Gregory Koukl's Blog, page 75

The Intellectual Life and the Fruit of the Spirit

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires (Galatians 5:22-24).

I love the intellectual life. I love the reading, the studying, the debating, the discussions, the ideas. I love all of it. But looming in the shadows are the various threats it poses to the fruit of God’s Spirit in my life: 

In regard to love, it threatens my ability to love others whom I have intellectual disagreements with and whose ideas I find dangerous.
In regard to joy, it threatens to subtly remove joy from my life as it often requires a critical and skeptical eye toward ideas, which can lead to negativity. 
In regard to peace, it threatens the peace I ought to live in with other believers even when I disagree. Indeed, I’ve had heated discussions that broke fellowship with my brothers in Christ for some period of time. 
In regard to patience, it threatens my ability to be gracious and understanding as I interact with those who have difficulty seeing and affirming the truth. Specifically, I have to be very attentive to this with my own family. 
In regard to kindness, it threatens my ability to be charitable to the ideas of others. 
In regard to goodness, it threatens the priority I place on practicing spiritual disciplines and cultivating virtue, as I feel the continual pull to bury my head in books. 
In regard to faithfulness, it threatens my faithfulness to God himself, as I give more attention to man’s written word than God’s written Word. 
In regard to gentleness, it threatens the way I interact with non-Christians as I strive against the urge to persuade using only the “resistless force of logic.” 
In regard to self-control, it threatens the priorities I must have in place as I battle for balance between the intellectual life and God, family, church, and other priorities. 

As we continue to cultivate an intellectual love for God, let us be on constant watch for these potential pitfalls, and let us attend to our own virtue and life in the Spirit with as much emphasis and passion as our intellectual life.

Webcast Tuesday

Greg is live online Tuesday 4-7 p.m. PT. Open lines all three hours so give him a call with your question or comment at (855) 243-9975.

Listen live online. Join us on Twitter during the program @STRtweets #STRtalk.

What Does the Bible Say about Raising and Disciplining a Child?

Greg offers his reflections on the biblical view of raising children.

 

"Our Minds May Be Separate from Our Brains"

Medical Daily reports in “Near-Death Experiences Suggest Consciousness Continues Beyond Death”:

A new study of cardiac arrest patients indicates that 46 percent had memories of the time during which they were clinically dead, while two percent could explicitly recall seeing and hearing events related to their resuscitation. These results, the researchers say, suggest consciousness is present beyond the point at which scientists can detect it. Our minds, then, may be separate from our brains.

The UK Independent explains more:

Experts currently believe that the brain shuts down within 20 to 30 seconds of the heart stopping beating – and that it is not possible to be aware of anything at all once that has happened.

But scientists in the new study said they heard compelling evidence that patients experienced real events for up to three minutes after this had happened – and could recall them accurately once they had been resuscitated. 

Dr Sam Parnia, an assistant professor at the State University of New York and a former research fellow at the University of Southampton who led the research, said that he previously [thought] that patients who described near-death experiences were only relating hallucinatory events….

Dr Parnia’s study involved 2,060 patients from 15 hospitals in the UK, US and Austria, and has been published in the journal Resuscitation.

Of those who survived, 46 per cent experienced a broad range of mental recollections, nine per cent had experiences compatible with traditional definitions of a near-death experience and two per cent exhibited full awareness with explicit recall of “seeing” and “hearing” events – or out-of-body experiences.

For more on this subject, see “Newsweek: Heaven Is Real,” “What We Can and Cannot Learn from Near Death Experiences” (an interview with Gary Habermas), and “Near Death Experiences and the Afterlife” (a lecture by Habermas). 

(HT: Wintery Knight)

10 Years at STR and Counting...

It’s my Stand to Reason employment anniversary this weekend. I’ve been working with STR for 10 years, and I’m just getting started.

I can summarize by saying this: It’s my dream job. I love working for STR. The people I work with are talented, intelligent, kind, and – most importantly – love God with all their heart. I also get to meet great people at events where I speak.

Here are two quick lessons I’ve learned along the way.

