Tag Archive for: Natasha Crain

How Culture Got to the Point Where Saturday Night Live is Promoting Abortion in a Clown Outfit

How Culture Got to the Point Where Saturday Night Live is Promoting Abortion in a Clown Outfit

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By Natasha Crain

This weekend, Saturday Night Live cast member Cecily Strong played a character called Goober the Clown who had an abortion when she was 23 and now talks to people about how normal abortion is in between clown jokes.

Goober explains that it’s a “rough” subject, so she does fun clown stuff to make it more “palatable.” In the context of her skit, saying that it’s a rough subject wasn’t a tacit admission that abortion is in some way wrong; it was a condemnation of those who make it rough to talk about because they have a problem with it.

If you can stomach it, you can watch the 4 minute clip here.

Yes, the intentional killing of preborn babies has become fodder for a comedy skit—something literally worth clowning around about.

Every single one of us should be asking how on earth we, as a culture, have arrived at such a moment.

If we’re not asking that question, we’ve become completely desensitized to evil.

In one sense, the question of how we got “here” is a complex one worth hundreds of pages of historical, philosophical, political, and theological history. (And if you’re looking for something of that nature, I can think of no better resource than Carl Trueman’s The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self: Cultural Amnesia, Expressive Individualism, and the Road to Sexual Revolution.)

But in another sense, the question is far more straightforward when you understand the nature of the secular worldview that dominates our culture.

In Chapter 8 of my upcoming book Faithfully Different: Regaining Biblical Clarity in a Secular Culture, I talk about “Reaffirming Biblical Morality (Under the Pressure of Secular Virtue Signaling).” As I explain in that chapter, there are a lot of nuances to what people popularly call “virtue signaling,” but my objective was quite simple: to take the moral statements people and institutions publicly make at face value and assume 1) they truly believe the position they’re stating is the morally good position to have, and 2) they believe there’s some kind of value in stating that position publicly (otherwise they wouldn’t have bothered to say anything at all).

What I show is that these bare bones aspects of virtue signaling play an important role in promoting the secular moral consensus over and against a biblical view of morality.

To do that, I break down the psychological process of moral buy-in that secular culture must go through to gain acceptance of a changed moral position: awareness, normalization, then celebration.

While in the chapter I take a more detailed look at each stage, for my current purpose I just want to highlight key points for understanding the normalization part of the process. Goober the Clown clearly wanted us to all feel just how normal abortion is with her skit, and it’s important to understand just how culturally strategic—and predictable—that is.

The focus on portraying abortion as normal and therefore good is no accident.  

Why is normalization in particular so important for gaining secular moral buy-in?

As I explain in chapter 8, “To understand why, we need to return to three of our secular worldview foundations [discussed earlier in Faithfully Different]: Feelings are the ultimate guide, happiness is the ultimate goal, and judging is the ultimate sin. On the one hand, secularism is all about the individual defining their own journey. On the other hand, if there’s a negative prevailing societal judgment about the morality of certain choices, it can make people question the validity of their journey…whether they want that gut check or not. Yes, the secular ideal is to live in a self-contained judgment-free zone, but when the reality is that there’s a holy God who defines morality and gives humankind an inner sense of right and wrong, there will be a battle fought with the conscience.

Through virtue signaling—publicly proclaiming the moral good of an action—people are fighting this inner battle in the public sphere.

The battle commonly takes three steps.

1. Publicly proclaim that the action leads to the holy secular grail of happiness (if it makes you happy, how could it possibly be wrong?). For those who believe that happiness is the ultimate goal, it makes a powerful statement to juxtapose a morally questionable action with the achievement of secularism’s greatest good. Abortion, for example, is commonly portrayed as the means through which a woman became free to happily pursue the life she wanted and the goals she had. 

2. Proclaim it with as many people as possible to demonstrate that there’s no shame in the action (if everyone’s willing to tell the world they’ve done it, clearly there’s nothing to be ashamed of). Here’s perhaps the most important thing you can take away from this article: Given that secularism doesn’t defer to an objective higher authority, the closest thing it has to a moral standard is the popular consensus. Read that again multiple times—it’s the key to understanding a vast array of activism we see today. Increasing the number of people who share a positive moral judgment of an action is a proxy for transforming that action into a moral good for those who otherwise have no objective, external standard. Goober the Clown talks about how once a woman goes out on a limb in a social group to say she’s had an abortion, several more will say, “Me too!” The message is clear, and it sounds like something out of a bad 1980’s commercial portraying peer pressure to do drugs: “Everybody’s doing it, so it’s fine if you do, too.”

3. Remind everyone that life is all about self-authority anyway. Sure, you’ve shown it’s possible to justify your moral choice in steps 1 and 2, but this reminds people you never really had to anyway. Goober the Clown says right up front that it should all just be part of her “clown business,” but people keep talking about it, so she has to as well.

Normalization is ultimately a process of publicly signaling to society that an action is so commonplace, it’s unnecessarily taboo. Normal is the social validation secularism needs to minimize conflict with the conscience.

Perhaps nowhere has that been so on display as in this skit. If we can show that a subject is so unnecessarily taboo that we can discuss it in a clown outfit, surely it must not be a bad thing… right?

Christians, don’t be surprised. Secular culture will undoubtedly continue to “clown around” with evil. It’s actually quite predictable.

It’s the modus operandi for suppressing truth in unrighteousness.  

Recommended resources related to the topic:

The Case for Christian Activism (MP3 Set), (DVD Set), and (mp4 Download Set) by Frank Turek 

Legislating Morality: Is it Wise? Is it Legal? Is it Possible? by Frank Turek (Book)

Defending Absolutes in a Relativistic World (Mp3) by Frank Turek

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Natasha Crain is a blogger, author, and national speaker who is passionate about equipping Christian parents to raise their kids with an understanding of how to make a case for and defend their faith in an increasingly secular world. She is the author of two apologetics books for parents: Talking with Your Kids about God (2017) and Keeping Your Kids on God’s Side (2016). Natasha has an MBA in marketing and statistics from UCLA and a certificate in Christian apologetics from Biola University. A former marketing executive and adjunct professor, she lives in Southern California with her husband and three children.

Original Blog Source: https://bit.ly/3DxEvht

 

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The Fast But Quiet Creeping of Everyday Cancel Culture: 3 Things Christians Need to Know

The Fast But Quiet Creeping of Everyday Cancel Culture: 3 Things Christians Need to Know

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By Natasha Crain

Last month, the CEO of video game maker Tripwire Interactive was made to step down from his job just 53 hours after he tweeted support for the new Texas abortion law (which banned abortion after the baby’s heartbeat can be detected). Here’s the offensive tweet that apparently warranted the loss of his job:

“Proud of #USSupremeCourt affirming the Texas law banning abortion for babies with a heartbeat. As an entertainer I don’t get political often. Yet with so many vocal peers on the other side of this issue, I felt it was important to go on the record as a pro-life game developer.”

That’s it.

That’s it.

He merely stated his view that he supports protecting unborn babies from being killed. But having a different view was too much for cancel culture to handle. The pressure came quickly. A co-developer, Shipwright Studios, tweeted a statement the next day in which they said they would be canceling any existing contracts with Tripwire Interactive because they could not in “good conscience continue to work with Tripwire under the current leadership structure”:

Almost unbelievably, Shipwright Studios’ About Us page has a section called “Moral Compass.” It states:

“STEM fields are notoriously unwelcoming for many demographics, but women and minorities are notably underrepresented in game industry as a whole, and game programming in particular. As a small business owned by three white men, we are not blind to the luxury of being able to keep our ‘politics’ separate from our work, as well as personal lives. But for many of our friends and colleagues, ‘politics’ are not some easily ignorable distraction.

As an industry, we can do better and we must.

While we don’t have the power to change the industry as a whole, we do have the power to change the way we conduct our business with it. We are ready to put our money where our mouth is and lend our voice to further causes that promote diversity and inclusion, preferring to work with clients working towards the same goals which only serve to enrich the industry to which we have devoted the entirety of our careers.”

I’m guessing you didn’t hear about this particular story, or if you did, you shook your head and moved on with your day. Maybe that’s what you’re doing right now.

But that’s the point of this article.

Similar actions are taking place every day across nearly every (if not every) industry. People are losing jobs for publicly sharing views that differ from what’s been deemed acceptable by secular culture.

This also happens in academia.

And Hollywood.

And in the press.

And even—if not especially—in personal relationships. Numerous people have been canceled by friends or family in the last couple of years simply because of what they believe (including myself).

You might collectively call all this “everyday cancel culture.”

Yes, there are still high profile cancel culture examples that grab sustained public attention, but it’s the everyday cancel culture that picks off person after person without national attention that’s far more insidious because the cumulative seriousness of what’s happening isn’t obvious to many people.

Meanwhile, everyday cancel culture rolls on with major implications that Christians need to understand. Here are three important things to know.

1. Cancel culture is deeply rooted in today’s pervasive secular social justice ideology, so it’s not going away any time soon.

It might be tempting to chalk all this up to mere social hysteria—a “this too shall pass” phenomenon. But that’s a really dangerous and incorrect assumption to have.

To see why, you have to understand that cancel culture’s major ideological roots grow several decades deep; this isn’t something freshly springing out of society’s top soil. And those roots are called Critical Theory.

Critical Theory as an academic subject is quite complex, but in its popular manifestations, here’s the basic idea (which is a worldview unto itself). The world is divided into two groups: those who are oppressed (the powerless) and those who are oppressors (the powerful). Those who are in the identity groups considered to be oppressed—for example, women, people of color, and the LGBT community—are victims of the social structure that has empowered the oppressors. You’ve probably heard quite a bit in the media, at least in passing, about Critical Race Theory in particular, but that’s just one Theory in the Critical Theory family—the one that deals with race-based oppression specifically. (For more on Critical Theory and its relationship to Christianity, see my article here.) The basic ideological structure of Critical Theory has become the de facto lens through which secularists view social justice, and it’s becoming entrenched in nearly every major cultural institution.

So what does that have to do with cancel culture?

In the context of Critical Theory, canceling is seen as a tool of the oppressed to deal with the sins of the oppressors.

That brings us to an important second point. But the bottom line in this one is that Critical Theory and cancel culture are integrally related concepts, and because Critical Theory is becoming firmly entrenched in society, cancel culture is likely here to stay as well.

2. Cancel culture sees itself as taking the moral high ground.

Those who aren’t steeped in the views of Critical Theory typically see cancel culture as a bad thing; it’s a dictatorial shutting down of opposing viewpoints. But if you understand it in the context of Critical Theory, it suddenly makes sense why proponents of cancel culture see it as a good thing:

The harsh actions involved with canceling people are assumed to be morally justified because they’re thought to be taken on behalf of the oppressed.

