Kevin DeYoung's Blog, page 4

Thinking Theologically About Racial Tensions eBook

Trent Hunter and the elders at Heritage Bible Church in Greer, South Carolina did a nice job of turning the “Thinking Theologically About Racial Tensions” blog series into a free eBook with questions at the end of each piece for their congregation. I’ve included the preface below and you can download a free copy here.

“Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,

The church has the best resources for dealing with the world’s greatest problems because we have been given a Word from God.

We know who we are because we know the One who made us. We have a common ancestor in Adam and a common dignity as those made in God’s image. We know what’s wrong with us because we have the true story about what happened when our first parents sinned. We failed to acknowledge God and so he has given us over to all manner of unrighteousness. We are haughty, hateful, and inventors of evil. But thankfully we have more than just an explanation for these things—our universal human dignity and universal corruption and guilt. We possess a universal offer of salvation. Through repentance and faith in the death and resurrection of Christ, we are new creations with a new common ancestor in Jesus. For, “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Ro. 5:8).

Our problem is that bad. Our God loves sinners that much.

We don’t hear much about these truths on the topic of race. Maybe that’s one reason this topic is famously tense. One individual denies the universal dignity of all people, another denies the universal corruption of sin. We are trying to discuss a problem we don’t understand. Even worse, we’re trying to solve a problem between people without God or grace. Each location on the map of history and the globe has its own unique truth suppressing profile. As Americans we have had our own evolving profile.

For all these reasons, our elders recognize that there is a need to offer biblical instruction on the topic of race. This is not because we believe that we are demonstrating sinful thoughts or attitudes on this topic as a church. Not hardly. Rather, this topic—filled as it is with human beings, human history, and human conflict—deserves nothing less than our best biblical thinking in order that we might honor Christ as Lord in our conversations with one another and with our neighbors. Our purpose is not corrective but instructive. As with every generation of Christians in every challenging place, God has equipped us well. “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2Tim. 3:16, 17).

Our commitment to the sufficiency of Scripture is why we are commending to you the work of Kevin DeYoung in his five-part series, Thinking Theologically about Racial Tensions. DeYoung teaches at Reformed Theological Seminary and pastors at Christ Covenant Church in Matthews, North Carolina. As elders, we used this writing to guide our conversations during a weekend retreat in the fall of ’20. By it we want to instruct you.

In the months prior to our retreat, our elders spent some time mapping the theology coming to us through our newsfeeds in the summer of 2020. We heard biblical terms used in unbiblical ways, such as justice and oppression. We heard ideas that weren’t in the Bible but that needed definition, such as wokeness, white-fragility, and critical theory. Finally, we noticed that there were some crucial biblical terms that were missing altogether, such as partiality or forgiveness. The more any conversation becomes unmoored from the categories of Scripture the more difficult it becomes. This proliferation of terms and teaching was an indication that we needed to anchor ourselves in the Word.

In Kevin’s work we found a great deal of help in slowing down to think God’s thoughts after him, to think in explicitly biblical categories. He put words to our own concern:

I fear that we are going about our business in the wrong order. We start with racial issues we don’t agree on and then try to sort out our theology accordingly, when we should start with our theology and then see how racial issues map onto the doctrines we hold in common. Good theology won’t clear up every issue, but we might be surprised to see some thorny issues look less complicated and more hopeful.

That’s getting things in the right order.

Working from the right starting place, others are doing important work as well. Scholars and pastors like Carl Trueman are writing incisive essays to help us discern the winds of doctrine blowing about us. In his article, “Evangelicals and Race Theory,” Trueman puts Critical Race Theory in its historical and philosophical context and shows the bankruptcy of this system. Then, in his piece on race and policing, “Across the Race Divide,” Kevin DeYoung interacts with a key chapter on the topic in David Kennedy’s book Don’t Shoot: One Man, A Street Fellowship, and the End of Violence in Inner-City America, to explore some underexamined dynamics involved in urban policing.

This is important reading. But the most important kind of reading is Bible reading. God has something to say about humanity and sin, about guilt and redemption. We want these truths to be clear in our minds so that we may speak the gospel clearly as we ought (Col. 4:4).

To that end, Kevin DeYoung and Christ Covenant Church were kind to allow us to put this material into an ebook for you. We commend it to you.

Read these articles alone or with a friend. We’ve drafted some questions to help you along. They are provided at the end of each section. We hope they help.

Your Elders,

Heritage Bible Church”

Christianity Is About Saving Sinners

Salvation is the great theme of Scripture. If we can plot the biblical storyline as creation, fall, redemption, and consummation, then clearly it is that third act which dominates the pages of special revelation. Strictly speaking, the Bible details creation in two chapters (Genesis 1-2), the fall in one chapter (Genesis 3), and consummation in two chapters (Revelation 21-22). The other 1,184 chapters are about redemption.

Of course, in saying Christianity is about salvation, we do not mean that Christianity is about nothing but sin and salvation. The Bible is a big book full of many ideas, many promises, and many commands. And yet, if we are to do justice to the death and resurrection of Jesus—and to the apostolic preaching about that death and resurrection—we must affirm that Christianity is chiefly, firstly, ultimately, and amazingly a message about God’s gracious initiative to save sinful human beings.

