Bono Coexist

Quick Arguments Against Pluralism

Posted on by Alan

Bono CoexistOverall it seems that arguing with pluralism is like pushing against the wind. If a pluralist will not even concede the validity of the law of non-contradiction, there is nothing to "push against" to even begin an argument against pluralism. Having said that, there are two approaches: one for a believer, and one for an unbeliever.

With a believer it should be noted that Jesus Himself did not allow for "multiple paths" to salvation. For instance, He unequivocally states, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me" (John 14:6, ESV, emphasis added). Additionally, Christ makes it clear the only alternative to that choice is condemnation (John 3:18). Of course, Jesus' words were not new—the Old Testament is also very clear that there is only one path, for example: "You shall have no other gods before me" (Ex. 20:3). Additionally, it shows no respect for "alternatives"—a great example is Elijah mocking the prophets of Baal in 1 Kings 18:20-40. If pluralism has any claim, how unenlightened it was for Elijah to ridicule someone else's valid faith-path.

No—a believer has no choice but to proclaim there is but one (specific) way to salvation.

With non-believers, first there has to be agreement that (a) there is truth; (b) truth can be known; and (c) truth does not contradict itself. If a pluralist disagrees with any of those, the main argument against him or her is that all nature, physics, etcetera oppose their view. How can someone logically apply different standards in the spiritual realm than those which are axiomatic and perpetually confirmed in the physical one? If the discussion is able to get past that fundamental step, then pluralism will collapse on itself since multiple major religions claim exclusivity. As such, at most one of those can be right (although all may be wrong).

A believer has no choice but to assert a single (specific) path to salvation, and a non-believer, if he or she does not give up basic logic, must choose one—and choose wisely.

[ This is a slightly edited version of a short critique I had as an assignment for Liberty University. ]

P.S. Of course, none of this does not mean various religions cannot "coexist." But "tolerance" means "tolerate," not "accept." It would be foolish to pretend somehow how all the religions in the normal coexist image can all be right…

Image of Bono with coexist found on photobucket.com. I could not find the original, but clearly the photobucket.com one isn’t it…

Guy preaching with a staff and a stone tablet

Why I Am a Heretic

Posted on by Alan

I am no longer going to update this post. Instead please see the Beliefs page to read the most up-to-date list of what I believe.

AKA, "What I Believe"

Guy preaching with a staff and a stone tabletI had an interesting conversation with a Twitter friend, and after he agreed to an uncomfortable implication of his belief system I commended him on being willing to admit it. I then suggested that someone else who held that same belief system would not be willing to make the same admission, to which he replied:

Yes, I believe he would. I probably wouldn’t just throw that out there in the public forum of twitter. He may not be comfortable with saying

To which I replied:

Why not? If it is true it’s to God’s sovereign glory isn’t it?

My response would seem a whole ‘lot more apropos if you understood what belief system it was in response to. 🙂

Either way, although I can understand choosing a proper forum for airing one’s beliefs, I kind of was taken aback at the idea that someone who has no problem debating for his theological worldview then wouldn’t be willing to lay all his cards on the table.

So, here are all my cards. Traditional Christians will find plenty to consider me a heretic, but I’m not going to do a bait-and-switch on you. (Most of this is from a post I did a couple years back on fahrner.us. All biblical quotes are from the English Standard Version. Oh, and I reserve the right to modify this post at any time, so if you want to beat me over the head with my own words, be sure to grab a screenshot. :-)) Continue reading “Why I Am a Heretic”

Triumph's Allied Forces (image from Amazon.com)

Fight the Good Fight

Posted on by Alan

Triumph's Allied Forces (image from Amazon.com)

Canadian Bands

Those of you who made it to church last Sunday know that for my sermons this month I am using secular (that is, non-Christian) songs as fodder for sermons. This week we look to our neighbors up north, Canada, for inspiration.

How many here can name a Canadian band our musical artist?

Other than the group that led to this sermon, the ones that came to mind for me were Rush, April Wine, and William Shatner.

Now, I figure many or most of you have heard of Rush, if only because of their hit Tom Sawyer. As for April Wine, is anyone familiar with their song, "Just Between You and Me"? (Personally, I think "Gypsy Queen" is their best song.)

How about William Shatner? What do you think of his musical work?

Continue reading “Fight the Good Fight”

Truth

Truth About Truth

Posted on by Alan

TruthAlthough there is still a part of me that enjoys a good verbal sparring, I greatly prefer discussion over debate. However, for a conversation to be truly objective and not subjective (e.g. "Will the sun rise tomorrow?" versus "What is the best ice cream flavor?"), there are some fundamental rules about truth I think people have to agree upon. Axioms…or "truth about truth."

