Why My Moralism Is More Legitimate Than Your Moralism

R. Scott Clark (click here for personal info) recently wrote an article on theological liberalism and that included the conflict with and distinction from what J. Gresham Machen wrote. Machen did a wonderful job in distinguishing theological liberalism from Christianity. According to Clark, three areas in which Machen showed the difference between Christianity theological liberalism was in the area of the supernatural, moralism, and in comparing Jesus to Paul (click here for the article). 

Though the focus of this article will be on moralism, something needs to be said regarding the areas of the supernatural and in comparing Jesus to Paul. 

Regarding supernaturalism, the theological liberalism of Machen's day, and today too much of theological liberalism denies the supernatural and reduces all of reality to the physical. Such a denial cuts at the heart of the Gospel as Machen noted. For without the supernatural intervention of God in history through Jesus Christ, we have neither the vicarious atonement of the righteous one for sinners nor is there the resurrection from the dead for our salvation and the proof that Jesus Christ is God's only begotten son.

Regarding the comparison of Jesus to Paul, Clark makes the point that theological liberalism has wanted to eliminate how Paul showed that he was a follower of Jesus by what he said about Him. Once theological liberals could sever Paul from Jesus, they could make Jesus into any kind of person they want to.

However, we should note one thing here, there seems to be some differences in what Jesus and Paul taught about our obligations in how we treat each other. While Jesus talked about taking those who persisted in unspecified sins before the Church for discipline and possible excommunication, Paul tells believers in Corinth to suffer mistreatment from fellow believers rather than taking each other to court. He said that to protect the reputation of the Gospel and because God will judge those who mistreat others in the Church. Likewise, just as we have the story of Nicodemus and how he promised to repay those he cheated according to the Law of Moses, Paul simply tells those who steal to stop and work to contribute to others.

While what Jesus said in the Gospels went along with the law, what Paul said in several instances showed a difference back then in how Jewish believers  regarded the law from how Gentile believers responded to the Law.

But the issue that this article wants to focus on here is the moralism issue. For it seems that when theological liberals and other unbelievers exhort society to pursue justice, some theological conservative Christians counter with cries of 'moralism.' And that moralism label is meant to discredit and dismiss what unbelievers are saying.

Clark illustrates, in this article, one of the major problems that come with these conservative brushing off of theological liberalism's calls for justice. How does Clark do that? He does that by pointing to rules on sexual behavior that theological liberals reject. So why can conservatives like Clark call social rules promoted by theological liberals 'moralism' while what conservatives understand of Biblical sexual morality as being obligatory? That is question that may not be answered here. For while the Bible speaks clearly as to what is allowed and disallowed in terms of how we sexually act, social justice issues promoted by theological liberals more often than not deal with the Commandments that prohibit murder or theft.

When Clark describes the sexual morality supported by theological liberalism, he writes as if the sexual moral sky is falling because of the current state that allowed for same-sex marriages. In addition, Clark gets specific in talking about sexual morals when he mentions same-sex marriage, no-fault divorce, sexual abuse, and a future that will logically bring polygamy and pederasty. Of course that future is logically deduced rather than witnessed by observation.

But Clark gives no such specific examples of social justice either in Machen's day or now. At the most, he equates those promoting social justice with the Methodist teetotalers of Machen's day, which is more historical than trivial since Machen's promotion to be Professor of Apologetics was blocked in a committee of the Presbyterian Church's General Assembly because of his opposition to the 18th Amendment that eventually made Prohibition the law of the land (see  https://www.ligonier.org/learn/articles/j-gresham-machen-the-politically-incorrect-fundamentalist  ).  Machen also opposed the creation of the Federal Department of Education, the Child Labor Amendment, and any attempt to establish a Christian culture. In the cases of the first two instances, Machen, a political Libertarian, was afraid of the sacrifice of individual freedom to a growing government. With the latter, Machen was a afraid that Christian culture would fail to respect minorities. 

Machen also opposed socialism because it would, in his opinion, result in the elimination of individual freedoms. Then again, Machen wrote that in 1923 in his book Christianity and Liberalism where his one possible exposure to Marxist socialism was Lenin and Bolshevism. The problem there is that Lenin ruled as a totalitarian, or a different kind of Tsar, rather than as a Marxist Socialist. A socialist contemporary of Lenin, Rosa Luxemburg, made a similar point though she also excused the Lenin and the Bolsheviks because of the revolutionary endeavors and the then current hardships it faced (see  https://www.marxists.org/archive/luxemburg/1918/russian-revolution/ch08.htm  )

When we look at today's social justice issues, we see that it involves much more than any past views on public consumption of alcohol. They involve racial inequality, the marginalization of the LGBT community in society, sexism, climate change, income and wealth disparities, economic exploitation, imperialism, and militarism, the last two which Machen opposed. In essence, social justice is concerned with social injustices that violate the the Commandments that prohibit it murder and theft. And yet, as previously mentioned, Clark compares those working for social justice to the Methodist teetotalers back when the Prohibition Amendment was being considered.

Clark then follows Machen's example of claiming that those working for social justice as have rejected the good news of the Gospel in favor of the law--Machen said the same about those advocating the social gospel in his day. But is such a claim true? Consider that the Gospel preaches grace and mercy as ways sinful people can favorably face a just God. Social justice is concerned with stopping current injustices and creating a more just society especially for those who have been oppressed. BTW, we should note that Machen, despite his own racism and opposition to social justice, expressed concern for those who were oppressed. Facing God is not an issue in social justice because social justice is dealing with people and the here and now. So how does promoting social justice imply a rejection of the Gospel?

What is there in the Gospel that prohibits one from working for social justice? Does believing in Jesus for the forgiveness of one's sins mean that one cannot not be concerned with and work to help fix racial inequality, the marginalization of the LGBT community in society, sexism, climate change, income and wealth disparities, economic exploitation, imperialism, or militarism? 

Can one believe the Gospel Machen taught and still work for social justice? For those who answer with a 'no,' we should note that we are playing an association game. Just as many unbelievers today might understandably but wrongly associate the rejection of working for legitimate social justice concerns with religiously conservative Christianity, so to did Machen, at least to some extent, and Clark now associate the working for social justice with theological liberalism. 

What we might be seeing in Clark and many like him is not just a whole hearted embracing of Machen's theology, it is also a mix that includes a whole hearted embracing of Machen's political libertarianism and enjoying the place of supremacy that Christianity has had in America since its beginning. That is not the same as calling America a Christian nation. That is because the idea that we can have a Christian nation is not supported by the New Testament.

In rejecting today's calls for social justice, Clark just might be reacting the way that we normally react to any calls for change in situations in which one feels comfortable. Change requires more internal energy from us than anything else we do. So besides how Clark seems to easily associate calls for social justice with theological liberalism, another reason for Clark's position here is a very natural resistance to certain changes.

