I just read an article in the Wausau Daily Herald, that was a reprint from USA today about apathy and religion. The article itself made several jumps and leaps to show how these, "so whats" are becoming more and more apparent as a group. They are not really Atheist, they are not really religious, they simply don't care.
As I read the article, I wasn't really shocked, I didn't really have a lot of fear about the whole thing, which is what I think the story was after. The story was more on the downfall of institutional religion than anything else. However, as I read there were some things in the story that did give me pause, that did cause me to fear.
What caused me to fear you might ask. It wasn't that the church was dying, that is simply not true, now, true it might not be doing so hot here in America, and the article is a strong call to Evangelism, even Evangelism on a completely different level, but this isn't what is frighting about the article. What is frightening is the Apathy. This article is pointed at religion, acknowledging the source and the world today, I wouldn't be surprised if the author wants to see religion go down the tube. However, these people weren't just apathetic about religion, they were apathetic about everything. Basically if it did not personally effect them, then they didn't care.
The very idea that someone could be so apathetic should scare us all. This kind of narcissism should make us all pause and think about the implications. This is not just a religious problem. What will be the long term effect of post modernism mixed with existentialism. Where everyone's point of view is true and their own, and everyone's point of view is based solely on their experience.
What do you do with a person who doesn't care about the larger questions. Think about it from only a work point of view. What would an employee be like that was apathetic from the major questions of the company, how to improve, be more efficient, how to make the business grow. An employee like that would be great at menial tasks, but completely useless for anything else, and even the menial tasks would probably not be that great unless there was a possibility for some kind of promotion, but once they were on top they would be no good. If this is sounding familiar it should, basically you have every factory ever created. The problem is that we are now seeing this with people, they have no motivation for what is best for the world, no need to see things improve, only the need for themselves, and if it doesn't or won't effect them, then they will not bother. In this there is no sense of sacrifice for the greater good, and on top of that, there is no need to save the life of anyone who is not you.
Now of course, I am looking at the extreme of this thought, but if this article is right, this won't be looking at the future too much longer. Christianity is fine, worry about these people because you want to see them come to Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit. However, as a cultural subgroup be very scared, this is the death of a culture.
Monday, January 23, 2012
Saturday, July 2, 2011
Bible Software and the future of us.
Last week the announcement of a new Bible Software (new version) made me quite excited. I am an avid user of Bible software. I personally use two of them, BibleWorks and Logos, I have a blog that I dedicate to both BibleWorks is here, and the Logos one here. You will notice that the Logos one is not very large and that the BibleWorks' one has plenty of space between posts. This is because I am a BibleWorks user, and this week the newest version was released, it won't be shipping until about mid-July but even so just watching the videos, you can see the improvements that have been made to small (new look for the buttons) to the large (the addition of the Manuscript Project). However, with all of this kind of material at our fingertips, the question could and should be asked about what this means for how we study and understand the text. I would say that it means our study is going to be "better," but I think this is a misnomer. I think this because, to say that implies that our study will be better than those who came before us, and I want to avoid even thinking something that can lead to this. On the other hand, won't it be "better" won't it be faster and more precise and all that. The answer is kind of a yes and no. The truth is that this software will make us faster in how we do work within the text, it will be more precise than simply depending on memory, it will be all of those things. On the other hand, we will also have less people that memorize, less people that truly study Greek and Hebrew Grammar instead simply relying on a program.
What we need here is not to get rid of the Bible Software, but instead, we need to realize what can happen if we rely on it for things we shouldn't. Bible software is great for doing exegetical work, it is great for having a library of books on your machine and doing searches on the Biblical text which in the past would have taken days and months and in some cases years. It is great for all of those things, but it is not something that takes the place of reading scripture daily, both Logos and BibleWorks comes with devotional books to emphasize the importance of this. It does not take the place of memorizing scripture so that you can take it with you anywhere, and in the realm of languages it does not take the place of learning the languages. Having and interlinear or a program rarely ever gives you the full story, it is something that you must read yourself and see it in the Bible for yourself.
