And they say she looks like Jack!

If you follow my wife's blog, you might think it's our soon-to-be-born-and-adopted girl.  However, Henry Mayo, my new nameless niece was born.  She missed sharing a May 9th birthday with her mommy by just 71 minutes.  Elisha and I have been on Jack duty at Fort Hogan, and the three of us are eager to meet her.

How do you bring the gospel, which is authoritative in its very nature, to someone who rejects any form of authority?

Another difficulty in presenting the gospel lies in the prevalent disdain for authority.  This is the third barrier to evangelizing post-moderns.

A mindset of unrestricted autonomy will always be opposed to the gospel message.  As soon as you start to speak of the imperatives of the gospel, they will say, "Don't tell me what to do.  Don't tell me how to live.  Don't tell me I'm wrong."  Ultimately, it becomes, "Don't tell me I'm in danger.  Don't tell me I'm going to hell."

Even if speaking on the behalf of God, when you tell them what they must do, they will not accept you.  They will try to dispute every statement.  They will suspect some ulterior motive, and they will oppose you.

People who hate authority don't want to be preached to.  We're so aware of this as Christians that we talk about befriending non-believers rather than preaching to them.  This done instead of befriending non-believers so that we would have opportunity to preach the gospel.

On one hand, it's not difficult to understand why people do not want to be preached to.  Preaching offends.  It has always offended, and God has always known this.  In addition, preaching can be difficult to receive because it is not a dialogue.  You sit, and you listen.  People don't like this.  They don't want to listen, but if they don't listen then they won't be saved.

The gospel speaks to all people, even those who do not want to be told what to do.  It tells them what they must do.  Acting as a messenger of this authoritative mandate can be difficult.

When we speak out about the gospel, we view it as ultimately the most kind thing we can do.  We are bringing light to darkness and offering hope to the hopeless.  We are speaking the only truth that can save a person's soul.  In spite the good reality of the gospel, it is often perceived as quite the opposite.

One reason the gospel is offensive is because it is opposes today's climate of pluralism.  This is the second barrier to evangelizing post-moderns.

Your post-modern coworkers have met all sorts of people of different religions.  Their Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim and Jewish acquaintances have been some of the most kind, sincere and generally pleasant people they have met.  There seems to be a mutual respect, and relishing diversity seems altogether reasonable.  After all, it seems to have worked for them.

Now we bring the gospel.  We explain that there is only one true and living God.  We explain that we have all rebelled against God and deserve His punishment.  Furthermore, we explain that Christ is the only way to be reconciled to God.

Then they ask, "So do you mean that anyone who doesn't believe in your Jesus is going to hell?  You believe that you're right and all other religions are wrong?"  Though you might try to say "yes" as gently as you can, the substance of the answer is in a certain sense quite harsh.

Another aspect of this problem of pluralism relates to cultural diversity.  Maybe you invite your friend to church.  During the course of the sermon, the pastor brings the hammer down on homosexuality and promiscuousness.  Your friend finds this offensive and promises to himself never to go to a Christian church again.  Why the offense?  Your friend knows several homosexuals, and they are nice people.  Most of his friends are sexually promiscuous, and they too are nice people.

When we tell someone that all these nice people are, in a sense, on God's bad list, we ourselves seem unkind at best, if not outright hateful.

How do we evangelize people without compromising the truth?  Certainly, rounding off the sharp edges of the gospel is not the answer.

How do you evangelize people who have no Biblical knowledge?  Furthermore, how do you bring the gospel truths to people who question whether we can really be certain about anything?

Too often I am content to become silent if someone resists the gospel and tells me they are not interested or have some other difficult objection.  Some recent reading, listening and discussion has caused me to consider more carefully how I might persist.  I don't want their excuses to coddle my own excuses for being tight-lipped.

I've been listening to a series by Gary Hendrix of Grace Reformed Baptist Church which discusses some of the barriers to evangelism with the young adults of my generation.  In the next few blog posts, I'll present some of these ideas in a (hopefully) condensed manner.

The first major barrier to evangelism has two parts:  Biblical illiteracy and post-modern epistemology.

More and more young people are Biblically illiterate.  They know next to nothing of what the Bible says, let alone what it means.  With respect to salvation, this is an obvious problem.  God designed salvation not merely to be seen or experienced.  It involves thinking; it involves knowledge.  A person must know who Jesus is so they might put their faith in Him.

More and more people have never attended a Biblical Christian church, and many will not come even if they are invited.  They don't know the Bible, and they are not willing to go to church where they might learn the Bible.

The second part of the barrier is a post-modern epistemology.  I wasn't familiar with the term, but epistemology is the study of knowledge and justified belief.

We assume that truth is knowable, and we assume knowledge can be communicated by words.  A post-modern mindset challenges these ideas.  They question whether truth is really knowable and whether we can be certain about anything.  They claim that you cannot be certain what a person means; you have to experience a thing for yourself.  In schools, the question is no longer, "What do these words mean?" but "What do these words mean to you?"

In this frame of mind, they often reject all dogmatism and all absolutes.  They ask, "What makes you think you have it right, and everyone else has it wrong?"

Even when Bible knowledge is communicated, it is received with a deeply  embedded skepticism--skepticism that we can know what the Bible meant and skepticism of the dogmatism of the Bible.  Even if they half accept Biblical truths, they cannot understand how we would be willing to stake our own lives on it.