There are other things could be said but we will leave it at that. Many religiously conservative Christians are having quite a difficult time in seeing the social justice movements of today as being anything other than a religious heresy. But they unwittingly do so perhaps in part for the same reasons we all have for resisting change. In addition, he does so because, perhaps like Machen to an extent, he has pronounced social justice as being antithetical to Gospel as a way of pronouncing it guilty by association.

 

Thaddeus Williams's Call For Social Justice Is A Call To Do What Causes Injustices

 Ever since the Obergefell decision, conservative Christian leaders have been in near panic mode because of what appears to be confirmation that Christianity's, also their own, status has dropped in terms of being an influential source in society. From this came their lament that Christianity has lost the "Culture Wars."

What followed was Rob Dreher's proposal called the Benedict Option (click here for book info). That option called for Christians to circle the wagons in order to stay pure from an increasingly anti-Christian culture and society until what was lost was won again. As a result, topics that are broader than what the Church is concerned about were presented with an even more Christian edge than before. The edge was so strong that what was presented were proposals on subjects that affected all of society but could only be promoted by Bible believing Christians. And that becomes problematic in a society with a fair percentage of unbelievers. Social Justice has been the topic of those Christian proposals.

What is implied by such an approach has been to encourage an all-or-nothing approach to responding to the issues brought up by subjects that affect all of society. By an all-or-nothing approach what is meant here is what Christian leaders are promoting regarding these subjects in ways that demand that Christians must either lead (a.k.a., dominate) how society deals with these subjects or abstain from participating in or with groups led by unbelievers. To participate with groups led by unbelievers would likely lead one to significantly compromise one's faith. This is especially true should a Christian see the world even in part how Marx saw the world.

This charge to lead, or dominate, gives us two problems: any other approach to Social Justice which are not based on the Scriptures is no longer society's approach to Social Justice but the Christian approach to the same, and that Christians have now put themselves into the position of dominating society with its Social Justices proposals and solution while not facing the fact that domination is the root of oppression.

So what is being reviewed here? It is Thaddeus Williams's (click here for a brief bio) perspective on Social Justice as portrayed in an interview with Fred Zaspel and posted on the Books At A Glance website. And one could either read the rest of the review or read the interview to see how much the above analysis accurately portray's Williams's perspective on the subject of Social Justice (click here for the interview).

The interview is about Williams's recent book on Social Justice called Confronting Injustices Without Compromising Truth: 12 Questions Christians Should Ask About Social Justice (click here for a link to the book).

In the beginning of the interview Williams talks about growing up in a generation where one's feeling should determine what one should do. Then he starts comparing today's Leftist approach to Social Justice with Christianity because, he claims that both are addressing the same set of existential questions revolving around how does one become justified. This kind of answer shows a disconnect between Williams's understanding about what Social Justice is about and Social Justice itself. Social Justice is really about our horizontal relationships as we exist in our groups; it is not about our vertical relationship with God. And so perhaps Williams is trying to Christianize the subject here.

In answering the next question, Williams claims that Leftists, Marxists in particular, have co-opted Social Justice issues. BTW, his criticisms of Marxists in this article beg the question that they have nothing to contribute to the subject of Social Justice. He then lists examples of Christians who worked for Social Justice starting with the early Church and proceeding through Wilberforce, Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Bonhoeffer, and Martin Luther King Jr. The trouble with his answer here is that he fails to address the vast number of examples of Christians visiting injustices on others. Examples could be taken from Europe's conquests of the New World to the Church's support for wealth in power during the pre-revolutionary times in France, Russia, and Spain as well as prior to the military coup in Chile. We see the same here with the Evangelical support for the Republican Party. In America, those injustices have often resulted from Christian support for white supremacy seen in slavery, Jim Crow, systemic racism, and the ethnic cleansing of Native Americans from the land all of which received the support from many Christians.

At this point Williams start mentioning the differences he finds between Social Justice A and Social Justice B. Social Justice A is the Christian approach to Social Justice while Social Justice B is the Leftist approach. To take the Social Justice A approach to Social Justice, one must start with the Christian beliefs in the godhead of God. At this point, we see that unbelievers cannot take the Social Justice A approach. And so what becomes of the impact of that approach? 

In saying that the Christian's pursuit of social justice, he cites Martin Luther King Jr in saying that unjust laws are those that do not reflect the transcendent laws of God. Now what Williams doesn't know is that King related this to how the law interacts with the human character.

Then Williams talks about the need for Social Justice to coincide with human nature. Here, Williams refers to our commonality found in our faith in Christ. Of course, this leaves many people out of that unity because there are so many unbelievers. But Williams later on includes our common humanity found in our relationship to Adam. But unbelievers don't need to believe in what the Scriptures say to understand our common humanity.

Williams then criticizes Social Justice B for being divisive. It is divisive, according to Williams because it strongly divides people into 2 kinds of groups and identity groups: those who are oppressed and those who oppress others. Such, according to Williams, causes endless divisions. Williams goes on to say that Social Justice B groups portray whites as oppressors. He gives two examples of people he knew who were caught up in identity groups who found their deliverance through the Christian faith. But are those divisions really caused by the Social Justice B approach or merely pointed out by the Social Justice B approach?

Williams then talks about his 12 questions for Christians to answer about Social Justice. Here, again, Williams tries to center the quest for Social Justice on the godhead of God in his first set of questions. In his second set of questions Williams asks legitimate questions about whether our different group identities are more important than our what we have in common with others through our relationship to Adam and our faith in Christ.

In the third set of questions, Williams, perhaps without knowing it, revisits the Social Justice debates between the Reagan Republicans and those who have been working for Social Justice from Martin Luther King Jr. to those promoting Critical Race Theory. For Williams looks at injustices as merely resulting from unjust laws resulting in, and these were not his words in the interview, equality of process. Such conservatives believe that because of the legislation that was inspired and passed by the Civil Rights Movement, the only substantial expressions of racism are practiced by individuals. Does Williams go that far in his analysis? He doesn't address that directly. But he does seem to believe his view of social injustices being a result of unjust laws.

However, he rejects the notion, used by Leftists, that social injustices could be also detected by 'disparate outcomes,' or what some have called the 'equality of results.' Kimberly Crenshaw defended using the equality of results to detect racism because without using results, businesses could just claim that they do not practice racism without having to show any evidence. But more importantly, Martin Luther King Jr, whom Williams cited as providing a Christian approach to Social Justice, also saw that the inequality in results is evidence of racism (click here to an King interview). Here, King included closing the wealth gap between the races as part of establishing true equality. As for what was accomplished before with the Civil Rights legislation, King thought of that as a quest for dignity, not 'genuine equality.'

In his last set of questions, Williams asks about the blaming of Christians for the injustices that have existed and still do. Again, our history provides quite bit of evidence pointing to the Christian participation in practicing social injustices.

Eventually, Williams closes with saying that justice outside of Gospel justice is a counterfeit justice. 