What we need here is not to get rid of the Bible Software, but instead, we need to realize what can happen if we rely on it for things we shouldn't. Bible software is great for doing exegetical work, it is great for having a library of books on your machine and doing searches on the Biblical text which in the past would have taken days and months and in some cases years. It is great for all of those things, but it is not something that takes the place of reading scripture daily, both Logos and BibleWorks comes with devotional books to emphasize the importance of this. It does not take the place of memorizing scripture so that you can take it with you anywhere, and in the realm of languages it does not take the place of learning the languages. Having and interlinear or a program rarely ever gives you the full story, it is something that you must read yourself and see it in the Bible for yourself.
Sunday, June 12, 2011
The need for Greek, and where you can learn it.
I cannot tell you how many times people ask me, when I tell them how important I think Greek is, why is it so important. This is a good and logical question but the truth is that very often people underestimate the importance of the Biblical languages. Even though so many are interested as to why they are so important to me, many of these same folks do not see the same importance. This is not to say that they do not find them important at all, they simply think that it is not for them, that it is for someone else, someone more interested or ambitious, or, heaven forbid, only for pastors. This is in many cases true, Greek and Hebrew are not for everyone, not everyone has what it takes to study and understand Greek, however, for many this is not true, and for some of these their lack of motivation comes from a misunderstanding. The misunderstanding is the main reason for me writing this blog, because the misunderstanding is based on the importance of the Greek Bible.
The New Testament is written in Greek, the Old Testament is written in Hebrew and at time Aramaic. This is a true statement. It is not and was not written in English. English and all others are "translations," or perhaps you prefer commentary, this is important to keep in mind. Why you may ask, or perhaps you find this statement surprising thinking always that the English Bible is the Bible. The problem with this is that too much of the English words you see on the printed page are dependent on the translator. If there is or was a theological argument, you will never see it, instead you will only see the perspective of whomever translated your version. On this note let me tell you, there are some really bad ones out there. At times even the supposed good ones are way, way, off. What this means is that the only way to see what the Bible says and know for sure what it says, is to read it in the original languages.
The next thing to notice is that very often Greeks and Hebrews thought differently than we do now, much of this comes out in the way they word things, or in how they use tenses and so on. Sometimes the significance comes in the word play or even something like Word order. The other day I was translating 1 Peter and he was writing about how we have hope, "in us" and the way he worded it simply would not work in English, "in us" is actually located in the middle of "the hope" and looks like this, the "in us" hope, this is hard to convey and rarely actually done in translations. Not only is this done, but the Greek New Testament makes use of word play, this is when words can have double meaning and is meant to be taken that way. Jesus tells Nicodemus that he needs to be born, "from above" or is it "again" what is in your Bible, the Greek leaves room for both and is probably intends for both to be read, which would help to understand the confusion on Nicodemus' side of things.
Really this is simply the tip of the iceberg, there is so much more to learn and understand and get out of your Bible. I could go even further but I will stop here for now. Instead I would like to take this opportunity to tell you of how important Greek is to me, and how important I think it is to at least try to learn it if you can. I will be teaching a free course in Greek this summer. The classes will be located in the NTC Nursing Building in some of the classrooms in the lounge area. These are free, you need to provide your own books or buy them from me, (reimburse me I only charge what I pay) and for that I will teach. but what if you don't live in or near Wausau WI, there is still the classes which Voelz provided online (video of his class) this is on Itunes U under Concordia Seminaries page. So I hope you will take the opportunity to use these and learn this language and is very worthwile.
The New Testament is written in Greek, the Old Testament is written in Hebrew and at time Aramaic. This is a true statement. It is not and was not written in English. English and all others are "translations," or perhaps you prefer commentary, this is important to keep in mind. Why you may ask, or perhaps you find this statement surprising thinking always that the English Bible is the Bible. The problem with this is that too much of the English words you see on the printed page are dependent on the translator. If there is or was a theological argument, you will never see it, instead you will only see the perspective of whomever translated your version. On this note let me tell you, there are some really bad ones out there. At times even the supposed good ones are way, way, off. What this means is that the only way to see what the Bible says and know for sure what it says, is to read it in the original languages.
