Randy Alcorn's Blog, page 93

Learning to See in the Country of the Blind

You can also listen to the audio version of this blog.

Throughout the ages, Heaven has played a dominant role in the thoughts and lives of God’s people. Heaven is the North Star by which countless Christians have navigated their lives. But have you noticed? Heaven today has largely fallen off our radar screens. If we are honest, we must admit that we are not daily and consciously looking forward to Heaven, much less to a New Earth. We’ve reduced Heaven to an otherworldly state, and we’ve ignored the clear biblical promise of a redeemed universe over which we will serve as God’s delegated rulers. We’ve become blinded to the truth, and we’ve lost our vocabulary of wonder and our anticipation of the great and glorious plan that God has in store for us. Jesus said of the devil, “When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44). Some of Satan’s favorite lies are about Heaven.

In his short story “The Country of the Blind,” H. G. Wells writes of a tribe in a remote valley deep in a towering mountain range, cut off from the rest of the world by a massive avalanche that has destroyed the mountain passes. As a result of a terrible epidemic, successive generations of this tribe are all born blind. Eventually, as a culture, they lose the very concept of vision and have no awareness of the world they’re unable to see. Because of their handicap, they do not know their true condition. When an outsider, who can see, stumbles into their village, they think he is a newly formed creature, with imperfect senses, and that all his talk of seeing is craziness. They cannot understand this other dimension called sight. Although they have adapted themselves to their circumstances, they cannot imagine what realms might lie beyond their valley.

Spiritually speaking, we live in the Country of the Blind. The disease of sin has blinded us to the truth about God and Heaven, both of which are real, yet unseen. Fortunately, Jesus has come to our valley from Heaven to tell us about his Father and the world beyond. If we will listen to Him—which requires a concerted effort to overcome our presuppositions, our ignorance, and the devil’s lies—we will gain a new understanding of our present circumstances and of the world to come. We will no longer be conformed to the pattern of this world but will be transformed by the renewing of our minds (Romans 12:2). Consequently, our lives will be forever changed.

This blog is excepted from Randy’s book 50 Days of Heaven, which is also available on audio. For more on the eternal home that awaits us, browse additional books and resources on Heaven available from EPM.

Photo by Bobby Stevenson on Unsplash

An Eternal Perspective on Persecution and Loss, and an Update on Gladys and Esther Staines

Last Sunday, November 3, was the International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church. But there are still plenty of opportunities this month to highlight the plight of our persecuted brothers and sisters around the world and spend time interceding for them. (Open Doors USA offers some free resources.)

Supporting organizations that work with persecuted believers has always been a focus of EPM. Those who are familiar with my books know that I wrote my novel Safely Home to open readers’ eyes to the persecution that Christians in many places face, and to encourage them to consider how they can help their brothers and sisters worldwide.

Though the book was first published in 2001, the subject of persecution is as timely as ever. I still hear people mention the dedication of Safely Home to the Staines family. Their commitment to Christ and their eternal perspective concerning their loved ones was a great example, and it was a privilege to dedicate my book to this wonderful family:

To Graham Staines, who left his home in Australia to serve lepers in India for thirty-four years.

To Philip Staines (age ten) and Timothy Staines (age six), who at half past midnight on January 23, 1999, as their father held his arms around them, were burned to death by a mob in India; murdered because of Whom they knew and served.

To Gladys Staines, who said to all India, “I am not bitter or angry. I have one great desire: that each citizen of this country should establish a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, who gave His life for their sins.”

To Esther Staines, Graham and Gladys’s daughter (then age thirteen), who said, “I praise the Lord that He found my father worthy to die for Him.”

To the hundreds of men, women, and children killed for Christ each day, ignored by the world but watched by the eyes of Heaven—those of whom the world is not worthy.

I met Gladys Staines and her daughter Esther in 2000 at a JESUS Film conference, just sixteen months after Graham, Philip, and Timothy were murdered. Nanci and I and our daughters had dinner with them one night and got to know them through various conversations (in the photo that’s our daughters Karina and Angela, with Esther in the middle). We were so moved by their Christlike response to this tragedy, which appeared on the front page of every newspaper in India.

“I have only one message for the people of India,” Gladys said. Then she stunned the nation by saying, “I’m not bitter. Neither am I angry. But I have one great desire: That each citizen of this country should establish a personal relationship with Jesus Christ who gave his life for their sins.… Let us burn hatred and spread the flame of Christ’s love. My husband and our children have sacrificed their lives for this nation; India is my home. I hope to be here and continue to serve the needy.”

At the funeral, masses of people filled the streets—Hindus, Muslims, and Christians—to show respect for the Staines family and demonstrate solidarity against the killers.

After Gladys and Esther spoke at the conference where we met them, an Indian national leader told us about the impact of their response to the murders. He said the people of India asked, “Why would a man leave his wealthy country and serve lepers in India for thirty-four years? Why would his wife and daughter forgive the killers of their family? Why would they choose to stay and serve the poor? Who is this God they believe in? Could it be that all we’ve been told about Christians have been lies? Could it be that Jesus really is the truth?” He stated that many Hindus had come to faith in Christ through their witness.

The Staines family carried on a long tradition of God’s people:

Others were tortured and refused to be released, so that they might gain a better resurrection. Some faced jeers and flogging, while still others were chained and put in prison. They were stoned; they were sawed in two; they were put to death by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated—the world was not worthy of them. (Hebrews 11:35–38)

I recently had the joy of hearing from Gladys. Though she now lives in Australia, she wrote, “The work is still continuing in some manner including the Mayurbhanj Leprosy Home. Praise God.”

Gladys also shared that Esther completed her medical studies, married a Christian man who is a medical practitioner, and is now a full-time mom to four children, ranging from under one year to seven years. Gladys lives nearby and sees them often.

In an interview done five years ago, Gladys shared this when asked how things have been for her and Esther:

It has certainly been with God’s help that we continued and have been able to stay close to Him. I never held malice towards anyone; but it was God who helped us and sustained us. The prayers of people… especially the people of India, have been our greatest strength. God has enabled us to go forward and continue to live for Him. My daughter is a great blessing to me. It must have been very traumatic for her 13-year-old mind to have undergone such a catastrophic incident so early in life. She was not angry with God. On the contrary, she remained close to God and maintained a very personal relationship with Him and never wavered in her faith.

… As a family, we gave our lives for His purpose, and this is how He wanted it. The Bible teaches us about forgiveness in small and big situations, and I have looked back onto my life later, after that incident. It was the Lord who enabled me to look into the bigger things in life and to forgive. Not that I always did so perfectly, but I am at peace.

Earlier this year, the movie “The Least of These” was released, telling the Staines’ story and commemorating the 20th anniversary of Graham, Philip, and Timothy’s deaths. It was done in consultation with Gladys, and some of the film’s proceeds will be given to the mission home in Mayurbhanj. Here’s the trailer:

Now I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel. As a result, it has become clear throughout the whole palace guard and to everyone else that I am in chains for Christ. Because of my chains, most of the brothers in the Lord have been encouraged to speak the word of God more courageously and fearlessly. (Philippians 1:12-14).

Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 5:10)

Credit for photo of Gladys and Esther

Will There Be Rodents and Insects in Heaven?

Over the years, I’ve been asked by readers about whether God’s future restoration of creation means that “undesirable” and “unpleasant” animals like rodents (such as rats) and insects (such as mosquitoes or spiders) will be present in Heaven. As one reader candidly wrote, “That sure wouldn’t be Heaven for me!”

But asking how rats and spiders and insects could possibly be on the New Earth is like asking how they possibly could have been in Eden. The point is, they were, and it didn’t diminish Eden, but somehow enhanced it. We’ve never seen rodents and insects as they once were, and as they yet will be. (I’ve met some pretty unpleasant people, and I’ve been one myself from time to time, but that doesn’t mean people won’t inhabit the New Earth—just that they’ll need to be changed.)

