Man has lived in darkness and needed a way out!

I was thinking about the differences between the colors known as black and white. Often, the question arises about whether or not they are actual “colors.”
Color Matters gives us the answer:

The answer to the question – “Are black and white colors?” – is one of the most debated issues about color. Ask a scientist and you’ll get a reply based on physics: “Black is not a color, white is a color.” Ask an artist or a child with crayons and you’ll get another: “Black is a color, white is not a color.” (Maybe!)

There are four sections on that page that present the best answers.

In line with the purposes here, I would like to share one of them.

1. Black is the absence of color (and is therefore not a color)

Explanation:
When there is no light, everything is black. Test this out by going into a photographic dark room. There are no photons of light. In other words, there are no photons of colors.

2. White is the blending of all colors and is a color.

Explanation:
Light appears colorless or white. Sunlight is white light that is composed of all the colors of the spectrum.  A rainbow is proof. You can’t see the colors of sunlight except when atmospheric conditions bend the light rays and create a rainbow. You can also use a prism to demonstrate this.

Fact: The sum of all the colors of light add up to white. This is additive color theory.

The Bible discusses darkness (black) and light (white). We can start with Genesis:

Gen 1:1

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

Gen 1:2

The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was [fn] on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.

Gen 1:3

Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light.

Gen 1:4

And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness.

Gen 1:5

God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the evening and the morning were the first day.

We see that the “light” was good (according to God) and that God divided the light from the darkness. At this point, man had not sinned, so “darkness” was not yet associated with sin, evil and death.

Since the Fall of Adam and Eve,

Note what is written in the book of Jeremiah:

Jer 17:9

“The heart is deceitful above all things,
And desperately wicked;
Who can know it?

I recall a non-Christian’s reaction to that verse when it was spoken of within a sermon while he was a visitor at our church.  Apparently, he rejects the fact that the heart of man is deceitful and desperately wicked.

After the sermon, I looked up the verse after it and he seemed pleased by this particular verse.

Jer 17:10

I, the LORD, search the heart,
I test the mind,
Even to give every man according to his ways,
According to the fruit of his doings.

I can only imagine that he thought this was a fair deal from God.  However, when Jesus came along He stated that something as simple as a lie causes us to be “of your father the devil.”

No wonder non-Christians often hate and reject Jesus!  Who wants to be told this?  No one!  But it’s the truth, nonetheless.

Jhn 8:44

“You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it.

We see from Psalm 92:15 that the LORD does not have any unrighteousness in Him.  He is upright.  He is my rock.

Psa 92:15

To declare that the LORD is upright;
He is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in Him.

During this time, the world was still waiting for the Savior, the promised Messiah in Scripture.

The Bible says that Jesus was born of the virgin Mary.  He was later proclaimed by the Father to be God’s Son as he started his 3 year earthly ministry.   We read about this account in Matthew 3.

Mat 3:17

And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”

(More accounts of God the Father’s proclamation regarding Jesus being His Son at end of post.)

Jesus was with God the Father and the Holy Spirit (also called the Trinity) in the beginning.  At my former Talk Wisdom blog, I have shared how the Three Persons in One God is evident all around us within Creation in a post entitled, The Trinity All Around You.

We see the purpose of Jesus Christ being born sinless so that He had the power to take away our sins.

1Jo 3:5

And you know that He was manifested to take away our sins, and in Him there is no sin.

We see that His death on the cross, the battle against darkness and evil in the grave, and His resurrection to life was for the purpose of saving us from the grip of the devil through the salvation  of our souls.

 

1Jo 2:2

And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world.

The darkness that we have known is passing away because the true light of salvation through Jesus Christ is already shining.

1Jo 2:8

Again, a new commandment I write to you, which thing is true in Him and in you, because the darkness is passing away, and the true light is already shining.

Those who hate others (and we see such hatred leading to death almost nightly on the news) are in darkness!

1Jo 2:9

He who says he is in the light, and hates his brother, is in darkness until now.

1 John 2:10 describes how to stay in the light and avoid stumbling.

1Jo 2:10

He who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no cause for stumbling in him.

So much of the killings, immorality, evil, sin, and death are perpetuated by those who hate and walk in darkness.  Why?  Because their eyes have been blinded by the darkness.

1Jo 2:11

But he who hates his brother is in darkness and walks in darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.

As Christians, we are to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  Plant seeds in the hearts of others.  God does the saving!

