Remonstrance

Jesus told him, “I am the truth.” - John 14:6

Truth is tied into the very person of Jesus Christ, and here Jesus agrees with the Postmodernist: truth is rooted in a person. Understanding necessarily changes from one viewpoint to another, depending on the experience, knowledge and complexities of the individual. One perception of truth is different than another’s.

The Postmodernist fails to consider the impact of omniscience, infinity and all eternity on truth. Such Omniscient Truth would encompass and overwhelm any and all finite views taken together.

Here is what it looks like:

“Lead me in Your truth and teach me, For You are the God of my salvation; For You I wait all the day.” - Psalms 25:5

First, it is “Your truth,” David concedes, acknowledging his personal poverty of truth. He called its owner, “the God of my salvation” who saves us from Impoverished Truth.

Second, it comes from interaction: “Lead me…teach me,” David says. As prophet with privilege, he was lead by theopneustos words (literally, “God- breathed,” in 2 Tim. 3:16) which fill the Psalms with supernatural Omniscient Truth. David was astonished by theopneustos, and craved more: “For you I wait all the day.”

Jesus said that David’s privileged experience would soon be available to all:

“But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth.” - John 16:13

Although available, Omniscient Truth is perceived only by:

1. Conceding who owns Omniscient Truth;
2. Seeking salvation from Impoverished Truth,
3. Following His guidance and leadership.

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As I read secularists, I am struck by how intimidated they are by the issue of Truth, and I think it’s fair to say this is because they are looking at the Real World exclusively from their private center of the universe, and they drown in the vastness of it:

“Truth lies in the abyss.” - Schiller. Atomic Bomb p. 61.

“Only in the world of possibilities is there continuity; in the world of reality decision always comes through a breach of continuity.” - Kierkegard summarized, Atomic Bomb p. 61.

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As Paul says,

Preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction.
2 Timothy 4:2

As it happened with the early church, so too we’ll find subsequent generations trying to pass along an empty, hollow shell of Christianity absent of the Holy Spirit. You can pass along your knowledge of Chemistry or Psychology without the Holy Spirit. Not so with our faith. There is a reality and a purity which is unalterable and dogmatic:

But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed! Gal. 1:8

The gospel is merely a hodge-podge of collective religious ideas: that was the gist of the Judiazers of Paul’s day. Today, it’s similar: "You can’t really be sure what it says, it’s not a clear book…" Christianity is becoming merged with the New World Religion of Postmodernism, and it’s called the Emergent Church.

We live in a post-Christian era because we have decided that God’s Word does not deserve the treatment Paul gave it in Gal.1:8 and 2 Tim. 4:2. Upon these issues rest our spiritual lives and that of our families.

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Tags: emergent, postmodernism

Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods? John 10:34

Jesus threw this amazing quote into the face of the Pharisees who were trying to accuse him of blasphemy. Interestingly, he’s twisting the scriptures slightly - more accurately, he feeds their twisted view of reality with some scripture, and leaving them befuddled. It is the secret of men’s hearts, widely-held, timeless and still popular today: "I am god!" To say, "the center of truth lies with me" is to say, "I am god!"

Did you know this verse lies at the heart of Mormon doctrine? The ambition of a good Mormon lifestyle is to achieve deity status, as Jesus achieved, through good works. Thus, the appeal of Mormonism world-wide, despite its harsh requirements: it appeals to that

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Tags: mormonism, pride

This comes from our Cell Wednesday night 1/18, Joe’s Teaching from “More Than a Carpenter,” chapter 1.

Why must postmodernists be so dogmatic and judgemental? It is an amazing and glaring hypocrisy which somehow escapes the enlightened scrutiny of the postmodern world. (The most difficult weakness to see is personal weakness, no matter how glaring.)

Joe found a blog where some postmodernist was raging with the usual pretense of great enlightened inclusiveness, and Joe asked the guy for one simple clarification (a fair question) about the guy’s postmodern dogma, and behold! What a stream of vindictive rhetoric he drew! All the marvels of enlightened inclusiveness is so very fragile and skin-deep, if anyone scratches the surface what bloody wrath suddenly gushes out! Postmodernism reminds me of early Nazism which engulfed the most educated nation of its day, with all its sloganeering and intolerance–aimed now at Christians, not Jews.

