Defending Driscoll: My Sins Demand It

Recently, I have read two columns about Mark Driscoll stepping down as the lead pastor at Mars Hill Church in Seattle.  Both of the columns are reasonable and rational attempts to publicly think through the Driscoll matter (Jonathan Merritt - Why Christians Shouldn't Celebrate Driscoll's Downfall and Dr. James Emery White - Your Pastor and Public Messes).  Both columns make valid points in thoughtful tones . . . yet . . .

This reminds me of a quote often attributed to John Wesley: “Catch on fire and others will love to come watch you burn.”  For those who don’t know, John Wesley was the man who founded what we now know as the Methodist Church (although it doesn’t look much like it did when Wesley started it as a movement within the Anglican Church back in the 1700’s).  Driscoll has been a man on fire for many years.  Consequently, many came to watch him burn, in a good way, the way Wesley meant it.  Now, unfortunately, it appears many have come to watch him burn because of his failures.

Thus, for my part, I’m in full Driscoll defense mode.  This isn’t because I think Driscoll is a great guy – I don’t know him.  It isn’t because I think he’s such a great preacher – I have heard parts of some sermons, and he’s okay, but I’ve heard better.  It isn’t because he is blameless – it’s obvious he’s a sinner, which makes his failures the more abysmal since he’s a pastor.  It isn’t because he doesn’t deserve the consequences he may be facing – that happens to all of us.

No, I’m in full blown Driscoll defense mode because somebody has to step up and say let’s stop eating our own in public.  When the New York Times does a big story on Driscoll stepping down there’s a reason: it makes Christianity look bad.  But let’s face it, the Christian blogs and Christian media have been at Driscoll for months and have often been less than gracious in their efforts and their tactics (one radio host offered up a sneak attack accusing Driscoll of plagiarism when he wasn’t expecting it – even if correct, this wasn’t the right way to go about it).  The New York Times is a very late comer to Driscoll bashing and only waded in when the story was sufficiently juiced up by the Christian media.

I’m defending Driscoll because we’re all Driscoll.  We’re all sinners in need of grace.  We’ve all failed so often and in so many ways most of us can’t begin to count the failures.  My own list is too full and too personal to recount here.

I know some will say ‘you know he made himself a public spectacle.’  So by making this argument, the next domino to fall is what?  That he deserves the treatment he’s getting from fellow brothers and sisters in Christ because of his celebrity?  The Christian media is just ‘getting the truth out?’  Since he’s operating in public, his downfall will be public and somebody’s going to report it, so why not the Christian media?  There’s an old saying when you have friends like that, who needs enemies.

What’s worse is now outlets like the Huffington Post are in on the action (Letter from Mars Hill Pastors about Mark Driscoll).  The religion page of HuffPo is hardly the place to get any sort of reasoned, rational, or respectable thoughts on an issue like this.  Most of the so-called Christian writers at HuffPo represent seriously unorthodox and often biblically, shall we say, questionable theological ideas.  Yet, we’re served up more anti-Driscoll fervor related to a letter from pastors within the Mars Hill churches.  Unfortunately, a certain anti-Driscoll blogger received this letter and then gave it to the Religion News Service, which promptly printed it in full.  I briefly scanned the letter and it appears to contain information that ought to be between Driscoll, Mars Hill, and those mentioned in the letter.  I will only refer the reader to Matthew 18 and say no more.

Driscoll is likely his own worst enemy.  Yet, do we not all suffer from the same disease?  Who is it that leads us into our sin most often?  Go look in the mirror and you might get a clue.

Neither you, nor I, nor Driscoll ever did anything to merit our salvation, so are we not in the same boat, like the disciples in the storm, often bailing out the water of our own sin, not trusting in the one who saves, but trusting in our efforts?  Much of what is going on now isn’t true, isn’t honorable, isn’t just, isn’t pure, isn’t lovely, isn’t gracious, isn’t excellent, and isn’t worthy of praise (Phil. 4:8) – much of it is self-justification in the form of ‘I ain’t that bad’ even if only faintly, passively, or remotely.

