So Dumb We Need a Pastor

How smart are you, and how much does being intelligent matter to your Christian life?

The other day, a discussion of IQ and what it means for human capabilities in various areas of life took a turn for the bizarre in the comment section of one of my favourite blogs. One of the wordier and more inscrutable readers said something that boiled down to this (I’m translating from intellectual-ese here):

“To be usefully involved in the Church requires a certain minimal level of reading comprehension. Important parts of the Bible are not instantly obvious to everyone. How smart do you have to be to understand it?”

I think Protestants find this an uncomfortable question because it undermines sola scriptura. They shouldn’t: pastors exist for a reason.”

It was, as you might well imagine, the last line that caught my attention.

The Gifts Yesterday and Today

Why are the spiritual gifts we observe in the book of Acts so much more impressive and obviously supernatural than the gifts we observe today? Why do some of the gifts on Paul’s ‘gift lists’ in Corinthians and Romans appear to be missing or underutilized in our churches?

If you’ve been reading the last two days (here and here), I’ve done my best to rule out A.W. Tozer’s chief culprits: unspirituality and bad teaching. These are certainly problems we may observe in many gatherings of Christians and of which we always need to be careful. I do not believe, however, that they are primarily responsible for the apparent dearth of gift in modern Christendom.

Where Did Those Gifts Go?

Yesterday I tried to establish that of the eighteen spiritual gifts listed in Romans and 1 Corinthians, at least half seem to have gone missing in our churches somewhere in the last two millennia.

Most Christian commentators agree this is at least partially true. We may argue about how to recognize the various supernatural abilities on the Holy Spirit’s gift list and about the nuances of a few of the Greek terms Paul uses. But in the end, most Christians acknowledge that unless we describe the gifts of tongues or prophecy very differently from the way we see them occurring in the book of Acts, or wildly dilute the concepts of miracles and healings, some of the Holy Spirit’s gifts are unaccountably absent today.

Very well then, let’s do some accounting.

Assumptions and Loaded Conversations

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Missing in Action

How many gifts of the Holy Spirit are listed in the New Testament? I suppose it depends on the criteria you use.

Whatever your standards for inclusion on the gift list, and whatever your final gift count, you will surely notice that several factors complicate our application of these familiar passages of scripture to the church today:

1. In many instances the exact nature of the gift and how we might expect it to show itself are not precisely spelled out for us;
2. We no longer have apostles in the sense the word is used of the Twelve;

Too Hot to Handle: Which Beer Do Christians Drink?

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Quote of the Day (24)

If you’re looking for a scapegoat in the ongoing war of the sexes, don’t look here:

“Weak men drive women insane, and insane women make men weak.”

— John C. Wright

Not wrong, but we’re no closer to a solution.

Feminism has already made tremendous inroads into today’s church. The war of the sexes is not yet waged in every Christian home and place of worship, but if you haven’t experienced it, trust me, it’s coming.

Inbox: The Finishing Stroke

Ever ask a simple question and get one of those answers that just won’t quit?

Having opened that can of worms before, I know the feeling of looking at your watch and realizing that you’ve inadvertently set yourself up for a reply on the scale of a Homeric recitation of ancient Greek epic poetry in dactylic hexameter.

Then again, sometimes it turns out the question wasn’t so simple after all. Or, in this case, that it provided the occasion to do an in-depth study that I trust may have had a few unexpected benefits.

In Exodus 32 God told Moses, “Whoever has sinned against me, I will blot out of my book”. The simple question originally asked was, “What about those who repented (if any did)?”

Inbox: The Book of Life in the Book of Revelation

The book of Revelation contains the majority of the Bible’s references to the moderately mysterious and much-discussed “book of life”. No study of the subject (such as the one beginning here and concluding here) that failed to address these verses would be particularly useful.

This one may not be either, but let’s at least take a crack at it.

Inbox: Booking It

In connection with the episode in Exodus 32 where God says, “Whoever has sinned against me, I will blot out of my book,” WD wonders, “What about those who repented (if any did)?”

Good question. I think this might be the first mention of such a heavenly “book” in scripture (assuming we take the reference literally), but similar language comes up in other places more than once. The Hebrew in Exodus is çêpher, an umbrella term for all kinds of written decrees, long and short, variously translated “book”, “letter”, “scroll” or “evidence”. The sense of the word is not merely a communication but a communication that has legal force.

