This deserves a post.

In the last 5 weeks or so, my life has changed in most extreme ways. The ways are easy enough to say or write: ‘got married’ ‘went on honeymoon’ ‘stayed at parent’s house for 2 weeks’ ‘moved 1000 away from home’ ‘left all friends and relatives behind’ ‘know basically nobody at new place.’ That is pretty much where is stands now. And I did it all in less than 30 days. It might be easiest to recount this time in my life by hitting the high notes. I hope to come back sometime later and flesh out the more interesting parts with more vivid detail, but at the moment I just want to lay it all out there.

Wedding Day

After 5+ days of bachelor week, it was time to make the ceremony. I would like to say that everyone I wanted to be there was there, but that isn’t true. I will say the wedding party came together nicely, and we had some good times at the rehearsal dinner. We had some folks missing from the reception, and that is okay, because we had a lot of people there. We were truly blessed to have as many friends there as we did. Both mine and Meghan’s biggest regret about the reception is that we did not spend nearly as much time with everyone as we wanted to. The whole wedding and reception felt over in about 5 seconds. Some of the day is a blur, some is not. Emotions seemed to be running high that day. I could barely keep it together as I watched Meghan approach the altar. My dad cried a few “tears of joy” during his prayer and held it together enough to get through the ceremony. I am thankful for everything my parents did and continue to do for us. Obviously the day didn’t end for me as we left the reception, but it did for all of you.

Honeymoon

We took off from RDU and made delayed time to the nation of Miami. After being accepted entry into the country, we had to wait about 6 hours to board the plane to Jamaica. After arriving in Jamaica, we had to wait close to an hour to gain entry into that country. We were interrogated concerning our reason for being there, which was the same as every other white person in line from Europe and the Americas: we want to take a $20 taxi ride past your third-world slums and spend the week in a $250-a-night luxury beach resort, where we will spend upwards of $80-$100 a day on food. I would like to think that our going to the country helps the people there in some way. We tried to buy things from Jamaican-owned stores, but many of the stores in downtown Montego Bay were owned by persons from India and Pakistan. The local food establishments were probably locally-owned, and we went to two where we were the only non-Jamaicans there. We also stopped by the Jamaican Bobsled Café, and got our pictures taken inside one of the bobsleds. We also bought a “hand-made” Jamaican basket and wooden bowl.

The beaches are certainly lovely and the people by and large could not have been nicer. We probably spend upwards of $100 on taxi rides during the week. Maybe more. Petrol is 83 Jamaican dollars a litre. This amounts to about $4.50 a gallon. Not worth 20$ to go 8 kilometers, but close I suppose. I hadn’t seen real poverty since I went to Mexico back in 1996 (not counting my trips through Camden, NJ) but I did see it in Jamaica. I am not sure if going to a luxury resort helps in any way, but I would like to think that since the resort we went to was family-owned, more of the money may be actually staying in Jamaica. They seem to have low staff turn-over there, which must mean the jobs are good. I asked the man that took us sailing and snorkeling at a reef if he though us coming to the resort was helping people in Jamaica. He told me yes. He told us quite a bit about his life, his farm, and his family. In many ways he is in much better shape than me; he claimed to be by and large self-sufficient, growing a lot of his own food and making his own herbal remedies with plants he find at the resort. He used a ladder to climb a tree and get some coconuts for us to try. I don’t think Meghan we expecting the milk to be as watery or bitter. But a coconut will keep you alive in a pinch. We got to try some of the coconut flesh. We set out from the hotel at 5:30 in the morning. During the trip we lost an hour, then arrived in Lynchburg at around 9:30 in the evening. Travel is a modern miracle.

Kinston

Meghan had no desire to spent two weeks in my apartment in Lynchburg, and the more I thought about it, I realized it would be a good time to hang out with my family before we moved 1000 miles away. We had already moved her stuff to a lovely storage unit on Park street, so we loaded up my truck and a U-Haul trailer with some belongings and headed to NC. We spent the next two weeks hanging out with my family and seeing some friends from back home. Kinston hasn’t changed too much since I left 7 years ago, but I found I gained a new appreciation for staying at home with my family. I hadn’t spend more than 4 consecutive days there in several years. Maybe as many as 5. Many of our days consisted of getting up, getting ready, and then spending the afternoon on the wireless internet network at my house. My mom, both of my sister, Meghan, and I all had laptops and we would sit in the living room and do whatever it was that we do online. Not a bad way to spend some time together.

We were able to do some sight-seeing as well. We toured the crystal coast, specifically Bogue Banks: Beaufort, Morehead City, Fort Macon, Atlantic Beach, Pine Knoll Shores, Salter Path, Indian Beach, Emerald Isle. Meghan and I were also able to travel out to Ocracoke Island, on the southern outer banks. We took a two-hour ferry ride to and from the mainland and spent a night at the Harbor Island Inn. We snuck in a Kinston Indians game for good measure. When we left Kinston, it was hard be believe two weeks had already gone by, and it was hard to believe within 4 days we would be in the state of Illinois, hopefully.

The Move

We spent a couple of days packing up my apartment. I attempted to take only the necessities, including 8 or so boxes of books. Most everything outside of my small personal effects and clothes were left behind, including a extra-long couch and a brown chair that an ex-girlfriend had given me. They are now all in the care of Fred, of Fred’s 12 Dollars and More Store, Motto: “Everything Under the Sun.” If you need any of these items, you can find them there. After some adventures with Meghan’s couch and the second U-haul trailer rental of the month, we began packing the storage unit and my apartment’s contents. I had a lot of help from some good friends. We decided to leave Lynchburg in the late afternoon and make it to Beckley, West Virginia. As we were leaving Lynchburg, I felt no sadness. For sure, I was probably too busy thinking about the road ahead and its many dangers. I just had no pain in my heart for the place. For sure, Lynchburg has been good to me, and I have gained almost everything I have now because of my time there, but I had a overwhelming feelings that the time had passed. Almost everything I once wanted to stay for is gone now. Save for a few friends left behind, the Burg is in many respects a shell of what it once was. I miss my friends, and I miss the time I had in Lynchburg, but I can’t seem to miss the place. I am sure that will change at some point, but that is just where I am now.

