All of our audio for the 2011 Word of Truth Conference is up, with the exception of the panel discussion, which we will have soon.

The new humility is doubt, except about certainty.  You can without doubt and yet with humility reject certainty.  However, if you are certain, be assured, today it must be hubris.  I was recently searching for something I had published online, and came across an exchange about this in a comment section with Phil Johnson, leader of Team Pyro and executive director of Grace to You.  This is the subject of the give-and-take.  I’m going to take you through the little conversation with some play-by-play commentary.

To Phil from Kent:  You are essentially with discernment drawing lines on what is culturally unacceptable and worldly in the way of contextualization. That’s what I’m hearing from the other side. I think we should be drawing lines. These things in culture do have meaning. This is what David Wells is saying in his books if I’m reading him right. This does impact the gospel in a bad way, a negative way, and sometimes the gospel is just downright changed to fit into something, as you would say, “uber-hip.” 

Here’s what I notice though. You totally pooh-pooh people who do the same thing, if they are at the right of you. You mock them, ridicule them, in your own inimitable way. Now if Spurgeon is to the right of you, you don’t do it to him, but you do it to living, breathing people. In one recent article, for instance, you bring up how that some woman got after you when you were in college at a fundamentalist college, probably Tennessee Temple, and she told you your wire rim glasses were worldly, or something like that. You threw all cultural separatists under the bus with your very, very strange example. It is an example of a rhetorical device, a kind of broad brush. You will likely deny it, but it is true. 

However, you don’t like the line (and neither do I) that Mark Driscoll crosses and many others that are either emergent or very fond of them. I agree with you. 

The big HOWEVER is that it comes off as very subjective because of the way that you accept your social and cultural standards but you don’t accept theirs. I agree that theirs are wrong, but why are yours right?

Phil chose out one line of those many upon which to concentrate his reply.

To Kent from Phil:   Kent: “I think we should be drawing lines.” 

I don’t. I think we should observe the lines God draws for us in His Word. That’s pretty much the answer to all the questions you asked.

In my opinion, that’s a snarky answer.  God draws all the lines.  We draw none.  I answered.

To Phil from Kent:  Phil,  

Very succinct. Let’s assume that I meant draw lines at God’s Word. So what is “fleshly lust” and “worldly lust” and “be not conformed to this world” and “the attire of a harlot” and “strange apparel” and “uncleanness” and “inordinate affection.” Do you make applications there or are we UNCERTAIN about how to apply Scripture? I used caps to help you understand one of my points. 

Scripture, for instance, doesn’t tell me that I can’t have a Ronald McDonald-like clown dance around and sing the gospel like a Gilbert and Sullavin musical? So that means it’s fine?

God draws all the lines.   Sure.   But what defines corrupt communication?  Do we have to draw that line?  Phil draws his line at certain language, certain four letter words, and is dogmatic in areas the Bible says nothing about. Of course we do, in application to Scriptural principle.  Phil knows this.  He is just getting smoked out on the inconsistency.  He replies.

To Kent from Phil:  Kent: 

My complaint with postmodernists and Emergents is that they tend to treat Scripture like nothing in it is clear and certain. My complaint with you is that in practice you tend to treat all your opinions and personal preferences as if they had unshakable biblical authority.

Virtually everything is clear and certain in your mind. The pomos’ pathological uncertainty is in part a reaction to the unwarranted hubris of the rigid fundamentalist perspective you represent, and vice versa. 

Your argument starts with the same presupposition as the postmodernists, but you turn the conclusion on its head. They seem to think if we can’t understand and be certain about every point of truth, we can’t really know anythingfor sure. You likewise treat certainty and understanding as all-or-nothing propositions, but come to an opposite conclusion, loathing to admit that there’s any uncertainty or ambiguity about anything you believe. I reject the presupposition, as well as the erroneous (albeit opposite) extremes that both you and the postmodernists’ take it to. 

