There is no condemnation in Osteen’s message for failing to fulfill God’s righteous law. On the other hand, there is no justification. Instead of either message, there is an upbeat moralism that is somewhere in the middle: Do your best, follow the instructions I give you, and God will make your life successful. “Don’t sit back passively,” he warns, but with a gentle pleading suggests that the only reason we need to follow his advice is because it’s useful for getting what we want. God is a buddy or partner who exists primarily to make sure we are happy. “You do your part, and God will do his part.” “Sure we have our faults,” he says, but “the good news is, God loves us anyway.” Instead of accepting God’s just verdict on our own righteousness and fleeing to Christ for justification, Osteen counsels readers simply to reject guilt and condemnation. Yet it is hard to do that successfully when God’s favor and blessing on my life depend entirely on how well I can put his commands to work. “If you will simply obey his commands, He will change things in your favor.” That’s all: “…simply obey his commands.”
and
As the New Testament repeatedly affirms, those who want to be saved by their own obedience need to know that God doesn’t grade on a curve. His record-keeping is bad news, not good news, unless Christ’s obedient record has been credited to us through faith alone. God’s law says, “If you want to be saved by your own effort, here are the terms: Do all these things and you’ll go to heaven; fail to do them and you’ll go to hell.” The revivalists of yesteryear came up with their own list, but it was basically the same threat: “Do or die.” The kinder, gentler version is, “Try harder and you’ll be happier; fail to do them and you’ll lose out on God’s best for your life here and now.” No heaven, no hell; no condemnation or salvation; no perfect obedience of Christ credited to us: Just do your best. Remember, God is keeping score! Christ becomes totally unnecessary in this message.
Osteen reflects the broader assumption among evangelicals that we are saved by making a decision to have a personal relationship with God. If one’s greatest problem is loneliness, the good news is that Jesus is a reliable friend. If the big problem is anxiety, Jesus will calm us down. Jesus is the glue that holds our marriages and families together, gives us purpose for us to strive toward, wisdom for daily life. And there are half-truths in all of these pleas, but they never really bring hearers face to face with their real problem: that they stand naked and ashamed before a holy God and can only be acceptably clothed in his presence by being clothed, head to toe, in Christ’s righteousness.
This gospel of “submission,” “commitment,” “decision,” and “having a personal relationship with God” fails to realize, first of all, that everyone has a personal relationship with God already: either as a condemned criminal standing before a righteous judge or as a justified co-heir with Christ and adopted child of the Father. “How can I be right with God?” is no longer a question when my happiness rather than God’s holiness is the main issue. My concern is that Joel Osteen is simply the latest in a long line of self-help evangelists who appeal to the native American obsession with pulling ourselves up by our own bootstraps. Salvation is not a matter of divine rescue from the judgment that is coming on the world, but a matter of self-improvement in order to have your best life now.
“Across all decision-making realms, it tilts to the woman,” noted Rich Morin, the Pew study’s lead author. “I was surprised by the percentage of men who made none of the decisions in any of the areas. A significant percentage were just bystanders.” Not surprisingly, one reason men say they are willing to acquiesce in their spouses’ wishes is that their wives usually have greater knowledge of the day-to-day activities and needs of the home than they do. They trust their wives’ choices the way they would any specialist’s. But what is rather unexpected is the deeper (and much sweeter) reason men have for giving in to their wives: They want them to be happy, or at least they don’t want to be responsible for making them unhappy.
The general consensus of sociologists is that, whereas a woman’s marital satisfaction is dependent on a combination of economic, emotional and psychological realities, a man’s marital satisfaction is most determined by one factor: how happy his wife is. When she is happy, he is. Working within this framework, most husbands are unwilling to dig in their heels on any issue unless they have a tremendous incentive to do so.
Now here’s my point: both the RCC and the EO have captured the Spirit in the Church so that Church too often has become Authority. One example, hardly foolproof, illustrates my point: RCCs and EOs talk about Church; Protestants talk about Scripture. It is their emphasis that I like — and I wish each talked more of Spirit.
Hindus in the Indian state of Orissa have been on a murderous rampage against Christians over the past few weeks. I’ve been following the story, but have not posted about it (or anything lately). Still, it is important to pray for our persecuted brothers and sisters, and so I offer a few links for anyone with me on their feed reader.
A previous roundup of links in the breaking days of the story: Mild Case of Christian-versus-Hindu Violence, by Terry Mattinglyof GetReligion.org (a religious media critique, more links in the comments).
