Digging Deep

September 5, 2010

A Glimpse of Eternity

Filed under: Barb Larson, Christian Living — Barb Larson @ 11:52 AM

My parents just celebrated their 51st anniversary.  As a gift to their children and grandchildren they took us to a local ranch where they served chuck wagons suppers served up with old-fashioned country music.  At the beginning of the evening they announced the names of those who were celebrating a special occasion.  A few minutes later, a man nearly ran up to the table where we were seated.  He touched my dad on the shoulder and asked if he was Ted K. My dad replied, a bit tentatively, that indeed he was.  Then, with a catch in his voice, the man said to my dad; “You led me to the Lord 40 years ago.” His wife stood beside him with tears running down her face as he introduced her to my dad.  A few minutes later my dad met his grown children and each one of them thanked him for the impact he had had on their lives because he had introduced their dad to Jesus all those years before.

As they walked away, I said; “we just experienced a glimpse of heaven.” For in heaven, we will not only rejoice in seeing our Savior but, I believe, we will meet once again those people whose lives we impacted. There will be surprises—those whose lives we touched completely unaware; an act of kindness, an encouraging word, a verse of Scripture shared at just the right moment, a cup of cold water. Perhaps we will even see the “ripple effect” of our influence which traveled further than we could have dreamed possible.

There will be others as well—good friends and intentional relationships in whose lives we invested, into whom we poured time, effort and love.  Last night, it took me awhile to fall asleep. I was rejoicing for my dad—who never knew it mattered so much to that man 40 years ago.  And it filled my life again with longing to make a difference.  If it was so exciting to rejoice with my dad, what will it be like to hear “well done” from Jesus and to see the impact of my life on others?

Of course, it requires that I spend my life well today so that I may rejoice in eternity.  So, my friends, press on, give generously, love lavishly and invest without measure.  We may not know until eternity just how much it all matters.

September 1, 2010

Crystal Clear

Filed under: Christian Living, Susan Rieske — Susan Rieske @ 5:28 PM

This past spring, my family and I walked through the death of someone very dear to us: my step-dad, Francis. It was, of course, a terribly hard experience for all of us. But as hard experiences usually are, it was also a refining experience…a time to do a double take on our lives, ask some hard questions, and reexamine our perspectives on life.

As anyone knows who has walked through grief, it is like getting a new pair of eyeglasses. Everything looks different, at least for awhile. Trivial things seem even more trivial. Many things you once thought were important are suddenly unimportant, and some things that weren’t treated as very important get bumped up a notch. Things begin to appear different to us, because death has a powerful ability to bring things into focus.

One of the things that came into crystal clear focus for me during this time was the shortness of life in comparison to eternity. As the Bible says, our life is like a vapor…here one minute and gone the next…fleeting, momentary, SHORT. It really is a very insignificant length of time in the vast scheme of history and eternity.

This was a truth I focused on often with the students I ministered to when I was on staff with Campus Crusade for Christ. To help them understand this truth, every year I would take the students in my Bible study on a field trip…to a cemetery. Sounds morbid, I know. But it was one of the most life changing times we had together. I took them to the oldest part of the cemetery and gave them one simple mission: to collect several names and dates from people’s gravestones. Then they were to do some simple math: calculate the amount of years each person spent on this earth and the amount of years that have passed since their death. Two small numbers. But those two small numbers always presented big realities.

For example, let’s think about some people we all know. Take George Washington for instance. He was born in 1732 and died in 1799. So he lived for 67 years. He’s been on the other side of this life for 211 years. How about Abraham Lincoln? He lived from 1809 to 1865…alive for 56 years, deceased for 145 years. Thus, these two great presidents, although they had a life of impact, still had an incredibly short life in the great expanse of history. They have spent three to four times longer in the afterlife than in this life. If you go back further in time, the numbers get even more gripping. Take King Tut. His birthdates are believed to be 1341 – 1323 BC. His life lasted a short 18 years. He’s been in the afterlife for over 3,000 years!

The reality is staggering and, quite honestly, gut wrenching. Our time on this earth will be so incredibly short compared to our time spent in the afterlife. The reality of this truth should grip us to the core. Our time on this life will end very soon. Our time in the afterlife will never end.