So the question becomes whether what was said at the beginning of this article which described the current Christian approach to Social Justice is seen in Williams's approach to Social Justice. Perhaps the problem here is that while using the term 'Social Justice,' Williams is really referring to Biblical justice. Thus, it seems that Williams is conflating the two. And is such a conflation something that is neither helpful nor Biblical.

There is at least one other question we could ask. With what Williams says about the quest for Social Justice starting with the godhead of God, and thus with the Christian faith, does he not create a permanent and deep division between Christians who thus have come to believe that they have everything to teach unbelievers about Social Justice and nothing to learn from them, to adapt a Martin Luther King Jr. saying,  and all others who follow other approaches? And if so, doesn't he do so despite criticizing Social Justice B for being divisive?

Christianity And Social Justice

 Tim Keller (click here for a bio) is a deservedly well respected and popular leader in Reformed Theology. He thinks through issues more thoroughly than many other leaders. He will use the Reformed Theological traditions, the confessions and catechisms, without putting them on too high a pedestal. And many Christians from the Reformed theological tradition rightfully look to him for guidance when confronting today's issues. Of course Keller is not infallible. But some of the criticisms of him are simply silly and reflect more on his critics than on him.

But there are valid criticisms to make of what he teaches, and his approach to justice have some questionable areas depending on one's context. And hopefully, the criticisms made in this blogpost will not add to the list of silly criticisms made by some others. The article being reviewed here is called Justice In The Bible (click here for the article). This article is part of a series of articles on justice and it contains links to those other articles.

The article, if it is to be read within the context of its title, is an important subject for Christians to study and to act on. But, and this cannot be emphasized enough, Biblical justice is not social justice--a distinction not made in the article being reviewed from what I have read. The difference between the two can be found in who is defining justice. In the former, God's Word tells us what is just. In the latter, it must be society that determines what is just and must act on what it finds. Keller's article makes some very good points that many other Christians fail to make in talking about biblical justice. But it does not provide a good aid for Christians who are working for social justice. Why is that? It is because despite some of his words that state otherwise, Keller's assessment of social justice movements acts more to discourage Christians from working for social justice than to encourage them.

Again, we should be reminded that social justice must be a societal response. That means that for the Christian to pursue social justice, they must work side by side with unbelievers. And that becomes difficult when Christian leaders, Keller is not the only one, overly criticize social justice movements while extolling a given Christian approach. And that is how Keller begins his article. He states that only the Bible gives a comprehensive enough treatment on the subject of justice while secular approaches are reductive.

What should be pointed out here is that the Bible's treatment of justice is one that cannot be fully reached this side of heaven. Thus, not everything that the Bible prescribes about justice is applicable here. In addition, along with overly criticizing secular approaches to justice, Keller writes that Christians who wish to pursue justice should begin with the Church. Though he does tell believers to work in the world, when we combine the claim of having a superior view of justice with his criticism of social justice approaches along with some errors in how he describes some secular movements, those who uncritically agree with him have far more reasons to not only work for justice within the confines of the Church, but to restrict their readings on justice to Christian views only. Thus, they will tend to be unable to pursue social justice.

Some of his errors in assessing other groups come with his comments about the Left. His comments about socialism imply that socialism is a monolith about power (a statement made from another article in his series on justice) that believes that a person's money belongs to the state. At this point, Keller has not only failed to distinguish Socialism in the Marxist tradition from Socialism that existed before Marx, he has failed to distinguish the different approaches to Socialism by those who lean toward Marx. Libertarian Socialism, for example, doesn't really believe in the State. Other forms of Marxist Socialism don't apply an all-or-nothing approach to private possessions and wealth as what Keller seems to have assumed.

And perhaps one of his most blatant errors in this article is when he says the following about Critical Race Theory (CRT)

CRT sees all racial disparities and inequalities are due to structural factors.

But how can that be when CRT sees racism as a combination of individual racial prejudice and social structures that discriminate or oppress people because of race (click here and there).

Furthermore, he seems to have strongly discouraged Christians from relying too much on a CRT viewpoint. Why? The following quotes might help answer that.

On the one hand, CRT can’t be used merely as a tool apart from its worldview assumptions, because the underlying worldview in many ways is the tool.

And

Listening to CRT thinkers can help us rediscover our own tools, rather than simply using theirs.

Regarding the first quote, we should remember that  CRT's worldview assumptions do not have be either accepted or reject in whole. They can be accepted in varying degrees depending on how they match up with God's Word.

The second quote shows why this article does not help Christians in pursuing social justice. This Christian apartheid approach to tools used to pursue justice removes Christians from working with CRT in part. It seems that Christians are restricted to using tools founded by other Christians.

Likewise, when Keller talks about equality, he seems to say that the concept of equality started with the Scriptures. If we consider the fact that the attempts to promote equality by our nation's founding fathers was flawed, then Keller's comments on why Aristotle seem to overstate the case. Aristotle, in a flawed way, did teach about and promote equality. Thus, the Bible doesn't have a monopoly on the concept of equality.

We might also ask if why Keller sees universal equality in the Scriptures because of the times. We should note that at least some others from the Reformed theological tradition did not necessarily see the same in the Scriptures. Here we could think of the Puritans, Jonathan Edwards, J. Gresham Machen.

Finally, I got the impression that this article by Keller was written as if he was participating in a measuring contest where he was writing to show the vast superiority of what he sees as the biblical approach to justice compared to what we see in the secular social justice movements, in particular those influenced by Marxism.

The above lists some of the flaws in Keller's article. and realize that those some of those flaws depend on the context in which one reads the article, there is much good in the article which is usually absent from other religiously conservative Christian writings on justice. His writings on how we are to advocate for the the vulnerable is a bright spot though he is reluctant for the Church to speak out as an institution on politics.

Perhaps the biggest strength of this article is found in Keller's treatment of corporate sin and corporate responsibility. To better understand those concepts, we only need to replace the word 'corporate' with the word 'group' where, in this case, the group is a society or the state. This part of Keller's teaching is very important because of the emphasis on individualism by many religiously conservative American Christians. We sin partly because of how the groups we are a part of have influenced us and the groups we belong to sin. The former explains why Israel was punished for the sins of individual Israelites. It also explains why Achen's family was punished with him for his sin (see Joshua 7). Keller lists how some nations sinned and thus were punished by God in the Old Testament. And by some nations it means that Israel was not the only nation punished for its sins.

Keller did well in drawing attention to systemic racism. As Keller wrote in the article, this is a very tough reality for American white Christians to acknowledge and Keller does well to bring this reality to our attention. He tells us that all of us Christians must work together to see how systemic racism was evident through slavery, Jim Crow, and redlining (he refers to that concept without using the word). But then he mentions how systemic racism exists today such as in how public schools are funded and how racism exists in the criminal justice system. But as Keller called systemic racism the 'elephant' in the room, economic classism shows that one can have more than one elephant in the room.

Keller also does well to remind us Christians of our duty to help and care for the vulnerable such as the poor. That not only should we be advocates for them, but that our efforts to help them should be sacrificial. 

