The Golden Calf

Update:



Check out Glen's post:

http://christthetruth.wordpress.com/2008/10/31/not-a-great-image/

How much more revealing can you get...

If God were your Father...

This still makes my blood boil in so many different ways...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7706977.stm

Hmm...

Guess Lambeth didn't turn out the way he hoped...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7689186.stm

The earthly-focused church

When I read things like this...
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(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7430684.stm)

Climate deniers 'are like Fritzl'

People who fail to tackle climate change are acting like an Austrian man who locked his daughter in a cellar for 24 years, an Anglican bishop has said.

The Bishop of Stafford, Gordon Mursell, wrote in a parish letter that not confronting global warming meant people were "as guilty as" Josef Fritzl.

It meant future generations would be left in a futureless world, he said.

Mr Mursell added he was not accusing people of being child abusers but shocking analogies were needed.

In a letter featured in parish magazines in the Diocese of Lichfield, the bishop wrote: "Josef Fritzl represents merely the most extreme form of a very common philosophy of life: I will do what makes me happy, and if that causes others to suffer, hard luck.

"In fact you could argue that, by our refusal to face the truth about climate change, we are as guilty as he is - we are in effect locking our children and grandchildren into a world with no future and throwing away the key."

He said people were "right to be disgusted at these crimes" but that "mere disgust is too convenient".

"There are lessons for all of us to learn," he added.

'Monstrous crime'

But on Monday, Mr Mursell told BBC Radio 4's Today programme he did not wish to shock people unnecessarily and was not "trying to imply that people who ignore climate change are child abusers".

"I am simply trying to use an analogy to get people to wake up to the consequences of what we are failing to do, because if we don't there won't be a future for our children either."

He said it was hard to imagine a more "monstrous crime" than Fritzl's and that was why he chose to use it as an analogy.

He added: "Could you not argue that if there is no future for our children and grandchildren, we will have been guilty of committing the most appalling crimes as well?

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... verses like this come to mind:
(ever so slightly out of context of course) =)

Matthew 18:6 Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.

(referring to the author I mean!)

The Word of God is no "Common Word" - Part 3

(also from Scrivener's blog)

In talking about Allah as an idol the question comes ‘If Allah is a false god, does that make him nothing? something? a demon?’ I think Paul might say yes to all three questions:

“So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world and that there is no God but one. 5 For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many “gods” and many “lords”), 6 yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.” (1 Cor 8:4-6)

Idols are nothing says Paul. But then he goes on to say they are not just called ‘gods’ but are gods. And then in chapter 10 he says pagan sacrifices are offered to ‘demons’. (1 Cor 10:20).

So are idols nothing? something? or demons? It seems like Paul is saying ‘all three.’ How can that be? Well it’s important that we take seriously the language of ‘gods’ (little ‘g’) and ‘demons’. (Ex 15:11, 1 Kings 8:25, Deut 10:17, Ps 82:1; Deut 32:16-21 - thanks Otepoti for these).

I think false gods are demonic. Their ‘nothingness’ is not a non-existence but rather an ontological lack. They are like a gaping hole - a nothing where there should be a something. A hole is not non-existent but it does have its existence in being a deficiency, a denigration. They are not unreal or non-existent. They are just ‘nothing.’ Their whole power and being is in being a negation.

Think of how John describes light and darkness. Light is something. Darkness is not something - certainly not like Light is something. Darkness is not unreal or non-existent but it still depends on being not light. On one hand it is a terrible power (a fearful something). But in another sense it is nothing - its whole existence is an existence in negation. I think idols are like this.

But again this is not to say the forces behind these dumb idols are impotent. Far from it - they have a fearsome dark power. Think of Deut 32

“16 They made him jealous with their foreign gods and angered him with their detestable idols. 17 They sacrificed to demons, which are not God–gods they had not known, gods that recently appeared, gods your fathers did not fear. 18 You deserted the Rock, who fathered you; you forgot the God who gave you birth. 19 The LORD saw this and rejected them because he was angered by his sons and daughters. 20 “I will hide my face from them,” he said, “and see what their end will be; for they are a perverse generation, children who are unfaithful. 21 They made me jealous by what is no god and angered me with their worthless idols.”

Here these gods ‘recently appear’. They are ‘no god’ and ‘worthless idols’ but nonetheless they are ‘gods’ - ‘demons’ even. Can we say then that objects of worship that are not God are nothing in themselves but become spiritual realities when worshipped. Demonic forces (which, again, are ‘dark’ forces - having their being in negating what is True) inhabit dumb idols when we invest them with power. When we seek life in what is dead it is not a neutral spiritual issue - the powers of darkness are involved.

