Christ by means of silence.)

I'm pretty sure that particular silliness will soon be history. And ironically, now after decades of folks calling themselves "Evangelical" while REMAINING SILENT ABOUT THE EVANGEL, it will soon be illegal to evangelize.

Tell me THAT'S not God's judgment.

It seems that many Evangelicals are more worried about having a place of freedom and affluence in the here and now than any actual concern about obedience as soldiers of Christ. According to the Old Covenant, God's people could expect peace and prosperity if they obeyed the Father. In the New Covenant, however, God's assembly actually has suffering as a promise for their obedience. Heard that in all that "God-anointed" teaching lately?

Think about it. We have entire "ministries" that have more to do with American politics than with biblical Christianity. Not exactly the Great Commission, huh?

I believe that, perhaps--just perhaps, this is a judgment on the assembly for our love of this nation over the kingdom of Heaven. (And for our faith in a "strong economy" for affluence over faith in the Father for our daily bread.)

Jesus said His kingdom wasn't of this world. What about ours?

In Christ,
Phil Perkins.
NOTE--The passages in bold were added for clarification.

IGNORANCE IS NEXT TO GODLINESS, Evangelicals vs. Jesus--Part III of II?

Most Evangelicals can’t name the ten commandments. Most CAN quote “Knowledge puffs up,” “God is love,” and “Judge not that you be not judged.”

And not much else.

Night before last I saw a Bible college student I'd met some time ago. He is a young man who is outwardly humble, quiet, and seems to be very concerned about his relationship to God. Yet, Dan is currently going to a “Christian” college that uses a text book that is in favor of homosexual marriage. I was shocked and angry. I reminded him that, as Christians, we aren’t to have anything to do with someone who calls himself a brother, yet knowlingly brings false teaching into the assembly. He didn’t know that. He squinted, furrowed his brow and slowly said, “There IS that verse that says we're to treat them as unbelievers,” thinking extra hard to remember anything at all.

That's all he knew about a central theme of Scripture?

Yep.

That's all he's got. And in a matter of months he may be your pastor or youth pastor. Does that scare you?

Several weeks ago, I read an article by Zac Poonen. Poonen is a Christian celebrity, a pastor, and author. Thousands read him and listen to him. He’s an authority. In his article he said that the first time believers were filled with the Holy Spirit was Acts 2, obviously oblivious to the fillings in the Old Testament and the filling of John the Baptist. When I corrected this, complete with biblical references, his defenders came out of the woodwork. They didn’t even MENTION the biblical mistakes Poonen made--let alone defend them. But they WERE mad at me.

Poonen's in sin. And so are his defenders. He isn’t doing the job of an elder while publicly holding the position. He isn’t studying the Scripture. Else, he’d remember John the Baptist and Bezalel and would know better than to say Acts 2 was the first time.

I could go on with example after example, from “Christian” nobodies to “Christian” celebrities. These folks hate the biblical Jesus, too. After all, the Jesus of Scripture kept saying “…have you not read…” and “…it is written…” Unlike today's Evangelicals, Jesus seemed to think that Scripture ought to settle any argument. And religious folks hated Him then, too.

Ironically, Poonen ended his article with “He who has ears to hear, let him hear," quoting the Jesus he ignores.

"Yet to this day the LORD has not given you a heart to know, nor eyes to see, nor ears to hear." Deuteronomy 29:4.

In Christ,
Phil Perkins.

IGNORANCE IS NEXT TO GODLINESS, I guess--Part II of II

"THE TEXT! THE TEXT! I DON'T CARE ABOUT THE TEXT!"

Let's do an experiment today. I am going to give you a set of quotes. I spend time with lots of folks. I witness on the streets and to my fellow workers. I speak and write to the irreligious and the religious. So I put together a set of five quotes. I will ask you to take a guess. Were these quotes made by a.)a preacher, b.)a church officer, c.)a person who regularly goes to an Evangelical church and claims to be a Christian, d.)a person who seldom, if ever, goes to church, e.)I made it up?

