Love Wins

It saddens me when I see people use the Bible to pick on a group of people. The Christian experience with the homosexual community reflects this.

Pointing to the Bible, many Christians say homosexuality is bad. But the same book also condemns many other things, then changes its mind later on. Or, sometimes we ignore Biblical rules outright. Christians, it seems, hate to admit this.

I don't think it's so simple to point to the handful of verses about homosexuality and say, "Aha! It's bad!"

In a nutshell, I'm not convinced homosexuality is some great evil, because....

1. The Bible is not clear what 'sin' is. If anything, there is a shifting standard.

Polygamy

It's overlooked in the Old Testament, if not outrightly condoned. Jacob had two wives and two child-bearing servants. Their children became the basis of the 12 tribes of Israel. Further, David had a harem of at least 10 concubines (2 Samuel 15:16) and Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines (I Kings 11:3).

Yet, the Bible later discourages polygamy. (See, e.g., I Timothy 3:2). So what about these great men of the Bible?

Warfare

It's commanded at the time of Joshua, then heavily discouraged by Jesus' teachings on the Sermon on the Mount. See e.g., "Blessed are the peacemakers" and "turn the other cheek" against violence. (Matthew 5:9, 39).

Civilian massacres

This was also commanded for Joshua, but incompatible with the words of Jesus. The examples of Jesus' love for people are numerous, but "love thy neighbor as yourself" stands high for me. (Mark 12:31).

Tend the Garden

Mankind was to told to tend to the Garden (Genesis 2:15). Yet, God commanded Joshua to hamstring captured horses. (Joshua 11:6). This bothers me - why not just kill them?

Capital punishment

It's encouraged throughout the Mosaic Code, but then discouraged with the teachings of Jesus. Most notably, "let him who is without sin cast the first stone." (John 8:7).

Pork eating

It's prohibited according to the Leviticus dietary laws, but then it's not. Jesus even states that food has no spiritual effect. (Matthew 15:11, but also see Peter's vision of Acts 10).

Sabbath breaking

The first Sabbath breaker was stoned to death for collecting firewood. (Numbers 15:32-36). Then Jesus collected food in the field. (Mark 2:23-27). Relatedly, Joash, a Godly king, stationed soldiers on the Sabbath. (2 Kings 11:5-9).

Divorce

It's first accepted, then discouraged by Jesus in Matthew 19.


Lesson learned
From the above, I see a shift within the Bible to one of greater freedom.

The rationale for the divorce change is interesting. It was originally permitted because of the "hardness of your hearts." (Matthew 19: 8). In other words, it was a rule contextualized to the time.

What other rules in the Bible reflect another era's context and not something we should necessarily follow today?

There are others, which we take for granted today.


2. The shifting standard seeing the context for rules, if not ignoring them, remains today.

Slaves, obey your masters

Sorry, but the Bible commands this. (Ephesians 6:5). In the prelude to the American Civil War, American church denominations divided on the modern application of this rule. The Union's victory against the Confederacy determined which Biblical application American churches would follow.

Women should cover their heads during prayer 

Otherwise, it's akin to having her head shaved. (1 Cor. 11:5-6). The analogy to head shaving means that Paul didn't mean that hair alone was a suitable head covering for women. 

Aside from the East Orthodox tradition, modern churches regularly disregard this instruction.

Women should remain silent in churches

The churches that follow this rule limit it to female church leaders, but Paul clarifies he means absolute silence. If women don't understand something at church, they must ask their husbands at home. (1 Cor. 14:34-35).

Fortunately, churches do not gag women while they are at church.

Rape victims must marry their rapists
Although it appears in the Old Testament (Deut. 22:28-29), which most Christians splice apart anyway, it should caution us about the context and times in which Biblical rules appear. 

Fortunately, this is also ignored.

3. What about embracing 'sin' as a culture?
Some people think that legalizing homosexuality as a nation would be to endorse sin. Notwithstanding the Establishment Clause implications of laws based on religious morality, I find the United States celebrates a number of sins. In fact, it embeds them deep into the foundations of society.


Greed
The love of money is the root of all evils. (1 Timothy 6:10). Yet it is a force embedded deeply into market capitalism.


Rebellion
Samuel famously likened rebellion to witchcraft. (1 Samuel 15:23). Granted, in context, he may have referred to rebellion against God and not political rebellion. But certainly, the Bible speaks of obeying one's political authorities, such as giving "to Caesar what is Caesar's." (Mark 12:17).

As we all know, the United States was born of a political rebellion. We celebrate it, but I can't say it was a "Christian" thing to do.


Theft
"Thou shalt not steal" is one of the Ten Commandments. (Exodus 20:15). Yet, the United States as we know it was born of the theft of land. In our history, we broke land agreement treaties with the Native Americans, Mexico, and the Hawaiian monarchy for land, and enforced the land theft through military force.

