Truth and the Church, Part Three

As I listen to sermons, many times I ask the question "if I believed that Christianity was one of many valid religions, could I still listen to this sermon as a truth rather than the truth"? Sadly the answer is often yes.

Francis Schaeffer addresses this issue in his book Escape from Reason. He blamed the communication gaps between speaker and listener on what he called differing "thought forms". This gap occurs when the words being used by the speaker have different underlying meanings for the listener. According to his book, the thought forms that challenged the Church in his day were those of thesis, antitheses, and syntheses. He admonished the Church in his time to understand that the Gospel must be presented in a way to penetrate that kind of thinking.

Present day I am of the belief that the Gospel is often being derailed in this same way, by the relativistic spirit of this age. George Barna's research would seem to confirm that belief as he cites an amazingly high number of Christians who see their religion as only true for themselves. As I gladly evict the Rajah from my head and thoughts forever, I will refer to him one last time. If the Church of Jesus Christ is to be the salt and light it was called to be in our day, the Rajah must also be evicted from the Church and the door diligently guarded to prevent his re-entry.

The Folly of the Rajahs, Part Two

As pointed out in the previous post, the true position of the Rajah is no better or different than the blind men to which he was supposedly imparting wisdom. His balconied position was ultimately one of self exaltation which depended on the blindness of everyone but the blind men to pull off. The intended point of the fable is:

Beyond the obvious absurdity of this statement, if widely accepted, it can also prove to be dangerous. According to Josh McDowell, the most often quoted scripture from the Bible fifty years ago was John 3:16. The most oft quoted scripture today is Mathew 7:1, "judge not lest you be judged". I will talk more about the church next time, but this trend is indicative of the culture as a whole and it's inability and unwillingness to judge. In this age of terrorism, this cultural weakness is made to order for an enemy born out of, and codified, not by a nation state but by a religion. There can be no doubt that Mohammad Atta was committed in his religion, and that that commitment puts the Rajah in a predicament from which his lack of judgement has him ill equipped to extricate himself.

Where there is no revelation, the people perish or cast off restraint.
(Proverbs 29:18)

If history teaches us nothing else at all, it teaches us that it teaches us nothing at all. The writer of Ecclesiastes was correct when he said "there is nothing new under the sun". It would seem that all nations rise only to answer the Siren call to their destruction. Today that call is "there is no truth", or better yet: "all is true", which is the same thing. This statement, which permeates Western culture, embraces blindness. Although allowing for the casting off of restraint for a little while, it has a simultaneous effect of diminishing a culture's ability to resist a strong and confident culture from imposing itself. This point is proven as the flagship of secularism, Europe, finds itself more Islamified year by year through Muslim immigration . As this religion gains more prominence and power, multiculturalism will be no obstacle for Islam's refusal to except it's multicultural designation as "a" religion. It appears apparent that Islamic advancement will not be a peaceful one. For this reason the road ahead is fraught with many dangers, but perhaps the most insidious danger of them all is the folly of the Rajahs.

The Rajah and his Folly, Part One

This is the first of a three part series analyzing and drawing logical conclusions from the ancient fable from India about a Rajah and six blind men. Part two and three will take a look at the damage that the wrong conclusions drawn from the fable are having on society and, more importantly, the Church. To be sure, these conclusions are not the problem, but the symptoms of a more insidious problem: illogical thought processes and the worldview that follows them. As those with a relativist's worldview have used the fable as an aid in explaining an illogical ideology, so will I use it to expose the fallacy of it's argument, and to show how this thinking has permeated the entire culture including the Church.The fable has been popularized in recent years by it's frequent use in illustrating how all religions contain different truths about the same God. Following is a brief synopses of the fable:

• 
  Visiting the Rajah six blind men, upon entering the palace courtyard, encounter an elephant for the first time. Examining the elephant with their hands, each describes it according to the part he is touching. One says "the elephant is like a tree" (the leg), and another: "the elephant is like a rope" (the tail), a wall (it's side), and so on. The blind men soon begin to argue loudly in their disagreement over the nature of the elephant. The Rajah, awakened by the commotion comes to his balcony and informs the blind men that they are only examining a part, and that they must examine the whole animal to know what an elephant is like.