Scripture tells us:

“The leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them. The cow will feed with the bear, their young will lie down together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox. The infant will play near the hole of the cobra, and the young child put his hand into the viper’s nest. They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain, for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.” (Isaiah 11:6-9)

Mosquitoes on the New Earth? Why not? If lions will no longer be carnivores, which we are told in Isaiah 11 and 65, does this imply that they weren’t originally carnivores? If so, why couldn’t mosquitoes have lived off vegetation rather than living beings, and/or why couldn’t they do so again on the New Earth? We should not mistake all animals’ current behaviors with their original design—think how misleading that would be if we did it with humans.

Some think otherwise, but I believe when Scripture says that death came through Adam, it means that God’s creatures didn’t die before people sinned—animal suffering came on the coattails of humanity’s fall. (Note Paul’s argument in Romans 8.) Prior to that they didn’t hurt and devour and eat one another. There may have been “death” of vegetation, as it could have been part of God’s design for the eco-system, but I think suffering and death of living beings, animals included, wasn’t. (Again, I know some think otherwise.) We tend to be uniformitarian in our assumptions, looking at the world as it is now and then projecting backward and looking forward and failing to see how radically different it once was and one day will be.

We often project our current revulsion to certain creatures (e.g. big hairy spiders give me the major creeps) on our eternal state—but this ignores two critical things: they will be changed and we will be changed. They won’t be worthy of revulsion, and we won’t be gripped by revulsion.

It’s the same way people respond to verses demonstrating there will be culture on the New Earth. When I go to a number of texts, then follow by saying there’s every reason to believe there will be art, crafts, science, research, technology, sports, etc., invariably someone says, “But there can’t be sports, because competition is sinful.” Is it? Really? Would there have been no sports without the Fall? Do we enjoy sports because we’re sinners or because we’re human, and that’s how God has designed us? Did humans invent playfulness, or did God invent it and build it into us and into animals like otters and dogs?

To argue against sports on the New Earth because some people are angry, hostile, arrogant, and insecure when they’re involved in sports now, as they live under sin and curse, is like arguing against art in Heaven because some art is lewd, or against music because some songs have immoral lyrics. The whole point is this: sin will be absent and the curse will be lifted—including the curse on people, animals, the eco-system, and culture.

We have never known a world without sin (and therefore we view even the coming new world with sin-tainted glasses). We have never tasted with untainted taste buds a single bite of untainted fruit. When we do, we’ll be startled at how good it tastes! When we behold for the first time an animal kingdom untainted by the curse, we’ll drop our jaws at what we see. Think flowers are beautiful now? Wait until we see flowers untouched by the curse, with eyesight undiminished by the curse.

If we were to see Adam and Eve as they were in the garden, we’d be stunned at how much humanity has deteriorated under the weight of sin and curse. When we see each other in the resurrection, we’ll be seeing untainted uncursed human beings as God intended them for the first time. No wonder we’re told, “The righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father” (Matthew 13:43). “Those who have insight will shine brightly like the brightness of the expanse of heaven, and those who lead the many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever” (Daniel 12:3). How dull and lifeless we dying sin-struck people are—how bright and magnificent we untarnished image-bearers will one day be!

We’ve never known anything but the curse, and therefore we’ve only seen glimmers and glimpses of what God first created. We are nostalgic for Eden and we long for the New Earth, but we live now in this brief unnatural state of sin and curse. No wonder we find it difficult to look backward to Eden and forward to the New Earth without imposing our curse-tainted perspective and expectations.

May God free us to see the world as He originally made it, by His design, and help us grasp how He will remake the world as the climax of Christ’s redemptive work, to His eternal glory. We can hardly begin to imagine the ways that people and animals and natural wonders and art and science and planets and galaxies will be transformed...but it’s sure fun (and healthy) to try!

Browse more resources on the topic of Heaven, and see Randy’s related books, including Heaven, Picturing Heaven, and We Shall See God.

Photo by Olha Sumnikova on Unsplash

No Matter How Painful the Situation, Ending a Disabled Child’s Life Through Abortion Is Never Right

Today’s blog is from Stephanie Anderson, who is part of our staff at Eternal Perspective Ministries. —Randy Alcorn

The title of The New York Times article grabbed my attention, as it was meant to do: “I Had a Late-Term Abortion. I Am Not a Monster.” Lyndsay Werking-Yip shares her story of expecting a little girl, who was discovered to have severe brain abnormalities through prenatal testing. She and her husband were told their daughter would face seizures and cognitive impairment along with other unknown issues, so they decided to end her life through a late-term abortion.

She writes,

Many imagine this as an impossible decision to make, one that would take hours of deliberation. I will be honest with you. You may not want to hear this, but the decision was obvious to us. Our child would not be given a life of pain and suffering. Instead, we would take her pain on as our own.

I regret that we had to make the choice. I regret that she was so sick, so broken. But I do not regret the decision we made. Within 15 minutes of the diagnosis, we knew what we had to do: We would become baby killers.

…When people ask, “How could you?” I reply that allowing her to live would have been a fate worse than death. Her diagnosis was not fatal, not incompatible with the bare mechanics of a living body. But it was incompatible with a fulfilling life. And that makes all the difference to me. That’s why I call myself “pro-life.”

Ms. Werking-Yip’s story is emotionally compelling. It’s easy for a reader to think, “I haven’t walked in her shoes. How dare I judge her and say she should have made a different choice and faced a lifetime of caring for a disabled child, or of having to watch her child suffer?”

Yes, leveling the terms “monster” or “baby killer” at a post-abortive woman (or man) has no place in a Christ-like and compassionate response. But the problem is that heartrending situations such as these can cloud our judgment and blur the line between right and wrong. Both truth and grace require us to recognize that ending the life of a disabled unborn child through abortion can never be right or compassionate, no matter how seemingly noble the intentions.

My Own Story

This issue is especially personal for me because it was three years ago last month that my son, Isaiah, was born silently. Two months before that, at our 20-week ultrasound scan, we found out he had multiple serious abnormalities, resulting in the prenatal diagnosis of Trisomy 18. What followed were some of the most difficult weeks of my life. Even now the memory of that time takes my breath away.

Because of this I do have some understanding of the emotions Ms. Werking-Yip faced. Honestly, I now grasp how for some people abortion can be alluring as an “out” from the terror of a prenatal diagnosis. The emotions I felt were suffocating, and I would have welcomed a seeming quick end to them. (Never mind that abortion promises an out, but instead delivers a lifetime of other pain and suffering.)

Although most children with Trisomy 18 die before birth, some do survive birth and live for minutes, hours, days, weeks, and very rarely, even years. In those last weeks of my pregnancy, I contemplated what it would mean to care for a severely disabled child and how that would affect our family. And yes, imagining a lifetime of suffering for your own child is painful. This wasn’t theoretical for me, because my older sister was born with a chromosomal abnormality that left her profoundly disabled. I had seen firsthand how difficult it was for my parents over the years, even though I know her life had God-given value.

But because I believe God has exclusive prerogatives over life and death, abortion was never an option for my husband and me (though it was certainly offered to us). We wanted to show love to this child, and we wanted God to write our family’s story, including this difficult chapter. And He did: just as my husband and I were beginning to work on a birth plan for Isaiah, we found out he had peacefully died in my womb.[1] God had taken our child home, and because He did so in His own time and way, I believe that part of our story has brought Him glory in ways I won’t understand until eternity.

A Meaningful Life?