Driscoll may be a rotten guy, but so am I.  Driscoll may be a sinner, but so am I.  Driscoll may sometimes get off track, but so do I.

Maybe God is humbling Mark Driscoll, but then again, do we not all need humbling from God from time to time?

Mars Hill and Driscoll need to work this out.  We need to let them figure it out and, in the meantime, keep our noses where they belong – smelling the stench of our own rotten deeds, our own foul mouths, our own evil thoughts, our own problematic proclivities, our own sinful desires so we are clear just who the real sinners are.

What is the meaning of Yes? California Colleges May Have to Decide.

California is now debating a law which requires its universities to come up with an "affirmative consent standard" that could be used in investigating and adjudicating sexual assault allegations. The standard would be defined as "an affirmative, unambiguous and conscious decision" by each party to engage in sexual activity.

What would prompt such action?  University campuses are not merely awash with sexual activity.  The assumption going in is not whether students will engage in sexual activity but how to make sure sexual activity doesn’t get out of control.  Particularly, and specifically, the concern is that some students (read: males) will have sex with other students (read: females) who have not truly consented to have sex.  One problem that has arisen during this time of all out sexual liberation is that, allegedly, one out of every five young women on college campuses have been sexually assaulted.  I don’t know the basis for this statistic except that it comes from a White House task force.  I do know the Department of Education released the names of numerous (many “top flight”) educational institutions that had problems in this area. 

Ironically, though,  any effort to restrain sexual conduct is deemed offensive.  The Los Angeles Times editorialized that “It seems extremely difficult and extraordinarily intrusive to micromanage sex so closely.”

So the tension is that libertines want unbridled sexual freedom but only when it’s absolutely clear that it’s unbridled, “consensual” sexual freedom.  Never mind that college campuses are

bastions of alcohol and drug induced sexual activity in which the participants may not always be in control of their senses and, thus, unable to ascertain with complete clarity whether the person with whom they are engaged in sex is, in fact, consenting.  Does consent have to be verbal or is a nod or some other physical action sufficient?  Must the parties enter a written agreement before having sex?  What happens when consent occurs while the parties are both intoxicated?  This is not an excuse for rape or any other kind of sexual assault.  However, what happens when Jane Doe wakes up the next morning and is half naked lying next to a guy whose name she may or may not know for sure?  Was there consent?  Was there not?  Who truly knows? 

These are the very kinds of laws that MUST exist when we untether ourselves from more fundamental moral restraints.  When, as a society, we decided we wanted unbridled sexual freedom, we failed to acknowledge the consequences.  One of those consequences is that the idea of consent inevitably becomes much more fluid.  In the not so distance past in the United States the anticipated norm for sex was that a man and a woman would be married before having sex.  Now there is no anticipated norm for sex, except that most of us still (thank God) see pedophilia as wrong.  When the guidelines for sexual activity become amorphous, consent, like other facets of sexual activity, loses its distinguishing characteristics – it’s just part of the morass.

So, now, ironically, the state of California is debating actually passing a law that requires colleges receiving public funds to specify what consent looks like.  After Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003), one wonders if such a law can pass constitutional muster.  After all, wasn’t the premise underlying Lawrence that intimate sexual conduct was protected by the 14^th Amendment?  If the state can’t regulate with whom one can have sex, might there be a problem trying to legislate what consent means?  Doesn’t this also mean these universities will be in the business of defining what sex is, as well?  Is kissing alone sex or do you need something else?  What else?  I won’t get any more graphic  but you get the point.

So California colleges may now have to come up with a definition of consent.  Ironically, this means that colleges will have less flexibility to deal with sexual assaults and, I predict, will actually lower the reporting.  People aren’t stupid.  Guys will now simply pull out their phone and video a young woman agreeing to sex so they have proof of consent and post it to Facebook or Instagram before they do anything and then what?  Now the whole world knows she said yes.  Moreover, this will mean, by definition, there will come a point during the sexual encounter where the consent cannot be withdrawn.  Otherwise, yes doesn’t really mean yes, leading to legal rape.  She no longer wants to, but said yes . . . so she’s stuck.  Is this what we’re after?  Really?

Yet, this is what happens when we untether ourselves from moral norms.  The inevitable result is that life must be regulated in every detail because people cannot be allowed to govern themselves.  Moral norms serve that purpose but in a pluralistic and predominantly secular society, moral norms no longer mean anything and are often seen as retrograde and anachronistic.  Ironically, though, leaving moral norms behind leads not to more freedom but less.  So now already confused and discombobulated 18 year olds arriving on California college campuses will find themselves dealing with an arcane code of sexual conduct which will likely require an entire course to understand.  Maybe we'll get lucky and students will decide it's too complicated to have sex and opt out until they get married.  I'm not counting on it, but one can hope.

Osteenized by Happiness: The Non-Theology of Joel and Victoria Osteen

"So, I want you to know this morning: Just do good for your own self. Do good because God wants you to be happy.  When you come to church, when you worship Him, you're not doing it for God really. You're doing it for yourself, because that's what makes God happy. Amen?"

Victoria Osteen

Just for kicks and giggles, let’s assume Victoria Osteen has, in fact, read at least parts of the Bible.  At exactly what point in the Bible does God ever say that worship is for us because that’s what makes Him happy? 

This is the problem with Ms. Osteen and her husband, Joel.  They never really quite say anything that is absolutely heretical; they just mosey right up to the edge of heresy, throw a rock over and watch it fall into the abyss, smiling white-toothed smiles all the while and following it with a hearty Amen!  I won't make the strange argument that maybe Victoria was actually channeling her inner John Piper and is really just talking about being a Christian hedonist here.  I wish.

The Osteens are practically off limits to criticism because since they’re just so gosh darn happy, they must be doing something right.  This fundamental assumption underlies their entire theology – what little theology they actually practice.  God loves you.  People who love you want you to be happy.  Therefore, God must want you to be happy.  Rinse, repeat.  Rinse, repeat.  Rinse, repeat.

But, golly gee whiz, there’s just one small bump in their road, one small fly in their ointment, one tiny chink in their armor – shhhhhhhh – no one’s listening, right?  Their theology isn’t (hem, haw) in the Bible.

I mean if it weren’t for that tiny little flaw, their theology would be fantastic, sensational, magnificent, spectacular.  For crying out loud, it’d almost be Oprah-worthy. 

So let’s imagine Joel and Victoria actually reading the Bible, trying to find the “happiness” verses.  They try Philippians 2:13 where Paul writes “for God is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.”  Whoops, looks like God is in it for His pleasure, not mine.  But that’s probably just Paul – he was kind of a killjoy, anyway, right – I mean he hates women and homosexuals, so he probably didn’t want anyone to be happy.  Let’s try Peter – yeah, certainly Peter will give us something, he was like Jesus’ right hand man, right?  Well, not so much.  1 Peter 1:6 tells us we should rejoice in our inheritance from God “though for now for a little while you may have to suffer various trials.”  Doggone it – Peter actually says we might suffer.  What happened to happiness?  Let’s try James.  He was Jesus’ half-brother – surely he’ll give us some happiness.  James 1:12 says “Blessed is the man who endures trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life which God has promised to those who love him.”  Oh, come on.  “Wait,” Joel says, “I know that Luke will give us something good – he was a doctor, I think.”  But then they get to Luke 14:27 where Jesus says “Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me, cannot be my disciple.”  Not Jesus, noooooooo.  Joel stops smiling.  Both he and Victoria have a tear roll down their cheek.  This cross thing is too much – we saw “The Passion of the Christ” by Mel Gibson – that wasn’t a happy movie. 

