So What's This All About?

In case you didn't know, I'm in the multi-year-long process of posting a Christian devotional at the TAWG Blog. The TAWG Blog is, and always will be, mostly apolitical. For the most part, Bible-believing Christians will find little to disagree with there. But I also firmly believe that God's word can--and should--inform everything in life, and this should include politics and popular culture. How should we vote? How should we respond to hot topics such as abortion, capital punishment, taxes, and other issues? Which party, if either, is closer to the Biblical ideal? Tony Campolo and Ron Sider, Evangelicals whose political leanings are on the Left, have made the case in several of their writings that God wants his followers to vote politically on the Left more than on the Right. At times, some of them have gone so far as to equate voting on the Left with obedience to Christ, either subtly or not-so-subtly contending that the converse is true as well: If you vote Republican, you're sinning against the Savior.
I don't agree. I think that to the degree they actually resort to the Bible, they're misinterpreting it. With a whole bunch of caveats, I think politically conservative positions are a lot more compatible with the Scriptures than the Leftist positions.
Just to clarify, I would never accuse people who disagree with me--especially siblings in Christ--of what they accuse me of. I don't judge my own heart, much less anyone else's, and I don't equate political disagreement with theological fidelity to God. I have no reason to doubt their love for the Lord and "for the least of these," but I believe that they're sincerely wrong.
So there are two main purposes for this blog. One is to make a case for my political beliefs based on Scripture. The other is a bit more vague, basically to work out my political beliefs and figure out what's based on Scripture and what's based on my own biases. I certainly don't have all the answers. Some of this stuff I'm still figuring out. And I'm certainly open to correction. As long as you make your case civilly and based on Scripture, feel free to make a comment, and I promise I'll post it and consider your arguments thoughtfully and prayerfully. Who knows? Maybe we'll learn a little something from each other.
May God bless our common striving together towards both the "little t" truth and "Big T" Truth. Our watchword here is a line from C. S. Lewis's The Last Battle: "Further up and further in!"

P.S. -- Below on the left is "Topics I've Covered" which lists everything I've posted topically. It's come to my attention that some people would like to see everything just listed for them. If that's you, you can get it here. Thanks to my friend Stephen Young for the tip!

Wednesday, June 11, 2014

A Time For War: A Review of Fight: A Christian Case for Non-Violence by Preston Sprinkle, Part Seven

Whenever I disagree with someone, especially a sibling in Christ, I want to be as fair in presenting their side as humanly possible. Therefore, after I finished his book, I sent the following email to Dr. Sprinkle:

Dr. Sprinkle,

My name is Keith, and based on the review in Christianity Today, I bought and read your recent work “Fight: A Christian Case for Non-Violence.” When I read the review of your book, my mind immediately came up with a dozen different Scriptural/theological objections to your position. I thought “But what about Romans 13?” “What about Genesis 9:6?” I thought for sure you’d indulge in special pleading and never actually address passages which don’t seem to support your position. I was wrong in this, and was pleasantly surprised by your willingness to do so.

First, just a little bit of my background. I’m an Evangelical (Southern Baptist), and I lean towards the Reformed understanding of Scripture (a lot more towards their soteriology than their eschatology). I believe in the Bible and take it as written from cover to cover. I love my Savior. Not as much as I should, but like all of us I’m a work in progress.

I was in the Army for 6 years, participated in Desert Shield/Storm (although I never actually engaged in combat), and studied for and received a Master’s Degree in Missiology from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.  I’m also politically conservative. I’m pro-life. I vote Republican. I believe in the Free Market System as the best of all economic systems we can come up with in a fallen world. All this takes a back seat to everything in the preceding paragraph, but it’s there.