Much of Ms. Werking-Yip’s explanation for why she chose to abort her daughter centers around what she defines as a quality, fulfilling life. She writes,

If you identify as “pro-life,” what does that phrase mean to you? I know that in advocacy circles, it means, essentially, “anti-abortion.” But what does life mean to you — the life that you are “for”? Does it mean breathing on your own? Does it mean having a heartbeat? What are the markers of a life of quality, of purpose, of meaning? If your brain was not functioning following a traumatic car accident, would you want your body artificially sustained indefinitely? What is the threshold of experience for you to want to continue living?

The problem is that the definition of what makes a life “meaningful” and “purposeful” is subjective, varying from person to person. Saying “My child wouldn’t have a fulfilling life, so I’m ending it” is a slippery slope. A society that makes decisions on this basis alone would be a terrible place to live. (This is why abortion is not just a private decision between a woman and her doctor; it is a decision with society-wide implications.) The value of a person’s life (and an unborn child is a person) must be based on something more than another person’s subjective feelings.

Does this mean caring for a disabled child and seeing her suffering wouldn’t have been extremely difficult? No, of course not. But there is often unexpected joy and hope and beauty in difficult situations that we can’t see coming. Human life is always valuable and meaningful, even when it doesn’t fit our ideal definitions.

Randy Alcorn writes in Why ProLife?:

Some argue, “It’s cruel to let a handicapped child be born to a miserable and meaningless life.” But what do the disabled think about their lives? Spina bifida patients were asked whether their handicaps made life meaningless and if they should have been allowed to die after birth. “Their unanimous response was forceful. Of course they wanted to live! In fact, they thought the question was ridiculous.” [2]

…A person’s nature and worth aren’t changed by a handicap. S. E. Smith, in an article in Disability says, “The able-bodied, who control much of society, need to break themselves of the beliefs that life with a disability is tragic, not worth living.” [3]

Neither Ms. Werking-Yip nor the doctors could say exactly what her daughter’s life would have been like. Doctors can be wrong even when a diagnosis seems certain, and in the very least, wrong about how many cognitive and physical abilities a child will have. But had her daughter been as fully disabled as doctors predicted, she was still fearfully and wonderfully made, and just as valuable as a child who is fully “normal.”

Hope for the Hurting

Grief, sorrow, pain, and fear are all natural reactions to a grim prenatal diagnosis. But we dare not allow feelings to displace objective truth. Moms and dads facing prenatal diagnoses like the one Ms. Werking-Yip and her husband faced need support that can help them see past their overwhelming emotions, understand their child’s value, and find hope for the future.

And for those who have already chosen abortion in such a situation and know it is something they need forgiveness for, there is abundant grace through Jesus Christ (see Finding Forgiveness After an Abortion). Many post-abortive women and men have found hope and healing at the foot of the cross.

Ms. Werking-Yip writes,

My child was lovingly cared for until her last heartbeat. She was gently laid to rest after her footprints were stamped in black ink on a rectangle of paper. Those same footprints hang on my bedroom wall along with a locket containing her ashes.

Is this not the picture of maternal feticide you had in mind? I am not a dark shadowy imaginary figure. I am a grieving mother.

My heart hurts for her. I pray this grieving mother will find true healing through Jesus Christ. And I hope that maybe her story will help other moms and dads facing difficult diagnoses choose a different end to their disabled child’s story.

[1] I recognize there are many ethical issues surrounding medical intervention and when to extend life vs. allowing death to happen naturally. Had Isaiah lived through birth, my husband and I would have needed to decide how much to intervene and what procedures to perform or whether to simply provide comfort care for his basic needs should it be clear he wouldn’t survive for long. We were spared having to make these difficult decisions because our child died in utero, but my heart goes out to other families who do have to work through them.

[2] W. Peacock, “Active Voluntary Euthanasia,” Issues in Law and Medicine (1987). Cited in John Willke, Abortion Questions and Answers (Cincinnati, OH: Hayes Publishing, 1988), 212.

[3] S. E. Smith, “Devaluing the Disabled Body,” This Ain’t Livin’, August 17, 2009.

Photo by Luma Pimentel on Unsplash

Let’s Show Women They Are a Vital Part of Christ’s Body, Not Just Tell Them to “Go Home”

Periodically I write an unusually long blog because the issues are so far-reaching that I think they demand extra attention. I don’t like to break such blogs into multiple parts, so if you have the time to work this through with me, here we go.

Many have reacted, both negatively and positively, to comments that John MacArthur made recently about Beth Moore. This happened at the Truth Matters Conference, held at MacArthur’s Grace Community Church in California. At that event, those on stage were asked to respond briefly in a word-association game.  When the moderator said “Beth Moore,” John MacArthur responded, “Go home.” Phil Johnson said, “Narcissist.”

MacArthur went on to say, “There’s no case that can be made biblically for a woman preaching. Period, paragraph, end of discussion…Just because you have the skill to sell jewelry on the TV sales channel, doesn’t mean you should be preaching. There are people who have certain hawking skills—natural abilities to sell—they have energy and personality and all of that. That doesn’t qualify you to preach.” 

Only God knows our hearts, but to many, including myself, it appeared presumptuous and condescending to seemingly compare the work of Beth Moore, and by implication other female Bible teachers, to those using hawking skills to sell jewelry on TV. But before moving on to what else Pastor MacArthur said, I want to take five paragraphs to clarify a few things so you don’t have to wonder what I’m thinking as I address this situation.

Women in Scripture

First, I need to make clear that I do not deny—rather I affirm—that there is a clear biblical teaching about husbands being humble and loving leaders of their wives (Ephesians 5:22-23). I also believe Scripture teaches men are to serve as elders and lead the church and carry the primary preaching responsibilities (1 Timothy 2:11-15). Many deny the straightforward interpretation of those passages, but I don’t. However, I am equally convinced from Scripture that women have vital roles in the church, including speaking roles, that do not necessitate them being the primary Sunday morning preachers.

Women are told to use their gifts to teach other women (Titus 2:3–5). First Corinthians 11:5, no matter how you interpret it, assumes that women were using prophetic gifts in the church assembly. (The passage does not forbid them from prophesying when the men and women of the church assemble, but lays out conditions for how it should be done.)

There are many passages, Old Testament and New, that show women in prominent roles. We are told the gifted preacher Apollos “began to speak out boldly in the synagogue.” Then Scripture tells us, “But when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately” (Acts 18:26). The fact that Priscilla is mentioned first in a culture that normally placed the wife’s name after her husband’s suggests that she had every bit as much, and likely more, theological knowledge and teaching skill as her husband. The two together used their gifts to offer biblical correction to Apollos and his teaching.

God incorporated the words of a number of women in the inspired text of Scripture—including Miriam, Deborah, Ruth, Abigail, Esther, Mary, and Elizabeth. Since God’s Word has His authority, these passages throughout history have used the words of women to teach and lead all who read them, pastors included.

There is much more to be said about this; one resource is Southern Baptist president J.D. Greear’s “Should Women Teach in the Church?”, and another is the Danvers Statement on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. I would also recommend Gavin Ortlund’s article “Four Dangers for Complementarians.”

Now that I’ve given grounds for many different readers to disagree with me, I’ll return to John MacArthur’s statements. (By the way, some people always respond that it is unbiblical to talk publicly about people if you haven’t talked to them privately. But this is not a Matthew 18 issue, as John MacArthur has not sinned against me. In fact, every writer and public figure automatically invites public responses whenever they write books and blogs and speak at churches and conferences. People publicly disagree with me online often, and they are not violating Scripture. In fact, if they came to me I wouldn’t have time to talk with all of them! So it’s not unfair for me to write this blog about an issue that John made public. And God knows I certainly wish John MacArthur well, and in no way wish him harm. If anyone would affirm the right for people to disagree in the public forum, it’s John MacArthur.)

My Heavyhearted Concerns

At the Truth Matters conference, after his “Go Home” comment about Beth Moore, Dr. MacArthur went on to express concerns about feminism and the church. He also made some comments about the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC). You can listen to the audio clip from the conference here.