What happens if Joel or Victoria gets cancer and dies?  What if one of their children is struck with an incurable disease?  How do Joel and Victoria then explain their theology?  No one is happy when such things come their way.  Somehow flashing the pearly whites while chanting “every day’s a Friday” doesn’t seem likely to handle such a storm.

Of course, that’s why actually studying the Bible is so important.  The Bible has much to say about human suffering and how to endure.  In Mark 4, Jesus and the disciples encounter a storm as they are crossing the Sea of Galilee.  Jesus is sleeping in the stern of one of the boats.  The disciples are bailing water out, but eventually it looks like the boats might get swamped.  They’re scared.  These are fisherman familiar with these waters – they recognize the intensity of the storm and know this might be the end.  Finally, when they feel they can’t hang on any longer, they awaken Jesus, asking him if he cares.  Jesus calms the storm with a word, then asks them if they have any faith. 

Joel and Victoria:  the point isn’t that the disciples were happily singing “row, row, row your boat” while the storm raged around them.  Jesus didn’t put some sort of cone of calmness around them, so they didn’t experience the storm.  The disciples were decidedly unhappy as they faced the water sloshing over the bows of the boat.  They were wet, tired, probably hungry and cold.  They were (gasp) sort of irritated with Jesus for not waking up and doing something.  Jesus, however, is sufficient to bring them through the storm -  when they were utterly miserable!  Notice Jesus didn't ask "aren't you happy?"  He asked the disciples if they had any faith.  

Being happy because God wants us to be happy misses so much of the Gospel message it’s not merely stupid, it’s false.  The Gospel teaches that humans have sinned, that it’s in our DNA, that we must pay for our sins and that there is only one way to receive a full pardon – repent and believe that Jesus lived a perfect life, died in your place on the cross, and arose from the grave after three days.  What makes us happy isn’t that our best life is now, but that God saw fit to forgive us, despite our sins.  We now get to glorify God and enjoy him forever. 

So Victoria was almost right.  God does want us to be happy, but not in ourselves, in Him!  But being almost right is like being almost happy.  It's not.

Janet Harris in Washington Post: Abortion is Not a Moral Issue - You Read that Right

“A Guttmacher Institute survey of women in the United States seeking abortions found that 3 percent said the main reason was a fetal health problem, and 4 percent cited a problem with their own health. The percentage of women seeking an abortion because they were victims of rape or incest was less than 1.5 percent.”

No, the above statistics were not cited by some pro-life “whacko” trying to undermine the oft made abortion argument about the woman’s health, rape, and fetal problems.  Let’s note that what these statistics tell us, assuming their accuracy, is that over 90% of all abortions take place because the woman prefers not to have the baby. Rather, the author of the above quote is a woman named Janet Harris, writing in the Washington Post on August 15, 2014.  Her reasoning in citing these statistics: “By implying that terminating a pregnancy is a moral issue, pro-choice advocates forfeit control of the discussion to anti-choice conservatives.”

In fact, Ms. Harris goes further.  She says, “To say that deciding to have an abortion is a “hard choice” implies a debate about whether the fetus should live, thereby endowing it with a status of being. It puts the focus on the fetus rather than the woman. As a result, the question “What kind of future would the woman have as a result of an unwanted pregnancy?” gets sacrificed.”

Wow.  At least she’s being honest.  I have long believed that the pro-choice crowd ought to stop nonsensical arguments like it’s a woman’s body, or a fetus isn’t really a human being, or it’s between a woman and her doctor.  Ms. Harris just says it: for her abortion isn’t a moral issue, it’s a simple cost/benefit determination.  Does it make sense based on whatever reasons the woman might determine to have the baby?  It’s like following a flow chart with yes/no answers which direct you towards the relevant action.  Ms. Harris explained her own decision to have an abortion this way “An unwanted pregnancy would have derailed my future, making it difficult for me to finish college and have the independent, productive life that I’d envisioned.”  She weighed what she wanted and perceived, rightly or wrongly, that having a child wouldn’t allow her to do what she wanted, when she wanted, under the circumstances she wanted.

