No mercy

"He that is appointed to kill an enemy, if he leave striking before the other ceases living, does but half his work."

John Owen - The Mortification of Sin (pg. 51 as cited in Overcoming Sin and Temptation)

We are appointed to this task. This is our job on this earth. God has given us an enemy, a means, and a motivation (be killing sin or it will be killing you). If we fail to completely accomplish this task then we have completely failed. Sin must be crushed. This reminds me of sports. In sports, a championship team is characterized by what is called "smelling the blood in the water." When they knock a team down they put their foot on the neck and go for the kill. They show absolutely no mercy toward their opponent. They leave no doubt. So it is for us. We must leave no doubt. No mercy for sin. Kill it and kill it now. I love how Piper characterizes this battle. He says that we as Christians need to have a "mean streak." This isn't a pleasant affair. It is bloody and dirty and we must have a mean streak. In the case of sin we must have a bloodlust and seek its absolute destruction. There is no room for anything but violence. May God give us the grace to be steadfast in this battle and give us the strength to persevere. Praise God that he has already claimed the ultimate victory over this enemy and has given us all we need to see the battle through to its glorious end.

Glorious Dawn

Glorious Dawn

Give me ears to hear and eyes to see.
Wake me up to see your beauty.
Oh that glorious dawn, that glorious dawn,
As into your presence I am drawn.

And we cry holy, holy, holy
Holy is the Ancient One.
We give glory, glory, glory
Glory to the Risen Son.

Frail and sin-filled man that I am,
I put my trust in the slain Lamb.
My God, by grace, passed over faithlessness,
For glory, to demonstrate his righteousness.

And we cry holy, holy, holy
Holy is the Ancient One.
We give glory, glory, glory
Glory to the Risen Son.

Perfect glory and depraved man
Combine, for glory, grace to land.
To impart the vision of the risen Son
At glorious dawn, we are transformed into one.

New York: Day One

This is actually the only day of the trip that I took pictures. We took a red-eye flight out of Utah at 9 pm MDT and arrived in Denver at 10. Then we had a two-hour layover and flew out at midnight and arrived in New York at 6 am EDT. It was still dark when we flew in and we got a really good view of the skyline from the air. It was really amazing to see the Statue of Liberty in the harbor and then to see the Empire State building and the Chrysler Building and a big empty space in between them where the World Trade Center stood. After we landed we took a van service to the church in Brooklyn where we would be staying and then we slept. Sweet sleep. We woke up around noon and we decided to do some sight-seeing in Manhattan. We didn't have to be back at the church until 6 pm so we had a few hours. All of my pictures are from this short period of time. I also only have building and scenery shots, nothing really of our group. However, a bunch of other people took photos throughout so hopefully I'll get some of those and post them accordingly. Anyway, here are my pictures.

This was my first view of Manhattan after getting off the Subway. Really cool architecture



I took this one from the shore of Battery Park.

This one was also from Battery Park.

This is Wall Street.

This is the bull at the beginning of Wall Street. If you've seen Hitch, then you're familiar with the other end of the bull. There were about 50-75 tourists standing around taking pictures of the bull so this is the best one I could get.

This is ground zero. It was amazing how massive the hole really was. Off to the left there is a subway running through it and that cement hole in the middle was probably part of the parking garage underneath the towers. It was really sobering to see the aftermath of 9/11.

Anyway, those are the highlights of my first day. If I get any more pictures from the others, I'll post those, but for now you'll have to settle for my descriptions of what we did. God Bless.

Happy Reformation Day

Today is the 490th anniversary of the nail heard round the world.

Just letting you all know, I made it home safely. New York was amazing. Seeing the sights was pretty cool too. The mission trip made a big impression on me and brought me to tears on a number of occasions. (I know, I know, crying isn't manly, but I think this kind is acceptable.) I will be posting a much more detailed account soon, but for now I just want to say:

Happy Reformation Day

O What great things our God wrought 490 years ago today that continue to shape this world and bring many to the greatness of knowing Christ!

New York

I leave my house in about an hour to go to New York with my church's youth group and the youth group of our mother church. We're going with an organization called Center for Student Ministries and we will be doing a lot of work with the poor and homeless. It's going to be pretty crazy. Hopefully I'll come back with some good stuff to write about, maybe even a few pictures to post, and most importantly, a little bit more transformed into the image of Christ.

Train up a child...

Lately I have had the privelege of being around a bunch of little kids. And I don't say that sarcastically :) Between the families at my house church and my friend and his family that I hand out with at least once a week, I'm around about a dozen different kids during the week and only about two of them are older than 10. The rest are younger than 6. It's been a very interesting experience. For instance, at my house church three out of the last four weeks one of the kids has thrown up. I meet with my friend every Tuesday night and he has five kids under the age of six and I usually spend some time reading to them while also trying to keep them from falling off of barstools and telling them to get off the table. I'm starting to wonder what God has in store for me in the future and if he's using this to train me for something. To be totally honest, I'm kind of terrified. Don't get me wrong, I like kids and I look forward to the day when I will have some of my own. But I'm terrified that I won't be a good father. There is so much that goes into it and I know I'm going to make a ton of mistakes and I just pray that the mistakes that I do make aren't too severe. The very prospect of being a father really makes me grateful that God is a sovereign God and he will keep me and my wife and kids. He's in control. I couldn't even imagine wanting to be in total control over the situation. I would totally screw it up. Anyway, the reason I brought all of this up is because being around this many kids has caused me to think a lot more about how to raise them and the verse that keeps coming to my mind is Proverbs 22:6 "Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not depart from it." If God ever blesses me with a wife and children I think this verse will define much of my parenting efforts. If I want to raise my children and in a God-glorifying manner, then I must train them up in the way of the Lord. If I want them to be not just good kids but good adults that seek after the glory of God, I must raise them to love and seek after God through the Bible. I must constantly be teaching them the Bible and the gospel and how everything is about the glory of God and that it is in seeking that glory that we will be satisfied and find eternal life. There is no greater parenting method than to train your children in the word of God. What a God-given blessing that my parents thought that way and constantly taught me the Bible. I can only pray that God would give me the grace to do the same for my kids. Praise God that he is a good Father and a sovereign Lord and he leads us in the way everlasting and provides for us the ultimate example of the kind of fathers and mothers we should be.

Gospel Series

I never blogged about it, but about two-and-a-half months ago I accepted the position at my church as youth leader. I'm not paid staff or anything, but I teach the youth (grades 7-12) Sunday mornings and I'm one of the youth leaders for our Wednesday night gathering (we combine with our "mother church"). So far we have gone through the book of Ruth, and the last two Sundays I have taught on heaven and hell. In teaching about hell, I centered on II Thess. 1:6-10. One of the phrases really caught me, and that is verse 8 where it says "dealing out retribution to those who do not know God and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus." After teaching about the eternal torment of hell and that it is those who don't know God and don't obey him that will endure that, I was deeply struck by the need to preach about what the Gospel is. In order for us to obey it, we must know it, and by knowing the Gospel, we will know who our God is. So I came up with a tentative eight-part series on the Gospel. Let me know if you have any feedback or additional topics that would be helpful to cover. Anyway here's the series:

The Good of the Gospel - God
The Object of the Gospel - Jesus
The Dilemma of the Gospel - Man
The Means of the Gospel - The Cross
The Effect of the Gospel - Sanctification and Glorification
The Enemies of the Gospel - Legalism and Antinomianism
The Power of the Gospel - God's Sovereignty and Evangelism
The Purpose of the Gospel - The Glory of God

That's it. Let me know what you think. God bless.

Response to my pastor

This is a response I just sent to my pastor about an article that he sent me and wanted my thoughts on it. In short, the article sees problems in the maturity level of believers in today's church and encouraged the development of small groups and discipleship to correct the problem. Anyway, I thought I would share my response with you.

