A Good Read & A Troubled Heart

If you've read this blog any length of time you know that I firmly believe it is impossible to separate a person from their worldview (assuming they live faithfully to what they believe). While I do not believe there should be a religious test for office (as in someone has to believe certain things to run in America), I do believe that the flip side of that—to try and ignore a person's worldview—is ignorance. How can we possibly understand or predict how a person will decide major issues like values, the battle between good and evil, Israel, Islam, etc., if we don't understand the framework or lens through which they view the world? We don't have to agree with a person's worldview, or even vote for them, but to ignore it and think we understand the person is foolish.

Albert Mohler posted an excellent blog entry today titled, "The Great American Worldview Test—The 2012 Election." I highly recommend you read it. It is a very equipping understanding that while we may frame individual issues as if they stand alone, they are, in fact, truly inseparably tied into our worldview. He makes a great case that this coming election—and he seems to frame it as Democrat vs. Republican—is a test between two worldviews that are a vast distance apart . . . and that both party's platforms are deeply tied into the worldview they subscribe to.

As he says at the end of the post, "Americans will elect a president in November, but our vote will reveal far more than our political preference. The 2012 election is a worldview exercise of unprecedented contrasts — an unavoidable test of our most basic convictions. The electoral map will reveal more than an election winner. It will reveal who Americans really are and what we really believe."

I couldn't agree more with what he is saying in terms of our revealing what we truly believe by what we make our priorities in the upcoming election. With that said, however, I find myself in a deep dilemna. Please don't let what I am about to write take anything away from what I wrote above. Mr. Mohler's article is right on and a must read. However, it leads me to a point I am deeply bothered by and don't have an answer to. I would really love to hear from conservative, Bible-believing Christians on how they are dealing with what I am about to say. So, here goes.

I will never vote for President Obama. While I am sure he has a heart for the poor and some other things Christians should care about and do more about, I do not know how he can profess to be a Christian and show such utter disregard for the Bible and what it says. I don't have a clue what his basis for determining right and wrong is, but it clearly can't be God's written Word. In fact, not only does he just not embrace it as his source of truth, he actively works against what it stands for in many, many areas. I would choose to not vote before I would ever cast my vote for him. He has done more in four years to undermine America's stand for God's values than anyone I can ever remember. The scary thing to me (and, I am sure, exciting thing to some others) is that it appears a vast number of Americans embrace him and his policies and reject God's written Word as their standard of right and wrong and life.

That said, Mr. Romney is a Mormon. It wasn't that long ago, when Mr. Santorum and Gingrich and Perry and Ms. Bachmann were still in it, Evangelicals were freaking out about a Mormon and making sure everyone knew it was a cult and that people falling into it were not going to be saved. What has changed? Is our dislike for President Obama so strong that we will vote for anyone but him? Now it seems like everywhere I turn Evangelicals are singing Romney's praises and encouraging a vote for him.

Please don't read into this something that is not there. I have only deep respect for Mr. Romney and would love to sit and visit with him and his family. And, I can only wish more Christians showed the kindness and family values and commitment to, and sacrifice for, their faith Mormons do. But . . . if we truly believe that Mormonism is a path away from salvation, and a faith filled with many false foundations, then aren't we legitimatizing it by being so cozy with Mr. Romney and giving him so much of our support and such a vast platform to showcase the Mormon faith's strengths? Aren't we, in fact, separating ourselves from our worldview and letting issues and not a worldview of eternal life (or Hell) frame us? Or do we not really believe Mormonism is not a path to salvation?

My fear is that, in fighting against Obama and abortion and gay marriage and such we are, as Christians, in some way causing millions of people to soften their resistance to a faith we claim is dangerous and not a true saving faith. If so, for the sake of a few years (in light of eternity) are we not playing a part in maybe millions being separated from God for all of eternity?

I don't know the answer to this. The thought of Obama for another four years as a President not worried about re-election is very scary to me. But the thought of playing a part in maybe millions coming to a faith I have been told, all my Christian years, by Christian leaders, is not a true saving faith, is also very scary. I don't want to lose sight of eternity because I am looking at a few years, or even decades. I know that Mr. Romney far better reflects our values than President Obama or the Democrat's platform does, and that we aren't electing a pastor, but a President . . . but I can't help but believe that, as Mormons are more and more seen favorably through this, more and more people will find their resistance to it dropping and their defense against it faltering. And if that mattered to us so dogmatically just a few months ago, has any of its threat to people's eternity changed? Or, are we putting this life and this nation ahead of the Kingdom of God, maybe not remembering this is not our home and there is a bigger issue at work?

I truly am in a deep dilemma I keep thinking about but can't find answers to. Again, I would really value hearing from committed, Bible believing Christians who have wrestled through this as to what your thoughts are.

Monotheism and Gore Vidal

I have either written about, or alluded to, the arguments about moral relativism multiple times. Basically, either there are absolute truths and absolute rights and wrongs, or it is all relative and what is right for some is right for some, but not necessarily for others. This morning Albert Mohler published a very good blog on Gore Vidal and his war on monotheism called Gore Vidal and the Sky God. I would recommend reading it. You can see it by clicking here.

In his blog Mohler captures what Vidal realized—that the absolute of truth and right and wrong lies in monotheism. Apart from one god (I leave it lowercase because he is talking about multiple monotheistic religions) there is no case for absolute truth that says something is absolutely right and other things are absolutely wrong. I'll quote a few parts of the article below, but I recommend reading it and reflecting on it. I think this whole argument is also, probably, one of the reasons evolution is so appealing. If we take God out of the picture and deny His existence then we don't have to make our lives accountable to Him or to face the fact that what may seem right to us may, in fact, not be right to He who defines right and wrong.