The Story We Are Telling

What is the driving theme throughout the Bible? What is the point of Holy Week? What is the story we have to tell to the nations? How we assess the central plotline of redemptive history will define the Christianity we live and the Christ we proclaim. Is the Christian faith mainly the story of a cosmos to be renewed? A God to be obeyed? A mystery to be explored? A journey to be experienced? Or is the good news of the Bible most consistently, most frequently, and most significantly the story of sinners to be saved?

In a day where emphasizing the salvation of sinners is sometimes denigrated as too narrow and too unconcerned with the real needs of the world, we must not lose sight of the soteriological shape of the biblical storyline. Christ’s work to save helpless, hell-bound sinners is at the heart of the gospel and is the irreducible minimum of the apostolic message of the cross.

There is a reason that all four Gospels culminate with the death and resurrection of Jesus. No other biography spends a third of its time detailing the subject’s last week. But the Gospels are no ordinary biographies. They tell the story of victory in defeat, of triumph through tragedy. Make no mistake: the point of Jesus’s life was to die, the point of his death was to rise again, and the point of his resurrection was to justify believing sinners (Rom. 4:25). Upon seeing Jesus, John the Baptist announced, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29). From even before his birth, the mission of the Christ was to save sinners. “You shall call his name Jesus,” the angel told Joseph, “for he will save his people from their sins” (Matt. 1:21). No wonder Jesus understood his own mission as coming “to seek and to save the lost” (Luke 19:10). “The Son of Man did not come to be served,” he told his disciples, “but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark. 10:45).

Christ and Him Crucified

To be sure, the work of Christ on the cross was multifaceted. In the death of Jesus, we have the conquering of evil, the defeat of Satan, and the example of perfect love. We can talk about more than sin and salvation when we talk about the cross, but we must not talk about less. For there is no good thing accomplished by the cross that was accomplished apart from the satisfaction of divine justice, the expiation of sin, and the propitiation of wrath.

If “evangelical” means anything worthwhile at all, it means that we are people who live and breathe and love and share the evangel. It means that our preaching never strays from Christ and him crucified (1 Cor. 1:23). It means that the most important thing about the most important message in the world is that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures (1 Cor. 15:3).

The problem in the world is (and always has been) sin. The need of the hour is (and always has been) salvation. We believe in ethics. We believe in discipleship. We believe that salvation is unto holiness and for good works (Titus 2:14). And we also believe with all our might that God sent his only begotten Son into the world that whoever believes in him may not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16).

We do not teach correctly about Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Christ if we do not say something about the point of Christ’s passion week as an atoning sacrifice for sin. His death was a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God for our sins (Eph. 5:2; cf. Lev. 1:9, 13, 14). Christ gave himself for our sins (Gal. 1:4). He became sin for us (2 Cor. 5:21). He bore our sins in his body on the tree (1 Peter 2:24). He was pierced for our transgressions and crushed for our iniquities (Isa. 53:5-6). The work of the high priest was to offer gifts and offer sacrifices for sin (Heb. 5:1; 8:3), and Christ is the best and true and final high priest because through the eternal Spirit he offered himself without blemish to God (9:14).

The death of Christ is enough to win for us cleansing and appeasement, forgiveness and redemption. Sin is lawlessness (1 John 3:4), but because of Christ’s death, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1:19). Christ’s sacrifice on the cross made purification for sin (Heb. 1:3), put away sin (9:26), and was a propitiation for sin (1 John 2:2). The One who loves us, the one who makes us a kingdom and makes us priests, is, we must always remember, the one who has freed us from our sins by his blood (Rev. 1:5-6).

God’s Salvation Story

We will not be Bible people—or Jesus people, or gospel people—if we are not salvation-for-sinners people. Though some may call it a soterian gospel or an individualistic gospel, the unavoidable reality of Scripture is that at the heart of the message of the cross is the simple, wonderful, glorious good news that Christ saves sinners like you and me. And if this message, and all that took place to accomplish what it announces, represents the climax of redemptive history—indeed, if all of history is about redemption—then we are right to conclude that this soteriological emphasis must shape the sound of our preaching, the priority of our ministry, and the mission of the church.

“The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost” (1 Tim. 1:15). That is the preaching that God blesses. That is that ministry that God uses. That is the mission that God has given us in the world. The mercy of God is the theme of our song because the salvation of sinners is the story of Scripture. Let us sing it, say it, and savor it—this week and for eternity.

Life and Books and Everything: Who’s to Blame for the Atlanta Shootings‪?‬

I’m podcasting solo in this newest episode of Life and Books and Everything, seeking to help us understand the wickedness of the Atlanta shootings from a Biblical perspective. Examining four threads that feed into how we measure culpability for heinous public crimes and distinguishing what should be condemned from what shouldn’t. And of course, there are books. Learn what books about race and other ideas I’ve been reading.