And yet, how many times do we get so wrapped up in this life that we give little thought to the afterlife? For example, how many of us spend our lives investing financially for a few years of retirement, and do little to invest spiritually in the thousands, even millions of years we will spend in the spiritual realm that comes after this one? How many of us prepare our children for the handful of decades of their adult life without working hard to prepare them for their infinite number of years in the afterlife? And saddest of all, we all expect that when this world ends, we will get to spend all of our years after this in heaven in the presence of God, when many of us gave very little thought or time to Him during our short 70 year or so lifespan on this earth. In fact, some of us can’t even part with a Sunday morning here or there. If we can’t give God the time of day, what makes us think we are entitled to spend an eternity with him?

The Bible makes it clear that there is only one way to spend eternity with God and that is through accepting Jesus’ death on the cross for your sin and seeking to follow him. And we have one short, short, SHORT life in which to do this! How you spend these few years will have radical consequences for your eternal afterlife. God intended us to do one main thing in this life: seek the one who we will spend all eternity with and do His work in telling others how they can spend all eternity with him. And we are supposed to be thinking about the afterlife constantly, not just when someone close to us passes into it.

What are you doing on your short vacation on earth that will prepare you for the real life after this one? Are you living for this short, vapor of a life or are you living for the next one that will outlast this one indefinitely? I know for me, this time has been a wake-up call to live not for this temporary life, but for my eternal one.

I am thankful that my dear step-dad knew Jesus and is experiencing that life on the other side. I am thankful that his eternity will be one filled with all that he loves, including God. And I am thankful that I can know that I will be with him someday. And while my vision has gotten a little clearer through this experience of losing him, I know also that his vision on life and eternity is now crystal clear. Death gave him new glasses too.

July 26, 2010

Be Filled With The Spirit

Filed under: Biblical Studies, Christian Living, Craig Smith, Holy Spirit, Theology — Tags: , , , , , , — Craig Smith @ 6:15 AM

(this one’s a little tiny bit technical for a just bit…but the practical payoff is totally worth it!  :)   )

I spent most of July in Guatemala, lecturing on the book of Ephesians to pastors and ministers from all over Central and South America.  Preparing and delivering those lectures was a very enriching time for me and I will probably just go ahead, bite the bullet and write a full-length commentary.  In the meantime, though, I wanted to jot down one or two thoughts that have been particularly impactful.  Today, I want to focus on Eph. 5:18:  …and do not get drunk on wine, in which is dissapation, but instead be filled with the Spirit.

For many Christians, this is a familiar command, yet one which is not easily put into practice.  It’s hard not to read this verse and wonder, “How exactly can I do that?”  The not-getting-drunk part is easy to apply, but the be-filled-with-the-Spirit part is a little less concrete, isn’t it?  I remember when I was involved with Campus Crusade for Christ back in Kent, Ohio in the early 90’s, the staff used to talk about something called “spiritual breathing” in which we were to breathe out sin (i.e. confess our sin to God) and breathe in the power of the Holy Spirit (i.e. appropriate the power of the Holy Spirit for Christian living).  This was an attempt to make Paul’s command in Eph. 5:18 practical on a daily basis, an attempt which I fully endorse.  However, as well-intentioned as the attempt was, it fell a bit short in terms of actual practicality.  “Breathe in/appropriate the power of the Holy Spirit” is really no less abstract than Paul’s original command.

However, in my recent work on Ephesians I realized that Paul’s command is not abstract at all.  In fact, Paul gave us very explicit, practical instruction on how to go about being filled with the Spirit.  This instruction immediately follows the command in question:

…speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody with your heart to the Lord; always giving thanks for all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God, even the Father; and being subject to one another in the fear of Christ. (Eph. 5:19-21)

Here, Paul uses five verbs, each of which gives us practical instruction on how to be filled by the Spirit.   Actually, to be technically accurate, it might be better to say that Paul instructs us how to position ourselves to be filled by the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit is God, of course, and therefore is not subject to our will.  We cannot “make” the Holy Spirit do anything, but we can do things which make us ready to take advantage of the Holy Spirit’s preferred mode of operation.  When Paul says “be filled with the Holy Spirit”, the form of the verb “be filled” reflects this reality.  In the Greek, this verb is a present, passive imperative which is slightly odd.  See, the passive form suggests something that is done to us, rather than something that is done be us…hence “be filled” rather than “fill yourselves”.  Yet the fact that this is an imperative means that there is something which we must actively do in order for this to happen.  So while we cannot “fill ourselves” with the Spirit, we can put ourselves in a position to “be filled” by the Spirit and the five verbs in vv.19-21 outline what it is that we are to do.