Announcing the launch of a new website designed to help ministers, ministerial students, and Bible students everywhere. BestCommentaries.com polls the most referenced commentary lists (and throws my own list in for good measure) and provides rankings and reviews. If you know John Dyer, give him a virtual pat on the back for providing a truly useful site for those who love good commentaries. Thanks, John.
If you’ve never heard S. M. Lockridge preach the “My King” (also known as the “Do You Know Him”) sermon, you owe it to yourself to visit this site where you can download or listen to an mp3. You can also watch a video slide show with the straight audio (w/o background music other sites add). Enjoy - and Praise God.
“If Peter and Paul were here, they would scold you because you wish right off to be as accomplished as they. Crawling is something, even if one is unable to walk. Do your best. If you cannot preach an hour, then preach half an hour or a quarter of an hour. Do not try to imitate other people. Center on the shortest and simplest points, which are the very heart of the matter, and leave the rest to God. Look solely to his honor and not to applause. Pray that God will give you a mouth and to your audience ears.
I can tell you preaching is not a work of man. Although I am old [he was forty-eight] and experienced, I am afraid every time I have to preach. You will most certainly find out three things: first, you will have prepared your sermon as diligently as you know how, and it will slip through your fingers like water; second, you may abandon your outline and God will give you grace. You will preach your very best. The audience will be pleased, but you won’t. And thirdly, when you have been unable in advance to pull anything together, you will preach acceptably both to your hearers and to yourself. So pray to God and leave all the rest to Him.”
(Here I Stand, Bainton, 273-274)
Even in my short time as a preacher, I have had all these experiences. God gives the grace, to him be the glory.
I’m not in the habit of favorably quoting Maureen Dowd, but you’ve got to give folks their due when they do well. I think the following NYT op-ed is worth reading…
This weekend, we celebrate our great American pastime: messy celebrity divorces.
There’s the Christie Brinkley/Peter Cook fireworks on Long Island and the Madonna/Guy Ritchie/A-Rod Roman candle in New York.
So how do you avoid a relationship where you end up saying, “The man who I was living with, I just didn’t know who he was” — as Brinkley did in court when talking about her husband’s $3,000-a-month Internet porn and swinger site habit? (Not to mention the 18-year-old mistress/assistant.)
Father Pat Connor, a 79-year-old Catholic priest born in Australia and based in Bordentown, N.J., has spent his celibate life — including nine years as a missionary in India — mulling connubial bliss. His decades of marriage counseling led him to distill some “mostly common sense” advice about how to dodge mates who would maul your happiness.
“Hollywood says you can be deeply in love with someone and then your marriage will work,” the twinkly eyed, white-haired priest says. “But you can be deeply in love with someone to whom you cannot be successfully married.”
For 40 years, he has been giving a lecture — “Whom Not to Marry” — to high school seniors, mostly girls because they’re more interested.
“It’s important to do it before they fall seriously in love, because then it will be too late,” he explains. “Infatuation trumps judgment.”
I asked him to summarize his talk:
“Never marry a man who has no friends,” he starts. “This usually means that he will be incapable of the intimacy that marriage demands. I am always amazed at the number of men I have counseled who have no friends. Since, as the Hebrew Scriptures say, ‘Iron shapes iron and friend shapes friend,’ what are his friends like? What do your friends and family members think of him? Sometimes, your friends can’t render an impartial judgment because they are envious that you are beating them in the race to the altar. Envy beclouds judgment.
“Does he use money responsibly? Is he stingy? Most marriages that founder do so because of money — she’s thrifty, he’s on his 10th credit card.
“Steer clear of someone whose life you can run, who never makes demands counter to yours. It’s good to have a doormat in the home, but not if it’s your husband.
“Is he overly attached to his mother and her mythical apron strings? When he wants to make a decision, say, about where you should go on your honeymoon, he doesn’t consult you, he consults his mother. (I’ve known cases where the mother accompanies the couple on their honeymoon!)
“Does he have a sense of humor? That covers a multitude of sins. My mother was once asked how she managed to live harmoniously with three men — my father, brother and me. Her answer, delivered with awesome arrogance, was: ‘You simply operate on the assumption that no man matures after the age of 11.’ My father fell about laughing.
“A therapist friend insists that ‘more marriages are killed by silence than by violence.’ The strong, silent type can be charming but ultimately destructive. That world-class misogynist, Paul of Tarsus, got it right when he said, ‘In all your dealings with one another, speak the truth to one another in love that you may grow up.’
“Don’t marry a problem character thinking you will change him. He’s a heavy drinker, or some other kind of addict, but if he marries a good woman, he’ll settle down. People are the same after marriage as before, only more so.
“Take a good, unsentimental look at his family — you’ll learn a lot about him and his attitude towards women. Kay made a monstrous mistake marrying Michael Corleone! Is there a history of divorce in the family? An atmosphere of racism, sexism or prejudice in his home? Are his goals and deepest beliefs worthy and similar to yours? I remember counseling a pious Catholic woman that it might not be prudent to marry a pious Muslim, whose attitude about women was very different. Love trumped prudence; the annulment process was instigated by her six months later.
“Imagine a religious fundamentalist married to an agnostic. One would have to pray that the fundamentalist doesn’t open the Bible and hit the page in which Abraham is willing to obey God and slit his son’s throat.
“Finally: Does he possess those character traits that add up to a good human being — the willingness to forgive, praise, be courteous? Or is he inclined to be a fibber, to fits of rage, to be a control freak, to be envious of you, to be secretive?
“After I regale a group with this talk, the despairing cry goes up: ‘But you’ve eliminated everyone!’ Life is unfair.”
The increasingly famous Tim Challies has added “commentaries” to his long list of book reviews and recommendations. I’ve often been impressed with what seems to be his desire to help his readers pursue spiritual formation (rather than simply pontificating). That said, he falls into the traps that most commentary list makers do not take the time to avoid. I offer the following critique for future aspiring commentary list creators.
1) What is the criteria for the list?
Challies give us two commentaries for each book of the NT. How did he decide? What makes a good commentary in his opinion? He does warn readers to choose commentaries “appropriate to your education and expertise.” What is the education and expertise of Mr. Challies? How can I know if my requirements for a commentary match his requirements for a commentary so that I can have any confidence that his recommendation will mean anything at all to me? Why does the NICNT “appear to be the best complete New Testament set”? What sets it apart?
Is this list anything more than “stuff I like”? Tell us why - the readers need to know how you are choosing volumes so that they can gauge how appropriate your selections are to their situation.
2) What makes any of these particular selections worthwhile?
This is related to (1), but what I am referring to here is the lack of any annotation for each recommendation. Whereas (1) is a critique of the lack of selection criteria, (2) is a critique of the lack of its application. Why is Fee better than Garland for 1 Corinthians? Is it because of Fee’s commitment to a charismatic interpretation? Does Challies like Fee’s proposed construction of the early Corinthian church? Why would a volume from 1987 be a better choice than the survey style BECNT from 2003?
3) Who would actually be helped by these recommendations?
Challies takes a few positive steps toward answering this question. He does warn readers to be aware that not all commentaries are equally useful for everybody. He also acknowledges that he is a non-scholar who enjoys studying God’s word.
However, the lack of any additional qualifications leads us to this basic understanding of these recommendations’ usability - “A list for people who like to study the Bible.” While admirable, this doesn’t really narrow the field down much. Will Bible study leaders or Sunday school teachers like this list more than non-teachers? Does it matter if you have a college background or not? Is this a list for people who just like to know a bunch of facts or do its members genuinely help readers in translating biblical principles to practical godly living? Tell us who the list was created to help: pastors, educated laypeople, the “everyman” - who? By not guiding his readers to understand the intended audience, Challies leaves his readers with little more than a few clues for better guesses - and I expect his intention was to help more than that.
4) What was the extent of the comparison?
Though usually my primary critique of a commentary list is (1), this “extent question” looms large over Challies list. He refers to his “attempt at thorough research” and his “extensive research,” but nowhere details what that research included beyond references to a few online commentary recommendation lists. Did he only look at commentaries reviewed by these sources? Or perhaps only those that appeared on two or more of the lists? If we do not really know anything about the extent of the “extensive research” then how can we have any confidence that these recommendations are actually the best recommendations for any particular biblical book?
Further, the striking admission that Challies was “relying almost entirely on secondary sources” suggests that he has no practical knowledge of the volumes he is recommending. Readers are left with the impression that all he did was uncritically compare a few relatively random lists and make guesses as to what books would probably be good purchases, maybe.
Conclusion
I applaud anyone’s desire to help others not waste money on books, especially commentaries. There are lots of intelligent, informed, discerning people on the web making recommendations (Challies may very well be one) - but if they do not give us any basis for their advice, then they are simply adding their voice to the “because I said so” cloud of the internet. Such is useful as far as it goes, but most people who desire to make wise commentary purchases would be so much better served by list creators simply answering for their readers the questions detailed above.