When everything is framed either implicitly or explicitly in terms of a fight against evil oppression, a lot of leeway will be given to what’s considered to be acceptable action.

The problem is how one defines oppression. Note that Shipwright Studios—the company that “canceled” Tripwire for having a pro-life CEO—said in their so-called “Moral Compass” statement that they want to lend their “voice to further causes that promote diversity and inclusion.” From a Christian perspective, it’s hard to imagine how they can’t see the irony in claiming they champion diversity and inclusion while canceling a relationship with a company whose CEO has a different view on the sanctity of life.

But once again, understanding cancel culture’s Critical Theory roots sheds light on why people like the Shipwright leadership don’t see it as ironic at all. They believe they have the moral high ground on this issue because they see it as a matter of reproductive justice. Within the framework of Feminist (Critical) Theory, it’s unjust for a woman to not have the choice to have an abortion.

In other words, the pro-life view is seen as oppressive to women.

Shipwright and others like them literally see themselves as the moral heroes and moral protectors of society, based on their own secular standard of justice (clearly, they don’t consider the injustice done to the preborn infant who is killed). When they say in their statement that they cannot “in good conscience” continue to work with Tripwire, they’re making it clear they believe they’re the good guys. And when they say would be doing the industry a disservice to “allow” a fellow industry CEO to have a public pro-life viewpoint, they’re making it clear they think canceling people for so-called oppressive views is actually a moral obligation.

3. Cancel culture will ultimately be at odds with Christianity because it has a different standard of justice.

Cancel culture proponents can make it sound like a good thing given the Critical Theory-based train of thought we just looked at. But Christians need to understand that it will continually be at odds with Christianity because secular culture has a different standard of justice (as we began to see in the last point).

Take, for example, these words from an article by progressive Vox writer Aja Romano: “The idea of canceling began as a tool for marginalized communities to assert their values against public figures who retained power and authority even after committing wrongdoing…In similar ways, both ‘wokeness’ and ‘canceling’ are tied to collectivized demands for more accountability from social systems that have long failed marginalized people and communities…Taken in good faith, the concept of ‘canceling’ a person is really about questions of accountability.”

Some people have tried to recast cancel culture as “consequence culture” to emphasize this idea of mere accountability. But accountability assumes a standard to be accountable to, and therein lies the problem.

As I explain in my upcoming book Faithfully Different (in which I have two chapters on social justice and cancel culture):

“One of the biggest problems with secular social justice from a biblical perspective is that it lacks an objective standard for defining justice in the first place. In secular social justice, oppression is often defined with respect to how people feel about dominant groups imposing their norms, values, and expectations on society as a whole, and that doesn’t necessarily correspond with what would be considered oppressive from a biblical perspective. As a result, people today are often being canceled for stating ideas that are wrong in the eyes of the world but not wrong in the eyes of God. When a person like Romano states that cancel culture is really just about accountability for when people ‘say or do bad things,’ it sounds reasonable on the surface, but it’s actually a very dangerous idea. It implies people are accountable to a mob that’s ready to take action as soon as someone’s words or actions stray from the mob’s own standard of justice.”

The mob’s standard will never be the same as God’s standard.

So where does all this leave Christians?

Given the factors discussed here, we can expect cancel culture to affect us personally and indefinitely. This mentality isn’t going away. We should just expect to be canceled in some way for stating what we believe because we’re seen as the bad guys now.

But that doesn’t mean we should be silent.

In fact, it means the opposite.

We need to be bolder than ever.

Bold enough to speak when people call us oppressors (by their own standard) and cut us off from relationships, positions, and opportunities.

Bold enough to act when people move to stop us in every way.

Bold enough to love according to what God wants for people rather than what they want for themselves.

It’s time for “salt and light” to really mean something. It’s not a cutesy phrase to put on the back of a t-shirt. It’s our calling to preserve truth in a decaying culture and shine light in a dark world. Let’s be sure we fear God more than we fear the temporal cancelation weapons of man.

For more on my upcoming book, Faithfully Different, check out pre-order details here! I wrote it to help Christians gain clarity about what it means to believe, think, and live differently as a worldview minority in a secular culture. Cancel culture and secular social justice are two of many subjects covered.

Recommended resources related to the topic:

Letters to a Young Progressive by Mike Adams (Book)

Counter Culture Christian: Is There Truth in Religion? (DVD) by Frank Turek

The Case for Christian Activism (MP3 Set), (DVD Set), and (mp4 Download Set) by Frank Turek 

 

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Natasha Crain is a blogger, author, and national speaker who is passionate about equipping Christian parents to raise their kids with an understanding of how to make a case for and defend their faith in an increasingly secular world. She is the author of two apologetics books for parents: Talking with Your Kids about God (2017) and Keeping Your Kids on God’s Side (2016). Natasha has an MBA in marketing and statistics from UCLA and a certificate in Christian apologetics from Biola University. A former marketing executive and adjunct professor, she lives in Southern California with her husband and three children.

Original Blog Source: https://bit.ly/3m6p4Xi

 

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10 señales de que los autores cristianos que sigues están enseñando (sutilmente) ideas anti bíblicas

10 señales de que los autores cristianos que sigues están enseñando (sutilmente) ideas anti bíblicas

Por Natasha Crain

Mi amiga, Alisa Childers, escribió recientemente una reseña del libro más vendido, Girl, Wash Your Face (Chica, lávate la cara), de Rachel Hollis. Esto inició una tormenta de discusiones en línea sobre lo que hace que alguien sea un autor “cristiano”, la responsabilidad que tiene un autor que se identifica como cristiano en la promoción de ideas coherentes con la fe bíblica, y el daño que puede haber para los cristianos que leen libros que contienen ideas no bíblicas.

Personalmente no he leído el libro, así que no voy a comentar sobre el mismo específicamente. Pero sí diré que me decepcionó y entristeció mucho ver el tipo de comentarios que escribieron los partidarios del libro:

“No pretendía ser un devocional”.

“Ella no está enseñando teología”.

“Nuestro trabajo no es perseguir a la gente y odiarla”.

“¡Dejen de competir! ¡Imagínense lo que los no cristianos piensan de los Super Jueces! Tenemos que centrarnos en nuestro interior porque el proyecto dentro de nosotros mismos es el trabajo más importante que vamos a realizar. No utilices tu blog para hundir a alguien”.

Desafortunadamente, estos comentarios son representativos de la falta de discernimiento que es común en la iglesia de hoy. Si Alisa caracterizó con justicia las afirmaciones del libro de Hollis, éste está promoviendo ideas que entran en conflicto con una cosmovisión bíblica. Y cuando existe la preocupación de que millones de mujeres están consumiendo contenido de un autor cristiano que puede llevarlas a abrazar ideas no bíblicas, deberíamos levantar una bandera de advertencia y hacer un llamado al discernimiento en el cuerpo de Cristo.

No se trata de ser un “Super Juez”.

Se trata de discernir la verdad bíblica de lo que no lo es… algo que la Biblia nos dice constantemente que hagamos.

Aunque este artículo no está directamente relacionado con la crianza de los hijos (sobre lo que normalmente escribo), es algo que afecta a la crianza de los hijos. Cuando los padres incorporan fácilmente ideas populares pero no bíblicas en su cosmovisión, esas ideas afectarán la forma en que crían a sus hijos y la naturaleza de la cosmovisión que transmiten.

Las siguientes son 10 señales de que los autores cristianos que sigues pueden estar enseñando sutilmente ideas no bíblicas. Digo “sutilmente” porque creo que la mayoría de la gente detectaría un problema inmediatamente si un cristiano dijera que no cree en la Trinidad. Pero es igualmente importante identificar cuando se presentan señales de advertencia menos obvias, como las siguientes.

1. Dicen: “Amo a Jesús pero…”

Se ha hecho popular que los escritores pregonen que aman a Jesús pero (rellene el espacio en blanco). Cuando veas que una frase empieza así, prepárate para una de estas dos cosas.

En primer lugar, puede ser algo que el autor sabe que es contrario a lo que Jesús habría aprobado. Por ejemplo, si buscas en Google “Amo a Jesús pero”, encontrarás toda una industria de camisetas, tazas y otras cosas que dicen “Amo a Jesús, pero me gusta maldecir”. ¿Es esto realmente algo que glorifica al Dios que dices amar? Si tienes que usar “pero” como palabra de contraste entre amar a Jesús y hacer una declaración sobre lo que haces y/o dices, probablemente no es algo de lo que estar orgulloso. Cuando los autores hacen esto para ser más agradables a su audiencia, a menudo es una señal de que seguirán otras ideas no bíblicas.

En segundo lugar, puede ser algo que no está en contraste con amar a Jesús en absoluto, pero el autor quiere que pienses que son diferentes al estereotipo negativo de los cristianos. Por ejemplo, dirán algo como: “Amo a Jesús, pero nunca afirmaré que tengo todas las respuestas”… implicando, por supuesto, que los cristianos normalmente afirman que tienen todas las respuestas. Los no creyentes pueden pensar que los cristianos se sienten así porque los cristianos creen que el cristianismo es una cuestión de verdad objetiva, pero eso no significa que los cristianos afirman tener todas las respuestas o que la aceptación de la verdad objetiva sea problemática.

2. Se empeñan en separar la relación con Jesús de la religión

Desafortunadamente, la idea de que Jesús de alguna manera odia la religión se ha hecho popular incluso entre los cristianos que, por lo demás, tienen creencias bíblicamente sólidas. Si Jesús realmente odiara la religión, la popularidad de esta idea no sería un problema. El problema es que Jesús no odia la religión. Él odia la falsa religión. Sin escribir un artículo entero sobre esto (hay un capítulo entero en mi próximo libro sobre esto), la conclusión es que no hay necesidad de separar a Jesús de la religión que es verdadera. El cristianismo es simplemente el nombre de la religión cuyo conjunto de creencias se centra en quién es Jesús y que nos llama a conocerlo, adorarlo, servirlo y obedecerlo. En otras palabras, el cristianismo es una religión centrada en una relación.

Cuando los autores empiezan a escribir negativamente sobre la “religión organizada” en general, y la ponen en oposición a su propia relación personal con Jesús, a menudo es porque van a 1) desafiar la idea de la verdad objetiva (sugiriendo así que la creencia religiosa uniforme que se encuentra en la “religión organizada” es mala) y/o 2) valorar sus percepciones espirituales personales por encima de la revelación de Dios a la humanidad a través de la Biblia (la experiencia personal se convierte en autoridad).

La verdadera religión glorifica a Dios (Santiago 1:27) y no es algo que los cristianos deban denunciar.