Now I should probably point out that not all commentators agree with me on this.  In fact, it appears to me that most commentators take the five verbs in vv.19-21 as the results of being filled by the Spirit rather than the means to being filled by the Spirit.  Thus, most commentators think that being filled by the Spirit will result in speaking to one another in songs and hymns and spiritual songs, singing, making music, giving thanks and being subject to one another.  This interpretation is quite possible, because the five verbs in question here are actually participles which are usually translated in English with an “ing” ending:  speaking, singing, thanking, etc.  And participles may sometimes denote the results of an earlier verb, so I understand how commentators can come to this conclusion. 

However, I disagree with taking these participles as the result of being filled with the Spirit for basically four reasons.  First, if these verbs denote the result of being filled with the Spirit, then we have no practical instruction on how to go about doing what we are commanded to do.  Second, while participles can denote result of an earlier verb, they do not usually do so and probably shouldn’t be understood this way unless there is a clear indication of this in the text, such as the presence of a purpose-word (“so that…”, “in order that…”, etc.).  No such clear indication is present in Eph. 5.  Third, if these five actions are the result of being filled with the Spirit, then no further instruction regarding them would be required.  What I mean is that if being filled with the Spirit results in singing, then this singing is essentially out of our control.  No further instruction on how to sing would be necessary.  And yet these five participles have accompanying instruction, some of which are even in the form of imperatives (direct commands).  We are told what kinds of songs to sing, when to be thankful and given extensive instruction on how to “be subject to one another.”  This instruction goes on well into chapter 6.  But all of this instruction makes little sense if the verbs in question are themselves results.  That would be like saying “jump out of the window with the result that you are falling and I command you to hit the ground at a speed of 60 m.p.h.!”

The fourth reason I differ from many/most commentators in my interpretation of this passage is simply that understanding these verbs as means rather than results fits perfectly with other clear biblical teaching.  Why should singing praise and songs of adoration lead to being filled by the Spirit?  Because as Psalm 22:3 states, “[God] you are holy, enthroned on the praises of Israel”.[1]  This theme is echoed in other places as well, including Mat. 18:20.  Why should thankfulness lead to being filled by the Spirit?  Because in gratitude we focus on what God has done and thus align ourselves with His purposes rather than being fixated on our circumstances.  Why should ”being subject to one another” lead to being filled with the Spirit?  Because being subject to one another leads to unity and unity within the body of Christ grants us access to the Holy Spirit’s power.  This is a significant theme in Ephesians and is emphasized in many other parts of the New Testament as well. 

On the whole, then, I think it’s pretty clear that Paul is giving us solid, practical instruction on how to go about fulfilling the command to be filled with the Holy Spirit:  we are to worship God in song, we are to be thankful to him in all things and we are to be subject to one another, fostering unity within the body.

One final issue which some of you more observant readers may have already  noted:  understood this way, the command to “be filled with the Holy Spirit” is a command to the church rather than to individuals.  In other words, Paul is giving instruction here on how the church is to operate so that the church will be filled with the Holy Spirit.  This is not a command or instructions for individual believers.  Again, this goes against the grain of most popular teaching on the subject, but two things should be noted.  First, in the original Greek, the command is clearly plural, stressing the communal nature of the instruction.  The lack of a second person plural in English makes this difficult to bring out in translation but it is clear in the original.  Second, saying that the command to “be filled with the Spirit” is intended for the church as a whole does not mean that it does not also apply to individuals.  In fact, this command will only be fulfilled in the church as a whole to the extent that it is fulfilled in the lives of the individuals who make up that church.

So…if we want to experience the power of God in our churches, the answer’s probably not the newest church-growth technique or the latest preaching fad.  If we want to see God move in power among us, maybe we should be concentrating on what God has already told us to do in order to get ready for precisely that!

[1] There is some question about the translation of this line.  In addition to the normal translation given above it could also be rendered as “yet you are enthroned as the Holy one, You are the praise of Israel.”  However, this translation, while possible, seems awkward given the original Hebrew word-order.  Moreover, the LXX Greek translation of this line favors the more common translation given above.