All children need a laptop. Not a computer, but a human laptop. Moms, Dads, Grannies and Grandpas, Aunts, Uncles – someone to hold them, read to them, teach them. Loved ones who will embrace them and pass on the experience, rituals and knowledge of a hundred previous generations. Loved ones who will pass to the next generation their expectations of them, their hopes, and their dreams.
– General Colin L. Powell Founder, America’s Promise – the Alliance for Youth.
I am both amused and bothered when I catch “news” stories that make a causal connection between rising childhood/teen sexual conduct and “abstinence” education. There are no reliable studies that demonstrate that abstinence education is any less effective than other sex-ed options.
It also matters how you define “abstinence education.” Some programs are abstinence-only, others emphasize a preference for abstinence, others include honest discussions of abstinence with other sex-ed information. Often, reporters unquestioningly include anti-abstinence quotes with no context or definition.
It’s estimated that 10 percent of the 3,000 middle and high school students in the Delaware Valley School District in Milford, P.A., are infected with an STD — including one confirmed case of HIV, Times Herald Record reported Friday.
A non-profit health clinic in Milford said they estimate more than 300 students contracted a sexually transmitted disease in the past year. Officials also told the paper students as young as 12 years old reported being sexually active.
Kristen Bruce, a nurse practitioner with the Milford clinic, said most of the cases were the human papillomavirus (HPV).
First of all, some basic math. If 1 in 4 teen girls have an STD, then that is 25%. If only 10% of all Delaware Valley students (male and female) have an STD, then the school district is doing something very, very right in their sex-ed department.
But that is not the way Delaware Valley school officials see it:
The Board of Education is currently revising the health curriculum, which places heavy emphasis on abstinence.
Why change what is clearly working? Can we at least have a one-sentence explanation as to how the health curriculum emphasizes abstinence, and why it is relevant to the STD rates? Do the planned changes to the curriculum include eliminating the abstinence portion or will they strengthen the emphasis on abstinence? Aren’t reporters supposed to ask questions and determine facts?
One reason the DV Board of Ed is not patting themselves on the back for a job well done perhaps is because they know the CDC STD Study results are bogus. Seriously, is one out of four teenage girls you know suffering from an STD? In every homeroom of every grade in your local middle- and high-school, there are 5 girls with an STD. During every softball game at your local ballpark, six players are suffering from a sexually transmitted infection. Is this believable? Maybe so in some areas - but nation-wide? Wouldn’t you like some follow-up on how this statistic was calculated? Wouldn’t you like to know why the CDC identified this school district as high-risk at 10% if they really believed 26% of all female teenagers have an STD?
In a nutshell, researchers looked at the data of 600 girls from other sexual infection studies. They lumped everything they could under the category “STD” and did not differentiate between 14-year old freshmen and 19-year old barmaids. Viola! Every girl in junior high is in imminent danger. But there is no background or factual evaluation of the study cited. It is part of a “citation” by a health “official” and thus is simply allowed to stand as factual.
Speaking of officials qualified to dispense medical knowledge related to public policy - do no physicians work for the health clinic? Why is this nurse practitioner especially qualified to serve as a reliable source for questionable CDC information?
The reporter did find one physician who was willing to go on record:
Dr. Joseph Rahimian, an infectious disease specialist at St. Vincent’s Hospital in New York City…
[Rahimian said,] “There’s no study that abstinence is a highly effective form of prevention for any of these infections.”
(Interesting to note that there are no physicians in all of Pennsylvania. Perhaps that is why nurse practitioners carry so much authority there.)
Taking what we have, where did Dr. Rahimian go to medical school to learn that not having sex was anything other than a “highly effective form of prevention” for sexually transmitted diseases? I admit, I have not been to medical school, so perhaps there is a study that shows that people who don’t engage in sexual activity have equally high rates of sexually transmitted diseases as those people who do engage in sexual activity. For most of us laity, something about this claim just doesn’t add up. Does the reporter not understand the illogic of the good doctor’s statement?
The idea that STDs are rampant because there is just too much abstinence is madness to the Nth degree. This type of unquestioning, uncritical reporting is lunacy in print. Reprinting the unsupported claim that STDs are rampant because of “abstinence education” is shoddy, negligent reporting that (considering the ease with which our present report could have been clarified) borders on outright bias and advocacy journalism.
The real sadness is that so many readers uncritically accept it all as somehow true.