3. Hay mucho de qué hablar sobre la autenticidad y el desorden

Autenticidad significa simplemente honestidad. A primera vista, no parece que eso tenga nada que ver con la Biblia y, en todo caso, parece que debería ir de la mano de la Biblia. Sin embargo, en la práctica, los autores que enfatizan lo “desordenadas” que son sus vidas y lo “auténticos” que van a ser con usted acerca de ese desorden, a menudo aprovechan la oportunidad para normalizar el pecado.

Como con varios de estos puntos, no siempre es así. Algunos autores que hablan en estos términos lo utilizan como una oportunidad para volver hacia Dios. Pero he visto que la mayoría de las veces es al revés, por lo que entra en la lista.

4. Promueven el valor de las preguntas por encima del valor de las respuestas

Otro enfoque de la “espiritualidad” que se ha puesto de moda es centrarse más en plantear preguntas sobre la fe que en compartir respuestas bíblicas. Los autores que se identifican como cristianos progresistas a veces llegan a acusar a otros cristianos de tener miedo a las preguntas y miran con escepticismo a cualquiera que intente responder a las preguntas que ellos plantean.

Ahora bien, si has leído mi blog durante algún tiempo (o mis libros, en realidad), sabes que estoy a favor de plantear preguntas difíciles sobre la fe con tus hijos… las preguntas son extremadamente importantes. Pero las preguntas también deben ser abordadas en la medida de lo posible, teniendo en cuenta lo que la Biblia nos dice.

Las personas que valoran más las preguntas que las respuestas suelen sentirse incómodas con la idea de la verdad objetiva, es decir, que existe una verdad independiente de nuestra experiencia personal. Todo lo que Jesús enseñó asumió que existe una verdad independiente de nuestra experiencia personal y que Él es esa verdad. Si un autor se siente incómodo con la idea de la verdad objetiva, se siente incómodo con Jesús.

5. Confunden declaraciones incontrovertibles con posiciones morales

Una autora muy popular escribió hace poco en su página de Facebook que quería dejar muy clara su posición en temas sociales. Aclarar estas cosas incluía hacer una declaración completamente incontrovertible para cualquier cristiano: ella “aprecia la humanidad de la comunidad LGBT”.

Todos los cristianos deberían apreciar la humanidad de cada comunidad porque todos estamos hechos a imagen de Dios.

Eso nunca se ha cuestionado.

Pero, por supuesto, ella dijo esto implicando que cualquiera que sostenga una visión bíblica del matrimonio de alguna manera no aprecia la humanidad de la comunidad LGBT. Es un movimiento muy engañoso hacer una afirmación con la que ningún cristiano debería estar en desacuerdo con el fin de sugerir que es algo con lo que no estarían de acuerdo quienes adoptan una posición diferente a la de la autora en una cuestión moral.

6. Se centran casi por completo en la acción cristiana, excluyendo la creencia

Alguien recientemente me dijo que la gente de su denominación no valora la apologética (por qué hay buenas razones para creer que el cristianismo es verdadero) porque su apologética está en sus acciones. Esta actitud, efectivamente, es la que se ve con muchos autores cristianos populares hoy en día, incluso cuando no dicen nada sobre la apologética específicamente. Para ellos, el cristianismo tiene que ver con lo que uno hace en el mundo; ya no se trata de creer en Jesús como Señor y llegar a un conocimiento salvador de Él. Este tipo de cristianismo apenas se diferencia del humanismo secular. Sólo viene con un aprecio por Jesús, cariñoso pero relativamente leve, en la parte de arriba… como una cereza caramelizada en un helado de buenas obras que se puede quitar fácilmente.

La Biblia es clara en cuanto a que la creencia importa… de una manera eternamente significativa. Para más información sobre esto, vea mi artículo, Is How We Live More Important Than What We Believe? (¿Es más importante cómo vivimos que lo que creemos?)

7. Utilizan la palabra “fe” para referirse a una especie de sistema de creencias sin límites sobre Dios

Una autora cristiana exitosa en ventas compartió recientemente la siguiente cita en las redes sociales: “La fe no es una creencia. La fe es lo que queda cuando todas tus creencias se han ido al infierno”. Esto, tristemente, fue recibido con miles de me gusta, me encanta y compartidos. También es una definición bíblica inexacta de la fe.

La Biblia no presenta la fe como una creencia ciega o como creer a pesar de la evidencia. La Biblia muestra repetidamente que la fe es creer en lo que tienes buenas razones para creer que es verdad.

La fe bíblica no son los pedazos rotos que quedan cuando has perdido un montón de otras creencias, como sugiere esta cita. Cada vez que veas que un autor promueve una idea inexacta de la fe, debería ser una bandera de advertencia. En este caso, la autora es conocida por escribir libros sobre sus luchas con la Biblia. No es de extrañar que comparta una cita de este tipo.

8. Regularmente te animan a “ser fiel a ti mismo”

Si escuchas con frecuencia de un autor que debes ser fiel a ti mismo, puedes apostar a que está en un terreno teológico inestable. Como dijo mi hija de 9 años cuando le pregunté si creía que la gente debería ser fiel a sí misma: “No deberías ser siempre fiel a ti mismo, porque si quieres ser un asesino eso estaría muy mal” #lógicabásica

Sencillamente, este tipo de sabiduría secular de “valerse por sí mismo” es solo eso… secular. No es muy inspirador ser más fiel a uno mismo. Como cristianos, deberíamos inspirarnos en ser menos como nuestra naturaleza pecadora y más como Jesús.

9. Consideran que juzgar a los demás es el pecado máximo

Para muchas personas hoy en día, el pecado máximo es juzgar a otro. Jesús no nos dice que no juzguemos… Nos dice que no juzguemos hipócritamente y que juzguemos con juicio justo (por ejemplo, Juan 7:24). Amigos, ¡tenemos que discernir! Discernir entre la verdad y la que no lo es no significa que se esté condenando espiritualmente a una persona, como la gente suele creer. Sólo Dios conoce el corazón humano, y de seguro no estamos llamados a determinar si otra persona es salva. Pero sí podemos y debemos abordar lo que dice la Biblia sobre la creencia correcta y la acción correcta. Si sigues a alguien que dice cosas como: “¡No te quedes si quieres juzgar a otros!” “¡Nuestro trabajo no es juzgar, es amar!” o “¡Esta es una zona libre de juicios!” aléjate. Es probable que signifique algo muy diferente de lo que crees.

10. Hacen afirmaciones sobre lo que significa amar a los demás sin abordar lo que significa amar a Dios

Cuando seguimos el mayor mandamiento -amar a Dios-, esto informa lo que significa seguir el segundo mandamiento -amar a los demás-. No nos corresponde a nosotros definir la palabra. Hay muchos autores (que se identifican a sí mismos como cristianos) hoy en día que defienden ideas no bíblicas de lo que significa amar a los demás, y está arraigado en la ignorancia del mandamiento de amar primero a Dios. Esta semana vi a uno de estos autores decir que los cristianos no tienen amor por oponerse al aborto, por ejemplo. Pero cuando amamos primero a Dios y comprendemos que estamos hechos a su imagen y que cada ser humano, por lo tanto, tiene un valor extraordinario, simplemente no podemos llegar a la conclusión de que amar a los demás significa permitirles quitar la vida a otro ser humano, sin importar la circunstancia.

Velen. Pónganlo todo a prueba. Y aférrense a lo que es bueno y verdadero.

Recursos recomendados en Español:

Robándole a Dios (tapa blanda), (Guía de estudio para el profesor) y (Guía de estudio del estudiante) por el Dr. Frank Turek

Por qué no tengo suficiente fe para ser un ateo (serie de DVD completa), (Manual de trabajo del profesor) y (Manual del estudiante) del Dr. Frank Turek 

 

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Natasha Crain es una bloguera, autora y oradora nacional que siente pasión por equipar a los padres cristianos para educar a sus hijos en la comprensión de cómo presentar un caso y defender su fe en un mundo cada vez más secular. Es autora de dos libros de apologética para padres: Talking with Your Kids about God (Hablando con tus hijos sobre Dios) (2017) y  Keeping Your Kids on God’s Side (Manteniendo a tus hijos del lado de Dios) (2016). Natasha tiene un Maestría en marketing y estadísticas en la UCLA y un certificado en apologética cristiana de la Universidad de Biola. Ex ejecutiva de mercadotecnia y profesora adjunta, vive en el sur de California con su esposo y sus tres hijos.

Blog Original: https://cutt.ly/PET5lk1

Traducido por Yatniel Vega García

Editado por Elenita Romero

 

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Are Christians the New Extremists? Yes, and That’s Okay

Are Christians the New Extremists? Yes, and That’s Okay

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By Natasha Crain

My blog and podcast have been quiet since April because I was finishing writing my new book, Faithfully Different: Regaining Biblical Clarity in a Secular Culture.

Faithfully Different is about the fact that Christians with a biblical worldview are now a minority in America and how the secular worldview that surrounds us is putting significant pressure on what we believe, how we think, and how we live. I wrote it to help Christians more clearly understand the fundamental differences between the secular and biblical worldviews, both for the strength of our own faith and for our ability to be salt and light to others. I’m really excited to share it with you! Faithfully Different comes out in February and I’ll be posting pre-order details here in the next few weeks.

In reading that, you might wonder if Christians really are a “minority” in America. I discuss this at length in my first chapter, but here’s the bottom line. About 65 percent of Americans self-identify as Christians—certainly not a minority. But when researchers ask questions about specific beliefs and behaviors, only about 10 percent of Americans have what would be considered a “biblical worldview” (holding basic beliefs consistent with the historic Christian faith and exhibiting corresponding behaviors). Furthermore, researchers have found that not only are those with a biblical worldview now a small minority in America, they’re a small minority within the church.

Now, there are plenty of minority groups that people don’t care much about. I’m sure there are only a handful of people, for example, who eat pickles every morning for breakfast. No one cares. But it’s becoming clear to Christians with a biblical worldview that secular culture does care about our existence…because it hates all we represent.

In a very real sense, we’re increasingly being seen as a small and extreme faction of society.

Understanding Christian “Extremism”

Read or watch anything in mainstream media that mentions “conservative Christians” and you’ll immediately know from the tone that the term isn’t being used as a neutral descriptor. It’s now a pejorative that comes with a knowing nod and eye roll among the supposedly more enlightened culture. (Note that I’m not necessarily talking about conservative in a political sense; in secular usage, “conservative” is a blanket label to reference Christians who disagree with mainstream secular views. There’s often a correlation with politics, but it’s not exclusive to that.)

The implication is that we’re those people—the hold-outs who won’t get on board with where the rest of society wants to go. We’re seen as an impediment to culturally-defined progress because of how different our views are relative to today’s mainstream secularism.