In the blog Mohler writes:

In his essay, “Monotheism and its Discontents,” based on the lecture at Harvard, Vidal perceptively and blasphemously blamed the existence of a binding sexual morality on monotheism. "The great unmentionable evil at the center of our culture is monotheism,” Vidal asserted, “From a barbaric Bronze Age text known as the Old Testament three anti-human religions have evolved — Judaism, Christianity and Islam. These are sky-god religions.”

And later he says:

Christians should pay close attention to Gore Vidal’s argument, but the mainstream media have almost uniformly ignored it. The obituaries have celebrated his literary gifts and noted his radical political ideas and rejection of Christianity, but not his call for “all-out war on the monotheists.” We should realize that Vidal’s rejection of monotheism, though blasphemous, was truly perceptive. He was certainly correct that a binding and objective morality requires a monotheistic God who both exists and reveals himself. He was also correct in pointing to the fact that a secularized Europe has largely abandoned a biblical morality when it comes, most specifically, to sexual behavior.

It is a truth we must realize to fully understand why the enemy attacks our faith so much—a faith that unashamedly declares itself to be the only way to truth. Because, if we are right, then everyone in the world is accountable to it, whether or not they like it or believe it. With that said, may you spend this week deeply aware of God's great love for you, and how mighty and powerful He is and how completely worthy He is of our standing for Him against all that comes our way. Thanks for reading!   —Erick

Is God a Christian?

In a recent blog post Albert Mohler discussed a book by R. Kirby Godsey called Is God a Christian? Let me say that I have not read the book and I am only going on what Mr. Mohler said about it and quoted from it—but even if it is not an accurate picture of Mr. Godsey’s arguments, it certainly is of others we will come across.

In his post, Mr. Mohler quotes Mr. Godsey as writing, “Most Christians assume that Christianity is the one and only religion that is God-inspired and that carries the imprimatur of God’s blessing.” Mr. Mohler then says how Godsey opposes that assumption and argues that, “the stakes for mankind have grown too high for any of us to engage our faith as if our understanding of God represents the only way God’s presence may be known in the world.”

On the surface this argument which Mr. Godsey purportedly puts forth sounds so comforting for those who know and love non-Christians. It sounds kind and “tolerant.” It sounds humble, “Yeah, who are we to claim we have the only way?” But, it is a devastating path for a Christian to go on—and one we MUST recognize and be able to teach our children to recognize.

Fundamentally, as with evolution, the justification of homosexuality as a pleasing lifestyle before God, or any other thing we have created contrary to the Bible, the argument reportedly put forth by Mr. Godsey is one more attack on the Bible as the written and inspired and accurate record of God’s words to us. And, when we start to lose that place of authority in our own heart that the Bible is God’s word to us, from Genesis 1:1 to the end of Revelation, we lose the very foundation of our faith. This is why I am such a supporter of defenses of the Creation account—because the devil doesn’t care where he begins to cast doubt in our heart about the Bible . . . he will eventually take that doubt and move it to the gospel. We can not take these things lightly as Christians, and as those commissioned to pass the baton on to the next generation.

Let me first say that Romans makes it clear that God is known to all men through Creation. So much so that men are without excuse for denying God. Rom 1:19-20 says: For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. So, in that sense, our faith is not the only way God’s presence may be known in the world. With that I don’t argue. That is why, I believe, so many religions carry the same themes, the same types of stories in their heritage, etc.—because, at their core, they are “God-inspired” by our innate knowledge that He is real and our seeking to give Him shape and definition.

So, I do believe that many religions have a true sense of God’s reality and presence . . . but, from that point, Christianity makes a unique claim, and it is based on the words of the Bible. In it Jesus says that He is the way—that no one comes to the Father except through Him. The parable of the minas makes it clear that at His return those who didn’t want Him as their King will be cast out. On and on we could go, quoting verses that make it clear that if we don’t come to God through the cross then we are not going to stand before Him. All of these claims come from a common origin—the Bible. And the Bible makes it pretty clear that there is only one way. So, there really isn’t room, if we believe the Bible to the accurate word from God, to accept multiple paths to God.

Of course, and here’s the rub, if we don’t believe the Bible to be the word of God then each can define their own path and what “feels right” to them and come up with their own brand of faith and religion that “resonates” with them. Of course, the slippery slope of that, is that there are no absolutes and such a relativism is a catastrophic place for a society to fall in to. There are many people who assert they are Christians who don’t believe that Jesus is the only way. I must ask, “If there was another way then what Father, who loved His Son, would subject Him to the cross?” If there was another way, than do we have multiple, alternative “Saviors”? Often it is these same Christians who will define right and wrong in society totally contrary to the Bible’s words . . . and I have to ask, how do they define the faith? Where do they derive their doctrine?

No, Christianity is based upon the Bible as the doctrinal foundation of our faith. It is one of the most primary ways God reveals Himself and His ways and His path to us. And it is clear that, in what God has chosen to reveal to us, Jesus is the only way. To reject that is to reject the Bible. To reject the Bible is to reject the faith—or to create a faith based on one’s own feelings or ideas and call it “Christianity”. That is arrogance, I believe.

It strikes me that, beyond the inspired recognition that there is a God, if Christianity is not the only God-inspired religion then it isn’t God-inspired at all because it can’t be God-inspired and be wrong, and if it is right it doesn’t leave room for other ways. I don’t see how the two can be reconciled.



Note: It is not arrogant for us to claim we have the only way. We aren't claiming it like we are some super brains who "figured it out." It is actually a very humble claim which says, in faith, "I don't have a way on my own, I trust God and His Bible to have shown me this." It is simply faith in what we believe God says. He makes the claim, we don't. We just repeat it.