The next thing to notice is that very often Greeks and Hebrews thought differently than we do now, much of this comes out in the way they word things, or in how they use tenses and so on. Sometimes the significance comes in the word play or even something like Word order. The other day I was translating 1 Peter and he was writing about how we have hope, "in us" and the way he worded it simply would not work in English, "in us" is actually located in the middle of "the hope" and looks like this, the "in us" hope, this is hard to convey and rarely actually done in translations. Not only is this done, but the Greek New Testament makes use of word play, this is when words can have double meaning and is meant to be taken that way. Jesus tells Nicodemus that he needs to be born, "from above" or is it "again" what is in your Bible, the Greek leaves room for both and is probably intends for both to be read, which would help to understand the confusion on Nicodemus' side of things.
Really this is simply the tip of the iceberg, there is so much more to learn and understand and get out of your Bible. I could go even further but I will stop here for now. Instead I would like to take this opportunity to tell you of how important Greek is to me, and how important I think it is to at least try to learn it if you can. I will be teaching a free course in Greek this summer. The classes will be located in the NTC Nursing Building in some of the classrooms in the lounge area. These are free, you need to provide your own books or buy them from me, (reimburse me I only charge what I pay) and for that I will teach. but what if you don't live in or near Wausau WI, there is still the classes which Voelz provided online (video of his class) this is on Itunes U under Concordia Seminaries page. So I hope you will take the opportunity to use these and learn this language and is very worthwile.
Sunday, May 29, 2011
Review: Love Wins by Rob Bell
Recently Rob Bell released a book titled Love Wins which has caused some controversy because in the book, Bell suggest that other non-Christians will also be in heaven. This thought goes against the grain of all mainline Christianity and especially among conservative Christians. However, to only see the controversy, the conclusion, I think is dangerous. I think it is important that we understand Bell’s thought process, his interpretation to how he got to this point will help to combat this thought in the future.
The book, Love Wins, starts with questions, a lot of questions, some of them good and some of them unneeded. He then goes through and tries to answer these questions using scripture and his theological framework. He starts by talking about heaven and looking at the Bible passages that deal with heaven. Bell comes to the conclusion that heaven will in fact be here on earth. He also comes to the conclusion that heaven will never be closed and that people (mainly those that reside in hell) will be able to come and go as they choose. Next Bell talks of hell. He does not deny that there is a hell. He goes through and tries to look at the scriptures that talk of hell and concludes that hell is a real place but it is not what we have come to think of it, instead it is a place purely by our choosing. This choice is something that can even be made after death. After he has established definitions for heaven and hell he then takes a look at the gospel message and what is being proclaim and what, in his opinion, should be proclaimed.
The controversy was sparked almost immediately, even before Bell released the book. Even with the previews, the implications of what Bell was suggesting became apparent. He seemed to be suggesting that heaven and hell were not so clear cut that more people would be in heaven than most Christians believe. You don’t take a swing at mainline Christianity without having some backlash and Bell got it, tons of blogs a few interviews and the like all just added fuel to the fire. The book itself goes beyond the suggestion, within the book Bell attempt to give Biblical evidence in support for his view that many people, including non-Christians will be in heaven. It would be bad enough if Bell stopped there, but in the book he continues on. He also suggest, using the image of the city in the book of Revelation, to suggest that people in hell will have to option to always come into heaven.
The book certainly comes to some bad conclusions but we must ask how does Bell get to these conclusions. The first thought would be to suggest that he obviously doesn’t read his Bible, but throughout the book he quotes scripture. Quoting scripture reveals that he is reading scripture this means that his problem must be with interpretation. I will say that in the book Bell at times seems to be doing a good job of interpretation and then others goes way off the deep end.
Bell starts his book by asking a lot of questions. Many of these questions reveal the struggle. As a Lutheran I can tell you they are some of the hard questions for those of reformed theology, some of the questions that really have no great answer. This is not to say that reformed theologians have no answers, they do, but many times these answers cause more questions than they give answers. These are questions have plagued many, questions of free will, questions of the grace and mercy of God.
Even as he attempts to answer these questions often times Bell is looking at the correct scriptures and often times his conclusions is only slightly off. He talks about heaven in terms of Garden of Eden, that is good, but then concludes that must mean that this earth is where heaven will be, that is incorrect. The same with resurrection. He talks about our own death and resurrection in this life, he talks about new life and that is good, but then he completely divorces it from Baptism, and then goes on to make it more of a feeling or experience as opposed to an actual death which is incorrect.