I pray that the following link will help you:

How To Know God Personally

Hat tips to all links.

*******

Endnotes:

The Father proclaiming Jesus as His Son:

Mat 3:17	And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”
	Mat 17:5	While he was still speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them; and suddenly a voice came out of the cloud, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Hear Him!”
	Mar 8:38	“For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him the Son of Man also will be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels.”
	Mar 9:7	And a cloud came and overshadowed them; and a voice came out of the cloud, saying, “This is My beloved Son. Hear Him!”
	Luk 9:35	And a voice came out of the cloud, saying, “This is My beloved Son.fn Hear Him!”
	Luk 15:24	‘for this my son was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’ And they began to be merry.
	Act 13:33	“God has fulfilled this for us their children, in that He has raised up Jesus. As it is also written in the second Psalm: ‘You are My Son, Today I have begotten You.‘fn

The Love of Many Will Wax Cold

In the previous blog post comment thread, a Christian blogging friend of mine was undeservedly labeled with a disparaging remark. I thought that a portion of my response deserved a blog post [a.k.a. a “Blogment”] all its own.  So here it is, with some added links and commentary:

 

Originally in reply to GMpilot:

From my perspective, Black3Actual does not deserve your disparaging remark. Just because you reject what he is sharing doesn’t make him what you called him in your comment.

For the longest time, you have disparaged God because of your own negative opinion of Him. You believe that the call in Scripture for the fear of God is something to dislike; even hate.

In Matthew 10:28, Jesus said, “Do not fear those who kill the body but are not able to kill the soul. But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.”

The fear (meaning, dread) of God happened to Adam and Eve the moment that they sinned. Prior to that, they had a forever kind of loving relationship with Him. We (all human beings since) have inherited this tendency to sin, and thus unredeemed men and women (if honest with ourselves) also have the same dreaded fear of God.

Upon being saved, that slavish “fear of dread” turns to a reverential awe of God. This is what Jesus Christ accomplished for us at the cross. We no longer live in dread of our Heavenly Father – it turns around 360 degrees [meaning, a TOTAL turn in which we can face Him because of His agape love] towards a renewed and caring love for Him! And, because of our reverence for Him, His righteousness, and His Holiness, we fear to do evil.  Our desire is to live rightly, for Him!

I see Black3Actual’s heart as being a believer who wants the Lord to use him for His great purposes and His glory. Through reading his blog – The Oil For Your Lamp, I see him as desiring to meet people who are lost with whom he can share the Gospel of Christ.

Jesus shows us many times in Scripture how to pray. There is a great difference between those who say pagan prayers (where he/she tries to harness the spiritual powers of the universe to do his bidding… and so will say, “As I will so it must be.”) They are actually proclaiming, “my will be done.” It is the “being their own God” syndrome. Contrast that with the Christian prayer, “Thy [God’s] will be done.”

The Bible has been attacked over the last 200 years or so like never before. We have been warned in Matthew 24 that this will be the case the closer we get to the end times when “the love of many will grow cold.” The KJV says, “And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many will wax cold.”

“Wax” as a verb from Dictionary.com:

1.  to increase in extent, quantity, intensity, power, etc.:
Discord waxed at an alarming rate.

[Note: Chuck Smith has a great written sermon on this verse. Read it HERE.]

Why has the love of many wax cold?

Because of lawlessness. Because iniquity shall abound.

We have seen the explosion of lawlessness and abounding iniquity here in the United States over the past 30 years! However, it most obviously became ratcheted up back in the 1960’s when the Bible was removed from the schools.

Mat 24:12

“And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.

Many secular “scholars” have joined in the savage attack. Yet, the critical scholars are proven wrong again and again. Why? Because as history unveils itself, the Bible is vindicated.

You, GM, choose your scholars. You choose your experts, in which mostly all express anti-Christian opinions. The point is that somebody chose those particular “experts” and they didn’t choose them by chance. They often stack the experts in such a way as to promote unbelief. [A recent example in the Darwinism vs. Intelligent Design battle is the so-called Homo naledi, which is already being questioned as a unique species of unclear evolutionary importance.]

The truth is, that link questioning this unique species will not get anywhere near the exposure via the media as the “discovery” of Homo naledi has.