On the west side of Roanoke, we ran into some storms. Maybe it was just the Burg giving its best shot at keeping us around. It should have tried harder. We came close to hydroplaning and fishtailing, but we did not. My friend Ryan Rosewell was along for the journey to help me keep my sanity and help with the move. It was a good way to go out after spending the last 2 and a half years together in an office for 20+ hours a week. We jammed to Foo Fighters and tried to make it past the rain and Appalachian mountains. I probably used as much fuel as a aircraft carrier during that part of the trip.

We woke up early at the Econo Lodge Beckley and hit the road. I had serious doubts that we would make it to Wheaton before the rental office for our apartment complex closed for the evening. Even though we were gaining an hour and crossing into central time, it would be close. We could start doing around 60 MPH after getting through the foothills and into Ohio. Luckily we weren’t in that state for very long. We cruised through Ohio, into Indiana and $3.79 gas. We cruised past corn fields and soy bean fields and $2.99 E85 ethanol. We cruised into Illinois with about an hour and forty-five minute cushion before the rental office closed. Paid some tolls, didn’t hit traffic until the final 2 mile stretch of 355 Interstate. We arrived at Briarbrook Apartments, Wheaton, IL, without making a single wrong turn during the entire trip. That’s not to say we didn’t come close a couple of times, but we never had to turn around a single time.

Wheaton

Orientation to a new place can take a while. And as anyone who has heard me talk about living up here has already heard, the price of living takes a little getting used to. In fact, I am not sure I can ever adjust to rent prices here. They are astronomically high. I heard a guy talk about paying $1600 a month with a straight face. Where I am from, that will get you a five-bedroom house with a pool and money left over to pay the utilities. Yes, a mortgage payment. But I suppose that is the cost of going into debt for school up here. By and large, I could not be happier with our place. We have a duck pond in the back yard, and some immigrant workers are putting a new roof on as a write this. Their air-compressor lets me know they are working.

The apartment is newly remodeled; in fact, we are the first people to live in it since the remodel. The neighborhood is quiet enough, and it appears most people would just assume be left alone. One advantage to living here is that while commodities have gone through the roof, they are still basically the same price here as anywhere else. So we pay basically the same for most things as we did in the Burg, but we are making more money. Of which, any extra will be spent on rent. But we are also poor teachers and students. We will make it work. Hopefully. Another advantage: if I wanted to, I could get up from my chair and be in the heart of downtown Chicago within an hour, thanks to the commuter train. It is about a 10 minute drive from our home, right beside Wheaton College campus. I have used the train twice so far, once to take my mom and sisters into the city the day after we got here, the second the next day when Ryan and I met his brother in Chicago and went up to Wrigleyville to be around the stadium during a Cubs game. I had thought about trying to go to a game during these few weeks before schools starts for Meghan and I, but I have been told that the only way to get tickets is to know someone with season tickets. The guy we bought our bed from told me he was number 22,000 something on the waiting list for season tickets. Something tells me he would take out a second mortgage to get them.

In the last two weeks or so since we got here, I have purchased with gift-card money 3 pieces of living room furniture from Target, put them together; two bookshelves from Big Lots, put them together; a desk from Office Max, put it together. The latter took two days and something approaching 5 hours of work. But I am using it now to hold my laptop computer to write these words, so it is all worth it now. I would have predicted that leaving all semblance of home to move 1000 miles to an expensive, scary city in which I know no other persons may bring about some sense of isolation. To top it off, I usually pride myself in knowing my way around, where I am at the moment in relation to other places and things, and the like. I know none of those things yet. However, I am not troubled by it, for whatever reason. Part of me knows that I will have something of a built-in peer group in my cohort from school, since there will be only a maximum of 20 persons and we will by and large be taking the same classes, etc. Part of me knows that Meghan will be getting to know people from her work as well. Additionally, part of me, as well as the rest of me, is married now, and I just don’t seem to care about hanging out the way I used to. I just don’t have a lot of motivation these days to make a ton a new friends. Meghan and I have been getting along fairly well, watching movies and catching up on season 4 of ’Lost.’ I have also found some time to get some reading done, and I hope to get through James Frey’s “A Thousand Little Pieces,” Homer Hickam’s “Rocketboys,” and Dave Eggers’ “A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius” before I have to go back to school in two weeks or so.

Impressions

A thought I keep coming back to is that ‘we did it.’ I have no idea how, or what I would need to do where I faced with a similar situation in the future, but somehow we did it. Starting with Spring 2007, there were so many things that were completely out of my control that fell into place. (1) Internship for Liberty MA. I had no idea where to start looking, and I had been told that often it takes 3 semesters to get the hours for the internship completed. I had to get mine done in 2 if I wanted to move on to a doctoral program. (2) Doctoral Programs. I had started looking and thinking seriously about this during thanksgiving of 2006. I knew that I wanted to start Fall 2008, and it would be going up against the wire to get my MA done by then. I began filling out applications before starting my internship, having no idea if I would be able to complete my hours. Additionally, I didn’t even know if I would get in to any programs. Even when planning my interview trips, I had no idea if I would get in or if I would finish my internship on time; I could have been totally wasting my time and money with the trips. (3) Marriage. I knew that we had a small window of time to this, because Meghan didn’t finish her school year until mid-June, and we would need at least a few weeks between the wedding and the start of the school year of Fall 2008 to move and for Meghan to find a job.