There are other good parts in the article and it is well worth reading. I should note that my own history might have colored how I have read this article. My experiences of protesting wars, protesting for the rights of immigrants, my past participation in a local activist group as well as in Occupy Wall Street have moved me to believe that we Christians need to be working hand in hand with others and not be afraid of what social justice movements teach. If we know the Scriptures well enough, we should be able discern what beliefs in those movements are not scriptural.

And we should note that Keller tells us to be political but not partisan. I believe that a better way to say that is to say that we should be involved in different social group movements but without being tribal. Here, being tribal, or tribalism, refers to a possessing a high degree of loyalty to a group such that loyalty to that group trumps our commitment to principles and values, especially those we learn from the Scriptures. The end result of tribalism is that we see right and wrong being determined by who does what to whom. We shouldn't have such allegiance to any group that prevents us from errors and sins.

Another Christian View Of Social Justice

Because of the times, Christian leaders have had to focus their attention on social justice issues again. This previously occurred during the Civil Rights Movement and opposition to the Vietnam War. It has probably occurred before that including with the abolition movement. But today we see a resurgence in such interest in social justice.

Now I am most familiar with the Reformed Theology response to today's social injustices and the social justice movement. But my brief exposure to other religiously conservative Christian responses to today's social injustices and the social justice movement tells me that there is a near consensus of opposition to today's social justice movement. It isn't that there is no significant agreement between the two groups. That there is some agreement is one of the reasons why the writers I have read have tried to speak forcefully against today's social injustices. But they also speak against today's social justice movements while doing so. They have written that way because they are afraid of the inroads that today's social justice movements have made into the conservative churches.

Thus, there is a significant weakness in the conservative Christian response to today's social injustices and the social justice movements. That weakness is to try to speak to today's social injustices in ways that give the impression that any valid points made about social justice stated by today's social justice movements have already been better said by conservative Christian leaders as they speak from the Bible. And so even though these conservative Christian leaders say that they don't want to dismiss today's social justice movements, they do just that by implying that they themselves have everything to teach the world about how to approach social justice and nothing to learn from others. So these conservative Christian leaders claim that while today's social justice movements may be able to point out some of the problems that exist, they are unable to say anything solving our problems with the injustices better than what religiously conservative Christian leaders have said.

As a result, pursuing social justice no longer becomes a collaborative effort by equal partners in society. Instead, some conservative Christian leaders are telling their followers, and the world, to follow them as they, again, speak in a much better way than their theologically liberal and secular counterparts have. Thus, these conservative Christian leaders are vying for a privileged position for conservative Christianity in society. For they believe that without the religiously conservative Christian view of social justice, society's efforts to solve problems with social injustices are doomed to failure. And so the end game implied by these conservative Christian leaders is for America to pursue an ethnocracy led by conservative Christianity while leaving behind what is left of our democracy.

What is an ethnocracy? Below is one definition of an ethnocracy (the definition below is partially based on the definition given here): 

A form of government in which a particular ethnic group holds a disproportionate amount of government power so that the state and society are not shared as equal partners.

And how do we define an 'ethnic group'? Ethnic can be defined in the following way (click here):

of or relating to large groups of people classed according to common racial, national, tribal, religious, linguistic, or cultural origin or background

In other words, when one group, such as a religiously conservative Christians, tries dominates the discussion on how to respond to social injustices, what it proposes no longer becomes a societal response. It becomes a special group response. That causes us to take the 'social' out of social justice. And that is designed to lead us to accept religiously conservative Christianity as deserving a special place of supremacy in leading, or controlling, society. The loss of that special place of supremacy is the point of the "culture wars" mentality that many religiously conservative Christians embrace.

There is one more observation to make as to why these conservative Christian leaders are reacting to the social justice movements the way they do. It is because the most visible social justice movements lean toward Marxism.This is highly offensive to those conservative Christian leaders because Marxism and its variants would dare become the slayers of Western Civilization's reputation. And this is where the heart of the conservative Christian opposition to many social justice movements lie. They fear that Marx's anti-religious viewpoints will gain more recognition and status and that the religious heritage that is so much a part of Western Civilization will suffer even more rejection by those in society.

So the above is a brief description of both the reaction and the problem with the responses to social justice and today's social justice movements by many religiously conservative Christian leaders. In reality, our society can't work toward achieving  social justice unless it is a collaborative effort by secular and religious groups working as equal partners. And to work collaboratively as equal parties means that there has to be significant give and take by both secular and religious groups working toward social justice. The subject of social justice is not one where my fellow religiously conservative Christians can learn how to respond to by isolating themselves and coming up with a plan apart from what the current social justice movements have said.

As a result, perhaps my fellow religiously conservative Christians must admit that Marx and his ideological descendants have more to teach us about social justice than they care to admit. Martin Luther King Jr. recognized that even though he saw Marxism as a 'Christian heresy.' And they can do so without giving into Marx's atheism. One doesn't have to agree with every major point Marx made in order to learn from him.

Without working with the current social justice movements in collaboration as equal partners, the current religiously conservative Christian approach to social justice can never adequately work for social justice. Rather, it will end up working for some kind of religious ethnocracy in the U.S and ethnocracies tend to promote social injustices. Achieving social justice must be a societal effort, not just attempts made by certain groups. And that means that not only must religiously conservative Christians work side by side as equals with current social justice movements, those movements must also reach out to work side by side with other groups of people, including us religiously conservative Christians, who don't lean toward Marx.

Is Choosing Between Christianity And Social Justice A False Dichotomy

 I happen to have two leanings that some find to be paradoxical if not contradictory: Reformed Theology and Marxism. To say that I lean to either one includes the idea that I have both agreements and disagreements with each ideology--counting theology as a religious ideology. I am use to those unbelievers who share my political and activist leanings thinking that to get Christians to become allies in social justice movements, they must first be deconverted and I have argued against such an belief (click here for an article).

Thaddeous Williams (click here for a very brief bio) of Biola University argues against the same point but to a different audience (click here for the article). Whereas I was addressing my fellow activists and those who held to a political ideology that was roughly similar to mine, Williams is addressing my fellow Christians who are considering leaving the Church because of the disparity between their concern for social justice and that of the churches they belong to.

In his article, Williams makes a distinction between two social justice camps: Social Justice A and Social Justice B. The former one is a view of social justice based on what God says while the latter one is not. Williams is worried that some Christians will leave the faith because of their dissatisfaction with the Church to head to the Social Justice B camp. He strongly disapproves of that camp because of its views on Christianity. He would rather have these disgruntled Christians join the Social Justice A group and thus remain in the Church though they might have to change their individual church membership.

Williams wants Christians who are considering leaving the Church because of what the Social Justice B groups says about Christianity to consider 5 questions. Those questions are listed below and will along with my attempt to represent how Williams's commentary on those questions along with my own responses.