The result is that secularists now see us with various degrees of indignation. As strange as it sounds to many Christians, we’re the new extremists—a minority group whose views are seen as 1) fundamentally different from the “average” view of secular culture and 2) concerning to the rest of society.

When you sense that this is how culture sees us, it can seem pretty bizarre. After all, Christianity has been the dominant religious influence in America for the last 400 years, but now it’s extreme (and concerning) to believe that the Bible is God’s Word?

While there’s no reason to agree with secularists that our views are concerning, there are many reasons to agree that our worldview is extremely different relative to the dominant secular worldview culture now holds. We’re certainly “extremists” in that sense—and should gladly embrace the fact if we fully understand the nature of a biblical worldview.

More specifically, we’re extreme in three major ways.

First, we’re extreme in our source of authority

The most foundational difference between those with a biblical worldview and those with a secular one is our source of authority. Every person, as part of their worldview, has an ultimate authority for what they believe to be true about the world and how they should function within it. For Christians with a biblical worldview, that source of authority is God, and we believe that He’s revealed those truths in the Bible.

In secularism, a person’s source of authority is the self. Secularism isn’t what you get when you simply subtract so-called religious beliefs from a person’s worldview. When you take away the authority of God, you aren’t left with no authority—you’re left with the authority of you.

This difference in authority is at the root of almost every difference between a biblical and secular worldview.

When the vast majority of people’s authority for truth is themselves, it shouldn’t be surprising that Christians are going to come to some very different conclusions about the nature of reality than culture. Even uttering the words “The Bible says…” with the assumption that what follows is objective truth that supersedes personal opinion is extreme relative to today’s average view that the individual reigns supreme.

And for those who assume the Bible is merely a written record of man’s thoughts about God (and nothing more), such extremity is concerning. How can Christians be compelled to follow new societal directions if they don’t view truth as something subject to change? With fellow secularists whose feelings determine truth, society can “progress” through the push and pull of changing popular consensus. But Christians who believe they have un unchanging authority for all time? That’s an infuriating barrier that secularists resent.

Second, we’re extreme in our understanding of morality.

It follows from the first point that Christians with a biblical worldview are going to be at great odds with secularists in matters of morality.

For those whose authority is God and who believe He’s revealed Himself and His will in the Bible, what the Bible says is right or wrong is going to be the final word…regardless of what we think, regardless of what any other individual thinks, and regardless of what society thinks. From a secular perspective, what a stubborn view!

When your authority is yourself, there’s no objective basis for defining morality for all people. In essence, each person is their own God. What’s right or wrong isn’t a matter of what someone else has said—God or not—it’s a matter of what you’ve said.

But wait! Wouldn’t that mean that secularists should accept the Christian view of morality as just one more valid view?

Absolutely.

But they don’t. And this is where secularists fail to live consistently within their own worldview rooted in the authority of the self.

If they were consistent, they’d say this: “Hey, we understand that your Christian view is just as valid as anyone else’s since every individual is their own authority and there’s no objective basis for claiming that anything is right or wrong for all people. But a bunch of us have (fill in the blank) view on (fill in the blank) issue, and we want to try to convince you to change your opinion! Yet even if you don’t change your mind, that’s OK, since everyone’s view is equally valid anyway. Have a great day.”

Instead, they’re saying this: “The (fill in the blank) view on (fill in the blank) issue is the objectively right view for all people, and if you disagree, you’re wrong…and evil.”

Without an objective basis for morality from a higher-than-human moral lawgiver, the closest thing secularists can have as a moral standard that applies to all people is popular consensus. That’s why it’s so important for secular culture to continually push their views of morality through every conceivable channel—education, media, entertainment, business, and more. The more people get on board with any given view of morality, the more the popular consensus is achieved, and the more secularists have a new supposed standard for what’s right.

But once again, Christians with a biblical worldview aren’t subject to that shift. No matter how prevalent any new idea of morality is, if it conflicts with what Christians believe God Himself has said, the popular consensus won’t become our new standard. And that “extreme” viewpoint relative to average culture is mind-numbingly frustrating to nonbelievers.

Third, we’re extreme in believing that judgment can be objectively valid.

This point follows from both of the prior points. Because Christians look to God and His word as the source of authority for our lives, and because views of morality are an outworking of those beliefs, Christians believe that judgment on matters of truth can be objectively valid—not just a matter of opinion.

In Faithfully Different, I describe the tenets of a secular worldview this way: Feelings are the ultimate guide, happiness is the ultimate goal, judging is the ultimate sin, and God is the ultimate guess. Judging is the greatest sin in secularism because when feelings are your guide and happiness is your goal, no one has the ability or right to tell you what only you can know (how you feel and what makes you happiest). From the worldview perspective that the authority is the self, it’s absurd and insulting for someone else to come along, look at a person’s life journey, and claim to know better than they do how they should or shouldn’t be living.

But that assumes there’s no God who has provided a reliable and authoritative source for that information.

From a biblical worldview perspective, God has provided that in the Bible. And if the God of the universe has told us what’s true about reality, it’s not absurd or insulting to share what He’s said—it’s literally the only reasonable thing to do given that the God who created everything would assuredly know more than any human.

Jesus never said that the world would understand us. To a large degree, secular culture’s views here are to be expected. What concerns me far more is when Christians don’t understand how extremely different a biblical worldview should be from a secular one. In many ways, secularists who think those with a biblical worldview are extreme relative to average society understand this more than self-professed Christians who see only marginal differences.

When we truly have a biblical worldview, we should understand that we really are “extremists” in today’s culture…and embrace it. Not only is it okay to be extreme in this way, it’s beautiful—because it’s what God Himself calls us to.

Recommended resources related to the topic:

Stealing From God by Dr. Frank Turek (Book, 10-Part DVD Set, STUDENT Study Guide, TEACHER Study Guide)

Jesus, You and the Essentials of Christianity by Frank Turek (INSTRUCTOR Study Guide), (STUDENT Study Guide), and (DVD)      

Legislating Morality: Is it Wise? Is it Legal? Is it Possible? by Frank Turek (Book, DVD, Mp3, Mp4, PowerPoint download, PowerPoint CD)

Is Morality Absolute or Relative? by Frank Turek (DVD/ Mp3/ Mp4)

Was Jesus Intolerant? (DVD) and (Mp4 Download) by Dr. Frank Turek 

 

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Natasha Crain is a blogger, author, and national speaker who is passionate about equipping Christian parents to raise their kids with an understanding of how to make a case for and defend their faith in an increasingly secular world. She is the author of two apologetics books for parents: Talking with Your Kids about God (2017) and Keeping Your Kids on God’s Side (2016). Natasha has an MBA in marketing and statistics from UCLA and a certificate in Christian apologetics from Biola University. A former marketing executive and adjunct professor, she lives in Southern California with her husband and three children.

Original Blog Source: https://cutt.ly/2QJ0e0X

 

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Christians Must Care Less about Our Cultural Reputation

Christians Must Care Less about Our Cultural Reputation

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By Natasha Crain

Never have I written an article title that sounds less intuitive. Don’t we need to be concerned about our witness to the world? Isn’t that implied in the Great Commission? Shouldn’t people see us and want to follow Jesus because of our reputation?

Stick with me here, because this requires some nuance and it’s really important.

The idea that Christians need to fix a growing reputation problem in our society is becoming increasingly common in conversations on social media and even in articles by well-known Christian leaders. Comments like “The world is watching…” or “We’re damaging our witness by…” often warn believers to modify what we say or do so culture will think differently about us. The assumption is that we’ve collectively gone wrong in recent months (or years), and now we’ve got to quickly do something about it…before the world thinks even worse of us.

I would agree that Christians (and Christianity in general) are increasingly being seen in a negative light by nonbelievers. But I think we need to be extremely careful in how we assess and respond to that fact.

Our cultural reputation is not necessarily a measure of how faithfully we’re living out our calling as Christians.

If we treat it as such, we’re going to end up fixing the wrong problems.

What Makes a Reputation?

By definition, a reputation is “the beliefs or opinions that are generally held about someone or something.” This implies that a reputation involves the words and actions of two parties:

  • What party one says or does
  • What party two thinks party one says or does, and how they evaluate that

This is where things get tricky. If your reputation is negative in some way with another party, it could:

  1. be deserved (based on what you’ve said or done);
  2. be a mistranslation between what you’ve said or done and what the other party thinks you’ve said or done; or
  3. be a negative evaluation of what you’ve said or done, even when accurately understood.

When we consider the layers involved here, we can better understand why our reputation—what people think of us—is less important than we might assume.

When a Negative Reputation is Deserved

I follow a number of atheist authors and organizations on Facebook to see what’s important to them and how they talk about various issues. One thing I’ve noticed over years of doing this is that they focus more on highlighting the worst examples of Christianity than on anything else. One example that quickly comes to mind is Westboro Baptist Church, known for protests featuring signs proclaiming that “God hates fags.”

This is horrendous.

God loves everyone, even if he hates sin. And to use such derogatory language reveals a misplaced motivation for why they do what they do. Such tactics are rooted in contempt, not in love for bringing people into a saving relationship with Jesus.

If someone pointed out this example as something that gives Christians a bad reputation, I would say, “Yes, it absolutely does.” This isn’t consistent with the Bible at all. It would be extremely unfortunate for anyone to judge the truth and/or goodness of Christianity as a whole based on individual examples like this, but the reality is that they do. While we may think this kind of extrapolation is unfair (“Westboro doesn’t represent Christianity!”), we have to recognize that our culture has a very poor understanding of biblical Christianity and will come to faulty conclusions because of it.

It’s not just extreme examples like Westboro that give Christians a bad reputation, of course. There are plenty of Christians engaging in conversations that could hardly be described as bringing glory to God. The tone we use, the approach we take, and the words we share can do even more damage to the Christian “reputation” than the Westboros of the world because firsthand interactions often leave a more lasting impact.

This aspect of reputation is what we should care deeply about because it’s what we have control over—the integrity of our witness. As Paul says in Philippians 1:27, “Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ.”

In all we do, we should stay obsessively focused on that question: Is my conduct worthy of the name of the Lord?

When There’s a Mistranslation

In a lengthy Instagram post this week, singer Demi Lovato detailed why gender reveal parties are “transphobic.” Lovato says:

“It’s both insincere and incorrect to pretend that gender reveal parties are not transphobic… Transphobia is not just about prejudice against individual trans people, it’s also a way of thinking that understands non-trans people as more natural/organic and erases everyone else.”

Yes, having a party to announce your baby’s gender now means you’re afraid of people who struggle with gender dysphoria and want to “erase” them.

