Clowning around in the Pulpit…literally.

Clowns in the Pulpit

A recent column by Josh Rottenberg in Entertainment Weekely sighted the awkward and many times blasphemous crossroads where Hollywood and faith have met.   In it, he discusses the failure of Christians to attend movies primarily for religious reasons.  Attempts to make Christian-targeted films resulting in massive box-office smashes have failed.  This was Hollywood’s pragmatic attempt to use the pulpit to find a market for its movies.

“‘After The Passion, there was a gold rush,’ says Phil Vischer, a co-creator of the Christian-themed cartoon franchise VeggieTales.  ’Hollwood thought, ‘This is great! We can market movies to pastors and they will get up on Sunday and tell their whole congregation to go see them! It’s a new button we can push, and money will fall from the sky! It was doomed from the get-go.”

As a result, though somewhat successful, Christian-themed movies (however blasphemous or vague)  like The Chronicles of Narnia, Evan Almighty, The Da Vinci Code, The Golden Compass, and The Nativity Story, have largely fell short of expectations in this theory. Instead, the Christian community has found identification with the Edenic-themed WALL-E, the amoral The Dark Knight and the strangely pro-life comedy Juno.  Why can’t Hollywood capture Christian audiences when it means to?

“Hollywood still hasn’t quite figured out how to crack the Christian code. ‘With a snap of his fingers, [mega-church pastor] Rick Warren could deliver hundreds of thousands of people to a movie,’ says Matthew Crouch, producer of the 1999 Christian film The Omega Code, ‘Hollywood is trying to figure out how to reach them.  But how do you get Rick Warren to sign on to a script? That’s the six-million dollar question Hollywood’s trying to answer.  But they don’t know how easy it is to offend that faith. You have to realize you’re playing with fire.”

Could I suggest something?  The reason Hollywood cannot reach the Christian community is the reason that Rick Warren can reach so many people.  Nominal Christians want the gospel and _________. Hollywood fails to understand the power of the gospel.  That though they classify us as a “faith,” our faith is real because it has an object–the person and work of Jesus Christ, the only name given under heaven whereby men may be saved.  Rick Warren does not understand this, hence EW ’s citation of his success. Rick Warren wants a faith-based program ministry that forgets that we are a people who are not of this world.  Though we want to help alleviate the ailments of this world, we understand that the most important ailment is sin, and its only remedy is the gospel of God.  Rick Warren does not get this.  Hollywood does not get this.  We are not of this world. We are passing through; the gospel is not. God has a purpose for the gospel in this world–to save sinners for himself and therefter to hear the praises of his glory in his Son.

What we have here in this article is a sad realization of the modern liberalism that has crept so pervasively into our churches–a watered-down version of Christianity that defines itself merely on a works-based mantra-”follower of Christ.” Any attempts to “reach people” are found in sweeping them through a gospel doorway right onward to an unoffensive life of service.  Before I continue, let me be clear: I believe that we are called to a life of service to mankind.  I do not believe that we are called to this life of service apart from a clear and uncompromising proclamation of the gospel.  This is our purpose: to lift up the Son for all to turn to and so be saved. Christians are the only people in the world who have a reason to do service–namely, to testify to the power of God to save sinners because of the person and work of Christ.

I have made quite certain that I am at odds with Rick Warren.  His gospel is watered-down, empty, and cursorily.  He has “bigger fish to fry,” namely, the PEACE plan. A acronym that basically stands for the gospel + good works.  We note the way he popishly declares people saved who read his book if they said that prayer at the end of his book.  “Welcome to the Family of God!”  He then ushers them on to service as if to say, “Now that you considered the gospel (a very thin one at that), you need to move on to bigger things, like service to mankind.” Foolishness…

There is no experience of weight under the law of God, there is no sense of shame for sin before a holy God, there is no mediating advocate through the finished and complete work of Christ, there is no repentance, there is no faith.  The gospel of Rick Warren is dead because it is natural.  It not the supernatural faith once for all delivered to the saints. It is pragmatic and cursorily.