Books and Everything

Reparations: A Christian Call for Repentance and Repair, by Duke L. Kwon &
Gregory Thompson

More than Just Race: Being Black and Poor in the Inner City, by William
Julius Wilson

Race and Covenant: Recovering the Religious Roots for American Reconciliation,
by Gerald R McDermott

American Awakening: Identity Politics and Other Afflictions of Our Time, by
Joshua Mitchell

Slaying Leviathan: Limited Government and Resistance in the Christian Tradition,
by Glenn S. Sunshine

A World Without Email: Reimagining Work in an Age of Communication Overload,
by Cal Newport

Life and Books and Everything: COVID-19 a Year Later: Perspectives from a Pastor and Doctor

Collin, Justin, and I enjoyed sitting down with Dr. Miguel Núñez, Pastor for Preaching & Vision at IBI and President of Ministerios Integridad & Sabiduría, who left his medical practice to follow his passion of preaching the Gospel. When COVID-19 broke out in 2020, he used his medical expertise to assess the situation for The Gospel Coalition. Now, one year later, he offers his insights along with a conversation about how the preaching of the Gospel is spreading in the Dominican Republic.

Why Reformed Evangelicalism Has Splintered: Four Approaches to Race, Politics, and Gender

It’s no secret that America is suffering from ever-deepening division and polarization. Many of us are concerned about the increasing animosity, belligerence, and violence in our body politic. What concerns me even more are the divisions in the church, in particular, the growing factionalism in the conservative evangelical Reformed world I inhabit. Whether the problem is on the right or on the left (or both), there is little doubt that our Young, Restless, and Reformed tribe is less young (and maybe less Reformed?), but certainly as restless as ever.

My memory may be too rosy, but in my estimation—having been “in the room” for most of this history—the early 2000s, up until 2014, saw a remarkable coming together of a variety of Reformed and Reformedish networks, ministries, and church leaders. Of course, the “Reformed resurgence” or “New Calvinism” or “YRR” was always divided along some obvious lines. There were the usual disagreements about the sacraments and spiritual gifts and polity and approaches to worship. But the “team” was held together by a number of important theological convictions: historic Christian orthodoxy, inerrancy, penal substitution, Calvinist soteriology, the Reformation solas, complementarianism, and the centrality of expositional preaching. Across the almost decade of (apparent) unity, there was also a shared sense of what the movement was NOT: we were not liberals, not Arminians, not Emergent, not seeker sensitive, not prosperity gospel, not egalitarians, not revisionist on sexual ethics, not Catholics, not watered-down evangelicals, and not compromisers on unpopular doctrinal truths.

For about a decade, it seemed, amazingly, that more pastors, more churches, and more networks were coming to share these convictions. Importantly, many brothers and sisters embraced being Black and Reformed. Christian hip hop was widely celebrated as rich theological wine being poured into new wineskins. “Big God Theology” was not only on the rise and on the move; it was bringing people together who had previously been apart.

And yet, on the other side of Ferguson (2014), Trump (2016), MLK50 (2018), coronavirus (2020–2021), George Floyd (2020), and more Trump (2020–2021), the remarkable coming together seems to be all but torn apart. Obviously, the biggest issue is race and everything that touches race (e.g., police shootings, Critical Race Theory, Trump), but it’s not just race that divides us. It is more broadly our different instincts and sensibilities, our divergent fears and suspicions, our various intellectual and cultural inclinations. Yes, there are important theological disagreements too, and these demand the best attention of our heads and hearts. But in many instances, people who can affirm the same doctrinal commitments on paper are miles apart in their posture and practice.

Toward One Way of Understanding Our Differences

Why?

That’s what I’ve been thinking about over the last year or more. I don’t have the last word on how to assess the problem, let alone all the next steps toward addressing the problem. But attempting to understand what’s going on is an important start.

It seems to me there are at least four different “teams” at present. Many of the old networks and alliances are falling apart and being re-formed along new lines. These new lines are not doctrinal in the classic sense. Rather, they often capture a cultural mood, a political instinct, or a personal sensibility. You could label each team by what it sees as the central need of the hour, by what it assesses as the most urgent work of the church in this cultural moment. Let’s give each group an adjective corresponding to this assessment.

Contrite: “Look at the church’s complicity in past and present evils. We have been blind to injustice, prejudice, racism, sexism, and abuse. What the world needs is to see a church owning its sins and working, in brokenness, to make up for them and overcome them.”Compassionate: “Look at the many people hurting and grieving in our midst and in the world. Now is the time to listen and learn. Now is the time to weep with those who weep. What the world needs is a church that demonstrates the love of Christ.”Careful: “Look at the moral confusion and intellectual carelessness that marks our time. Let’s pay attention to our language and our definitions. What the world needs is a church that will draw upon the best of its theological tradition and lead the way in understanding the challenges of our day.”Courageous: “Look at the church’s compromise with (if not outright capitulation to) the spirit of the age. Now is the time for a trumpet blast, not for backing down. What the world needs is a church that will admonish the wayward, warn against danger, and stand as a bulwark for truth, no matter how unpopular.”

Notice that each “team” is labeled with a positive word. Although I’m closer to 3 than to any other category, I’ve tried my best to label each group in a way that expresses the good that they are after. Most of us will read the list above and think, “I like all four words. At the right time, in the right place, in the right way, the church should be contrite, compassionate, careful, and courageous.” The purpose of this schema is not to pigeonhole people or groups, nor is it to suggest that if we could just mix in 25% from each category then all our problems would be solved. I realize that the danger with schemas like this is that people may further divide by placing others into rigid categories or that people may stumble into moral equivalency as if there are no right approaches or right answers.

