Archive for April, 2008

Reason for God

by Hugh on April 1, 2008 in Books, Faith with No comments

So chapter 1 of Reason for God, following the introduction, Keller addresses the issue that he says he hears frequently in his ministry, he sums it up with the word ‘exclusivity’. That is people taking issue with religions that make truth claims and then who try to persuade others of those claims and who refute the truth claims of other religions. The argument put against religions making truth claims is to say, firstly that all religions are basically the same – equally true (or equally false), and also to say that the divisiveness between these exclusive claims is what causes so much of the war and violence in the world.

Keller talks through the 3 main responses to the problem of religion: to outlaw religion, to condemn religion, or to keep religion private. He then goes on to explain why these responses don’t work, and are inconsistent.

Outlaw Religion – take the 20th Century, the regimes that claim religions cause war and violence have suppressed those beliefs with more brutal violence. The belief that as we advance technologically we would evolve out of religious beliefs has been proved untrue. Those countries that have tried to outlaw Christianity have failed, China being the obvious example.

Condemn Religion - that is by argument and education to make religious belief socially unacceptable. There are several objections raised in this section, “All religions are essentially the same“, “Each religion only sees part of the truth“, “Religious beliefs are culturally and historically conditioned“, and that “Religious beliefs are arrogant“. Keller in essence argues that all these criticisms find their root in unprovable, exclusive claims, and in making the objections reveal their own arrogance, and therefore hypocrisy.

Keep Religion Private - I guess this is a big thing at the moment with all the news about voting on embryo research… Keller argues that we all have religious beliefs (a set of beliefs formed to answer life’s big questions), and that whether we’d call ourselves religious or secular these ‘religious beliefs’ affect all areas of our life – the secularist still makes decisions based on religious beliefs.

There are a number of things I like about Keller’s approach here… firstly he doesn’t assume too much, he’s not specifically talking about Christianity or referencing the Bible, he’s dealing with more basic issues, yet at a level which is intellectually and philosophically robust. Secondly he’s well researched, quoting both secular and Christian academics, using the secular philosophers writings to prove his points – clever! Thirdly, he’s gracious, he exposes the folly and hypocrisy of some arguments, but does not then become proud in his writing, but urges engagement with the big questions. Finally, he’s honest, he doesn’t try and get out of the facts, mainly that religions are divisive and do cause problems!

Keller concludes with a well worked in (not just crowbarred in) explanation of the Gospel of Grace, of Jesus Christ the sacrifice for sinful humans, and the example of unity and peace in truth.

You can listen to the talk on Exclusivity from Redeemer.

Remember I said about Tim Keller doing a talk at a Google Authors event… well here’s the video from that…

More Driscoll Bashing

by Hugh on April 1, 2008 in Faith with 9 Comments

It’s not often that I get annoyed when reading the EN newspaper (Evangelicals Now), because on the whole it’s pretty good, you know it’s sound, and usually very interesting… unlike the Church of England Newspaper, that gets me annoyed some times. But I got a bit annoyed when reading the most recent edition (April 2008), specifically Josh Moody’s ‘Letter from America’.

This piece is yet another “We like Mark Driscoll’s theology, but we don’t like his style” piece, of which you’ll find plenty across the web. It’s not that I have a problem with people who disagree with MD, it’s just that I find it sad that people insist on criticising a faithful gospel ministry, and for what gain? On top of that, this particular piece is about 2 years behind the times, essentially it is poorly researched.

The Internet Monk has some detailed thoughts about why people don’t like Mark Driscoll, worth reading if you’re a critic. For my part I’ve responded to the editor of EN to perhaps give a different perspective, doubt it will get published, but I have a blog, so here is my response published here…

Dear Sir,

Can I graciously suggest that Josh Moody is out of date, and perhaps out of touch when he writes about Mark Driscoll in the April edition of EN. Driscoll was given the dubious title of ‘The Cussing Pastor’ by Donald Miller in his book ‘Blue Like Jazz’, this was published 5 years ago. I’ve yet to hear Driscoll swear in a sermon, though his language in the past has certainly been more risqué, it is not what we would call swearing – ‘B.S.’ is of course just two letters! Since then Driscoll has I guess become more ‘mature’, he has publicly repented of many failures in his ministry, most recently when teaching on Humility (4th November 2007). As for the call for mentors, Driscoll counts John Piper and CJ Mahaney as his closest ministry mentors (2nd March 2008), not to mention the likes of Bruce Ware, Tim Keller and Wayne Grudem – of course Piper did once say ‘crap’ in a sermon! Moody here seems to be telling us about the Driscoll of several years ago.

There is much that could be said in response to Moody’s criticisms of Driscoll’s missiology of being ‘theologically conservative and culturally liberal’, but it would be unwise to debate the rights and wrongs of different forms of entertainment. The point here is that the proclamation of the gospel needs to be related to the context in to which it is preached. Paul, preaching to the Areopagus in Acts 17 gives a classic example of this gospel-contextualisation, this passage is key to Driscoll’s methodology and the name of his church (Mars Hill) is derived from it. Driscoll is preaching to young, liberal, post-modern, pagan Seattle-ites, people who listen to secular rock music, who watch R-rated films, who gamble, who drink, who get their teaching about sex from porn rather than the Bible – it is in to this culture that Driscoll preaches. While some call for a retreat from this kind of sinful culture, Driscoll and others are calling Christians, to engage with, to be a part of, and to understand the culture so that we can be missionaries within it. Dr. R. Albert Mohler, Jr., writing in a recent book (Preaching the Cross) put it like this, “We cannot simply withdraw. That would be to deny our commission. But we cannot feel at home either. That would be to deny our identity.” Driscoll is equally clear in his teaching that Christians need to be distinctive and above reproach in all matters, his view is that Christians should “go as far into the culture without sinning as they possibly can”, in order to share Christ. I would challenge EN readers to consider reading Driscoll’s first book entitled ‘Radical Reformission’ and make an informed opinion, about Driscoll, and about how we can best preach Christ in our culture.

Yours Sincerely,

Hugh Bourne

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