1. As I seek social justice, have I distinguished a breakup from a breakthrough?
   
   Williams wants disgruntled Christians to consider that their dissatisfaction with their church's lack of stance on social justice issues as a sign that they have broken through their church's barriers to working for social justice. He characterizes all such churches to be neo-gnostic or, as Francis Schaeffer called them, 'super spiritual.' And right there we have a problem with social justice.
   
   After all, social justice includes battling against all kinds of prejudices. And to describe those Christians who disagree with us on social justice as a monolithic group is at the heart of prejudice. For myself, my own church is terribly deficient in addressing social justice issues. But for me to respond to that lack in the same way that Williams does not only promotes bigotry, it also  strongly indicates that I believe myself to be a better Christian than those who don't share my views on social justice. In Biblical terms using the parable of the two men praying (see Luke 18:9-14), Williams is telling these Christians to think of themselves as the Pharisee from that parable and to think of those neo-gnostic Christians as the tax collector about whom the Pharisee thanked God that he was not like him.
   
   Sure, I believe that my views on social justice are better and more biblical than that of the leadership of my own church. But my Christian faith can't be reduced to my views on social justice. And where I might be stronger on social justice than many, but not all, in my church, I have many faults where they have strengths. In addition, it isn't the person who bragged about his spiritual superiority who was justified before God in that parable, it was the person who could only ask for mercy because he was too aware of his own sins who received mercy.
   
   
2. As I seek social justice, am I breaking from a one-sided stereotype of Christianity?
   
   Here, Williams is asking social justice conscious Christians if they are breaking the mold of what Social Justice B people say about Christianity. To do this, while acknowledging some major sins committed by Christians in the past, he painted a picture of Christians as leading the charge in social justice. He said that it was Christians who rescued unwanted babies in the Roman Empire. It was Christians who founded the more hospitals and orphanages than any other group. It was Christians who started major universities, drove up literacy rates and led the way in abolishing slavery in the UK, US, India and other places in the world.
   
   But in listing those accomplishments by Christians, Williams forgets to mention that Western Civilization was dominated by Christianity and so some of those accomplishments are due to that place of supremacy that Christianity had. But with its place in supremacy in Western Civilization, came religious wars, harsh anti-semitism, imperialism, colonialism, and white supremacy. In addition, yes, some Christians opposed slavery but some other Christians not only supported slavery, they also supported Jim Crow and white supremacy.
   
   Also, Christianity has had its intellectual struggles with science over heliocentrism, verified parts of evolution, and climate change. And in teaching people from other continents how to read in English, French, and German, Christians were, in part, replacing the cultures of many indigenous people with a European culture.
   
   
3. As I seek social justice, am I taking the deconversion stories of other Christians seriously?
   
   Williams addresses this question by citing Monique Duson who had been battling evil systems. Then she came to realize that while she was battling evil systems, she was forgetting about the evil in her own heart.
   
   I've seen many protesters who are very angry and self-righteously indignant against evil systems and elites. And the way Williams answers this question is very biblical and needed. On the other hand, we should be reluctant to think that all unbelievers are unaware of their own faults or who are protesting out of hate and anger. The true Christian faith is about Jesus's followers who recognize their own sinfulness and are told to forgive others as they have been forgiven. That is what Jesus taught as well such as in His parable of the man who was forgiven a great debt but could not forgive a person who owed him a small debt (Matthew 18:21-36).
   
   We could also include the previously mentioned parable of the 2 men praying and ask ourselves whether we want to protest against the injustices of the world as the Pharisee prayed or having the same mind as the tax collector had who begged God for mercy.
   
   But we should note here that quite often, long standing social injustices are initially corrected with a phobic mindset so that everything that could be merely associated with a given injustice is lumped together with those factors that  contributed to a given injustice. That is because there is a fear that we can't distinguish between the two. This kind of thinking also produces the anger and self-righteousness that Williams mentions in his question.
   
   
4. As I seek social justice, am I replacing the fruit of the Spirit with resentment, self-righteousness, and rage?
   
   Here, Williams has a legitimate concern. And that concern is addressed by the parables mentioned in the commentary on the previous question.
   
   
5. As I seek social justice, am I heeding the grandfatherly wisdom of John Perkins?
   
   What did Perkins teach? Perkins taught that to pursue justice, one must start with God. He also said that we can't pursue justice if we replace the Gospel with a human agenda.
   
   These are disturbing points because they seem to imply that only Christians can promote social justice. And thus, Christians must take the lead in promoting social justice because unbelievers cannot promote social justice because of their unbelief. Thus, there is no working with unbelievers as equals when pursuing social justice.
   
   Williams makes a similar point when citing Abraham Kuyper. It was Kuyper who said that 'every square inch of human experience' is under the lordship of Christ. But how does that work in nation and society in which there is religious freedom. What does that imply for all Christians who live in a multi-religious nation and society?
   
   Though there are problems with some of the other things Williams has said, it is his answer to the last question that is disturbing. Shouldn't the work for social justice be a collaborative effort between Christians and non-Christians as equal partners. And if we take Perkins's statements seriously, what we should consider social justice to be for those in the LGBT community?
   
   Overall, Williams's article is lacking. It does make a some good points and express some legitimate concerns. But the overall tenor of the article strongly suggests, if not implies, a Christian place of supremacy in both working for social justice and in society in general. And history teaches us that that is not a good idea
   
   
   
   
   

Week #15 Of The New Life

When this series started, the new life was one-dimensional entity that revolved around the pandemic. And now, we have a chance to make that new life multidimensional. And not only is the new life multdimenional, some parts of the new dimensions offer welcomed changes to the past rather than interruptions to what is now a cherished past.

The pandemic continues to live. My own state has done well to handle the pandemic but the fat lady hasn't sung yet. We need to proceed cautiously lest we lose precious ground that we have gained. Some states that had so far not experienced much pain from the pandemic are now experiencing that pain. Texas, Oklahoma, Alabama, South Carolina and some other states serve as examples. And for as long as we have multiple states dealing with surges, the economy cannot fully recover. Such shows how interdependent we all are on each other.

So it looks like, except for major shareholders, we will be suffering from the pandemic for quite a while. We will be suffering until we can find a vaccine to the virus.

But not all is bad in the new world. The brutal murder of George Floyd, possibly in combination with the effects of the pandemic, has awokened many in America about the systemic racism Blacks have faced in America for 400+ years now. Of course there are many white Americans who stubbornly refuse to face that systemic racism. Most of them believe that racism in our nation either ended with Civil War or with the Civil Rights Movement.

When the subject of racism is brought up, many white Americans unknowingly demonstrate their privileged status when they express their first concerns. For their first concerns when thinking about racism is that of feeling guilty and possibly losing some pride in their heritage. In contrast to that, the first concerns for many Blacks when the subject of racism is thought about or discussed, revolve around being regarded and treated as being human if they are not treated as equals.

Thus we see a divide that has existed for almost the history of humanity. For while the marginalize struggle to improve their lot in order to survive, the privileged resist that struggle lest they feel bad about themselves.