But that is only one example. The quest to disprove (as well as disparage, twist, misinterpret, demonize etc.) the Word of God will go on until Christ returns. Meanwhile, Christians are rest assured that:

Forever, O LORD, Your word is settled in heaven. – Psalm 119:89

 

GM, I don’t ban you and I continue to answer your anti-Christian rants here for the purpose of countering what you write; and hopefully helping those who may come upon this blog to read the posts and comments to see what the Bible says on such matters. I don’t know everything, but God’s Word has the correct answers. Whether you agree or not doesn’t really matter.

Dostoyevsky famously said, “If there is no God, then all things are permissible.” That is why the fear of God is good, and to be a God-fearing person is healthy.

I have attempted to begin to express the relationship between the love and the fear of God. I’m sure there is much more evidence of this that can be shared from the Bible.  I would like to encourage readers to share such evidence in the comment section!

~  Christine

 

Hat tips to all links.

H/T:  Black3Actual

H/T:  GMpilot

 

 

There is a Cost to be Paid For Our Sins

Through years of experience, I have found that a person is usually not brought towards faith in Jesus Christ through intellectual arguments. When someone is focused on “winning the debate” rather than realizing that their sin separates them from our Holy and Righteous God (which exposes the fact that they are in desperate need of the Savior, Jesus Christ), then the only thing that generally happens during such “debates” is a stalemate.

I agree with what Bill Keller wrote:

The anger of the lost keeps many people from sharing their faith. Never forget, they are angry at God, NOT you. Your job is simply to tell them the truth, and share with them the hope and love of Christ. What they choose to do with that truth is then between them and God.

It helps to remember this: someone who is lost and simply trying to justify their rejection of Christ will always have more questions than you will ever have answers.

Keep in mind that you will rarely, if ever, win a debate with someone who is lost – especially when they exhibit no desire to accept what you are saying. Your time is best spent praying for these people rather than debating them.

However, you will meet many people who are searching for reconciliation with God; and therefore, will be honestly open to looking into having a relationship with Jesus Christ.

It is for the sake of people who are genuinely searching that I continue to answer the questions of skeptics. Reading through such arguments may help another person (who happens to come here and read them) end up taking the Gospel of Jesus Christ seriously.

The original skeptic,  who originally poses such questions is may or may not ever become a believer. But that’s O.K. !  My job, our job as followers of Christ is to share the gospel of Jesus Christ!  The Bible (NKJV) instructs us to be evangelists:

1Pe 3:15   But sanctify the Lord God[fn4] in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear;

1Pe 3:16   having a good conscience, that when they defame you as evildoers, those who revile your good conduct in Christ may be ashamed.

1Pe 3:17   For it is better, if it is the will of God, to suffer for doing good than for doing evil.

1Pe 3:18   For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us[fn5] to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit,

3:15 NU-Text reads Christ as Lord.
3:18 NU-Text and M-Text read you.
3:20 NU-Text and M-Text read when the longsuffering of God waited patiently.

I have found that oftentimes, the non-believer has objections against Christ’s crucifixion on the cross to pay for our sins. Even some liberal theologians try to claim that this concept of substitutionary atonement is somehow “outmoded.”  That is REALLY a sad state of affairs!  It leads to confusion, non-repentance,  and ultimately the rejection of the Cross of Christ for the needed redemption for our sins.  What’s worse, is that the reconciliation between Holy God and sinful man is not possible without Someone paying the penalty for our sins.  Jesus Christ is the only genuine Savior in history who accomplished this for us!

For anyone interested, below is a link to a video and post where a caller stated that he questions why Jesus Christ would die on the cross for his sins.

Answering Muslims: Muslim Caller Hears the Gospel and Becomes a Christian.

Lee Strobel is a former atheist turned Christian. In his book, “The Case for the Real Jesus,” he shares an example of a supposedly “Christian” Episcopal bishop who created and stated a negative analogy in order to disparage the truth and our need for Jesus’ death on the cross at Calvary.

“Episcopal Bishop John Shelby Spong said, ‘A human father who would nail his son to a cross for any purpose would be arrested for child abuse.'”

Over the years of actively “giving an answer to those (who are perishing) for the hope that is in you (me);” I have found that many detractors like to use the “cosmic child abuse” argument against Christians.

Paul Copan’s great explanation for the necessity of substitutionary atonement through Jesus Christ’s crucifixion on the cross at Calvary in order for sinners (which includes all of us) to be reconciled back unto God totally obliterates Spong’s argumentative comment!

