Saturday, June 25, 2011

Today is a Sad Day for Us All

With a winning vote of 33 to 29, the Republican-led New York state legislature passed a bill legalizing gay marriage. Today is a sad day for us all. New York joins Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire, Iowa, and Washington D.C. as having legalized same-sex marriage, which according to the Wall Street Journal amounts to more than 10% of the U.S. population.

I called my best friend to chat and the news about New York was bound to come up. Here’s his reaction: “That’s sad, but I’m not at all surprised.” You know what, I happen to agree with him. We all saw this coming: with Cali’s Prop 8 overturned, a recent Gallup poll indicating for the first time a majority of Americans now support gay-marriage, and now rumors President Obama may officially lend his support, we saw this coming from a mile away.

Homosexual rights advocates claim legalizing same-sex marriage boils down to an issue of equality. They make the case that they are treated as sub-class citizens, lacking basic human rights … natural rights … and now compare their struggle to blacks in the 1960’s who fought to defend their civil liberties. But is this what’s really going on here?

Dr. Michael Brown rightly answers this question when he pointed out that there is a huge difference between blacks being denied access to public water fountains and forced to sit at the back of a bus, with the situation homosexuals find themselves in. Homosexuals have all the same rights before the law as heterosexuals have. What’s more, it is commonly accepted in businesses around our nation that sexual-orientation not be a means of discrimination. Finally, no respectable person is advocating for gays and lesbians to be mistreated on any level. So what “natural rights” do homosexuals claim they are denied? They would say they are denied the right to legally marry.

It is here that we have to take a step back and ask: what is marriage? Well, historically and before the law (I suppose I now need to say: the law in most states), marriage is a union between one man and one woman. How is it that the homosexual community claims they are denied equality before the law? Because they don’t have the right to get married? Actually, homosexuals have the right to marry – they can marry a member of the opposite sex. The homosexual advocate might respond, “Well that’s not what I want marriage to mean.” Oh, I see. Isn’t what you’re really after a redefinition of marriage? You want marriage to be whatever you want it to be, isn’t that right?

Though they, and other liberals, will adamantly deny it they know what kind of slippery slope this is. Because once you allow one group to redefine marriage to fit new parameters, whose to say another group doesn’t also have the right to redefine marriage into something else (i.e. polygamy, incest, bestiality)? If you think I’m off my rocker, consider that 30 years ago no one seriously considered a day when marriage could mean anything other than one man and one woman. What’s more, there are current court cases in Europe involving each of the aforementioned cases. It’s not that far of a stretch.

Please don’t misunderstand me, however, because the reason I and many other conservatives stand firmly in defense of “traditional” marriage has nothing to do with the fact that it is historical. Rather, it has everything to do with the true and living God of Biblical Christianity. The Creator of the universe also defined how human beings ought to live, including the institution of marriage:

4 And He answered and said, “Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning MADE THEM MALE AND FEMALE, 5 and said, ‘FOR THIS REASON A MAN SHALL LEAVE HIS FATHER AND MOTHER AND BE JOINED TO HIS WIFE, AND THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH’? 6 So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.” (Matthew 19:4-6, NASB).

As Christians we believe marriage to be between one man and one woman for life. To deny God’s view of marriage is to deny the Christian faith; there is no middle ground on this one.

For all the rigamaroo of how Christians really view homosexuals, please know that we do not hate them. We do strongly disagree with the homosexual lifestyle and especially a redefining of marriage. Though it is uncommon in this day and age to disagree with someone and not hate them, nevertheless, this is the truth. We are able to separate the beliefs and behaviors from the individual, and we are required by our faith to love the individual.

Our message is an all inclusive message that everyone everywhere is born having offended the one true God, the Creator of all things. This God is all-powerful, all-knowing, unchanging, and eternal (which means there was never a time when He did not exist, in fact, He existed before time itself). Unlike human beings, who only have one personality sharing one being, God’s one Being is shared by 3 distinct Persons: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Each of these divine Persons are distinct from one another so that each can say of Himself: “I,” and of the other two, “You.” These Persons share some functions – such as Creating the Universe – and also have unique functions, which you will how they play out in what follows.