Cut to February 2008. The first weekend of the month, I interviewed at Regent University. I asked a bunch of semi-controversial questions to my interviewers and also told them that on a scale of 1 to 10, my excitement about going to the school was a 7. I was wait-listed at Regent. The second weekend of the month, I got engaged. The third weekend of the month, I took a trip to Wheaton and interviewed with the faculty. I asked some semi-controversial questions during a group interview about their internship placement. I toured Chicago alone in 17 degree weather. The forth weekend was my weekend off. The fifth weekend of the month, I flew with my dad to Portland, OR, to interview at George Fox University. The day before leaving, I received an email from Wheaton College Graduate School informing me that I had been accepted into their program. At Fox, I did ask one or two controversial questions to a professor there that used to teach at Wheaton. I was accepted into their program three days after returning to Lynchburg. I chose to accept the offer at Wheaton, and it was uncomfortable to turn down the other offer. I was later informed by Regent that I was not accepted into their program.

Cut to April 2008. I finished my internship hours. I have no idea how this happened. Meghan applied to a school in Wheaton, She sent her application on a Tuesday, and on Thursday received a call from the administrator. On Friday she had a phone interview, 10 days later we were flying to Chicago for a face-to-face interview. She received the job 2 weeks and 3 days after sending her application.

During this entire time, we were planning the wedding. We wanted to do it at Sweet Briar College, but all of the Saturday times has been reserved for the entire summer, probably years in advance. We were able to secure a Sunday, and we were married June, 29, 2008, with little to no major problems in planning or execution phases. In the meantime, we were able to move out of two apartments and take the belongings 1000 miles to NC and IL. Which gets us the beginning, middle, and end of this post.

All I have left to do is to complete 4 years of doctoral study followed by an application to a competitive internship placement, post-doc placement, and career. All of this against the backdrop of a failing world-wide economy, skyrocketing commodities prices, and general suffering and anguish. In the words of Sam Baker: “Pretty world; pretty roses.”

 

 

Glenn and I made this video for our fantasy football league. Enjoy.

I forgot to include the promised ‘further reading’ section in my previous post, so I thought I would do that here.

For Problem of Evil concerns, a good place to start may be Philip Yancey ‘Where is God When it Hurts.’ Additionally, C.S. Lewis ‘The Problem of Pain’ is a good resource. Searching Google Scholar for persons such as Alvin Plantinga, William Rowe (atheist), William Hasker, and Paul Draper (agnostic) may be good places to start in the academic literature of POE work.

For fidelity of Scripture concerns, I would check out Nicholas Perrin ‘Lost in Transmission.’ Additionally, the ‘Case For…’ books by Lee Strobel may be of benefit as well, along with C.S. Lewis ‘Miracles.’

For historical Jesus concerns, I would look at three books by Gary Habermas: ‘The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ,’ ‘The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus,’ and ‘The Risen Jesus and Future Hope.’

For doctrine of God concerns, I would check out A.W. Tozer ‘Knowledge of the Holy.’

These books are a good place to start any study of the various topics discussed in my reponse below.

http://yearoflove.org/blog/my-journey-from-christianity-to-love/

This post is in response to a friend’s blog post essay; the link is included above. The motivation for my response post comes from a couple of different sources. One is that the author requests responses and feedback for his post and it would seem that he is inviting divergent viewpoints and critiques. The second is that it appears to me that the author is attempting to not only define his new belief system, but is actively encouraging others to adhere to his new worldview. It is my opinion that these motivations warrant a response that can engage some of the ideas presented by the author and provide alterative/divergent information along with specific critiques of some of the arguments. I also hope to follow a few of the ideas presented by the author out to their logical conclusions. Hopefully, this will allow the implications of these ideas to be more fully understood, or at least come into contact/interact with orthodox Christian belief.

I have attempted to follow some general ground rules. The first is that I will refer to the post author as ‘author’ rather than to use his name. I hope this will strongly detract from my response carrying the tone of a person attack in any form; this is not my intent. The second rule is that I have made strong attempts to limit the scope of my comments to information found in the essay itself. I do not wish to create straw-men or throw red herrings about when presenting information and questions that are critical of the author’s essay. A severe limitation is that the author and myself are operating from two radically different worldviews, and as such we will be using different standards by which to judge significant aspects of reality. I can acknowledge this fact but I am unsure about how to most effectively proceed without talking past his concerns on some level (e.g. using examples from the Bible, a book of which we have radically different readings). I have attempted to acknowledge this problem when it presents itself. In addition, I have attempted plain speech when possible; my desire is to raise objection without obscuring the problems with technical language or purely logical arguments. I am not writing a research paper; rather I am writing personal thoughts of integrated information from my studies of theology, philosophy, and psychology that I have found useful in shaping my Christian belief. I will include some further reading at the end of this essay.

After several readings of the author’s essay, I found that the concerns could be organized into several discrete categories. The major categories are The Person/Nature of God, The Nature of Salvation, The Authority/Fidelity of Scripture, The Problem of Evil, The Existence of Hell, and the Role of Feelings Versus the Nature of Reality (i.e. An Epistemological Structure/Perception/Correspondence Theory of Truth Question). From this major category organization, I will attempt to touch on the specific arguments in the essay.

The Person/Nature of God

As a Christian, the potions of the essay concerning the nature of God are the most troubling. In this section I will quote the essay and then follow with some thoughts. (1) “… A God who is truly loving and forgiving would never send his creations to Hell to suffer for eternity.” In a sense this proposition seems to follow logically. The argument is presenting the idea that the love of God is incompatible with creatures being sent to Hell. The difficultly with an argument such as (1) is that it does not take into account God’s other divine attributes. Additionally, we can better understand the author’s intent from statement (2): “I struggled for years trying to figure out how God could be the embodiment of love and the model for forgiveness, yet also punish people by sending them to Hell for eternity…”. (The part of this quote I left out is important, and will be covered later in this essay.)

