New Book on Decision-Making

Tim Challies has a review of what seems like an excellent book on decision-making here.

My own articles on the subject can be found here. The first two are commentary on culture, the latter two are specifically about decision-making.

Review: Keller's "The Reason for God"

How should I put this: this is simply the best, modern, popular level defense of the Christian faith.

Keller addresses the issues pertinent to our current situation: how can I know things? Why's there so much suffering? Why's there so much sin in the church? Does Christianity explain what I see and experience?

You have to think while reading this book; but I don't think that you need knowledge about Christian theology before reading it. You just have to pay attention and use your head.

Now, that might be asking too much... but thank God that he is sovereign, and he is as much the redeemer of the mind as he is of the heart.

I'm curious - if you've read this book - is it too intellectual for someone without a Christian background?

If you're a Christian and you haven't read it, and you want to be able to give a cogent reason for the faith delivered to us - read this book.

The End of the Shack

I actually haven't reached the end of "The Shack."

I've read a tad further - and I've found that the author tells us that God is not angry, nor is he wrathful.

Really.

I think I can show that he's wrong. Click here.

That's 51 verses about the wrath of God, by the way. And I didn't even touch his anger, fury, or any other word for wrath.

Or hate. How about hate. "The LORD tests the righteous,but his soul hates the wicked and the one who loves violence." (Psalm 11:5)

I wonder if Young knows that he's shredded the heart and soul out of the cross of the Christ, my great savior and my God.

"But he was wounded for our transgressions;
he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace...

"Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him;
he has put him to grief..."
(Isaiah 53:5, 10)

I believe I'm done with this book. Why continue in it? Young creates idols, assaults the sufficiency of Scripture, tears down the incarnation of the Son of God, and maligns God's character - and thus the cross - and the gospel.

I know he means well. And I believe he's my brother. I pray that someone close to him will correct him and bring him under the authority of Scripture and of a Scripture-loving local church.

John, Stick to Hunting and Fishing.

Eldredge has just released a new book.

It's about praying for guidance. He says stuff like, 'God, should I go fishing today?' And, according to him, God answers.

I for one, believe the Holy Scriptures are sufficient for every good work. And I don't see this sort of behavior or guidance in them. I see meditation on God's word, the Spirit applying it to our very core beings.

Blogger Tim Challies cites theologian Sinclair Ferguson:

"Christians in an earlier generation rarely thought of writing books on guidance. There is a reason for that (just as there is a reason why so many of us today are drawn to books that will tell us how to find God's will). Our forefathers in the faith were catechised, and they taught catechisms to their children. Often as much as half of the catechism would be devoted to an exposition of the answers to questions like the following: Question: Where do we find God's will? Answer: In the Scriptures. Question: Where in particular in the Scriptures? Answer: In the Commandments that God has given to us.

Why were these questions and answers so important? Because these Christians understood that God's law provides basic guidelines that cover the whole of life. Indeed, in the vast majority of instances, the answer to the question 'What does God want me to do?' will be found by answering the question: 'How does the law of God apply to this situation? What does the Lord require of me here in his word?'"

Here's an article about decision-making. Here. Click it. You know you wanna.

Why Do Good People Suffer?

Or in other words, why, if God is 'good,' does 'evil' exist?

This is the question "The Shack" seeks to answer. I don't know how it answers it yet. But I figured I'd give you four answers God gives.

1) Shut up. (That is, don't question God. He's God, and you're not.) (Job 38 through the end and Romans 9)

2) Evil exists to show the glory of God in his love (Romans 9, Romans 5:12-21, John 9:2-3, Matthew 11:25-26).

3) Wait - God's going to fix it! (Which is a good thing for those he's forgiven - bad for those he hasn't.) (ALL over the prophets, psalms, etc.)

4) Suffering exists as the beginning of punishment for unbelievers, and as holiness-producing discipline for believers (Luke 13:1 and following; 1 Peter 4:12 and following; Hebrews 12:1-10 ish).

If you want more ref's, I can grab 'em.

It's too bad that people aren't willing to just say - 'hey, what's the Bible say on this?' I shouldn't ask my pastor or someone to explain what the bible says - I should read some stupid book that denigrates God. But hey, it's written well and makes me feel good.

A friend of mine coined the term 'spiritual masturbation' to refer to such things. He's right. And I'd apologize for the ugliness of the term, except for the fact that what is being done in creating and worshiping an idol is worse.

