The Foundation of Christian Logic

Posted on 16 January 2014 by Seth Meyers

The way in which we reason, how we evaluate claims to the truth, the standards we adopt for knowing, etc.–is itself an ethical matter. …

A person cannot have it both ways regarding his final standard or ultimate reference point. He presupposes and reasons either according to the authority of God or according to some other authority. Attempting to be neutral about God’s ultimate authority in determining what we know is a result of a bad attitude toward God’s ultimate authority.

Greg Bahnsen, Van Til’s Apologetic, 90, 92

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Intellectual Sustenance of 2013

Posted on 13 January 2014 by Seth Meyers

Listed in the basic order that I read them this year, here are the books that I completed in 2013. By completed, I mean first that I grasped the author’s main point including his most significant arguments, and second, I don’t plan to return to this book again except to refresh my affections or site some relevant piece of research or review a penetrating insight.

I tarried long with other friends this year, but not sufficiently to mark “completed” over the doorpost. Bahnsen’s Theonomy in Christian Ethics, Vlach’s Has the Church Replaced Israel?, MacArthur’s Strange Fire, and Scruton’s Beauty are a few friends whom I should finish conversing with by the end of 2014.

Awards:

  • Book of the Year: S. Pearce Carey, William Carey
  • Surprise of the Year: David Gordon, Why Johnny Can’t Sing Hymns
  • Worst of the Year: William Lee, Grace Recovered

Scoring:

0     The book was notable for lacking this category repeatedly.

1     The book dipped into this category at times.

2     The book consistently demonstrated this category.

Non-Fiction Categories:

  • Weight: Did the book ask and answer the most germane questions about an important topic?
  • Research: Did the writer demonstrate a thorough command of the subject?
  • Style: Did the theme, vocabulary, and composition represent an enduring standard?
  • Logic: Did the book model logic in definitions, formatting, and focus?
  • Affections: Was some truth presented powerfully to the affections?

Walker, F. Deaville. William Carey, Missionary, Pioneer and Statesman. Chicago: Moody Press, 1951, 256 pages.

He fills the pages well and several times includes more details than the longer, more esteemed biography by Pearce Carey.

  • TOTAL: 8, W: 2,  R: 2, S: 2, L: 1, A: 1

Carey, S. Pearce, and Peter Masters. William Carey. London: Wakeman Trust, 1993, 419 pages.

If Baptists can be Renaissance men, Carey earned the title. He planted flowers, mastered languages, and preached powerfully in another culture for the glory of Jesus Christ.

  • TOTAL: 10, W: 2,  R: 2, S: 2, L: 2, A: 2

DiLorenzo, Thomas. Lincoln Unmasked. Three Rivers Press, 2006, 223 pages.

Lincoln’s heritage damaged the US because he encouraged the expansion of the federal government.

TOTAL: 6, W: 1,  R: 2, S: 1, L: 2, A: 0

Thompson, Jim. Prophecy Today: a Further Word from God? Darlington, England; Webster, NY: Evangelical Press, 2008.

A good set of arguments against Grudem’s view of prophecy.

TOTAL: 8, W: 2,  R: 2, S: 1, L: 2, A: 1

Lee, William. Grace Recovered. Light Point Press, 2012, 140 pages.

The arguments by Arminians serve to strengthen many uncertain Calvinists in the making. This is a classic example of really bad Scriptural explanations.

TOTAL: 2, W: 0,  R: 1, S: 1, L: 0, A: 0

Gordon, T. David. Why Johnny Can’t Sing Hymns: How Pop Culture Rewrote the Hymnal. Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2010, 186 pages.

The subtitle reveals that Gordon is really aiming at popular culture with similar conclusions on that score as Roger Scruton and Ken Myers. Pop culture is like eating spoonfuls of sugar, and thus its musical issue embodiment is sick as well.

TOTAL: 10, W: 2,  R: 2, S: 2, L: 2, A: 2

Gordon, T. David. Why Johnny Can’t Preach: The Media Have Shaped the Messengers. Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2009, 108 pages.

What is contemporary culture doing to the sensibilities that are necessary for preaching? In 100 short pages, Gordon insightfully demonstrates that much pulpit mediocrity is due to a glut of pop culture.

TOTAL: 8, W: 1,  R: 2, S: 2, L: 2, A: 1

Johnson, Paul. Socrates: a Man for Our Times. New York: Viking, 2011, 194 pages.

Johnson’s accessible and yet dense writing style paints a portrait of a great thinker. He implies that Socrates will be accepted by God.