Quote #1. "The text! The text! I don't CARE about the text (of Scripture)." (Yelled loudly.)

Quote #2. "I don't care about logic. I'm just mad!" (Again, yelled loudly.)

Quote #3. "I wish you'd stop throwing the Bible in my face!" (In a burst of anger, but in a hushed voice so no one else could hear.)

Quote #4. "I think you're right, but..." (Spoken over the phone to tell me that sin would continue, despite biblical evidence presented.)

Quote #5. "I prayed to accept Jesus." (In response to a question concerning where he thought he might go for eternity, referring to an event in his youth.)

THE ANSWERS:
1. The text! The text! I don't CARE about the text!

c. An Evangelical church-goer who claims to be a believer. This fellow was a recent graduate from Southern Baptist college and attends an SBC church. It was in a discussion in which I took the historical position on a particular doctrine and advanced multiple Scriptures in its defense. My friend denied this doctrine vigorously, but quoted no Scripture, though asked repeatedly.

2. I don't care about logic. I'm just mad.

c. An Evangelical church-goer who claims to be a believer. Again the same fellow in the same discussion as in quote #1.

3. I wish you'd stop throwing the Bible in my face!

a. An Evangelical pastor. His name is Paul Ostrander of Billings, MT. He is not what he says he is. One would think this came from a tense time in street evangelism, but the non-churched don't seem to hate the Scripture that much.

4. I think you're right, but...

b. A church officer. This fellow is a deacon named Jerry. The church he attends and helps run knowingly supports teachers who deny the veracity of Scripture. He admitted that isn't okay with the Bible, but was angry that I had run around the church telling folks what the leadership was up to behind closed doors. So he continues in the sin and so does his church.

5. I prayed to accept Jesus.

d. A person who never goes to church at all. He was a drunk lying next to the trash bins behind the Denny's restaurant in downtown Billings, MT. He was a Southern Baptist.

SOOOOO.....how many did you get right? 5 for 5--A+. Apply now to Mensa. 4 for5--B. You're pretty smart, but no genius. 3 for 5--C-. Not quite college material. 2 or lower. I'll bet you teach adult Sunday School!

If you didn't do so well, here's an extra-credit quote to bring your grade up:

EXTRA CREDIT QUOTE. "I love God and want to know Him, so I study the Bible constantly."

EXTRA CREDIT ANSWER. e. I made that one up.

Never heard it.

Ever.

Think about it,
Phil Perkins. PS--Really. I've NEVER heard that one. Probably never will.

IGNORANCE IS NEXT TO GODLINESS, I guess--Part I of II

I recently met a commenter on a blog. I'll call him "Bob". "Bob" is probably a sincere Evangelical. His view of scripture is very high as Evangelicals go these days. However, his view of actually studying the Bible is typically Evangelical. While he SAYS we ought to know what Jesus teaches, biblical knowledge is optional, at best. And those who spend the time and energy necessary to know the Bible are actually bad.

Read what Bob wrote and see if it's not the sort of thing you hear in your church:

Christianity is not about How much one knows about Jesus or believing How rich God wants us to be. Neither is it about claiming to know more than others or claiming that God speaks to them audibly or in person. It is not about thinking and living as we like or what we think is right or holy. It’s about dying to self which means not only in actions but in our thinking, bringing every thought to the obedience of Christ (i.e his teachings).In short it means complete obedience and full surrender to Jesus the Christ. What we think or believe or hope is not gonna save us even if we have faith that can move mountains unless we abide in Christ (i.e live according to his word). He sent the Holy Ghost to teach us his will so that we may abide in him. So, any spirit that does not teach the commandments or complete obedience to Christ is not holy.
Lord I pray that you help us to understand the teachings of Christ that we may abide in HIM.

THERE. Does what Bob wrote sound familiar?