So yes, idols are nothing. And something. And demons.

What say you?

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1. yemsee - an ontological lack! =)

   yea darkness which is a creation of the Lord - Is 45:7
   is a darkness that can be felt.. yet it is simply there to be cast out, to be destroyed?

   perhaps not a nothingness but an inevitability of destruction?
   or a uselessness, like a black hole kind of thing, that seeks only the destruction of others?

   since the term gods - i’m assuming derived from Elohiym - which denotes not just strong and mighty, but strong and mighty in the shepherd sense, i.e. to save
   so they are gods that are not gods?

   Christ even calls men (to whom the word of God came) gods - John 10/Ps 82 anyway, who will die like men - and Scripture cannot be broken
   

   
   

2. Dan - Agreed.

   I read a very interesting book by Mike Taylor on ’spiritual warfare’. He made a case that in some cases gods that appear to be living and active are like ‘PO Boxes’ for demons who are decieving people.

   He argued the same for stuff like ‘hauntings’ and ‘ghosts’

   I think this fits with your ‘ontological lack’.

   
   
3. yemsee -

   speaking of ontological lacks..

   like the church is ‘everything in everyway’ (or all in all)

   as in everything outside of Christ is destined for destruction and in some sense is nothing?

   
   

4. Glen - Dan, I like the PO box illustration. Very helpful. So does Mike Taylor speak about Allah at all? I wonder what order of demon picks up Allah’s mail.

   Where was I reading recently that Luther thought Allah (or at least Islam) was the beast out of the earth of Rev 13. Was it you?

   Also, having used ‘ontological lack’ I don’t think I like it any more. But yes, it’s trying to convey the parasitic nature of evil. Darkness is real but it’s real as an absence of something - light. In that context all outside the light that the Triune God *is* is darkness. Cf 1 John 1:5-7

   “God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. 6 If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. 7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.”

   Or John 1:4-5:

   4 In him was life, and that life was the light of men. 5 The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood/overcome/taken in it.

   We should be struck by just how weird it is that there *is* such a thing as darkness given who Christ is. But nonetheless there is this thing called darkness that somehow exists as the negation of Christ in His world. I dunno. I keep just making the same simple point but I can’t quite see beyond to how to co-ordinate these truths or see where they lead.

   Happy Good Friday by the way.

The Word of God is no "Common Word" - Part 2

(copied from Glen Scrivener's blog)

Is the Father of Jesus the God of Muhammad?

My answer? Of course not. Here are some points in no particular order:

1) Let’s let Allah define himself:

“He does not beget nor is he begotten.” (Sura 112)

The Quran defines the god of Islam explicitly as not the God of the Bible. Let’s respect Muslims enough to let them define who their god is. He is not the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We honour their faith by speaking of Allah as another god - that is how Allah defines himself. From our perspective we cannot speak of Allah as anything other than an idol - anything else fails to take Muslim faith on its own terms.

2) Can anyone really imagine the prophets addressing the Edomites, Philistines etc saying ‘Yahweh is very much like Baal/Molech/Asherah’??! Never!

The question for the nations is not ‘Do you believe in God?’ But ‘What god do you believe in?’ Whether you’re evangelizing in north Africa or north America “God” cannot be assumed. In fact “God” is the least obvious word in our evangelistic encounters. How on earth do we get to a position where people make it the point of commonality!

.

At this point a commenter replied that the ‘Baal’ analogies do not work because Allah is thought to be ‘the transcendent Creator’ and not simply a power within the world. He claimed that a Muslim convert would have to repent of many beliefs but not his belief in ‘God as infinite transcendent Creator.’

To this I replied…

3) We don’t say “Baal is called ‘Lord’ and receives worship therefore no convert from Baalism needs to repent of their notions of Lorship or worship.” Of course they will have to repent of all of this. So then why would anyone claim that a belief in the ‘infinite transcendent Creator’ is of a different order? Fundamentally I see this as committing two errors. It is to say…

A) ‘Transcendent Creator’ is more foundational to God’s being than His triunity.

B) The Muslim means roughly the same as the Christian when speaking of the ‘Transcendent Creator’

I strongly disagree with both.

A) i) If God is transcendent Creator you’ve made Him dependent on creation.

A) ii) It is a position that leads to Arianism. Athanasius complained that Arius’ error was to conceive of God as Unoriginate and then to consider trinity. On this trajectory he could never affirm the homo-ousios of One whose being was ‘ek tes ousia tw patri‘ (out of the being of the Father). Similarly if your conversation with a Muslim begins with some ‘bedrock’ notion of transcendence before introducing them to Jesus it will necessarily mean introducing them to one who is less than the transcendent one. You’ll have shot yourself in the foot from the very beginning. Let’s not define Jesus out of full deity before we’ve even begun. We therefore must not begin on the Arian trajectory of affirming transcendent Creator first - Jesus will not come out very well from such a starting point!