Can we emphasize God’s love and mercy above his justice? Could God be all-loving, (i.e. the perfect lover, the definition of love) and not possess the justice needed for this love to be the greatest possible love? How can we define forgiveness without an idea of justice? Of what is God forgiving us? In order for God to be God in the sense of an omnipotent, omniscient, greatest of all possible beings, we have to assume by definition that he is the perfection of all His attributes. We cannot emphasize one attribute at the expense of the others, because a God of perfect love and forgiveness without perfect justice is no longer God. This being is simply a figment of our desires and imaginations without possession of the attributes of God.

One of the key problems the author states as having with Christianity is the doctrine of Hell, and specifically God sending persons to Hell. One of the questions we must ask when talking about Hell and the nature of God is whether or not persons deserve punishment. Of course it is easy to say that we are not sinners or some other such thing, but what evidence do we have to support this? If God was fully God as discussed above, would his nature alone not provide the standard by which we are held accountable? This standard is not an arbitrary list of rules and regulations that God made up to punish humans; rather righteousness and goodness are defined through the nature of God as the greatest of all possible beings. Goodness and righteousness could be no other way. If we fall short of this standard (I.e. the glory of God) we as humans are by definition sinners. This last paragraph of reasoning is intertwined with the nature of salvation and the doctrine of Hell proper, and I will return to it later in this response essay.

Statement (3) from the essay reads as follows: “I believe that God is love and that it is not quite accurate to call ourselves children of God, but more accurately to call ourselves God incarnate.” I will attempt a response dealing the content of the statement. The author is making two different statements about God: the first is that God is love, the second is that we (humans) are God incarnate. While the first statement is true in a specific sense, it seems that what was said previously in my essay about emphasizing one attribute of God at the expense of others is important for this statement as well. God is love, but love is not God. They are not equivalent. Love is an attribute of God’s nature, but love is not God. Love cannot be God, because love is but a part of the nature of God as God. Additionally, the author seems to be making a leap from speaking about what God does/attribute of his nature (love) to who he is definitionally/ontologically (humanity) without providing any source of evidence or logic that can take us there. Why is humanity God incarnate? What should we do with all of the evil in the world, specifically the evil that is done by other humans/God incarnate. If humanity is God incarnate, it would appear that we should possess the attributes of God, therefore we should not do evil. However, I would posit that everyone in the world can think of a least one evil act done by at least one human. Would evil that is done by one human make that specific human not part of the divine? If so, does that person still retain his or her ‘humanity,’ and if so, how? As we can see, this problem is particularly complex, and just simply asserting ‘humanity is God/part of the divine’ is an extremely weak position.

Using the information from (3) above, we could use the attribute of love as an example for the following. In order for humanity to truly be God incarnate, humanity must possess perfect love, or else by definition we are not God. We could be a lot of things (e.g. the force, the great spirit, the flying spaghetti monster) but we are not God. We cannot be God unless we possess His attributes. As a postulate problem, there is a logical fallacy with assigning beings of different characteristics (humanity proper) with the attributes of God. As God is the greatest of all possible beings, there cannot be more than one ‘greatest’ of anything, and two different entities cannot possess equal characteristics, because they will cease to be two entities and be the same entity. Depending on how one defines what one means by ‘God’ this may or may not be a problem. But it should be said that if we do not talk about God as possessing perfect attributes, we are no longer talking about God. Therefore, statements from the essay such as (4) “We are God. We are Love.” cannot be true in an meaningful way, based on what the word ‘God’ means. Due to the differing characteristics of humanity proper, it is very difficult to see a way in which all human beings could be Love in an equal sense; yet this would have to be the case if we are God incarnate.

The Nature of Salvation

The author speaks extensively of his motivation for becoming a Christian. It appears that this motivation was one of fear. Specifically fear of going to Hell. Unfortunately, evangelicalism of the last 150 years or so has used fear to shock people into becoming Christians. It is important to note that Christ was not shy when speaking about the afterlife, Heaven as well as Hell, but he did not scare people into His Kingdom. His message, as best I can tell, was one of reconciliation. Coming to the world, not to condemn it, but to save it (see John 3:17). This is a popular proof text for Christian universalists, so perhaps it is good that I am using it here. We find from Scripture that Jesus Christ was God. By coming into the world, He very well could have judged everyone where they stood, because all men had fallen short of God’s nature. He did not do so; rather He provided a way (I.e. substitution death on the cross and being raised from the dead) whereby men could be reconciled to God (through the death and resurrection of Christ) and participate in the Kingdom of Righteousness (by accepting that Christ is God and following His way by giving up your life to Him). The motivation for saying yes to Jesus is life, not death.

Evangelical Christianity has become enthralled with presenting salvation as a prayer, as fire insurance, and as a way to not get ‘left behind.’ The problem with the methodology is that it leads to precisely the problems that the author has run into: namely, he made a decision based in fear, and this motivation does not seem to be in line with the person of God. And I would agree with this line of reasoning, at least in part. I believe as well that this line of reasoning leads to questions such as the following: (5)”… how God could be the embodiment of love and the model for forgiveness, yet also punish people by sending them to Hell for eternity for simply failing to accept Christ as their savior.”