More Shack-alicious and First Impressions of Blue Like Yazz...

I've taken it on myself to start reading pop-Christian literature. I usually don't because, well, there's a lot of really good Bible teaching stuff out there.

Take that as you will.

Anyway, I watched Driscoll on "The Shack" last night, and was pleasantly encouraged to see his analysis was very similar to my own. One verse he drew on that I forgot about was this:

God has said in Romans 1:22-23, "Claiming to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things."

Whoops.

Whoops seems a light word when that 'mistake' results in the wrath of God, actually (from 1:18 and 2:1-11).

So I've started reading Blue Like Jazz. First impressions:
1) Miller has an amazing ability to write conversationally.
2) These conversations, so far, have done a great job pointing out the sin of man. He's done an excellent job showing how universal it is. He's done a great job showing how it's rooted in the self - in self-pleasure. He's done a great job showing that infects even the good things we do. He's done a great job in showing that everyone is sinful. Awesome.
3) He does a lot of needless ripping on nameless, descriptionless 'fundamentalists.' I'm not sure that's edifying or loving to certain people in the Church.
4) He makes a big deal out of being a political liberal. Eh, frustrating. I'd never say that being a Christian means you have to vote Republican (at least without some argument from Scripture), but at the same time, I don't like it. I think ALL Christians should have some sort of biblical political ethic - a biblical basis for what they think government should be and how we should interact with it - before engaging in such speech. Both Republicans and Democrats. Let's elevate God's words, not our unfounded opinions. Again, that goes for you all on both sides. Knock it off.

Legalism and "The Shack"

I love the Gospel. I love safeguarding the Gospel. And so when it comes to Gospel-attacking doctrines – those of Rome, some New Perspective on Paul ideas, the replacing of the Gospel with an experience of ‘personal relationship’ without doctrine in some of the emergent or seeker-oriented movements – I get mad.

And I think there’re two good reasons to get mad about that. First, those things are assaults on who the God of all glory has revealed himself to be. They’re attacks on God himself. Second, get the Gospel wrong, and you send people to hell. (Galatians 1:8, 9; Galatians 5:4; Romans 9:30-10:4; 1 John 4:1-3, etc.)

They just go a little more comfortably. And with a few more ‘spiritual experiences’ under their belt.

That said, people like me, including me, can often get really legalistic about doctrine. What I mean by that is this: we have a situation in which God has spoken into the world. We are to believe what he says. To refuse to believe what he has said is rebellion.

So wrong doctrine isn’t merely the result of poor exegesis – it’s the result of sin.

That said, some of us doctrine hounds expect the intensity and soundness of our arguments to change people . We want to shake their shoulders and shout, “Why don’t you GET it???”

We forget two things. 1) Assuming the person’s a Christian, they stand forgiven before God. 2) Again, assuming the person’s a Christian, we’re forgetting that the Holy Spirit is working on their hearts in varied degrees in different areas.

And so we can get legalistic. Expect perfection out of people, etc. That’s bad. We need to treat people in light of Jesus’ sovereignty. Sometimes I forget that.

So when I picked up the new book “The Shack,” having heard about it, I was ready to give it the benefit of the doubt. I was ready to find Scripturally sound, edifying ideas expressed in it. Did I?

If you don’t know the story, a man’s kid dies, and he gets an invitation from God to have a chat. And the first thing that we see is that this guy had gone to seminary, where he learned that God had stopped speaking with the Scriptures - which is CLEARLY wrong according to what the book says.

Now, I don’t know why that mention is even there. Why the need to rip on people who are trying to learn and teach God's word? Why is there a need to tear down those who know more about the Bible than we do?

And then why the need to take a pot-shot at people who believe the canon of Scripture is closed - and that it alone is authoritative and sufficient for Christian life? It’s not necessary in the plot. I’m confused.

Well, and mad. I do think the Bible is sufficient (2 Timothy 3:16-17). So does God, by the way.

So the dude goes to the shack and meets the Trinity. All three persons of which are manifested physically. God the Father’s a black woman, and the Holy Spirit is an Asian woman who reminds me of Lucy Liu.

So here’s the beginning of the big problem with the book – it’s an attack on the nature of God. John 1:18 and 1 John 4:12 both say “No one has ever seen God.” 1 Timothy 6:16 says that no one has ever seen – nor can they see – God the Father. That’s because, as Jesus said in John 4:24 – ‘God is Spirit.’