I find in this interesting article from EW an indication that many clergy are reaping what they have sowed.  By ignoring the supernatural power of God’s purpose in the gospel, we have turned to all manner of natural elements to reach the carnal mind.  We will even dress up like clowns to entertain it. Note the interesting testimony Rottenberg uses to begin his article:

“It’s one thing for some nerdy fanboy who lives in his parents’ basement to show his enthusiasm for The Dark Knight by dressing up as the Joker. But for a pastor to stand before his congregation in full Joker regalia, complete with ratty wig and gruesome makeup, and deliver a sermon on good and evil–that’s something else altogether.  Last summer, in a radical attempt to engage his young congregants at the Christ Chapel Mountaintop Church in Manassas, Va., pastor Rob Seagears did exactly that.  Each Sunday, Seagears dressed up as a character from that weekend’s top-grossing film and used the movie–no matter how vulgar, violent, or ungodly it seemed–as the basis for a discussion of Christian morality.”

Reading this with as much charity as possible, I acknowledge that I don’t know this pastor’s heart and intention.  I also don’t know the content of his message (or even if there was one).  He might have had a clear presentation of the gospel in his message, but based on this information, it was probably what it said-”a discussion of Christian morality.” 

This is not the gospel.  This man, literally, was clowning around in the pulpit.  This is not the charge of the pastor.  The pastor is called to preach the gospel (2 Timothy 1:8-14; 2:15; 4:1-2).  Paul himself refused to turn from it in the name of “contextualization.” 

As Mark Dever once so wisely proposed:  “Here’s a good measure to see if your contextualization is a good contextualization that honors God.  Does it make the offense of the gospel clearer or does it disguise it?”

For the Corinthians, Paul refused to talk to them in the style of some Greek orator and so titillate their carnal intellectualism.  For the Galatians, he refused to have them think the gospel must be added to circumcision and other Judiaic laws and so massage their carnal desire to be self-righteous.  For the Colossians, he refused to allow them to think that wisdom, knowledge and spiritual experience was found anywhere but in Christ–not in the worship of angels, mysticism, or aceticism–and so “transcend” to the upper realms of spirituality.  Paul wanted to know nothing among his people but Christ and him crucified (1 Corinthians 2:1-2).  Indeed, this was of first importance to Paul (1 Corinthians 15:1-3).

My first reaction to the story given of this pastor is to call him a false teacher who is disqualified from the ministry, but after I calm down, I remember this quotation he gave to EW:

“Pop culture is the language they speak…This was about meeting them where they are and trying to build a bridge back to God.”

I will trust what he said and take it to mean that he truly wants to reach people.  But what does it mean when we say “reach people”? Does it mean that we want to help them live their best life now and so ignore their need for Christ’s righteousness? Does it mean we want them to have a purpose-driven life and so forget the cross in the dust of our service projects?  Or does it mean that we want to reconcile them to God through faith in Christ by an open and pleading proclamation of the gospel (2 Corinthians 5:20-21)?

My purpose here is not to attack cultural engagement.  My purpose here is not to attack this pastor (though I still will contend that he requires church discipline for mocking the pulpit).  My purpose here is to call pastors back to their charge in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus: Preach the Word! (2 Timothy 4:1-2).

This man wants to discuss Christian morality by dressing up like a clown, or by dressing up like Indiana Jones, or by driving up to the pulpit in a motorcycle dressed up like Batman.  What foolishness, what a shame, what a mockery to that sacred desk…

Paul wants to know nothing among his people but Christ’s death and resurrection.  Don’t ever assume that your people know the gospel.  Unpack all of its glorious facets for the rest of your preaching ministry.  This is your charge.  People will respond to the gospel because this is where God has placed his power.  Either they will respond to it with derision or they will respond to it in faith.  This is what we have been promised from the beginning (2 Timothy 4:3-4; 2 Corinthians 4:1-6).