Bell is trying throughout the book to be serious with the Biblical passages and in my opinion he has two main problems that seem to in the end distort everything into this idea of heaven and hell. The two main problems are that he refuses to drop the idea of free will, and he holds grasps onto the idea that God is nice. The free will idea causes a lot of problems throughout the book he says over and over again that love demands freedom and that love never denies freedom. This sets him up to be unable to answer the question of how God can command us to be repentant yet say that we are not saved by works. If repentance, if faith are all things that we do with our free will then how can we be saved without works. This flies in the face of Lutheran theology which denies free will when it comes to salvation, however we do agree that to reject God’s grace and mercy is all at the fault of the person. This sets up a paradox which Lutherans do not try to answer, because to us, the Bible does not say. The conclusion to this reveals his second problem, mainly that God does not judge because judgment would be “mean” and God is “nice.” To be fair, I do not remember Bell ever using the word “nice” but throughout the book, this seems to be the assumption that he has made. As I try to answer this allow me to clarify, God is just, He is merciful, God has a list of attributes a mile long and then some, but God is not “nice.” Why is He not “nice” you may ask, at its heart it is how you define “nice,” this word does not mean merciful or just, it is being socially acceptable, being pleasurable, it is being pleasing or agreeable. Now some of these things God certainly is, God wants us to be happy, does that mean, “being pleasurable” I would say so. However, notice that all these things are defined by the culture in which they are in, in order to be truly “pleasant” or “agreeable” right now in this culture you shouldn’t even bring up religion at all and it is heavily frowned upon to even suggest that without “your” religion something negative will happen to you. In order to be “nice” you simply cannot do those things, and this is the flaw. God is the God who is merciful, but He is also the God that Judges, now that does not seem very nice, and judgment is not nice, sending someone to eternal damnation because they “chose” to reject God with no chance after the judgment is done is not nice, but that is the way things are, and that is the way the Bible talks about God.
In Rob Bell’s understanding God can neither deny free will nor can He be anything other than nice. Coming back to the the questions he asks in the beginning of the book we can begin to see his framework. If God does not deny free will then things like repentance and faith must be things we can decide but to send people that do not accept this to hell would not be nice. Therefore, God must be more open than we at first thought, accepting repentance and faith in ways we as Christians do not realize even from those that are Buddhist that are trying to do good, really they are trying to do good out of love, and therefore they do have faith, is it misplaced, sure but it is faith and in the end it will be revealed and the Buddhist will realize who their faith was really in. What about those murderers and rapist and such, you know, those people that are really “evil” well they will want to be their own God’s so badly that they will not accept heaven or God, maybe when they are in hell then they will but then again hell is right next to heaven and they will be able to see everything, but it is only when they accept God that they will be able to enter in. God must do this, He must allow them to choose, and He must be nice.
I found Bell’s book to be dangerous to the common every day reader but almost a must read for pastors. It is dangerous because he is very deceptive and uses a lot of scripture to back up his point. Bell is known for being able to feel the “pulse” of the culture and this book does exactly that. However, this book is almost a must read for pastors, through it you can see the logic and the flow of thought that eventually lead to this heresy. It is an easy and fast read, all his paragraphs have two space in between and he uses large print (I almost wonder if this review has more text).
The book, Love Wins, starts with questions, a lot of questions, some of them good and some of them unneeded. He then goes through and tries to answer these questions using scripture and his theological framework. He starts by talking about heaven and looking at the Bible passages that deal with heaven. Bell comes to the conclusion that heaven will in fact be here on earth. He also comes to the conclusion that heaven will never be closed and that people (mainly those that reside in hell) will be able to come and go as they choose. Next Bell talks of hell. He does not deny that there is a hell. He goes through and tries to look at the scriptures that talk of hell and concludes that hell is a real place but it is not what we have come to think of it, instead it is a place purely by our choosing. This choice is something that can even be made after death. After he has established definitions for heaven and hell he then takes a look at the gospel message and what is being proclaim and what, in his opinion, should be proclaimed.
The controversy was sparked almost immediately, even before Bell released the book. Even with the previews, the implications of what Bell was suggesting became apparent. He seemed to be suggesting that heaven and hell were not so clear cut that more people would be in heaven than most Christians believe. You don’t take a swing at mainline Christianity without having some backlash and Bell got it, tons of blogs a few interviews and the like all just added fuel to the fire. The book itself goes beyond the suggestion, within the book Bell attempt to give Biblical evidence in support for his view that many people, including non-Christians will be in heaven. It would be bad enough if Bell stopped there, but in the book he continues on. He also suggest, using the image of the city in the book of Revelation, to suggest that people in hell will have to option to always come into heaven.