I’ve found a lot more unity within the Church than I expected. I speak to a wide diversity of churches and denominations: Lutheran, Presbyterian, Baptist, Catholic, Coptic, Calvary, Anglican, etc…you name it. Although there are theological differences – both great and small – I always find myself surrounded with people who love our Lord Jesus and want to serve Him in the best way they can. Look, I know we have a lot of work to do in the area of church unity. I’m not oblivious to that fact. I’m just saying I find a lot of kindred spirits even among Christians who are theologically different from me. I’m welcomed (and trusted to teach) in many places I wouldn’t have expected to have an influence.

The biggest threat to the Church is…the Church. I know I often teach on Islam, homosexuality, and abortion, and that might suggest I consider one of those topics as the biggest threat. They’re not. Yes, they’re significant external challenges that the Church must face, but the bigger problem is internal. I believe the more important question is whether we’ll rise to stand firm against the challenges or fall and capitulate to cultural pressure. There will always be new challenges that will come our way. Some big and some small. It’s our response, however, that worries me. I’m seeing a lot of believers who are unable to stand their ground and instead are giving up ground. That encourages the enemy. That’s why my focus is always on training believers to stand firm.

It’s a privilege for me to serve God through my work with Stand to Reason and I’m looking forward to the next decade of ministry with STR.

Challenge Response: Knowledge Is the Enemy of Faith

Here's my response to this week's challenge:

You Can’t Erase Gender, but You Can Sure Try

Remember when I said we should expect to see more efforts to erase the distinction between men and women? Take a look at these excerpts from a handout titled “12 Easy Steps on the Way to Gender Inclusiveness,” compiled by Gender Spectrum and given to Lincoln (Nebraska) Public Schools staff (“not meant as rules staff had to follow, but as suggestions for how teachers can make students feel comfortable”):

1. Avoid asking kids to line up as boys or girls or separating them by gender. Instead, use things like "odd and even birth date," or "Which would you choose: skateboards or bikes/milk or juice/dogs or cats/summer or winter/talking or listening.” Invite students to come up with choices themselves. Consider using tools like the "appointment schedule" to form pairs or groups. Always ask yourself, "Will this configuration create a gendered space?"

That alone is interesting and odd. If you’re not going to divide the class into boys and girls, why would you continue to divide the children into two separate lines? The reason they’re being divided up in the first place is that they’re different in a way that’s relevant to getting little kids to stand quietly in line—and they’re two kinds of different. Of course, the teachers could continue to artificially divide them into two lines by irrelevant categories, but it’s not going to accomplish the good that dividing them by gender—the relevant category—used to accomplish. You don’t avoid cooties by separating kids according to their preference for summer or winter, so what’s the point? It’s odd to me that the people who came up with these suggestions didn’t just recommend teachers stop dividing the children into separate lines. (They probably will eventually, but one step at a time.)

This is exactly the kind of inconsistent thinking being expressed by many same-sex marriage advocates (with, I predict, the same eventual outcome of dropping the number two). They’re insisting we ought to hold on to two-person marriage while at the same time removing the reason for defining it as two people in the first place. When “male” and “female” are deemed irrelevant, the number two is no longer in play. At that point, if you insist on “two,” you’re just prolonging a meaningless habit, and how long will that last?

2. Don't use phrases such as “boys & girls,” “you guys,” “ladies and gentlemen," and similarly gendered expressions to get kids’ attention. Instead say things like “calling all readers,” or “hey campers” or “could all of the athletes come here." Create classroom names and then ask all of the “purple penguins” to meet at the rug.

A lot is being made of this “purple penguins” designation in the media, but in fairness, the guidelines are not asking teachers to call kids “purple penguins,” they’re asking teachers to divide the classroom into groups and give those groups special names. “Purple penguins” is just one example of a name they could use, and using it would be no different from dividing students into groups and referring to them as “Bruins” and “Trojans.” It’s only the fact that the group names are supposed to be used as a way to avoid “boys and girls” that turns this into craziness. 

4. Have visual images reinforcing gender inclusion: pictures of people who don't fit gender norms, signs that ”strike out" sayings like “All Boys...” or ”All Girls...” or “All Genders Welcome” door hangers. 

5. When you find it necessary to reference gender, say “Boy, girl, both or neither.” When asked why, use this as a teachable moment. Emphasize to students that your classroom recognizes and celebrates the gender diversity of all students.