Jesus is sometimes tauted as the prototypical postmodernist because he taught on love and acceptance. But to actually talk about Jesus will get a postmodernist pretty heated. Why? Even a scant look at the historical record quickly torpedoes the fantasy-Jesus endeared by postmodernists. Consider these:

“I and the Father are one.”
The Jews picked up stones again to stone Him.
Jesus answered them, “I showed you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you stoning Me?”
The Jews answered Him, “For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy; and because You, being a man, make Yourself out to be God.” John 10:30-33

And then:

The high priest stood up and came forward and questioned Jesus, saying, “Do You not answer? What is it that these men are testifying against You?”
But He kept silent and did not answer. Again the high priest was questioning Him, and saying to Him, “Are You the Christ, the Son of the Blessed One?”
And Jesus said, “I am; and you shall see THE SON OF MAN SITTING AT THE RIGHT HAND OF POWER, and COMING WITH THE CLOUDS OF HEAVEN.”
Tearing his clothes, the high priest said*, “What further need do we have of witnesses?
“You have heard the blasphemy; how does it seem to you?” And they all condemned Him to be deserving of death. Mark 14:60-64

Why get so caught-up in such rage? It happened then, and still today, despite our many millenia of enlightened thought. If Jesus is a fraud, so what? Why fear such a fool? Does Jesus take any money or expect anything in return? No, in fact it is His clear and simple message:

“For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.” Mark 10:45

Now what is so threatening about that?

Andy teaches next Cell Group.

Everybody needs to know about the Cell Group retreat in one week from Saturday night. It begins at 4 pm.

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Tags: apologetics, persecution, postmodernism

Listen to Sea of Joy and what I’ve got burning inside…

 

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I just witnessed a worker bust out in tears over the joy of serving others. He once bragged he never cried, hadn’t cried for years, and it was foolish and useless. That was a year ago.

But tonight he wept a Sea of Joy over the kids he loved and served for years. Now growing older, these kids are becoming winners with spiritual hope — not just Kosmos hope — and a real future, unlike so many others he knew–even himself at that age. He wept at the honor God granted him to imprint their childhood with living spirit.

But his joy was mixed with grief. Now his “children” were walking into a fog of waiting hurt and scars that stay for a lifetime. One of them is my own child, and I know what he means: their sweet naivety will vanish soon. They’ll never again have those squeaky-high voices. He asked me if he will recognize them later, and will they remember him? These questions are difficult to answer.

He was a heartless punk who now feels that weighty love parents carry, deep inside. How strange for a non-parent to care this deeply. It is supernatural, a new life Jesus sparked in that young worker’s heart…and Paul felt it, even though unmarried:

You therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. 2 Timothy 2:1

I know how it feels, and even this young worker is cherished in my heart the same way, and I love him like a son. I prefer to say “Little Brother,” only because I never want to confuse those disciples or myself about who their true father is, waiting in heaven, and I also want them to come alongside and even peck at my character the way siblings do. I get it enough, but I could use more pecking, I’m sure.

This is what happens when “a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies,” Jesus said: “It bears much fruit.” (Jn. 12:24) I’ve seen that young worker miss many Friday night adventures with his peers to spend with kids far below his level. And tonight, “it bears much fruit” in his heart.

Who is this dude?

Tonight I swim by moonlight in a Sea of Joy not easily forgotten.

Sea of Joy

Mark and Diana, Neil and Kalie…come dive in! The water’s fine!

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Hey, check it out! Here’s an interesting note I got from Steppenwolf:

Your video “Blind Guides!” has been identified by YouTube’s Content Identification program as containing copyrighted content which UMG claims is theirs.

Your video “Blind Guides!” is still available because UMG does not object to this content appearing on YouTube at this time.

The video? Watch for yourself! It’s a take-off on Paul’s words in Galatians 1:9 — “As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, he is to be accursed!” And “accursed” is, to be precise, “God-damn”.

(Used in my Galatians 1 podcast.)

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Tags: legalism, video