  • There is truth.
    If there is no truth, then there are no objective discussions; it is all opinion. (And, cookie dough ice cream is best.)
  • Truth can be known.
    If there is truth, but there is no way of knowing it, then it is (for all intents and purposes) as if there is no truth.
  • Truth does not contradict truth.
    If truth can contradict truth, then truth cannot be known and there is no truth.
  • You do not have to be able to explain something 100% for it to be true.
    (Or, just because you cannot explain something 100% it does not mean it is not true.) There are many truths that we cannot fully explain. For instance, the sun will rise tomorrow regardless of whether you understand all the rules of physics involved.
  • You have to care.
    This one is my most recent addition. To actually have a discussion about truth, both parties have to care what the "true" answer is. In politics and religion, this is often not the case. Sadly, even though everyone is going to "give up the ghost" sometime, many don’t care about the answer to, "What happens after you die?"

Well, there is my list for now. What would you add? What would you subtract? What would you say differently?

Is it true for you? 🙂

Wise Men on Camels

“Whoever is wise, let him attend to these things…”

Posted on by Alan

Wise Men on CamelsI continue to slowly read through the Bible in one year. Although there are some days it does seem like a burden (due to my humanity, not Scripture itself), being “forced” to spend time in God’s Word daily has been a great blessing.

I’ve never really been big on poetry (I abhorred it in high school English classes), so Psalms can be problematic for me. Luckily, as I’ve aged it is less taxing, and often I can actually enjoy it.

Reading Psalm 107 today was one of those cases…what an awesome song! It’s an tremendous reminder of how often God has bailed so many of us out of terrible situations, including one common to all mankind: Continue reading ““Whoever is wise, let him attend to these things…””

What About the Children?

Posted on by Alan

My good friend Winslow reminded me that I had left another article hanging. At the end of "What If'ing the Lord Almighty," which included rather disturbing incidents in the Bible where God's judgment didn't work out so well for children, I wrote:

So, how do I explain how a righteous God has children abandoned, swallowed up by the earth, "devoted to destruction," or drowned?

Although I may posit an answer in a future piece, the space limits of a bulletin article mean that I must leave it as an exercise for you. It is an answer an unbelieving world needs because vocal scoffers attempt to damn our God by bringing up every harsh incident that offends modern sensibilities…

Now, I will admit that I left myself enough wiggle room ("I may posit") that I didn't necessarily intend to do a follow-up. Was it a cop out? Maybe. However, after a game of phone tag with Winslow which included a voice mail message asking I finish what I started…well, here goes. Continue reading “What About the Children?”

Apocalyptic Love

“Not for Me”

Posted on by Alan

Apocalyptic Love

AKA "Slash's Advice for Christian Living"

Messages from Secular Songs

If any of you have spent time on-line looking at (or listening to) my sermons before arriving here in Pleasanton, you'll notice a good number that are based on songs by secular groups. For instance

And although those were the only ones that came to mind as I as writing this sermon, there may be more and I've also worked in plenty of other snippets of secular songs into my sermons. That probably may make some folks cringe, but music has always had special meaning to me…speaking to my heart in ways mere words cannot.

So, although I have not yet figured out which songs to include…even for next week…this month I will do a series of sermons that are based on non-Christian songs that seem to have an important message…or which at least have a memorable verse that we can learn from.

If you have any suggestions, please be sure to let me know after the sermon…I always love an excuse to spend more money buying music. 🙂

Now, what we may learn from a secular song might be that they are very very wrong…but there are also plenty of tunes out there that seem to show a bit of what remains of the image of God in this world's inhabitants.

A wisdom that seems beyond our behaviors.

Continue reading ““Not for Me””

Snooty woman

Sanctified Smugness

Posted on by Alan

Snotty manMany of the folks I follow on Twitter are Calvinists. I personally believe in free will, but do grant that they have ample evidence for their predestination views. I just weigh the evidence in toto differently.

As someone who is thus the recipient of it, I have noticed a certain smugness in what quite a few Calvinists tweet, and after non-Calvinist Ed Young embarrassed us free will-ers with an anti-Calvinism diatribe sermon, the Twittersphere was all abuzz. His talk was amazingly shallow and inaccurate, but I did note that sometimes I have found Calvinists to be kind of snooty (as he mentioned in his sermon). Trying to put Calvinism’s most common smug comments into a single tweet, I wrote: Continue reading “Sanctified Smugness”

A Galaxy

God is Dead (Again)

Posted on by Alan

A GalaxySpace.com had to know they were going to grab some attention a tile like this for an article:

“The Big Bang Didn’t Need God to Start Universe, Researchers Say”

And the beginning of the piece doesn’t disappoint:

SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Our universe could have popped into existence 13.7 billion years ago without any divine help whatsoever, researchers say.