The book certainly comes to some bad conclusions but we must ask how does Bell get to these conclusions. The first thought would be to suggest that he obviously doesn’t read his Bible, but throughout the book he quotes scripture. Quoting scripture reveals that he is reading scripture this means that his problem must be with interpretation. I will say that in the book Bell at times seems to be doing a good job of interpretation and then others goes way off the deep end.
Bell starts his book by asking a lot of questions. Many of these questions reveal the struggle. As a Lutheran I can tell you they are some of the hard questions for those of reformed theology, some of the questions that really have no great answer. This is not to say that reformed theologians have no answers, they do, but many times these answers cause more questions than they give answers. These are questions have plagued many, questions of free will, questions of the grace and mercy of God.
Even as he attempts to answer these questions often times Bell is looking at the correct scriptures and often times his conclusions is only slightly off. He talks about heaven in terms of Garden of Eden, that is good, but then concludes that must mean that this earth is where heaven will be, that is incorrect. The same with resurrection. He talks about our own death and resurrection in this life, he talks about new life and that is good, but then he completely divorces it from Baptism, and then goes on to make it more of a feeling or experience as opposed to an actual death which is incorrect.
Bell is trying throughout the book to be serious with the Biblical passages and in my opinion he has two main problems that seem to in the end distort everything into this idea of heaven and hell. The two main problems are that he refuses to drop the idea of free will, and he holds grasps onto the idea that God is nice. The free will idea causes a lot of problems throughout the book he says over and over again that love demands freedom and that love never denies freedom. This sets him up to be unable to answer the question of how God can command us to be repentant yet say that we are not saved by works. If repentance, if faith are all things that we do with our free will then how can we be saved without works. This flies in the face of Lutheran theology which denies free will when it comes to salvation, however we do agree that to reject God’s grace and mercy is all at the fault of the person. This sets up a paradox which Lutherans do not try to answer, because to us, the Bible does not say. The conclusion to this reveals his second problem, mainly that God does not judge because judgment would be “mean” and God is “nice.” To be fair, I do not remember Bell ever using the word “nice” but throughout the book, this seems to be the assumption that he has made. As I try to answer this allow me to clarify, God is just, He is merciful, God has a list of attributes a mile long and then some, but God is not “nice.” Why is He not “nice” you may ask, at its heart it is how you define “nice,” this word does not mean merciful or just, it is being socially acceptable, being pleasurable, it is being pleasing or agreeable. Now some of these things God certainly is, God wants us to be happy, does that mean, “being pleasurable” I would say so. However, notice that all these things are defined by the culture in which they are in, in order to be truly “pleasant” or “agreeable” right now in this culture you shouldn’t even bring up religion at all and it is heavily frowned upon to even suggest that without “your” religion something negative will happen to you. In order to be “nice” you simply cannot do those things, and this is the flaw. God is the God who is merciful, but He is also the God that Judges, now that does not seem very nice, and judgment is not nice, sending someone to eternal damnation because they “chose” to reject God with no chance after the judgment is done is not nice, but that is the way things are, and that is the way the Bible talks about God.
In Rob Bell’s understanding God can neither deny free will nor can He be anything other than nice. Coming back to the the questions he asks in the beginning of the book we can begin to see his framework. If God does not deny free will then things like repentance and faith must be things we can decide but to send people that do not accept this to hell would not be nice. Therefore, God must be more open than we at first thought, accepting repentance and faith in ways we as Christians do not realize even from those that are Buddhist that are trying to do good, really they are trying to do good out of love, and therefore they do have faith, is it misplaced, sure but it is faith and in the end it will be revealed and the Buddhist will realize who their faith was really in. What about those murderers and rapist and such, you know, those people that are really “evil” well they will want to be their own God’s so badly that they will not accept heaven or God, maybe when they are in hell then they will but then again hell is right next to heaven and they will be able to see everything, but it is only when they accept God that they will be able to enter in. God must do this, He must allow them to choose, and He must be nice.
