Eternal Perspectives

There is more over there.

I have a new post up at Lord of the Kingdom which I believe is worth reading (obviously, or I wouldn’t have written it!). Click the link above (or here) to be swept away.

(I wrote the following to a cyberfriend earlier today and am posting it for anyone who is interested.)

I did something a few days ago that I should have done months – or years – ago: I deleted all the blogs in the “Favorites” folder of my browser; I did this for essentially one reason: it was hurting my relationship with God.

For whatever reason or reasons, I just couldn’t take anymore. Everywhere I went I ran into blogs, posts, and comments where no one wanted to learn something “outside the box” – “the box” being their own preconceived notions, doctrines, biases, and theological categories/strangleholds. People were either like lap dogs drooling about what their “master” had just written or, conversely, like pit bulls attacking and defending themselves (or their masters) from those that didn’t see things exactly the same way. I can’t remember ever reading a blogger who responded to criticism by saying, “Wow, thanks! I never thought of that before. I’m going to have to think my way through this in light of what you just said and/or reminded me of. Praise God for the faithful wounds of friends!” Not once.

I also burnt out because it pained me to watch people flock to untrained, unqualified bloggers because (I don’t think I’m overstating this) they tickle their ears, i.e., they tell them what they want to hear. Definition of an Online Authority: someone who sees things the way I do. The Christian blogging community is like what Tolkien says of hobbits:

. . . they like to have [blogs] filled with things that they already knew, set out fair and square with no contradictions.”

At best, much of what I have encountered is little more than this sort of confirmation of biases; at worst, it’s the bickering and baiting befitting the Brandybucks, Bolgers, Bracegirdles, Burrowses, and – of course – the Sackville-Bagginses. It’s like having to eavesdrop at The Ivy Bush night after night after night and listening to them go on and on and on, ever reading and talking but never really learning anything. Has no one ever read Confucius? – “If one’s words are not better than silence, then one should keep silent.”

I’ve never been much of a hobbit nor have I ever wanted to be a hobbit. I’m far more a Ranger who seeks to protect those who do not know the danger just out of sight. Or, again citing Tolkien,

. . . [The hobbits] heeded less and less the world outside where dark things moved, until they came to think that peace and plenty were the rule of Middle-earth and the right of all sensible folk. They forgot or ignored what little they had ever known of the Guardians, and of the labours of those that made possible the long peace of the Shire. They were, in fact, sheltered, but they had ceased to remember it.”

(There is an obvious difference online, however, and it is this: there are already false sheep and false shepherds in the community. But they enjoy the popular support of the masses and will not be moved. Maybe this is part of the appeal of soft, shallow Christianity in the West these days. I really don’t know.)

It is probably not without significance that Rangers did not hang out with hobbits: the latter were not even aware of the existence of such Guardians and believed Gandalf – a premier Guardian – to be little more than someone who performed magic tricks. Gandalf did spend time with hobbits, of course, but Gandalf was an angel. I am not.

So I’m disappearing from this dreadful “cyber-Hobbiton” that has emerged online. I will, when I can, post at both my blogs but I don’t know that I’ll allow comments. I might allow some – such as you – to have authorial or even editorial access to the blogs: not everyone is bad for my spiritual health, after all – perhaps not even most. You, as always, are like a refreshing drink of cold water on a sweltering day. I must confess that I have kept a link in my Favorites to one blog only: yours. I’ll have to be careful even there, though, since you sometimes quote others who are terrible busybodies and who seem to enjoy stirring things up just for the sake of being different or driving traffic.

I hope this doesn’t sound judgmental. It isn’t supposed to be. It does, however, reveal who and where I am right now; I may be fooling myself and actually be quite arrogant, proud, and judgmental.

If so, so be it. I’ll let God deal with me on it.

Update: I have yielded ground, upon reflection, and allowed a total of six seven blogs to enter my Favorites folder. Three are composed by thoughtful, gentle, encouraging souls whose words are comforting; three are from individuals and groups who are often irritating or troubling, but to whom I listen because I need to: they are legitimate authorities in their fields (theology, philosophy, and sociology) and often poke me where I need to be poked. So I am not completely isolated or insulated after all.

The following excerpt is from Christian Theology by Millard Erickson. Like the post below, it too is reproduced without the publisher’s permission, awareness, or (hopefully) objection.

After rejecting postmillennialism, Erickson discusses the remaing two options:

This leaves us with a choice between amillennialism and premillennialism. The issue comes down to the biblical refrences to the millennium – are they sufficient grounds for adopting the more complicated premillennial view rather than the simpler amillennial conception? It is sometimes contended that the whole premillennial conception rests on a single passage of Scripture, and that no doctrine should be based on a single passage. But if one view can account for a specific reference better than can another, and both views explain the rest of Scripture about equally well, then the former view must certainly be judged more adequate than the latter.

“We note here that there are no biblical passages with which premillennialism cannot cope, or which it cannot adequatly explain. We have seen, on the other hand, that the reference to two resurrections (Rev 20) gives amillennialists difficulty. (more…)

The following is from an introductory-level systematic theology, Understanding Christian Theology, and is reproduced without the publisher’s permission, awareness, or (hopefully) objection.

Probably the most important issue in understanding prophecy is the question of whether it should be understood literally. One widespread assumption is that while ordinary Scripture can be interpreted in a literal manner, with terms retaining their natural meaning, prophetic portions of the Bible should be treated as a special case, with the literal or natural meaning no longer applicable.

“During the first two centuries the early church tended to interpret prophecy literally. Thus they expected Christ to return to earth to establish His kingdom and reign for a thousand years, after which new heavens and a new earth would be established.

“A school of theology that sprang up in Alexandria, Egypt, about A.D. 190 attempted to combine biblical interpretation with the idealism of the Greek philosopher Plato. This resulted in those leaders taking the Bible as an extensive allegory and not literally.

“Refuting this position, the early church was able to restore the church as a whole back to the normal, grammatical, historical, literal interpretation of the Bible. However, in the area of prophecy this was more difficult since there were prophecies that had not yet been fulfilled, and so the church was unsuccessful in completely defeating the nonliteral interpretation of prophecy. The result was that while North Africa had been committed to the premillennial position, when that generation of leaders died, the amillennial position moved in. It is significant that for centuries thereafter Christianity in northern Africa was sterile.

“The early church floundered somewhat in its approach to prophecy and its interpretation. This was brought to a head to some extent by the teachings of Augustine (354-430). He held that while the Bible should be interpreted in its normal, literal sense in most areas, in the area of prophecy it was not to be taken literally. This view was then adopted by the Roman Catholic Church, and unfortunately the Protestant Reformers also built on Augustine’s view instead of the views of the early church.

“Yet many of these same theological leaders said some prophetic events will be fulfilled literally. For example, the Roman Catholic Church believes in a literal hell, a literal Second Coming, and literal judgments from God, but it denies a literal, future millennial kingdom. Perhaps this is because in the millennial kingdom Israel will be an important factor, and since the church consists mainly of Gentiles there has been unconscious resistance to the idea that the Jews have an important future. This problem of denying a literal fulfillment of prophecy and especially a literal millennial kingdom still persists in many churches today.

“If a person does not interpret the plain statements of prophecy literally, there is no rule by which any consensus of meaning can be established; the existence of a wide diversity of interpretations shows the failure of this approach. As many as fifty different interpretations can be offered for just one passage in Revelation that could be easily understood if interpreted in its natural way.”

- p 1253

I’m preparing to teach a class on systematic theology in a week or two; hence, my productivity here has dropped significantly as I develop and modify materials for the class. The class is supposed to go for 50 weeks or so, but we’ll see.

Once the class starts, one of two things is likely to happen:

1. My writing here and at LOTK will dry up completely, or
2. The class will trigger thoughts and I’ll write about them.

I’m hoping for the latter. But who knows?

Stay tuned.

The New Living Translation Bible is no study Bible by any stretch of the imagination but it is not without its value. I read the following from 2 Cor 6 this morning and need to make it a daily prayer; I’ve emphasized the phrases that were especially striking to me:

3 We live in such a way that no one will stumble because of us, and no one will find fault with our ministry.
4 In everything we do, we show that we are true ministers of God. We patiently endure troubles and hardships and calamities of every kind.
5 We have been beaten, been put in prison, faced angry mobs, worked to exhaustion, endured sleepless nights, and gone without food.
6 We prove ourselves by our purity, our understanding, our patience, our kindness, by the Holy Spirit within us, and by our sincere love.
7 We faithfully preach the truth. God’s power is working in us. We use the weapons of righteousness in the right hand for attack and the left hand for defense.
8 We serve God whether people honor us or despise us, whether they slander us or praise us. We are honest, but they call us impostors.
9 We are ignored, even though we are well known. We live close to death, but we are still alive. We have been beaten, but we have not been killed.
10 Our hearts ache, but we always have joy. We are poor, but we give spiritual riches to others. We own nothing, and yet we have everything.

“Our hearts ache, but we always have joy.” This in particular merits more study. I’ll be back if I find something out about this seeming paradox.