Paul Copan wrote:

“We have to be careful about this notion being outmoded,” came Copan’s reply. “C.S. Lewis rightly warns us against chronological snobbery — saying, ‘Oh, they used to do things that way, but we know better now because we’re more enlightened.’ Sometimes there is a mind-set that if no one believes something anymore, surely it has got to be false. G.K. Chesterton said if you take that view, you may as well say that on certain days of the week something is true and on others it’s not. The question should be: Is there anything to this notion of substitutionary atonement?”

“Well, is there?” I asked. “Why can’t God just say he forgives the sins of the world?”

Copan’s answer came swiftly. “Why can’t judges just forgive criminals? Why can’t they let rapists and thieves back on the street and just say, ‘It’s okay, I forgive you’? For God to do something like this would be an insult to his holiness. It would look like he was simply endorsing rebellion against himself and his character. He is a righteous judge, and therefore he must find us guilty of sin because the truth of the matter is that we are guilty. We have fallen short of how God wants us to live. We violate even our own moral standards, so certainly we violate God’s higher standard. To pretend otherwise would be a lie — and God is not a liar.

“Also, if God simply forgives, then he hasn’t taken human responsibility with much seriousness at all. To simply let people go does not hold them accountable to the standards that people know they’ve transgressed. And he would be denying the gravity of sin, which we take far too lightly but which God takes very, very seriously.”

That last remark made me think of a comment in a book I had been reading on the plane to Florida for the interview. As James R. Edwards, a professor of biblical languages and literature as well as a Presbyterian minister, said in Is Jesus the Only Savior?:

The doctrine of atonement obviously hangs on the doctrine of sin. A physician who removes a leg because of a splinter is a monster. A physician who removes a leg because of cancer or gangrene, on the other hand, is a hero who saves his or her patients life. It all depends on the nature and seriousness of the problem. Spong and others see sin as a splinter; the New Testament sees it as a cancer that is fatal if left untreated. And that accounts for the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on a cross of cruelty and shame. The cross is indeed an outrage — an outrage of grace. If this is the kind of world in which we live–and I believe it is–then the death of God’s Son for the sins of the world is the only way the world can be reunited with its Maker and Redeemer.

Nevertheless, I continued to press the issue about why God simply couldn’t magnanimously forgive people without having to sacrifice his Son. “What about the story in Matthew 18 about the king who forgave an enormous debt that was owed to him by his servant?” I asked Copan. “He seemed capable of forgiveness without sacrificing anyone on a cross.”

Copan’s eyebrows went up. “Ah, but notice what happens in that parable: the king doesn’t just forgive; he also absorbs the debt,” He said. “The king basically says he’s going to bear the burden of the loss even though the servant owes the money. Similarly, Jesus pays the cost of our sin on the cross. It’s sort of like a child who breaks a neighbor’s window. He may be too young to pay the price himself, so his parents pay it for him. Or when a small corporation is bought out by a larger one, the new corporation has to assume its debts.

“There’s a cost to sin: Romans 6:23 says it’s death, or eternal separation from God. That’s the penalty we owe. That’s the cost we incur when our sins separate us from God. But Jesus willingly paid the price in our place, as our substitute–and offers forgiveness as a free gift. There’s nothing illegitimate about that kind of representation. If we aren’t able to handle our situation, what’s wrong with someone who’s willing to assume our indebtedness?

“From one perspective, Jesus’ death was the very low point of God’s career–he is crucified as if he were a criminal, exposed naked to the world, cursed on this tree, and tortured though he was innocent. But despite this ultimate degradation, John talks about the Son of God being ‘lifted up,’ which is a double entendre. Yes, Jesus was physically lifted up on the cross, but this is also the point of God’s exaltation. The crucifixion turns out to be a high point of God’s career. The point is, Jesus was willing to go this low for our salvation–to be humiliated, to be degraded, to be insulted, that through this selfless act he was able to rescue us, bring an end to the powers of darkness, and bring about the restoration of a fallen world into a new creation.

“God isn’t guilty of cosmic child abuse. It’s not as though the Father consigns the Son to this humiliating death on the cross; it’s something Jesus does voluntarily. Jesus says in John 10 that he lays down his life of his own accord. It’s important to see the Trinity being involved in this whole process. As 2 Corinthians 5 says, God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself. God the Father and God the Spirit suffer along with the Son as he hangs on the cross. The Father isn’t pitted against his Son; this is something the Son willingly takes upon himself in order to pay the debt that humankind could not pay on its own.”