I'll post the full report a little later, but look what happened right out my window!

Our reading for this week's Bible study included a poem about the suffering of Christ.  Although I'm no poetry lover, I found this poem to be particularlly worthy of consideration as it turns your mind toward the work of Christ.  If possible, read this apart from your normal hurried routine of checking email, blogs, facebook, etc.

What follows is but a small taste.  The italicized words are those of the mob shouting out to Christ on the cross.

Now heal thy self, physician; now come down.
Alas!  I did so, when I left my crown
And father's smile for you, to feel his frown:
          Was ever grief like mine?

In healing not my self, there doth consist
All that salvation, which ye now resist;
Your safety in my sickness doth subsist:
          Was ever grief like mine?

Betwixt two thieves I spend my utmost breath,
As he that for some robbery suffereth.
Alas! what have I stolen from you?  Death.
          Was ever grief like mine?

- from The Temple (1633), by George Herbert

I recommend reading the entire poem if you have time.

The results from my previous post are in. By unanimous decision, 5 points go to Mike from Halifax, England.  (He was actually the only one to respond!)  Nevertheless, he definitely had the right idea in pointing out that contrary to the diagram, "we are all headed towards hell... [and] God has chosen us out of that line."

I had asked "What possible presuppositions represented above would certainly make specific election seem unfair and even unjust?"  In this post, I will provide one possible answer to the question.  The presupposition that stood out to me was represented by the heavy arrow pointing toward heaven.  I suppose part of the "fairness" they see here is that a man's own choice sends them to hell.

Now if you started with that diagram and then said, "No, God determines whether an individual will go to heaven or hell," they might have a picture in their mind somewhat like the following:

I can understand why this seems unfair.  They might respond, "Now according to the idea of specific election people don't have a choice, and a lot of people are going to end up in hell whether they like it or not.  That doesn't seem to mesh with the idea of a God who loves everyone."

Now I would venture to guess that the objection comes not because God specifically picks individuals to be saved.  Who could complain about that?  The real objection is that God must therefore specifically pick individuals for hell in some fashion.

How would I answer these objections?  First, I would say that we both agree on two facts: 1) there is a sense in which a man's own choice sends them to hell and 2) there is a sense in which God's choice sends them to hell.  As I pointed out in a previous post, the choice of man which sends them to hell is NOT merely the choice to reject the gospel.  If that were the case, then hiding the gospel would be in others' best interest; for if they don't hear the gospel, then they haven't had a fair chance to choose their response.  Thus by default they would be eligible for heaven.

On the contrary, the choice which earns them eternal punishment is the choice to disobey God's law.  The choice is the choice to sin.  God must execute punishment for that person's sins.  In fact, because of His very nature (and the fact that He cannot actualize a contradiction), God has no choice.  His choice is never whether or not He will carry out justice.  The choice I'm talking about is His choice to establish His Law and to establish the penalties for violations of that Law.  That was the choice that put anyone who would sin on the path to judgement.  And could anyone say that God's determined penalties are unfair?

Another part of the objection to the notion of specific election could be this:  "How could it be fair to send anyone to hell if they had no fair chance?"  So a second point to consider is whether anyone truly has a chance.  In a certain sense, everyone does have a chance to gain eternal life on their own.  The first real chance a person has is to obey God's Law.  No one who keeps His Law (all of it) will be subject to God's wrath.  Thus, this first chance is genuine, and even those who say that salvation is determined by man's choice rather than God's specific choosing would have to admit that in a certain sense the gospel is really a second chance,

However, in another sense, no one has a chance to gain eternal life life on their own.  Why?  Because everyone blew their chances through sin.  Ironically, it is the choice of man to disobey God that causes them to forfeit their chances.  They carried out their sin willingly.  They took pleasure in the defiant acts that would earn them eternal and ultimate displeasure.  Their will turned them away from life instead of towards it.

Any claims of unfairness are only hypothetical.  You would have to find a case where despite a clean record of Law keeping, God chose to send the person to hell.   Obviously, such a case does not exist.

Furthermore, to claim unfairness, you would have to say that if God gives anyone a second chance then He owes everyone a second chance.  Is God then obligated to show mercy in equal degree and duration to all people?  Are variations in mercy unfair?

My intention here was shed some light on a presupposition I came across in Bible study handout with regard to the fairness of specific election.  If you started with that diagram when considering specific election, then God's determination the fate of individuals could seem unfair.

If you're going to have a simplistic diagram showing the path of salvation, I put together what I think is a better alternative.

I welcome comments.  What are some other reasons why specific election seems unfair?

Looks pretty good, eh?

I came across a diagram which may offer insight into why specific election is so reprehensible to many.  While I wasn't able to keep a copy of the handout, I did my best to recreate it from memory.

The question I will pose to you is this:  What possible presuppositions represented above would certainly make specific election seem unfair and even unjust?

I'll award 5 points to anyone who identifies what I belive is the most basic problematic presupposition.  Hint:  I'm thinking in very broad terms rather than addressing the numbered assertions specifically.

I've updated my blog to the updated code from my blog engine.  While I was at it, I updated the visual styles as well.  The best thing about this update is that I can now post entries using Windows Live Writer.  In addition, I added "Latest Comments" to the right sidebar.

(I am just testing the image upload with a picture of my nephew)