Having made those important caveats, I believe that conceptual groupings can help us see more clearly that our disagreements are not just about one thing, but about the basic posture and way in which we see a whole lot of things. Although any categorization tool will be generalized, simplified, and imperfect, they can still be useful, especially if we realize that some categories can have a left wing (moving toward the next lowest number) and a right wing (leaning toward the next highest number).

With that in mind, think about how the four teams assess a series of contemporary issues in two broad categories.

Table 1 (Race)

White SupremacySystemic RacismPolice ShootingsCritical Race TheoryBlack Lives MatterContriteEssential to American history, Whites must repentRampant— disparities imply discriminationEvidence of continuing racism and injusticeFull of good insightsSay it, wave it, wear itCompassionateMore prevalent than we think, Whites should lamentNot the only explanation, but should be seen and called outFirst step is to weep with those who weepChew on the meat, spit out the bonesSupport the slogan, not the organizationCarefulA sad part of American history but not the whole story, we should all celebrate what is good and reject what is badOpen to the category, but racial disparities exist for many reasonsLet’s get the evidence first before jumping on social mediaCore concepts are deeply at odds with Christian conviction, but let’s not throw around labels willy-nillyBlack lives are made in the image of God, but given the aims of the larger movement, using the phrase in an unqualified way is unwiseCourageousSadly, a part of our past, but lumping all Whites together as racists is anti-gospelA Marxist category we must rejectThe real problem is Black-on-Black crimeThe church’s path toward liberalismWhat about Blue lives? Unborn lives? All lives?

 

Table 2 (Politics and Gender)

TrumpChristian NationalismWearing MasksSexual AbuseGender RolesContriteNo! The church’s allegiance to Trump is the clearest sign of its spiritual bankruptcy.One of the biggest problems in our day, a dangerous ideology at home in most conservative white churchesI feel unsafe and uncared for when masks aren’t worn—besides Covid affects minority communities worse than othersIt’s about time the church owned this scandal, believes victims, and calls out perpetrators and their friendsThe problem is toxic masculinity and unbiblical stereotypesCompassionateA matter of Christian liberty, but there are good reasons to criticize TrumpToo many Christians are letting their politics shape their religionIt’s one small but important way to love your neighborSympathize with victims, vow to do betterTraditional views are good, but many dangers come from our own mistakesCarefulA matter of Christian liberty, but there are good reasons someone might have voted for TrumpChristian symbols and rhetoric supporting insurrection is bad, but the term itself needs more definition.Probably overblown and a bit frustrating, but let’s just get through thisEach case and each accusation should be looked at on its own meritsWe need a strong, joyful celebration of biblical manhood and womanhoodCourageousYes! He’s not perfect, but he stood up to the anti-God agenda of the left.A new label meant to smear Christians who want to see our country adhere to biblical principlesA sign of the government encroaching on our libertiesA real tragedy, but so is demonizing good peopleThe problem is feminism and emasculated men

 

So What’s the Point?

To reiterate, the point of this schema is not rigidity or relativism. I’m not suggesting that every Reformedish Christian can be neatly placed in one row all the way across, neither am I suggesting that we are all blind men with the elephant, each person no closer to the whole truth than anyone else.

One reason for the schema is to take a step toward understanding our current context. The loudest voices tend to be 1s and 4s, which makes sense because they tend to see many of these issues in the starkest terms and often collide with each other in ways that makes a lot of online noise. The 1s and 4s can also be the most separatist, with some voices (among the 1s) encouraging an exodus from white evangelical spaces and some voices (among the 4s) encouraging the woke to be excommunicated. The 2s and 3s are more likely to appeal to unity, or at least ask for a better understanding of all sides, which can make them sound too squishy for either end of the spectrum. The effort by the 2s and 3s to find middle ground is made difficult by the fact that many 2s want their friends among the 3s to call out the dangerous 4s, while the 3s would like their friends among the 2s to be less sympathetic to the 1s.

Just as important as understanding our context is understanding ourselves. We’d like to think we come to all our positions by a rigorous process of prayer, biblical reflection, and rational deliberation. But if we are honest, we all have certain instincts too. By virtue of our upbringing, our experiences, our hurts, our personalities, our gifts, and our fears, we gravitate toward certain explanations and often think in familiar patterns when it comes to the most complicated and controversial issues. Why is it that by knowing what someone thinks about, say, mask wearing that you probably have a pretty good idea what they think about Christian Nationalism and systemic racism? To be sure, friend groupings play a part, as does the totalizing effect of politics in our day. And yet, our own unique—and often predictable—sensibilities often play a bigger role than we think.

We won’t be able to put all the pieces of Humpty Dumpty back together again—and maybe some pieces shouldn’t have been glued together in the first place. But if we can understand what’s going on—in our networks, in our churches, and in our hearts—we will be better equipped to disciple our own people and reach out, where we can, to those who may disagree. Most importantly, perhaps we will be able to find a renewed focus, not on our cultural sensibilities and political instincts, but on the glory of Christ, the incarnate Son of God, who came from the Father full of grace and truth.

