Pete's Blog

C.J. Mahaney asked Dr. Wayne Grudem a few questions and posted them with Grudem's answers (it's four parts: 1, 2, 3 and 4). One of the questions that Mahaney asked was what area of ministry Grudem was typically most tempted to feel discouraged in. At the end of his answer (I think this was the question that Grudem gave the longest answer to), he told this story (it's in the fourth part):

One event that still puzzles me concerns my book Evangelical Feminism and Biblical Truth (2004). I had been involved in the controversies over biblical manhood and womanhood for over 20 years at that point, and during that time I had compiled a list of 118 objections that egalitarians (evangelical feminists) had made to the biblical teachings on men's and women's roles in marriage and the church. I then researched and wrote detailed answers to those objections, and added a number of appendices that could not easily be found anywhere else, key documents on the controversy over men's and women's roles. Many evangelical leaders gave strong endorsements to the book.

I had hoped the book would provide a final answer to the manhood/womanhood controversy in the evangelical world, but instead I don't think it had much impact or visibility, due to some mistakes that were made so that it was not sent out for review to influential journals, and I didn't find this out until over a year later, when it was too late for reviews. I believe that God is still sovereign, and in his wise providence he will yet use this for good, but I don't understand it at this point. I leave it in the Lord's hands.

I'm very familiar with the book, so I know how significant it is for the book not to have been peer-reviewed. I remember listening to him talk about the book in 2003 with Mark Dever and sound very excited about it almost being done (though I only listened to the interview for the first time within the past year since I wasn't even a Christian when they had the interview). The book's free online and I refer to it whenever I have a question about the gender controversy going on within evangelicalism. It's super readable, and though scholarly, totally accessible to readers of all brands and types. Imagine working months and months, and years and years on something, and then seeing nothing come of it. I thank God that Dr. Grudem found enough encouragement in Romans 8:28 to go on.

I pray that I learn that when things don't go as I plan, that God is still sovereign, and that He means it for my good.

(HT: Justin Taylor)

Kim Riddlebarger (a guy, not a girl), a pastor who's best known (which is a relative statement since relatively few know him) for his work studying eschatology, in particular, defending amillennialism, wrote a funny blog entry today. He comments that Rick Warren has released some new Purpose Driven materials, and quotes Warren as saying that they arrived just in time for the financial crisis for people to find hope in the tough times. Dr. Riddlebarger then implies that it's a money grab.

Anyway, Riddlebarger satirises Warren's announcement, writing an ad for his own books. There's one line in there which I think is hilarious. Here's an excerpt from the satire, and I've emphasized the parts which contribute to his great line:

In these days of economic uncertainty, a proper view of the end-times is a must. To help you navigate these perilous times the Riddleblog reminds you of the two books written by its proprietor. If these uncertain times have you worrying about your job, retirement savings, and 401K, you need to buy both my books (multiple copies to give to all your friends and family) which will help you know what is going on, and will also ensure that I don't have to worry about these things. [Emphasis and hyperlink added.]

If you read the full post, you'll notice that Dr. Riddlebarger comes down very hard on Rick Warren. Just so you know that I wouldn't drink Jim Jones' kool-aid (i.e., that I don't automatically believe or agree with everything certain people say), I'd like to point out that Dr. Riddlebarger's approach doesn't seem to demonstrate Christian love. Rick Warren might have a low view of repentance (at least in application, probably not in word) and he might have a differing view of God's sovereignty than my own, but I don't have any reason to doubt that he's genuinely interested in the salvation of lost souls through his materials. If Dr. Riddlebarger does, he doesn't present it in this post. I think that he should give Warren the benefit of the doubt. (I made my thoughts aware on his blog post.)

--

I highly recommend a lecture that Dr. Riddlebarger delivered where he gives a couple of the best arguments for amillennialism. He also runs through a few of the objections that come up from this system. The lecture's about an hour long and then there's about ten minute's worth of questions and answers. He starts off with a long introduction, talking about the dangers of dispensationalism, the existence of popular dispensationalist materials and scholarly dispensationalist materials, his own books, and other stuff. It's good, maybe a bit repetitive, but if you only want to hear him talk about amillennialism, start at 23:43.

An anagram is a word or phrase formed by reordering the letters of another word or phrase. Here are some neat ones I found on a website:

1. Dormitory ↔ Dirty Room;
   
2. Listen ↔ Silent;
   
3. Astronomers ↔ Moon starers;
   
4. George Bush ↔ He bugs Gore.
   

There are others, but they're not quite as good.

Hemant Mehta (whom I've referenced once before on my blog) posted yesterday about prayer happening at President-elect Obama's inauguration. He started off saying:

A couple weeks ago, Barack Obama picked Rick Warren to deliver his Inauguration's invocation prayer. The gay community was (rightfully) mad. At the same time, Obama announced that Rev. Joseph Lowery would give the benediction prayer. Lowery is a little better on gay issues, but he still opposes gay marriage.

Atheists were mad that prayer was being used in the inauguration in the first place: Why was he mixing church and state? (We even filed a lawsuit.)

Then, later in the post wrote:

What's the problem?

There shouldn't be prayer at these government gatherings in the first place.

Many are public events funded by taxpayer money. They should be free of religion.

He concluded the post urging his readers to donate money to atheist organizations.

First, as I've said before on this blog, I don't think it's inconsistent to let religion inform your sense of morality in a democracy. It's a democracy so the people should choose people who will accurately represent them. So, obviously I don't have a problem with God-language, prayer or religious overtones occurring in official government proceedings and documents. That said, I still wanted to make a simple case for why religious elements are not logically inappropriate in a government that has a separation of church and state. So I commented,

You said there's no place for religion. Why's there a place for no religion (i.e., atheism), then? Government should function on a type of charitable pluralism, not a secularism where everyone is so scared of controversy that they cannot even ask what religion another person is.

The reality is that there are many religions. Assuming that atheism is true, and running government as though it were (i.e., devoid of God-reference), does not solve the problem. (Just as assuming Christianity is true, which I think is accurate, and christianizing government would not work either.)

Basically my method is that whenever a freethinker (i.e., an atheist) says there should be no God-language in a democratic government, I want to respond back, "How would you take it if I said, 'There should only be God-language'? Or, to phrase it another way, 'There should be no non-God-language—atheist-language' (since atheism means no God). Are you trying to force your worldview on me, now?" I got mixed reactions.

First, "Government should be free of interference from all religions. Atheism is no more a religion than science is a religion." Again, how is this different from a theist saying there should be no interference from atheists? The logic of this rebuttal is inconsistent.

Next, someone quoted this from my comment: "Why's there a place for no religion (i.e., atheism), then?" And asked, "Do you even know what you're saying? I sure don't." Fun, fun.

The last one that was obviously directed at me said,

Pete: we're not trying to add atheism to the ceremonies, we're trying to disentangle them from religion entirely. I'd be just as annoyed if the ceremony were anti-religious as I am that it is pro-religious.

The goal is neutrality.

This person seems to think that the only way to stay neutral is to have no religion. Hmm, if an individual has no religion by decision, what is he? An atheist! He seems to say that the only way a government proceeding would be atheistic would be if it were anti-theistic (opposed to God, or, more specifically, opposed to theism, belief in God). He said, "we're not trying to add atheism to the ceremonies, . . . I'd be just as annoyed if the ceremony were anti-religious. . ."

Those are my quick rebuttals. I published more comments on Hemant Mehta's blog post which essentially give these responses.

All-in-all, I don't know why it's an issue. If a Jew were to pray at the inauguration it simply would not affect me. Rick Warren praying at Mr. Obama's inauguration, in their minds, shouldn't affect them, since they believe it has no true impact.

Lastly, Jefferson said that there should be a wall of separation between church and state. This same man had no problem reading Scripture (from his softened bible) at government proceedings. No one actually knows today exactly what he meant when he said that there should be a wall of separation, but it seems pretty obvious to most, that he wanted to protect the government from becoming the wing of a church.

A final word: Listen to Mohler talk about charitable pluralism and the following Q & A time.

Reading a verse in the Psalms has brought me back to thinking about Bible translation. Psalm 51:4 in the ESV reads,

If you take it at face value, the verse says that David sinned so that God would be cleared (or vindicated or justified) in His judgment. That doesn't sound like a plausible interpretation to me.

Another version, the New English Translation Bible (hereafter referred to as the NET Bible), translates it

This at least is understandable and compatible with my understanding of an unchanging, omnipotent, sovereign God (which I think the Scriptures teach). Of course, the second part in this version is a paraphrase:

The Hebrew term לְמַעַן (lÿma'an) normally indicates purpose ("in order that"), but here it introduces a logical consequence of the preceding statement. (Taking the clause as indicating purpose here would yield a theologically preposterous idea – the psalmist purposely sinned so that God's justice might be vindicated!) For other examples of לְמַעַן indicating result, see 2 Kgs 22:17; Jer 27:15; Amos 2:7 . . . (A translator's note on this verse from the NET Bible)

That's a helpful note. So the ESV accurately translates what the Hebrew actually says and the NET Bible translates what the Hebrew actually means. Being able to get both provides a compelling reason to read multiple translations when doing Bible study.

I don't know anything about Hebrew, so I'm going to assume that the NET Bible's right for paraphrasing the second part of the Hebrew that way, especially since that's how Paul applies the verse in Romans 3:4. But what if we didn't have Paul interpreting it for us? The NET note says that term "normally indicates" [emphasis added] purpose. And they deduce that in this case it doesn't indicate purpose because it would be theologically incompatible. As soon as I read this, I thought back to something Piper'd written:

The following meditation comes from my devotional lingering over Psalm 96:7. All the modern versions translate it, "Ascribe to the Lord...strength" (ESV, NIV, NASB). Only the KJV renders it with the literal, "Give unto the Lord...strength."

There's nothing unusual about this Hebrew word "give" (yahab). It's used over sixty times in the Old Testament in all the ordinary ways the word give is used.

The word ascribe in Psalm 96:7 is an interpretation. It's a paraphrase. It's a good interpretation, I think, but, as with all paraphrases, it short circuits our reflection.

When you read the NET Bible for Psalm 96:7, the use of "ascribe" instead of "give" isn't even mentioned in the notes.

I think this is the main reason why I advocate literal translations. It's easy enough to use explicit language to give the immediate meaning of a passage, but it runs the risk of covering over a deeper meaning the author had invested in his original choice of words.

Here's an illustration: The replacement of the words referring to a dead person sleeping in the Old Testament. Consider, for example, 1 Kings 2:10: "Then David slept with his fathers and was buried in the city of David" [ESV, cf. NASB, KJV]. The NIV and HCSB (i.e., the Holman Christian Standard Bible, one of Mohler's three recommended translations) use "rested" instead of "slept," the NLT (i.e., the New Living Translation) uses "died," and the NET Bible uses "passed away." All of these obviously convey the same immediate meaning: He's dead! But Grudem once made an interesting comment: He said that when the Bible talks about dead people who are said to be sleeping, it is foreshadowing resurrection.

You might think that "rest" carries the same connotations as "sleeping." It's true that it can, but in this case, I think the translations are using "rest" like you would for any inanimate object. E.g., "The fork rested in its spot." By not using the word "sleep" the implication of one day waking is veiled. The literal translations keep the Old Testament type intact.

Given that example, I want to go back to my question of how does the translator decide when to keep the author's original wording, and when does he change the wording because it's incompatible with his views. For example, John 11:3-6 reads,

So the sisters sent word to Jesus, "Lord, the one you love is sick."

When he heard this, Jesus said, "This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God's glory so that God's Son may be glorified through it." Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. Yet when he heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was two more days. [NIV, emphasis added]

But verse 6 literally reads, "So, when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was" [ESV, cf. NASB] (though I don't know anything about Greek, Piper pointed this out, and I trust his scholarship, and also, the NET Bible and the HCSB translate it "so").

Jesus found out that Lazarus was dying, so He didn't move, in order to let Lazarus die, that He may be glorified. But you don't get that right away from the reading of the NIV. The NIV doesn't leave it clear, for whatever reason, that Jesus stayed behind because of what Mary and Martha had told him.

This is my case for why a literal translation is best to be the first Bible you go to. But I also think that using multiple translations has a place. The way I balance it is by first lingering on the words of the literal translation and then, when I'm stumped, I'll go to the paraphrase. If I go too quickly to the paraphrase I'll jump too quickly to the immediate meaning it provides and ignore any underlying implications in the wording. At the same time, I still don't usually get it. Maybe fifty years from now I'll start making the connections that men like Piper and Mohler make.

Feel free to correct my spelling (or grammar) if I have any errors in my posts. I just corrected my misspelling of "complementarian" in the previous posts that used it (I used to think that it had two 'i's in it).

Labels: Miscellaneous

With engagements being put on my mind anew, and Jon Bloom, the Executive Director of Desiring God (Piper's ministry), producing an absolutely wonderful blog entry related to Joseph and Mary's engagement (i.e., betrothal), I have to point out an awesome illustration of grace, demonstrated by an awesome woman.

Matthew 1:18, 19 reads, "When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly." Hearing that Joseph decided to divorce her, you have to come to the conclusion that either Mary didn't defend herself when Joseph found out she was pregnant, or Joseph didn't believe her when she did defend herself.

I'm inclined to think the latter – that she would definitely explain that she'd seen Gabriel and that the pregnancy was of God (Lk. 1:26-38). She'd heard from God, and not telling it would be like Ezekiel not sharing his prophecy with the world. So I think that Joseph didn't believe her (as Jon Bloom imagines in his hypothetical narrative). Mary had somehow exceeded the trust that she'd earned from Joseph. Her story was indeed incredible.

I wonder what sort of miracles I would be too naturalistic to believe. Would I believe it if my best friend had been supernaturally given a haircut by God? Would I believe it if my pastor told me that he was about to get on a plane for Saudi Arabia when God transported him there, as He did to Philip away from the Ethiopian eunuch? Do I trust those whom I should trust unconditionally? Is unconditional trust necessary? Was Joseph wrong for not trusting Mary?

If Joseph had been right, and Mary had cheated on him, then he would have been justified in leaving her (Mt. 19:9 – the true application of this verse). And I don't want to vilify him by overstressing this, but he could have given her a second chance. If she'd cheated on him, it would have been either during their engagement, or shortly before. It would have completely changed his perception of her. But he could have gone ahead with the marriage anyway.

The point is, though, Mary was faithful! And it would have no doubt hurt her that the man she loved, and was going to take as her husband, didn't believe her on as critical an issue as fidelity. While never having been in a reciprocating BGR, I don't have full experience of the truth of the statement, "Trust is the foundation that holds a marriage up" (although, you might be more spiritual than me and say that's blasphemy of the highest order since God is the foundation that holds a marriage up), I still believe it.

Mary was such an amazing woman, that even though her groom-to-be thought that she was a fornicator, she still married him. I'm not Catholic, so I don't think that she somehow bore James, the brother of Jesus, without having sex, nor do I think that she ascended into heaven (as Enoch, Elijah and Jesus did), nor do I think that she was sinless, but I still think that she's amazing. She forgave Joseph's lack of faith in her and gave him a second chance. On top of that, she raised the Lord, but I'm trying not to overshadow small moments of massive, Holy Spirit given forgiveness.

I hope and pray that I have that much grace with my friends, and someday in my marriage.

Being a lover of freedom, when the revolution came in Germany, I looked to the universities to defend it, knowing that they had always boasted of their devotion to the cause of truth; but, no, the universities immediately were silenced. Then I looked to the great editors of the newspapers whose flaming editorials in days gone by had proclaimed their love of freedom; but they, like the universities, were silenced in a few short weeks. . . .

Only the Church stood squarely across the path of Hitler's campaign for suppressing truth. I never had any special interest in the Church before, but now I feel a great affection and admiration because the Church alone has had the courage and persistence to stand for intellectual truth and moral freedom. I am forced thus to confess that what I once despised I now praise unreservedly.

Labels: Miscellaneous

I've already posted this entry in early May, but the formatting was choppy. In posting the entry yesterday on the True Woman Conference, though, I had an idea for how I could post the list in a more appealing, more organized way. The original post follows, although, I did make a few changes.

Last year when I got back from Tanzania I wrote a list of the characteristics that I think every Christian man should exemplify. I was motivated to do this having worked with some tremendous men who displayed amazing character and vision and love for Jesus Christ. Furthermore, a girl I was working with commented that she respected the biblical man I described. I figured I would share these characteristics.

Another thing to note is that these come from the mind of a single guy. I've never dated a girl so I'm not basing these assertions on any BGR experience. You may compare them to the list of 13 characteristics (the first six and the final seven) of manhood that Albert Mohler wrote up, which he relates heavily to married life.

They're not grouped according to importance. Some of them are abstract (e.g., 35) but most of them are practical (e.g., 2). But they're not grouped this way either. I aimed to group them topically.