The first human beings, Adam and Eve, broke God’s law and every person after them has been born bearing their guilt. To make it even worse, each of us continues to commit our own personal offenses against the Lord as we disobey His commands (sin). The consequences of this are extremely severe because God is a perfectly just and righteous Judge. He must punish sin. This includes all kinds of sin … including the sin of homosexuality. The punishment for sin is death, both physical and spiritual. This means that not only do we die physically, but we deserve to stand before God’s throne and face judgment and sent to Hell forever. Hell is described as the lake of fire where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. It is filled with sorrow upon sorrow as God removes His restraint from all sent there to suffer the mental and physical ramifications of sin. It is a terrible terrible punishment, but it is a just punishment.

For those who might argue that they weren’t aware of God’s requirements, the Bible also tells us that God wrote His law on our hearts, to be an integral part of humankind. Therefore we have no excuse before Him because we know what is right and what is wrong.

One final note of clarification before I move on: Why is homosexuality considered an offense to God? Because God has defined human sexuality and how it is to be lawfully expressed: between one man and one woman in marriage.

Thankfully, the message of Christians doesn’t end there. In eternity past, the Father chose from the mass of sinful humanity a particular group to demonstrate His grace and mercy upon. There was nothing in this group, no work or foreseen faith, that caused the Father to choose them, but is based solely upon His good pleasure. At the predetermined time, He sent His one and only Son (Jesus Christ) to earth in the form of a baby. This is an amazing moment in history 2,000 years ago because we have the Creator entering into His Creation. The Maker of all things entering into time and space. He humbled Himself and added the nature of humanity to Himself – so now He has 2 natures: divinity and humanity. He is fully God and fully man; one divine Person with 2 natures. The Holy Spirit miraculously caused the virgin Mary to conceive Jesus as a baby. Jesus was born sinless, and perfectly obeyed God’s law for the entirety of His life without sinning.

Around the age of 30 years old, Jesus began His earthly ministry lasting 3 years. He performed miracles, healing the sick, the lame and the blind – even raising the dead (a feat he would soon overcome Himself). Jesus also proclaimed the good news of the kingdom of God, which plainly meant that He would open up the doors to the forgiveness of sins. At the end of His ministry, Jesus was betrayed over to the Jewish authorities and crucified on a cross. Though he was innocent of all crimes he was murdered by His own creatures.

Jesus Christ’s death was no accident, however. In fact, it was predestined by God (Acts 4:27-28) to accomplish a specific purpose. What Jesus accomplished by dying on the cross was breathtaking: He acted as a substitute for the guilty sinners the Father chose in eternity past. This means that all the past, present and future sins of these particular sinners were paid in full in his body on the cross (1 Peter 2:24). The beautiful thing about this is that rather than these sinners being found guilty before God (which they would in-and-of-themselves) and cast into Hell for all eternity, they had their sins paid for by a perfect substitute: Jesus Christ.

How does this deliverance from sin become applied to sinners? The Scriptures are clear that it is not obtained by works of any kind. It is also clear that salvation is not achieved by outweighing your bad deeds with good deeds. Forgiveness of sins is found by trusting and believing solely in the work of Jesus Christ; it is by faith alone that sinners are saved from their sins. But there is another problem: sinners cannot even believe in God. The Bible actually states that sin has affected us so much that we lack the ability to have faith in (trust) God and His truth. “Dead in our trespasses and sin” is a Biblical description of how we are born into this world. What this means is that we are spiritually dead to the things of God because of our sinful nature – which is how all of us are naturally born. While it is fairly obvious, I’ll go ahead and state the obvious: dead people can’t believe in anything. Dead people can’t do much of anything =). Therefore it is necessary for God to spiritually resurrect us, also called being “born again.” This is a work of God, and indeed, must be a work of God because dead people can’t raise themselves from the dead.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise then to say that just as God resurrects sinners to newness of spiritual life that He also grants the ability to believe in Him. After being raised to spiritual life we then have faith in Jesus Christ to save us from our sins. This faith is the passive mechanism by which God imputes (or “considers to be ours”) the righteousness (goodness) of Christ to the sinner. The result is that the sinner is no longer standing before God with His own supposed righteousness, but rather as having considered to have Jesus’ righteousness as his own. The sinner is not made righteous, but is declared and considered to be righteous because of Christ. This again leaves salvation to be a work of God alone.