I found Bell’s book to be dangerous to the common every day reader but almost a must read for pastors. It is dangerous because he is very deceptive and uses a lot of scripture to back up his point. Bell is known for being able to feel the “pulse” of the culture and this book does exactly that. However, this book is almost a must read for pastors, through it you can see the logic and the flow of thought that eventually lead to this heresy. It is an easy and fast read, all his paragraphs have two space in between and he uses large print (I almost wonder if this review has more text).
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
The cornerstone of Faith and Reason: The Bible
Anytime you get into a dispute or an argument it seems that if you are not on the same premise that you will find yourself talking past each other. The same goes when you get a group of people together to talk about things like religion and spirituality all to often the people come from to many viewpoints and cultures and so on and when one speaks the words seem to go right past the others.
That being said allow me to introduce who is writing here so that with some understanding the conversation can always continue. First off, allow me to say that this blog is not some misguided attempt to persuade you to be a Christian, I firmly believe in the power of the Word of God, I do not believe I have to persuade anyone. Even beyond that, I don't think I could persuade anyone if I wanted to. This stems from my belief that all faith, all true Faith in Christ comes from the working of the Holy Spirit, not by me or my apologetics text book, or anyone else for that matter. I do believe that Jesus Christ died for my sins and that He rose on the third day. I do believe that in Baptism my Old Sinful self has been drowned, has been buried with Christ and that God has created a New Creature in me which desires His Will but that I daily muck up only to return to the promise of my Baptism, so daily my sinful self is drowned and daily God does this work. This is my Faith, This faith is based on the Word of God written in scripture and understood with reason.
Of course not everyone sees that, some choose to reject God's Word, and in a way it is the only choice we can make, because Grace is a gift of God and Faith is a work of the Holy Spirit which means only non-faith, or the rejection of faith is OUR work. However, I think to understand me you need to understand this, you need to understand that I have faith in the Word of God, I have faith in the inerrancy of Scripture. However, I don't believe that all of this was done simply for me or for my sake, actually, I also believe it was done for you as well.
One might ask the question started in the last blog, "where does reason come into play" reason comes into play in all kinds of areas even in the reading and understanding of Scriptures themselves. The core Gospel message of what Christ has done for you is something that is not hard to understand. However, other parts of the scriptures without sound study and reason become impossible to grasp.
Allow me to explain further. A person can understand the Scriptures to some capacity without faith, it is true, one could understand the words on the page, even do some historical investigation. On the other hand one with very little reason but a lot of faith could very well understand sections of Scripture and know them very well. However, again I move to the title of the Blog, it is at the corner of using both a persons faith in God and His Word, along with reason which will open up the scriptures even further than either one without the other. This is not to say they will somehow have a full understanding, I am not sure if anyone outside of Christ has ever been able to FULLY understand everything scripture has to offer, it depth is of the deepest caliber.
That being said allow me to introduce who is writing here so that with some understanding the conversation can always continue. First off, allow me to say that this blog is not some misguided attempt to persuade you to be a Christian, I firmly believe in the power of the Word of God, I do not believe I have to persuade anyone. Even beyond that, I don't think I could persuade anyone if I wanted to. This stems from my belief that all faith, all true Faith in Christ comes from the working of the Holy Spirit, not by me or my apologetics text book, or anyone else for that matter. I do believe that Jesus Christ died for my sins and that He rose on the third day. I do believe that in Baptism my Old Sinful self has been drowned, has been buried with Christ and that God has created a New Creature in me which desires His Will but that I daily muck up only to return to the promise of my Baptism, so daily my sinful self is drowned and daily God does this work. This is my Faith, This faith is based on the Word of God written in scripture and understood with reason.
Of course not everyone sees that, some choose to reject God's Word, and in a way it is the only choice we can make, because Grace is a gift of God and Faith is a work of the Holy Spirit which means only non-faith, or the rejection of faith is OUR work. However, I think to understand me you need to understand this, you need to understand that I have faith in the Word of God, I have faith in the inerrancy of Scripture. However, I don't believe that all of this was done simply for me or for my sake, actually, I also believe it was done for you as well.