Hollywood can’t reach the carnal mind for Christ–the gospel can. The Men of God, however, must guard that good deposit entrusted to them (1 Timothy 6:20).  Don’t make a mockery of that good deposit.  We are not clowns; we are preachers. Let Hollywood mock the Cross, but we will stand by it until our Master returns.

Working with you for the gospel,

Vince R.

Youth, Discipleship, and the Centrality of the Home

Several articles in the April 6 issue of the Southern Baptist Texan impacted my affections as I read them.  They exhibit a major passion of mine: the centrality of the family in discipling children.

Tammie Reed Ledbetter addresses the research related to youth who prefer expository preaching. Even though this article is not directly related to the centrality of the home, it does relate to the importance of good doctrine and the sufficiency of Scripture in discipling young people.

One Texas church is turning toward a more family-integrated approach.  This article relates the major success of that church.

The newsjournal also included a post  from Eric Bridges, an IMB correspondent, who discussed the rise of formerly evangelical young people who now claim to have no religious affliation.  He examines the idea that this tragedy lies at the feet of parental failure to disciple their children.

I am greatly affected by these articles because they go the heart of my calling toward biblical manhood.  They strike the alarming chord reminding me of my call to prepare to disciple my children in the fear and admonition of the Lord.  It is not the youth pastor’s job to teach my kids.  That lies at my feet.  May we all tremble at the responsibility and weight the Lord calls on Fathers, and may we awaken to God’s intended purpose for the family.

Working with you for the Family and for our children,

Vince R.

The New Atheism and the Endgame of Secularism

Dr. Mohler’s lecture last year at Dallas Theological Seminary.  I plan on quoting it in my final paper for the class entitled  The Victorian Period.  He speaks of “the Victorian Loss of Faith.”  My working title is: “The Ebb of Faith’s Sea: Doubt and Modernism in Tennyson and Arnold.”

“The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth’s shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.” -From Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold

Embryonic Stem-Cell Research History: Just in Case You Missed it…Like I did.

I haven’t been living under a rock or anything, but on many issues, my cultural engagement is pretty weak.  Embryonic Stem-Cell Research has been thrown around near my ears, but only over the past year or so have I given myself to trying to stay informed.  Here’s an article summarizing the history and controversy of Embryonic Stem-Cell Research since the first invitro fertilization baby was born in 1981.  It is very helpful for people like me who need a little bit of help understanding the basic facts of the issue.  This is a much needed review in light of President Barack Obama’s woeful decision on Monday March 9, 2009 to repeal President George W. Bush’s 2001 ban on federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research.

Here is an exhortation for the Church:

We are called to stay informed.  We are the people who know the dignity of human life from conception until natural death.  We are the people whose love for the glory of God in all things must stay engaged in this issue in which the glory of God in the Imago Dei is being destroyed and dishonored.  We are the people who are called to love our neighbor by warning them of lies and deceit while working to think through the same concerns that even the lost world cares for.  We must work to provide biblical and honest answers while not straying or compromising from the integrity and truth of God in his word.   This is a time for God’s people and his scientists to rise up and provide, for the glory of God, an honest alternative.  Pray for the scientists, pray for those whose hurts and afflictions have called for these questions, pray for the families who just wanted to have children but did not think through the reprecutions of this issue, and most of all, pray for the lives that will be intentionally destroyed in the name of human progress and human glory.

I’m still praying for you Mr. President.  God have mercy on you.

Working with you for life,

Vince R.

Echoes of the Reformation in 2009

Check out this article from Time Magazine: Ten Ideas Changing the World Right Now: #3 The New Calvinism.

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Thanks Sareena for finding this.

Albert Mohler and the City of Man: A Book Review

"In the end, the culture and its challenges will pass away. But our Lord has left us here for a reason-as His people, we are to be salt and light to a dying world."