I would point out that I believe (5) misses the very point of the nature of forgiveness, salvation, and the person of God and the nature of humanity. I agree with the author that if this were true, it would be extremely difficult to accept. Thinking of the problem in this way, it seems that God has set up an arbitrary regulation and if you do not follow it, you will be sent to Hell. However, God does not send people to Hell for simply failing to accept Christ. God allows people to go to Hell because they are sinners. They have fallen short of the glory of God (because he is the greatest of all possible beings) due to the effects of sin and having a sin nature, which leads to committing sin in the very members of our bodies. Not accepting Christ is one way in which man continues rebellion against the nature of God, and desires to be God. It may appear to some that I am playing word-games with this issue, but it is a fundamentally different thing to say (a) ‘not accepting Christ sends one to Hell’ as opposed to saying (b) ‘being a sinner (having a sin nature) sends one to Hell.’ Please notice a key difference: (a) rests all of the responsibility on God, in that he is a cosmic bully who has set up arbitrary rules, while (b) rests the responsibility on the nature of each individual defined by acceptance of Christ’s Lordship as the only way to become a person that can be reconciled with God. In this way, it is not what we do (specific acts of sin) that separates us from God, but rather who we are (our sin nature). In Christ we are a new creation, and we can find favor with the greatest of all possible beings with all perfect attributes through Christ alone. The logical conclusion of (a) is that if Christ did not exist, one would not go to Hell since rejection of Christ means going there. This is not the case due to who we are as sinners in need of reconciliation to a perfect God.

The Authority/Fidelity of Scripture

The author raises many good questions concerning the nature of the Christian Scriptures. However, this area is one that is possibly the most in danger of us speaking past each other. The fact that I hold Scripture to be the Word of God on the foundation of Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit will seriously affect our conversation about it. I would offer one possibility for further study, and that is for the author to not use blanket statements and questions such as (6): “I believe there is a lot of truth in the Bible, but also lots of half-truths, lies, misinterpretations and blatant mistranslations” and (7): “how [do] we know that the Bible was never changed, mistranslated, or misinterpreted?” and corollary questions as his guide for defining the Bible. Rather, it may be important to study specific books or chapters in detail and learn more about the history of each. It is unfair to the text to assign these types of definitions without having specific examples. This is true not only for the Bible, but anything about which one makes accusations.

I acknowledge that this next comment reeks of intellectual snobbery, but I would also encourage the author to undertake a study of academic literature. Website and popular-level materials are informative on some level, but they often obscure or gloss over important information. I would encourage a thorough look into these topics before completely changing an entire worldview.

Obviously the Bible is a big book that was written over a long period of time by many authors. It is quite easy for many to dismiss it out of hand as impossible that the writing of a book such as the Bible could be done and hold any semblance of inspiration from God. Find specific problems and work through them. Obviously it is much easier to dismiss it all, but this may prove to be impossible when some actual study of specific texts and reliable history takes place.

I would consider this section to be the weakest of my response, and some would argue it needs to be the strongest. However, at this time I am unsure about where to go when the author and myself are coming to the text from such divergent viewpoints.

The Problem of Evil

The classical problem of evil (POE) is a line of argument that atheists and theists have grappled over for hundreds of years. The basic idea is the following: (c) God is all-powerful, all-knowing, and wholly good, (d) an all-powerful, all-knowing, wholly good being would not allow evil, (e) evil exists, therefore, (f) God does not exist. The author interacts briefly with POE on several occasions in his essay. The author’s list of fundamental questions are each classic POE atheistic questions/arguments (in his essay they can be found below the bold type that states: “There were so many fundamental questions that I could never answer…”). One specific question asks why God would create human beings if He knew they would eventually go to Hell. I believe the short answer is found in God’s rational for the creation of Man: to have fellowship with beings that would freely love him, thereby bringing glory to himself as the greatest of all possible beings. In my work with POE, free will made a lot of sense to me with regard to God granting human beings the power to make significant decisions. We can only truly be free if we have the ability make a decision that dictates a significant outcome in a meaningful way. It appears from Scripture that Adam and Eve made free-will decisions to eat the fruit; as a result, they fell from the perfect state in which they were created and took on the nature of sin. It is important to note that God did not taint the fruit in some way, thereby holding the responsibility for the entrance of sin into the world and ‘causing‘ sin. The fall came because of a free decision of the heart, not by a physical eating of the fruit. In order for free will to exist, God had to set up a circumstance by which free will could be undertaken. Therefore, I believe a more fundamental question than the author’s is ‘why would God create Eve knowing that she would sin?’ I believe both mine and the author’s questions can be answered by an understanding of the free will of persons, and that God’s perfect goodness desires for every person to be saved, while his perfect justice demands fidelity to His nature. Free will on some level must exist for us to be fully human; even though some people may not be saved, it is God desire that everyone be saved. This is the most overt philosophical concern in the essay, and it is one that is not easily untangled. However, as I have tried to show, I believe there is at least one good reason for belief that God (full perfect attributes) could allow human beings to make decisions that ultimately result in Hell.

The Existence of Hell

The doctrine of Hell has been a difficult topic for many believers and non-believers alike. The rational for the existence of a place that is totally cut off from the presence of God may be explained in light of God’s perfect attributes: namely, that God must have created a place that can in fact be cut off from his presence, as a container for sin. We must keep in mind that Hell was not created for human beings, rather for Satan and his angels. The fall of Man made the use of Hell for fallen humans necessary. The concept of sin must be tied in with the concept of Hell. When we speak about Hell as a container for sin, it can almost bring about the emotion of comfort; that at some point in the future, God will again separate the evil from the good so that His full glory can be revealed to His creation. Because of free will and the existence of sin, we must have the existence of Hell. If Hell were not an actual place, sin and evil would be free to exist forever and would not be able to be separated from that which is eternal.