I have to say, I’m impressed with your book. I still disagree with you profoundly in your analysis of some passages, and I come to completely different conclusions. I reject the pacifist position, and have absolutely no problem with Christians serving in the military or the police or any other law-enforcement organization in which they might (theoretically) be called upon to kill an evildoer. Your and my respective interpretations of certain U.S. military actions are very different. I don’t think there’s an intrinsic incompatibility between trusting in the Lord and building up the military, just like I don’t think there’s one between trusting the Lord and locking your door at night and turning on a security alarm. And I heartily disagree with your exegesis of Romans 13. On a side-note, the examples you give of people you disagree with sometimes wander into straw-man arguments, but not nearly as often as I thought it would. I give you major props for actually confronting arguments which disagree with you, even if I have some quibbles about how you present opposing views at times.  

Having said all that, I respect you. I don’t for one moment question your sincerity and devotion to our Savior. You obviously take God’s word very seriously, and I don’t accuse you of being a “wimp” or being anything less of a man because of the positions you’ve taken on these issues. I don’t think you’re a coward. I don’t think you’re taking “the easy way out.”  

Your book is a very thorough case for nonviolence/pacifism, and you cover biblical history pretty well, even if I disagree a bit with some of your interpretation of it. Of course, it’s not exhaustive, nor would I expect it to be, since you’re obviously targeting more of a general audience. However, there are a few lacunae which I noticed, and I’d appreciate if you could address them:

1) Nowhere do you address the common “Three God-Ordained Institutions” paradigm which is the standard among most Evangelical/Reformed theologians. I don’t know exactly how far back it goes, but I do know that Martin  Luther definitely held to it. You know, the “Family/Church/State” trichotomy? Each of these institutions has been established by the Lord for specific and discrete functions, and while there’s some overlap, whenever one of them tries to do the job of either of the other two, there’s a huge problem. In short, the state’s function is to protect the peace, provide a basic level of order in order to protect rule of law (as opposed to the rule of the jungle), and—in the words of Romans 13—“to bring punishment on the wrongdoer.” It’s there basically to keep society from completely falling apart until the Lord returns. It’s not there to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and it’s not there to raise our children. And it’s certainly not there to usher in any aspect of the Kingdom of God, either in the current version or the one to come. Quite frankly, any Bible teacher who asserts that any political system or government is going to usher in paradise on earth (in any sense) is either not thinking or presenting clearly. Continuing this motif, the church’s job is not to keep the peace in society or punish evildoers. The Gospel is never advanced by the sword, and on that point I think we’re in complete agreement.

You don’t address this above paradigm at all in the book, to commend it or critique it or reject it. Your view of the state seems to range between antipathy and apathy, and I think there’s either an implicit or explicit rejection of the above model in your thought process. I understand that you don’t have room to include everything, but I think that addressing it would’ve been useful. Could you address this with me? Do you reject the above understanding of the state?

2) The reason why the above is so important is because as members and participants in the above institutions, my responsibilities are different. I served in the U.S. Army, have been a Christian since my early teen years, and was a member of my family since I was born. As an individual Christian I’m obligated to “turn the other cheek,” and the obligations of the Sermon on the Mount apply to me. As a soldier or a cop, I’m not representing my own interests; if an enemy solider or a mugger shoots at me, he’s not shooting just at me, he’s shooting at what the uniform represents. When I shoot at him as a soldier, that’s an entirely different thing than if I was shooting at him as an individual or taking vengeance for myself in any way. I’m sure you reject this interpretation, but I think it merits addressing further.

3) I thoroughly believe in the full 100% inspiration of the Bible. I believe that the words of Jesus as recorded in the Gospels is [sic] the word of God. Having said that, there’s a problem with taking all of Jesus’ commands in the Sermon as categorical without considering the rest of Scripture. For example, do you pray in public at all? Is Jesus opposed to praying in public? If all we had was the Sermon, you’d definitely get that impression, but we have the rest of Scripture to give us balance. Do you literally give anything you own to whoever asks you for it? If I simply asked you, would you be willing to hand over the keys to your house and your car?

