Dr Youssef, well done and true.

As for the president, we can’t know what is in Mr Obama’s heart. His actions and associations, however, speak volumes.

Three years into his presidency, we should no longer give him the benefit of the doubt: he is either willfully ignorant about Islam, or lies about it for political gain. Neither is acceptable.

This is not a partisan problem: Sadly, Mr Obama is not alone in this deception. President Bush also, repeatedly and against all evidence, referred to Islam as a “religion of peace.”

As always, we should defend Christians, wherever they may be. Let us also pray for Muslims, that they may see the light that is Christ.

I happen to be a Reformed Protestant (think 5 solas), one of those dread Calvinists, and I believe that most of us are not quite going to make it to heaven. Quite probably including (excluding?) me, but, hey, I enjoy a challenge as much as the next guy…

What brought all this up is today’s Bible verse, Matthew 13:47-48:

Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a net, that was cast into the sea, and gathered of every kind: Which, when it was full, they drew to shore, and sat down, and gathered the good into vessels, but cast the bad away.

The Bible is chock full of such verses, e.g. goat and sheep, those who the Father sends, and so forth. Further, Scripture clearly tells us that we will all be judged by God.

The criteria for admission to heaven are pretty clear: love God, love your neighbor as yourself (Matthew 22:36-39). Everything else is just commentary. Judgment as to how well one did these things is not up to us. God, and God alone, will be the judge.

That doesn’t mean we sit idly by and excuse heinous behavior, or pretend that it doesn’t matter to God. The point? Not all of us will get past those pearly gates. Observation of what goes on on this side of the Kingdom of God is instructive. Far too many people in this world don’t look like they’re even trying to make the cut.

It’s through Jesus that God’s promise to Abraham is fulfilled.

Too simple? Piper provides context, with inexorable logic:

God promised Abraham that through his offspring all the families of the earth would be blessed (Genesis 12:3). Then came the narrowing down: Isaac, not Ishmael; Jacob, not Esau; the twelve tribes of Israel, not the nations; the tribe of Judah, not his eleven brothers; David, not Jesse’s other sons.

God chose one, and then one again, and then again, all pointing to his final choice, Jesus Christ, the offspring. It’s through Jesus that God’s promise to Abraham is fulfilled. In Jesus all the familes of the earth are blessed — Arab, Asian, African, American — everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved (Romans 10:13).

Thus are the sons of Ishmael, and everyone else alive on earth for that matter, able to be blessed.

My Calvinist instincts might be prone to raise an argument against Romans 10:13; it is not sufficient to merely call on the name of the Lord. God, from the very beginning of time, has chosen those who will make such a call.

That said, ss Mr Piper concludes, it is up to us to help do the Lord’s work by spreading the Gospel to those who now deny the sons of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, and, the Son of Man, Jesus Christ.

But to judge, in the common English sense of the word, means to discern, to distinguish, to characterize. It’s not “judgment” in the sense of the Gospels. That sense is clear from this passage from the Gospel of my namesake, St John (5:25-29):

Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live. For as the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself; and hath given him authority to execute judgment also, because he is the Son of man. Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.

God will judge us, at the end. While we are here on this Earth, we need our judgment. We need to judge what is right, what is wrong, what is good, what is evil. And, if we’re able, act on those judgements.

Those who don’t judge in this sense, and let pass and do nothing about things that are evil, will likely not be well judged in the end. By God; not by me, or thee.

From a Reformed Protestant perspective (I am one such), the KJV suffers some theological dissonance relative to its close cousin the Geneva Bible (1599 edition).

For example, James had his translators remove the word “tyrant,” which the Geneva reformers used to refer to popes and monarchs who would have themselves appointed as head of their national churches.

Also, there are today more accurate translations from the original languages. For example, today’s English Standard Version (ESV)is a better word-for-word version than the KJV (thought-for-thought versions are akin to having training wheels on a bike, and don’t belong in a proper church, but then I’m old-school).

Let’s put it this way: if you want to read the Bible for comprehension, the ESV is easier for us moderns. However, all that said, when I want to feel what God is saying to us through Scripture, as against read Scripture, it’s to my Authorized 1611 KJV I go.

2:1 In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. 2 This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. 3 And all went to be registered, each to his own town. 4 And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, 5 to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. 6 And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. 7 And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

8 And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. 9 And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear. 10 And the angel said to them, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. 11 For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. 12 And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.” 13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying,

14 “Glory to God in the highest,
and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!”

Merry Christmas to all; keep Him in your heart.

It’s been a common complaint that supposedly Catholic universities are not nearly as Catholic as once they were. A that political correctness now reigns, in the form of “I’m OK, you’re OK” religious “tolerance” that goes so far as to ignore the Christian faith’s bedrock beliefs of exclusivity.

In this regard, the liberal press has two lodestars: firstly, that no religion may have an exclusive claim to the truth. Secondly, that Islam should have a privileged place in America. That is, there shall never be anything that inconveniences a Muslim from his prayers or other requirements of his faith, and that never shall be heard a discouraging word about embarrassing things such as Islamic terrorism or the absolute intolerance of Jews and Christians in Muslim lands.

A case in point was a style-type article in the news section of the ever-so-politically correct Washington Post. “Enrollment of Muslim students is growing at Catholic colleges in U.S.” extols the headline, and the article is a paean to the increasing numbers of Muslim students at schools such as Georgetown and Catholic University.