I listened to the full clip twice, start to finish, and to be honest, it made me very sad—not only because of the unnuanced statements, but also because of the laughter and applause of the audience. There was no attempt to treat Beth Moore with respect and kindness. Therefore, the inevitable impression was chauvinism and even misogyny. There was also no attempt to affirm women and their gifting and true equality in a complementarian framework.

Basically, complementarianism is the belief that men and women have different but complementary and equally important roles and responsibilities in marriage, family life, and the church. In 1 Corinthians 11:3 male leadership is compared to the Father’s role in relation to the Son. They are one, they are utterly equal, yet they have different roles. (For further insights on  complementarianism, see this article.) 

Someone might say, “But MacArthur didn’t have opportunity to give a larger context or to balance his response, because he was required to give a super-short answer.” That raises the question, why are Christian leaders subjecting themselves to word associations from a moderator that require them to give answers without qualifications, when the design is obviously for them to give a controversial response? MacArthur actually said he felt like he was being set up, and indeed he was. Unfortunately, he seemed to willingly dive right into the set-up. (If you listen to it, you’ll see what I mean. It’s clear the moderator knew MacArthur doesn’t like Beth Moore and is expecting him to say so, and MacArthur appeared to gladly comply.)

But the fact is that Pastor MacArthur chose to say a great deal more beyond “Go home,” giving him plenty of time to qualify or back down on his response. Instead, he goes deeper and broader in his criticisms without saying one word to affirm respect for women or the value of female Bible teachers within the church’s ministry, even though he doesn’t think they should be preaching. As a professional communicator and a shepherd of both men and women, why not say something, anything, to clarify that you mean no disrespect for women or their gifts, roles, and callings to serve Jesus both inside and outside the church?

Now, I do not agree with everything that Beth Moore has said or done or written, just as I do not agree with everything John MacArthur and nearly everyone else has said, done, and written. (Obviously there are many good people who frequently disagree with me, and sometimes they are right to.)  From time to time, I retweet both John MacArthur and Beth Moore. Whenever I retweet something from Beth Moore I know what’s coming—some people will tell me I shouldn’t. But I believe Beth is a genuine lover of Jesus who affirms God’s Word. I am troubled by a panel of Christian leaders speaking of her derisively, including calling her names and making demeaning comparisons (e.g. “narcissist” and TV jewelry saleswoman).

I am also troubled that a Bible-believing and Christ-affirming audience found all this so funny and entertaining and worthy of applause. As I said, I listened to this front to back twice to be sure I was hearing accurately and being fair. Both times I felt defensive for my own wife and daughters and the very gifted and capable women I have worked with in ministry. In a blog last year called “Dismissive and Disrespectful Attitudes toward Women Should Have No Place among Evangelicals” I agreed with Beth Moore when she called out the troubling presence of misogyny among some Christian evangelicals, including church leaders. Sadly, this incident will go down as a prominent and memorable example of that.

Both Biblical Truth and Careful Communication Matter

Now, I have read some treatments of this episode from people who appear delighted to take down John MacArthur, because they hate his affirmation of biblical authority and his willingness to publicly point out theological heresy. This blog is very difficult for me to write because I deeply appreciate John MacArthur and his dedication to biblical truth. John has said and written many Christ-honoring and helpful things over the years, and I gladly affirm the majority of his Bible teaching and insights in his many sermons and books and most of the notes in his study Bible. Both of our daughters and one of our sons-in law attended the Master’s College (which MacArthur was then president of and is now the Chancellor Emeritus). Francis Chan is one of many Master’s graduates I know and appreciate. Under John’s leadership, Master’s has held fast to the authority of Scripture when countless “Christian” colleges have abandoned their belief in God’s Word. (I have spoken at a number of these colleges and know firsthand how far they have strayed from recognizing biblical authority.)

I have only had two conversations with John MacArthur, once when Nanci and I visited Master’s because my oldest daughter was considering attending there, and once again years later when I was speaking at a Desiring God event,  where I enjoyed a long lunch with him, John Piper, and Jerry Bridges. Both times I found John to be not only interesting but likeable.  

However, as much as I have loved and appreciated him, and still do, I fear without intending to he sometimes sabotages his own message. People do not hear the good things he says because of the manner in which he says them.

I think this is unfortunately true in this area of the role of women in the church. With grace and empathy and careful communication, he could better represent Scripture and his beliefs about women pastors and preachers, and at the same time, show respect and kindness toward Beth Moore (and other women) as a fellow image-bearer and follower of Christ. Even if you agree 100% with John MacArthur’s interpretation of Scripture, surely there is a better way to treat people and convey that position. Look at what Scripture has to say about how we are to communicate with others:

“But speaking the truth in love, let us grow in every way into him who is the head—Christ” (Ephesians 4:15, CSB).

“Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness” (1 Timothy 6:11).

“And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness” (2 Timothy 2:24-25).

 “Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love” (Ephesians 4:2, NIV).

“Let your graciousness be known to everyone. The Lord is near” (Philippians 4:5, CSB).

“Who among you is wise and understanding? By his good conduct he should show that his works are done in the gentleness that comes from wisdom” (James 3:13, CSB).

I greatly respect pastor Max Lucado for his steadiness and humility as he follows Jesus. Max is one of MacArthur’s few equals among evangelicals in terms of being prominent and prolific. In a blog entitled “Are We Listening?” Max responded to John’s words by saying “the bride of Christ is sighing.” He said, “Really? Dare we be dismissive? The message of #metoo is a sobering one.”

Max said that when it comes to how Christians speak, “tone matters” and it is important to disagree with love, because “words can wound.”

Indeed words can wound, and in this case they have. But Scripture makes clear that words can also heal, and I pray that John MacArthur, and others who wholeheartedly believe God’s Word just as I do, will heed the Scriptures we love: “Thoughtless words can wound as deeply as any sword, but wisely spoken words can heal” (Proverbs 12:18).

No Place for Chauvinism in the Church

As I said, I believe Scripture teaches that husbands should tenderly lead their wives and male elders and pastors should lead the church. But how elders and pastors treat and speak of women, privately and publicly, will model for our men how they should treat their wives. 

The widespread perception among both unbelievers and believers in our culture is that conservative Bible-believing churches—especially those that are also politically conservative—are the last bastion of cultural chauvinism, dedicated to stereotyping, subjecting, and minimizing the equality, worth, intelligence, and gifting of women. We are thought to foster disrespect and, indirectly, abuse. And every story of an evangelical pastor misusing his power and committing immorality with women in his church furthers that stereotype.

While I don’t see much outright hatred of women in the church, I do see a lot of dismissiveness, mistrust, and prejudice. I also see disrespect and condescension toward women, especially those with leadership and speaking gifts and strong personalities (which seem to be respected in a man, but resented in a woman).

Unless we intentionally demonstrate an authentic (not merely superficial) respect for women as intelligent and gifted students and teachers of God’s Word, many of our girls and young women will drift away from complementarian churches. (I base this not on speculation, but on long heartfelt conversations with such young women.) In some cases they will end up in churches that reinterpret and modernize Scripture to go along with the current drift of culture, including the defense of abortion and homosexual marriages, and affirming universal salvation, along with many other unbiblical beliefs. Some will believe the only way they and their gifts can be valued is to leave Bible-believing churches—how tragic is that?

Others may stay in Bible-teaching churches but never discover and use their gifts, which lay dormant and buried for lack of opportunity and encouragement. Many women will be unfulfilled; some will feel guilty for wanting to use their gifts for Christ’s glory and the good of the church! Furthermore, there’s a large segment of the culture we won’t reach. What woman (or for that matter, what kind of man) wants to come to a church where women are ignored, marginalized, and even demeaned? I don’t.