I would stand instead with Peter: “Some things in [Scripture] are hard to understand” (2 Peter 3:16). And I stand with the Westminster Confession: “All things in scripture are not alike plain in themselves, nor alike clear unto all; yet those things which are necessary to be known, believed, and observed, for salvation, are so clearly propounded and opened in some place of scripture or other, that not only the learned, but the unlearned, in a due use of ordinary means, may attain unto a sufficient understanding of them” (1:7). 

…and if you can’t find principles in Scripture that clear up the question of clown church for you, even in the absence of any explicit statement on the issue, you need to study Scripture more and seek a fuller understanding of it. There are scores of questions like that (some more subtle, some less so), and the answers to the various questions range from crystal clear to not quite so clear. We’re not all going to agree on the answers to every question, but that should not preclude our discussing them carefully, and it certainly doesn’t mean the person with the most rigid ideas should be the person who decides for everybody else, just because is perpetually cocksure that he is always infallibly right.

What do you think of some of Phil’s language to me, his descriptors of me?  Where does God draw the line on “clown church.”  He doesn’t, of course.  He expects us to draw that line.  So does Phil, despite his first comment.  What a strange explanation for postmodern uncertainty Phil has.  It reminds me of Daniel Wallace’s explanation of Bart Ehrman.  He blames the uncertainty of postmodernism on the certainty of Bible believers.  And Phil, of course, is certain that this extra-biblical speculation is the truth.  Ironic.  Phil’s moderate uncertainty is a better friend of the postmoderns.  Does that seem strange to you?  I answered.

From Kent to Phil:  Phil, 

That was an absolutely rhetorically loaded few paragraphs. And you’re dead wrong. You have brought up the point of due process. Due process deals with the point, but you instead say these things, inventing most of what you wrote: 

“you tend to treat all your opinions and personal preferences as if they had unshakable biblical authority”—(name one, I mean it)”unwarranted hubris””cocksure””the person with the most rigid ideas should be the person who decides for everybody else””rigid fundamentalist perspective””infallibly right” 

I repudiate as strongly as possible every one of those rhetorical techniques. Also you intimate that I have some predetermined standard and then look for principles later to back them up. I’ve preached expositionally for twenty years now through most of the Bible exactly because I don’t believe in that. 

You intimate in the first paragraph of your comment that it is people like me (“fundamentalists”) create pomos. No way. . . .  I think pomos are created the same way we see false teachers in Scripture are created. They won’t hear His voice (John 10).

You say that you draw the line at the Bible. Beautiful. But yet you know that my Ronald McDonald example is wrong when the Bible says nothing about it. How? Principles. Which is exactly how we draw our lines. You can’t have it both ways. You are drawing lines. You are getting criticized for it. God does expect us to judge culture. And we can be sure that it is wrong, despite the fact that some things are hard to be understood (in the context Paul’s eschatological passages, which you can understand being difficult to Peter still). Some culture is going to drag down the name of Christ, to blaspheme Him and consequently affect the gospel. Do you understand that you are saying that those to the left are uncertain and I’m rigid because I’m on the right of you? You are perfectly balanced. How about let’s just see what is Scriptural? I’m all for that. 

Not everybody to the right of you is some kind of raving, knee-jerk, with one blood shot eye in the middle of the forehead. Do you understand that this sounds just like what you are name-calling me and us? I call that carnal weaponry. Let’s be all for using Scripture to judge the culture, eschew ourselves of some and hold on to the other. 

Now about wire rim glasses and flared pants….