God Will Be True to His Promise (Even When We Get in the Way)

Genesis 12 explodes with good news. While Abram was still living in Mesopotamia (Acts 7:2) and part of a family of idol worshipers (Josh. 24:2), God came to him and promised a sevenfold blessing (Gen. 12:1-3). Abram would be a great nation, he would have a great name, and through him, all the families of the earth would be blessed.

But no sooner do we hear of God’s promised blessing to Abram than we find the promise threatened by famine in Egypt and (even worse) by Abram’s foolishness before Pharaoh. Fearing that his life will be in danger because of the beauty of his wife, Abram instructs Sarai to lie to the Egyptian king and say that she is his sister. This leads Pharaoh to shower Abram with riches and to take Sarai into his harem as his wife. Whether Pharaoh committed adultery with Sarai or not is unclear (I think not). What is clear is that when Abram is sent away by the king he leaves Egypt a much wealthier man than we he arrived.

The point of the story is not to moralize, good or bad, on Pharaoh or Abram or Sarai. It’s not wrong to draw lessons from Old Testament history (1 Cor. 10:6), but Genesis 12:10-20 is not mainly about the patriarchs. It is first of all about the invincibility of God’s promise.

Pharaoh’s house was cursed when it looked like Pharaoh would dishonor Sarai (cf. Gen. 12:3). And meanwhile, Abram was blessed—blessed beyond his wildest expectation and certainly blessed well beyond all deserving. This is the story we see over and over again in Genesis: God’s protection and God’s provision for the sake of God’s promise.

What did Abram do to deserve to leave Egypt a richer man than when he arrived? Nothing. Actually, less than nothing! And yet, Abram left with great wealth, because God is true to his promise. The promises of God are so sure, not even God’s people can ultimately mess them up.

Looking Back

There’s a connection between the story about Abram and Sarai in Egypt in chapter 12 and the story about Adam and Eve in the Garden in chapter 3.

Both stories center around a temptation caused by food. In the garden, it’s the fruit that looks good to eat and the temptation that arises from that, and in here it’s the temptation arising from the lack of food.

In both instances, we see the disastrous results of a husband’s poor leadership involving his wife.

We also see that both stories deal with deception. The serpent deceives the couple, and here the couple deceives Pharaoh. The result of both deceptions is this language, “they saw and they took.” The woman saw the fruit, she took and she ate. Pharaoh saw the woman and took her to be his wife.

In both stories, once the deception is found out, the ruler asks questions. God comes to Adam: “What have you done?” Pharaoh comes to Abram: “Why have you done this? Why didn’t you tell me?” In both cases the man’s excuse is to point to his wife: “Well, the wife that you gave me, she gave me the fruit.” “Well, the wife that I have, she’s simply too beautiful. I had to lie.”

And what’s the result in both stories? The couple is sent out. Adam and Eve are kicked out of Eden. Abram and Sarai are sent away from Egypt.

You could even look at the next passage to follow in each instance. After leaving the Garden there is family conflict between Cain and Abel. After leaving Egypt, there is family conflict between Abram and Lot. We are meant to see this episode in chapter 12 as another kind of fall from grace. The two stories track with each other in uncanny ways.

Except for this all-important detail. In Genesis Adam and Eve are kicked out of Eden, and they leave with cursing. In Genesis 12, Abram and Sarai are kicked out of Egypt, and they leave with blessing. They deserve cursing, just like Adam and Eve did in the garden, but here the promise of God is so operative that when they deserve the same cursing, instead they get what they don’t deserve, they get more blessing.

Looking Ahead

And there’s a connection with this story, not only going back to the garden, but looking forward to the Exodus. Remember, Moses is writing this story is writing it for the people when they are wandering in the wilderness, on the cusp of entering the Promised Land. Think about the parallels they would have seen between their story this story.

Abram migrates to Egypt because of a famine. Jacob’s family, at the end of Genesis, will go down to Egypt because of a famine.

When Abram and Sarai approach the land, they plan a speech for Pharaoh so that it might go well with them. When Israel’s family journeys to Egypt at the end of the book, they plan a speech for Pharaoh so that it might go well with them.

Sarai becomes a sort of slave to Pharaoh. The Israelites will become, for many centuries, slaves to another Pharaoh.

God then afflicts that Pharaoh with plagues, just as he afflicts the Pharaoh in Genesis 12 with plagues. In both cases, the plagues result in Pharaoh sending God’s people out of Egypt.

And what happens when they leave Egypt? Both times they leave with great wealth from the Egyptians. And in both cases, the next stop is to journey in the Negev and then later arrive back in the land.

This story in Genesis 12 was meant to be a comfort to God’s people wandering in the wilderness because of their sin. Parents would have been able to say to their children, “Remember what God did for Abram? He almost blew it. But God took care of him. God rescued him. God blessed him and brought him back to Canaan, all for the sake of his promise. Surely he will do the same for us.”

Looking at Ourselves

Obviously, the lesson from Abram and Sarai in Egypt is not that we should lie our way to wealth and prosperity. Abram’s conniving is a rebuke to all of us who think God’s plan needs help from the world’s ways.

But mostly, the story is a word of hope. It’s a firm reminder that nothing and no one can fully and finally derail the promises of God. You may look at your sin and stupidity and think that you’ve forfeited all of God’s blessing for you. But you haven’t. We may corporately look at the failures of God’s people—worldly compromise, theological error, fallen leaders, hypocrisy, duplicity, sin, and scandal—and wonder how the church will ever accomplish the purposes God has for her. But don’t forget: Jesus himself promises to build his church. This is not an excuse for us to be lazy, let alone to be disobedient, but it is reason for hope.

I don’t know what God is up to in your church, your city, your denomination, or your country, but we can be absolutely certain of this: Christ will be true to his word. The gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable (Rom. 11:29). Nothing can fully and finally derail or destroy the promises of God. Not the world, not the flesh, not the devil. Not even us. Jesus Christ will have his way. He will keep his promises. He will bless his people. He will build his church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.

Life and Books and Everything: Stephen J. Nichols on R.C. Sproul

Collin, Justin, and I sit down with Stephen Nichols to discuss his new biography of R. C. Sproul: A Life, an in-depth look at Sproul’s life and ministry―his childhood; his formative seminary education; his marriage and partnership with his beloved wife, Vesta; his influence on broader American evangelicalism; and his many friendships with key figures such as James Montgomery Boice, John MacArthur, John Piper, J. I. Packer, and Chuck Colson. This biography details the profound impact Sproul had on the lives of many during his lifetime, and highlights the various ways his legacy continues to influence countless pastors and students worldwide.

Book and More Books:

Journey to the Cross: A 40-Day Lenten Devotional, by Paul David Tripp

R.C. Sproul: A Life, by Stephen J. Nichols

The Holiness of God, by R.C. Sproul

Of Faith and Fear

“Faith over fear.”

It’s one of those Christian slogans that is undeniably true, and, at the same time, less helpful than it may seem.

To be sure, our lives as Christians ought to be marked by faith not fear. Over and over, the Bible tells us not to be afraid (Josh. 10:25; Isa. 44:8). We should fear not, for the Lord will help us (Isa. 41:13). God gave us a spirit not of fear but of self-control (2 Tim. 1:7). Jesus himself repeatedly exhorts his people not to be afraid (Matt. 8:26; 14:27; 28:10; Mark 5:36; Luke 12:32; John 14:27). Perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:18).

The reason the Christian can face life unafraid is not because we are intrinsically brave, let alone because nothing bad will ever happen to us. The reason we do not fear what man (or disease or weather or accidents) can do to us is because we fear God instead. Scripture is full of commands like “the Lord your God you shall fear” (Deut. 6:13), “Serve the Lord with fear” (Ps. 2:11), “Fear God and keep his commandments” (Eccl. 12:13), or simply “Fear God” (1 Peter 2:17). We know that the fear of the Lord is clean (Ps. 19:9) and the beginning of wisdom (Prov. 1:7).

This is a crucial message in our day. The daily news doesn’t get our attention by broadcasting good news; it gets eyeballs with bad news. Politicians get our support by stoking fear in what the other side will do if they win. Social media influencers hold our attention not by painting a balanced picture of possibilities and tradeoffs, but by depicting a dystopian nightmare that’s one wrong move, one disappointing election, one disturbing trend away from reality. The truth is we can be fearful people—irrationally jumping to the worst possible conclusions, perversely relying on doomsday predictions to give us our emotional fix, unthinkingly forming our opinions (or even our doctrines) based on the loudest and latest jeremiads. So yes, “faith over fear” is a needed word for our day.

And yet, the slogan is in desperate need of some balance of its own.

For starters, not all fear is the same. As Justin Taylor helpfully points out, we must distinguish among different concepts like worry, concern, fear, moral panic, and fear mongering. When we teach our children not to play in the road, we are inculcating a salutary kind of fear, different from teaching them to sleep with a knife under their pillow each night for fear of robbers. Too often in popular discourse, one side looks to score rhetorical points by labeling every kind of concern—whether exaggerated and unreasonable or sober and well-grounded—as sinful fear. But that’s not how the Bible works.

When the book of Proverbs admonishes us to work hard so as to avoid poverty (Prov. 6:6-11) or to walk in God’s ways so as to avoid personal calamity (Prov. 5:21-23), we are being motivated by something like fear.

When Paul escaped through an opening in the wall in Damascus (Acts 9:23-25), should he have had greater faith?

Were the people guilty of panic in Nehemiah’s day when they prayed to God and set a guard as protection against their enemies day and night (Neh. 4:9)?

Was Jesus wrong to warn people of hell in harrowing detail and to motivate people to obedience based, in part, on the dread of judgment (Matt. 5:27-30; 10:28; 18:7-9; 24:48-51; 25:30, 41-46)?

We must not think that being concerned about the future is inimical to confidence in God. Surely, it was not a sign of Jesus’s lack of faith that while in the Garden of Gethsemane he was very sorrowful and deeply troubled (Matt. 26:37-38).