Sorry the list is so long. That notwithstanding, please give me feedback.

The Lord's men are those who:

Update: I've added a clarification on number 22.

Labels: Abbreviations, Characters, Manhood, Resources

"It's not about going back to the nineteenth century; it's about going back to the Scriptures." Albert Mohler said something like that on his radio program on November 25^th, in reference to complementarian Christian women asserting that they want to start a counter-cultural movement where it is acknowledged that there is a difference in the roles that men and women are to enter into. He said that when he read the True Woman Manifesto (I'll get to it in this post), he got the impression that if a Christian woman in the 19^th century were reading it, she would wonder why the document was written. It would be like a duh moment. The goal of the complementarian movement is not to make people old fashioned. The goal is to be biblical.

On the program, he was talking with Mary Kassian, professor at Southern Seminary, Canadian, author and speaker (and the first person to get a post with the "Character" label on my blog). On it, they were talking about the True Woman conference that happened back in mid-October, where about 6300 women went to listen and interact about biblical lessons on gender, and more specifically, femininity. They talked a fair chunk about the document I mentioned above. Mrs. Kassian wants to see 100 000 women sign the document internationally. That's my hope for many of the girls who read this blog, that maybe you would sign it.

I mostly wrote this post because I liked what Mohler said so much. Evangelical feminism is brand new, less than a hundred years old. It's coming out of the culture of radical feminism, not the Bible. If egalitarianism were biblical it would have emerged in Church history at some point earlier. It didn't. Biblical gender is not about going back to the cave man days, but it's about being biblical.

Below is the audio that's from the conference. I hope you listen to it. I've only listened to the panel discussion and Mrs. Kassian's first talk so far, but I'm going to read the rest soon. I highly recommend her talk.

Thursday, October 9

Friday, October 10

Saturday, October 11

Labels: Characters, Miscellaneous, Resources

As Canada had a record low voter turnout last month for the election, I was not surprised when I read that the sentence the Collins English Dictionary will be using to illustrate the use of the word "meh" will be "the Canadian election was so meh." Canwest News wrote,

A disgruntled Canadian voter expressing boredom in an Internet forum about the recent federal election will have that feeling immortalized in the Collins English Dictionary.

The U.K.-based publisher of the popular reference book announced this week that the word "meh" - meaning "mediocre" or "boring," as in "the Canadian election was so meh," Collins editors explained - has been chosen over hundreds of other submissions to become the general public's entry in the dictionary's 30th anniversary edition, to be printed next year.

But the lexicographer who used the election reference to convey the meaning of English's new "expression of indifference" insists he intended "no slight to Canada."

I find it amusing that the sentence says "so meh." It's like saying, "You're twice as average as the average person," or, conversely, "You're special – just like everybody else."

Labels: Politics

The Ottawa Citizen:

In a recent ruling against PickupPal.ca, an Ottawa-based website that helps people put together carpools, the board stated "the term carpool vehicles was introduced in the late 1970s to allow working people to share rides to and from work."

Using carpools for other purposes is illegal, according to the decision.

Another implication to this ruling is that you can't carpool to church on Sunday, for example, or as the article uses as an example, teammates can't carpool to hockey practice. The problem is that the courts have taken a definition and decided that it's a complete, maximum definition. It's exclusive. Their ruling says that there can be no other activities that can be described as carpooling. Realistically, that definition should be a minimum. Carpooling can be working people sharing rides to and from work.

For those of you with a C4C weekly meeting, you had better not have shared a ride home from school. Ridiculous.

Labels: Politics

I was reading back entries of Justin Taylor's blog recently. He wrote in early 2005,

A law in California says that "Children under 14 are banned from using tanning salons, unless they have a doctor's note, and those 14 to 18 need parental permission to receive a tan." (HT: The Corner).

In 1997 the California Supreme Court ruled that the requirement of parental consent before a minor's abortion was unconstitutional.

So to recap this sick scenario: if you are a girl between ages 14-18 in California, you need your parent's permission to receive a tan, but if you don't need it in order to kill your unborn child.

It was neat reading this because, if you didn't know better, you'd think that he'd have written it just a little bit before the 2008 election. In California, one of the items on the ballot was Proposition 4. That link leads to a summary of how the bill would amend the California constitution. The first point is the most significant one: "Changes California Constitution to prohibit abortion for unemancipated minor until 48 hours after physician notifies minor's parent or legal guardian."