Maybe I don’t need to write much, because I answered it in the comment section to Phil’s blog post.  The Peter passage about the ‘hard to be understood’ Pauline eschatalogical passages is used by both postmoderns and evangelicals like Phil in order to draw a truck through.  I’m saying Phil can’t have it both ways.  He can’t apply Scripture where it is silent and claim approved certainty and then accuse others of being too certain.   This is where I think Phil and others should look at historic theology.  What have Christians been sure has been a valid application of Scripture, and then why did those applications erode.  It was because of worldliness and the acceptance of it.  The worldliness, however, is part of the church growth methodology of Phil’s and other evangelical churches.  They got where they were by both using and approving their own new measures and worldly behavior and worship.  Just a few days ago, Phil wrote the following:

We’ve had a standing challenge for six years for our critics to point out actual examples (with cut-and-paste quotes, not a skewed paraphrase) showing where they think we have breached the bounds of taste, propriety, Christian charity, or good manners.

The complaints-to-substance ratio currently stands at about 500:1. 

So I’ll add another aspect to that challenge: I’ll apologize and eat a worm if you can show one example where I have published watchblog-style criticism consisting of raw passion or verbal hysterics instead of rational or biblical arguments.

So what do you think?  Did we meet Phil’s challenge?  He breached the bounds of at least Christian charity and good manners.  And there was no biblical argument, just speculation.

The church at Corinth, the one begun by Paul in Acts 18, was a horrible mess.  Why?  There are many reasons, but a few crucial and insidious ones are seen in 1 and 2 Corinthians.

19What say I then? that the idol is any thing, or that which is offered in sacrifice to idols is any thing?

20But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils.

21Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord’s table, and of the table of devils.

All of life in Corinth was woven into its mystery religion, including business and labor.  Almost every industry had its own god or idol.  When a particular guild held a festival, the god was involved.  The idol was nothing—like Paul wrote, it wasn’t anything.  However, also like he said, when the Corinthians sacrificed to their idol, they were sacrificing to the devil, the demon, behind the idol.  The danger of the association was not with the idol, but with the demon.  People didn’t worship a hunk of rock or wood because one of those were so convincing, but because the demon was powerful and persuasive.  The system of Satan was behind idol worship, so attendance to a festival brought a Corinthian church member under demonic influence.  And then those members were bringing that into the church.

Demons are involved in the world.  Like Paul said in Ephesians 6:12, “we wrestle not against flesh and blood.”   Believers in Corinth and believers in evangelicalism and many in fundamentalism see their associations with the world—its entertainment, its music, and its art—as neutral as the rock or wood of a Greek idol.  The notes, the celluloid, the canvass, the sounds of a steel stringed guitar—they are nothing—but there are the demons behind all of these.  He that thinks he stands, take heed lest he falls (1 Corinthians 10:12).  Satan ties believers up with their worldly associations.

Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 12:1-2:

1Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I would not have you ignorant.

2Ye know that ye were Gentiles, carried away unto these dumb idols, even as ye were led.

He doesn’t want the brethren ignorant about the gifts controlled by the Holy Spirit.  But how does that relate to “dumb idols”?

The term “abuse” has caught my attention.  The way that it has been borrowed as a propaganda weapon had me wondering about its history.  Ironically, “abuse” has been abused.

First, the English word is in the King James Version, so it goes back in the English at least to 1611.  The English word first appears in 1 Samuel 31:4 and the Hebrew word is pronounced aw-lal.  This first usage is when Saul asks his armor bearer to thrust him through with his sword and “abuse” him (parallel in 1 Chronicles 10:4, same story, same Hebrew word, same English translation).  The Hebrew verb in the hithpael, which is how it is used there, means: “to deal wantonly or ruthlessly.”  Of course, the particular abuse is to be impaled with a sword—not our typical idea of abuse.  We wouldn’t even use the term “abuse” for that.  But aw-lal is found quite a few times before 1 Samuel 31:4, which is how we would understand a word, how the Hebrew word itself is used.  It seems so far that the understanding of “abuse” is related to motive.  Someone wants to hurt or harm someone.  It isn’t for his good at all, and in this case, it is the death of Saul.

Aw-lal is used for the first time in Exodus 10:2, and in the hithpael, translated “I have wrought,” speaking of what God did in His plagues on Egypt.  He “abused” Egypt.  How God treated Egypt is different than how he treated His own people when He chastised them.  God punished Egypt toward its destruction.