For Christians, it’s nothing new to be called homophobic or transphobic because of a belief that biblical marriage is between a man and woman or that God created two genders. But to characterize these beliefs as “phobic” (a fear) is a mistranslation; saying that God has a sexual and marital design for humans isn’t to be afraid of anything. It’s to believe that God has revealed his will and purposes for humanity in the Bible and that popular moral consensus on these issues conflicts with that revelation. It simply doesn’t follow that these beliefs imply hatred or fear, yet society continually labels them as such. The result?  Christians often have a reputation for being homophobic or transphobic.

No one wants to be known as hateful or fearful, so what do we do with that?

Here’s where the problematic responses come into the picture.

Christians are increasingly on a crusade to save us from this reputation—not by working to correct the misunderstanding that moral disagreement equals hate, but by refusing to speak up or by changing their view to match that of society. I experience this all the time when I post articles about hot cultural topics on my Facebook author page. There are always Christians who comment that it gives others a negative impression of us when we speak out on certain subjects (even when we do so graciously), or who comment that the traditional view is wrong in the first place.

Silence or agreement may improve our cultural reputation with non-believers, but it’s fixing the wrong problem.

In our silence, we fail to be the salt and light we’re called to be.

In our agreement, we fail to be faithful to God’s Word.

In fixing our “reputation,” we break our integrity.

When There’s Accurate Understanding with Negative Evaluation

Russell Moore, President of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, has written often in recent months about his concern for the church’s witness, particularly in the area of politics.

In his widely shared article, “The Gospel in a Democracy Under Assault,” Moore wrote that Christians need to be “people of truth.” What does that entail? He explains:

“It will take decades to rebuild from the wreckage in this country. But, as Christians, we can start now—just by not being afraid to say what is objectively the truth. Joe Biden has been elected president. Millions of babies are being aborted. The pandemic is real. So is racial injustice—both personal and systemic. So is the sexual abuse of women and children. If Christians are people of truth, we ought to be the first to acknowledge reality.”

In a backhanded way, Moore is suggesting that Christians are guilty of damaging our witness because we’ve collectively been denying the “realities” on his truth list. The implication is that we need to be known for agreeing with these statements if we have any hope of salvaging our credibility.

But some of these so-called truths we’re all supposed to acknowledge are grossly oversimplified.

For example, I’ve never seen a single person suggest that the pandemic doesn’t exist. Everyone knows it’s real, but Christians have varied views on its relative risk, issues surrounding freedom to worship, and the tradeoff between health risk and economics. If culture accurately understands that many Christians are concerned about the freedom to worship even in a pandemic but evaluates that negatively (an example of the third type of reputation issue), that’s not necessarily something we can or should fix. The world doesn’t like it, but sometimes we have to be just fine with that.

Similarly, Moore says that we all must acknowledge the reality of systemic racism. But systemic racism is a loaded term that has a very specific meaning today—it’s the idea that racism is baked into the very structure of our society, and any disparity in outcomes between people is due to oppressive social structures. There are many Christians who would not agree with Moore that this is a “truth” we should be lining up behind in order to salvage our cultural credibility. Again, if culture evaluates Christians negatively for not buying into the idea that disparate outcomes are necessarily the product of racist social structures, we can’t necessarily fix that reputation “problem.” The world will simply not always think well of us for what we believe or what we don’t.

Ironically, Moore himself is adding to the very reputation issue he is concerned about by suggesting to the watching world that Christians have thought or done wrong to get the reputation we have. Yet at least a couple of those things have more to do with the negative evaluation people have of legitimate Christian concerns than about actual failure to live faithfully.

It is right to be concerned with our witness to the world. We do want people to be attracted to Jesus through us. But that doesn’t mean we should try to manage our reputation, because there’s much involved we can’t control. Remember, Jesus said the world will hate us (John 15:18). We just want to be sure we’re disliked for the right reasons. If the world hates us because of the truth we share, that’s to be expected. If the world hates us because we’re acting like a bunch of ungodly jerks, may we feel the deepest conviction to repent of the ugliness we’ve brought to the name of the Lord.

Recommended resources related to the topic:

Jesus, You and the Essentials of Christianity – Episode 14 Video DOWNLOAD by Frank Turek (DVD)

So the Next Generation will Know by J. Warner Wallace (Book and Participant’s Guide)

Counter Culture Christian: Is There Truth in Religion? (DVD) by Frank Turek: http://bit.ly/2zm2VLF

 

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Natasha Crain is a blogger, author, and national speaker who is passionate about equipping Christian parents to raise their kids with an understanding of how to make a case for and defend their faith in an increasingly secular world. She is the author of two apologetics books for parents: Talking with Your Kids about God (2017) and Keeping Your Kids on God’s Side (2016). Natasha has an MBA in marketing and statistics from UCLA and a certificate in Christian apologetics from Biola University. A former marketing executive and adjunct professor, she lives in Southern California with her husband and three children.

Original Blog Source: https://cutt.ly/DcHKhj7

 

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CHRISTIANS SHAMING CHRISTIANS OVER VOTING FOR TRUMP: 3 STRAWMAN ARGUMENTS THAT NEED TO STOP

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By Natasha Crain 

There’s been a sad fallout among Christians now that the election chaos has (mostly) come to an end and a new administration is taking over: Christians are shaming other Christians for having voted for Trump.

It’s one thing to say, “As a Christian, I didn’t support Trump because (fill in the blank with disagreements regarding his character or the party platform).” But it’s entirely another thing to mischaracterize why many Christians did vote for Trump and then attempt to make that into a shameful thing. Not only is that uncharitable between brothers and sisters in Christ, but it fuels the flames of the resentment non-believers have toward politically conservative Christians.

When a person mischaracterizes another’s position on something in order to attack it, that’s called a strawman fallacy. And there’s a lot of strawmanning going on right now.

Here are three big ones.

Strawman 1: If you voted for Trump, you did so because you want Christians to have political “power.”

Ed Stetzer, a dean and professor at Wheaton College, published an opinion piece in USA Today this week titled, “Evangelicals face a reckoning: Donald Trump and the future of our faith.” The subtitle is, “We must live up to our calling as evangelicals: to proclaim Jesus Christ to the world, rather than betray Him to sustain worldly power.”

The subtitle is simply puzzling—if a person voted for Trump, they weren’t living up to their calling as evangelicals because they were chasing after worldly power? This is a strawman, but to understand why, we need to understand what it means to be a secular country—and what it doesn’t.

The United States constitution states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” This so-called Establishment Clause of the First Amendment is what people commonly refer to as the principle of “separation of church and state” (though that term is nowhere in the Constitution). The Establishment Clause ensures that the government will not establish a state-supported church and will not force individuals to practice a particular religion. That’s a great thing! It’s freedom of religion. But that says nothing about how individuals should or shouldn’t use their religious beliefs to inform their participation in public life. Secular doesn’t mean we’re supposed to create some kind of neutral, value-free society and keep our worldviews to ourselves. That’s impossible. Every society necessarily makes judgments about what’s good and bad, and ultimately those are worldview questions.

Now, with that in mind, does that mean Christians want power when they vote a certain way? If by power, you mean that they want to advocate for the values that are consistent with their worldview, then the answer is yes, and that’s not a problem. That’s what one should expect to happen in a secular country, where the state isn’t enforcing the authority of a single religion. Everyone is free to vote according to their conscience. If Christians supposedly want “power” because they vote according to their worldview and values, then every single person voting could be accused of the same thing.

One has to wonder, then, what Stetzer has in mind when he cautions Christians not to “betray” Jesus to sustain worldly “power.” Whatever a person thinks of Trump personally, it should be obvious that many Christians (if not the vast majority) were not voting for him as some kind of godly individual, but rather for the platform he represents—particularly over and against the Democratic platform. To suggest that Christians who chose the Republican platform over the Democratic platform are somehow betraying Jesus by voting for someone in the interest of “power” is just outlandish. Conservative voters aren’t chasing power any more than liberal voters are. They’re just voting for the platform that best aligns with their values, even if the candidate representing that platform doesn’t always embody those values. (Does any candidate ever?)

Strawman 2: If you think your faith should inform your political views, you’re a “Christian Nationalist.”

This phrase (“Christian Nationalist”) is getting tossed around everywhere lately. According to an organization called “Christians Against Christian Nationalism,” the term refers to “a cultural framework that idealizes and advocates a fusion of Christianity with American civil life…it carries with it assumptions about nativism, white supremacy, authoritarianism, patriarchy, and militarism.” You can see an image from the organization below.

Let me just say I have literally never come across a Christian who would be considered a Christian Nationalist according to this description—and I follow a lot of online groups/social media communities with Christians all over the spectrum of belief. That’s not to say such people don’t exist (there are always extremists), but that they certainly don’t represent a large number of Christians.

Here’s the problem: People are slapping a strawman label of “Christian Nationalist” on anyone who voted for Trump. If a Christian Nationalist is someone who meets these criteria, then it’s ridiculous to say that all those voting conservative are “Nationalists.” However, I don’t think most people have a specific list such as this in mind when they use the term. They’re simply accusing Christians of mixing church and state because they voted for a platform according to their (Christian) values. To them, that’s “Christian Nationalism.” But, as I explained in the prior point, that shouldn’t even be seen as a problem! Again, it’s what’s expected in a secular country. We have freedom of religion—no state church—and can use that freedom to vote based on our conscience.

This point is closely related to the first point, but comes with a fancy label for extra shaming.

Strawman 3: If you’re concerned about the future of the country given the election results, you’re putting your faith in a person (Trump) rather than in Jesus.

I have seen numerous reminders on social media that we need to put our faith in Jesus, not a political savior. Sometimes these are meant as a simple encouragement, but a lot of times they come with the implication that those who are concerned about the direction of the country under Biden are putting their hope in politics instead of Jesus.

This is the ultimate strawman!

No one I know “worships” Trump or thinks that the President is some kind of replacement savior (not that that means such people don’t exist, but those who do certainly don’t represent the average Christian). People who voted for him may believe that his policies will place the country in a better direction than those of Biden, but that isn’t a confusion about where our hope comes from. When Christians talk about hope in a biblical sense, we’re talking about the hope of eternal life. We may additionally have political hopes for our country’s direction, based on our worldview, but these are completely different kinds of hope. A person can have the hope of eternal life, the hope of a certain direction of the country, and deep concern about an election outcome all at the same time.

Christians are on the receiving end of all kinds of mischaracterizations by non-believers. When we strawman each other, we only add to those misunderstandings. Moving forward isn’t about how we fix our “reputation” for having voted for Trump (as some Christians seem to be concerned about); non-believers will never like our values, no matter who we vote for. It’s about having nuanced and charitable conversations about the best way to live out our faith in the public square…while accurately understanding and responding to one another’s views. Strawmen are easy to blow down, but the damage is hard to fix.