I think he's right on in most of his assessments. A couple of minor nit-picky things like using the term saints for mature Christians. Paul even called the Corinthians saints. We don't want to create a catholic mindset where we elevate mature Christians over immature ones. We are all one in Christ and we don't want to create division where the Bible doesn't and in fact fights vigorously against it (Eph. 4:2-6). But overall I think his analysis of the problem is right on. Modern day evangelical churches are producing baby Christians - Hebrews 5 Christians if you will. The level of immaturity is even such that we are losing (perhaps even lost entirely) our distinction from the world and we cannot accurately gauge the salvation of most of the people sitting in the seats in front of us. Not that we are the judge of the people's salvation and relationship to God. May that never be! I would hate to think about me judging anybody's salvation. What I mean though, as I'm sure you know, is that all we can look at is the fruit in a person's life and if the American church today is producing fruit, it is small and produces little impact. There is an aspect where I don't fully line up with the solution that is being offered. Let me say, first, that I think small group discipleship and accountability are key. If we lack that, then we miss out on half of the equation and we won't achieve the fullness of God's blessing for us and we won't fully achieve the measure of a mature Christian and thus our church bodies won't achieve the full measure of a mature man. We must have small groups. We must encourage tight knit relationships (Col. 2:2 - being knit together in love). We must have close relationships founded upon, grounded and established upon, Jesus Christ and Him crucified. This is my concern with the emphasis on small groups. The emphasis on small groups seems to think that if we just had good small groups then all our problems would disappear, or at least a good deal of them would. And my response to that is how often in scripture do we see the writers putting an emphasis on small group fellowship, above and beyond that of the larger fellowship? To be sure, there are examples. Acts 2 comes to mind as well as all the portions of scripture that talk about the group that Paul took with him. He was never without Barnabas or Silas, and it seemed he always had disciples around him as well, such as Timothy and Titus. He also spent a great deal of time with Aquila and Priscilla as well. In fact, at the end of most of Paul's letters he sends greetings from a great deal of people that were with him. At the end of II Timothy Paul urges Timothy to return to Paul quickly because only Luke was with him and everybody else had either abandoned him or gone into ministry in other parts of the world. All that to say, we have a great list of examples of small group fellowship and how needed and beneficial it is. If we think we can go it alone and be the American lone ranger Christian, then we have got it all wrong. We need each other, particularly in a smaller group as these examples illustrate. But my question is where do we see the gathering into small groups encouraged or commanded in Scripture? I'm just working off of memory, but I can't think of a single passage that relates small group fellowship specifically to spiritual growth. Large group fellowship is most definitely encouraged and commanded (Heb. 10:25 among others) but I can't think of any verses that specifically talk about small group fellowship and discipleship.

Rather, what I think you see more often in the Bible is an emphasis on preaching and teaching truth, specifically that of the gospel. You see this in passages like Eph. 4:11-16. What comes first? People gifted to preach and teach and expound upon the truth of God's word, and by so doing they equip the people who hear them to grow themselves up into a strong and mature body. What's interesting about this passage is that it links maturity to a knowledge of the Son of God and unity. And the end goal of all this is that we attain to the measure of the fullness of Christ. As it has been said before, when you train a cashier to spot a fake 20 you don't have them look a bunch of counterfeits, you have them look at and study the real thing until they are so accustomed to seeing the real thing that spotting a fake is easy. We all are, as Christians, called to be like Christ, so the only way that we can truly be like Christ is if we look at Him constantly. When Paul came to the Corinthians his goal and his means of making them mature Christians was to preach Christ and Him crucified and at the end of I Cor. he says that this is of first importance. When Paul wanted to correct heresy in the Galatian and Colossian churches he told them about Christ. In fact, in Colossians 2 Paul tells us that the way to be firmly grounded and established in the faith is to know and understand and gaze upon Christ. When Paul wanted to give the Philippians a reason for joy he talked about nothing other than Christ. When Paul wanted to have fellowship with the Roman church he wrote the book of Romans and then called the whole book the gospel in chapter one. In Rom. 1:14-17 Paul tells the Romans that he longed to preach the gospel to the believers there. Not to unbelievers, but believers. I think the church has made a huge mistake in thinking that the gospel is what brings us from life unto death and then the rest of our Christian lives is training separated from the gospel. I've been thinking about this and writing about this a lot lately and the short end of it is I believe that it is the gospel that saves us and, if you will excuse the word choice, it is the gospel that keeps us saved. As you know, I fully cling to and believe in the perseverance of the saints and that it is God's power that does it, but I believe that the means that God uses to do this is through the gospel. And if I went into some of the thoughts I've been having about all this and reasoning from the scripture, then this e-mail would get far too long. But the basic gist is that I believe all texts speak of God as seen through the face of Christ (II Cor. 4:4,6) and we must focus on Christ in order to produce transformation into the image of Christ in the lives of those who profess belief. So my conclusion about this article is that it is right in that we focus too much on programs and we have weak (even blasphemous) preaching and teaching, shallow books, and a self-centered gospel. But the answer isn't encourage small groups. The answer is preach and teach in such a way that people see the face of Christ and leave transformed into the image of Christ's glory and then those small group fellowships develop much easier. Granted, because of our nature and our individualistic culture we must encourage small group fellowships from the front, but I guarantee that it will be much easier when the congregation is gazing into the face of Christ and not just going along with some program that tells them that the Bible and God is all about them

The Trinity

How often have you guys thought about the Trinity - what kind of impact it has on our beliefs, is it really a core doctrine, why the need for the nicene creed, and how it affects our day to day lives? I have to admit I haven't really thought a lot about the Trinity...ever. I've known that it was a core belief. I've known the basic tenants of it since I was a child. I've even known how to defend it at a very basic level for a long time. But I've never really thought long and hard about it before. Until recently, that is. The Trinity has been at the forefront of my mind a lot lately, and I've come to realize just how utterly essential this doctrine is to everything that we hold. It affects our beliefs, it affects how we view God, it affects how we view ourselves, and so, not surprisingly, it does have an impact on how we live our daily lives. We must live our lives in light of a trinitarian worldview. We need to know that God has always been in relationship with God and has loved that relationship for eternity past. There has never been a time when God lacked perfect fellowship. Simply put, the Trinity destoys all our hopes of being the center of God's "life." God has always been the center of God's "life" and He has never needed us. The Trinity is a wonderfully humbling thing. And oh how wonderful it is to be humbled by a loving God who loves showing us how perfect He is. Hopefully, Lord willing, I'll be posting more on this subject in the future. I'm sure they will be pitiful in light of this glorious truth, but I pray that I will learn so much more of the nature of my God through this study and be brought so much lower than I currently think myself to be. God bless.

...it was the worst of times

What an awesome thought that this earth is the worst of times for us! It will never get any worse than this life. I was talking about this with a friend of mine today and we both had had pretty rough days at work in general. Things just hadn't gone too well. And we both were filled with joy at the thought that the glory that awaits us will make all of this look like nothing. Our time down here doesn't even compare to what awaits us. What a hope we have in Jesus. We have died with Him and our life is now hidden in Him awaiting the time when we will be revealed with Him in glory. I love how I Peter 1:8-9 talks about our lives here on this earth. Right now we don't see Jesus as we will at the revelation of His glory (I Jn. 3:2), but we love Him and believe in Him and because of this glimpse we see now in the word we rejoice with joy inexpressable and full of glory. Let us take rest in that. We rejoice explosively because of the little bit that has been revealed to us about our Savior. Imagine what heaven will be like!