Another early usage of aw-lal is in Numbers 22:29, when Balaam says that his donkey is mocking him.  The word translated “mock” is aw-lal.  Balaam is receiving verbal abuse from a donkey.

Aw-lal is used again in Judges 19:25 and again translated “abused,” which in this case describes the horrific treatment of the mean of Gibeah against the unnamed concubine.  What happened there is called “abuse” in English and is again the Hebrew aw-lal.  Not ironically the dealing of those men who did this to the concubine is called aw-lal, translated “they gleaned” (in the poel), in Judges 20:45.

In the King James Version, only aw-lal is translated “abuse,” and only the two times of 1 Samuel 31:4 and 1 Chronicles 10:4, parallel passages.

In the New Testament, the Greek verb translated “abuse” (katachraomai) is found only twice, both used by the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians (7:31, 9:18).  In both cases, “abuse” is taking something that is good and then perverting it for wrong purposes.  That seems to fit with the etymological understanding of the English word, abuse being a wrong use of something.  The Greek word is compound, chraomai meaning “to use,” and kata meaning here “against, over against, or opposite,” together “to use the opposite of its intended purpose.”  In the first usage, Paul uses the word for a misuse of the world and the second a misuse of the gospel.  Abusing the world would be to have the world be something more important than it is and misusing the gospel would be to have it being something less important than it is.

The King James Version in 1 Corinthians 6:9 uses the term “abusers,” as in “abusers of themselves with mankind,” but the Greek word is the word for homosexual.  The translators saw homosexuality as the misuse of the body God created, so it was an abuse of the body.  A lot of times the term “abuse” is used that way today with drug abuse and alcohol abuse, but they saw homosexuality as sexual abuse, which it is.

The above is essentially the usage of “abuse” in the Bible, but as well opens our eyes to what people saw as “abuse” in England in 1611 through the eyes of the King James translators.

How would one go about understanding the term “abuse” in history?  I chose to see the samples in google books, since you can view literature from the 16th century (1500s) there and take advantage of the unique search feature.

In 1590, Theodore Beza makes commentary on the Hebrew text of the Psalms, and he opens some explanation of Psalm 50 with the question:  “How long, o ye hypocrites, will ye abuse (abufe) the patience and longsuffering of God?”  This isn’t his translation, but he believed the thought was implied to us in the awesome description of God at the beginning of this psalm of David.  So in this case, it is God being abused in the lack or irreverence of the worship.

Lancelot Andrewes uses the term “abuse” (abufe) in 1593 in his An Apologie for Sundrie Proceedings by Jurisdiction Ecclesiastical.  On p. 102 he uses the verb “abuse” to describe what a judge would do when he judges a man wrongfully.  The man is being “abused.”

In 1599, you could have ordered from an English catalogue, A Treatise Concerning the Use and Abuse of the Marriage Bed, including the second chapter, titled “The Gross Abuse of Matrimonial Chastity.”

One of the doctrinal statements of the Reformed church was the Second Helvetic Confession, written in 1562 and revised in 1564.  Originally in Latin, they were translated into English.  Chapter 28 is entitled, “The Goods of the Church and the Right Use of Them,” and it can be read in Philip Schaff’s The Creeds of Christendom.   The word “abuse” is used in that section to describe how men in the church misuse the material goods or money of the church.  Misuse of church funds is called “abuse.”

William Shakespeare, in 1593 in his Venus and Adonis, wrote:  “Torches are made to light, jewels to wear,
Dainties to taste, fresh beauty for the use,
Herbs for their smell, and sappy plants to bear;
Things growing to themselves are growth’s abuse.”  I’ll let his use of “abuse” explain itself, but it is how the English term was primarily used, that is, something of a particular use being used for something opposite.