We certainly want an end to the part of the new life associated with the Pandemic. But whether we maintain the part of the new life that is now calling for the end of systemic racism will depend on how persistent and constant we become in calling for the end of racism. In addition, if we follow the words of Martin Luther King Jr., we find that we cannot just isolate and oppose racism. For according to King, racism, economic exploitation, and militarism are inextricably linked. Thus to fight one of those evils, one must fight all of them.




 

What Is The New False Gospel

After some delays, we finally get to finish reviewing a 3 part series by Thabiti Anyabwile on Social Justice (click here for the article). And unfortunately, this last article serves as a bit of a disappointment because of its lack of depth.

In the article being reviewed, Anyabwile reviews the claims of Tom Ascol as he sounds a red alert alarm on what he sees the new threat/new gospel to be for the Church (click here to here his presentation). Ascol emphatically states that the new threat to and the new gospel for the church is social justice especially as it is taught in cultural Marxism. Ascol makes it sound like this threat is both wide if not deep. He makes it sound like social justice is invading most of our neighborhood churches.

To be specific, Ascol says that the influence of social justice and cultural Marxism is introducing godless ideologies that are dictating to us how we should view reality. From Marxism comes the notion that we divide the world into the oppressor groups and oppressed groups. Cultural Marxism redefines these groups from economic classes to marginalized groups of people. Thus, this new teaching is telling us to discard the old ways of ordering society. And it is teaching us to see the oppressor, straight white males who are cisgendered as the enemy who, along with his view of reality and authority structures, must be overthrown. And all of that is done in the name of equality according to social justice teachings
 
And though Anyabwile's response is accurate, it is shallow. Anyabwile answers Ascol's concerns by saying that there is a larger and more organized anti-social justice movement in the conservative churches than a social justice movement. In fact, Anyabwile states that there is no social justice movement in the conservative churches.  There might be some individuals who are involved, but there is certainly no organized movement in the conservative churches toward social justice. And from my experiences and observations, he right.

Thus, Ascol is crying wolf on whether the conservative churches are being threatened with social justice especially as it is approached from the cultural Marxist perspective. But such a response does little to review the claims made and perspective held by Ascol. That is what makes Anyabwile's response shallow.

What would be a better response to Ascol's alarm? First, we should look at what Ascol seems to be so scared of. His complaint is not just that there is some secular invasion of ideas into the Church, but how we look at reality from a Western Civilization point of view is being challenged. That means old ways of ordering societies, old authority structures, the place of white men as being oppressors, and Judeo-Christian values must be recognized and changed. The last item seems to be out of place because Judaism rejects the most basic of Christian values: the status of Jesus as being both God and man who came to save His people from their sins. So what Ascol must mean by Judeo-Christian values is God's law and how society must be ruled by that.

Second, what we see in Ascol's perspective is a canonization of the old status quo in which he grew up and a demonization of a possibly emerging status quo. Canonizing the way one grew up and demonizing the new that challenges much of what one grew up with is as old as the hills. But that itself does not really say what needs to be said about Ascol's views here. For what Ascol does is to approach both the old status quo and the new challenge from social justice from a cultural Marxist perspective in all-or-nothing way of thinking. That is what produces Ascol's canonization of the old status quo with its regard for Western Civilization and his demonization of challenges of the old status quo by social justice from a cultural Marxism perspective.

Thus, it is Ascol's all-or-nothing approach to both the old status quo and the new social justice view that is the problem. And if we compare Ascol's approach to the old status quo and to cultural Marxism with Martin Luther King Jr.'s approach to Marxism, we easily see why Anyabwile's review of Ascol is shallow and why Ascol overstates his case.

When King compared Marxism with the then status quo, he said the following: 'Historically capitalism failed to see the truth in collective enterprise and Marxism failed to see truth in individual enterprise.'  In other words, King does not take a black-white approach to either the then status quo or the challenge of Marxism. And citing William Temple, a former archbishop of Canterbury, King repeated his observation that Marxism is a 'Christian Heresy.' By that he meant that Marx had combined some essential truths of Christianity with beliefs that must be rejected by every Christian. But again, King is avoiding this all-or-nothing approach to either the then status quo or the Marxism of his day as exemplified in the communism of the Soviet Union (click here for the source).

Another way of approaching Ascol's point of view is to modify a statement King said while opposing the Vietnam War (click here for the source):

The Western arrogance of feeling that it has everything to teach others and nothing to learn from them is not just.

If we replace the word 'Western' with a fill-in-the-black, can we not see the fault of Ascol's line of thought here. Certainly social justice and cultural Marxism has much to learn from Christianity. But are we daring to deny that that we religiously conservative Christians have things to learn from social justice and cultural Marxism? Or are we assuming, despite Church history and the problems that were so much a part of Western Civilization, that our knowledge of the Bible as well as our embracing of Western Civilization means that we have nothing to learn from social justice and cultural Marxism? Again, that question challenges us to not approach either the old status quo and cultural Marxism in an all-or-nothing manner.

Generally I like what Anyabwile writes. But his response to Ascol lacked depth and dependence on how others have responded to similar challenges. And just because Ascol has well overstated his case, that doesn't mean that we should ignore all of his warnings. But what we should challenge him to do is to look out for competing and threatening ideologies that come not from the new, but from the old status quo in which he grew up.



 

ONIM For February 18, 2019

10 Best Fact Checking Sites Found Here.

If you are not sure about the validity of a news story linked to below, you can use  mediabiasfactcheck.com to check out the credibility of the source of most of the stories linked to here.

 

Christian News

• Integrating Justice Into Our Spiritual Disciplines -- Witness: A Black Christian Collective
• Watch It Now: America's Civil Rights Movement -- Witness: A Black Christian Collective
• A Most Mischievous And Ill-Informed Half Truth -- Mortification Of Spin
• Reaching Out To The Digital Generation For Jesus Christ -- Jim Erwin
• Martyrs And The Book Of Revelation -- Bible & Culture
• A Tiny Chapel--And A Law Beloved By Evangelicals-- Might Stand In The Way Of Trump's Wall -- Yahoo News
• A Vicious And Cruel Injustice -- Fuller