Though the fable is useless in revealing any truth about God, or religions for that matter, it does inadvertently reveal some truth about the person who would use it to that end. This can be seen by considering the positions and attributes of the players and who they represent. There are the blind men arguing in the court yard; they represent religions. There is the elephant who silently stands there being large; he represents God. And there's the sleeping Rajah who is elevated above the fray, and of course, can see all. He's not suppose to represent anybody, but he ends up representing the relativist.

The thrust of the fable is suppose to draw our attention to the blind men because of their closed-minded, and stubborn refusal to accept all religions as equally valid. But I'd like to divert the reader's attention away from the blind men and toward the person using the fable to make his relativistic point. As one listens to the story, the first question that should be asked is: who does the story teller most relate to? The answer of course is not those dogmatic blind and intolerant religious people arguing down in the courtyard; but rather the reasonable and seeing Rajah standing in his elevated balcony. This is the very reason the fable fails in making it's point. No person has ever escaped the bounds of our existence to be in a position from which religions can be objectively observed as they seek God. So claiming to be wise, they become fools. This is also the reason the fable makes it's unintended point: that those who think all religions are valid are the real narrow-minded blind men. They are blind to the fact that if differing religions disagree, only one can ultimately be true; they are narrow-minded in their lack of willingness to consider the possibility that any one can be true, and true to the exclusion of all others. It also reveals their utter ignorance on matters of religion, and their hypocrisy in the fact that though they themselves are blind, they accuse others of being so.

It has been said that ideals have consequences, and I would add that as of late, so do worldviews. In part 2 I will discuss the dangerous consequences for society of the real narrow mindedness illustrated by the Rajah.

A Debate with "Progressive"

I have been debating the last few days with progressive on his blog Forwardly-Thinking. If you're interested in reading this debate click here.

A Lesson Hard Learned

My wife married a union advocate, and as such bore the brunt of much ire concerning the evils of his employer. The CEO, or so I thought, was getting rich off the backs of good folk like myself, and I was angry about it. To say the least my wife was not happy with the embittered heart of her husband and (surprise) this caused some discord; but this would not continue.

I believe that most have experienced what I will call "an episode of clarity" when, for whatever reason, the fog in one's head clears for a few seconds to reveal a morsel of truth previously obscured. I experienced such an episode while visiting my in-laws many years ago. It was three against me as my wife and her parents, (for all of whom I have much respect) endeavored to expose the bitterness that had overtaken my heart concerning my employer. I was standing ready to defend my ground to the death when it occurred to me that all three of my adversaries loved me and were not trying to win an argument, but were trying to expose a blind spot. As it happened, this was one of the many three second or so "episodes", magnified in the annals of my mind thus becoming much more than a blip in time. As it turns out, it was the beginning of a veritable turning point. To be sure they didn't win the argument, as such, for it was never their aim. But through their efforts I began to realize that they were seeing something that I could not, and this scared me.

To illustrate why this scared me, I'll use Carl Jung's* four- paned window. He used this window to divide knowledge about ourselves into four categories. Each pane represents one of the following:

1. That which we know about ourselves that others know too, i.e. I'm not a sports fan, I love sweets.
2. That which we know about ourselves that others will never know(nope, still not telling!)
3. That which we don't know about ourselves and others don't either, i.e. our subconscious.
4. That which we don't know about ourselves, that others do know.

Number4 is by far the worst, for if others knew good things about us hopefully they'd tell us. For this reason I think it safe to assume the attributes in pane 4 do not reflect the positive or good. This was what my family was attempting to convey, but were having a dickens of a time doing it. Had they not loved me, I doubt whether they would have persevered as the conversation was filled with emotion and was somewhat unpleasant. But they did persevere. Real learning took place when the door was opened in my mind to the possibility that I needed to learn; that in fact, I was missing some pearl I really needed to possess.

Building on the previous post I think this is an example of how we can grow in Christ through his Body. It was not "my family" that was challenging me as much as it was the Body of Christ. They could have perhaps joined with me and said just as truthfully "Yea! Those C.E.O.'s are just a bunch of greedy jerks". As for me, I'm glad they didn't; I'm all the better for it.