June 24, 2010

Fear & God’s Will

Filed under: Christian Living, Encouragement, God's Will, John Stone — John Stone @ 5:44 AM

By: John Stone

In our town, we have a tradition each June for parents of graduates to host parties to celebrate the accomplishments of their children.  It is always interesting to talk with the different students and ask about their plan for the coming future.  Answers each year range from the well thought-out to the completely ambiguous.  Most are asking the age-old question of how they can determine God’s will for themselves. 

Initially, I thought about sharing some suggestions concerning how to discern the will of God (e.g. fasting, praying, seeking wise counsel, and waiting on the Lord’s movement for direction).  However, at one of these parties, a young man who just finished college asked me to catch a coffee with him.  We met earlier this week and he shared very candidly that he feels a bit paralyzed as to what his next move should be.  He expressed concern that he might make the wrong choice, and this immobilizes him. 

As I asked him some questions, it became clear to both of us that his paralysis is rooted in fear.  For him, this fear originated from a skewed belief that comes from a phrase often espoused within the church.  It goes something like this:  God has a perfect and a permissive will.  The scope of this article isn’t to defend or deny this, but instead to highlight how this thinking can forge a false belief about God’s character.

 If we don’t sin and make all the right choices God wants us to make, then we get to live a fantastic life within His perfect will.  However, when we sin, or make a choice that really wasn’t God’s best, we are forced to settle for God’s permissive will.  Taking a misstep in a small area might not seem too devastating, but what if I marry the wrong person, or take the wrong job?  Now my whole life has been fouled up by my bad choice!  It’s no wonder that my young friend feels a great weight in his decision.  The sorrow that comes from thinking we’ve missed God’s perfect will usually leads not to repentance, but to death.  

Please understand that I strongly believe in making decisions based on the criterion I referenced earlier.  We must seek the Lord and do our best to discern His direction for us.  Even when we’re unsure how to move, however, we must resist the enemy’s call to fearfully freeze into inactivity.  Instead we can and must rest in the freedom that Romans 8:28-29 brings us.  God works all things together for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.  There is nothing I can do (including making poor decisions outside His will) that can thwart His purposes in my life.

 In this way, our confidence in decision-making is rooted in a proper understanding of God’s character rather than our own ability to choose correctly.  Regardless of our sin, poor choices, or lack of taking God’s “perfect” direction, God remains faithful to us.  We can experience freedom in decision-making because of God’s faithfulness and power.

 If you’ve made a decision that you currently regret, the hope is that God has not doomed you to a life of second-best.  Even now, He is at work to conform you to the character of Christ.  If you are in the midst of making a decision (big or small), seek the Lord and know that regardless of your decision He will accomplish His purposes in you. 

 My young friend and I ended our conversation that day by reminding one another that God has not given us a spirit of fear, but one of power, love, and a sound mind (2 Timothy 1:7).  May He give you the grace today to resist fear and move boldly in that spirit of power, love and a sound mind.

To find out more about John Stone, visit his Christian speaker home page here

May 3, 2010

The Word: Understanding & Trusting the Bible in an Age of Skepticism

Filed under: Apologetics, Biblical Studies, Christian Living, Christian speakers, Craig Smith, Faith & Culture — Tags: , , , , , , — admin @ 12:45 PM

Video interview with Dr. Craig Smith, Christian speaker and author of the new book, The Word:  Understanding & Trusting the Bible in an Age of Skepticism.


You can buy a copy of the book at any of the following locations:

Shepherd Project Resource Store

Amazon

Barnes & Noble

April 30, 2010

National Day of Prayer

Filed under: Christian Living, Craig Smith, Faith & Culture — Tags: — Craig Smith @ 7:46 AM

Although I honestly doubt that much will come of this absurd ruling by the Wisconsin judge that the National Day of Prayer is unconstitutionial, I’d like to recommend Jim Daley’s article to you:

(http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/panelists/jim_daly/2010/04/a_day_of_prayer_for_judicial_common_sense.html)

April 23, 2010

Making Right

Filed under: Christian Living, Craig Smith, Ethics, Morality, Philosophy, Theology — Tags: , , , , , , — Craig Smith @ 4:45 AM

A common question I get asked a Christian teacher:  what makes some things right and some things wrong?