One might ask the question started in the last blog, "where does reason come into play" reason comes into play in all kinds of areas even in the reading and understanding of Scriptures themselves. The core Gospel message of what Christ has done for you is something that is not hard to understand. However, other parts of the scriptures without sound study and reason become impossible to grasp.
Allow me to explain further. A person can understand the Scriptures to some capacity without faith, it is true, one could understand the words on the page, even do some historical investigation. On the other hand one with very little reason but a lot of faith could very well understand sections of Scripture and know them very well. However, again I move to the title of the Blog, it is at the corner of using both a persons faith in God and His Word, along with reason which will open up the scriptures even further than either one without the other. This is not to say they will somehow have a full understanding, I am not sure if anyone outside of Christ has ever been able to FULLY understand everything scripture has to offer, it depth is of the deepest caliber.
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
It's all in the name.
As I was thinking of exactly what to title this blog, I thought of all kinds of catchy titles, but none of them seemed to fit. At the Corner of Faith and Reason came to mind and so I decided to go with it. The title alone can seem to fly in the face of what we as a modern culture have become. Typically when we meet people we tend to think in terms of one or the other, but never both. Either we find that reason is the answer to all our problems, science becomes the new god as we tear through every aspect of our lives in an attempt to make sense of our universe, our world, but most importantly our lives. To this end we work so hard so that everything has its place, always to find that the answers leave us with more questions, in many cases it is the rejection of faith that causes more chaos. On the flip side of this we have those who have completely rejected reason, they have completely rejected most science and decided to rely only on faith. Often times within our religious circles this is the way we look out into the world, we run away from anything that seems like "science" or "logic" and focus in on only faith, and only our faith at that. Looking at things in this way leads to the title of this blog. Reason without faith leads only to chaos and depression as a person feels increasingly pointless. On the other side we see people of faith that reject everything else who are often times very happy but along with this are also often times misguided, and on top of this they are often misguided in the one thing they hold most dear, their faith.
Now to make myself clear, when I say that they rely on faith alone, I am not talking of salvation. As a Christian and a Lutheran I firmly believe in the three sola's, sola scriptura, sola fide, and sola gratia. Which means I believe in Faith Alone for salvation, that is Faith in Jesus Christ that has been worked in us by the Holy Spirit. Instead, what I am referring to here are those who refuse to see how reason can help us to understand the scriptures rather than destroy it.
These are the two extremes as we come to the corner of faith and reason. Those who reject faith fail to see that faith is the very thing that makes their position possible which seems like a paradox, and in a way it is. At the very core of science is theory, and even beyond, things that cannot be proven at least not now, we simply do not have the tools, and in some cases maybe ever. These things end up becoming accepted and believed based on faith. On the other hand, those who rely on their faith and reject reason fail to realize that reason is in most of their activities and even in how they understand the Bible to begin with. In order to read you must be literate, you must understand the logic of words and writing, to understand speech you must be able to understand inflection, words...etc. Everything they know relies to some capacity on logic and reason. The Corner of Faith and Reason, both are needed, God created us to think, He created us to have reason, and through the Holy Spirit He creates faith, the right faith within us, so let us start the conversation where it should be, at the corner.
Now to make myself clear, when I say that they rely on faith alone, I am not talking of salvation. As a Christian and a Lutheran I firmly believe in the three sola's, sola scriptura, sola fide, and sola gratia. Which means I believe in Faith Alone for salvation, that is Faith in Jesus Christ that has been worked in us by the Holy Spirit. Instead, what I am referring to here are those who refuse to see how reason can help us to understand the scriptures rather than destroy it.
These are the two extremes as we come to the corner of faith and reason. Those who reject faith fail to see that faith is the very thing that makes their position possible which seems like a paradox, and in a way it is. At the very core of science is theory, and even beyond, things that cannot be proven at least not now, we simply do not have the tools, and in some cases maybe ever. These things end up becoming accepted and believed based on faith. On the other hand, those who rely on their faith and reject reason fail to realize that reason is in most of their activities and even in how they understand the Bible to begin with. In order to read you must be literate, you must understand the logic of words and writing, to understand speech you must be able to understand inflection, words...etc. Everything they know relies to some capacity on logic and reason. The Corner of Faith and Reason, both are needed, God created us to think, He created us to have reason, and through the Holy Spirit He creates faith, the right faith within us, so let us start the conversation where it should be, at the corner.
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