So first, The Shack represents God in a way that Scripture does not represent him. Not only does this strongly imply that the picture of God that Scripture gives isn’t good enough, it also paints a picture of God that isn’t Scriptural.

The second commandment of the ten is that there should be no images of God (Ex. 20:4). Paul preaches in Acts 17:29 that we should not think of God as something we could fashion or imagine. Remember: the ancient Israelites were punished in the desert not because they worshiped some random calf god – it was because they made an image and called it God – the LORD (Ex. 32:5). And God had not represented himself that way.

There were consequences from the hand of God the Almighty. How is creating a picture of God that Scripture does not give us not idolatry? This is serious business. Read Deuteronomy 4-5. Deuteronomy 9:12-14. Psalm 106:19-20 tells us why this is so significant – God has showed us how glorious he is by what he has spoken in his word (see also Deut 4) – to make an image is to rob him of his glory.

That’s kind of a ‘duh’ statement. Images exist to show off the things of which they are images!

So a false image results in false glory. And false glory is a false god, results in false worship, and is altogether a different religion.

And if God is physical, then we’re talking Mormonism - or a very similar heresy. Well, except for the Mormons’ (recently recanted) racism. And at least the Mormons get it right and refer to God as masculine since, well, the Bible does.

So yeah, there’s that. So then there was a discussion in the book of how limited human freedom really is – by circumstances, environment, experiences. Good insight. I was ready for good at this point...

And then – THEN – there was an orthodox definition of the Trinity in these pages! I was surprised! So pleasantly. I think I praised God.

And then the author proceeded to mock that definition as useless. I don’t know if he’s ignorant of the fact that my brothers and sisters in Christ of old died for that definition. I don’t know if he’s ignorant of the fact that that definition comes out of Scripture. And so he’s calling something Scripture teaches about who God is – useless.

I do hope this isn’t intentional.

Somewhere along the line, Jesus clumsily drops and ruins dinner. Whoops. Then the ‘Father’ and ‘Spirit’ make fun of him.

“And let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.” (Heb. 10:28, 29)

Hm.

There’s something that’s really insidious that this book implies, though. Consider these Scriptures: John 1:14; John 1:18; John 14:1-11; 2 Corinthians 4:4; Colossians 1:15; Hebrews 1:1-3.

Jesus himself is the image of the Father. He is the full revelation of all of the glory of God. The New Testament is the record of his words and activities on earth, and as Hebrews says, the consummation of God revealing himself to humanity (until the end – 1 John 3:1-2).

To commend to us – to even suggest – another image of the Father – is an affront to the sufficiency of Jesus, an insult to the incarnation – and at the very least, a misunderstanding of who Jesus even is – and thus what knowing God is.

I’m sure the author didn’t intend this; but this book is destructive. It replaces the Father with an idol, true worship with false, and the sufficiency of Jesus with – the book "The Shack" itself. It is at best dangerous for our knowledge of God and true worship, and at worst, heresy.

I haven’t yet finished the book. My wife’s a little ahead of me in it. She tells me the author assaults the idea of hierarchy in the Trinity. No big surprise. Not heresy, but wrong.

I haven’t yet got to the author explaining the problem of evil, which is the purpose of the book. If his explanation is anything like his picture of God, then I fear it. Perhaps at a later date I’ll throw out there the Bible’s answers to the problem of evil.

This book raises the question – is Christian fiction okay? What about Pilgrim’s Progress? What about The Chronicles of Narnia?

There’s a big difference. Those two works are allegories. They do not purport to represent God as he actually is; but rather, give analogies for understanding things expressed explicitly in Scripture. They do not presume to speak for God.

Please, do not waste your time with this book. Spend your time with Scripture – and see how God reveals himself – and reveals himself fully – in the person, the man Jesus Christ. Know him thus, and worship him.

AGH! One more thing!!!!

That is to say, one more thing you have to do: read John Piper's book The Future of Justification: a Response to N.T. Wright.

NT Wright is a Bible scholar who has done a great job responding to the Jesus seminar, teaching on Biblical theology, and teaching about the resurrection - and undermining (though not denying) the gospel of grace. Piper, in a kind, clear fashion evaluates and critiques Wright.

Though if you haven't run across people that are denying the doctrine of the imputation of Jesus' righteousness through faith - then, this book will probably be of no use to you.

And if you don't know what the imputation of Jesus' righteousness is, then read this. If you don't understand imputation, you need to.