World News

• Sandusky, Ohio, Swaps Columbus Day Holiday For Election Day -- New York Times
• Here's (Almost) Everything Wall Street Expects In 2019 -- Bloomberg
• Negotiators Reach Deal 'In Principle' To Avert Shutdown -- Politico
• College Student Shot Dead By Alleged Abductor -- ABC7 News
• U.S. Pledges To Fight Russia, China For Influence In NATO's East -- Bloomberg
• Revisiting The Catonville Nine's Greatest Day -- Waging Nonviolence
• Hedge Fund Manager: Stock Buybacks Should Be 'Illegal' -- CNN 
• Breaking News On Torture In Egypt And Syria -- Human Rights Watch
• At U.S.-Mexico Border, A Tribal Nation Fights Wall That Would Divide Them -- PBS
• 30 Years On, Russia Views Afghan War With Pride -- AP News
• Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Says 'Shock Doesn't Begin To Cover' This Lobbying Tactic -- Huffington Post
• The Denver Teachers Strike Is Over. They Won -- Vox
• Billionaire Richard Branson: Taxing The Extremely Wealthy Like Me 'Makes Sense' -- CNBC News
• GOP Leader Apologizes For Tweeting: 'Time For Another Kent State -- USA Today
• Democrats Want A 'Smart Wall.' That's Trump's Wall By Another Name -- Guardian
• Students Skip School Across Europe To Demand Climate Action -- New York Times
• Thousands Of UK Students Skip Class To Protest Climate Change -- Vice
• Venezuela Is Unraveling--So Is Its Science -- Scientific American
• Dismissed Employee Kills Five Coworkers In Illinois Factor Shooting -- Reuters
• Millennial Life: How Young Adulthood Today Compares With Prior Generations -- Pew Research Center
• Climate Change Still Seen As Top Global Threat, But Cyberattacks A Rising Concern -- Pew Research Center
• The Changing Face Of Congress In 6 Charts -- Pew Research Center

Israel-Palestine News

• Democratic Party Leadership, In Bed With AIPAC, Condemns Ilhan Omar for Anti-Semitic...Accusations -- Mondoweiss
• Ilhan Omar Was Dead Right About Lobbyists For Israel -- Truthdig
• Ilhan Omar Is Not Anti-Semitic. She's An Anti-Imperialist -- Forward
• Israel's Mueller Holds Key To Netanyahu's Fate -- Bloomberg
• There is A Taboo Against Criticizing Israel's AIPAC--And Ilhan Omar Just Destroyed It -- Intercept
• Noam Chomsky Slams Israeli Interference In U.S. Politics As Far Greater Than Russian -- Haaretz
• Israeli Leader Hopes Summit Brings Arab Ties Out In The Open -- Reuters
• In Hebron Israel Removes The Last Restraint On Its Settlers' Reign Of Terror -- Mondoweiss
• 'There Are No Foreigners Left': Israeli Settlers Rampage In Hebron Following Expulsion Of Human Rights Observers -- Mondoweiss

Donald Trump News

• BBC Cameraman Shoved And Abused At Trump Rally In El Paso -- Guardian
• Trump Lied About Getting Special Permission From El Paso Fire Dept, Says Fire Dept -- Huffington Post
• Trump Vows Emergency Declaration Over Wall, Agrees To Shutdown-Averting Bill -- Reuters
• Trump Intervenes In Support Of Coal Plant Owned By Major Donor -- MSNBC
• McCabe Says Justice Dept. Officials Had Discussions About Pushing Trump Out -- New York Times
• Rep. Omar Fires Back After Trump Calls For Her Resignation: 'You Have Trafficked In Hate Your Whole Life' -- CNN

Pick(s) Of The Litter

• National Debt Tops $22 Trillion For The First Time As Experts Warn Of Ripple Effects -- USA Today
• Why Does The Democratic Party Refuuse To Address Poverty? -- Nation
• In Landmark Move, L.A. County Will Replace Men's Central Jail With Mental Health Hospital For Inmates -- Los Angeles Times
• How The Iroquois Great Law Of Peace Shaped U.S. Democracy -- PBS
• Parkland Shooting Victims Are Remembered In Silence -- AP News
• Nearly 1,000 Madagascar Children Dead Of Measles Since October: WHO -- Reuters
• The War In Afghanistan Isn't A 'Stalemate.'  The U.S. Has Lost -- Los Angeles Times
• What It Really Takes To Secure Peace In Afghanistan -- ZNet
• Russian-Style Kleptocracy Is Infiltrating America -- Atlantic
• Opinion: Kareem Hunt Signing Shows Hitting Women Is Forgivable In NFL, But Kneeling Is Not -- USA Today

Just For Fun

• El Chapo Claims He Is Victim Of Phony Witch Hunt -- Borowitz Report
• Jeff Bezos Chooses Soon-To-Be Bankrupt Mar-A-Lago As New Amazon Headquarters -- Borowitz Report
• Trump Base Celebrates President For Standing Up To Constitution -- Onion
• Mass Invasion Of Polar Bears Force Russian Islands To Declare Emergency -- Onion
• Man Robbing Chick-Fil-A Impressed By Level Of Customer Service -- Babylon Bee

What Does Eschatology Got To Do With Social Justice?

Ed Stetzer (click here for a bio) and Gabriella Seifert (could not find a bio) that would respond to, or more accurately affirm the eschatology of Martin Luther King Jr (click here for the article). What the article really affirms is only one the King's personal missions, he had more than 1 mission in terms of his work and ministry. Thus, their article seems to be lacking in terms of understanding both the battles King waged against injustice. In addition, their article does not adequately cover the eschatalogical issues that were involved in King's views.

As far as understanding King's missions in life, Stetzer and Seifert only talked about the eradication of racism. Though eliminating racism was important to King, he fought 2 other battles: economic exploitation and militarism/war. And it is only when we include all of those issues together along with what it will take to adequately address those issues that we get to meet the real Martin Luther King Jr. For the real Martin Luther King Jr. was calling for moral and structural revolutions in America. The moral revolution was concerned with society turning from being 'thing-oriented,' where gadgets, profits, and property rights were counted as being more important than people, to being 'person-oriented'. The structural revolution stood against the materialism that came with Capitalism. In fact, King stated that Capitalism's materialism was just as evil as Communism's materialism though they were significantly different.

Consider the following two quotes from Martin Luther King Jr. (click here for the source):

I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift from a "thing-oriented" society to a "person-oriented" society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.

and

A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fairness and justice of many of our past and present policies. n the one hand we are called to play the good Samaritan on life's roadside; but that will be only an initial act. One day we must come to see that the whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life's highway. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it is not haphazard and superficial. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth. With righteous indignation, it will look across the seas and see individual capitalists of the West investing huge sums of money in Asia, Africa and South America, only to take the profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the countries, and say: "This is not just." 

In terms of eschatalogical issues, what is missing is how the eschatalogy one adopts limits the degree in which individual Christians and the Church should work for and expect justice and heaven to be realized on earth. Not that there are no Christians who think that we should not try to work for any justice. Rather, the issue is how much justice on earth should Christians work for and whether that work is to be done by the individual Christians alone or with the Church. Though I disagree with R. Scott Clark's approach to this issue, he does provide some useful distinctions on the different kinds of eschatology (click here for the source):

There are essentially three kinds of eschatologies: completely realized (e.g., full-preterism, Jesus has returned and this is the new heavens and the new earth); semi-realized (the dominant view among the Reformed and usually described as Amillennialism); and unrealized (or futurist; which would include most forms of chiliasm, premillennialism). Postmillennialism as we know it today has features that align it with the semi-realized and with the futurist views. It says that the Kingdom of God has been introduced into history but it also looks forward to an earthly golden age (prior to Christ’s return).