“Some people say this seems utterly drastic,” I observed.

“Well, yeah, if this were to happen to you or me, we would be terribly embittered and completely overwhelmed. But Christ bears the punishment perfectly. As British theologian John Stott said, ‘For the essence of sin is man substituting himself for God, while the essence of salvation is God substituting himself for man.'”

“The atonement, then, is not illogical or unfair,” I suggested.

“That’s right,” Copan agreed. “Remember, the Scriptures have a number of different pictures or metaphors for what was accomplished on the cross. But the substitutionary aspect of the atonement is deeply significant in that Christ our representative accomplishes for us what we can’t do for ourselves.”

“So what should our response be? Gratitude–the Christian faith is a religion of gratitude. Why would we be reluctant to humble ourselves and receive the free gift of forgiveness that Christ purchased through his death–and also receive the gift-giver himself as the leader of our life?”

Source: “The Case for the Real Jesus,” by Lee Strobel, published by Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 2007 pp. 254-256.

*******

Three awesome verses uttered by Jesus Christ himself in John 10  explains why Jesus is God, loves the Father, loves us sinners, and the fact that by His own power, He arose from the dead!

Jhn 10:15 As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep.

Jhn 10:17 Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again.

Jhn 10:18 No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.

The rest of the verses in 1 Peter 3 explains exactly why Christ’s sacrificial death on the cross and resurrection to life was necessary to save us!

1Pe 3:18

For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us [fn] to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit,

1Pe 3:19

by whom also He went and preached to the spirits in prison,

1Pe 3:20

who formerly were disobedient, when once the Divine longsuffering waited [fn] in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water.

1Pe 3:21

There is also an antitype which now saves us—baptism (not the removal of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God), through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,

1Pe 3:22

who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, angels and authorities and powers having been made subject to Him.

Hat tips to all links.

 

The Bible and same sex relationships: A review article.

There is a very interesting essay written by Tim Keller at Redeemer Report: The Bible and same sex relationships: A review article.

Keller wrote this report in answer to the two most vocal “gay” Christian authors who have written their own books on the subject.

Excerpt:

Vines, Matthew, God and the Gay Christian: The Biblical Case in Support of Same Sex Relationships, Convergent Books, 2014

Wilson, Ken, A Letter to My Congregation, David Crum Media, 2014.

As Bible-based Christians, we need to be armed with biblical arguments against those (especially “gay Christians!”)  who are trying to create their own  ideological case in support for that which is clearly forbidden in Scripture.

Several weeks ago, I started to listen to a rebuttal against Matthew Vines, whose self-identification label is listed as a “Gay Christian.”

I must admit, this man’s discussion was quite refreshing because he spoke of those who oppose his views with cordial respect.  This is entirely unlike the radical homosexual activists who verbally blast, hatefully abuse, erroneously sue, and viciously disparage Christians (or anyone else) whose deep religious beliefs encourage them to hold to God’s idea of marriage as being between one man and one woman.  The video I was watching was very, very long, and I did not complete it. Perhaps I can locate it again and share a link to it within this post for anyone interested in the back and forth between Vines and the biblical marriage traditionalist.

For now, here at Talk Wisdom I will share some significant excerpts, including the subtopics being discussed at the Redeemer.com site. You can follow the link above to read the entire essay.

Excerpts:

1.  Knowing gay people personally.

In this portion, the idea that homosexuality is a sin that cannot be forgiven by God is shown to be incorrect, (and  THAT incorrect notion could also be considered a form of bigotry) but it can’t be used to say that Scripture approves of homosexual behavior.

So I say good riddance to bigotry. However, the reality of bigotry cannot itself prove that the Bible never forbids homosexuality. We have to look to the text to determine that.

2.  Consulting historical scholarship.

This is highly significant! Read it all at the link, but here is the conclusion based on the evidence:

I urge readers to familiarize themselves with this research. A good place to start is the Kindle book by William Loader Sexuality in the New Testament (2010) or his much larger The New Testament on Sexuality (2012). Loader is the most prominent expert on ancient and biblical views of sexuality, having written five large and two small volumes in his lifetime. It is worth noting that Loader himself does not personally see anything wrong with homosexual relationships; he just — rightly and definitively — proves that you can’t get the Bible itself to give them any support.

Mr. Loader should be commended for his honesty!