TOTAL: 7, W: 2,  R: 2, S: 2, L: 1, A: 0

Kimball, Roger. The Rape of the Masters: How Political Correctness Sabotages Art. San Francisco: Encounter Books, 2004, 180 pages.

A conservative, learned, and sarcastic critique of the misguided opinions of liberal art teachers.

TOTAL: 7, W: 2,  R: 2, S: 1, L: 1, A: 1

Reisinger, John G. In Defense of Jesus, the New Lawgiver. Frederick, MD: New Covenant Media, 2008, 357 pages.

Written as a defense of New Covenant Theology in the face of a Reformed Baptist critique, this work really clarifies the issues under discussion. Convincing.

TOTAL: 8, W: 2,  R: 2, S: 2, L: 1, A: 1

Malone, Fred A. The Baptism of Disciples Alone: a Covenantal Argument for Credobaptism Versus Paedobaptism. Cape Coral, Fla.: Founders Press, 2003, 319 pages.

Started as a Baptist, then Presbyterian, then back to Baptist, Malone tries to show that you can be a consistent Covenant Theologian and a Baptist. He ultimately fails though he does present good arguments against paedo baptism.

TOTAL: 7, W: 1,  R: 2, S: 2, L: 1, A: 1

Brooks, Thomas. Heaven on Earth; a Treatise on Christian Assurance. London: Banner of Truth Trust, 1961, 320 pages.

A good Puritan work on assurance of salvation with lots of Scripture, lists, and Lordship salvation. As is typical in this genre, he circles the field a lot.

TOTAL: 9, W: 2,  R: 2, S: 2, L: 2, A: 1

Henry, Matthew. The Quest for Meekness and Quietness of Spirit. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1955, 144 pages.

Filled with Scripture and application, this is the small, smooth stone that will kill a giant-sized spirit of impatience, hasty anger, coarseness, and self-assertion.

TOTAL: 10, W: 2,  R: 2, S: 2, L: 2, A: 2

MacDonald, Gordon. Ordering Your Private World. Nashville: Oliver-Nelson, 1985, 267 pages.

Good advice about prioritizing and scheduling, but very little Bible. It became tiresome to us.

TOTAL: 5, W: 1,  R: 1, S: 1, L: 1, A: 1

Scruton, Roger. Culture Counts: Faith and Feeling in a World Besieged. New York: Encounter Books, 2007, 108 pages.

High culture deserves our attention since it is the study of “true judgment.” He proves this point with penetrating examples from the arts.

TOTAL: 9, W: 2,  R: 2, S: 2, L: 2, A: 1

And my diet of fiction this year was not very broad. But if I’ve only got time for one fiction book, my wife and I chose well. (We read it together.)

Scoring:

0     The book was notable for lacking this category repeatedly.

1     The book dipped into this category at times.

2     The book consistently demonstrated this category.

Fiction Categories:

  • Biblical: Did the author honor Scriptural truth or a Christian worldview even if unwittingly?
  • Creative: Did the author grip the imagination by inventing characters, situations, or other aspects of reality?
  • Style: Did the theme, vocabulary, and composition represent an enduring standard?
  • Credible: Were the characters, plot turns, and relationships believable?
  • Affections: Was some truth presented powerfully to the affections?

Austen, Jane. Emma. Kindle edition, a lot of pages.

Austen ties her readers with so many fictional cords to the virtues of masculinity, humility, holding your tongue, conviction, and the music of words. Feminists beware.

TOTAL: 8, B: 2, C: 1, S: 2, C: 2, A: 1

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A Famine of Fathers

Posted on 9 January 2014 by Seth Meyers

I asked 6 young men in our church a few questions while we were digging last Saturday:
1. “Did you live with or have a consistent relationship with your father growing up?”
All 6 said no.

2. “Did your father make a significant impact in helping you to grow up?”
All 6 said no.

3. “Who would you look to as an example of a respectable man in your life–the kind of man that you might want to be like? Maybe he is not a believer, but at least he is dependable. Is there any man in your life that you admire?”
One: my unsaved brother because he supports me and my mom.
One: my unsaved uncle.
The other 4 said no.

Either fatherhood is not important, or we should expect a society where this is common to exemplify a history-making train wreck.