We also supported our allies to steal land. This occurred in 1947 with the foundation of the modern state of Israel. Sorry to state the obvious, but this stole land from the Palestinians. Yet, many American Christians venerating America's partnership with Israel. By doing so, they validate and celebrate this sin.


4. What definition of 'sin' should we use that transcends time?

Evil exists. Don't get me wrong, I believe that. 

But God is also love. (1 John 4:8). Love does not harm. (Romans 13:10). We must remember these when we apply Biblical rules in the modern world. 

As for a good principle, does it love thy brother or cause harm? 

Sometimes enforcing a Biblical rule in the modern world would cause great harm. This post has many such examples.

5. Conclusion

I must also conclude that applying the Bible's rules against homosexuality would cause great harm in the modern world, particularly if one were born homosexual.

Love wins.

America as a "Christian Nation"

Many Christians in America assert that the Founding Fathers intended the nation to be Christian. Some go as so far to say there was even a covenant between God and the Founding Fathers that America should remain Christian.

Some even say that 9/11 was God's anger against America for leaving our Christian heritage. This was the plot of a book, called the Harbinger. The book was a huge hit among social conservatives, but has no readership beyond that.

Personally, I find the 9/11 connection highly insulting.

Anyway, this whole nonsense about Founding Father's making America Christian generally rears its ugly head in our social controversies - prayer in public schools, support for Israel, evolution in schools, and of course gay marriage. 

So, how exactly was America bound to God?

Ten years ago, I saw Oliver North on television outline something similar, but pointed to the Declaration of Independence for support. Nevermind that the DOI was not the Constitution and the author himself cut up the Bible to remove the miracles. He was a Deist.

I think enough people are now aware of the Jefferson Bible so at least they stopped talking about Jefferson. But now it's moved onto Washington's inaugural prayer.

The social conservatives want to bring America back to God. 

As if we ever were. 

Here are my problems with this whole idea.

1. Slavery and Racism

If America was founded under Christian principles, then it justifies all the terrible racist injustices of our early history. Both slavery and this mistreatment of Indians are justified. 

Of course, no one actually admits this, but that is precisely the case.

2. lack of legal justification

The founding father's wrote a Constitution to protect religious liberty. 

George Washington had no authority to bind America to God. Such would have been a treaty with a foreign power and would have required 2/3 majority of the Senate anyway.

But why would he want to? If he did that, he would be acting as king and we had just fought a war to remove kingship from America.

3. Lack of spiritual justification

If you read Washington's prayer, it's a prayer of thanks, not a vow. As an analogy, giving God thanks at Thanksgiving does not bind one as a Nazarite or monastery. But that's what they would have you believe.

4. Damages Christianity

By using legislation to force people to act Christian, it's a huge turn off to secularists to explore the Christian faith. If you don't believe me, look at Europe. Centuries of enforcing Christianity through the government lead to an even more secularized society, not a Christian one.

5. Historical revisionism

Many of the Founding Fathers were Deists. To the extent they were Christian, they used Deistic language. 

Bible and Government - Melchizedek

So, for now, I plan to go through the Bible and look at what it has to say about world government. One aspect of this will be looking at the various statesmen.

We will start with Melchizedek.

According to Genesis 14 and Hebrews 7, Melchizedek was both the King of Salem and High Priest of God. So, he had a dual function role of political and religious leader.

In Genesis 14, Abram wins a major victory and meets with the kings of the various local city states, including Salem. In Hebrews 7, the author highly analogizes him to Christ.

We wonder why the Bible does not discuss Melchizedek more. Who was he? Where did he come from? How did he become high priest? Why does the Bible story follow Abram and not Melchizedek?

Melchizedek must have had a lot more power, prestige, in his day. Yet, so little we can glean about him. Even Hebrews 7 mentions these mysterious aspects about him, saying 'Without father or mother, without genealogy, without beginning of days or end of life, resembling the Son of God, he remains a priest forever.' (v. 3).

Some might goes so far as to statement this means he actually was Christ. I think the statement of his lake of genealogy could be taken metaphorically, meaning not that he didn't have one, but none is described. Yet, he was high priest. So, he could have been the first high priest of all time.

Yet, the Genesis account overshadows him for someone more important in terms of the Biblical story, which is Abram. It is like Melchizedek is only a supporting cast member in the life of Abram.

We can only get from this a sense of humility. Melchizedek takes a back seat and lets the story unfold around Abram.

So, what can the Christian statesmen learn? We might have to use our power, influence, and role to raise up others.

The Bible and Government

I'm going to start a new project. My interest is the relationship between Christianity and world government.