3.  Re-categorizing same sex relations.
The following argument is one that is used quite extensively by homosexual activists. However, as you read through the complete section at the link, you will find that the need to “change their interpretations” in today’s era because views changed against slavery is not supported by evidence.

A third line of reasoning in these volumes and others like them involves re-categorization. In the past, homosexuality was categorized by all Christian churches and theology as sin. However, many argue that homosexuality should be put in the same category as slavery and segregation. Vines writes, for example, that the Bible supported slavery and that most Christians used to believe that some form of slavery was condoned by the Bible, but we have now come to see that all slavery is wrong. Therefore, just as Christians interpreted the Bible to support segregation and slavery until times changed, so Christians should change their interpretations about homosexuality as history moves forward.

[But] historians such as Mark Noll (America’s God, 2005 and The Civil War as a Theological Crisis, 2006) have shown the 19th century position some people took that the Bible condoned race-based chattel slavery was highly controversial and never a consensus. Most Protestants in Canada and Britain (and many in the northern U.S. states) condemned it as being wholly against the Scripture.

David L. Chappell in his history of the Civil Rights Movement (A Stone of Hope, 2003) went further. He proves that even before the Supreme Court decisions of the mid-50s, almost no one was promoting the slender and forced biblical justifications for racial superiority and segregation. Even otherwise racist theologians and ministers could not find a basis for white supremacy in the Bible.

So we see the analogy between the church’s view of slavery and its view of homosexuality breaks down. Up until very recently, all Christian churches and theologians unanimously read the Bible as condemning homosexuality. By contrast, there was never any consensus or even a majority of churches that thought slavery and segregation were supported by the Bible.

Wilson, Vines, and many others argue that same-sex relations must now be put into this category. Since we see that there are sincere Christians who disagree over this, it is said, we should “agree to disagree” on this.

However history shows that same-sex relations do not belong in this category, either. Around each of the other items on Wilson’s list there are long-standing and historical divisions within the church. There have always been substantial parts of the church that came to different positions on these issues. But until very, very recently, there had been complete unanimity about homosexuality in the church across all centuries, cultures, and even across major divisions of the Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Protestant traditions. So homosexuality is categorically different. One has to ask, then, why is it the case that literally no church, theologian, or Christian thinker or movement ever thought that any kind of same sex relationships was allowable until now?

One answer to the question is an ironic one. During the Civil War, British Presbyterian biblical scholars told their southern American colleagues who supported slavery that they were reading the Scriptural texts through cultural blinders. They wanted to find evidence for their views in the Bible and voila — they found it. If no Christian reading the Bible — across diverse cultures and times — ever previously discovered support for same-sex relationships in the Bible until today, it is hard not to wonder if many now have new cultural spectacles on, having a strong predisposition to find in these texts evidence for the views they already hold.

What are those cultural spectacles? The reason that homosexual relationships make so much more sense to people today than in previous times is because they have absorbed late modern western culture’s narratives about the human life. Our society presses its members to believe “you have to be yourself,” that sexual desires are crucial to personal identity, that any curbing of strong sexual desires leads to psychological damage, and that individuals should be free to live as they alone see fit.

These narratives have been well analyzed by scholars such as Robert Bellah and Charles Taylor. They are beliefs about the nature of reality that are not self-evident to most societies and they carry no more empirical proof than any other religious beliefs. They are also filled with inconsistencies and problems. Both Vines and Wilson largely assume these cultural narratives. It is these faith assumptions about identity and freedom that make the straightforward reading of the biblical texts seem so wrong to them. They are the underlying reason for their views, but they are never identified or discussed.

4. Revising biblical authority.

Vines and Wilson claim that they continue to hold to a high view of biblical authority, and that they believe the Bible is completely true, but that they don’t think it teaches all same-sex relations are wrong. Vines argues that while the Levitical code forbids homosexuality (Leviticus 18:22) it also forbids eating shellfish (Leviticus 11:9-12). Yet, he says, Christians no longer regard eating shellfish as wrong — so why can’t we change our minds on homosexuality?

This is another very familiar argument.  In fact, several weeks ago a more liberal relative used the old “shellfish” argument with me in order to support homosexuality as now also being exempt from the laws in the Bible.

Tim Keller answers this argument masterfully!