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Biblical Calling is the Creation of New Desires

Posted on 9 January 2014 by Seth Meyers

Jeremiah Burrows on God’s calling:

The work of grace, when it is first wrought, has the name “vocation” or “calling.” What is it for a man to be called? “Give diligence to make your calling and election sure.” To be called is this: whereas before you were altogether digging and delving in the earth and seeking for your happiness in the world, it pleased God to make you hear a voice behind you, calling you and telling you, “O poor soul, your happiness is not here. There are other things in which the Chief Good consists. …” Here’s the first work of grace. And the soul answers unto this call of God and says, “Lord, I come.”

In keeping with this doctrine, I often pray for myself and those in our church that God would give them new desires.

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On Being Christ-Centered When It’s Easy

Posted on 8 January 2014 by Seth Meyers

While on our most recent furlough with access to unlimited data, I downloaded the messages from the first T4G conference. Slowly, I’ve been working through each of them, and today I arrived at my second chance to hear Ligon Duncan teach us about preaching Christ from the Old Testament.

His message was a textbook example of powerfully convincing the already convinced. He referenced preaching Christ from 2 Samuel 7 with the Davidic Covenant; preaching Christ from Isaiah 6 which is also mentioned in John 12:41; and preaching Christ from the Protoevangelium in Genesis 3:15. Now, I would not critique his interpretation of any of those passages, but I do question who would disagree with those? Rare would be the pastor who cares about the Bible, yet refuses to make the connection with Jesus Christ in those passages.

The Bible is filled with many other difficult passages for someone with a Christ-centered perspective on preaching. How do we accurately draw our people’s affections to Christ when preaching on OT narrative like the Israelites who died for looking in the Ark at Bethshemesh in 1 Samuel 6? Or two chapters later when Samuel’s wicked sons are appointed as judges?

It would have been helpful to have heard Dr. Duncan treat passages like these and offer insights and principles by which a pastor could exalt Christ without lifting stories from their original context. And it would have been great to have heard him address the kind of questions I could just imagine John MacArthur (who was in the crowd when Duncan was speaking) would ask: “If I merely preach what the text says without looking for a road to Christ that is not explicitly there, have I failed as a preacher?”

But he neither asked nor answered these questions. Though he did refer to numerous times that the NT says, “This is that” which was spoken by the prophets. As far as I know, there are only two times time when Scripture says something like this (Acts 2:16 and John 6:58).

For several reasons which I’ve already published, I want to be Christ-centered in my preaching. But that does not mean that I am able to interpret all the kinds of passages in Scripture. How nice to have had Ligon Duncan’s help!

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American Exceptionalism

Posted on 2 January 2014 by Seth Meyers

When I read Roger Scruton’s thoughts on America, I am filled with gratitude for the citizenship that I was blessed at birth with.

Take away America, its freedom, its optimism, its institutions, its Judeo-Christian beliefs, and its educational tradition, and little would remain of the West, besides the geriatric routines of a now toothless Europe. Add America to the discussion, and all the dire prophecies and mournful valedictions of the twentieth century seem faintly ridiculous.

 

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Scruton vs. Carson on Culture

Posted on 26 December 2013 by Seth Meyers

Roger Scruton, Culture Counts (2007) 1-2 and 106:

By “culture” I mean what has been called “high culture”–the accumulation of art, literature, and humane reflection that has stood the “test of time” and established a continuing tradition of reference and allusion among educated people.

[T]he attempt to build a realm of intrinsic value–and that is what a culture really is.

D. A. Carson, Christ and Culture Revisited (2008) 1:

Not very long, “culture” commonly referred to what is now meant by “high culture.” … Today, “culture” has become a fairly plastic concept that means something like “the set of values broadly shared by some subset of the human population.” That’s not bad, but doubtless the definition could be improved by a bit of tightening.

To which Scruton replies, 2:

The culture of a civilization is the art and literature through which it rises to consciousness of itself and defines its vision of the world. All civilizations have a culture, but not all cultures achieve equal heights.

Carson again in a footnote, 3:

Here I am parting from many older treatments [i.e. T. S. Eliot], which, despite their heuristic value, subtly assume some notion or other of “high” culture.

But Scruton defends Eliot, 13-14:

A culture consists of all those activities and artifacts which are organized by the “common pursuit of true judgment,” as T. S. Eliot once put it. And true judgment involves the search for meaning through the reflective encounter with things made, composed, and written, with such an end in view.

As I referenced previously and as these two men demonstrate, there are two sides in the church’s culture wars. Scruton’s side allows him room to oppose pop music (for one among several examples see pages 60-65 in Culture Counts), but Carson’s leaves music alone. The first camp makes judgments about architecture, art, and literature while the second seems quick to find reflections of common grace in inferior works.