It is common coin in the abortion debate (true or not – I don’t know) that one of the reasons for shifting public sentiment against abortion is the availability of pre-natal technology, particularly in-utero pictures of the baby, that has led to a more common understanding of the fetus as a human being, not just some kind of lump of tissue.  In other words, the debate has shifted to the determination of what exactly does it mean to be human.  Ms. Harris acknowledges this in saying talking about abortion as a difficult choice gives the baby a status – something the pro-choice crowd has long found one of the most perplexing and persistent problems with their position.  We all know that when a woman has a fetus developing in her uterus there is only one possible outcome if she carries the child to term and has the child – it will come out a human being.  When we couldn’t see those little rascals wiggling around in utero it was easy to calm ourselves into calling it a fetus and pretending that meant nothing morally.  Now, not so much.

The fundamental problem here, though, isn’t simply about abortion.  It’s more about what does it mean to be human.  Ms. Harris is, whether she acknowledges it or not, claiming that our determination of whether someone is or isn’t a human being is not a moral issue.  While Ms. Harris seems to be arguing for some sort of cost/benefit measurement, how can one do so when the costs and benefits are unknown?  She cannot possibly be claiming that she had full information about what kind of person her child would have become had she chosen life rather than abortion.  Ironically, she argues that having a child would have derailed the independent and productive life she envisioned.  How could Ms. Harris know she would actually have an independent, productive life?  By what standard, moreover, is she measuring independent and productive?  She doesn’t say.  Perhaps some might argue Ms. Harris is not actually living an independent and productive life, despite her own self-analysis.

My argument about information cuts both ways, of course  – her child could have been the next Albert Einstein or the next Jeffrey Dahmer.  Nonetheless, in order to reasonably argue the decision is purely a cost/benefit analysis implies sufficient, if not full, information to make the most rational choice.  Would she, had she known her child would invent a cure for breast cancer or a new type of vehicle that runs on air, have decided otherwise?  Therein lies the fundamentally interesting reality about being human: we simply don’t know the future sufficiently to come to rational conclusions about such details.

 

As if her argument were not ominous enough in the abortion debate, what about end of life decisions?  Are older, but practically non-functioning adults no longer human?  Do we define human being simply based on our economic or practical viability?  What about people with Down’s Syndrome who are functioning reasonably well, but will never be completely independent?  Are they human, or not, Ms. Harris?  What about a baby who is born with a debilitating disease but the parents decide to take care of her and love her until she dies at say, age 5, from Tay-Sachs disease?  Was that child a human being, Ms. Harris?  Upon what basis do you make your decision?  What about artists – are they really necessary, Ms. Harris?  I mean, cost/benefit wise do we really need art or music?  It’s nice, but maybe not sufficiently beneficial.  Why would you choose to treat artists as humans, versus accountants or truck drivers or fast food workers?

Who gets to tell us if we’re human or not?  Ms. Harris, are you prepared to make the definitions?  More to the point, are you prepared to live with your own definitions when you no longer meet them and have to be terminated for being non-human?  Really?

Finally, is Ms. Harris arguing morals don't exist at all or that only abortion isn't a moral issue?  Wonder if Ms. Harris has children?  How would she feel if a drunk driver killed one?  Not a moral issue then?  Bet she'd be pretty angry.  In my experience, even many atheists want to claim they're moral people (for reasons that continue to confound me, but the atheists I've come across assure me it's because I'm blinded by my theism or I'm just stupid).  You see, there's a reason even the pro-abortion crowd believes abortion is a moral issue - because it's about human life.  And only the most crass, cold-hearted, corrupted souls will argue that whether to take human life or not is anything less than a moral issue.  It could be more than a moral issue, but it's never less.  Even abortion advocates get this, Ms. Harris, why don't you?