4) Is trusting in the Lord intrinsically incompatible with using earthly means to protect yourself? Each and every time? Do you lock your doors at night? How could you possibly do that, if you trust in the Lord to protect you? I fully understand your focus on the dangers of trusting in earthly means to the detriment of trusting the Lord. The Lord—as you so aptly put it—repeatedly warned against this tendency, just as he warns against the dangers of wealth. I’ve come to the conclusion that earthly wealth is not bad, but it’s very dangerous. Just like with the military, there are lots of warnings against greed, putting your trust in riches, etc., scattered throughout Scripture. But there are some men in the Bible who A) are very very wealthy, and B) commended by God as following him faithfully (not perfectly). There’s Job and Abraham just off the top of my head. So it’s possible—not easy, but possible—to have material wealth in this world and still have the right attitude towards it. I think it’s the same with military might.

The reason I’m approaching you on this is because I have a blog called Intersections, in which I try to hash out where politics, pop culture, and the Bible intersect. I try to be fair with those who disagree with me, but I’ve come to the conclusion that the politically conservative position—in general—is closer to a biblical worldview than the liberal/progressive alternative. I plan on presenting my review/critique of your book on the blog soon, and I want to fairly present your side as best as I can. I fully understand that you’re undoubtedly really busy, so I’d never interpret a lack of response from you as an unwillingness to hash this out with someone who disagrees with your biblical interpretation somewhat. My critique will include some passages of Scripture and some objections which you don’t specifically address in your book, and I’d like to give you a chance to respond to those before I publish anything. If you don’t respond, however, I’ll have to present my critiques without your specific response, and I don’t want to do that.

Let me make absolutely clear that my critique will be respectful. As I mentioned before, I don’t consider you to be cowardly or ill-informed or hypocritical. I consider you a brother in Christ who happens to have a fairly major ethical disagreement with me. The reason I’m critiquing your book is because I think that your work is the most biblically-based, reasoned, thoughtful, fair-minded presentation of the Christian pacifist movement that I’ve read so far. Theologically we agree far more than we disagree. It’s really only on this one issue—the possibly legitimacy of physical violence by Christians in some rare circumstances—that we part ways.

May the Lord watch over any conversation we have on this, and hopefully he can use us both to encourage and “sharpen” each other (Prov. 27:17) to mutual benefit and more Christlikeness. “Further in and higher up.”

Your brother in him,
Keith

Here’s his response:

Hey Keith,

Thank you for your very kind and challenging email. I love honest and humble criticism, so thank you for your well-thought out words. 
Unfortunatley, I'm in the middle of a major move (from CA to ID) and have a ton of various things going on over the next few months. I have to limit my interactions and time, so I'm not going to be able to respond to your questions. I'm truly sorry. 
Off the top of my head, though, I didn't arrive at my view purely from the Sermon on the Mount, but surveyed all of Scripture, including the rest of the NT. 
Also, I arrived at my position from exegetical grounds; theological questions about Luther's view of the State are secondary and I've never read Luther (or little of him) so I really don't know how I feel about his view (or the Reformed view) of God/State. I think my section at the end of ch. 8 on Rom 13 (along with my chapter on Rev) will give you my view of the State.

Again, I apologize for not being able to give a thorough response. But I wanted to let you know that received your email and will continue to chew on your challenging questions. 
your brother in Christ,

Preston

            Let me say right off the bat that I fully believe him. Quite frankly, I’m a guy who’s posting on a blog. He’s a very well-known author and a professor in a well-known place of higher education (Eternity Bible College). I don’t know the figures, but I’m sure he has a lot more people paying to hear him speak and to read his works than I have people willing to read my stuff for free. If he hadn’t responded to my email at all, or with just a form letter, I wouldn’t have taken it as an unwillingness to engage with disagreeing viewpoints. It’s pretty obvious that he’s done so in the past.
            Having said that, I wish he’d had the time to respond to the points I’ve made. I’ll probably be wrapping this up in the next posting.

No comments:

Post a Comment