It’s also worth pointing out that “faith over fear” usually cuts in both directions. If it was wrong to vote for Trump out of fear for what the Democrats would do if they won, then it must have been wrong to vote for Biden out of fear for what Trump would do if he were given a second term. You can’t chastise half of the country for fearing socialism if you spur on your side to vote because all those other people are fascists. We say “faith over fear” but often the issue is not really faith but a different assessment of the threat at hand. We can tell conservative Christians not to be so afraid of a Biden presidency, but then many of those same conservative Christians would tell their critics not to be so afraid of Covid. In both cases, I doubt that the courage to face the future is rooted in tremendous confidence in the Lord (at least not entirely) as much as it is in an evaluation that the thing other people are fearing is not nearly as dangerous as they think. We say “faith” but what we sometimes mean is “there is very little here to fear.”

This leads to one final thought. The exhortation to “faith over fear” is bound to land better on others when it rings forth as a word of hope instead of a word of shame. Granted, Jesus had no problem rebuking his disciples for their lack of faith (Matt. 8:26). But that’s far from the only way the Bible seeks to engender faith in God’s people. What’s missing from the “faith over fear” mantra is a robust exploration of why we can have peace instead of panic. With the Spirit to strengthen us, the Son to sympathize with our weakness, and the Father to care for us in all things, we have no cause for despair. Of all people, we who believe in the all-encompassing providence of God have reason to face the future unafraid. Let’s be careful, then, that when we say “faith over fear” we are making God’s promises feel big more than we are making our fellow Christians feel small.

Life and Books and Everything: Tim Keller on the Reformed Resurgence

Collin, Justin, and I sit down with Tim Keller to discuss the Reformed movement, The Gospel Coalition, and what comes next in Evangelicalism. Along the way, you’ll hear advice for evangelizing, warnings about Christian celebrity, and of course book recommendations for pastors and leaders.

Books and More Books:

Dynamics of Spiritual Life, by Richard F. Lovelace

Evangelism Through the Local Church, by Michael Green

Evangelism in the Early Church, by Michael Green

Between Faith and Criticism, by Mark Noll

Reformed Resurgence: The New Calvinist Movement and the Battle Over American Evangelicalism, by Brad Vermurlen

What Is Conservatism?

Conservatism, as a political and moral philosophy in the Anglo-American tradition, has a long history that is usually traced back to Edmund Burke’s Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790). Burke, the Irish-born philosopher and politician, was not against all change. He generally supported the American colonies, seeing American independence not as a revolution but as an exercise in British citizens directing their own affairs instead of being mismanaged from afar.

The French Revolution, however, was another matter. Burke thought it folly for the French to think they could start over as a people or that human nature could be made anew. Burke thought people were guided by passions and sentiments more than by reason. He feared that if you strip away everything you know, something worse and more tyrannical will take its place. For Burke, we are born into the world with a civilizational inheritance to maintain, whether we like it not, much like parents are obliged to care for their children, and children are obliged to obey their parents. Burke insisted that Britain should be grateful for the habits, institutions, and principles that gave them unrivaled freedom and prosperity, and that this cultural heritage ought to be conserved rather than violently overthrown (for more on Burke, see Yuval Levin’s excellent book The Great Debate).

This is not the place to sketch out the history of conservatism, but suffice it to say it has been, like every other earthly ism, a diverse and imperfect tradition, including (in broad strokes): politicians like Benjamin Disraeli, Winston Churchill, and Margaret Thatcher in England and Calvin Coolidge, Barry Goldwater, and Ronald Reagan in America; authors like Whitaker Chambers, Henry Jaffa, George Santayana, Richard Weaver, and Roger Scruton; economic theorists like Frederick Hayek and Milton Friedman. In its American form, conservatism has counted groups as varied as classical liberals, early Federalists, and southern agrarians among its intellectual heroes. In its more recent form, conservatism became mainstream with the rise of William F. Buckley, Jr. and the launch of National Review in 1955.

What’s the Point?

I’m not writing about conservatism because I think the Christian religion requires a conservative political philosophy, let alone because I think the two are identical. And yet, there are good reasons for Christians to know more about conservatism than they do. 

(1) For starters, most white Christians in America think of themselves as conservatives, but I imagine few have read much, if anything, from the centuries-old conservative tradition. 

(2) It has often been assumed that Trump and conservatism are the same thing, or that Republican policies and conservatism are the same thing, or that conservatism is the same as a disdain for the elite nexus of Hollywood, the media, and the academy.

(3) Conservatism, without any definition, is often invoked as an explanation for someone’s political views. This happens from the right (“but I’m a conservative”) and from the left (“you are too beholden to your conservatism”). In both claims, the moniker “conservative” is little more than an ideological label that quickly identifies someone’s views as obviously trustworthy or obviously hijacked.

(4) While I’ve argued before that Christian pastors and ministry leaders would be wise to provide less in the way of political punditry, this does not mean Christian theology and political philosophy have nothing to do with each other. If we can talk on the level of moral philosophy and anthropological assumptions and political first principles (away from the constant clamor of the 24-hour news cycle and polarization of national elections) we may be able to have a more meaningful conversation. If nothing else, the conversation will be deeper and richer and (likely) wiser for reading and evaluating the most important thinkers in the conservative tradition of the last two centuries rather than just listening to the loudest voices who claim to speak for conservatism today.