Well, if you're a Bob, this is my answer to you:

Bob,
Parts of your comment are VERY GOOD. The fact that we are to die to self isn't taught anymore. And the idea that we ought to bring our thoughts into line with Christ is both good and biblical.

Yet, I have some questions. One, if it's important to bring our thoughts into obedience to Christ's teachings, where did He say in His teachings that "how much one knows about Jesus" isn't vitally important? Is that one of His teachings?

Two, if it isn't important to know about Jesus, why do we speak the gospel? It's about Jesus, after all. Can folks be saved without knowing about Jesus?

Three, when did Jesus say we are to be rich at all? He and His disciples blew that one. So did Paul and most of the Prophets.

Four, if it isn't important to know as much about Christ as possible, why did God send "the Holy Ghost to teach us", as you say? What is He going to teach us, since knowledge isn't all that important?

The truth is that Christ came to die for our sins and to be the Light of the World. Light in Scripture is a metaphor for the giving of knowledge. If you are a saint, your number one job, after sanctification, is to become a Bible student.

The word "disciple" means a learner. We are ordered to make disciples--students. What do you do with that? Throw it away?

Christ, through His Holy Spirit, said in Psalm 119:9-11, "How can a young man keep his way pure? By keeping it according to Thy word. 10 With all my heart I have sought Thee; Do not let me wander from Thy commandments. 11 Thy word I have treasured in my heart, That I may not sin against Thee."

So, while you've disparaged biblical knowledge, you've actually done even worse than that. You disparaged those who have done their homework. You said, "Neither is it about claiming to know more than others..." Actually, that IS IMPORTANT.

Do you have any idea how many hours it takes to become fluent in Scripture knowledge? I can tell you almost no Evangelicals, including their pastors, do know. We know they don't know because they don't know their Bibles.

Scriptural knowledge is one of the qualifications for leadership, so comparing the knowledge of different brothers and sisters is mandated in the Scripture.

Did you know that? Do you even know where? Did you know why? If not, why not?

When was the last time you thanked someone who has studied the Scripture and put that blessing into your life? Christ, in His Scripture said we are to honor those elders who perform their duty well. You, Sir, have dishonored God's best servants.

Instead, you ought to seek their help.

Think about it.
Phil Perkins.

THE HOLY SPIRIT MADE ME DO IT

Comedian Flip Wilson had a character in his arsenal of goofball personas he invented to make the rest of us laugh who always had the same ready excuse for the stupid or bad things "Geraldine" did. "The Devil made me do it." Audiences laughed hysterically because it was entirely obvious that the excuse was just that--an excuse. In today's Evangelical community the excuse has been changed.

But only a little.

Today, males in the pulpit who are SUPPOSED TO actually study the Word and report to us in sermon form what that Word says, often resort to "and God told me..."

If God has spoken to all these men, why do they contradict each other? Is God confused? Is He a liar? Like the Catholics who have a piece of the cross in this cathedral and one in that cathedral and other cathedrals until, when added up, the cross must have weighed several tons, even so Evangelicals could put all their and-God-told-me's together and start a new religion.

Christo-hindo-buddho-islo-mormo-watchtowero-psycho-scientologo-confusitarianism.

Take this quote from "Jenn" who wrote, "You have to study - and hard. Then pray that God will open your eyes and heart about the questions at hand."

Now think this through. There are two sources of spiritual truth available to Jenn, evidently, and the best one for the hard questions isn't the Scripture. After you study, if you still have questions after a time of study, ask God. Notice she didn't say to ask God and then go back to studying. No, when we can't get anymore out of that Bible Ouija board, we go to our other Ouija board. Pray and wait for the unholy tingles, call it "the Holy Spirit" and you're on your way.

And He will "open your eyes and heart", according to Jenn. (Where does it say in the Bible that God will give us important truth without study?)

This sort of thinking is unbiblical and misses the seriousness of dealing with God. We have forgotten the holiness and fierceness of God. We have forgotten that false teachers will live for eternity in hell. We have forgotten that God ordered the death of all who claim God has spoken what He didn't say.