Recommended resources related to the topic:

American Apocalypse MP3, and DVD by Frank Turek

Correct, NOT Politically Correct: How Same-Sex Marriage Hurts Everyone (Updated/Expanded) downloadable pdf, Book, DVD Set, Mp4 Download by Frank Turek

Economics, Environment, Political Culture CD by Kerby Anderson don’t promote

Government Ethics CD by Kerby Anderson don’t promote

The Case for Christian Activism MP3 Set, DVD Set, mp4 Download Set by Frank Turek

You Can’t NOT Legislate Morality mp3 by Frank Turek

Fearless Generation – Complete DVD Series, Complete mp4 Series (download) by Mike Adams, Frank Turek, and J. Warner Wallace

 

 

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Gratitude is Easy…Contentment is Hard

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By Natasha Crain

Every year between Halloween and Thanksgiving, I feel a little uneasy about the countdown of blessings so many people do. Something seems slightly “off” about it, but I’ve never been able to put my finger on what it is.

It’s like a gallon of milk that hasn’t actually expired. You know it should be good, but there’s enough of a strange scent that you pass it to the nearest person and ask them to confirm that it, indeed, does not smell right. (Why do we always do that?!)

I think I’ve finally put my finger on where the funny smell is coming from. It’s not that there is anything wrong with focusing on giving thanks every November. It’s great to have the reminder to think about the many wonderful things we have in our lives, and the Bible clearly calls us to give thanks to the Lord in all circumstances.

But the smell that’s slightly off for me is that gratitude alone is pretty easy.

It doesn’t require much sacrifice or change of heart to take inventory of our blessings. Gratitude is simply a measure of our perspective on the things we already have, and most of us can easily embrace those things with a seasonal reminder.

Gratitude is not what most of us struggle with most, however. It’s the closely related cousin named contentment that causes far more consternation.

While gratitude is a measure of our perspective on the things we already have, contentment is a measure of our perspective on the things we don’t have. It’s being able to say we want nothing more no matter how much or little we have.

But how is that possible? How can we ever genuinely say that we could want no more if we were to have almost nothing?

Such true contentment is only possible with a full dependence on Jesus. Every earthly thing can be taken from us, but Jesus can never be. We can always trust that He is all we need because His promises are for eternity; our earthly time is but a mist (James 4:14).

It’s amazing that as a society we go from gratitude in November to wanting more, more, more in December. What’s more amazing is that we’ve already been given the most we can have: the birth of Jesus.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the November counting of blessings naturally segued into the December counting of all the things we don’t need in light of the birth of Jesus?

I don’t need security. Or more money. Or more excitement. Or more kids. Or a different job. Or different schools for my kids. Or anything else.

I simply need the promise of an eternity with God, which is exactly what Jesus’ birth brought.

When we fully appreciate the promise that Christmas offers, we can say we are thankful for all we have and need nothing more. It is this gratitude with contentment that results in complete and lasting joy.

Each day this month, talk to your kids about something they don’t need in this world in light of the birth of Jesus. On Christmas, joyfully celebrate that we have ALL we will ever need in Him.

Recommended resources related to the topic:

Jesus, You and the Essentials of Christianity – Episode 14 Video DOWNLOAD by Frank Turek (DVD)

How Philosophy Can Help Your Theology by Richard Howe (DVD Set, Mp3, and Mp4)   

Natasha Crain is a blogger, author, and national speaker who is passionate about equipping Christian parents to raise their kids with an understanding of how to make a case for and defend their faith in an increasingly secular world. She is the author of two apologetics books for parents: Talking with Your Kids about God (2017) and Keeping Your Kids on God’s Side (2016). Natasha has an MBA in marketing and statistics from UCLA and a certificate in Christian apologetics from Biola University. A former marketing executive and adjunct professor, she lives in Southern California with her husband and three children.

Original Blog Source: https://cutt.ly/vgXhmSE

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How to Explain to Your Kids Why Social Justice Warriors Hate Christians So Much

By Natasha Crain 

Black Lives Matter activists cornered a woman at a restaurant in Washington D.C. this week because she wouldn’t raise her fist in solidarity with their chants that “white silence is violence.” If you watch the clip of this happening, at about the 28 second mark you can hear the protester in front accusingly ask, “Are you a Christian?”

If you haven’t studied much of what’s going on ideologically behind recent protests, this question might seem strangely out of place. What does being a Christian have to do with whether this woman agreed to raise her fist or not? Why would these protesters single out Christianity as a potential cause of someone refusing to give in to what they see as a fight for social justice? After all, they didn’t ask, “Are you a Muslim?” or “Are you a Hindu?” They also didn’t ask any questions that weren’t religious in nature, such as, “Are you a racist?” (a question that would have seemingly been more relevant given the nature of the situation—not that they should have been harassing her in the first place).

Earlier this summer, protesters in Portland were burning Bibles. Again, one might ask, “Why so much anger toward the Bible? What does this have to do with protests? What does this have to do with racial injustice?”

Events like these that suddenly and explicitly pit Christianity against the cause of many Social Justice Warriors (“SJWs”)  are the tip of an ideological iceberg that many Christians are (to a large degree) unaware of. Black Lives Matter is just one of many social justice movements, and these movements often share a hostility to Christianity. If you don’t understand the underlying iceberg, these hostile tips that peak out can seem out of place. But when you understand the worldview that SJWs often have in common, it’s not surprising at all.  

Middle school and high school age kids—particularly those in public schools—are increasingly surrounded by this ideology that ultimately results in hostility toward Christians, even if they don’t yet see that that’s where it leads. Many Christian kids are getting caught up in it as well, and I’m increasingly receiving emails from parents who tell me that even their church’s youth group is promoting SJW thinking.

In this post, I want to shed light on why SJWs often not only disagree with Christians…but also hate us. We and our kids need to understand why.

The Worldview of the Social Justice Warrior

The term Social Justice Warrior gets thrown around a lot, and people can mean different things by it, so let me start by clarifying how I’m using it here (and how it’s typically used in culture).

An SJW is NOT just a term for anyone who cares about marginalized people, or for anyone who sees the importance of righting injustices in the world, or for anyone who believes that government should in some way be involved in achieving better outcomes for people.

The term SJW is typically used to describe someone fighting to right the perceived injustices experienced by specific identity groups, and they are fighting to right those injustices in a specific way. SJWs focus on issues like gender, race, immigration, and LGBT rights.

SJWs often root their ideas in what’s called Critical Theory (“CT”). According to CT, the world is divided into two groups: those who are oppressed (the powerless), and those who are oppressors (the powerful). Those who are in the identity groups considered to be oppressed—for example, women, people of color, and the LGBT community—are victims of the social structure that has empowered the oppressors. The ultimate oppressor is someone whose identity doesn’t fall into any of the oppressed groups: the straight, white male.

In this worldview, all relationships between people are understood to be functions of power dynamics. Those in power want to keep their power, so they will want to maintain societal structures that have always been in place because that is supposedly what gave them their power to begin with (and sustains their power still today). Because the historical structure of society is presumed to be the ultimate reason why anyone is currently marginalized, nothing less than a societal revolution is needed to fix the problems we see—a complete overturning of everything considered to be “normal” in America.

Read that last sentence again, as it’s very important.

SJWs who root their ideas in CT despise everything that has been “normal” for America because it’s all part of the “system” that resulted in the inequalities experienced today. The system is too broken to be fixed (goes the narrative), therefore the system must be done away with. Furthermore, those in power not only don’t want to see this, they can’t see this, because they can never see truth the way a member of an oppressed group can, given their “lived experience” of oppression.

Much more could be said, but this brief worldview summary actually gives us enough background to work with in order to understand how it logically works out to a hatred of Christians. (There’s a great video here that explains CT in more depth, which could be very helpful to watch with your kids. Note that this video shows why CT is NOT biblical, despite the title.)

I believe it boils down to three key reasons, as follows. Note that my purpose here is not to do a full compare and contrast between CT and Christianity (that would be a much longer post), but rather to highlight the elements of CT that specifically have led to outright hostility toward Christians.  

First, Christianity is part of the perceived “norm.”

When we’re talking about emotionally charged terms like “oppressed” and “oppressor,” no one should be surprised that those identifying themselves with the “oppressed” group have more than a passing feeling of disagreement with those considered to be oppressors. When a person feels they’ve been victimized, they’ll of course have resentment and anger toward those believed to be responsible. As I explained above, many SJWs blame everything related to the (perceived) “norms” of society for the injustices we see.

Christianity is considered to be part of these norms.

Let’s see an example of how this works out. The Smithsonian’s National Museum of History and Culture made headlines in July because of a graphic they placed on their website under the “Whiteness” section of their “Talking about Race” portal (it has since been removed). At the top, the graphic stated:

“White dominant culture, or whiteness, refers to the ways white people and their traditions, attitudes and ways of life have been normalized over time and are now considered standard practice in the United States. And since white people still hold most of the institutional power in America, we have all internalized aspects of white culture—including people of color.”

The graphic included a broad selection of allegedly “white” value examples, such as rational thinking, a family with a father and mother, hard work, planning for the future, and even the bland taste for “steak and potatoes” (who knew?). So much could be said about this, but for our current purpose, I want to specifically point you to the Religion section on “whiteness.” It says:

  • Christianity is the norm.
  • Anything other than Judeo-Christian tradition is foreign.
  • No tolerance for deviation from single god concept.

That first line says a lot. It would be easy to pass by if you didn’t realize just how much SJWs hate anything associated with the deadly “norm” today. There’s no point in even discussing the validity of the claim that Christianity is a norm, or that all norms are bad. Because SJWs believe norms of society are the evil source of all inequalities today, and have labeled Christianity as part of those norms, Christianity too is evil.

Not just wrong. Evil.

Second, Christians believe that objective truth exists, which bluntly challenges the SJW’s claim that authority can and should be based on “lived experience.”

Christians believe that truth exists outside of any one person’s opinion, because truth has been revealed to us by God himself. That means no human has special access to knowing truth just because of their status in a given society. This is a direct challenge to the claim that it is only those who have the lived experience of being in a specific identity group who can speak to what’s true about the world (along with what’s wrong with the world and what the solutions should be).

From an SJW perspective, asserting that there is truth that’s independent of power structures is just one more way of using power (through so-called “truth”) to oppress people. Remember how I mentioned that the “whiteness” chart from the Smithsonian listed rational thinking? That seems absurd until you realize this is why it made the list. People use rational thinking to show that truth and authority can’t be a simple function of a person’s lived experience. SJWs know that’s a threat to their whole paradigm.

Again, Christianity is not just wrong. It’s evil because it allegedly uses objective truth as a weapon to deny the authority of people’s lived experiences so Christians can allegedly remain in societal power.

Third, Christians believe the Bible is God’s Word, which repulses SJWs who see the Bible as a tool of oppression against marginalized groups.