This declaration of God happens at a moment in time as God has predetermined for His elect people, by which He then secures and seals them with the Holy Spirit to be a guarantee of their salvation. The Holy Spirit is with believers in Christ until He returns to earth on the Last Day where He will destroy the universe with fire in judgment. On this day, every person who has ever lived will stand before the great throne of God and bow before Him, acknowledging that Jesus Christ is Lord of all. It is then that sinners are divided: the righteous from the unrighteous. The unrighteous stand before God with their own works, and woefully fall short of God’s just standard. They are sent to Hell to pay for their own sins forever in the pit of darkness. The righteous are considered righteous, not because of works they had done, but because they trusted in Christ to deliver them from their sins, by which Christ’s righteousness was imputed to them. They are ushered into the new heaven and new earth where they will worship and serve God forever and ever, fellowshipping with the saints, and will always shine as trophies of God’s grace.

My message to the homosexual community is this: today is the day of salvation. Your Creator made you in such a way that the natural and lawful expression of your sexuality is in the sacred bond of marriage between one man and one woman. Turn (repent) of your wicked ways, including your homosexuality, to the true God who alone has a way of salvation. He is the Creator and He knows what is best for you; He knows you even better than you know you. He has the right to do as He wishes, because the Lord is God.

This is not a hateful message, but it is one I believe, and it is the truth. As passionate as you are of your homosexual lifestyle, I am of my Christian lifestyle. We can agree to disagree, and we can peaceably live together. But please know that if you want to talk with me further about any of this, it would be my privilege and honor to discuss these important life-changing topics with you. For these issues are nothing short of matters of life and death.

Thanks for reading,

Casey

Sunday, June 19, 2011

If You’re Going to Believe in Predestination…

Back when I was first converted to belief in Calvinism, I didn’t have anyone good enough in my life to lock me up during my cage-stage (by “cage-stage” I mean the period of time when new Calvinists ought to be locked in a cage because they go nuts =)). It was a topsy-turvy time for me because of how drastic Calvinism was beginning to change my life. I needed to find a more theo-centric (God-centered) church, figure out how to preach the gospel Biblically, and how to worship God in a way that was honoring to Him.
One of my dear friends, who was along for the ride but still on the fence wanted to know why I thought Calvinism was important. I reiterated some of the points above, but also added that I knew if I was going to believe in predestination I was going to believe in it completely. What I meant by that was that I’m not like those who give God the ultimate credit for good in the world but don’t also attribute to Him as the ultimate reason for the existence of evil.

As an Arminian I grew accustomed to hearing (and wound up believing) arguments that God was involved in the world but that He created human beings in such a way that He allows us to have “free will.” Now, whatever was meant by “free will” was never made clear to me, but was clear is that our decisions were free in the sense that God was not forcing us to make them. This to me was the end-all-be-all argument against Calvinism because I reasoned to myself: how can a decision be free if you are predestined to do it? And therefore God cannot ultimately be responsible for our decisions, or the existence of evil.