The simplistic answer often given to this important question is that the Bible defines right and wrong, but there are two problems with this answer.  First, the Bible doesn’t directly address every question of right and wrong that we will encounter.  Second, the Bible is a means of revelation, not of determination.  In other words, the Bible doesn’t determine right and wrong, it merely reveals it, like turning a spotlight on a fence in a dark field.  As soon as you see the fence you know if you’re on the right or wrong side of the fence, but without the spotlight you might not even know there was a fence.  But the spotlight isn’t the fence, it merely reveals the fence.  So what is the fence?  What makes the authoritative determination of what is right and what is wrong?

As I see it, there are essentially three thee loci of right/wrong:  the nature of God, the nature of God’s creation and the nature of God’s will.  While there is some interconnectedness of all three, they can be thought of as distinct loci.

The first locus is the nature of God.  These are moral truths that depend on what God is like.  For example, lying is wrong because God is truth.  God Himself cannot lie (Heb. 6:18)  because His essential nature is truthful. Faithfulness is right because God is faithful, love is right because God is love, etc.  These are necessary (in the philosophical sense; i.e. they can’t be any other way), transcendent and unchanging truths.  God could never make a world where these moral truths didn’t apply because God Himself never changes in His essential nature. 

The second locus is the nature of God’s creation.  These are moral truths that emerge from the way God set the universe up.  I believe the prohibitions against homosexuality fit into this category.  There is no particular reason why we have to have 2 genders (male and female) that come together in marriage and produce children.  God could have made it so that there were 4 or 48!  He could have even created us so that there was only 1 gender and we spawned children like polyps!  If He had created humans in one of these other ways, the prohibitions against homosexuality wouldn’t apply.  However…we don’t live in that universe.  The universe that we inhabit was set up with 2 genders and homosexuality was forbidden because it goes against the way God created this universe to function.  These second kind of moral truths are also unchanging, at least so long as we inhabit this universe.  They are not, however, necessary because they do not directly emerge from God’s unchanging nature.

The third locus of right and wrong is the nature of God’s will.  So, for instance, God told the Israelites not to eat pork.  There is nothing inherently wrong with pork.  In fact, before His covenant with Moses and the people of Israel, God allowed people to eat pork (see Gen. 9:3).  Moreover, Jesus declared all foods clean in Mar. 7:19, so pork was and is acceptable food for humans generally…but not for the Israelites during the O.T. covenant.  Why?  Well, we can speculate on why, but I think it boils down to making the Israelites noticably distinct.  But that’s another discussioin.  My point here is simply this:  pork isn’t inherently bad, but God told the Israelites not to eat it.  If they did eat it, it was considered a moral lapse and atonement was required.  In other words, this instance of right and wrong emerged from what God told them to do.  The same holds true for individuals.  If God told me to go into ministry and I didn’t, I would be sinning.  But if you haven’t been called to ministry, then not going into ministry isn’t a sin.  Again, what makes the choice about not going into ministry right or wrong is God’s will for each of us.  So, this particular locus of right and wrong is neither transcendent nor unchanging.  It can change as God reveals a new phase of His plan for His people (either corporately or individually).

So there’s my take on making right:  right emerges from the nature of God, from the nature of God’s creation or the nature of God Himself.

April 12, 2010

Filed under: Christian Living, Craig Smith, Encouragement — Tags: , , — Craig Smith @ 3:17 PM

The following is an excerpt from a recent message.  Listen to the full audio version here.

Because we all get the spiritual wind knocked out of our sails from time to time, God commands us to encourage one another.  But what does Biblical encouragement look like?  It’s not just saying “you can do it!”  Biblical encouragement isn’t a pep-talk.  It’s a pit-crew.  It’s not someone standing on the sidelines saying “go get ‘em!” but someone waiting on deck to change your tires, fuel you up and get you back out on the track. 

Let me offer three characteristics of Biblical encouragement:

 1.   Biblical encouragement is steeped in God’s Word

 Biblical encouragement is steeped in God’s Word.   See, encouragement begins with the end in mind.  It seeks to give someone what they need to move from where they are to where they need to be.  But if we’re trying to move them to where we want them to be, then our “encouragement” is really nothing more than selfishness.  When a husband “encourages” his wife to go out and have some girl-time with her friends so that he can watch the game without being interrupted, that’s not biblical encouragement. Biblical encouragement seeks to move someone from where they are to where God says they need to be, and to do that we need to understand from His word where they need to be.