In 1659 a book was written by Nicholas Clagett, The Abuse of God’s Grace, attacking the cheapening of grace by the libertines.

Richard Baxter in 1658 in a treatise on conversion wrote:  “As long as you are unconverted, you live in the continual abuse of God, and all His mercies.”

The earliest I found of the terminology of “abuse of children” is found in 1699 in the address to parliament, Lex Forcia, “to remedy the foul abuse of children at school.”  I believe that “abuse of children” was related to what was occurring with the abuse of corporal punishment in their schools as found in William Hazlitt’s Schools, School-Books, and Schoolmasters.  Certain corporal punishment as “abuse of children” is warned back as far as 1669 in England.

In 1775, Thomas Whithers calls blood-letting the “abuse of medicine.”  If George Washington had only read this in time….

As we move into the 19th century (1800s), we find more usage of “abuse of children” and we read it mainly to be what was done to children sexually.  In commentaries on the laws of England in 1874, rape of children is called “defilement” and “abuse” of children.  In a digest of reported cases from 1756 to 1870, again the term “abuse” is used to describe sexual abuse.  In the penal code of the state of California in 1877 “abuse” is again relegated to sexual abuse, but other bad treatment of children is categorized as the “endangerment of children,” which includes “moral endangerment.”  The same code also punishes Sabbath breaking, which included all labor and disturbing of the peace.

An early usage of “spanking” that I saw called “abuse of children” was in the life and work of David P. Page in 1893, a section that I think many would find of great interest, in which Page lays out some suggestions for young teachers for the right usage of corporal punishment of students.

The first case that I found of someone calling all spanking “abuse of children” was in the American Journal of Politics in 1894.  It seems today to be a mainly post-Darwin understanding of anthropology that would view all corporal punishment as abuse.  Although if you were to read An Outline of Educational Theories in England, you also do see an opposition to corporal punishment in certain post-Enlightenment, early naturalistic philosophers like John Locke, especially in his “Thoughts on Education.”  Not many picked up on what Locke was writing.

I’m not going to deal with 20th century history, because we know that the term “abuse” began to take on whole new meanings that were especially related to developments in psychology.

More to come.

1 Corinthians 11:3-16 is in the Bible.  I’m not going to say “sorry,” because the Bible is good for you.  So those verses are good for you.  God is good.  And it is His world that He created.  You’re part of it.  So you and me function better when we operate within His design.

Don’t read into v. 3.

But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God.

Authority and submission are in play all over the place.  God has it be that way.  Christ is the head of every man, not just married ones.  And God is the Head of Christ.  Have a problem with that?  Didn’t think so.  That’s good with you.  But what about the one sandwiched between those two?  The man is the head of the woman.

I’m going to assume that you don’t think that “the man” and “the woman” are a universal, invisible man or woman, but representative of the particular.  But now the spin begins.  And I’m not going to talk about what that is, just that men in general are in headship over women in general.  Men are in authority and women are in submission.  So 1 Corinthians 11 isn’t talking about marriage, that married women should submit to their husbands.  No, women are to submit to men, and that should show up everywhere.  If you are arguing, move down to v. 16, because there shouldn’t be any contention over this.  The apostles weren’t arguing over it, so no one else should have been.

Maybe you’re good with all this so far, but I’m guessing it’s already controversial, just like it would have been in Corinth—hence, v. 16.  But the point of the post is about the symbol of male authority in dress and then the symbol of female submission in dress.  Does God expect or assume that from His own?  Yes, He does.  1 Corinthians 6:10.

Paul makes his point about the female head-covering in vv. 6-7 and then argues for it in vv. 8-10.  In v. 10, he writes:

For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head because of the angels.

Paul’s argument is about angels.  I’m not even going to go into that.  I want you to consider just the one point.

A woman ought to have power on her head.  Power on her head?  What’s that?  I’m not endorsing the ESV one iota, but here is how the ESV guys translated the same Greek words.  I believe they are correct in their understanding of what that is, when they translate, “a symbol of authority on her head.”