We shouldn’t ever violate what Scripture commands in an attempt to be relevant, but we should exercise the freedom to do what Scripture allows to grant women the widest and deepest and most meaningful roles in Christ’s body. (See the article “Delighting in Authority: How to Create a Culture of Happy Complementarians” by Whitney Woollard, which I shared on my blog. Also see my response to the question “What Is Your Stance on Women in Leadership?”)

In 1 Peter 3:7 husbands are commanded to “live with your wives in an understanding way…showing them honor as coheirs of the grace of life.” Isn’t it true that the men who lead churches as pastors and elders should “live with women of Christ’s church in an understanding way…showing them honor as coheirs of the grace of life”? Husbands are warned if they fail to understand and honor their wives, their very relationship with God will suffer: “…so that your prayers will not be hindered.” It’s no stretch to say that church leaders who fail to understand and honor women will also have their prayers hindered—apparently God is not prone to listen to men who don’t make a point of understanding and honoring women.

What’s at stake here? Many Bible-believing churches are held in suspicion of disrespecting women (valuing them only as cooks, clean-up crew, nursery workers, and singers). Women comprise over half of the church but appearances suggest men are far more important in the body of Christ, and that God has gifted men to study and teach Scripture, but not women. Compared to society, the church appears chauvinistic. How sad, when by His example, Jesus was truly revolutionary in His demonstration of the value and worth of women.

Christ’s View of Women

In the Gospels, we see that women disciples were more prominent than men at the cross and tomb, and it was the prophetess Anna who announced Jesus as Messiah.

The Knowing Jesus Study Bible says this:

Luke showed a great interest in women and included in his Gospel numerous stories about women, many of them unique to his account of the life and ministry of Jesus (he also included more specific names of women than did the other Gospel writers). He continued this interest throughout Acts, the sequel to Luke (see Acts 1:14). Luke related stories about healing (Luke 4:38-39; 8:1-3, 40-56; 13:11-17; 17:11-17) and faith (Luke 4:26; 7:36-50; 8:48; 18:1-8; 21:1-4) of women and emphasized stories of women involved in discipleship (Luke 8:19-21; 11:27-28), particularly in the detailed account of Jesus’ dialogue with Mary and Martha (Luke 10:38-42) and in the reports of the female disciples who traveled with Jesus (Luke 8:1-3). Women are prominent in the stories of the births of both Jesus and John the Baptist (Mary, Elizabeth and Anna; Luke 1-2) and are described in both the passion and resurrection narratives (Luke 23:49; 23:55-28:12).

I love what Dorothy Sayers writes in her book Are Women Human? Astute and Witty Essays on the Role of Women in Society:

Perhaps it is no wonder that the women were first at the Cradle and last at the Cross. They had never known a man like this Man—there never has been such another. A prophet and teacher who never nagged at them, never flattered or coaxed or patronised; who never made arch jokes about them, never treated them either as “The women, God help us!” or “The ladies, God bless them!”; who rebuked without querulousness and praised without condescension; who took their questions and arguments seriously; who never mapped out their sphere for them, never urged them to be feminine or jeered at them for being female; who had no axe to grind and no uneasy male dignity to defend; who took them as he found them and was completely unself-conscious. There is no act, no sermon, no parable in the whole Gospel that borrows its pungency from female perversity; nobody could possibly guess from the words and deeds of Jesus that there was anything “funny” about woman’s nature.

Questions for Church Leaders

So how can we reflect Jesus’ love for and respect for women? I suggest that male church leaders ask, “What can we do to…”:

empower our women to exercise their God-given gifts (in God’s prescribed way) for the benefit of the body?
uncover and maximize—not cover or minimize—their gifts, not just the gift of helps, but teaching and leading and exhortation and prophecy, exercised in the right spheres?
understand and know them better?
listen to the women in our congregation, ask for their input, and benefit from their insights?
treat them with more respect as fellow-heirs, equal partners?
show girls and women that our church offers them more respect, not less, than the world?

Pastors and elders, why not invite in wives, female ministry staff, or laywomen and give them the floor, for whatever’s on their mind, then ask for their input on current agenda and issues?

Please though, whatever we say and do about the role of women in the church, let’s obey God’s Word: “Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience” (Colossians 3:12).

There are many differences both among Christian complementarians and egalitarians, and we should not assume otherwise. I am a complementarian who believes that we should affirm freedom for women to exercise their gifts in every area Scripture does not explicitly forbid, and that is maybe 95% of them. Sam Storms has a similar view and I highly recommend his article “10 Things You Should Know about Complementarianism.”

Final Thoughts

I’m well aware I will receive many criticisms for sharing these disagreements with John MacArthur and for “siding with” Beth Moore. I will also receive criticisms from people who think I’m wrong to affirm the great majority of what John MacArthur has taught. (I am an equal opportunity offender!) Many complementarians will think me too permissive; all egalitarians will think me too restrictive. So be it. The truth is, I am not seeking to please potential critics. I am seeking to please Jesus, who is full of grace and truth. Paul says, “Am I now trying to win the approval of human beings, or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ” (Galatians 1:10).

Every time we function with grace-only, we dishonor Jesus. Every time we function with truth-only, we dishonor Jesus. “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). We need Christians who, like Jesus, are full of grace and truth. People with both sound doctrine and warm hearts. Those whose hearts are warm but who lack sound doctrine will trample the truth of Jesus. Those whose doctrine is sound but who lack the grace of Jesus will trample people. Christ’s heart is equally grieved by grace-suppression and truth-suppression, by grace-twisting and truth-twisting. Grace and truth are both necessary. Neither by itself is sufficient.

One final quote from Sam Allberry: “If it’s lacking in charity, it’s not orthodoxy. If it demeans and mocks women, it’s not complementarianism.”

Note: To read one viewpoint on the differences between complementarianism and egalitarianism, see this article. Also, Bruce Ware offers an excellent summary of the two positions, and the objections to each of them.

If you want to explore egalitarianism directly (without complementarian comments), see Christians for Biblical Equality. Also, if you wish to see and hear my informal presentation of key Scriptures on the biblical role of women in the church to a small group of leaders of my home church, see this video.

Added Note: Let me emphasize again that I believe we should exercise biblical discernment about Beth Moore as we should any teacher, certainly including me. Disagreements with Beth Moore are not the problem. John MacArthur could have said, “I have some concerns about Beth Moore’s teaching. She affirms the gospel, but she also spiritualizes texts and at times exercises faulty interpretation. I have other doctrinal concerns as well. And while I agree that women have a vital place in the life of the church, I disagree with her position on women preaching from the pulpit.”

Had he said that, then people could have agreed or disagreed and there could have been a civil discussion. I certainly wouldn’t have blogged about it, and I doubt others would have said much. But that’s not what happened. It was about women wanting power in the church, and Beth Moore being called a narcissist and compared to a TV jewelry saleswoman. If you have doctrinal concerns about Beth Moore or anyone, you can certainly express them, but for the honor of Jesus please do so without attacking, demeaning, ridiculing or stereotyping them in particular, or in this case, women in general. Not only is that right, which is most important, it’s also smart, because otherwise you’ll never persuade anyone.

For more on grace and truth, see Randy’s book  The Grace and Truth Paradox , and his devotionals Grace and  Truth .

Photo: Christianpics.co

Ray Ortlund on Is God For Us, Or Is He Against Us?

The New Testament repeatedly affirms God’s love, through Christ, to His people. With amazement, John writes, “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!” (1 John 3:1; see also 4:16). If ever exclamation marks were justified in a translation, surely they are here.

“God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us” (Romans 5:5; see also 8:39; Galatians 2:20; Ephesians 3:17–19; Titus 3:4–7). We are God’s “dearly loved children” (Ephesians 5:1) and “brothers loved by God” (1 Thessalonians 1:4).