SJWs believe that the Bible supports slavery, the oppression of women, and discrimination against the LGBT community. It’s far outside the scope of this post to defend the Bible against these claims. Again, for my current purpose, I just want to show that the belief that the Bible is guilty of these things drives hostility. If the Bible was simply a guidebook on what to eat or wear, it wouldn’t even be part of the hate equation. But because the Bible does speak about slavery, women, and homosexuality—and in a way that SJWs take to be in opposition to these groups—they are repulsed by the idea that any morally upstanding person would look to such a book as an authoritative guide. 

Here once more we see that SJWs believe Christianity is not just wrong. It’s evil.

With these points in mind, it’s not surprising at all that a BLM protester would scream accusingly in a woman’s face, “ARE YOU A CHRISTIAN?” It actually makes complete sense. You just have to understand why.

The more we can help our kids understand that today’s secular social justice movements are in no way just about helping marginalized people, the more we can help them think critically about the chaos that will undoubtedly continue to unfold around them in the coming years. Rather than fear such conversations, we should embrace the chance to show them just how much a person’s worldview impacts everything they believe, think, and do in this life.

Recommended resources related to the topic:

American Apocalypse MP3, and DVD by Frank Turek

Correct, NOT Politically Correct: How Same-Sex Marriage Hurts Everyone (Updated/Expanded) downloadable pdf, Book, DVD Set, Mp4 Download by Frank Turek

The Case for Christian Activism MP3 Set, DVD Set, mp4 Download Set by Frank Turek

You Can’t NOT Legislate Morality mp3 by Frank Turek

Fearless Generation – Complete DVD Series, Complete mp4 Series (download) by Mike Adams, Frank Turek, and J. Warner Wallace

Natasha Crain is a blogger, author, and national speaker who is passionate about equipping Christian parents to raise their kids with an understanding of how to make a case for and defend their faith in an increasingly secular world. She is the author of two apologetics books for parents: Talking with Your Kids about God (2017) and Keeping Your Kids on God’s Side (2016). Natasha has an MBA in marketing and statistics from UCLA and a certificate in Christian apologetics from Biola University. A former marketing executive and adjunct professor, she lives in Southern California with her husband and three children.

Original Blog Source: https://bit.ly/32TK8Xv

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How to Build a More Discerning, Less Naïve, and Better Culturally Engaged Church

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By Natasha Crain 

In my last article, Christian Naivety is Harming the Church’s Engagement with Today’s Culture; I identified four ways that I’ve seen many Christians respond with naivety to calls for discernment in today’s world. At the end, I asked, “How do we fix this?” and said my answer would be the subject of my next article. This is that article. Since this is a follow-up, please be sure to read my last post before this one for context.

Let me start by saying that the title of this article is a rather sweeping proposition. Obviously, this is a single article, the issues are complex, and I’m not claiming that what I write here is a complete answer to all the problems we have. But I want to offer what I see as some key levers needed to drive change in how Christians engage with today’s culture.

In my years as a marketing executive, I came to deeply appreciate one particular model that people in the marketing field have used for over one hundred years (in various shapes and forms). It’s a simple funnel that describes the psychological stages people go through before committing to an action:

AIDA model

Though this originates in marketing, I’ve noticed many times in the last few years how this model applies to so much in the area of ministry as well. As such, I’m going to use it as a framework for my current subject. If we want to move more Christians to the bottom of the funnel—the action point of being more discerning, less naïve, and better culturally engaged—here are the key levers I see at the awareness, interest, and desire points leading there.

  1. Grow awareness of worldview differences by addressing biblical illiteracy.

Every time there’s a heated discussion on social media about some issue of discernment (calling out sin, the intersection of morality and politics, etc.), you can count about 5 seconds before a Christian drops a comment reminding everyone involved that Jesus says not to judge.

Or that Christians just need to “love” people (however, the person defines that).

Nothing to me represents a bigger lack of biblical literacy than when people make those two culturally popular comments, completely lacking in context and understanding of what the Bible says on these subjects.

Now, if research showed that Christians read their Bibles consistently and deeply and we were still seeing pervasive comments that suggest a lack of understanding, I would be writing here about the need for more guidance in Bible study. Guidance is surely important too, but the research shows many Christians aren’t even reading the Bible in the first place.

A study by LifeWay Research, for example, found that only 45 percent of those who regularly attend church read the Bible more than once a week. Almost 1 in 5 churchgoers say they never read the Bible, and that’s about the same number who read it every day.

If a person doesn’t realize that their understanding of the Bible lacks appropriate context and depth, they end up navigating the stormy cultural waters in whatever way happens to make sense to them based on what they think the Bible says. Ironically, without an accurate biblical anchor, their Christian views get completely watered down by the cultural waves…and discernment no longer functions effectively. They’re less able to engage effectively with culture because they aren’t even fully aware of how a biblical and secular worldview really differ.

A less naïve, more discerning church must start with deeper biblical literacy. This should be a top priority for churches everywhere.

  1. Grow interest in cultural engagement by addressing (lack of) conviction.

Even if a person gains a better understanding of what the Bible says on relevant cultural topics (the awareness I just addressed), it doesn’t mean they’ll be interested enough to become culturally engaged. There could be many reasons for that, but there’s one that’s especially problematic: a lack of conviction that Christianity is objectively (and exclusively) true.

Pew Research shows that 65 percent of Christians believe many religions can lead to eternal life. This, of course, is another example of pervasive biblical illiteracy; the Bible clearly claims that only through Jesus is there eternal life (see Chapter 7, “Did Jesus Teach That He’s the Only Way to God?” in Talking with Your Kids about Jesus for more on this). If a person believes that Christianity is one of many worldviews that ultimately leads to the same truth, they aren’t going to be all that interested in standing up for what they perceive to be just one of those so-called “truths.”

A church filled with Christians who lack conviction that Christianity is the one true worldview is a church filled with Christians who will never care enough to challenge a non-Christian culture.

This is why there’s a desperate need for apologetics in the church today (apologetics is the study of why there’s good reason to believe Christianity is true and how to defend the faith against various challenges). Christians need to understand: 1) the evidence for God’s existence (see chapters 1-6 in Talking with Your Kids about God); 2) why multiple religions cannot be true (see chapter 10 in Keeping Your Kids on God’s Side); 3) the evidence for the resurrection (i.e., the truth test for Christianity as the one true religion—see part 4 of Talking with Your Kids about Jesus); and 4) the evidence for the reliability of the Bible (see part 4 in Keeping Your Kids on God’s Side).

Knowing why there’s good reason to believe Christianity is objectively true—and why that truth makes an eternal difference—is a critically important step toward building a church that cares enough to stand for truth.

  1. Grow desired or engagement by destigmatizing the relationship between politics and religion.

Let’s now say that we have a person who is aware of what the Bible says on today’s hot topics, and they’re interested in engaging culture because they’re convicted that the Bible offers the one true picture of reality.

That doesn’t mean they’ll actually do something.

Marketers are well aware that awareness and interest do not always lead to a strong desire to do something because there’s often some kind of barrier. There are a lot of barriers I could list here with respect to cultural engagement, but a major one I’ve seen is the prevailing stigma about mixing politics and religion.

Just saying the words “politics” and “religion” in the same sentence immediately puts people on the defensive. Unfortunately, many pastors and Christian leaders have emphasized a generic dichotomy between the two areas, and over time the stigma of mixing them has grown. Consequently, when important cultural concerns arise—such as the ideology of the Black Lives Matter organization (which I discussed in the last couple of posts)—many Christians automatically bucket those questions into the “don’t touch this” category of “politics and religion,” as if it’s their Christian duty to stay out of it. Meanwhile, people start burning Bibles as part of BLM protests, and Christians are surprised! If you paid attention to their underlying ideology in weeks leading up to this, it’s not surprising at all.

We need to be able to think in more nuanced ways about the interaction of politics and religion if we’re ever going to have a more culturally engaged church that isn’t taken by naive surprise as hostility to Christianity increases.

Here are a few quick things I think we should be able to all agree on:

  • While some “political” issues are worldview neutral (e.g., local zoning laws), many are not (e.g., abortion or religious freedom laws).
  • When we’re talking about issues where biblical morality conflicts with secular morality, someone’s morality will be legislated; legislation based on a secular worldview isn’t the “neutral” option.
  • Acknowledging that there are political issues that involve the moral direction of our country and that Christians should care enough to be engaged in such areas, is not the same as saying one political party or the other represents Christianity. It’s also not the same as saying that we’re looking to a political leader to be our savior, or that we think we’ll eventually build an earthly utopia. These are often the strawmen people try to knock down when claiming Christians shouldn’t mix their faith with politics.
  • There are also many political areas where Christians can legitimately disagree. For example, we should all agree that God cares for would-be immigrants, but we may have very different policy opinions on how best to process immigration in this country. Identifying where grey exists is important for maintaining charitable conversation among Christians while uniting on issues that should be more black-and-white for anyone with a Christian worldview.

In short, we need to quit ending culturally relevant conversations before they begin by perpetuating the idea that politics and religion shouldn’t mix. Of course, they should, in some cases.

In all three of these areas, there is much that any pastor could do in a church through sermons, groups, studies, initiatives, and more. But that doesn’t mean others can’t make a significant impact as well. For example, you can:

  • Use social media to share biblically-sound articles that educate others about cultural issues from a Christian worldview. (I do my best to share a variety of such articles from my author Facebook page—you can follow me there if you don’t already.)
  • Take the time to engage in a thoughtful dialog when you see Christians make comments online that lack biblical understanding. It’s worth the time even if the person you initially respond to doesn’t seem to appreciate it—remember that others are reading too. If a comment is best addressed privately, do it that way. But resist the urge to just be silent because that’s the easy thing to do.
  • Lead a Bible study (online or in person, through your church or on your own).
  • Lead a book study that addresses current cultural questions from a biblical worldview.
  • Start a group to learn apologetics. (If you’re interested in starting a group specifically for parents and grandparents, we give you all you need to get going with Grassroots Apologetics for Parents. You can start an in-person or online chapter!)
  • Encourage your pastor to address more of these questions in sermons.
  • Work with your church to invite subject matter experts to provide training. Many of these experts are currently offering training online. For example, the Life Training Institute a 4-day Zoom event next week that anyone can sign up for: How to Survive Being Pro-Life on Campus in a Cancel Culture. Many apologetics speakers are also offering remote sessions right now. The Center for Biblical Unity is offering trainings on a biblical approach to current racial questions. So much is available!
  • Commit to the serious discipleship of your kids. They are literally the future. Training them in the same ways I’ve mentioned here for adults is just as important.

With more discernment from biblical literacy, more interest from conviction, and more willingness to engage by removing the “politics vs. religion” barrier, we can shape a better culturally engaged church. Perhaps one of the positives that will come from the chaos of this year will be a wider recognition that these things are so desperately needed in the body of Christ.

Recommended resources related to the topic:

American Apocalypse MP3, and DVD by Frank Turek

Correct, NOT Politically Correct: How Same-Sex Marriage Hurts Everyone (Updated/Expanded) downloadable pdf, Book, DVD Set, Mp4 Download by Frank Turek

The Case for Christian Activism MP3 Set, DVD Set, mp4 Download Set by Frank Turek

You Can’t NOT Legislate Morality mp3 by Frank Turek

Fearless Generation – Complete DVD Series, Complete mp4 Series (download) by Mike Adams, Frank Turek, and J. Warner Wallace

 

Natasha Crain is a blogger, author, and national speaker who is passionate about equipping Christian parents to raise their kids with an understanding of how to make a case for and defend their faith in an increasingly secular world. She is the author of two apologetics books for parents: Talking with Your Kids about God (2017) and Keeping Your Kids on God’s Side (2016). Natasha has an MBA in marketing and statistics from UCLA and a certificate in Christian apologetics from Biola University. A former marketing executive and adjunct professor, she lives in Southern California with her husband and three children.

Original Blog Source: https://bit.ly/30RAGmC 

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Christian Naivety is Harming the Church’s Engagement with Today’s Culture

By Natasha Crain

I had no idea my last article, “5 Ways Christians are Getting Swept into a Secular Worldview in This Culture Moment,” would resonate with so many—it’s been liked and shared over 250,000 times to date (!). Although I no longer leave comments open on my site (I just don’t have the time to moderate and respond), I had the opportunity to observe a flurry of conversation threads on social media related to what I had written. Those conversations threads generated all kinds of ideas for future articles, but the one that pressed on me most over the last few weeks was this one.

As I considered the types of pushback I received from some fellow believers (not skeptics!), I started to realize that their comments had little to do with the facts, logic, or manner in which I wrote that particular article. Rather, they were the same kinds of reactions I’ve see to any post other Christians, or I write involving a call to better discernment in the church. Articles of this nature are often met with the same types of broad pushback about 1) the need for love, 2) the need for action, 3) the need to not be fearful, and 4) the need for unity (the implication being that these things are all somehow in tension with discernment).

I want to show today why there’s a certain biblical naivety in such comments—one that actually harms the church’s ability and opportunity to effectively engage with culture.

1. There’s a naivety about the relationship between discernment and love.

This, perhaps, is one of the greatest naiveties in the church today. If you have anything to say that is perceived to be negative, there will be plenty of Christians ready to tell you you’re not being loving. Others won’t directly make that accusation but will instead point out that they’re “just going to keep on loving people,” as if it’s impossible to offer truth while loving people.

Now, there are certainly times when Christians deliver truth in unloving ways. That’s a whole other conversation. But what I’m addressing here is the aversion some Christians have to any sort of statement that suggests a person, group, or action is wrong from a biblical perspective. In a lot of cases, those Christians even agree that the person/group/action is wrong, but they think there’s a negative tradeoff between drawing attention to our disagreement and being loving.

Please hear me out: It is not more loving, biblically speaking, for Christians to be a group of Pollyannas in a hostile culture. It’s naïve.

Jesus didn’t create the church to be an endless source of warm fuzzies to the world around us. That approach may draw some people to some version of Christianity, but it won’t be a Christianity based on the teachings of Jesus himself. As Christians, we’re called to be salt and light in the world. But how can we “preserve” God’s message when we refuse to share what He’s said in the name of our own definition of love—one rooted in either comfortable silence or superficial niceties? Surely, this is not a biblical love for others, as I explained in my last post. A biblical love is one that loves others in the context of what it first means to love God.

Furthermore, it’s extremely naïve to think that the more we look like the world—cheerfully glossing over the worldview differences that should drive our thinking and living—the more people will seek Jesus. Why seek Jesus when who He is and what He taught apparently makes no tangible difference in the lives of Christians, other than that they (sometimes) go to church on Sundays and pray in the quiet of their homes? How does this challenge people to consider the radical claims that Jesus was God himself, has authority over our lives, made reconciliation with our Creator possible through his sacrifice on the cross, was supernaturally raised from the dead, and is our only hope for eternal life?

It doesn’t.

We can keep on smiling and nodding along with culture, but let’s not be deluded that we’re doing Jesus any favors with complacency in the name of “love.”

2. There’s a naivety about the relationship between discernment and action.

I received several well-meaning comments and messages in response to my article suggesting that what Christians need to be focusing on right now is how to help those who are suffering due to inequality and discrimination…not on being critical of how people are doing that. In other words, don’t worry about the underlying (neo-Marxist) worldview of an organization like Black Lives Matter, just jump in and serve alongside of them—why can’t we all just work together, even if we have some disagreements?

To be clear, I didn’t say or imply that Christians should never work side-by-side with nonbelievers. That would be ridiculous. Once again, however, nuance is called for. There are many non-Christian organizations in the world working toward causes that Christians should care about as much as non-Christians, and in ways that don’t conflict with a Christian worldview. If we want to help save an endangered species side-by-side with an organization that assumes a naturalistic worldview (in which that species developed through blind, purposeless chance), there’s probably not an issue. Our approaches and end goals, in that case, can align despite divergent underlying worldviews.

But what if a non-Christian organization seeks to achieve a common goal using approaches in conflict with a Christian worldview?

And what if it turns out that what we think is a common goal is only superficially in common? That when we dig deeper, we find out that we may be using similar words but have a wildly different ending vision in mind?

This is exactly the issue in the case of Christians and the BLM organization. BLM’s specific vision and desired policy approaches for getting there are decidedly hostile to a Christian worldview. Al Mohler does a good job of explaining why in this article, so I’ll encourage you to click here for further explanation if you’re unfamiliar with the issues.

As Mohler says, “Black Lives Matter did not emerge merely as a sentence. Those three words function as a message and a platform making a significant political statement—one guided by a Marxist ideology that seeks to revolutionize our culture and society.”

And to be sure, the label of “Marxist ideology” is not something being unfairly thrust upon BLM. You can see a video here of BLM founder Patrisse Cullors assuring her interviewer that the group has an underlying ideology: “We’re trained Marxists.”

I have no doubt that Christians are well-meaning when they say they just want to get involved and do something to show their concern and support for the black community. But the choice isn’t BLM or nothing, and pointing out major issues with BLM doesn’t imply an encouragement to do nothing! (As just one alternative, you can bring training to your church on how to better support biblical justice through the latest efforts of the Center for Biblical Unity.)

Discernment must go hand-in-hand with action. If we’re unaware of how our actions are working toward a society opposed to our fundamental beliefs, we’re just naïve lambs being led to the slaughter. Well-meaning Christians may not realize it along the way, but make no mistake…those leading the lambs most certainly do.

3. There’s a naivety about the relationship between discernment and fear.

Another common response I see to articles written about the distinction between biblical and non-biblical thinking is that the activity of discernment is inherently fear-based.

“Do we really have to fear anything that isn’t explicitly Christian?”

“Why are you scared of people who believe differently?”

It’s unfortunate and sad when Christians think that the motivation behind discernment is somehow rooted in fear, as common statements like these assume. When someone attempts to clarify the line between biblical and non-biblical thinking, they’re not “scared” of what others believe or suggesting that there can be no common ground at all; they’re illuminating important differences because Christians should be able to see clearly enough to guard God’s truth from error (1 Tim. 4:16).

As Christians, we should be concerned when the lines between biblical and secular thinking are becoming so muddled in the minds of many believers that we’re losing our ability to impact culture. But concern isn’t some kind of unhinged emotional response that’s anxiously scrambling to get people to see your way because you’re afraid you’re losing a battle (the idea I think people have in mind when they make statements like the examples here). We know how the battle ends, but we’re called to preserve and fight for truth in the meantime. To not do so because we assume discernment is rooted in fear is a naivety about the need to think and live differently than the secular world. It’s a failure to understand just how different a biblical worldview and all of its implications for our lives really are.

4. There’s a naivety about the relationship between discernment and unity.

Finally, another common refrain from Christians when discernment-related questions are raised is that those questions cause “division” in the body of Christ. The basic idea is that we need to prioritize unity over differences.

But take that thinking to the extreme: Should we align ourselves with Christians who think blowing up buildings is “biblical”? Of course not. I can’t imagine that the same people who comment about our need for unity would say we should. We all recognize that a line must be drawn at some point. The problem is that many Christians are subjectively drawing that line based on cultural comfort rather than biblical direction.

In Ephesians 4:11–15, Paul tells Christians to speak the truth in love rather than being like infants “tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching.” The result, he says, is that we will “grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ.”

Discernment is part of spiritual maturity.

Paul speaks to the importance of sound doctrine in his instructions to Timothy as well: “Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.” (2 Tim. 4:2–4)

The Bible in no way suggests that we are to accept all ideas put forth in the name of Christ as equally valid or to remain silent. Championing a superficial unity to avoid working through disagreement naively allows many harmful ideas to infiltrate the church. [For help talking about this with your kids, see Part 2 in Talking with Your Kids about Jesus.]

In sending out his twelve disciples, Jesus said, “I am sending you out like sheep among wolves. Therefore be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves” (Matthew 10:16). Just as today, the world the disciples would be preaching to was hostile to their message. Jesus’s command to them was to navigate what they would encounter by being shrewd—having “sharp powers of judgment,” as the dictionary defines it. We, too, should be both shrewd and innocent, but we’ve lost a lot of that balance to the naïve confusions I described here.

How do we fix it? That will be the subject of my next article.

Recommended resources related to the topic:

How to Interpret Your Bible by Dr. Frank Turek DVD Complete Series, INSTRUCTOR Study Guide, and STUDENT Study Guide

How Philosophy Can Help Your Theology by Richard Howe (MP3 Set), (mp4 Download Set), and (DVD Set) 

Counter Culture Christian: Is There Truth in Religion? (DVD) by Frank Turek: http://bit.ly/2zm2VLF

The Case for Christian Activism MP3 Set, DVD Set, mp4 Download Set by Frank Turek

 

Natasha Crain is a blogger, author, and national speaker who is passionate about equipping Christian parents to raise their kids with an understanding of how to make a case for and defend their faith in an increasingly secular world. She is the author of two apologetics books for parents: Talking with Your Kids about God (2017) and Keeping Your Kids on God’s Side (2016). Natasha has an MBA in marketing and statistics from UCLA and a certificate in Christian apologetics from Biola University. A former marketing executive and adjunct professor, she lives in Southern California with her husband and three children.

Original Blog Source: https://bit.ly/2DH4GZ4  

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