An idea that does not bring about an emotion of comfort is the idea that human beings could spend eternity in Hell. This thought is truly horrifying, and I do not begrudge the author one bit for having serious problems with this actually happening. However, I would also invite the author to reconsider his personal role in God’s judgment. If God is the greatest of all possible beings, possessing infinite love along with infinite justice, would it not be prudent to trust that He will deal with each person in a way that is both infinitely loving and infinitely just? Is the justice of God an attribute that we should worship along with infinite love? Could true love exist apart from justice? As asked above, what is mercy if humans are not sinners?

As Christians, we should be focused on trusting God for all of our needs, including the need to want everyone to go to heaven. My personal belief is that as evangelical Christians, we have often been assigned personal responsibility for things that are between other people and God. In Scripture we are told to preach the Gospel of Christ. Apart from that, each and every person makes his or her own decision and is ultimately responsible before God.

One of the problems with the above statement can be illuminated by a question by the author: (8) “What would happen to people that never heard the gospel in their lifetime” as well as (9) “What about kids who died too young to make a decision to ’get saved.’” For (8), my response would be that they are in the hands of an infinite God. Some Christians may disagree as to what exactly happens to those who never hear the gospel or have a chance to make a choice in this life, but I would hold to the truth that whatever happens, it is God’s business and He alone possesses the divine attributes possible to determine the most just, fair, merciful, and loving fate of each person. In regard to (9), I have a personal stake in this question because I lost a brother at a young age. What do I believe about his death? I believe he died with a sin nature. I believe that he was not able in this life to make a decision about Christ. I believe that God knows all things, and he has done with my brother the best possible thing that can be done. I am waiting in faith to find out exactly what that is. And I believe that when I find out I will understand God in a more full way that I do now, and I will praise Him for the life of my brother, not because of my brother or any emotion I may have concerning his passing at a young age, but because of who God Himself is.

At what point does any one of us have a responsibility to ensure (not suggest or assist, but ensure) that others do not go to Hell? At what point do we need to feel a sense of fear or depression for other people? Obviously we should not be callused about human beings dying without Christ, but I believe that in some degree, being preoccupied with Hell and with others going there leads to and strengthens a desire to be God and to do His job for Him. To whoever is reading this now, I think we can agree that Hell is an extremely unpleasant subject and, if it were up to us, would not exist. However, we do not possess the infinite attributes of God. We can be assured that if Hell does exist (and I think we have a significant foundation upon which to base its existence) it exists for a significant reason that it is the work and reflection of ALL of God’s attributes. I have tried to talk about its existence in light of his mercy and justice. There are obviously many more ways to speak about Hell and God as co-existing (much like the existence of evil proper). Additionally, I hope to interact with the tentmaker.org site specifically in a later post. For this post, I am still attempting to limit my response to the specific information contained within the essay.

To close the section on Hell, I would re-emphasize that we can be assured that salvation comes by trusting in the person of Christ. As I mentioned earlier, Christianity is not fire insurance; it is a relationship with Christ and a life of participation in the Kingdom of God, both in this life and the life to come. We must overcome the Spirit of fear within us with the Spirit of God that is renovating the hearts and minds of those who believe.

Role of Feelings Versus the Nature of Reality

The author includes several extended sections describing feeling/not feeling saved, depression, fear, and other associated emotions. One specific comment describing the feelings after rejecting belief in Hell is as follows: (10) “For the first time in my life I felt like everything was alright with the world.” This is certainly not a bad thing, and I would even argue that having a generally optimistic or positive outlook can be make life easier. However, I would ask if the author changing his view actually changed anything about reality itself? Obviously his perception of reality changed, but did this perception change in turn change the world? As a critical realist, I would argue that it does not. Changing a view or a feeling about the existence of Hell or the reliability of Scripture does not change their reality. They either exist in a specific form or they do not. Nothing we can do/feel can change these facts.

The question then becomes: ‘what do we use to make these determinations?’ Obviously taking the word of men alone is highly questionable, considering that the word of men could have errors. The author seems to be rejecting the Bible on these very grounds, but on what ground is he then making this determination? As best I can tell, it is from internet research and self-help books, along with other books on spirituality. Are these texts and ideas in some way more reliable than Scripture that has been scrutinized for the last 2000 years? I am not presenting this question to affirm the truth of Scripture, but rather to compare it to the truth standard that is apparently being used by the author in the essay.

When responding to the role of emotion within the essay, I find it extremely difficult to respond in a way that does justice to the content itself. It is also impossible for me to say “you shouldn’t feel that way” or in some way judge the feelings of someone else. These feelings are obviously very strong and have been used to guide the formation of the author’s belief system. My general concern about the topic of emotion is of what role it should play. Should I use my feelings of fear or of comfort to dictate truth? I have stated above that our feelings do not change the reality of anything, and may actually hamper us in the search for truth. Emotions such as fear can be strong motivations, but it is important to note that God does not use fear to bring us to Himself. He uses knowledge. In this pursuit of knowledge we should desire nothing less than the truth. We can obtain truth by being extremely critical of both ourselves and our sources.

As an augmentation of the ideas above, I will note that the author speaks of the fear of being wrong as a significant motivation to adhere to a Christian belief system while rejecting all information that opposed this belief. He describes wanting to keep his belief system intact (11) “because it was too depressing to think that we might be all alone here with no divine protector.” After reading this I found the end of the essay somewhat starling, because being alone with no divine protector is exactly what the author concludes.