Why the Arminian version of me didn’t likewise conclude that God was not then responsible for good things in the world due to free will, I can only attribute to my being terribly inconsistent. But the beautiful and utterly opposite quality of Calvinism is that it is so wonderfully consistent with itself and with the Bible.
What do the Scriptures teach with regard to man’s will in relation to God’s sovereignty? For starters, man does have a real will and he makes real decisions and choices. However, man’s decisions are not autonomously made outside of the will of God, but are instead subject to His sovereign decree. Naturally this brings us to a discussion of primary and secondary causes. The Arminian says of election, for example, that God chose us by looking down through the corridors of time, and based on foreseeing who would choose Him then reacts by electing them unto salvation. For the Arminian, the first cause and ultimate reason people are elected unto salvation must be as a direct result of man’s will. The Calvinist recognizes that God alone is the Creator, and when He created time itself this includes all the actions that occur in time. Therefore the reason God has knowledge of future events is not because He is passively receiving information, but because of His eternal decree of future events. For the Calvinist the first cause and ultimate reason people are elected must be attributed to God’s will and sovereign decree.

Fundamentally, Arminianism is lacking a Biblical understanding of precisely how sin has affected mankind. Since the Fall of Adam, the whole of a man is affected by sin, most notably the will of man. The Bible describes our will as being dead, and corpses … well, they don’t decide much of anything. This is why if God left the end result up to us we would all end up apart from Him because we are unable to make positive advancements in the gospel.

Since man’s will is not autonomous, it must be subject to God’s will. One or the other must be the case. A helpful example in the Scriptures is Acts 4:27-28: 27 For truly in this city there were gathered together against Your holy servant Jesus, whom You anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, 28 to do whatever Your hand and Your purpose predestined to occur.” (NASB). Here we see the choices of many people having been predestined by God. God’s decree is the first cause; man’s choices are the secondary cause that actualizes the events. Let me ask you: according to the text what is the ultimate cause of Jesus dying on the cross? Well, God’s predestined purpose. Here’s another question for you: were Herod, Pontius Pilate, the Gentiles and Jews all responsible for their involvement? Well, yes absolutely.

This is referred to as Compatibilist Freedom. God’s decree is the ultimate cause of everything with our choices being a part of that decree. God’s will predestined man’s decisions.

The Arminian might object: well doesn’t this mean our decisions aren’t real decisions since they’ve been predetermined? Only if for a decision to be considered a “real decision” it must be completely autonomous apart from God’s sovereignty – which is clearly not what the Bible teaches.

Doesn’t this make God the author of evil? Well, man is the one who authors, or actualizes, sin. Man is the secondary cause of human decisions. God’s decree for what would happen is the first cause.
My favorite part about this Biblical truth is that when evil things happen in the world, we know that they have meaning. We know this because God predestined them to occur, just like the death of His Son – which is the worst thing that has happened since the Creation of the world. Sometimes, God predestines things that He hates, but it is always for a purpose. While we don’t always know the full extent of why God predestines something, we know that it is for the good of those who love Him: 28 And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” (NASB).

And that is a comforting thought.
rustypth

Friday, June 17, 2011

Action and Paction this Summer

“I’m just doing the best I can to save you.” So goes my favorite line from my favorite movie of the summer (so far). Spielberg and JJ Abram’s “Super 8” went far beyond super in what they were able to deliver. The trailers I caught beforehand left me with suspicions about what the plot was going to be, and my guess was aliens/monsters. While I won’t provide any spoilers I will say that the plot was pretty much what you’d expect from Steven Spielberg. What made this movie was the phenomenal acting, done primarily from youthful actors and actresses.

Within minutes of the opening I found myself with a strong connection to the main character, his situation, and his family. As the scope enveloped new characters the connection expanded to include his best friend, amongst his larger circle of friends. Next arrived on scene the girl, and the beginnings of young romance.

There was action, paction, humor, serious reflection, family trials, times of bonding, love, and oppression. Things that make up the world in which we live; things that we all know and care about. This is the quality that makes Spielberg and Abrams brilliant at what they do. They understand what it is to make a human connection and they communicate that connection through film in a way that make other directors downright jealous.