 Biblical encouragement has to be steeped in God’s Word because biblical encouragement depends on truth, not platitudes.  Biblical encouragement doesn’t sing “the sun will come out, tomorrow!” No, it says, “God has not given up on you.  God will never give up on you and He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion.”

 2.  Biblical encouragement is discerning. 

 Biblical encouragement is discerning.  It recognizes that different people are encouraged by different things and that different circumstances call for different kinds of encouragement.  By the way, I think there are basically four kinds of encouragement:  affirmation, consolation, exhortation and edification.

 a.  Affirmation – helps people see their value and potential, especially when they’ve lost sight of it.  Affirmation can take the form of words or of actions.  You know that game “strength bombardment”?  It’s where someone sits in the center of a circle and everyone else talks about their good qualities.  Some people are really encouraged by that kind of affirmation.  Personally, I hate that game.  I’d rather pull out my own fingernails than sit through that.  But trust me with a significant task because you believe I can do it well, and I’m affirmed. 

 b.  Consolation – recognizes the pain that people feel and acknowledges the legitimacy of their wounds while at the same time helping them see past the horizon of their suffering.

 c.  Exhortation – calls people to live in light of what they know rather than what they may feel at a given moment.  This can be a tricky line to walk.  On the one hand, if we tell someone to get it together and move on without allowing them time to heal from genuine wounds, we may just be creating an army of walking wounded.  On the other hand, sometimes sorrow and self-pity can cloud people’s vision and sap their strength, creating a well of despair that it can be very hard to climb up out of.  Illustration:  Crying Children.

 d.  Edification – gives people practical steps to enable them to move from where they are to where they need to be.  Sometimes this means helping them see something about themselves or their situation that they haven’t understood.  In that sense, this kind of encouragement could be called education, but remember that biblical encouragement is about pouring strength into someone so that they can live out God’s will for their lives.  Sometimes we can show people what they need to know, but sometimes it means coming alongside them, putting their arm over your shoulder and loaning them your strength as you take the next few steps together.

Biblical encouragement is discerning in that it offers the kind of encouragement that is most fitting for the situation or for the person who needs to be encouraged.

 3.  Biblical encouragement is personal.

 The only way to know how a person will be most encouraged or what kind of encouragement is required in a particular situation is to know the person you’re trying to encourage.  That’s why the greatest encouragement almost always comes from those who know us best.  Now, this means two things.  First, if you want to be an encouragement to someone, you need to take the time to get to know them, or at the very least, to know the situation they’re facing. This usually means learning how to listen.  Second, if you want someone to encourage you, then you have to be willing to let yourself be known.

April 7, 2010

Irony (and not the Alanis Morissette kind)

Filed under: Christian Living, Craig Smith, Faith & Culture, Philosophy, Postmodernism — Tags: , , , , — Craig Smith @ 4:52 PM

D.A. Carson said something in a book that I read recently that continues to echo in my head.  Describing the post-modern emphasis on tolerance, Carson made the point that tolerance presupposes disagreement.  In other words, you can’t “tolerate” something unless you happen to think it’s wrong.  We don’t “tolerate” those things that we agree with.  We “tolerate” those things that we disagree with by conceeding that, though we disagree with them, they have the right to exist.  Summarizing the beliefs of the French philosopher Voltaire, his biographer Evelyn Beatrice Hall penned the famous quote:  “I disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”  This is “tolerance”, an ideal on which much of the American notion of freedom is based.  Unfortunately, it becomes nonsense in the modern understanding of tolerance.

In contemporary parlance, “tolerance” means something like:  all ideas are equal and no idea is inherently more right or wrong, accurate or inaccurate, than any other.  While it is true that this notion might reduce conflict (why fight about an idea that is no more or less meaningfull than any other?), it is not, by any stretch of the imagination, “tolerant.”  This might be “accepting” or even “inclusive”, but it is not “tolerant.”