*Carl Jung was the person my junior high teacher told me was the creator of this illustration. I have since been told that it was Voltaire, so now I'm not sure who's idea it was; any help would be appreciated.

When Men Speak Well of You

Jerry Falwell was a self righteous intolerant bigot who wanted to impose his morality on the whole country; or so I once believed. The fact that I believed this, yet knew not why, attest to the insidious affect of being an uncritical consumer of mass media. My first real memory of "the man" was on a televised debate in which he was the moderator. Being a non-believer at the time, I was struck by his courteousness, gentleness, and the sound arguments forwarded by what I knew to be his side. This seemed odd to me at the time because it so conflicted with what I "knew" to be true about him.

I have since come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, and so have come to view him as a courageous brother in Christ. And even though, like every other single person I've ever met, I found things about him with which I disagreed, I grew to have great respect and admiration for his vision and audacity. He was a man of incredible courage and fortitude. As many in his day were content to remain safely within the confines of their church buildings, he realized the importance of Christians being salt and light to a dieing world and challenged Christians nationally concerning the very meaning of those words. The vision of the Moral Majority was built on the belief that the country was not suffering collectively from a lapse in morality as much as it was a lapse in understanding within a majority of otherwise moral people. (I hasten to add here that it is a testimony to how right he was that we now so cringe at the name then chosen for that organization. The word moral now, unlike then, has an entirely different and negative connotational feel.) What was taking place in the culture, and indeed in the spiritual realm then, was the beginnings of what Daniel Patrick Moynihan D-NY coined: defining deviancy down. Sadly what was then a slip is now a free-fall; but one is confronted with the fact while remembering Falwell that this free-fall is in spite of his efforts, and not due to a lack, or because of them.

God bless you Mr. Falwell, you will be missed.

A New Feature

Well its not totally new, but I'd like to draw your attention to the "My Favorite Post" links at the top right. What you will find there are posts from various blogs that I think interesting, and that say things that I'd like to say, and say it better than I ever could (which is pretty much always). Also there might be some of my own that I want to "hang on to" a little longer. I just added one on being an evangelical which I totally agree with, and also covet the author's skills in communication. Enjoy.

Peaceful Advances, Violent Losses

The history of socialism is not a pretty one. Its path through history is strewn with hundreds of thousands of bodies. To be sure, those that consider themselves socialist seem to be nice enough people as long as they find themselves in the majority, and so are not only in power but are advancing a socialist agenda against freedom, but they don’t seem to handle setbacks very well as the aftermath of the elections in France will attest. Amazingly, it has been socialist organizations that have organized and funded most, if not all of the anti-war and anti-American protest around the world, ostensibly due to their pacifist inclinations, but one would be hard-pressed to conclude very much passivity as they watch flames leaping from their car.

It is imperative that the French, as well as the rest of the free world see this for what it is, which is an attack on freedom. The nation was warned that if things didn't go a certain way in the then up-coming election, there would be consequences, and the resulting minority made good on their promise. It's important to consider that these things are not done by the entire minority but a very few. The masses that make up the minority, one would hope, understand the concept of democracy sufficiently to realize that there is always the possibility of finding oneself in the less powerful minority party. There should also be a realization and solace for the minority party at this point in the importance and meaning of the word "republic". However for those hungry and lustful for unlimited power who also have been gratifying that lust unabated for some time, the meaning of such a word is probably minimized, and offers little if any solace; for their objective was never the betterment of the republic as much as it was the betterment of themselves. This thinking lends itself to some degree to the reasons behind their ability to trample on the rights of others by making threats and destroying property if the gratification of that lust is threatened. For those members of the now minority not so disposed to create chaos and burn their neighbor’s car to the ground because their ideals didn't win in the marketplace of ideals, it is time to wake up and realize just exactly the kind of thinking that they have attached themselves to.

It is my fear that if the socialist tide here in the U.S. is ever seriously threatened we will face the same or even worse. We are a nation medicated by entertainment and soothed into complacency by the nanny state "safety net" to the point that we don't even notice the socialist agenda attached to it. My question is this: what is going to happen when this culture of death society, devoid of a moral compass is told that the federal coffers are empty as the Ponzi-scheme that is our current welfare state finally reaches its inevitable conclusion?

