View from the Heart
Last Toke: 48 days
Last Smoke: 41 days

So it's been a while, eh? Well, I've been somewhat busy with some new project kickoffs at work, plus re-doing the lawn at home before fall fully sets in.

What I have been doing in blogworld has been going back and forth with Jeanne on The Unseen Blogger.

Apart from the usual futility of speaking the truth to someone who isn't interested in hearing it, I do find these online debates helpful in strengthening my faith as I remember and look up texts to respond to various arguments from the dark side.

All in all, however, I find debating these matters to be pretty useless, especially online. While many of my brothers and sisters tend to believe that faith in Christ and the Bible is a rational and logical thing, easily provable using classical apologetics, I do not. Faith in Christ's Lordship and the authority of Scripture is, at its core, irrational. While I can construct elaborate arguments from history and a study of systematic theology and logic, the power of the Gospel is in its ability to change lives demonstrably in the context of relationships.

So it gets a bit frustrating to try and convince someone who can't get a glimpse of Christ in you through interpersonal contact that Jesus is Lord -- and that they should entrust their lives and eternity to the propositions of the Gospel.

Furthermore, I am a presuppositionalist, which means that I approach evangelism and Christian apologetics not from a rational or logical perspective, but from a firm conviction that you have to understand what people's religious commitments (i.e. - presuppositions) are. For example, Jeanne doesn't believe in the absolute authority of the Bible because it tells her that people she cares about are most likely going to, or are already in, Hell. The concept of biblical judgement doesn't square with her presuppositions about God, namely that He is all love and wouldn't hurt a fly - let alone cast His 'children' into a lake of fire. Another of her presuppositions that I infer from our conversations is that people are basically good, thus not deserving of the judgement prescribed in the Bible.

So any attempt to persuade Jeanne of the rightness of my positions -- which, by the way, are built on my own set of presuppositions -- needs to attack the validity, reasonableness and essential truth of those presuppositions of hers which stand in opposition to submission to the Gospel Message.

This is a daunting task, given the fact that most of us are tenacious when it comes to our religious commitments. There is a place here for reason and logic, but simply providing evidence that these presuppositions are wrong won't do as long as the person's commitment to them remains intact. For instance, to point out the savagery among the New Orleans looters or the jihadi terrorists as sufficient evidence against believing in the inherent goodness of man only provokes a response that other people and circumstances oppressing them are forcing them to act against their natural instincts. Lost in this argument is the obvious conclusion that depravity and evil are universal, so that while one group of people do evil and violence to repress another, the others respond with evil and violence.

The power of the Gospel is in the effect of the Holy Spirit to prompt followers of Christ to break that cycle. When Rome persecuted believers in the times of the Apostles, they died with love in their hearts and forgiveness on their lips. And the Holy Spirit changed hearts and minds by the thousands!

So it is here. Only the Holy Spirit, acting in conjunction with the faithfulness of believer, can cause people like Jeanne (and myself, for that matter) to question and re-examine their presuppositions under the searching illumination of the Truth.

So what I thought I'd do here (besides praying that the Holy Spirit would do His work) is to lay some of my own presuppositions.

1. God exists, and is a rewarder of those who seek Him.
2. Jesus of Nazareth is the Messiah, the Savior of the world, by virtue of His atoning death on the cross and His conquering of eternal death by His Resurrection.
3. The Holy Spirit is the active force of God in the world today, convincing people of their sin and pointing them to Christ and His Word for reconciliation, joy, hope, peace and purpose in this life and salvation and perfection in the life to come.
4. People suck. They are inherently self-centered, evil, and unconcerned with the needs of others.
5. Being a people, I also suck.
6. Given points 4 & 5, life is, and will continue to be, extremely sad and disappointing.
7. People live in one of two states in response #6, denial or profound grief.
8. Faith in Christ is not a prerequisite for either response.
9. The working of the Holy Spirit IS a prerequisite for seeing life as it truly is.
10. Once given the insights listed above, Christians are enabled to come to God in complete and utter reliance and be truly transformed into the image of Christ.
11. The other choices are insanity or suicide.
12. God can, does, and will perform physical miracles.
13. Only God decides what, when, and for whom these miracles will be performed. There is no formula for unleashing the miraculous in your own life.
14. Even Christians are severely limited in their ability to understand and follow God, having to continue to struggle against their inherent evil nature in order to commune with the Holy Spirit.
15. Prosperity is a trap.
16. Poverty is not inherently noble.
17. Truly loving people is the most scary endeavor a human can undertake.
18. A person can only truly love under the influence of the Holy Spirit, using the life, ministry and death of Jesus as an example.
19. Relationships are the most important work that God has given us to do.

Well, that's a quick stream-of-consciousness attempt to get at my deep down.

What about you?
- posted by The Drake @ 8:58 AM