God loves being God

Lately, I've been looking at a lot of cool things in creation. Last Saturday, I watched part of a show on the Discovery channel called "Blue Planet." In the one we watched they took a submersible two miles down to the floor of the ocean. Down there there is no light. The weight of the water is a pulverizing 3800 pounds/square inch. The temperature at the thermal vents is around 750 degrees. It's an amazing world. And at the bottom of this world there are animals that create their own light called bioluminescence. This light helps them catch food and evade attack. While I was watching that the thought struck me that even in the darkest places, there is still light. The analogy is pretty obvious in that even in the spiritually darkest places, there is still light. It might be small and weak, but it is still there and it still illumines and transforms. The show continued and they showed these incredible creatures that looked alien. I had never seen anything that looked like them. And the amazing thing is that even under all that weight of water, their physical structure looked more delicate than anything I've seen above water. And then today, I got on the hubble telescope web page and looked at amazing pictures of far away galaxies and stars. I realized that these things have been there since God spoke them into existence during the first six days of time itself and man had never seen them. God didn't create creation for man. God created everything for God. God loves being God. God loves displaying His glory for the very sake of demonstrating the overflow of His nature even if man isn't there to appreciate it. It brought to mind Job 38:25-27: 25 “Who has cleft a channel for the torrents of rain and a way for the thunderbolt, 26 to bring rain on a land where no man is, on the desert in which there is no man, 27 to satisfy the waste and desolate land, and to make the ground sprout with grass?

God brings rain on land where there is no man because God wants to pour it out and show the greatness of His glory. We are not the center, we never were the center, and praise God we never will be the center. He was, is, and always will be the center of everything and in Him everything lives and moves and has their being. All things are from Him, through Him, and to Him, to Him be the glory forevermore. We were made to feel small.

D. James Kennedy

D. James Kennedy died earlier this morning in his sleep. From what I understand (which isn't much) he had been having some health problems lately and had decided to retire from his ministry. I never knew much about him but I was aware of him and some of his impact (especially as it related to ECT) and from what I've read lately he was a faithful servant of God and served the church in America greatly. I'm sure he will be greatly missed by many. Another saint has gone home. Praise the Lord!

I Beg

This is another of the great songs on Shane & Shane's new cd "Pages." (You're probably going to be hearing a lot about this cd over the next few posts.) I just want to talk about the chorus of this song. It starts with a pre-chorus that says "I'm haunted by a God that has the right to ask what by the very nature of my rebellion I cannot give" I love this line. It is so Augustinian: "Command what you will, but give what you command." This has been my prayer over the last couple weeks. Probably in large part to reading Piper's short commentary on Augustine in "The Legacy of Sovereign Joy." I too am haunted by the fact that God commands me to do things that I am completely unable to do them. One of the major sins I struggle with in my life is that of trying to rely on my own strength to do things. I acknowledge that God is sovereign, and I frequently ask God to reveal His will to me and then I respond "Thanks God. You can step aside now. I got this." I think I can figure it out, perform the work, say the words. I am completely incapable and I've been wrestling a lot with my pride over this issue. So my prayer is the same as the chorus of this song: "I beg for you to move, I beg for you to move, I beg for you to break through." O God, break through my pride and the heart that I keep trying to turn back into stone. Make me humble. I long for brokenness, and the desire to say "Not by my will, but the Lord's. Not by my strength, but Yours." Have Your way with me.

Doxology

I couldn't think of a title for this post, until I got to the end. I'm currently listening to the new Shane and Shane cd. It's incredible. It's definitely different from their past cds. I know it will take some time to get used to it, but its a great cd. It leads into worship so well. I can't help but worship my Redeemer when listening to these songs. So far my favorite song on the cd, and perhaps of all S&S songs, is "Embracing Accusation." When I heard it I burst into tears and wept with joy and grief. The truth of the song is so amazing and it coincided with some of the things that God has been showing me in His word. What an amazing Gospel song. Even if you don't buy the cd, listen to that song. It may not impact you as dramatically as it did me, but the truth of it cannot be denied. Praise the Lord! My Redeemer lives! My Advocate, Intercessor, Savior, and my Righteousness! To You alone be all glory forevermore!

And there was great rejoicing

Shane & Shane's new cd comes out tomorrow! I pre-ordered mine in order to get the behind the scenes extra stuff, so I don't know when exactly I'll be getting my copy, but when it does come, expect a review. Until then, go now and buy it as soon as possible. It's bound to be good.

I smell like smoke

After five years of having a job, I finally took a vacation. I've had some long weekends before, but this summer I took some serious time off. I just spent the last five days at Grand Teton National Park (which is right next to Jackson, Wy) with my parents, and my sisters and their husbands. It was great. I had forgotton how much I missed camping. Being outside, sitting by the campfire, watching black bears roam through the campsite looking for food (picture forthcoming), I love it. It was a really good week. We did a lot of stuff. Monday we had dinner at the Bar J Ranch. If you are ever in Jackson, you have to visit the Bar J Ranch. This was my third time. Basically, it's a real cattle ranch and you show up (hopefully with a reservation, you'll need it) and pay for your meal. There are about five choices. I had the chicken and bbq beef combo. Then you find your table in this big barn-looking auditorium. There are about 700 people seated in the building. They are able to serve all 700 people within 20 minutes. It's pretty cool. After you finish eating, you get some dinner entertainment with the Bar J Wranglers. They sing a bunch of songs, do some comedy stuff, it's a blast. I highly recommend it. Tuesday we visited yellowstone and saw Old Faithful and walked around the geysers and the hot pools. Wednesday, we went whitewater rafting down the Snake river. This was also my third time doing that. The rapids weren't as big this time as they have been in the past due to a lot of rain that they have had lately. But it was still a ton of fun. If you've never been, basically you sit on the side of a small 8-man raft and you have to paddle through all of the rapids. If you don't paddle, then there's a good chance that you won't make it through, so there is pretty good incentive to paddle through them. It's always a little scary at first, but it's a ton of fun. On one of the bigger rapids with six foot waves, my brother-in-law, Eric, was sitting in front of me and got knocked back into me. It's pretty intense. I love it. Thursday we took a day and just chilled out. We didn't do anything planned, we just sat around the campfire and read, or played Scrabble or cards, some of us took a walk, just a good relaxing day. I got a fair amount of reading done. Spent a lot of time reading the Word and I got half-way through both Preaching the Cross and The Legacy of Sovereign Joy. Both really good books. I look forward to finishing them. And finally, I drove home yesterday. As much as I love camping, I really loved sleeping in my own bed last night. If only I could get the campfire back home, then everything would be perfect. Anyway, that's where I've been the last week. Hope your weeks have been good. God Bless.

The long awaited return

Sorry I've been away for so long. Some of that has been because my computer had a nervous breakdown and gave me the blue screen of death. It took a while but it's finally back on its feet. I feel as though a lot has happened to me lately, but ironically I don't know what to talk about. Let's start with a cd review.

I recently bought Matt Redman's new cd, Beautiful News. I must say it is excellent. It's one of the best cds I've ever listened to. It is incredible musically (especially considering the worship music genre), but the best part of the cd is the lyrics. They are so God-centered and Bible-saturated that they can't help but convict and encourage and uplift. They constantly point me to God time and time again. My favorite song on the cd is "Yes and Amen." It has been a particularly convicting song to me lately. We need to declare Yes and Amen to everything that God does and asks us to do. So often my mind is on my own agenda and my own ideas and I need to remember that God is the sovereign ruler over my life and He is also a good and loving Father and everything He asks of me and everything He does is good and perfect and is the best thing for me and I need to obey in faith (Rom. 1:5). That concept of the obedience that comes from faith has also really been on my mind lately. Maybe I'll devote a future post to that sometime.

I've also been recording some guitar parts (and the occasional vocal part) for a friend of mine. He's written a bunch of songs based on the Song of Solomon and we're recording them at a studio. Hopefully we'll have a cd all together sometime soon. He's also doing me the honor of recording a song that I wrote and putting that on the cd as well. I've had a lot of fun doing it. I'm looking forward to recording the rest of the songs. The songs also have really good lyrics and it's been a joy to hear scripture sung.

And finally, I just got back from spending a week with Jen and Kellen up in Salmon, Idaho. Kellen just became the pastor of the Calvary Chapel up there. It's been very encouraging to see what God is doing in him and in the people of the church up there. We had a lot of good discussions and it was a great time of rest and relaxation. I think that was the longest amount of time I have had off since I started working when I was 18. Up until then I hadn't had anything longer than a five-day weekend, so it was a good vacation. I was able to do a lot of praying and reading during that time also. I read Mark Driscoll's "Confessions of a Reformission Reverend," which just proved to me that I am not Mark Driscoll. It was a good autobiography of sorts and gave an inside look as to how Mars Hill started and what it's goals were and are and how they hope to acheive them through the grace of God. I also read most of "The Supremacy of God in Preaching" by Piper and "How Readest Thou" by Ryle. Both are really short and really good. I recommend them both.

Anyway, that ought to be enough for now. I know I've promised it before, but this time I really will try and post a bit more frequently. Be praying for me. I have some pretty big decisions to make and I need a humble heart before God. And thanks to my two readers for checking in on me :) God bless.

Quote of the Day

Charles Spurgeon on Calvinism and the Gospel, as quoted by Mark Dever at blog.9marks.org:

"I have my own private opinion, that there is no such thing as preaching Christ and him crucified, unless you preach what now-a-days is called Calvinism. I have my own ideas, and those I always state boldly. It is a nickname to call it Calvinism. Calvinism is the gospel, and nothing else. I do not believe we can preach the gospel, if we do not preach justification by faith without works; not unless we preach the sovereignty of God in his dispensation of grace; nor unless we exalt the electing, unchangeable, eternal, immutable, conquering love of Jehovah; nor, I think, can we preach the gospel, unless we base it upon the peculiar redemption which Christ made for his elect and chosen people; nor can I comprehend a gospel which lets saints fall away after they are called, and suffers the children of God to be burned in the fires of damnation, after having believed. Such a gospel I abhor. The gospel of the Bible is not such a gospel as that. We preach Christ and him crucified in a different fashion, and to all gainsayers we reply, "We have not so learned Christ."

Postmodernism's Delimma: Part 1

I was going to write this paper back in September. I started on it and worked on it for about a week and then I kind of hit a roadblock and totally stopped. Well, I have started to work on it again and I'm going to start posting parts of it. Hopefully this will inspire me to complete the work as best as I possibly can as soon as I possibly can. This first installment deals only with the philosophical propositions that hold postmodernism up, namely that of relativism. Also, I should note that, although the thoughts are my own, I am a philosophical second-hander and am basing most of my assumptions in this paper on the work of David Wells and his book "Above All Earthly Pow'rs" and my experience in college as a philosophy minor and hearing my professor describe his own relativism. I also realize that this is only a brief handling of the subject and could us a great deal more depth, so I would appreciate any comments anybody has on the subject. Anyway, without further ado, here is part one:

The Definitional Impossibility of Relativity

As our world moves farther along the road of post-modernism, we must consider whether or not its guiding principles are valid or not. Post-modernism relies very heavily on relativity. Postmodernism is a move away from modernism and the enlightenment and the belief that there is absolute truth. Truth is relative and is defined by the self, now. Whatever is true for you is what truth is. We must be tolerant of everyone else’s beliefs and “truths” because there is no set truth that we must believe in. The only thing that we can be intolerant of is the forcing of our own “truths” onto someone who does not accept those truths, and therefore, is not held to them. That person is only held to the truths that he or she accepts. Therefore, postmodernism can be defined as the rejection of absolute truths (hence the "post" modern) and the belief that truth is now relegated to the individual and cannot be universally applied.

This belief is founded upon the fact that many people have very differing views of what truth is. I believe that such and such is truth, but someone else believes that the opposite is true. How can we determine who is right? What determines absolutes? Instead of wrestling with these questions, the postmodern turns to the answer that there must not be any absolutes because we can’t seem to agree on what truth is and who determines it. Truth is relative. But can this be possible?

In a word, no. Relativity is definitionally impossible. Relativity is founded upon the principle that there are no absolute truths. This is an absolute statement. But we’ve all heard this objection before. It usually goes something like this:
Professor: There is no such thing as absolutes!
Smarty-pants Student: But isn't that an absolute statement?

Why hasn’t this derailed post-modernism? Is this objection a correct one? I believe that it is a correct objection. We’ll deal with why it hasn’t derailed this dominant belief system later. For now, I will deal with the philosophical problems that relativism must face. I believe it is a correct objection because for postmodernism to be true it must be the case that there are no truths that are absolute, otherwise, we could hold all people to the same absolute truths. If there are absolutes, then postmodernism fails because its guiding principle, relativity, crumbles. To put it in a classical argument it would go as follows:
1. If relativism is true, then there must be no absolutes.
2. There are absolutes (as demonstrated by the above statement)
3. Therefore, relativism isn’t true
Relativism is, therefore, definitionally impossible.

But are there ways around this? Postmoderns can’t say that there are no absolutes because that would be an absolute statement. They can’t say that there are absolutes because that denies relativity and is an absolute statement. But can we say that there might be absolutes? This is not an absolute statement, because it doesn’t say that absolutes exist or not, it only allows for the possibility. But it is this very possibility that denies relativity. Relativists cannot allow for the possibility of absolutes because that would mean that truth is not always defined by ourselves, but that there can be (or at least might be) objective truths for all people. So relativity in general is impossible. But can we allow for ethical relativity? This is where postmodernism hangs. After all, a postmodern relativist would still claim that 2 + 2 = 4 in all cases, but they would deny that what is ethically true for me must be ethically true for others. So postmoderns wouldn’t deny absolutes absolutely, but they would deny them in ethical matters and matters of religion.

However, the same problem crops up in this area as well. Definitionally, a relativist cannot claim that there are no ethical absolutes because that is an absolute statement. However, it could be objected that the above absolute statement isn’t an ethical statement and therefore does not fall into the same trap as before. That is to say, you can make absolute statements about ethics because those absolute statements only negate general relativity, not ethical relativity. Therefore, I can say there are no ethical absolutes without denying my original premise. This is an untenable position. In this scenario absolutes are allowed but only in regard to general matters, not in regard to ethical maters and then trying to differentiate between ethical relativity and general relativity. If general relativity doesn’t exist, then how can ethical relativity? We cannot make absolute statements about ethics and still hold on to ethical relativity. I cannot think of any argumentation that would support this without becoming absurd.

There is another problem with ethical relativity. Relativity itself isn’t the only force behind postmodernism. Moral elitism, or rather, the repugnance of it is also a driving force behind postmodernism and the relativity that is its bedrock and cornerstone. Postmodernism rejects the idea that we can impose our ethics and morals on another culture. How dare we claim that we know the only right way to live and act and then expect all other cultures and persons to ascribe to it. This is one of the main criticisms of religion in general and Christianity in particular. It is okay (indeed, even encouraged) to have and hold certain religious beliefs. The problem comes when we attempt to change the worldview and ethics of those who don’t believe the way we do. How can we possibly say that we have the right to try and convert other religions and peoples to our way of thinking. There are so many different religions and faiths, how can we claim to have the best one? Therefore, ethics (and religion, morals, etc.) must be relative. How can we impose our ethics on one another?

But in saying this, they deny their own ethical relativism. They have made supposed moral humility an absolute moral good (not to mention that their moral humility turns into pride when confronting those seeking to impose ethical absolutes). They also commit the same error as general relativity because it declares there can be no moral absolutes. This, obviously, is an absolute statement. Postmoderns cannot cling to moral relativity and then declare tolerance of other religious views an absolute moral good. You cannot attack those who are intolerant of other religions and then say that morals and ethics are relevant. Ethical relativity in the postmodern worldview is impossible.

Really quick

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