Christ’s incarnation and atonement provide the ultimate demonstration of love : “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins” (1 John 4:10).

Yet Scripture also reminds us that God cares as much that we share in His holiness as in His love: “God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness.... Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:10, 14).

True, God’s discipline toward His children may not feel loving. Part of our problem is that we think to “love” means to “do no harm,” when it really means “to be willing to do short-term harm for a redemptive purpose.” For those who are in Christ, God’s discipline is an act of love.

I appreciated these thoughts from Ray Ortlund about how Scripture demonstrates that God can be both for us, and against us:

God is for us. Romans 8:31

But I have this against you. Revelation 2:4. See also 2:14, 20; 3:3.

So, which is it? Is God for us, or is God against us? If we are in Christ, the answer is: maybe both. God is certainly for us, and God might also be against us.

God is for us in an absolute sense, in Christ. We have peace with God (Romans 5:1). There is now no condemnation threatening us, none at all (Romans 8:1). God foreknew us, predestined us, called us, justified us and promises to glorify us (Romans 8:29-30). God is for us.

So here is my assurance. I can sin my way out of my marriage, I can sin my way out of the ministry, I can sin my way out of physical health, and a lot more. But I cannot sin my way out of Christ, and neither can you, because the cross of Christ paid the damning penalty for our sins.

God might also be against us at times. Not that he de-justifies us, but he might discipline us (Hebrews 12:5-6). He might oppose us (James 4:6). He might send out wrath against us (2 Chronicles 19:2; 32:25). Not condemning wrath, but purifying wrath, correcting wrath, for a time. Even his disciplines and oppositions are gifts of love. How could it be otherwise? The smile of God is not an all-approving grin. What kind of Father would that be?

Is our understanding of the gospel biblical enough to include a category for the God who is for us also being against us? Is our understanding of the gospel big enough and complex enough so that we feel not only reassured but also solemnized? If the only message we are willing to receive is reassurance that God’s condemning wrath has fallen on Another, why? Why block out this other clearly biblical message, warning us that his disciplining wrath can fall on us? If we are in Christ, why deflect anything the Bible clearly says?

Even when God is against us, still, he is for us. His love is burning away whatever keeps us from pressing more deeply into his mighty heart.

“Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent” (Revelation 3:19).

This post originally appeared on Ray’s blog .

Photo by Chris Meads on Unsplash

The Love You're Looking For: A Short Film about an Unexpected Love

I enjoyed this short film, titled “The Love You’re Looking For.”

I encourage you to share it so that women who have had abortions or are facing an unplanned pregnancy can find hope and healing.

Also check out theloveyourelookingfor.com for more stories and resources. And if you or someone you know is struggling with a past abortion, see my article Finding Forgiveness and Freedom after Abortion.

Browse more prolife articles and resources, as well as see Randy’s books Why ProLife? and ProLife Answers to ProChoice Arguments.

Godly Optimism

Do you consider yourself an optimist or a pessimist? We have no guarantees about how our circumstances will turn out in this life. But when it comes to eternity, Christians have every reason for optimism—we know how the story will end!

The following is from Charles Spurgeon’s sermon “God Rejoicing in the New Creation,” given on July 5, 1891:

It is a present and a lasting joy: “Be glad and rejoice forever in that which I create” (Isaiah 65:18). Be now glad, and now rejoice: it is a present joy. Take a delightful interest in that which God is now creating in the spiritual realm. Be glad in anything that the Lord has created in you. Has He created in you so much of the new life as to have produced conviction, repentance, faith in Christ, hope in the promise, longing for holiness? Be glad in this even if you have other circumstances pressing upon you, and causing you to be heavy of heart.

Though you might be mourning because you are so sickly, yet be glad that you are born again. If somewhat distressed because you are so poor, yet be glad that you are a child of God and have a place in the new family of love. Let the old things go and grasp the new, the heavenly. The old creation—bear with it a little longer, for the time of your redemption from its bondage draws near. Find your joy where God would have you find it, namely, in that part of your nature which is new. Rejoice in the new principles, the new promises, the new covenant, and the blood of the new covenant which are yours—all of them. The Kingdom of God is within you; rejoice in it.

Find your joy in the new creation of God as you see it in others. The angels rejoice over one sinner who repents (Luke 15:10); surely you and I ought to do so! Try and do good, and bring others to Christ. And when a soul shows signs of turning to its God, let that be your joy.

“Be glad and rejoice forever.” As long as you live, there will be something in the new creation that shall be to you a fresh joy and delight. Heaven will only enlarge this same joy. Be glad forever, because God will ever be creating something fresh in which you may be glad.

It may be said of the joy we ought to feel that it is a joy God intended for us: “Behold, I create Jerusalem to be a joy, and her people to be a gladness” (Isaiah 65:18). He has made the new city, the new people, the new world to be a source of joy.

We ought to be glad and rejoice forever in that which God creates. Ours is a heritage of joy and peace. My dear brothers and sisters, if anybody in the world ought to be happy, we are the people.

How large our obligations! How boundless our privileges! How brilliant our hopes!

What should make us miserable? Sin? That is forgiven. Affliction? That is working our good. Inward corruptions? They are doomed to die. Satanic temptations? We wear an armor which they cannot penetrate. We have every reason for delight, and we have moreover this command for it: “Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart” (Psalm 37:4). May God bring us into that blessed condition and keep us there!

God intends not only that we should have joy but also that we should spread it among others. He intends that wherever we go we should be light bearers and set other lamps shining.

Help the widow, comfort the fatherless, assist the poor, cheer up the disheartened, tell the glad news to the weary heart. In the Father’s hands, in Christ’s hands, in the Spirit’s hands, seek to break the prisoner’s fetters and to bring him out into the light of liberty. You, too, are anointed to proclaim liberty to the captives (Luke 4:18). May the God of infinite mercy help you and me so to do!

When you and I see sin subdued, do we not feel happy? Whenever the news comes to me that a man has been reclaimed from drunkenness or a woman has been saved from the streets, or when I hear of a hard-hearted sinner repenting, I rejoice in the Lord. Conversion days are our high holidays. But eventually there will be a still greater joy. We shall enter into Heaven, and there will be joy among the angels and joy in our hearts over God’s new creation work, which will proceed at a glorious rate. The day shall come when Christ shall reign from pole to pole. And what a joy that will be!

We shall indeed be glad in that which God creates, as the islands of the sea shall ring out His praise! Then Christ the Lord will come, and what joy and rejoicing there will be in that day when He has fully fashioned the New Earth and the new heavens.

Nothing prophesied should be dreaded by us. There is nothing foretold by a prophet or beheld in a vision that can alarm the Christian. He can stand serenely on the brink of the great eternity and say, “Come on! Let every event foretold become a fact! Pour out your vials, you angels! Fall, you star called Wormwood! Come, Gog and Magog, to the last great battle of Armageddon!” Nothing is to be feared by those who are one with Jesus. To us remains nothing but joy and rejoicing. For God has made His people a joy, and He has made them for rejoicing.

Charles Spurgeon wrote this sermon near the end of his life, at a time when he was seldom able to preach. In the printed version of the sermon, distributed around the world later that same week, this statement was added, helping readers appreciate the context in which Spurgeon spoke his powerful words about joy and rejoicing:

Mr. Spurgeon has been very seriously ill, but the prayers of the Lord’s people, at the Tabernacle and elsewhere, have been graciously answered on his behalf. Hearty thanksgiving should be rendered to the Lord for his partial recovery, joined with earnest supplication for his complete restoration to health and strength. Both Mr. and Mrs. Spurgeon are deeply grateful for the widespread sympathy that has been manifested during this season of severe trial.

Spurgeon’s partial recovery was brief. That he died only six months later makes all the more potent his words about the grounds for rejoicing.