Conclusion and Questions for the Author

I listed my motivations for writing this essay at the beginning, but I think it may be important to re-visit the topic and add a few thoughts. I would hope ultimately that some of above thoughts could be used by those who are searching for some answers about Christ and what it means to follow Him. I know also that simple words never convince anyone of anything. There is a certain sense in which those who find must be seeking in the first place. Those who are receptive to the Gospel will find it. Conversely, those who do not seek the truth at any cost will not find it. Just as I am thoroughly unconvinced by any of the ideas presented by the author in the blog of love, I trust that without the Holy Spirit’s movement, he will remain equally unmoved by any of my thoughts. I wrote this with the intention that I myself might be reminded of the love of a great God for me, and I pray that he is glorified by my attempt to discuss faith in Christ and the reality of God. In this discussion, we are confronted with uncomfortable truth, but it is truth that we should be willing to accept, in light of the person of Christ. I pray that each person reading this will be challenged to dig deeper in his or her understanding of Truth.

Finally, I will present the following questions to the blog of love author for immediate comment.

(1) In the essay you state: “I concluded that there was no way that Hell could exist.” I am assuming you mean that there is no possibility that Hell exists, an argument of which I have never seen presented in any form. Could you clarify what you mean by this statement?

(2) You claim that you found a third alternative between Christianity and Atheism, yet the God that you state “exists” cannot be God under any meaningful definition of God. Why the move from Christianity to a new-age-type pan-theosophy? Christian universalism allows for all to escape Hell, so why the rejection of Christianity proper if Hell was your major concern?

I invite any and all comments or concerns. My hope is that I can be critiqued and strengthened through this post as well.

 

 

I have finally found the time to write an offical thank-you to everyone involved with our wedding, either as a participant or as an attendee. Thank you for taking the time out, spending some money in the Lynchburg economy, and supporting us in our time of decision and vow-making. I think the only regret Meghan and I have from that day is that we did not have more time to talk to all of the people that have supported us and befriended us over the years. It meant so much that you would be with us on that day. We hope to have a few pictures of the honeymoon up soon as well as some offical pictures from the wedding. We have seen a few preview shots and they look very promising.

We woud not be where we are today without the support of each and every one of you. We are so thankful for you. God bless and we hope to see you again soon.  

Tar Heel Trio Returning to School

With the news that Wayne Ellington, Ty Lawson, and Danny Green are withdrawing from the NBA draft to and returning for another college basketball season in Chapel Hill, the Tar Heels just became a lock for the national championship. Will Tyler Hansbrough slice through the hype for concensus national player of the year honors for a second-straight year? Is it possible to improve on last year’s record, which was 36-3? Probably. Look out Duke. You sons of guns.

The Western Land nervous under the beginning change. The Western States, nervous as horses before a thunder storm. The great owners, nervous, sensing a change, knowing nothing of the nature of the change. The great owners, striking at the immediate thing, the widening government, the growing labor unity, striking at new taxes, at plans; not knowing these things are results, not causes. Results; not causes; results, not causes. The causes lie deep and simply – the causes are a hunger in a stomach, multiplied a million times; a hunger in a single soul, hunger for joy and some security, multiplied a million times; muscles and mind aching to grow, to work, to create, multiplied a million times. The last clear definite function of man – muscles aching to work, minds aching to create beyond the single need – this is man. To build a wall, to build a house, a dam, and in the wall and house and dam to put something of Manself, and to Manself take something back something of the wall, the house, the dam; to take to take hard muscles from the lifting, to take clear lines and for from conceiving. For man, unlike any other thing organic or inorganic in the universe, grows beyond his work, walks up to the stairs of his concepts, emerges ahead of his accomplishments. This you may say of man – when theories change and crash, when schools, philosophies, when narrow dark alleys of thought, national, religious, economic, grow and disintegrate, man reaches, stumbles forward, painfully, mistakenly sometimes. Having stepped forward, he may slip back, but only half a step, never the full step back. This you may say and know it and know it. This you may know when the bombs plummet out the black planes on the market place, when prisoners are stuck like pigs, when the crushed bodies drain filthily in the dust. You may know it in this way. If the step were not being taken, if the stumbling-forward ache were not alive, the bombs would not fall, the throats would not be cut. Fear the time when the bombs stop falling while the bombers live – for every bomb is proof that the spirit has not died. And fear the time when the strikes stop while the great owners live – for every little beaten strike is proof that the step is being taken. And this you can know – fear the time when Manself will not suffer and die for a concept, for this one quality is the foundation of Manself, and this one quality is man, distinctive in the universe.

John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath, pp. 152-153. 

Usually I read a fairly diverse collection of materials. I may be reading a novel, a non-fiction book concerning some element of psychology, theology, philosophy, etc. Often these texts are never related to each other in any meaningful sense. I suppose my current reading has been somewhat influenced by my reading of Steinbeck’s ‘The Grapes of Wrath’ and wanting more exposure to farming/agrarian concerns. So I decided to buy a book by Wendell Berry entitled ‘What are People For?’

‘What are People For?’ is a collection of essays commenting on biographies and former teachers, along with popular literary works. In a particularly moving essay, he compares the ‘styles’ of two eloquent works centered around rivers: Hemingway’s ‘Big Two-hearted River’ and Maclean’s ‘A River Runs Through It.’ last night as I read the beginning of the essay as Berry comments on’Big Two-hearted River’ that I would love to read his thoughts about ‘A River Runs Through It.’ A commentary on this work began in the next paragraph. I though it was a striking coincidence.

My next move was to pick up my copy of ’A River Runs Through It,’ the 25th anniversary edition. I noticed upon reading the cover that the introduction to the 25th anniversary edition was written by Pulitzer Prize-winner E. Anne Proulx. Interesting, because before a couple of days ago I didn’t know who she was, even though I have read the introduction several times before. I learned who she was because two days ago I rented a film adaptation of her novel ’The Shipping News.’ Of course the coincidences could stop there, but upon reading Proulx’s introduction, I noticed that she referenced Wallace Stegner in her introduction with relation to his contributions to Western regional story-telling.