Escape From Reason, Francis Shaeffer

I just finished reading this book and was taken by Shaeffer's admonition at the end:

"The reason we often cannot speak to our children, let alone other people's, is because we have never taken time to understand how different their thought-forms are from ours. Through Reading and education and the whole modern cultural bombardment of mass media, even today's middle-class children are becoming thoroughly twentieth-century in outlook. In crucial areas many Christian parents, ministers and teachers are as out of touch with many of the children of the church, and the majority of those outside, as though they were speaking a foreign language.

So what is said in this book is not merely a matter of intellectual debate. It is not of interest only to academics. It is utterly crucial for those of us who are serious about communicating the Christian gospel in the twentieth century."

Sadly there doesn't seem to have been much change since these words were penned in 1968, but I do think I see some stirrings in the Body of Christ... perhaps.

On the Wright Family Education Administration-(WFEA)

My wife and I went to a promotion ceremony last night that was organized by a WFEA accredited homeschool group where our children were officially promoted to the next grade. As I sat in the WFEA approved sanctuary, I was reminded that the whole concept of "grades" was yet another word that I had been trying to eradicate from my vernacular. To be sure, we do tell our children what grade they're supposedly in so that they can relate with the world on its level of thinking, but the WFEA does not in any way, shape, or form see the children placed within its care through the lens of a one size fits all "grade level". Our children, like all children, are marvelously complex in their abilities, needs, learning styles, attention requirements, etc., etc., and so on; and the WFEA adapts the curriculum, hours of study, and a whole host of other variables to meet each student's specific needs.

One would think that the WFEA would be a good model for the DOE, but sadly it is not, for the DOE I do believe has been hi-jacked by the NEA, the ACLU, the ASCS, and anybody and everybody else that is sufficiently anti-Christ and thinks they know a thing or two about raising our children. But never fear, for the WFEA is well versed in all the subjects important to these groups. It might even be said that perhaps the WFEA is a little too well versed on subjects like so-called: Global Warming, Earth Worship, Evolution, Diversity, Tolerance and Islam to name a few. Rest assured; if there's a hot button subject out there, the WFEA is teaching it with clarity. And not only this but as an added bonus, the WFEA also teaches reading, writing and math; and all of this at the low low price of zero dollars to the American tax-payer. Furthermore, since we still have to pay the taxes that would have otherwise been spent on government employee's generous pensions, that should be at least a couple of bake sales that can be foregone in the ever-present funding activities of the current governmental "education system".

Many criticize administrations like the WFEA as being intolerant, narrow-minded, and anti-social. They insist that children should be sent out of the home and into an environment with their peers under the tutelage of a gagged teacher in a system where all religion except Secular Humanism, and its BFF, Islam, is not tolerated so that they can learn to be more tolerant. But I'm not feeling the "tolerance". So instead I've decided to include tolerance, not stupidity, instead.

In the WFEA approved schoolhouse, our children will learn how to seek wisdom, understanding, knowledge, and virtue according to the last few thousand years' understanding of those terms instead of last years' fluid and ever-morphing understanding. Character is a central theme in the WFEA as well, character that is also based on something besides last month's cause-celeb fads. Meaning in life beyond YOLO, or get-all-the-material-stuff-you-can-get-and-flaunt-it-for-all-it's-worth-while-you've got-it meaning. Gender rolls 101,202,303 and 404 will also be demonstrated and taught. Failure will also be an ongoing subject as the administrators fail before the students and demonstrate, as best they can, humility, perseverance, patience with self and each other as well as forgiveness.

In short, I think that the WFEA is one of the best schools anywhere, and it's not alone. Schools just like it dot the countryside. There's probably one between you and that fenced-in compound known as the statist school just down the street. But you'd never know it, and you could create one to your own liking as well... if you wanted to.

Disclaimer:
I know that there are many fine and wonderful people who slug it out day in and day out inside the belly of the beast which is the modern day government run education system. This post is not in any way meant to slight those honest and hard-working individuals. My hat is off to you all, God-speed.