Ironically, it seems to me that genuine “tolerance” – i.e. the willingness to listen to and even support the right to speak of those with whom you disagree – is more respectful than the contemporary perversion of it.  Which is more respectful of someone, to say “talk all you want because nothing you say can actually mean anything to anyone but you” or “let me hear what you think so that I can evaluate whether or not you’re on to something”?  The latter presupposes that someone might have something to say which is meaningful and significant while the former presupposes that letting this person speak won’t make any difference anyway.

I was just coming back from speaking at an event and I sat next to a college philosophy major who believed that there was no truth and that no ideas actually described things the way they actually are.  This is a nonsense position, of course, since if someone says “No idea can actually be true [i.e. describe things the way they actually are]” then they are proposing an idea that they believe actually describes things the way they are, but that’s another issue entirely.  This student and I talked for several hours, but as we were landing I looked her in the eye and I said, “You know, I think you’re wrong.  But here’s the thing:  I’ve been listening to you because I think your ideas matter.  I think you’re very bright and because I think it’s at least possible that your ideas are actually right, I think you’re worth listening to.  Having heard you out, I happen to disagree with you, but ironically, my disagreement is actually a kind of respect.  By thinking that your ideas matter, I think you matter.  But if your ideas don’t actually mean anything, if they can’t possibly match up with the ways things actually are…then your ideas are meaningless and, by extension, so are you.  But I don’t think that.  I think your ideas matter and, by extension, I think you matter.  I think you’re wrong, but I only bother saying that because I think you – and your ideas – count.”

Of course, I’m sure I sound more eloquent here  than it came out live, but that’s essentially what I said.  How did she respond?  She teared up and raced off the plane so fast that I saw her go back later to get her bags that she’d left in the overhead bin.  I pray God continues to work on her obviously broken heart.

But do you see what I mean?  Tolerance, at least in the modern sense, isn’t respectful.  It’s disrespectful.  Ironically, genuine tolerance…the kind that presupposes disagreement…is far more respectful of persons than the modern version could ever hope to be.

March 21, 2010

Charity

Filed under: Christian Living, Craig Smith — Tags: , , , , , — Craig Smith @ 2:36 AM

I’ve been travelling in Asia for the last several weeks.  As you probably know, most of Asia holds to Buddhist or Hindu (or a mix of the two) religious beliefs.  Having spent several years here when I was growing up, this is no surprise to me and has provided for some great conversations with my kids.  What is new to me, though, is an observation I made just yesterday about the social impact of those religious systems:  while walking on the island of Koh Samui, Thailand, my oldest daughter pointed out a sign for a Thai boxing match aimed at raising relief funds for victims of the Haiti earthquake.  Besides the obvious oddity of buying tickets to watch two men beat each other up in order to raise money to help people who have been beat up by a natural disaster, here’s what struck me:  this is the first sign I’ve seen anywhere in Asia for anything like this.  In America right now there are a thousand charities raising money to help the earthquake victims in Haiti, but over here…nothing.  Even this Thai boxing match was organized by American ex-pats and appeared to be being marketed to Westerners.

In other words, the only impulse towards charity I’ve seen here was from Westerners.  No great surprise, I guess.  Remember who contributed almost all the funds a few years ago to help the victims of the tsunami that hit Thailand?  Right, Westerners…and mostly Americans at that.

Now, I don’t mention this in order to say “America is the best!”  No, I mention it to ask a question:  why?  Why should America, which it seems to me is fast-becoming a thoroughly secular nation, still lead the world in charity?

The answer, I believe, is that America still feels the impact of a historic Christian world-view.  Even the most jaded of secularists in the States tend to think that people matter and that helping people is a good thing…even if they are utterly unable to give justification for those beliefs.  But here in Asia, where Buddhism and Hinduism have dominated for centuries, the moral landscape is strikingly different.  Though the people are all so nice and polite, there is little or no concern for larger issues of social justice or humanitarian effort.

My point?  I’m not entirely sure.  I’m a little jet-lagged and a lot tired…and I have to get up early to catch a plane for Hong Kong in the morning…so I’m not really feeling all that profound.  But that Thai-boxing-Haiti-relief sign really got me thinking.  In my travels around the world as a Christian speaker and teacher, I think I see the global influence of America declining.  In some of the things that we export…through Hollywood in particular…I welcome that.  But in other ways, I fear for a world where a Christian worldview (or at least the last vestiges of one) no longer has a serious spokesman.

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