Prop 4 was rejected by the Californian people a week ago.

Labels: Blogs, Politics

• the gang lords and drug dealers in the Jane and Finch area (Toronto gang hotspot) to find Christ.
• abortion doctors to be converted. Similarly, pray that a Canadian will be raised up who will fight for the unborn as William Wilberforce fought for enslaved Africans.
• University physics professors to know the true age of the earth, biology professors to know where humans came from, philosophy professors to know that absolutes exist and religion professors to know that the Bible is from God, so that they stop leading generation after generation of students astray.
• the United Church of Canada, the Anglican Church of Canada and the other liberal protestant denominations to have a revolution within themselves where they find themselves more conservative (i.e., believing the Bible).
• a theological thinker of the weight (not literally) and stature of Augustine to be given to Canada. I mention this one recalling that Mark Dever, when he visited the tank where Ambrose baptized Augustine, prayed for God to let him take part in calling great men to the ministry of the Word.
• the tens of thousands of immigrants moving to Canada every week to come to faith; there could be such an amazing foretaste of heaven, of every nation, tongue and tribe, within these borders.
• your pastor's sermons to be published in the local newspaper every week, as Charles Spurgeon's were, reaching so many people in your community with the Gospel.

Labels: Abbreviations, Prayer, Resources

Mormonism is almost a form of universalism. Depending on which Mormon you talk to either only those former Mormons who went into apostasy will go to hell, or those who knowingly and willingly reject the Mormons' gospel will. The reasoning behind this is they think that hell was created for the spirits who rebelled against Elohim (i.e., specifically God the Father in Mormonism; Yahweh is Jesus within that system) before the foundation of the world, and that earth is for everyone else by Elohim. The enticement for becoming a Mormon is getting into a better level of heaven; there are three different spiritual levels of heaven, and then there's also hell. If you want more information on the system, I would recommend listening to James White on Issue Etc. talk about Mormons' view of heaven.

To ascend to the best level of heaven, you need to be baptized by a Mormon who's been baptized (they believe in a similar form of apostolic succession as Catholics, that the Holy Spirit is only passed on by the laying on of hands by someone who already has the Holy Spirit). For some non-Mormons who are dead, modern day Mormons will go through the rite of baptism for the dead which they take from 1 Corinthians 15:29, "Otherwise, what do people mean by being baptized on behalf of the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, why are people baptized on their behalf?" So, for example, if a Mormon man were to take an interest in the late Marilyn Monroe he could get baptized for her (which, realistically, has probably already been done, Mormons keep such quality and extensive genealogical records to track such things), hoping that she respond to the preaching of the gospel in the next life (which they justify based on 1 Peter 3:18, 19: "Christ ... in the flesh ... went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison"), and he'll meet her in his level of heaven.

All that is introduction to a controversy I read about in an article that's arisen between Mormons and Holocaust survivors and their descendents. When new names of victims of the Holocaust are discovered, the Mormons are getting baptized for them. The Jews are worried that this practice will play into the hands of future Holocaust deniers. They're worried that people will look back on history, reading through the Mormons' genealogies, see all these victims' names and think that they were Mormons not Jews.

The Mormons are responding by agreeing to take all the Holocaust victims' names out of their records. I guess it shouldn't surprise me since I think that Mormons even have a non-proselytizing policy for Jews, considering them to have their own covenant.

The reason I wanted to post on this is because I find it funny. This is what happens when your communion tells you that anyone who doesn't believe what you believe needs to be evangelized, and then makes exceptions. It makes perfect sense to me that the Mormons would be getting baptized for these deceased Jews – they didn't believe in Jesus or Joseph Smith, of course they need to be baptized. The idea that Jews' own covenant covers them is just confusing, unless you consider that what's realistically happening is the Latter Day Church is compromising since it's so politically incorrect to evangelize Jews.

Lastly, I think this serves as an example of why exclusivism (i.e., that only those who accept the Gospel will be saved, with the exception of babies and mentally disabled people in some cases) in evangelicalism is the only consistent position to take. There is no biblical warrant for thinking that you can be saved outside of Christ, even if the Gospel is not available where a person perishes. It may seem harsh, but first, it's just, and second, it's such a motivation to go and send. "How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent?" (Rm. 10:14, 15).

Labels: Miscellaneous, Politics