Having identified 3 kinds of eschatology, not to be confused with 4 schools of eschatology, Clark gives a mixed message in terms of how much the Church should be involved in bringing justice to earth. From the same previously cited article, Clark says the following:

We see modern versions of this over-realized eschatology in contemporary evangelical rhetoric about “social justice.” Some of them speak openly about bringing heaven to earth in ways that the apocalyptic Anabaptists would have understood entirely. We should not assume that such rhetoric is either biblical or Reformed.

Certainly Christians as individuals and even as groups should seek to approximate social and civil justice, insofar as lies within them. The Reformed do not share the Anabaptist eschatology, however. We expect both the church and the state to be an approximation, to reflect a semi-realized eschatology. This is not heaven. Social action cannot bring about heaven on earth. It cannot bring the Kingdom of God.

and:

Jesus inaugurated the Kingdom of God on the earth but the Kingdom is not to be found in social action, marches, or power politics. The visible, institutional manifestation of God’s kingdom is much more humble. It is more like Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem on a donkey than it is Caesar entering Rome. Remember, the disciples frequently pestered Jesus about when he was going to institute a glorious, earthly kingdom (e.g., Mark 10:37; Acts 1:6). They did not understand. Jesus explained to Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36). They would not understand that until Pentecost, when Peter announced that Jesus was reigning now (see his sermon in Acts 2) from heaven, that he was arranging all things for the progress of the gospel. That progress, however, did not mean earthly glory. It meant persecution (Acts 7), martyrdom, and death. The visible, institutional manifestation of the Kingdom is the preaching of the gospel, the use of the two sacraments, and the use of church discipline (see Matt 16 and 18; 28:18–20).

Indeed, there is no evidence in Acts that the Apostles sought to bring heaven to earth except insofar as the ministry of Word, sacrament, and discipline brought the elect into contact with the realities of the new heavens and the new earth by anticipation (Acts 2:42). They wrote no petitions. They conducted no rallies. They chanted no slogans, even as their brothers and sisters (c. 65 AD) were arrested unjustly, covered with tar, and set on fire to cover up Nero’s failed urban renewal program.

It is important to read the previously cited article by Clark along with this article being linked to here. For though Clark does well in warning us against reducing the Gospel to a social gospel only, his rigidity in thought and excessive loyalty to his theological heroes from the past prevents from him borrowing anything from those whose eschatology is too faulty--that is whose eschatology carried expectations that were too great. And in comparing today's world with that of the New Testament Church, Clark's call on the Church to simply imitate what was done then assumes that there are no significant historical changes between then and now.

Certainly, King's eschatology would be considered faulty in Clark's eyes--and we should note that Stetzer and Siefert inadequately described King's eschatology. But does that mean that Christians should not have joined and worked with King and his movement?

Though we really talked more about Clark than Stetzer and Siefert, the point of these citations from Clark is to show that Stetzer and Siefert did an inadequate job in talking about King's eschatology just as they underrepresented King's work by reducing his mission to opposing racism--which ironically is the typical white American's view of King's work. And King and his work are too important to inadequately write about.


 

A Neglected Blast From The Past Which Can Refresh Our Protests

Julia Marks runs a website called thevalueofsparrows.com (click here).  Marks calls herself a Christian mystic. But her blog is full of articles from other writers some of whom are far from Christian mysticism. In addition, the list of blog articles occasionally includes an article written by her.

One of the blog articles Marks posted on her blog comes from a sermon delivered by Martin Luther King Jr on how the value of managing opposites not only makes one strong, but prepares one for engaging in nonviolent activism. The sermon, posted in May of 2014, was based on Jesus's exhortation to His disciples to be as 'wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.' It comes in three parts. Part 1 deals with our need to be tough minded rather than soft minded, which is being as wise as serpents. Part 2 tells to had being tenderhearted to our tough mindedness. Being tenderhearted makes one as harmless as doves. Part 3 tells us how the combination of being tough minded and tenderhearted control how we engage in nonviolent activism (click here for the article). 

In part 1, Martin Luther King Jr. tells us to be tough minded rather than soft minded. The former forms judgments on situations and people after evaluating as much information as possible. Being tough minded seeks the truth over what is convenient. Being tough minded means putting in the work in order to arrive at a 'realistic appraisal' of a situation and requires a firm commitment.

Being soft minded seeks to maintain a comfortable place in the status quo. Thus, unlike being tough minded where one 'postjudges,' being soft minded leads one to prejudge people and situations. Being soft minded doesn't require a person to think through things, it settles for a non-strenuous thinking that quickly comes to a convenient assessment. Being soft minded moves one to be gullible especially when listening to or reading those who pass themselves off as authority figures.

Being soft minded causes one to be susceptible to accepting superstitions and 'irrational fears.' In terms of religion, though I disagree with the example King uses, he states an important preference by those who prefer to be soft minded. King says:

Soft-minded persons have revised the Beatitudes to read, “Blessed are the pure in ignorance: for they shall see God.”

Thus, it is easy to see why King calls on us to be tough minded and engaged rather than soft minded with an attention deficit disorder when thinking through today's issues and injustices.

King then deals with being tenderhearted in the second part of his sermon. Why? Being tough minded but hardhearted only leads one to objectify others and thus make others disposable. Being hardhearted leads one to being cold and unable to love others. Being tough minded emphasizes God's justice. But God's grace is neglected unless one is tenderhearted as well.

Then King talks about how being tough minded and tenderhearted moves Blacks to seek 'freedom and justice.' In contrast to that, King states that being soft minded allows people to settle for being victims and being dominated. King mentions how some of the Hebrews preferred the comforts they had as slaves in Egypt to the challenges they had in seeking their own freedom.

According to King, being hardhearted makes a place for bitterness and even violence. And employing violence can only bring 'temporary victories' at best.

In part 3, King culminates his message in showing how being tough minded and tenderhearted leads one to pursue change through nonviolent methods. Being tough minded and tenderhearted combines both God's justice and His grace, for we need both.

There is so little to criticize in King's sermon that it is not worth the time mentioning any errors.  But if we use this sermon by King as a canon for today's activism, especially activism of liberals and leftists, we find that our current forms of activism are found wanting-- and wanting to a great degree. For while we may refrain from employing physical violence in our activism, our violence of the spirit shown in our bitter denouncements of our rivals can only make our pursuit of social justice more and more impossible. For instead of trying to win people over with the combination of our tough mindedness and tenderheartedness, we find ourselves seeking to conquer all with whom we disagree. And besides the fact that we lack the numbers to conquer others, such a method of victory carries a too high a cost that is repaid in inevitable blowback.

Perhaps one of the reasons that the Left in America has such an insignificant impact is because our hardheartedness makes people defensive and thus impossible for us to gain them as allies. Thus, our hardheartedness puts us in the impossible position of having to conquer them.



 


references

• https://thevalueofsparrows.com/2014/05/04/sermon-a-tough-mind-and-a-tender-heart-by-martin-luther-king-jr/