Study is hard work. Why would we think for a moment that the God Who designed the eye and the stars the eyes sees would be simple or easy? Did He not tell us that we are to pursue Him with everything we have?

Here are some questions for those who seek God in the tingles, instead of Scripture:

1. If the Scripture isn't the final authority, why waste our time there at all? Go around the road block and get the answers right away.

2. Is your "Holy Spirit" confused, a liar, or are there more than one since your "Holy Spirit" has so many opinions?

3. If the Scripture can't do the job and you need the tingles, why not admit in all your doctrinal statements that your final authority isn't Scripture, but the spirit or spirits you call "Holy"?

4. If you really believe that your "Holy Spirit" is right, why don't you challenge the other "Holy Spirits" who give doctrines that contradict your "Holy Spirit"?

5. Ought you not warn others of teachers whose "Holy Spirit" isn't holy at all if yours is?

I wonder what God will say to me next Tuesday. Perhaps we'll start releasing buterflies during service. The doves were just too messy.

In Christ,
Phil Perkins.

BOYDMILLER, A RELIGION STUDENT, AND PATRICIA BURNS--Three examples of the new paganism in the church.

I have decided to do a new series on what I have previously called "a soft paganism" in the church.

In the seventies and later, churchees (churchees is my term for the Modern Evangelicals, most of whom don't know God, but go to church and believe that they do know God) began several pagan practices. They slipped in unnoticed and I myself practiced most of them.

The one I have in mind here is the replacement of the Scripture with feelings in the inner state. What I mean is that when something is mentioned of Scripture, folks who SAY they believe in Scripture as the absolute Word of God will actually contradict it and cite the inner workings of their heart, mind, soul, or spirit.

Good examples of this are found in the last two comment threads on this site. In the last one a fellow calling himself "Boydmiller" has refused to support missionaries and pastors, encouraging others to do the same sin. (He has changed his position numerous times, so be sure to read all in context and go here to see the beginning of our interactions, so you can follow his changes--or just take my word for it if you wish since his position changes are mute to the point here. When faced with the objective teaching of Scripture to care for each other, his final defense was that "the Holy Spirit" had not led him to support ministers.

Now, I don't know just what he means by the leading of the Holy Spirit, but it usually refers to what is felt in an inner state mentally or emotionally. So in final analysis, he has supplanted the authority of Scripture with his "Holy Spirit".

In the comment thread on my last posting on the Eight Characteristics of Hell, I met Patricia Burns. She has a cult-like little thing going. When I confronted her with the fact that she is trying to teach men in contradiction to Scripture which forbids the practice of women having authority over men in the assembly, her defense was that she didn't contradict Scripture and that she would stay with her Scriptural ideas (Scriptural in her mind, that is) until her "Holy Spirit" told her otherwise. So we know Patricia, too, will leave the teaching of Scripture if her "Holy Spirit" leads her a different way.

My third example is a religion student whose name currently escapes me. He is attending an SBC school which has knowingly allowed teachers who don't believe in the inerrancy of the Scripture to teach that the Scripture has errors and is currently using a text which explicitly allows for homosexual marriage. When I confronted him with the fact that contributing to such folks is sin, his defense was the same as Patricia and Boydmiller, his "Holy Spirit".

This has happened sublty and occurs in the pulpit. Folks who SAY they believe the Bible contradict it on the basis, not of a different interpretation of the Bible, but of the leading of their "Holy Spirit", whatever that is.

Their "Holy Spirit"(s) are not the actual Holy Spirit anymore than the "Jesus" of the Watchtower is the actual Jesus. And the proof is in the fact their "Holy Spirits" contradict each other, since different folks hold different doctrines given them by their "Holy Spirits".

Pray for me as I think this through and try to articulate it for us.

And pray for my purity and wisdom.

In Christ,
Phil Perkins.

