In my early 20s, I was very idealistic of what I thought a godly woman should be (much of it was influenced by reading books by Leslie Ludy and Elisabeth Elliot). I tried desperately to mold and shape my personality into what I thought would be attractive to other men. Coming to a Reformed understanding of the nature of justification and sanctification has been such a freeing process.
Hagar is an example of someone used and abused by the church, and there are many Hagars around us today. Pollsters tell us that the increasing number of “de-churched” people—those who used to attend religious services but no longer do—point to negative experiences in the church for why they’ve left. How does God feel about them? How does he feel about you, if you’ve been hurt by the church, and have fled into the wilderness like Hagar did?
Everyone has blind spots. Even our most beloved heroes have feet of clay. However, what should we do when the whole thing is filled with clay? When the blind spot becomes large enough to divide an entire denomination for over 100 years? We need unequivocally repudiate it, lament and ask forgiveness for our unqualified endorsement of such a man, and then rethink whether we ever want to do so again. We can’t even start this process until we see for ourselves what’s really there.
When the news hit and I observed all the commentary, I too wanted to offer my two cents. However, I found myself struggling to say anything publicly. While I do think there might be some merit to the contributing factors cited, namely that he was never a true believer to begin with, I know there is more to the story than simple pat answers can provide. Now with the news that Marty Sampson of Hillsong fame has announced his departure from the faith, I am compelled to speak.
One neglected aspect of the story of Modernity has been the loss of a Christian anthropology. Along with its exile of God, Modernity has also been busily re-defining humanity with unhappy consequences.
The psalmist’s age-old question, “What is man that you are mindful of him?” is now the great question of our age, as technology has given us tremendous power to manipulate the created order. For all its benefits, it has also given sinful, autonomous man the false idea that he can redesign human nature. This is […]
The evangelical Internet is abuzz with discussion about ad intra relations within the Trinity. Bruce Ware and Wayne Grudem have been recognized as presenting forms of Eternal Functional Subordination (EFS) of the Son to the Father in their respective books, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit: Relationships, Roles, and Relevance (Crossway) and Systematic Theology: An Introduction […]
What really set Christianity apart in the ancient world was the incarnation—the claim that the Most High God had himself entered into the realm of matter, taking on a physical body. In Gnosticism, the highest deity would have nothing to do with the material world. By contrast, the Christian message is that the transcendent God […]
Every day, the twenty-four hour news cycle chronicles the advance of a secular moral revolution in areas such as sexuality, abortion, homosexuality, and transgenderism. It’s easy to get caught up in the latest controversy, but current events are merely surface effects, like waves on the ocean. The real action happens below the surface, at the […]