That part we can all agree on. Don’t worry, it won’t last ...

Retro Christianity

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The Distance Between

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Too Hot to Handle: Coalition of the Unwilling

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Look It Up Your Own Self!

My biggest source of confidence in understanding and interpreting the scriptures has being looking in-depth for myself at the passages in which I’m interested before reading any commentaries or looking into any other educated opinions.

Sure, I’ll look at what others have written about the Bible — but only after I’ve spent a good long time establishing my own opinion about what the Holy Spirit was saying, trying to grasp the issues involved, and praying them through.

Other opinions are great, but they’re worth precisely what the commentator has invested in them. Which is often not quite as much as we think.

That’s not a complaint. It’s just math.

Recommend-a-blog (19)

Douglas Wilson meets Rachel Held Evans

Douglas Wilson. Ah, Douglas Wilson.

Yes, THAT Douglas Wilson: the one quoted in the notorious Gospel Coalition blog post about men, women, sex and authority, the same post that got Rachel Held Evans mightily agitated and for which its writer, Jared Wilson (no relation, so far as I know), was compelled to eventually apologize (though Jared’s dutiful groveling is now well and truly buried, probably by TGC, and I haven’t got the patience to seek out and link to the inevitable archived version; feel free to concoct your own conspiracy theories).

Doug Wilson remained gleefully unrepentant.

Quote of the Day (23)

Intellectual autonomy is a chimera, a mirage, a phantasm, a will-o’-the-wisp.

Most of us make our choices (be they heaven or hell, life or death, blessing or ruination) primarily on the basis of the testimony of others, not because of any independent intellectual exercise. Those who succeed in freeing themselves of the “outdated worldview” characterized by belief in the existence and authority of God have merely accepted the default assumptions of other, much more dubious would-be authorities.

Or put another way, “Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools”.

Valley and Peak

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The Worship of Angels

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Why Do Christians Worship?

[NFL fans will not miss the obvious; this post was written well prior to the acquisition of Manning’s second (and final) Superbowl ring — Ed.]

Prior to the Superbowl, there was much discussion about Denver quarterback Peyton Manning.

Everybody seemed to want to know where Manning rates on the list of all-time football greats. It was not a subject debated only by the talking heads on TV. Jim Rome rambled on about it on my car radio. It came up at work. It came up at my local diner. Even people who would otherwise be uninterested in football seemed to have an opinion about Manning’s legacy in the two weeks between conference finals and the big game — and even more so during the game itself.

It is in the nature of mankind to have something to say about greatness.

Too Hot to Handle: Tom Becomes a Redhead

In which our regular writers toss around subjects a little more volatile than usual.

Worship is one of those polarizing subjects.

At one end of the spectrum you get Christians for whom everything is worship; hence terms like “worship team” and “worship leader” and so on. Such a concept of worship is so broad as to be almost meaningless. At the other end you have the ritualists, whether they are Catholicized and liturgical or simply traditionalist evangelicals with very rigid ideas about what a church’s corporate worship ought to entail. Such a view of worship fails to deal adequately with Romans 12:1.

Both extremes claim scriptural evidence for their positions, though I would argue that both views of worship are too limited. Everything in the Christian life may be done worship-fully, but choosing to worship remains a specific and deliberate act.

Higher Learning

The martyrdom of John Lambert came up in discussion with my fellow blogger IC last week. Lambert was burned at the stake in 1538 for refusing to retract his objection to the doctrine of transubstantiation. As he died, Lambert is reported to have cried out over and over again, “None but Christ! None but Christ!”

Subsequent to our conversation, IC sent me a link to a video clip of an episode from the otherwise-execrable TV series The Tudors, in which John Lambert meets his end. Interestingly, the show’s producers opted to change Lambert’s dying statement to “All for Christ! All for Christ!”

So what? Such minor tweaking of dialogue takes place all the time in the process of bringing real stories to big and small screens alike. It’s still a powerful scene, and the viewer’s sympathies are fully with Lambert, which is presumably the writers’ intent.

Still, there is a difference in meaning, and I think it’s one worth noting.

Traitors at the Table

The most recent version of this post is available here.

In Need of Analysis: Worship as a Lifestyle [Part 2]

“God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”

We have been discussing worship as a lifestyle, a concept set out by John Piper among others, and how the recent discovery of a “worship lifestyle” compares with the way the word “worship” is actually employed throughout scripture.

First we drew a sharp distinction between two ways scripture uses the word: (1) to describe “acts of worship” (the public appearance) and (2) to refer to “worship” itself (the heart reality). Then we went on to establish that genuine worship is deliberate, sacrificial, obedient and informed by the character of God himself. It is not a mechanical, rote act, nor is it to be engaged in casually. It takes place at specific times, not at every moment of life.

In Need of Analysis: Worship as a Lifestyle [Part 1]

The subject of worship is currently getting a little more attention than usual in Christian circles, and that’s not a bad thing. We have John Piper to thank for this, among others who have written about worship as a lifestyle.

Piper starts by encouraging us to enlarge our thoughts of worship:

“… don’t think worship services when you think worship. That is a huge limitation which is not in the Bible. All of life is supposed to be worship.”

and goes on to describe eating at Pizza Hut to the glory of God, having sex to the glory of God and dying to the glory of God. So eating moderately, healthily and gratefully is worship; loving sex within the bounds of marriage is worship; chastity, too, is worship. “You are always in a temple,” Piper says. “Always worship.”

Tom Takes a Breather (2)

Long-time readers will probably remember that we did this in June last year, and it was so much fun (for me at least) that this year we’re doing it again. You’re currently reading our 921st consecutive daily blog post since December 2013. (To be fair, a little over 6% of those posts were recycled, but if you don’t tell, I won’t.)

I’m going to take this coming week to recharge my batteries and work on a few pieces without an immediate deadline looming, but really that’s just a convenient excuse to do this:

Christianity Without Christ

If you missed the goings-on in the streets of San Jose last week outside a rally for presidential candidate Donald Trump, you might have been the only one. Protesters waved Mexican flags and were caught on camera burning Trump hats, egging, punching and kicking Trump supporters and calling them “racists” and “fascists”. One police officer was assaulted. Video clips on YouTube show victims almost uniformly white and attackers almost uniformly Hispanic.

A minor skirmish, really, but we’re only in June. It’s a long way to November, and there’s no guarantee the election of a new president — no matter who he or she may be — will do anything to substantially ease racial tensions.

Too Hot to Handle: Unpardon Me

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A Tale of Two Speeches

Ah, Rachel Held Evans, what would I do without you?

Wait, I’m pretty sure I’ve used that opening line before.

Never mind. The point is that our good friend RHE has a few words to say on the subject of a commencement speech she gave back in 2003 upon graduating from a conservative Christian university and what, if given another shot at the same gig with proverbial 20/20 hindsight, she would say differently today.

Fair enough. I hope we’ve all learned something in the last 13 years.

Game Misconduct

Most hockey fans are familiar with it, though I suppose it happens less in international play than in the NHL.

Hockey has two minute penalties, five minute penalties, compound penalties like “double minors” and a variety of other ways of maintaining order. But it is only the rarest and most egregious offenses that call for ejection. The player who receives such a penalty is sent straight to the dressing room.

Game over.

It’s called a game misconduct, and something similar may happen to Christians.

Paying Attention

God, to the prophet Balaam:

“You shall not curse the people, for they are blessed.”

Now check out when this statement is made. It’s at the tail end of almost 40 years of what must have seemed like absolutely pointless wandering, basically filling in time. It’s made about a people who had just spent years watching their parents and grandparents, uncles and aunts die in the wilderness for their disobedience.

Blessed, huh?

Inbox: Sucking the Life Out of ‘Vampire Churches’

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Lurking Sentimentalists Beware

At the risk of getting clobbered by the chronically sentimental, I’d like to ask a few hard questions about a relatively recent trend within evangelicalism. Baby dedications are now being offered as a service in churches that claim to base their faith and practice solely on the principles and instruction of the New Testament.

You know what I mean: special events at which new parents “present” their baby and some designated individual asks them on behalf of their church (in front of friends, family and brothers and sisters in Christ) if they are willing to raise their child “in the nurture and admonition of the Lord”, or something like it.

I find the logic baffling.

Quote of the Day (22)

Yup, in Canada this is just another pylon marking our national descent on the mad Gadarene slide:

“Canada’s House of Commons has passed the government's proposed assisted suicide law.

The House of Commons voted 186-137. The law still requires Senate approval.”

What’s that? You say the phrase doesn’t ring a bell?