STEALING FROM SERVANTS

Boydmiller is a fellow I met on another comment line and he thinks we ought not give pastors, missionaries, evangelists anything to live on. In stead, they should "work with their hands" like everyone else.

No, wait. That statement's too embarassing because of a little thing called THE BIBLE. So now it's okay in Boydworld to give them something. Yes, we now have express permission from Boyd to give them "food and drink". Thanks, Boyd.

But, money is still bad.

So I asked if I should stop sending money to missions and start sending sandwiches and Koolaid.

I await his answer.

UNSAVED BELIEVER

Bill's his name. I worked with him as my foreman for a few weeks before he moved on to greener pastures. He’s likable enough. Always a smile and a joke. However, many of his jokes were off color. He used God’s name in vain many times a day and used the f-word like water. In addition to that, he often took tools and supplies from our employer to his home, which became their new home. Then one day he invited me to a concert.

At his church.

Yep. Bill’s an Evangelical believer.

He called last week for work. He’d like to return to the tiny town where I work because the Assembly of God church he was attending there had recently doubled. Bill’s very sperchul, so he just has to be in a happening church. Bill even speaks in tongues. I wonder if he can tell some of those dirty stories in an angelic language or say the f-word in tongues. Perhaps in his angel language it’s the q-word or the k-word. Of course, I’ve no clue what “word” is in angelese. Perhaps it’s “dlospeq”, in which case the f-word would be the f-dlospeq or the q-dlospeq or the k-dlospeq or…

His call reminded me of several arguments we had while he was still my foreman. I had told him that stealing from his employer, cussing, and cursing God’s name regularly without so much as a twinge of conscience was a sign of an unsaved soul. So I told him as gently as I could once again.

Here’s where it gets good: When I told him one must repent of one's sins to be saved, he said that was not true. In Bill-land you just have to sepGeezus. As long as you sepGeezus yur SAVED, SAVED, SAVED! Remain in your sins if you want. Just sepGeezus and your ticket's punched to go to the Six flags Over Heaven, cotton candy and all.

I don’t know who Bill’s pastor is, but I’m sure his (or her)spot in hell will be very hot. And close to Joel Osteen.

In Christ,
Phil Perkins.

DOUBLE DECKER HYPOCRISY

I was riding "The Deuce" That's what they call the double decker bus that takes one down "The Strip" in Las Vegas. I wasn't there for pleasure. I was in LV because I was taking training to work on steam and gas turbines in power generation plants across the country and LV is where the school is. However, while there I did a lot of Bible reading and in order to hold myself accountable in such a place, I flashed my Bible a lot. That way everyone knew I was a Christian.

That would keep me from messing up and possibly lead to some evangelistic opportunities. Both branches of my strategy worked and while on my way back from buying a Bible for a fellow trainee, I met Frank. He was passing out tracts on The Strip. Frank's real! After a brief conversation he agreed to allow me to witness with him and a number of his friends the next night on Fremont Street.

All of that was for this story:

On my way to Fremont Street and Frank and company, I was on The Deuce. And that's where I met the face of what's wrong with Evangelicalism. As usual, I had my Bible on the seat beside me. Behind me were two couples. One was young. The others were parents-in-law. Well, the young husband pointed to my Bible and asked if I attended a church locally in LV. "No, I don't live here." I told them I was in LV for training, not pleasure. He told me that he lead the youth group in his church and he was quite Evangelical as if that was really going to get brownie points. Just why he wanted to impress a middle aged bald guy with more wrinkles than that twenty you found in your 12-year-old couch I don't know, but religion functions quite well for such things, I'm told.

Here's where things get interesting. Whether or not you know this, Vegas is a chamber pot--Sodom for heterosexuals, as well as a huge gambling den. Going on The Strip will expose you to actual full-length, billboard-sized pictures of naked women. It's nothing to which a Christian man ought expose himself unless he is prayed up and has a really good reason to do so.