6. Point out and inquire when you hear others referencing gender in a binary manner. Ask things like, “Hmmm. That is interesting. Can you say more about that?” or “What makes you say that? I think of it a little differently.” Provide counter-narratives that challenge students to think more expansively about their notions of gender.

There has to be a better way to show compassion to the few children who suffer from gender confusion that doesn’t involve destroying a healthy understanding for all the children of the reality that the world is divided into boys and girls who are different from each other. It’s also hard for me to believe that little kids will go along with this. They’re still quite aware of who the boys are and who the girls are, and they tend to care.

You can read more about this situation in the Lincoln Journal Star. Here’s an extraordinary quote at the end of the article:

“Our purpose is to educate all kids," [Student Services Director Russ] Uhing said. "We do not push a political agenda, we don’t push a religious preference on people, or a sexual preference on people. That’s not what our role is.

It sounds like Uhing is making the common mistake of thinking the worldview he’s promoting is neutral just because he doesn’t attach a political or religious label to it. But of course, there is no neutral view. He is promoting an aspect of a particular worldview. Erasing the distinction between boys and girls is anything but neutral. It teaches children what to think about the meaning of male and female—the most basic aspect of ourselves, telling them that gender is meaningless, something we create for ourselves and use however we like, not something given to us for a purpose we ought to submit to. This understanding of gender has numerous cultural, philosophical, theological, and yes, even political implications. Whether he realizes it or not, the view Uhing is advocating does play a part in advancing a particular political agenda, which is precisely why I predicted we would see more of it.

Links Mentioned on the 10/14/14 Show

The following are links that were either mentioned on this week's show or inspired by it, as posted live on the @STRtweets Twitter feed:

One Tough Customer (PDF) by Greg Koukl (on the Steamroller tactic) 


New Family Structures Study by Mark Regnerus


City of Houston Demands Pastors Turn over Sermons by Todd Starnes


Losing Your Salvation in Ephesians 1:14-3 by Amy Hall


Does God Whisper Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 (PDF) by Greg Koukl


Thinking about God: First Steps in Philosophy by Gregory Ganssle


Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview by J.P. Moreland and William Lane Craig


Mortimer Adler


Saving Leonardo by Nancy Pearcey

Listen to today's show or download any archived show for free. (Find links from past shows here.)

To follow the Twitter conversation during the live show (Tuesdays 4:00–7:00 p.m. PT), use the hashtag #STRtalk.

Pastors’ Sermons Subpoenaed

Well, this is disturbing. Joe Carter reports:

This summer Houston Mayor Annise Parker championed a so-called Equal Rights Ordinance which, among other changes, would force businesses to allow transgender residents to use whatever restroom they want, regardless of their biological sex.

In response, a citizen initiative was launched to have the council either repeal the bill or place it on the ballot for voters to decide. The mayor and city attorney defied the law and rejected the certification, so the initiative filed a lawsuit. In return, the city’s attorneys subpoenaed a number of area pastors.

According to Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), the city demanded to see what these pastors were preaching from the pulpit and wanted to examine their communications with their church members and others concerning the city council’s actions….

“The city’s subpoena of sermons and other pastoral communications is both needless and unprecedented,” said ADF Litigation Counsel Christiana Holcomb. “The city council and its attorneys are engaging in an inquisition designed to stifle any critique of its actions. Political and social commentary is not a crime; it is protected by the First Amendment.”

Texas law makes it clear that the discovery process in a legal proceeding “may not be used as a fishing expedition.” Houston’s city attorneys are certainly aware of this fact, so why are they seeking the sermons and communications of pastors who aren’t even involved in the lawsuit?

Read the rest here.

Challenge: Knowledge Is the Enemy of Faith

We’re going back to the wikiHow article on “How to Argue That God Does Not Exist” again this week with this common challenge: 

The mortal enemy of faith is knowledge, a scientific fact that has been demonstrated by researchers at the University of British Columbia.[1]The basis of any religion is that you must believe something someone else tells you is true, even though your mind tells you it is a lie and it makes no sense. There is name for that: fideism. Without fideism, the concept of religion would not exist.

Give your answer to this objection in the comments below, then check back here on Thursday to hear Brett’s answer. (And if you’re interested in seeing a response to the study cited above, see here.)

[Explore past challenges here and here.]