As I finished Dr. Mohler’s book Culture Shift: Engaging Current Issues with Timeless Truth, I realized the unrelenting importance of cultural engagement.  I may not be one called toward academic cultural apologetics, but as a Christian, I have a responsibility to know the place where the people dwell.  As I recall Discern Your Culture at New Attitude 2007, I remember a profoundly affecting and simply stated truth Dr. Mohler brought, “The only reason we care about the culture is because the culture is where the lost people are.”  Very simple; but often overlooked.  In the name of cultural engagemet, Christians often forget their responsibility to holiness and Christ-centeredness.  And just the same, in the name of holiness and Christ-centeredness, Christians often forget their responsiblity to love their neighbor.

This book heightens my intensity and passion for engaging the City of Man.  Here is an excerpt that powerfully portrays the necessity for Christian engagement with the culture.  Dr. Mohler springs off the shoulders of St. Augustine with simple theological dexterity:

“The City of God is eternal and takes as its sole concern the greater glory of God.  In the City of God, all things are ruled by God’s Word, and the perfect rule of God is the passion of all its citizens.

In the City of Man, however, the reality is very different.  This city is filled with mixed passions, mixed allegiances, and compromised principles…citizens of the City of Man demonstrate deadly patterns of disobedience, even as they celebrate moral autonomy, and then revolt against the Creator.

Of course, we know that the City of God is eternal, even as the City of Man is passing.  But this does not mean that the City of Man is ultimately unimportant, and it does not allow the church to forfeit its responsibility to love its citizens.  Love of neighbor–grounded in our love for God–requires us to work for good in the City of Man, even as we set as our first priority the preaching of the gospel–the only means of bringing citizens of the City of Man into citizenship in the City of God…

Love of neighbor for the sake of loving God is a profound political philosophy that strikes a balance between the disobedience of political disengagement and the idolatry of politics as our main priority…we are concerned for the culture, not because we believe that the culture is ultimate, but because we know that our neighbors must hear the gospel, even as we hope and strive for their good, peace, security, and well-being.”-pp.3-4

If you are looking for a work that serves as a nice introductory seque into worldview apologetics and cultural engagement, I strongly suggest you begin with Dr. Mohler.  He is a nice bridge into more thorough and dense works from Francis Schaeffer, C.S. Lewis, David Wells, and many more.  As C.J. Mahaney puts it in his review of the book,

“Al Mohler is a unique gift to the church.  His writing combines penetrating theological discernment and insightful cultural analysis with a passion to faithfully proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ.”

I must agree.  Dr. Mohler refuses to leave the gospel.  For him, cultural engagment means that we go straight to the need of the lost–a regenerated soul.  For without that happening to us first, our worldview would not be any different from theirs.

Working with you to bring a gospel-centered worldview to the market place,

Vince R.

The Root of Roe v. Wade: The Contraception Mentality

Here is a powerful examination of the current “contraception mentality.”

Check out this compelling excerpt:

“We submit, therefore, that children are now being aborted in the flesh, because they have already been, in large measure, aborted from the mind.”

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Thank you to Bro. Hank for bringing this the current issue of Touchstone Magazine to my attention.  Go visit his biblicaly charged engagment with the Pro-life movement over at Lawn Gospel.

Working with you for Life,

Vince R.

God Should Have Aborted Me!

“Your origin and your birth are of the land of the Caananites; your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite.  And as for your birth, on the day you were born your cord was not cut, nor were you washed with water to cleanse you, nor rubbed with salt, nor wrapped in swaddling cloths.  No eye pitied you, to do any of these things to you out of compassion for you, but you were cast out on the open field, for you were abhorred, on the day that you were born.  And when I passed by you and saw you wallowing in your blood, I said to you in your blood, ‘Live!’ I said to you in your blood, ‘Live!’  I made you flourish like a plant of the field.  And you grew up and became tall and arrived at full adornment.  Your breasts were formed, and your hair had grown; yet you were naked and bare.  When I passed by you again and saw you, behold, you were at the age for love, and I spread the corner of my garment over you and covered your nakedness; I made my vow to you and entered in a covenant with you, declares the Lord God, and you became mine.” Ezekiel 16:1-8

Here we see a wretched baby.  A pagan child thrown out and cast asunder as some rejected creature.  It was an unknown and unwanted child of God.  Note some truths of this baby:

1.) