Too Hot to Handle: Stomaching Veganism

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

How, now?

Increasingly, studies like this one point to the strong possibility that a strictly vegan diet might actually be the healthiest for human beings, and that even consuming a small amount of meat in our diet is sufficient to increase our chances of diabetes, among other things.

These studies may well be accurate (though, as with all assertions of the scientific community these days, I tend to reserve judgment until we see all the consequences of a purely vegan diet in a representative sample of the human population over a generation or two). But for the sake of argument, let’s give these studies the benefit of the doubt and assume they represent truth and not simply another scientific boondoggle.

Tom: So, the obvious question ...

Do Christians Hate Science?

If you pop around on the Internet for very long, you’ll find that one of the most common screeds against Christians is that we hate science.

I don’t think it’s true, of course, but it does seem a rather general perception among our detractors. They think we see in science a direct threat to our beliefs; and since science undeniably does many good things for us, secularists of various kinds have a duty to deprive us of our illusions in this regard. We will thank them later: or if we do not, it will only be because we couldn’t be helped.

No Prophecy of Scripture

Doug Wilson is currently working his way through the book of Acts every Saturday on his blog. This week he’s in chapter 21, noting that as the apostle Paul made his way toward Jerusalem, he received prophetic warnings in every city to which he traveled concerning what would happen to him there.

That sort of thing happened often in the first century. If it happens at all in the twenty-first, it does so almost exclusively in Charismatic circles.

Human and Angelic

“He also measured its wall, 144 cubits by human measurement, which is also an angel’s measurement.”

John makes this observation in the second-last chapter of our Bibles, amidst visions of a new heaven and new earth, complete with the holy city coming down out of heaven from God. This is where we find the famous line about how God will wipe away every tear from the eyes of his people, and there will be no mourning, crying or pain. Believers all long to realize these visions of the future; they really, really matter, and the chapter contains many more statements equally significant to the remedy of the human condition and our final destination.

In such a context, why would we care if human beings and angels use the same measurement system? Can such an observation be anything more than comparative trivia?

Perhaps. Indulge me, if you will.

Anonymous Asks (377)

“What does the command to ‘fill the earth and subdue it’ entail?”

Today’s question is a reference to Genesis 1:28, in which God told our distant ancestors, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” He gave Noah and his sons a similar mandate after the flood: “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth and upon every bird of the heavens, upon everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea. Into your hand they are delivered.”

A Two-Letter English Pronoun

Relatively mature Christians have absorbed an abundance of important principles from scripture. Sadly, we don’t always apply them as effectively or comprehensively as we might. At least, I don’t.

The limitations of human memory in a fallen world are such that we are constantly relearning things we already know. For me, this week’s “Oh yeah” moment was a conversation with my brother about our dad, and a reminder that the Lord put us together in one Body by his Spirit for many reasons.

One good reason: iron sharpens iron. We help each other understand the Bible. You will always see things I don’t, and vice versa.

No King in Israel (30)

Judges is a grim book. It shows fallen man the way he truly is, even when favored with a level of access to divine revelation that many nations never experienced. Few of its chapters are consistently uplifting or their positive aspects unmitigated by reminders of human wickedness and fallibility. Jephthah’s story, which we have just finished, mingled God-given victory with bad judgment, betrayal and brother-against-brother violence. Our final judge’s life was a notorious mess, and the book gets even bleaker from there.

In between, chapter 13 is a brief, cheery respite from the darkness. From verse 2 on, it’s all wonderful, including a rare pre-incarnate glimpse of Christ himself.

Too Hot to Handle: The Words are Immaterial

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

Tom: Clint Bryan at Christianity Today has a post up about something called the Hillsong Church. I’ve heard the name and vaguely associate it with religious music and the “worship team”-style presentation, but I know very little about the Hillsong phenomenon, and I don’t think I could hum even a single one of what Mr. Bryan says are very hummable tunes. If you tell me that’s a not-very-subtle indication I’m not exactly at the nexus of mainstream evangelicalism, IC, I suppose I’ll have to take the rebuke with grace, but I thought maybe we could talk about Mr. Bryan’s article since it touches on a subject you’ve written about a fair bit.

Immanuel Can: Yep, okay. Where do you want to start, Tom?

The End of Evangelism

There is general fear being widely expressed among evangelicals today that we are not reaching people the way we used to. Certainly the numbers of people in the modern West who are becoming Christians seems to be slumping, and a lot of us are a bit nervous about the trend.

Is the Age of Evangelism Ending?

According to Bible.org, one problem is that the professional clergy people and leaders are not stepping up, and that church ministries and programs are not going out to reach people. Meanwhile, The Evangelism Institute has found that while 85% of evangelical churches have a pro-evangelism statement in their constitution, less than 5% of the people are actually involved in doing something with it.

What Does Your Proof Text Prove? (34)

A Minneapolis pastor named Jonathan Parnell is offering tips on being a friend of sinners. He believes it’s a good thing to be. John MacArthur riffed on the “friend of sinners” idea in a 1980 sermon. He liked it too. A church in Milwaukee identifies with the concept so much that it has taken the name. “Friend of Sinners Church” offers a free breakfast followed by a worship service each Sunday.

So was Jesus a friend of sinners? Should we be? Well, yes and no.

Tears in Your Bottle

“You have kept count of my tossings; put my tears in your bottle. Are they not in your book?”

— From Psalm 56, a Miktam of David

Scholars debate when various scribes added the superscriptions over some of the Psalms, and whether we can trust them all to the same degree. They note, for example, that the translators of the Septuagint a few centuries before Christ both edited and freely supplemented existing Hebrew superscriptions.

Anonymous Asks (376)

“Is thrill-seeking wrong?”

An old acquaintance is in hospital right now going on two months with little prospect of an easy recovery, the victim of a motorcycle accident. He’s got a long road ahead of him with many potential pitfalls and pains as he tries to regain his strength and mobility and get back on his feet without inadvertently undoing the beneficial effects of a complex surgery in the process.

His drastic reversal of fortune brings up the question Did this have to happen? Not knowing all his circumstances, I have no good answer for that.

Clearing Away the Cobwebs

“For those who love God all things work together for good.” So wrote the apostle Paul, and so we believe. Of course, as with other frequently quoted verses of scripture, a variety of interpretations and applications exist and are commonly (and sometimes unreflectively) held by fellow believers.

Supposing your elders tasked you with expositing that familiar quotation from Romans on a Sunday morning, you might find you have to clear away a few cobwebs first.

No King in Israel (29)

Today’s instalment takes us to the eleventh of our twelve judges of Israel. We are getting there.

At least eight tribes provided Israel with leadership and deliverance during the period of the judges, and perhaps as many as ten.* The tribal affiliation of at least two judges is questionable, so we cannot confirm precisely which tribes did not receive representation in leadership during the period. We can say with certainty that Reuben, Simeon, Levi and Gad go unmentioned.

Too Hot to Handle: Fundamentalism and Modernism

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

Theistic evolution is a concept that has become increasingly acceptable throughout Christendom. As long as God is said to have directed it, evolution is a pill many otherwise-solid Christians seem prepared to swallow.

Tom: I read Terry Mortenson’s article on compromise this morning. It seems as good a starting point as any. He names a number of well-reputed conservative stalwarts whose own statements suggest they have gone (or went) a little soft on the issue — James Orr, Dyson Hague, George Frederick Wright, R.A. Torrey — to one degree or another, some as far back as the early 1900s. Other less conservative believers like Andrew Klavan accept evolution outright, convinced it’s so obvious that believing it is simply common sense.

Traitors at the Table

People: you just can’t count on them.

That’s one of the things you can count on about human nature. We don’t have what it takes to see things through.

Oh, we mean well enough … and we intend to try our best … but often our best is a lot less impressive in the delivery than we thought it was going to be.

And let’s face it: most of us are just not in anything for the long haul. While the idea is new and the fire in us is fresh, we’re all enthused about whatever’s going on. But fires cool, and new turns old, and we lose interest.

A career, a program, a plan, a commitment, a hobby or a marriage … all fine in the short term, but give any of them enough time and everything turns out to be work.

So we quit. And honestly, sometimes by the time we do it’s just as well that we do.

Not a Matter for Rule-Making

An anecdote only: I won’t try to turn it into a thesis since it’s merely an observation.

The habit of using the Law of Moses as a way of filling in any perceived blanks left by the writers of the New Testament seems well ingrained among the supersessionist Reformers I encounter. For example, there are many discussions online about tithing these days. These almost inevitably take on a quasi-legalistic tone (“What must I do?”).

When you think about it, this makes some sort of sense.

Who Then Is It?

“If it is not he, who then is it?”

Good question, Job. If it is not God who gives the earth into the hand of the wicked … if it is not God who keeps his appointed rulers from dispensing justice … then who can we blame? When we suffer inexplicably, whom but God may we reasonably charge with afflicting us?

Most deep thinkers eventually arrive at this question, and not all are omni-determinists. Job was several millennia pre-Calvin.

Anonymous Asks (375)

“Why do people struggle with lack of faith?”

On its own, the word “faith” is content-free. There is no such thing as generic faith. To talk about believing without asking what you are supposed to believe is like trying to order dinner at a restaurant when you’ve never been given a menu and the waiter refuses to tell you what the options are. A question so unspecific is quite impossible to answer meaningfully.

Faith always has to be in something or someone. It cannot exist in a vacuum.

The Commentariat Speaks (34)

The subject of faith has been on my mind this week, and we’ll revisit it tomorrow in our usual Monday “Anonymous Asks” post. Faith does not come easily to many, and even those of us habituated to trusting in Christ to meet our physical and spiritual needs on a daily basis find occasions when we too struggle to believe the Lord will do the things he has promised.

Far more important in the long run is faith that saves. One man’s honesty about his personal struggle to find it touched me the other day, and I’d like to share it with you.