B) Only the God who exists as Himself in relations of otherness can actually have a relationship with creation in which we can know Him as transcendent. ‘Transcendent Creator’ is dependent on trinity (not the other way around). The Muslim account of transcendence is completely confused (as is every unitarian account). Allah is a prisoner of his ‘transcendence’ - by definition cut off from any relationship with it (whether transcendent or immanent).

‘Transcendent Creator’ is neither the foundational nor a shared understanding of the living God. And it’s not desirable that it should be.

.

At this point my interlocutor (rightly) suspected I was denying the possiblity of true philosophical reflection on divinity apart from Christian revelation. He claimed I was being overly Barthian ;-) I replied with these points…

4) In terms of theological method, “Christ alone” is not a Barthian novelty! It’s difficult to think of a more crucial verse in the history of the church for theological method than Matthew 11:27: “No-one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him.”

To this let’s add John 1:18; 14:6 and Colossians 1:15. To this let’s add the continual Scriptural witness that we are blind, dead, enemies of God unable to know Him apart from His Word to us. (e.g. Ps 14:2; 2 Cor 4:4; Col 1:21). These plain and central truths cannot be evaded by crying ‘Barthian’!

5) Nicea’s “The Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth” was a deliberate and crucial choice of order. Triunity precedes creation. Of course it does - unless we want to define God as dependent upon creation.

6) Even Jews who have the Scriptures do not know the Father if they reject the Son. (cf ALL OF JOHN’S GOSPEL!)

7) To go over a previous point - there are tremendous Arian dangers of considering ‘Creator’ more foundational than trinity. Once you have assured your Muslim friend that she really does know God and that the God she knows is definitionally the infinite, transcendent Creator, do you really think you’ve helped her towards faith in Jesus of Nazareth?? Have you not just given her every reason to reject divine honours (thus defined) being attributed to Christ. Won’t she simply thank you for confirming her own doctrine of God which by definition precludes Jesus from being anything more than a prophet??

Athanasius rightly said ‘the only system of thought into which Jesus Christ will fit is the one in which He is the starting point.’

The Rock upon which we build is nothing and no-one else but Christ. Let’s be clearer on this whether we’re evangelizing Muslims or our friends in the pub. They do not know God and besides - why would we want to confirm for them a sterile, non-relational doctrine of God in the first place?? Let’s tell them, ‘The god you had thought existed was not God - let me tell you about the living God who is unlike anything you’ve imagined. His name is Jesus and He blows your god out of the water!’

Seven times seven...

In the 6th century the Roman Catholic church listed 7 deadly sins & their punishments in purgatory: (Wikipedia article here)

Pride - Broken on the wheel
Envy - Put in freezing water
Gluttony - Forced to eat rats, toads, and snakes
Lust - Smothered in fire and brimstone
Anger - Dismembered alive
Greed - Put in cauldrons of boiling oil
Sloth - Thrown in snake pits

(I find the last one quite funny... since the punishment/solution to sloth is to make you run around like crazy)

Recently one of the leadership has suggested another 7 more updated 'deadly social sins':

Environmental pollution

Genetic manipulation

Accumulating excessive wealth

Inflicting poverty

Drug trafficking and consumption

Morally debatable experiments

Violation of fundamental rights of human nature

Though not official, these are my suggestions their equivalent punishments in purgatory:

Having a plastic beer ring around your neck
Constantly progressing through the 'evolutionary cycle'
Pouring molten gold down your throat
Being eaten by pigs and dogs
Being constantly chucked off a tall building
Turned into a guinea pig and made to run on a giant hamster-wheel
Constantly having to watch Barney & Teletubbies while eating British food

The Word of God is No "Common word"

Ever read this?

A Common Word

Basically a letter written from Muslims to Christians emphasizing how we have a common ground to love people together....

What's really surprising is the number and names of Christians who agree with the document (for whatever reason) (all signatories can be found at the website)

A response from the Barnabas Fund
(supporting persecuted Christians - many in Muslim countries)

Even better.... John Piper on YouTube

Money... money... money....

Cut & Pasted from Dan Hames blog (works for Mike Reeves)

Two brief videos to watch.

Brian Houston of Hillsong promoting his book 'Money'. Compare with...

John Piper against the prosperity gospel.

Well worth watching.