Too Hot to Handle: Faith in the Crosshairs

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“We Should Only Allow …”

I’m reading a twenty year-old article on the subject of divorce written by a Christian whose judgment and understanding of scripture I respect and whose personal conduct as a believer is excellent.

So it’s hard to explain why I feel a bit irked as I work my way through it. I think it has to do with the phrase: “We should only allow …”

I wonder, who is “we”, and what is the biblical mechanism by which we choose to “allow” or “not allow” certain sorts of choices to be made by other believers?

Making Sure

People who don’t think a genuine believer in Jesus Christ belongs irrevocably to him use a variety of verses to support their claim that it is possible to be saved and then lose your salvation.

This isn’t a verse I’m used to seeing used that way:

“Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall.”

The usual suspects are full of catchy expressions like “eternal sin”, “sin that leads to death” or even “impossible to restore them again to repentance”. Separate such phrases from their contexts and it is possible to become quite confused and concerned about the permanence of salvation.

Angels Unawares

“Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.”

In accepting the truth that there exists a world of spirits, a unseen reality beyond that which we can observe and quantify, we open ourselves to a range of possibilities we are far from equipped to explore intelligently.

How does a Christian process such a thing?

Elders and HR Departments

Gotcha, Mr. Employee!

Having recently experienced a round of mandatory workplace sensitivity indoctrination administered by our Human Resources department (part of a company-wide initiative, not the result of any particular violation on my part), I’m struck by the differences in how offenses are handled between believers and between my fellow employees.

When I say “not the result of any particular violation”, I should probably append the word “yet” just to be safe. The number of ways one may offend in the workplace today is truly remarkable, and there’s no guarantee I will not fall afoul of their ever-morphing web of ultra-flexible guidelines at some point.

They’re like flypaper. I kid you not.

Choosing Sides

Ah, Numbers 16, the famous Korah chapter.

I cringe when I read it, I cringe when I read other people writing about it, and I’ll almost surely be cringing as I write about it myself.

And yet it’s there, and New Testament writers have no problem drawing on it for the purpose of instructing Christians, despite the fact that many of us feel it would be awfully convenient if the chapter would simply go away.

Since it won’t, let’s look at it carefully.

The 1830 Principle

“Sorry, you’re just not old enough ...”

I’ve read this statement or something quite like it maybe ten times in the last year:

“Rapture doctrine did not exist before John Darby invented it in 1830 AD. Before it ‘popped into John Darby’s head’ no one had ever heard of a secret rapture doctrine.”

It’s even been picked up by Wikipedia, which I guess makes it a “thing”. They won’t go quite so far as to say Darby invented it, but they concede that he certainly popularized the teaching.

Too Hot to Handle: With One Accord

In which our regular writers toss around subjects a little more volatile than usual.

Tom: You and I were talking last week, Immanuel Can, about this recent exchange of ideas I had with Crawford Paul at assemblyHUB — civilly, of course — on the subject of worship, specifically what we refer to as the “Lord’s Supper”, that ended with Crawford pointing out that “The topic is much bigger than this article”.

I couldn’t agree more, so I’ve written here and here about it. But I’d really like to explore the subject a little more with you. What appears to be eating Crawford and others is that the traditions they have grown up with about corporate worship appear to be just that — largely traditional, rather than scriptural.

This is a subject I know you love, so I wouldn’t want to leave you out. Specifically, I’m interested in exploring our corporate freedom in worship, but not divorcing that from the issue of our corporate responsibilities.

Immanuel Can: Right. Count me in. Where would you like to start?

Marketing Jesus

This article about effectively marketing the church was forwarded to me by a reader along with a two-word review: “fantastically misguided”.

“Misguided” is a good way to put it. I think Cameron and Tara from Christ & Pop Culture are well-intentioned. They contend that Jesus must be the focus of all attempts to promote a church and that “church marketing strategies applied without guidance from Scripture undermine the kingdom of God by causing Christians to alter their identities”.

So with Christ as the focus and scripture for guidance, what could go wrong? Lots, it seems.

The Rabble Among Them

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The Giant Reset Button

Photo: Flattop341

Baruch Davidson notes that the Jubilee year is not observed or commemorated in modern Israel.

Before the Assyrian conquest of the northern portion of the divided kingdom in the sixth century BC, Davidson says, the Jubilee was regularly celebrated. But a dispute over the interpretation of the words “all who live on it” in Leviticus 25:10 has led many Jews to conclude that the festive year of freedom may only be celebrated when all twelve tribes are living in the Promised Land. So until the return of the ten “lost” tribes, the Jubilee is on hold.

That may not seem a big deal today. It would have been a huge deal to an Israelite in the years before the Assyrian captivity.

Here Comes the Baggage

Yesterday I briefly noted some of the different approaches taken within Christendom to remembering the Lord Jesus. If you haven’t read that post first, this one will probably make less sense than it might otherwise.

The New Testament does not lay down many hard and fast rules about the mechanics of worship, only that we are to “remember” our Lord in the sharing of the bread and the cup and to examine ourselves prior to doing so. Arguably this is the most important part of the Christian life. One can be as active in church as humanly possible, as diligent and and hard-working as anyone, and even passionate about meeting with the people of God.

But forget Christ and it’s all a waste of time.

Calling an Audible

Some call it the Lord’s Supper or the Lord’s Table. Some refer to it as Communion, Holy Communion or the Eucharist. Some call it the Breaking of Bread. Some call it the Worship Service. And some would argue that not all these terms refer to precisely the same thing.

I agree, actually, but it’s not my purpose to set out all such similarities and differences in a single blog post. My point is that, different as they may be, all these overlapping practices (rightly or wrongly) draw their scriptural authority from the words of the Lord Jesus to his disciples at their last Passover supper and the things he did there.

Let’s concede this: whatever we call it, none of us celebrate it precisely the way it was celebrated in the early church, and it’s quite possible that even in the first century there was little consistency from one local church to another in the way it was practiced.

Generational Train Wreck Alert!

It’s becoming increasingly hard for me to dismiss the conviction that this generation deserves whatever it gets.

I refuse to believe every college or university student in the Western world is out of their minds, but the media seems bound and determined to prove me wrong.

For these lost twenty-somethings, the capacity to invent drama where no drama exists is apparently beyond measuring. Their will to be miserable no matter what their circumstances seems boundless. Their sense of entitlement and victimhood is off the charts.

Too Hot to Handle: Bucking or Buckling?

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This Is Interesting ...

Well, it’s interesting to me anyway.

The giving of the Ten Commandments to Israel at Mount Sinai occurred on the third new moon after the people of Israel had left Egypt. God addressed them directly in a thick cloud from the peak of a fiery, quaking mountain amid thunder, flashes of lightning and the sound of a trumpet.

The people were understandably petrified.

How Do You Love the Gospel?

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Work Your Way Upstream

Douglas Wilson is, in his own words, “evangelical, postmill, Calvinist, Reformed, and Presbyterian, pretty much in that order”.

One out of five ain’t bad, I suppose.

But hey, I’m an equal opportunity reader. Despite my lack of common ground with many of Mr. Wilson’s expressed convictions, I find much of what he writes profitable.

That Wacky Old Testament (4)

Bible Babble’s atheist webmaster appears confused by the second commandment:

“People seem to think the second commandment says you aren’t supposed to make a graven image of God, and that’s it. But you are not to make any graven images of anything in heaven, in the earth, or in the water. This would include no graven images of fish, moles, worms, birds, shrimp, ants, and all sorts of things. One must wonder why God was so worried about these things that he felt the need to put these ahead of murder and stealing.”

The apostle Paul saw it as his job (and the job of those he travelled and taught with) to demolish “every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God”.

You know, I think this just may qualify …

The Greatest Identity Crisis In History

Ron Cantor says Messianic Jews are the most hated people on earth. That can’t be fun.

Much has been written about the difficulty of living between two countries (not to mention while living for another world entirely). This particular exchange of ideas occurred elsewhere, but is too relevant, useful and thought-provoking to be buried in a thread of hundreds of comments.

I’m sharing it here with permission.

John Piper, Social Activism and ‘Doing Good’

Debt in the Americas by % of GDP
(hint: black is not good)

Extracted from their original context, many verses may be stretched to the point where they say almost anything we’d like them to.

John Piper, for instance, finds social activism in scripture in places where, try as I might, I just don’t see it:

“It is right and good to pursue obedience to Galatians 6:10, which says: ‘So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.’ ”

With you so far, John. But now things get dicey. In Mr. Piper’s view, “doing good” is a pretty broad term.

Too Hot to Handle: Off the Rails or On Track?

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All About Me

Sometimes I wonder if people actually read what they are writing and saying.

Have you ever played back a voice message and been embarrassed by your own wording or tone? Or perhaps re-read something you wrote ten years ago and been stunned by your own immodesty, immaturity, naivety or selfishness? If you have, then you understand the way time, spiritual growth and objectivity allow us to see the holes in our own arguments.

INtent vs. CONtent

I’ve harped on this one before, but I keep hearing people applying Paul’s instructions to Titus just a little too broadly:

“Remind them … to speak evil of no one …”

Correctly understood, this is sound advice that makes for consistent Christian living (not to mention it’s the word of God). But applied to everything we don’t like willy-nilly, it quickly degenerates into silliness.

Not every negative statement is “speaking evil”.

Why Donald Trump is Not the End of the World

A truth that sometimes gets back-burnered:

“There is no authority except from God, and those [powers] that exist have been instituted by God.”

(Romans 13:1)

As has been pointed out ad nauseum (I heard it again this week), this verse of holy writ was written in a day when Nero was emperor. This would be the same Nero rumored to have had captured Christians dipped in oil and set on fire in his garden at night as a source of light, who executed his own mother and is alleged to have poisoned his step-brother.

Alongside that track record, Donald Trump’s history of womanizing, “unpresidential character” and snarky, distasteful personal remarks is weak tea.

Appearance and Reality

SMC from the outside

I happened to be in Palo Alto, California a while back and saw Stanford Memorial Church from the inside.

It’s an amazing structure, built in the memory of her husband by Jane Stanford between 1898 and 1903. The memorial service for Steve Jobs was held there and it has been called the university’s “architectural crown jewel”. I wouldn’t disagree.

You can Google Image it if you’re interested. I’d rather not violate anyone’s copyright by posting their pictures, but some of them are as beautiful as the experience.

The Stakes

A good writer makes you care about his characters.

When you’re reading a novel, you are probably not consciously asking yourself at every moment, “Does this person I’m reading about really matter to me?” Being occupied with such questions takes you out of the story and defeats the purpose of the narrative. You simply find the characters likable or despicable, interesting or uninteresting, and on that basis you decide whether to continue reading.

Their motives matter, and what’s at stake for them matters, in ensuring that you remain engaged in the unfolding drama.

That Wacky Old Testament (3)

Greg at Holey Books complains that the Levitical law is sexist:

“Women Are Worth Less (Lev. 27:1-4). This is one of those passages that really, really should make believers — especially women — question just how much of the Old Testament we can take seriously. According to Leviticus, a man’s worth — in “dedicating a person to the LORD” — is 50 shekels. A woman, however, is only worth 30. (NB: the ratio here is strangely reminiscent of the U.S. Constitution’s provision that a slave was only worth 3/5 of a white man. There must be like the “golden mean” of massive inequalities.) It is difficult to explain this away without logically also concluding that part of scripture was a historical artifact of its time that we should not take seriously. Unless, of course, you actually hold that men and women aren’t equal or shouldn’t be equal. Which would, obviously, be absurd.”

Notice that Greg is reacting as if Leviticus declares that the intrinsic value of a woman before God is only 60% of a man’s value, as if the Law somehow diminishes her personhood. He finds such an idea offensive to the core and “absurd”.

Too Hot to Handle: Empty-Somethings

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The Laughter of Jackals

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Quote of the Day (21)

The Ten Commandments begin with “You shall have no other gods before me”.

It would have been almost automatic for those who first heard these words to apply them primarily to the false gods served by the nations around them. Steve Shirley at Jesus Alive claims scripture makes reference to 34 separate pagan deities from Adrammelech to Tammuz and Tartak, and I have no reason to challenge him since doing so would be a lot of work for not much payoff. Suffice it to say there were plenty of options.

And yet none of these “gods” are giving Jehovah much competition these days.

Something Worth Dying For

So I’m lunching in my favourite café.

You will forgive me for eavesdropping, I’m sure. If you’ve ever done the lunch thing in a major metropolis on a main street, you know that bodies are close together and overhearing one another is usually unavoidable.

Well, forgive me or don’t, but a group of five a few feet away are discussing a friend who, after all their best efforts to cure him, remains “religious”. Poor benighted fellow.

And I’m thinking … where does this come from, this compulsion to strip others of the comfort of faith?

Pretending to See the Future

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That Night

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