I'm reviewing what others have said, some of which I will critique here. But I want to approach it from a fresh perspective. 

Critique of Herbert Armstrong's The United States and Britain in Prophecy (Part 1)

In a series of posts, I plan to critique the logic of The United States and Britain in Prophecy (TUSBP) booklet by Herbert W. Armstrong (HWA).

Why do this?  
My reasons are several fold.

First, I grew up in his church, the Worldwide Church of God. As an adult, I am ready to challenge the rationale and beliefs.  This is spiritual and intellectually rewarding for me. Second, to assist those interested in TUSBP. Finally, in a weird way, it is fun to see just how crazy HWA was.


Anglo-Israelism
In this booklet, HWA argues that Europeans are descended from the Lost Tribes of Israel.  Specifically, the United States and Britain have special roles as being from Ephraim and Manasseh.  This theory of a connection between the English speaking world and ancient Israel is known as "Anglo-Israelism."

HWA was not the only one who believed in Anglo-Israelism. He probably was not the first to make the connection. It is beyond the scope of this analysis, but I suspect that Anglo-Israelism has its origins in the 1700s or 1800s as a byproduct of both Imperial Britain and American westward expansion. Notions of "Manifest Destiny" and "White Man's Burden" come to mind as well as the warped racial-religious rationales during the slave trade era and Indian wars.

So, I obviously have some biases against Anglo-Israelism.


TUBSP, Generally
In a nutshell, the logic is bad.  In fact, atrocious. I suspect that HWA had a conclusion in mind and scoured the Bible and history for support. Rather, he rearranged both.

Racism?
I cannot help but wonder if theories like this have a racist component. White people might want to believe that their race, in particular the English bloodlines, have a special blessing to God. This would justify racial self-entitlement.

That said, I cannot find a strong racial bias in this particular book. I read bizarre, racist statements by HWA in other places, but this specific book lacks them. However, given the racial undertones plus the racist statements elsewhere, I suspect a racist component underscored HWA's belief in Anglo-Israelism theories.

The End Times or Last Days
Much of the book is colored with language that we are living in the "End Times" and that Christ will return soon. The Bible uses these terms, but HWA seemed to believe that Christ's return would happen in his lifetime. Of course, he famously mis-predicted the return of Jesus in 1971 and in 1975, before he stopped vocalizing predictions.

However, he was not the only one of the era to make such predictions. A more famous example of HWA's era is actually Hal Lindsay in his Late Great Planet Earth.

It seems that the 1960-1970s America was filled with a deep-seated pessimism. This is understandable given the Cold War, possibility of nuclear war, and America's loss in Vietnam. Likewise, there was a major cultural shift so moral conservatives would indeed think America was deteriorating.

For the record, the "Last Days" as defined by the Apostle Peter, is anything after the first Pentecost about 2,000 years ago.  See, Acts 2:14-17.

This backdrop is important for understanding Armstrong's book because he weaves this deterioration of America-Britain as predicted in the Bible and hence, his proof of of Anglo-Israelism. An example of this appears below.

"We had pride in our power!" (TUSBP, p. 161-163)

In a section about the implications of Anglo-Israelism, HWA states that America, as predicted in the Bible, has lost "pride in our power." (Page 162). HWA states:


"Today even little nations dare to insult, trample on, or burn the United States flag - and the United States, still having power, does no more than issue a weak protest! What's happened to the pride of our power?
We have already lost it! God said, "I will break the pride of your power!" And HE DID!"

(Id., citing Leviticus 26:19, emphasis in original). 

The section of the Bible that HWA cites are the rewards for obedience and punishments for disobedience. 

But let us consider HWA's statement with the backdrop of history. From the perspective of the early 1970s, perhaps Anglo-America military deteriorated. In hindsight, we saw Reagan's military buildup in the 1980s and collapse of the Soviet Union (1990-1991). Further, we saw numerous military campaigns by the United States or Britain over the years. Some of these were part of international agreements, such as the United Nations.

1. Argentina (1982) (entirely the UK)
2. Grenada (1983) 
3. Panama (1989) 
4. Kuwait and Iraq (1990) 
5. No-fly areas imposed on Iraq (1991-2003)
6. Haiti (1994) 
7. Former Yugoslavia (mid-1990s) 
8. Serbia (1999) (NATO)
9. Afghanistan (2001-present)
10. Iraq (2003-?) 
11. ISIS in Syria (2014) 

This overlooks the covert and limited actions. A few high profile ones were the Navy Seal rescue of Captain Phillips (2009) and the death of Osama Bin Laden (2011). It also overlooks where America tried, but failed - Iran (1979) and Somalia (1993). Even the failures would indicate pride in the military.