Here Vines is rejecting the New Testament understanding that the ceremonial laws of Moses around the sacrificial system and ritual purity were fulfilled in Christ and no longer binding, but that the moral law of the Old Testament is still in force. Hebrews 10:16, for example, tells us that the Holy Spirit writes “God’s laws” on Christians’ hearts (so they are obviously still in force), even though that same book of the Bible tells us that some of those Mosaic laws — the ceremonial — are no longer in binding on us. This view has been accepted by all branches of the church since New Testament times.

When Vines refuses to accept this ancient distinction between the ceremonial and moral law, he is doing much more than simply giving us an alternative interpretation of the Old Testament — he is radically revising what biblical authority means. When he says “Christians no longer regard eating shellfish as wrong,” and then applies this to homosexuality (though assuming that Leviticus 19:18 — the Golden Rule — is still in force), he is assuming that it is Christians themselves, not the Bible, who have the right to decide which parts of the Bible are essentially now out of date. That decisively shifts the ultimate authority to define right and wrong onto the individual Christian and away from the biblical text.

The traditional view is this: Yes, there are things in the Bible that Christians no longer have to follow but, if the Scripture is our final authority, it is only the Bible itself that can tell us what those things are. The prohibitions against homosexuality are re-stated in the New Testament (Romans 1, 1 Corinthians 6, 1 Timothy 1) but Jesus himself (Mark 7), as well as the rest of the New Testament, tells us that the clean laws and ceremonial code is no longer in force.

Vines asserts that he maintains a belief in biblical authority, but with arguments like this one he is actually undermining it. This represents a massive shift in historic Christian theology and life.

5. Being on the wrong side of history.

More explicit in Wilson’s volume than Vines’ is the common argument that history is moving toward greater freedom and equality for individuals, and so refusing to accept same-sex relationships is a futile attempt to stop inevitable historical development. Wilson says that the “complex forces” of history showed Christians that they were wrong about slavery and something like that is happening now with homosexuality.

Charles Taylor, however, explains how this idea of inevitable historical progress developed out of the Enlightenment optimism about human nature and reason. It is another place where these writers seem to uncritically adopt background understandings that are foreign to the Bible. If we believe in the Bible’s authority, then shifts in public opinion should not matter. The Christian faith will always be offensive to every culture at some points.

6. Missing the biblical vision.

This section is my favorite part!  Why?  Because it presents a new argument (one that I had not considered until now) regarding God’s design for “complimentary things that [are] made to work together” and how the reason why God made us male and female really do matter – and are designed to work together!

The saddest thing for me as a reader was how, in books on the Bible and sex, Vines and Wilson concentrated almost wholly on the biblical negatives, the prohibitions against homosexual practice, instead of giving sustained attention to the high, (yes) glorious Scriptural vision of sexuality. Both authors rightly say that the Bible calls for mutual loving relationships in marriage, but it points to far more than that.

In Genesis 1 you see pairs of different but complementary things made to work together: heaven and earth, sea and land, even God and humanity. It is part of the brilliance of God’s creation that diverse, unlike things are made to unite and create dynamic wholes which generate more and more life and beauty through their relationships. As N.T. Wright points out, the creation and uniting of male and female at the end of Genesis 2 is the climax of all this.

That means that male and female have unique, non-interchangeable glories — they each see and do things that the other cannot. Sex was created by God to be a way to mingle these strengths and glories within a life-long covenant of marriage. Marriage is the most intense (though not the only) place where this reunion of male and female takes place in human life. Male and female reshape, learn from, and work together.

Therefore, in one of the great ironies of late modern times, when we celebrate diversity in so many other cultural sectors, we have truncated the ultimate unity-in-diversity: inter-gendered marriage.

Without understanding this vision, the sexual prohibitions in the Bible make no sense. Homosexuality does not honor the need for this rich diversity of perspective and gendered humanity in sexual relationships. Same-sex relationships not only cannot provide this for each spouse, they can’t provide children with a deep connection to each half of humanity through a parent of each gender.

This review has been too brief to give these authors the credit they are due for maintaining a respectful and gracious tone throughout. We live in a time in which civility and love in these discussions is fast going away, and I am thankful the authors are not part of the angry, caustic flow. In this regard they are being good examples, but because I think their main points are wrong, I have had to concentrate on them as I have in this review. I hope I have done so with equal civility.

Hat tip:

Redeemer.com

1Co 6:9

Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, [fn] nor sodomites,

1Co 6:10

nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God.

1Co 6:11

And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.