This debate enters the church every Sunday in the form of musical styles, architecture, and personal appearance. It touches economic and political philosophy (though the two sides probably have most everything in common here).

But what we shouldn’t deny is that the tension exists. Rather, the times call for a sober investigation of first principles surrounding–it would appear–even the very definition of culture and the fabled existence of that dreadful beast, high culture.

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Divine Generosity

Posted on 12 December 2013 by Seth Meyers

His benefits are so many, so various, so minute, that they often escape our observation while they exactly meet our wants.

Spurgeon on Psalm 116:12

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9 Good Bad Examples From Evangelical Academia

Posted on 8 December 2013 by Seth Meyers

While I acknowledge that Christians must love God with their minds, I am often disturbed by the intellectual statements and positions of men in the most influential places within the evangelical academy. On top of this, many ministers seem to lend strong loyalty to academic voices and publications. Yet, I have discovered in my brief ministerial experience some reasons to hesitate—cautionary doubt about the reliability of the academic industry.

  1. Wheaton College hosted “Evangelicals and Catholics Together.” J. I. Packer—a still highly respected evangelical scholar—agreed with Cardinal Francis George that at the core Catholicism is Christian. Numerous influential names were present in the large auditorium when I asked the final question about why I have never heard a Catholic simply say that they are trusting in Jesus. Cardinal George and I had a brief dialogue before I returned to my seat to shouts and boos. Then president Duane Litfin somewhat abruptly closed the session.
  2. Richard Mouw, president of Fuller Theological Seminary, does all but endorse the evangelical status of Mormonism.
  3. Tim Keller who serves in a visible position with the Gospel Coalition endorses BioLogos. This think tank has devoted themselves to certain aspects of what Peter called intentional foolishness (2 Pet. 3:5) in their manner of handling the Flood and evolution.
  4. Tremper Longman III receives accolades as an evangelical scholar, but he’s not quite sure if Solomon wrote Ecclesiastes, Moses wrote the Pentateuch, Jonah was actual history, and of course Genesis 1-2 is opaque. See the relevant sections in his Introduction to the Old Testament.
  5. John Frame believes and teaches others that it is not wrong to choose to watch movies for “the normal course of my cultural pursuits” if they contain nudity and glamorized immorality as long as they are not “the main point” of the movie. Doctrine of the Christian Life, 895-896.
  6. The late Robert Webber used the F-word and other obscenities in an evangelistic Bible study where he also said something like, “You know, praying, reading your Bible everyday, and fasting—I’m not so good at those things.” What a raw relational bridge that was to we rootless 20 somethings. And Webber’s particular scholarly expertise? Writing books on worship.
  7. A well-known theologian who has done a lot of good in a lot of areas referred to The Titanic at a minister’s conference in South Africa remarking that he knows we all watched it and liked it. The non-academic writer, Randy Alcorn sternly and correctly rebuked that particular movie for its smut in The Purity Principle.
  8. Mark Noll castigates creationism repeatedly in his highly acclaimed The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind as well as his more recent and less profitable Jesus Christ and the Life of the Mind. In the latter (page 124), his conclusion is that there can be no more valid objection to evolution since it is “fully compatible with historic Christian orthodoxy.”
  9. Two different professors at Reformed Theological Seminary covered Karl Barth. (The lectures are available at iTunes U.) In one of the classes, a student asked if Barth was a false teacher, to which the lecturer shrugged out something like, “I guess he’s more toward a false teacher.” The second professor had very mild words for Schleiermacher, Barth, etc. Are these guys true teachers or false? What would Jesus or the apostle Paul say about men who handled the Scriptures they way they did?

All these men or institutions are respected and influential within evangelical academia. I did not choose minor voices or backwoods ministries. Secondly, the errors that were listed are obvious. If we disagree with the examples, then there is a presuppositional tension between us, not some superficial problem. Third, each of these men is coming from the conservative, Reformed camp. This should be the best that the evangelical truth-seeking industry has to offer.

Possibly, I am growing too cynical and critical at the ripe age of 35. But it’s also possible that Jesus’ judgment in truth will be harsher yet.

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Some Results from the Internet

Posted on 5 December 2013 by Seth Meyers

[With the internet] we have been blessed with the nanosecond attention span, the erosion of patience, the exponential growth of credulity and gullibility, the silent proliferation of pornography, and the removal of most of the societal barriers that formerly obstructed it.

From Slashreap to Scardagger, compiled for us by Richard Platt, Letter 20

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