In a nutshell, HWA was wrong. America's military had a set-back from Vietnam, but America's pride in the military was not completely broken.

Noah's Ark in Dordrecht, Holland

I went to go see the full-scale replica of Noah's Ark that someone built in Dordrecht, Holland.

Here is a picture I took of it:

It is a creation museum with a lot of exhibits directed to children.

I was curious about it and definitely more interested in seeing what a full-scale replica of Noah's Ark looked like in person.  It had a lot of exhibits on the Book of Genesis and the Bible.  I understand it had a bias towards a literal interpretation of Genesis as history.  I do not share this perspective, but it is their museum and they can design as they want to.

Likewise, I respect the magnitude of work involved in making it.

As far as the museum itself, I felt disappointed.  There also was nothing on environmental protection in the whole thing.  I find that sad because the story of Noah's Ark lends itself to discussing the state of the planet and nature.  The movie Evan Almighty picked up on this theme, whereas this big Noah's Ark replica and museum did not.

Yet, the exhibit designers felt it more important to talk about how humans and dinosaurs coexisted.  In all honesty, I found that disturbing.

Environmental stewardship is part of the Genesis story as well.  Genesis 2:15 states, "The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it."  Man's role in taking care of the planet should be taught to children.  If we are going to talk about Genesis, we cannot neglect this.  

Galatians 5 and 6 (reread)

I think it is hard to separate these two chapters from each other.  So, I will deal with them together.

Having discussed at length the nature of salvation through grace and not works, Paul turns to the responsibilities, manifestation, and benefits of the Christian life.  The common link is love.  Love of God and love of our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ.

Love transforms us.  It gives us joy and washes out our selfish desires that harm other people.

I think it is common to read the list the acts of sinful desires that appear in 5:19-21 as a checklist of things to avoid as a measure of salvation.  The danger I see in the checklist mentality is that people can replace circumcision as a precondition for salvation with this checklist of abstinence and restraint.  Either salvation comes from faith or it does not.  If salvation comes from faith, then we should not read into this a checklist of abstinence to earn salvation.

Another danger I see in this is that it tends to keep people out of church.  All too often, churches condition attendance of their church with certain lifestyle requirements, using lists like these.  It does not always happen explicitly.  It can be subtle and implicit.

I think it also is common to read them as a continuation of the "moral code" of the Old Testament into the New Testament era, whereas the ceremonial code is done away.  That logic bothers me for a number of reasons.  For starters, the Bible does not specify what exactly is "ceremonial" and what is "moral" of the Old Testament.  So, it becomes subjective to the reader.  But also if we consider Galatians 5:3, although the example is circumcision, but I think it stands for the notion that if we hold onto any part of the Old Testament law as applicable law, we need to do the entire law.

Another problem with that is that Christians mess up all the time.  They have fits of rage, factionalism, or envy, which are things mentioned to avoid.  But if the list is linked with salvation, then when they mess up, the Christian might feel unhappy, depressed, or question his or her salvation.

Here is my take on this checklist of acts of sinful desires that appears in Galatians 5.  I think they must be considered in light of the context of these two chapters.

For starters, yes, avoiding them becomes a "work" of human effort.  But we do not avoid them to earn salvation, lest we be able to boast.  We avoid them because the actions harm ourselves and  others around us.  If we sow them, we will reap destruction (6:8).

Paul contrasts these two with love and the Spirit.  Serve each other with love and love your neighbor as yourself.  (5:8-9).  Likewise, sow into the spirit and reap eternal life.  (6:8).  The specific examples of fruits of the spirit are tastes of life that God has in mind - love, joy, peace, kindness, patience, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.  (5:22).

Note, this list of nine stand in direct opposition to the abstinence checklist earlier in the chapter.  Whereas the abstinence checklist can be summed up as selfishness and indulgence, these nine fruits are about love and self-control.  They are also considered "fruits", meaning that they do not develop overnight, but sprout out automatically, naturally, and over time.

I think this is the Christian walk and what Paul means.  By embracing the spirit and God's love, the fruits of joy, peace, and the like will emerge.  These fruits will drown out our desires to even do the acts of the sinful desires.  Thus, the measure of the Christian walk is not so much how well we avoid all the things in 5:19-21, but also how much joy, love, and other fruits we have.  For it is these, from the holy spirit, that will transform our hearts and how we inter-relate with the world,

A few other things stand out:

I wish [the circumcision advocates] would go emasculate themselves.  (5:12)

Ouch!

Burdens and loads (6:2 and 6:5)

 I have heard it from several sources that "burdens" as used is analogous to boulders whereas "loads" is analogous to small backpacks.  So, when we have major life events that are difficult to bare alone, we are to help each other.  In contrast, the daily activities and personal responsibilities of life, we should not be selfish and make others do what we should do.