Secular optimists are merely wishful thinkers. Discovering the present payoffs of optimism, they conduct seminars and write books on thinking positively. Sometimes they capitalize on optimism by becoming rich and famous. But then what happens? They eventually get old or sick, and when they die, if they haven’t trusted Christ, they go to Hell forever. Their optimism is an illusion, for it fails to take eternity into account.

The only proper foundation for optimism is the redemptive work of Jesus Christ. Any other foundation is sand, not rock. It will not bear the weight of eternity.

If we build our lives on the redemptive work of Christ, we should all be optimists. Why? Because even our most painful experience in life is but a temporary setback. Our pain and suffering may or may not be relieved in this life, but they will certainly be relieved in the next. That is Christ’s promise—no more death or pain. He will wipe away all our tears (Revelation 21:4). He took our sufferings on Himself so that one day He might remove all suffering from us, which is the biblical foundation for our optimism. No Christian should be a pessimist. We should be realists, focused on the reality that we serve a sovereign and gracious God. Because of the certainty of Christ’s atoning sacrifice and His promises, biblical realism is optimism.

We see the optimism in Spurgeon’s teaching on the biblical text about God having made us for joy and rejoicing. Knowing that it will be relieved doesn’t make suffering easy, but it does make suffering bearable. Hope allows us to have joy even in the midst of suffering. Paul says, “I rejoice in my sufferings” (Colossians 1:24), and James says, “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds” (James 1:2). The apostles didn’t enjoy their suffering, but they rejoiced in the midst of it because they trusted God’s sovereign plan.

Our optimism is not that of the “health and wealth gospel,” which claims that God will spare us from suffering here and now. Peter says, “Rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed” (1 Peter 4:13). Christ’s future glory, in which we will participate, is the reason for our present rejoicing in the midst of suffering.

Anticipating Heaven doesn’t eliminate pain, but it does lessen it and put it in perspective. Meditating on Heaven is a great pain reliever. Suffering and death are temporary conditions—they are but a gateway to eternal life of unending joy. The biblical doctrine of Heaven is about the future, but it has tremendous benefits here and now. If we grasp this truth, it will shift our center of gravity and radically change our perspective on life. This is what the Bible calls hope, a word used six times in Romans 8:20-25. In this passage, Paul says that all creation longs for our resurrection and the world’s coming redemption.

Don’t place your hope in favorable circumstances, which cannot and will not last. Place your hope in Christ and His promises. He will return. We will be resurrected to life on the New Earth. We will behold God’s face and joyfully serve Him forever and ever. We will, in fact, live happily ever after. That is not a fairy tale; it is the blood-bought promise of almighty God.

This article is excerpted from We Shall See God, in which Randy Alcorn has compiled profound spiritual insights on Heaven from the sermons of Charles Spurgeon, one of the greatest theologians of all time. 

Right now We Shall See God is available from EPM for $7 (53% off retail $14.99), plus S&H. Sale ends Thursday, October 24 at 12 pm PT (noon).

“This is my favorite devotional book. You can't go wrong with Charles Spurgeon and Randy Alcorn when reading about Heaven. Each chapter starts with a selection by Spurgeon regarding Heaven, and then Alcorn writes a few paragraphs reflecting on what Spurgeon has written. This makes a marvelous gift. Spread the joy!” —Reviewer

Photo by Warren Wong on Unsplash

Let’s Be Clear What We Do and Do Not Mean When It Comes to Terms Like Gender Equality

The fact that a term or phrase can be used by one person one way, and mean something completely different to another person, is nothing new. But as people who believe that words matter—because God communicated to us using precise words, right down to the smallest jot and title—we as Christians should be especially thoughtful in how we use terms, and educate ourselves about what others mean when they use them. We’d be wise to carefully articulate what we do and do not mean (and support or oppose) when we use certain words.

Take, for example, two terms commonly heard today: “gender equality” and “the empowerment of women.”

One site defines “gender equality” this way:

Gender equality is achieved when women and men enjoy the same rights and opportunities across all sectors of society, including economic participation and decision-making, and when the different behaviours, aspirations and needs of women and men are equally valued and favoured.

Christians should be the first to fully elevate and respect women and their God-given equality with men! My wife Nanci and I raised two daughters whom I respect deeply. I’ve never had a moment’s regret that God gave me girls instead of boys. As the father of daughters I routinely stood against some of the chauvinistic assumptions I saw and still see, in the world at large, and even among some evangelicals.

When it comes to gender equality and the empowerment of women, there’s much that Christians can affirm and agree with the world about. Girls and women should be given equal opportunities for education (see John Piper’s post “Why We Educate Our Girls”) and employment, and legal rights, like the right to vote and run for office. Women should be able to live full lives of opportunity free of enslavement and abuse.

In fact, I argue that as believers, we should show girls and women that the church offers them more respect, not less, than the world. In many parts of the world where, unfortunately, women are treated as inferior, the church is indeed “radical” in its treatment of women by elevating them as equals in Christ: “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28 ). Where God’s Word is available or translated into people’s heart languages, it brings transformation.

John 1:9 says that Jesus came as “the true light, which enlightens everyone.” I think this reflects the fact that all people in history have benefited from the coming of Christ, even those who reject Him. The model of Christ, His grace and truth, His elevation of women, and conciliatory words created a reference point for bringing freedom and civil rights to many societies. As far as we still have to go, the progress in affirming the rights of women and racial minorities in our own culture is due not to the current beliefs of moral relativism, but to the teaching and model of Christ which sowed the seeds for later reversal of the injustice (including slavery, women unable to vote, etc.) that hung over this country when it was founded.

The Wikipedia page for the term “gender equality” says this:

On a global scale, achieving gender equality also requires eliminating harmful practices against women and girls, including sex trafficking, femicide, wartime sexual violence, and other oppression tactics.

Of course we can agree that Christians, and indeed all people, should oppose and actively work to eliminate such evil practices! God calls us to seek justice in the world He’s placed us in: “Learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow’s cause” (Isaiah 1:17). “Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute” (Proverbs 31:8, NIV).

But unfortunately, when the secular culture refers to gender equality, sometimes they’re including an entirely different set of issues that prolife Christians must be aware of. The Wikipedia page also says this: “Gender equality is more than equal representation, it is strongly tied to women’s rights, and often requires policy changes” (emphasis added). Women’s rights, sadly, have been hijacked to not just include access to abortion but often exclusively focus on it. For example, see the Wikipedia page on women’s rights, which quotes the Human Rights Watch as saying, “The denial of a pregnant woman’s right to make an independent decision regarding abortion violates or poses a threat to a wide range of human rights.”

This is tragic, as abortion not only kills children, but also deeply hurts women. My books ProLife Answers to ProChoice Arguments and Why ProLife? were born out of a heart both for the unborn and their mothers. In fact, my deep concern about abortion didn’t start with a burden for children, but a burden for women who struggled due to their past abortions.

Life Site News reports that often U.N. documents also use the terms “gender equality” and “the empowerment of women” to mean the promotion of abortion. This is both sad and extremely ironic, because Jesus is clearly in favor of gender equality and the empowerment of women, in the sense of their equal worth and value! I hate it when good expressions become code words for what’s evil.

So one of the ironies of that particular use of “gender equality” is that by its advocacy of abortion, it endorses the single greatest means of rob­bing the youngest women of their most basic right—the right to life. A little more than half of aborted children are female, and in some cultures prenatal testing is done to identify females and kill them before they are born. This is anti-woman on the most basic level. (See my article Is Abortion Really a Women’s Rights Issue?)