That may run counter to our instincts, which recoil at the thought of something coming from nothing. But we shouldn’t necessarily trust our instincts, for they were honed to help us survive on the African savannah 150,000 years ago, not understand the inner workings of the universe.

Instead, scientists say, we should trust the laws of physics.

“The Big Bang could’ve occurred as a result of just the laws of physics being there,” said astrophysicist Alex Filippenko of the University of California, Berkeley. “With the laws of physics, you can get universes.”

As a result of such confidence, I immediately gathered all my bibles and started a bonfire.

Well, maybe not quite yet. 🙂 Continue reading “God is Dead (Again)”

Pacifiers and Hearing Aids

Posted on by Alan

Captain Francesco Schettino

Has anyone here heard of Captain Franscesco Schettino? Why he is famous…or rather…why he is infamous?

It is because he was captain of the Costa Concordia cruise ship that sank of the Tuscan coast this past January…a captain who decided to save his own scalp and hop into a lifeboat instead of making sure all his passengers were safe. Although he claimed afterward that he tripped into the lifeboat, he broke a sacrosanct rule: the captain goes down with the ship. Well, at least he or she does if anyone else is going to go down with it. A captain does not abandon ship until he or she knows everyone is safe.

Now…although the sinking of the Costa Concordia was major news, it is not the most famous shipwreck in history. I haven't done any empirical surveying, but what do you figure is the most famous one?

That's right…the Titanic. Although folks do question his judgment in other respects (for instance, launching lifeboats before they were full), the Titanic's Captain Edward John Smith went down to Davy Jones' Locker with two thirds of his passengers. Captain Smith went down with the ship.

Continue reading “Pacifiers and Hearing Aids”

1984 + ?

1984 + ?

Posted on by Alan

1984 + ?As Jeremy passed the deteriorating wood-tiled church on North Main Street, he tried to remember just how long ago its large doors had been locked for the last time. Was it ten years? Longer? Shorter? However far back it was, the doors were no longer white, having lost the battle with weather that any abandoned building does. Its handicapped ramp had also, long ago, seen its rust color turn into the hue of gray decay. From the looks of it, it also lost its structural integrity—a fitting unsafe entry path to an unused church.

For that matter, even religious worship would have been permitted if the proles had shown any sign of needing or wanting it.1

Jeremy tried to narrow down the actual year by remembering other connected events. Although what finally finished off the small congregation was the hate-crime judgment against their minister, he wasn't the first conviction in Antrim when the Tolerance Purge ("Tolperge" in Newspeak) arrived. Not surprisingly, the first Tolperge drive avoided houses of worship, focusing instead on businesses. Religious kooks would be allowed their bigotry, at least for a time, but owning a business was a privilege in the eyes of the Federal Government, the Department of Tolerance, and their Tolerance Czar ("Fedgov," "Deptol," and "Czartol" respectively). Continue reading “1984 + ?”

Happy Father's Day to mothers pulling double duty

“To some of the mothers on Father’s Day…”

Posted on by Alan

2014 updates added at the bottom…

I’ve frequently noted (half-jokingly) how on Mother’s Day we get sermons about how great moms are, how we need to treat them nicer, and so on.

However, on Father’s Day we are told about how dads need to be more reliable, step up to the plate, be less absent, etcetera.

So…today it seemed very apropos when this was one of the first tweets I saw:

Father's Day Tweet for Mothers

Nothing meant against the tweeter…she’s a wonderful woman (thus why I’ve blurred her picture and handle). But really?! Continue reading ““To some of the mothers on Father’s Day…””

Facing God and the Face of God (Part 2)

Posted on by Alan

Quick Review

For those who weren't here last week…or who have an MTV generation attention span :-)…let's start this week off by doing a quick review of "Facing God and the Face of God (Part 1)." I started off by sharing some pretty disconcerting scriptures, the first of which was Hebrews 9:27:

And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment

It actually went downhill from there, with even Jesus Himself causing us some angst with His words captured in Luke 12:4-5:

4 "I tell you, my friends, do not fear those who kill the body, and after that have nothing more that they can do. 5 But I will warn you whom to fear: fear him who, after he has killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him!

After those words…and more like it…we tried to start answering the question:

When we face God what kind of face will we see?

Continue reading “Facing God and the Face of God (Part 2)”