How many of us have had moments where we wish we could have a burning bush experience with God? A lot of people like to do questionnaires, and a question that often pops up on them is something like, "If you could ask God anything..." Many of us would like very much to get some kind of direct communication from God. That desire drives all kinds of books, studies, and seminars about how to hear the voice of God. Wouldn't that be nice? If God had something to say, wouldn't we really want to know what it is?
But I have noticed a facinating contradiction. Most people are Biblically illiterate. Think about that for a second. The churches are full of people who seem totally convinced that the Bible is the word of God. It is God-breathed. They go to church and hold on to their Bibles and praise the Lord and everything. And these people yearn to hear directly from God. Yet they don't read the Bible, much less do they study it. What is the explanation?
If we really believe the Bible is God-breathed, how can we resist wanting to know what it says? Shouldn't that drive us to read it? And not only to read it, but shouldn't it drive us to try with everything we have to study it so that we can understand it?
And that's another thing. Most people in America have at least a high school education. A big chunk of us have college educations. That means we had to study, we had to write papers, and we had to exert a great deal of mental energy to learn things like algebra, history, chemistry, etc. We go through that because we think it's important. But few of us ever exert half that much energy in studying the Bible. Sunday schools rarely go beyond a 3rd grade level even in adult classes. I don't think I've ever been in a Sunday school class where the teacher required the class to read a chapter in the Bible and be prepared to discuss it the next week. In fact, people seem to have an aversion to any kind of requirements at all. Oh, there are a few who'll get together in a special small group to do some deeper study on hearing the voice of God or something, and they'll covenant to do their little readings. But they never study the Bible with any intensity.
A close friend of mine recently told me how she thought very highly of her pastor. She said she always feels blessed when she attends church. I don't remember her exact words. But this person has never read the Bible. A pastor's job isn't to make us feel good. It's to encourage us in the faith, to build us up in the knowledge of Jesus Christ. I know people who have gone to her church for years and remain Biblically illiterate. How effective could that pastor be if he is totally unable to motivate anybody to grow in the knowledge of Jesus Christ?
Jonathan Edwards did not make people feel good. He certainly didn't make people feel good with "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." Rather, he made them feel conviction. Conviction can be quite uncomfortable, but it is exactly what people need to feel, because conviction leads to repentence and salvation. Jonathan Edwards was quite effective in motivating people to live holier lives and to take their faith seriously. I just don't see a lot of that these days.
6 comments:
I love that word, "ubiquitous."
Steve, Jesus certainly talked about the horrors of judgment more than you'd think from sitting in church your whole life without ever reading the Bible.
I think your deduction that I haven't read the Bible is based on the assumption your position is unassailable.
I think your deduction that I made any such deduction about you is based on a misreading of what I wrote.
If it were about anything other than religion, then I would say that belief out of fear would be DURESS, and legally that would be non-binding!
We've already talked about this here.
Steve,
I never said (or even thought) that you never read the Bible. You simply misread what I wrote. Nor did I assume, say, or even imply that if you disagreed with Jonathan Edwards that you haven't read the Bible. So no, my deductions about what you deduced are not wrong. You said very plainly what you think I assumed, and you were wrong. I did not misread you at all.
Steve,
We've talked about all this already. If there is something unBiblical about anything Jonathan Edwards said, then quote it for us and show us that it's unBiblical.
You say that Edwards "missed the message of the Bible, which is that of salvation, not punishment." But both salvation and punishment are in the Bible, and Edwards didn't miss either one. Moreover, how could the Bible possibly have a message about salvation if it doesn't also have a message about what we're being saved from?
Steve,
If I'm understanding you right, it sounds like the problem you have with Edwards is not that anything he said was inconsistent with the Bible, but that he was unbalanced. He focused on some parts of the Bible (i.e. punishment) and ignored everything else.
If that's what you're saying, then I'm certain you're wrong. Edwards was very prolific, and he covered a wide range of topics. You should read his book on the Freedom of the Will sometime. It will give you a completely different impression of Edwards than from reading "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," and it will also answer a lot of the questions you've been having about Calvinism.
Steve,
I'll try to clarify my comment. Here's what I said: "Jesus certainly talked about the horrors of judgment more than you'd think from sitting in church your whole life without ever reading the Bible." Pay close attention to the phrase, "you'd think from..." The contraction means, "you would think from..." In other words, Jesus talked more about the horrors of judgment than you, me, or anybody would think if all you, me, or anybody did was go to church without ever reading the Bible. That doesn't say anything about whether you, me, or anybody has gone to church our whole lives or about whether you, me, or anybody has read the Bible. It just says something about what would happen if we went to church our whole life without reading the Bible.
In the Freedom of the Will, Edwards gives a philosophical defense of the compatibalist view of freedom. He explains thoroughly how the compatibalist view is consistent with moral accountability. You don't actually have to buy this book either. You can check it out at a library. Or, if you don't mind doing a lot of reading on the internet, the whole thing is publish on the web here. If you want a sneak peek, I did a series of blogs covering parts of the book here starting with "Argument against morality from determinism, part 3," but you should probably read "the power of intuition" and parts 1 and 2 of "argument agaisnt morality from determinism" just for context. Keep in mind, though, that I'm giving my own understanding of Edwards, and it's always possible that I have misunderstood his arguments in some places.
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