I also am saddened when believers end up automatically pushing back against terms and phrases without carefully explaining what they’re really opposing, and what they’re totally in favor for. It’s like arguing against “every child a wanted child” without explaining that we actually do agree every child should be wanted—but the solution isn’t killing unborn children, but  placing children in homes where they are wanted, and learning to want children more.  Another example is when Christians say, “I oppose the ACLU” without qualifying that we should thank God for the ACLU’s historic efforts in racial equality and justice (not always done the right way, but resulting in just laws for which we can be profoundly thankful). Even though I oppose most of what they do today, I thank God for what liberal groups like the ACLU accomplished in the racial arena.

The bottom line? When we talk about a term like “gender equality,” let’s be sure we are clear what we are and are not opposing. In no way should we ever be anti-women; but we’re emphatically against the inclusion of abortion as part of what defines women as having value and worth.

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How “Former Christian” Bart Ehrman’s Testimony Should Encourage Us to Grapple Biblically with the Problem of Evil and Suffering

In my last blog post, I shared a video about Vaneetha, a woman with a faith-filled response to the incredible suffering she’s experienced in life. Today, in contrast, I’m sharing some excerpts from a chapter of my book If God Is Good that focused on Bart Ehrman and his best-selling book God’s Problem, which documents how a “former Christian” denied his faith because he couldn’t reconcile evil and suffering with God’s goodness.

That Bart Ehrman was a “devout and com­mitted Christian” is his claim, not mine. What isn’t debatable is that he once was part of the evangelical subculture. Unfortunately, Ehrman’s Christian-to-non-theist testimony gives apparent credibility to his claims, so he functions as a winsome evangelist for atheism.

Ehrman offers a gripping self-introduction to his book:

The problem of suffering has haunted me for a very long time. …Ultimately, it was the reason I lost my faith.

For most of my life I was a devout and committed Christian.... Early in my high school days I started attending a Youth for Christ club and had a “born-again” experience.... When I became born again it was like ratch­eting my religion up a notch. I became very serious about my faith and chose to go off to a fundamentalist Bible college—Moody Bible Institute in Chicago—where I began training for ministry.

…I went off to finish my college work at Wheaton. There I learned Greek.... At Princeton I did both a master of divinity degree— training to be a minister—and, eventually, a Ph.D. in New Testament studies.

I had solid Christian credentials and knew about the Christian faith from the inside out… But then... I started to lose my faith. I now have lost it altogether. I no longer go to church, no longer believe, no longer consider myself a Christian. The subject of this book is the reason why.

Ehrman lost faith in Scripture before losing faith in God.

Ehrman refers to his earlier book, Misquoting Jesus, to say his belief in the Bible’s truthfulness diminished the more he studied it. He decided it was not God’s inerrant revelation but “a very human book with all the marks of having come from human hands: Discrepancies, contradictions, errors, and different perspectives.” Nonetheless, he writes,

I continued to be a Christian—a completely committed Christian—for many years after I left the evangelical fold. Eventually, though, I felt compelled to leave Christianity altogether. ....I could no longer explain how there can be a good and all-powerful God actively involved with this world, given the state of things. For many people who inhabit this planet, life is a cesspool of misery and suffering. I came to a point where I simply could not believe that there is a good and kindly disposed Ruler who is in charge of it.

Ehrman emphasizes that even after coming to believe that parts of the Bible were untrue, he kept his faith. He seems to want the reader to suppose that disbelieving Scripture did not contribute to his loss of faith. But how could it do otherwise? Once we call some parts of the Bible false, on what basis do we judge other parts true? If we vacillate on the reliability of the Scriptures, we will first reinterpret the Bible, then outright reject it.

Ehrman argues that the answers given in the Bible are not only unsatisfying, but contradictory.

Most of God’s Problem consists of Ehrman’s critical examination of Scripture. He writes, “Given... that God had chosen the people of Israel to be in a special relationship with him—what were ancient Israelite thinkers to suppose when things did not go as planned or expected?... How were they to explain the fact that the people of God suffered from famine, drought, and pestilence?”

Ehrman surveys answers to these questions, including human free will; God’s anger at disobedient people; suffering as being redemptive; evil and suffering existing so God can make good out of them; suffering as encouraging humility and undermining pride; suffering as testing faith; evil and suffering as the work of Satan, which Christ will overcome in his return; and suffering and evil as a mystery.

Oddly, he thinks that because the Bible’s answers vary, this makes them contradictory. The idea that they supplement one another doesn’t seem to occur to him.

While Ehrman finds it troubling that the Bible approaches the issue in different ways, I find it reassuring. No single reason gives a sufficient explanation, but different threads of biblical insight, woven together, form a durable fabric.

I find the book’s subtitle ironic: How the Bible Fails to Answer Our Most Important Question—Why We Suffer. The problem is not that the Bible fails to answer it; Ehrman himself documents that it offers multiple answers. He simply doesn’t believe them.

Ehrman summarizes, often accurately, the biblical teaching. Then he disagrees with it, usually citing no authority beyond his personal opinion. His faith in his own subjective understanding at times seems breathtaking.

Bart Ehrman’s case appears persuasive because of what he leaves out.

Bart Ehrman has become an atheist poster boy, presenting himself as a reverse C. S. Lewis, compelled by intellectual honesty to abandon his faith.

Just as Christians elevate the testimonies of former atheists who have come to Christ, so atheists elevate Ehrman. He writes, “I did not go easily. On the contrary, I left kicking and screaming, wanting desperately to hold on to the faith I had known since childhood.” He borrows from Lewis, who said, “I came into Christianity kicking and screaming.”

Lewis wrote in Surprised by Joy,

You must picture me alone in that room in Magdalen, night after night, feeling, whenever my mind lifted even for a second from my work, the steady, unrelenting approach of Him whom I so earnestly desired not to meet. That which I greatly feared had at last come upon me. In the Trinity Term of 1929 I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed: perhaps, that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England.

There’s a significant difference between Lewis and Ehrman. Ehrman speaks of his former faith largely in terms of a young person attending churches, schools, and events, and adopting certain religious practices. That his Christianity could withstand neither academic questioning of Scripture nor the realization that this world teems with terrible evil and suffering suggests that he had never embraced a deeply rooted biblical worldview in the first place.

Lewis, by contrast, had come to his atheism as an adult, having seen the horrors of the trenches in World War I, and rejected the trappings of Christianity he’d seen as a child and adolescent. Years later, in his conversion to Christ, he turned away from atheism, even though doing so was particularly difficult in the academic culture of Oxford, where Bible-believing professors could be subjected to condescension and ridicule.

I’m convinced that many Christians, younger and older, have faiths very similar to that which Ehrman abandoned—on the verge of being persuaded to jettison their weak faiths by college professors utilizing Ehrman’s kinds of arguments.

In light of the great number of young people who reject their faith as college students or young adults, we need to ask ourselves two questions: What are we doing to help nominally Christian young people come to a true faith in Christ? And what are we doing to help youthful genuine Christians go deeper in exploring Scripture, learning sound theology, and developing a truly Christian world-view, not a superficial one that’s likely to collapse in the face of suffering?

The book’s presumptuous title is off-center; the problem of evil is man’s problem with God, not God’s problem.

While God suffers with his children, he does not struggle with his attributes and decisions. He knows what will be worth it in the end. He knows how His goodness, omnipotence, and wisdom fit with evil and suffering. It would be more accurate if Bart Ehrman titled his book My Problem.

The problem of evil and suffering is not God’s problem. It is Bart Ehrman’s problem... and yours, and mine.

God asks Job, “Will the one who contends with the Almighty correct him? Let him who accuses God answer him!... Who has a claim against me that I must pay?” (Job 40:2; 41:11). God has not asked us to give Him a performance review so that He may do a better job the next time He creates a universe or devises a redemptive plan. Rather, He promises that at the judgment he will give us a review.

When we stand before God, we will either thank Him for the justifying work of Christ, or we will face the problem of trying to justify ourselves on some other basis.

That will be the real problem.

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