The head-covering in Corinth was a symbol of the man’s authority over the woman, whether it be a father and a daughter, a husband and a wife, or whatever other man-woman relationship it was.  It wasn’t to “tell the difference between men and women.”  It wasn’t to “make the man look more masculine and the woman to look more feminine.”  It was a symbol of subordination for the woman.  Women were not wearing it because they knew what it symbolized.  That was the whole point to not wearing it.  Women weren’t abstaining from the veil because they wanted to look like men, but because the veil meant submission.

Paul spent all of these verses about this one issue, what some want to dismiss as “non-essential.”  If it was non-essential, then Paul could have just said, be charitable toward the women not wearing the head-covering, because in non-essentials after all, there is charity, and in all things unity.  The modern idea of unity is accepting the no head-covering wearing women.  They’re fine.

In Corinth, the head-covering was one symbol of female subordination of women to men even as not wearing it was a symbol of male headship of men over women.  We still do have a symbol of male authority and female submission in our culture.  For men it is pants and for women it is the skirt or dress.  This symbol still does exist, although not to the extent that it once did, but that is in a major way because professing Christians have conformed to the world.  Whatever the symbol is in the culture, that is the one that Christians should follow.  If the world has no symbol, Christians should originate their own.  They don’t need to, however, in the United States, because we already have the symbols here.  The symbols, however, are necessary because of, among other reasons, created order (v. 9) and because of the angels (v. 10).  If anyone understands authority and submission it is angels.  One insubordination landed angels under God’s condemnation forever.

I know some people believe that Paul made the head-covering permanent.  I’m not going to argue about that in this post.  I know some will say that wearing the veil is only for worship time, during praying and prophesying.  I know that others will say that the symbol is nothing more than the hair length.  I’m not going to debate any of that.  These verses cannot be nothing!  Most evangelicals and fundamentalists interpret them the same way that I do in this post.  They simply choose to disobey them, to rebel against them, to snub their noses at God.  And then they provide cover for each other by mocking those who call for obedience.  Or they attempt to muddle the discussion to the degree that, since no one can actually know what these verses are talking about, they don’t have to practice them.  That’s not going to fool God. Not. at. all.

On 9/25/11, Peter Van Kleeck, Jr. posted the following on the Sharper Iron English Bible Text Debate Forum:

In 1558 William Whitaker, a master apologist for the truth of sola Scriptrua, wrote his comprehensive apology against the Roman Catholic dogma of Bellarmine and Stapleton on the topic of Holy Scripture – Disputations on Holy Scripture. Under the First Controversy and the Sixth question Whitaker writes concerning the necessity of Scripture,

“For if in civil affairs men cannot be left to themselves, but must be governed and retained in their duty by certain laws; much less should we be independent in divine things, and not rather bound by the closest ties to a prescribed and certain rule, lest we fall into a will-worship hateful to God.” [523]

So for this brief post, here is the question, to those whose trust rests in the quality and certainty of modern scientific textual criticism [MSTC], in what way is MSTC “bound by the closest ties to a prescribed and certain rule” seeing that Holy Scripture falls most conspicuously under the category of “divine things”?

I maintain that MSTC is not bound but rather is a “will-worship hateful to God.” For the nay-sayer, I concur that a form of textual criticism was in practice before the likes of MSTC, but that form was not of the same genus. Not of the same genus in that pre-Enlightenment textual criticism was subject to the leading of the Holy Ghost as manifested in the spirit-filled believing community of the time, whereas MSTC is subject to the scientific deductions of select scholarly board. For those perhaps a bit confused on this point, here is a slice of Theology 101. Where the Holy Spirit is leading the word of God is also present, and where the word of God is present so also is the leading of the Holy Spirit. MSTC pretends no such thing. You need not look any further than the several prefaces to the various editions of the leading Greek NT’s on the market today. The goal of the MSTC scientific exercise is not for certainty, truth, or doxology, but for scientific worship of their own wills by oppressing the church with their findings and declaring all others uneducated, ignorant, and old-fashioned. So I conclude, where the Spirit of God is leading, the word of God accompanies that leading, thus pre-Enlightenment textual criticism is not of the same genus as MSTC, and should not be considered as such.

For those who seek to position MSTC with in the limits of the “prescribed and certain rule” [i.e. Holy Scripture], know that if you cannot, then you are in danger of condoning, supporting, and advancing a “will-worship hateful to God.” Why is it will-worship? Because MSTC’s goal is professedly not that of God’s will but of a never-ending scientific endeavor governed by the limitations of human cognition to locate God’s words. [i.e. men worshipping their own will to decide certain content qualities of divine revelation] Why is it hateful to God? A willful act not subject to the will of God is what brought us sin and the fall of man. Thus, MSTC is nothing more than an present day extension of that god-overthrowing will evidenced by our first parents.

The purpose of this post is to sharpen the iron of the supporters of the MSTC, by challenging them to locate MSTC in the greater exegetical and historical tapestry of Bibliology and if they cannot, to abandon MSTC as a system suitable for the work of Christ’s Kingdom.

Some will say that no one has commented because it is “just such a waste of time.”  Others will say that it is “just a worn-out, now boring, so yesterday issue.”  Some might say that they are “through with King James Onlyism.”

If his post were of the Ruckman, double inspiration, or even English preservationist fare, it would get comments.  People would say something.  Long stretches of commentary and argument have been made over on Sharper Iron on this subject, even recently.   What Van Kleeck writes is not old and boring and so yesterday.  Those who support what he calls MSTC (modern scientific textual criticism) haven’t dealt with what Van Kleeck is writing.

Now I’m going to get into opinion, even speculation.  Why is it that no one over at Sharper Iron is answering Van Kleeck?

First, it is very difficult to answer.  Someone doesn’t want to embarrass himself by answering.  It is true and whatever someone throws up against him will look bad.  Ignoring is the better tack.  There’s deniability there.

Second, he sounds like he knows what he is talking about and it is easier to make points against straw men and people who don’t know what they’re talking about.  And then you just broadbrush everyone else into that person’s category.  Here you have someone that knows theology, philosophy, and history.

Third, and related to the second, he has read more about this than the normal Sharper Iron reader.  The normal Sharper Iron guy has read what fundamentalists have written, the modern books.  He doesn’t know historic bibliology.

Fourth, and related to the second and third, the Van Kleeck post ruins the fundamentalist and evangelical fake narrative on this issue.  They’ve got to have it be a twentieth-century only issue.  That narrative is easier to shoot down.  What Van Kleeck is writing about is the actual issue, the true, the real narrative, and no one would want to give it any credibility by even commenting to it.  They feel better off just ignoring it.

Fifth, you won’t be able to use your typical cliches, propaganda, and mockery with what Van Kleeck wrote.  It doesn’t soundbyte very well for your affectionate crowd.

Sixth, MSTC have now created an environment where they don’t have to answer to the truth.  At least on earth.  They will be better off with a Bible with a percentage of doubt.  They will get along with more people, be more popular, and even be more faux-scholarly.  The emperor is still wearing no clothes.

Seventh, Van Kleeck just seems very, very smart and Sharper Iron guys just don’t want to get whipped up on.  Even the name, Van Kleeck, Jr. sounds intimidating, like he would be a theological sharpshooter who would throw up theological raisins and shoot them out of the air.

So the cowering continues.

Some have called our church isolationist, that we isolate ourselves from all other churches. That’s not true. We do fellowship with other churches, and that fellowship is with churches of like faith and practice. We have begun and continued fellowship based upon common belief and practice. What happens when we believe or recognize that one of the churches with whom we are in fellowship does not believe and practice the same way as we do?