Other movies are at the top of my list this summer, including Thor and X-Men, but neither of these movies compare to the strong connection one feels toward the heroes of Super 8.

Thor was more enjoyable overall for me, and much more relaxing to watch. At points it had me sincerely laughing aloud – although what I found even more humorous than the movie was the woman behind me who propelled over-the-top laughter at each and every funny moment. I was laughing at the movie then at the overly involved fan sitting behind me =). It was also a surprise to me how well Natalie Portman pulled off her character. She may have bumped herself back to the top of my favorite actresses list (at least tied for first). Be warned, the plot is slightly lacking, but if you go into it looking for an easy-going experience you’re bound to love it.

X-Men was fantastic. But would you expect to hear anything else from someone who grew up watching the cartoons? Compared to Thor, it took a lot more work for me to watch this film, probably because I am so familiar with all the characters and plotline. The choice of James McElroy as Xavier was a terrific match. Professor X and Magneto’s friendship was portrayed extraordinarily, which made their inevitable separation that much more meaningful. The movie left me wanting more, and I am counting down the years until the next installment to this X-Men reboot series.

Do yourself a favor though, if you have yet to see Super 8, see this before the rest of the summer blockbusters. You won’t regret it.

Thanks for reading,

rustypth

Saturday, June 4, 2011

All So One Person Isn’t Offended

My gorgeous wife pointed me to THIS article yesterday and we were both stunned. It’s graduation season for high schools across the country and one set of parents decided to file a lawsuit against a Texas school district to prohibit public mention by students of any religious discussion. The Judge, to my utter dismay, ruled that students are forbidden from using religious words including “prayer,” “amen” and “bow their heads.”

Why did the Schultz family go to such great lengths to make this fuss? In the words of the judge: so the parents and their son would avoid “irreparable harm.”

I would ask the reader to please open up the faculties of your mind and examine the goal of the Schultz family, the ruling of this federal judge, and then ask yourself: does this make sense? What is it the Schultz’s are trying to accomplish in actuality? Isn’t it the suppression of any public expression of religious belief and conviction? Do they believe they have a unique right to not be offended? Why suppress the rights of others to express themselves? The answer to the last question, ladies and gentlemen, is the core of this debate.

There have always been people who wish to silence religious opinions, especially those who profess faith in Jesus Christ as the only Savior of sinners. In fact, rather than be surprised by this reaction, we should be prepared for it. Doesn’t the Bible describe dead sinners as “suppressing the truth in unrighteousness” (Romans 1:18, NASB)? Their suppression … their holding down of God’s truth is not done innocently. They know full well that which is known about God because He made it plain to them (Romans 1:19). Therefore we are left with only one possible conclusion: their suppression of the gospel is purposeful and forceful.

Because people like the Schultz’s exist I can’t help myself but give constant thanks to the triune God in heaven for allowing us the privilege of the first amendment of the United States Constitution, which makes clear our right to say things people disagree with. No doubt there are creative and gifted minds at work to undermine the First Amendment – as evidenced by the Schultz family and various unjust judges – but it will take a lot of effort to explain away this powerful right granted to us:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

What has amazed me in all of this is the arrogance and pride that is naturally associated with the Schultz’s lawsuit. The only way they can justify taking away the God-given right of freedom of speech is if they truly believe they have a special right not to be offended. It is as though they believe they are superior in some way to religious people – especially towards Christians. How else can they make a case forbidding student citizens from freely expressing their own beliefs?

One wonderful thing the Enlightenment brought about was the recognition that since all people are created in the image of God and are equal to one another, they therefore have basic rights before one another [although I consent this idea was not always expressed or defended the way I now do].

Knowing the evil intent that exists within many in our own free nation, we need to be prepared for the reality that our rights may be taken away from us. On that day we will then answer the Schultz family and the unjust judge, like Peter and the Apostles: “We must obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:29). In the meantime, may the Lord grant to us grace to act as salt and light to preach the gospel to a lost and dying world.

Thanks for reading,

Case