What made Proulx’s mention of Stegner interesting is that Wendell Berry has an essay about him in the book ‘What Are People For?’ that I read last night as well. It seems that Berry even spent an entire year with Stegner as part of a fellowship at Stanford University. So now my books are connected in explicit content; however it was theme that compelled me to write this post.

Berry comments on a poem by Hayden Carruth entitled ‘On Being Asked to Write a Poem Against the War in Vietnam.’ This work appears to state that writing a poem against the war is pointless, except paradoxically, this is stated by means of a poem. We are reminded by Berry of the difference between despair and hope, in that complete despair does not even attempt to speak at all. Soft hopefullness uses communication, and especially art, to mantain the potential for change. It is person, not societal, change that is most relevant to this discussion of hope.

In reading this poem criticism by Berry I was reminded of two important issues I had previously read about. The first was from ‘Grapes of Wrath’ when Steinbeck speaks about fear and wrath, and their relation. We should not fear the time when men are angery, or when the bombs fall. We should be fearful of the time the bombers live but do not bomb, because there is no hope left. Despair has overtaken hope. I will post that passage in full after finishing this post.

The second point is the role of art in technological change. I read Tyler Veak’s introduction to ’Democratizing Technology: Andrew Feenberg’s Critical Theory of Technology,’ a work in which he serves as editor. I honestly did not understand half or maybe even three-fourths of what I read. I did however see the possibility and importance of using art as a means by which technological structures might be altered. This may mean a lot of things, and i hope to understand it better in the days to come. In addition, I checked the book out of the Liberty University library. As I walked into the stacks, I noticed an empty desk to my left in the front of the room. On my way out with ‘Democratizing Technology,’ Dr. Veak was sitting at the desk.  

I could not help but be reminded of the relationship of art and technology upon reading Proulx’s introduction to ‘A River Runs Through It’ and ‘What Are People For?’ Proulx uses art as a means by which the essential truths of human experience can be encapsulated and given to those searching for answers and personally relating to that common experience. We can attempt to make shape of what was previously shapeless. In relation, Berry states in a essay entitled ‘Style and Grace’ (on Hemingway and Maclean) that “works of art participate in our lives; we are not just distant servers of their lives. They are in conversation among themselves and with us.”

Applying this web of topics and information to something concrete should be attempted. I can think of no better subject than my previous post subject: Hulk Hogan. The first observation is that I attempted to state in my previous post the irrelevance of even speaking about the problems and absurd situations created by what the Hulk does, what he embodies, and what he produces. My silence on the subject, I would like to think, would be less useful than verbally acknowledging the fact that what is said may in reality have little meaning. Is this similar to the paradox spoken about by Berry in regard to the Vietnam poem? I would like to think so. 

Secondly, Hogan lacks any semblanceto a producer of what has been discussed by the authors above as art, in any way, shape, or form. The difficulty lies in a career filled with fakery, with a rise to fame through the entertainment business of professional wrestling. Long known for staged fighting and outcomes, the world of professional wrestling can almost assuredly be characterized as wholly devoid of art. Art itself can be used in variety of ways, but I like to include such ideas as beauty, production, relevance, and significance. It could be argued that a scripted reality show (such as ‘Hogan Knows Best’) does not meet the criteria for art, either. 

The tragedy of a life publicly producing what might be called the antithesis of art is that it is a life totally lacking substance. The faux front is all that is there; when life crumbles there is no support, nothing to hold fast, nothing to prevent the fall. This statement has theological considerations as well; luckily for us, art maintains a prominent place in theological study. As for Hogan and his family, art will not solve all of their problems. Of course not. All I am saying is that life lived well will naturally be attracted to art, and will desire to produce art. it will desire to produce what is beautiful, what is significant. Between persons and between persons and God, we are blessed to experience each other through art. 

Speaking of the future, Hogan’s new shows might be a step in the right direction:
Hulk Hogan’s Celebrity Championship Wrestling - American Gladiators      

I got sucked into watching most of the Hulk Hogan interview on ‘Larry King Live’ last night. His problems seem to be multiplying with each new day; divorce, son in car accident that leaves friend severely brain-damaged, supposedly cheating on wife with friend of daughter, son going to jail, release of jailhouse tapes that further define his views on theodicy (God laid some ‘heavy sh–’ on him) and that his son somehow fell through the cracks of the penal system. To think that his son has been treated unfairly may take some stretching of the truth, but then again, perhaps if he had just been a normal 17-year-old kid he would not have had to serve any jail time. The point though is that he is not a normal kid.

I used to watch the hit reality TV show ‘Hogan Knows Best’ for reasons I cannot define at the moment. I did begin to see some interesting developments during my time as a viewer of this program, with the most interesting one being how seriously Hogan takes himself. I think he must believe he is truly a big star, with important contributions to society. I will offer into evidence exhibit a, exhibit b, exhibit c, exhibit d, exhibit e as proof of the contrary. However, it is not difficult to tear down the man’s film and television career; this can be done to just about anyone who works in the film and television industry. I just wonder about his perception that any of this controversy really matters to anyone. What does that then say about someone who writes a blog post about it?

It seems like a ‘chicken versus egg’ controversy: does a reality show turn your life into ruin or was your life already this way, with the reality show bringing it to light? There are unfortunately now countless examples of reality shows leading to break-up of marriages, ruination of familial and friendship relations, among other things such as going to jail and having the world know about your private conversations within said jail. What does it all mean? Absolutely nothing at all. It is a non-story, much like 99% of what passes for news these days. The people that write about it? They could not be more lost or out of touch with the difference between having information and having knowledge. 

I can think of at least one good thing about the economy and society as we know it being dumped over the gates of oblivion: we won’t have reality TV anymore.