In just such a sewer this young youth pastor had purposely brought him, his wife, and his mother! Just what he and his father were thinking I don't know. As the conversation went, I told him I was going down to Fremont Street to hand out gospel tracts and evangelize. Here is roughly how the conversation went at that point:

Me: I'm going to meet some friends and pass out gospel tracts and evangelize down on Fremont Street.

Pastorboy: (Enthusiastically) Oh, you mean down there where all the dancers (read strippers here) are?

Me (thinking): Now how did he know just where to find strippers in a strange town? And why did he use the euphemistic "dancers" instead of calling them what they are--after all, Fred Astaire was a dancer.

Me (speaking): I don't know. I'm not from here. You're here on vacation?

Pastorboy: Yes.

Me (looking at his pretty young wife and his mother and reeling with the incongruity and blurting it out like a gag reflex): I would NEVER bring my family here!

My words trailed off as I realized I had just accused Pastorboy of the sin he was engaged in right in front of his own parents as well as what had to be his very young bride. That was the end of that conversation.

Meanwhile, a lost man sat next to me, immediately telling me the story of why he was running from the law and how many women in LV he had been with and their names as if I'd asked. I waited for an opening (you know--when he stopped to take a breath) and started to tell him about God's coming judgment.

Well, Pastorboy's stop was before mine. "Keep up the good work," he said as if in pain.

Yeah. He was still pretending we were on the same team or something.

Amazed,
Phil Perkins.

UNBELIEVERS THE NEW CHRISTIANS!!!

Yes, that's right. The new thing out now is that you don't have to believe the Bible to be a believer. I know that sounds stupid, but I have been assured by several people with very straight faces it isn't. Instead, it's just very "nuanced" as many say.

Funny. When folk like that say "nuanced" these days they say it as if the rest of us may not be smart enough to know what that means. So, I'll take a moment to straighten out you backward people who sit around reading just your Bibles all the time, because heaven knows you have to do a lot more than that just read your Bible in order to keep up with all the theological innovations made by the sort of folk who say things like "nuanced," "metanarrative," "missional," and stuff like that. So here's what "nuanced" means: It means I am trying to fit an old heresy that the church rejected hundreds of years ago in by calling it something else really new and different-sounding. The point of the "nuanced" thing is to make an old, rejected idea sound like something novel that only the "nuanced" person and his friends could think of and that no one else in two thousand years of Church theology, thought, Scripture-searching, and scholarship could ever have thought of. EVER.

Several times in the last year I have had discussions with folks I otherwise would have thought to be real Christians. These quazi-Christians have introduced me to a new doctrine. The doctrine simply states that one doesn't have to believe in the inerrancy of Scripture to be a Christian.

Now, that sounds much more nuanced than the way I first stated it in my opening paragraph. You don't have to believe in inerrancy to be a Christian. So one can believe in Christ, but doubt the factuality of the Bible He seemed to love and trust.

This is a very stupid thing to say and here's why: Jesus taught and acted as though the Scripture was a reliable guide to truth. He told His Father that His Word was truth. This presents the unbelieving believers with a logical problem. Specifically, they must make a case that those who believe in Christ don't have to believe Christ. Or, to put it another way, one may believe that Christ is the God of All Truth while believing this God of All Truth was either mistaken or lying when He said and acted as if the Bible is completely true.

This case cannot be made to anyone who is not on pot or a rock-ribbed Evangellyfish.

In Christ,
Phil Perkins.

BIG COMEDOWN FOR GOD

Driving through Kansas City, MO recently I saw a sign that really got my attention. It said, "Such and Such Church, Where Christ Is Lord!" My, my, my. All this time I thought (and so did God, evidently, since He said as much in the Bible) Christ was in charge of all things everywhere at all times.

Not so. He's only in charge (lord) at that particular church. Well, perhaps He's Lord at a few others that have made Him the Big Cheese at their place as well. I'm sure God's ecstatic about all this and hopes He gets elected to a second term.

In awe,
Phil Perkins.