Concise Guide to Conservatism

With that last point in mind, I thought it would be worthwhile to look at one answer to the question posed in the title of this post. If someone wants a short, straightforward, and seminal exploration of conservatism he can do no better than to read Russell Kirk’s Concise Guide to Conservatism (Regnery Gateway, 2019). Originally published in 1957 as The Intelligent Woman’s Guide to Conservatism (a jab at George Bernard Shaw’s Intelligent Women’s Guide to Socialism and Capitalism), the Concise Guide is much more accessible than Kirk’s larger work (a revised dissertation of all things!) The Conservative Mind (1953). 

Kirk was born in 1918 in Plymouth, Michigan (now a suburb of Detroit) and went on to earn degrees from Michigan State, Duke, and the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. After teaching for several years at his alma mater, Kirk left Michigan State in 1959 and returned to his ancestral home in Mecosta, a rural community an hour north of Grand Rapids. In 1963, Kirk converted to Catholicism and married Annette Courtemanche. Together they had four children and often welcomed guests, literary figures, refugees, and vagrants to “Piety Hill” (their country home). Through his teaching, his writing, and his involvement in the leading conservative journals of the day, Kirk gained the reputation as a key theorist, moralist, historian, novelist, and philosopher of post-war conservatism. Russell Kirk, lauded by his friends as “the benevolent sage of Mecosta,” died in 1994.

In the Concise Guide, Kirk lays out ten characteristics of conservative thought.

“Men and nations are governed by moral laws; and those laws have their origin in a wisdom that is more than human—in divine justice” (2). Kirk made clear that “Christianity prescribes no especial form of politics” (9). At the same time, he believed that conservatism was built on a religious foundation and that religion in the modern world was largely defended by conservative people (9). “The conservative believes that the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom” (10) “Variety and diversity are the characteristics of a high civilization. Uniformity and absolute equality are the death of all real vigor and freedom in existence” (2-3). In rejecting absolute equality, Kirk did not mean equal treatment under the law, but an equal outcome enforced by the state.
“Justice means that every man and every woman have the right to what is their own—to the things best suited to their own nature, to the rewards of their ability and integrity, to their property, and their personality” (3). Society, said Kirk, is a partnership in which all have equal rights but not all have equal things.
“Property and freedom are inseparably connected: economic leveling is not economic progress” (3). Kirk argues that the three fundamental rights in the Anglo-American tradition have been life, liberty, and property (what Thomas Jefferson described more expansively as “the pursuit of happiness”). If there were no private property, we would not all be rich together; we would all be poor together (56-57). Private property is not only a good in itself; it is also a means to culture and freedom. The role of the state is to protect man’s property, not to allocate it. For his part, the virtuous citizen understands that property comes with duties, and by our property and possessions we ought to serve God and serve our fellow men (60).
“Power is full of danger; therefore, the good state is one in which power is checked and balanced, restricted by sound constitutions and customs” (3-4). Kirk is not anti-authority, nor even anti-government. He considers government “a necessary good” provided it is just, balanced, and restricted. Men with power cannot be trusted, so ambition must be made to counteract ambition.
“The past is a great storehouse of wisdom; as Burke said, ‘The individual is foolish, but the species is wise’” (4). The conservative knows he was not born yesterday. He is eager to listen to the “democracy of the dead.” The conservative does not idealize the past, but he believes that we will be wiser if we listen to the wise men and women of the past.
“Modern society urgently needs true community: and true community is a world away from collectivism” (4). Conservatives are public-spirited. They believe in doing one’s duty to town and country, to his business and to his church, to his school and to his union, to his civic association and to his charitable fund (44). In genuine community, decisions are made locally wherever possible, and philanthropy and neighborliness are voluntary virtues.
“In the affairs of nations, the American conservative feels that his country ought to set an example to the world, but ought not to try to remake the world in its image” (5). Kirk is less interested in a specific foreign policy than in a general inclination that urges America to be virtuous, without necessarily being interventionist.
“Men and women are not perfectible, conservatives know; and neither are political institutions. We cannot make heaven on earth, though we may make a hell” (5). Human nature is not malleable. We must deal with people as they are, not as we wish them to be. This means, as Kirk says elsewhere, “politics is the art of the possible, not the art of the ideal.”“Change and reform, conservatives are convinced, are not identical: moral and political innovation can be destructive as well as beneficial” (5-6). The conservative does not believe in change for the sake of change. He is not eager for revolution. He does not believe in the abstract cult of progress. When in doubt, permanence should be favored over progress. Choose what is old and tried, even if it is imperfect, before what is new untried. Conservatives prefer the devil they know to the devil they don’t know.Summary

Kirk was writing in the 1950s so the great enemy, as he saw it, was collectivism and totalitarianism. Like many conservatives, he did not see the injustices in his country as well as the injustices in other countries. In general, the conservative movement since World War II has been proven right on the issues of communism and socialism but has often been proven slow (or wrong) on the issue of race. Of Kirk’s ten points, I’d say 1 is undeniably Christian and 4, 5, 6, and 9 can be drawn from Christian principles, but they are certainly not the last word on moral philosophy or a Christian approach to society and politics. As I said earlier, I do not offer this summary of conservatism because I think it should become a confessional standard for Christians. Perish the thought! We have an inerrant Bible, not to mention our own dogmatic tradition. But I do believe Kirk’s definition of conservatism (or something like it) is worth our careful consideration, not least of all from those Christians who call themselves conservatives.