These formerly Catholic schools’ faculty and administrators would never, ever, be so rude as to even suggest that, according to our Scripture, Muslims are bound for hellfire. As are all others who don’t accept Christ as Lord and Savior. Now, as they say, your mileage may vary, and you may believe as you wish. And we must certainly allow that we Christians may be wrong, and acknowledge that we may not coerce or force others to come to Christ. He, the Lord, will take care of that, if we but, as it says in Scripture, “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight” (Mark 1:3).

But we should never, ever, deny Christ as Lord and Savior. And in this world, our task is to bring others to Christ. Not meet them halfway. There is no “halfway.” There is Christ, or there is hellfire.

Icon of Jesus Christ

From Dr. Michael Youssef on Obama’s Christianity:

Obama may not be a Muslim. But until he comes out and says, “Jesus is the only way to the Father and heaven,” he is not a true Christian either.

Dr. Youssef’s comments are in the context of the apparently cozy relationship between Islamists and so-called mainline Protestant churches. The ones, like the Episcopalians, Jeremiah Wright’s United Church of Louis Farrakhan, er, Jesus Christ, the Unitarians. You know them, the squishes, who essentially reject Christ as Savior.

It is a funny accident of history that those Christians who are today the best supporters of Israel and the Jewish people tend to be folks like me: evangelicals. It is no accident that because we support Israel and the Jews, Islamists detest us. As Dr. Youssef notes, when you declare Jesus Christ as the only way to the Father, you kind of rule out Mohammed and the violent jihad of his followers.

As far as Obama making a declaration of faith, I don’t think it ought be demanded. That would be unamerican, frankly. Sure, I would want my president to be a confessing Christian, but I also would not make the man’s faith a test for holding the office. Not that I’m happy with the incumbent, who is what we used to call in school a sucking up brown-noser to the Muslim world.

The Taliban asserted responsibility for the attack, accusing the medical volunteers of being foreign spies and trying to convert Muslims to Christianity, accusations the group denies.

I doubt they were “foreign spies,” but isn’t it sad that a supposedly Christian group, that is witnessing Christ to Muslims in its own way, would not also seek to win them to Christ?

Our politically correct “leaders” tell us to respect other cultures and religions. If Muslims tolerate murderers in the name of Islam, as committed by the Taliban and other jihadis, there is nothing worthy of respect. As for the Christians who deny the Great Commission (Matthew 28:19), they in essence have denied Christ.

The most charitable interpretation is that the group, the International Assistance Mission, in denying that it was handing out bibles, was taking the safe course of action. A course of action that would enable it to continue its mission. If so, God bless them and may they win many Afghans to Christ through their actions.

However, as executive director Dirk Frans said, “it was inconceivable that the medical team was handing out Bibles.” To paraphrase Inigo Montoya, I do not think that word means what Frans thinks it to mean.

One may only hope that along with medical work, any Christian might, somehow, share the Word of God with those who do not know of it.

Included among the fluffy bunnies are those who view Jesus as just a kind person who preached in favor of nonviolence, the poor, and downtrodden.  This would include many secularists and liberals such as Richard Cohen, whose review of Gibson’s movie prompted this train of thought.  His review back in March 2004 shows how even a well-informed liberal can totally miss the message.

Cohen admits, straightaway for those who haven’t read his body of work, that

I may not be a typical viewer. Importantly, I am not a Christian and so, I suppose, I am not conditioned to seeing the passion of Christ in religious terms.

You don’t say. He then goes on to describe the violence of The Passion as having a ” fascistic sensibility.”  He actually takes this theme to its reductio ad absurdum by writing that “portions of the New Testament are — an assignment of blame that culminated in the Holocaust”.  The only problem with this statement is it turns the gospel message of love, forgiveness, and redemption on its head, and frankly ignores it.  That those who would kill our Savior’s people, the Jews, in the name of the good news of His coming pervert the gospels beyond recognition.  Whatever else such people may be, they are not Christian.

The truth is much harder than the misuse of the gospels.  The truth, the necessary truth, is that some Jews of Jesus’ time did conspire to kill him.  It would be inaccurate in the extreme to claim that it was just the Romans.  As a matter of biblical prophecy, it had to be Jesus’ own people who rejected Him, as they had rejected Israel’s prophets in the past.  Mainstream Christian teaching today, especially including the Roman Catholic Church, emphatically denies that today’s Jews, or even all Jews of the First Century CE, are “Christ killers”, or, more ludicrously, “killers of God”.

However, it seems that many liberal Christians would likely agree with Cohen’s wrong-headed assertion of a straight line from the gospels to the Holocaust.  I assert that many of these are the also those who focus on the good, safe, freshly-shampooed Jesus of popular piety, even, perhaps, the “Buddy Christ” sent up in Kevin Smith’s Dogma.  It’s hard to imagine such a vision of Jesus as stinking, as bleeding, or dying a hideous death for us on the cross.

The violence of the Passion is probably much, much worse than the gospel writers would want to commit to papyrus.  It is scary, and what is scariest is what Cohen reports as part of his reaction — that we tend to view this awful violence dispassionately, from a distance, as if through a distorted lens.  So we glide through Lent, celebrate Palm Sunday when the crowds are still with Jesus as He enters Jerusalem, and then, scoot quickly towards Resurrection Sunday, Easter morn.

Cohen is also right on the mark when he notes that it may require a religious sensibility to fully accept the violence as being a necessary part of the story of The Christ.  Knowing that we killed Jesus, and knowing that He bore more pain than is, literally, humanly possible, does require faith.

Christianity is a hard religion; it requires the cross, a scandal, as St. Paul wrote.  Jesus lived in order to die with extreme violence.  He also died in order to give us life, but a life that is far from the “I’m ok, you’re ok” blandness of the Fluffy Bunny Christians.

[originally published on my old blog in March 2004; still relevant]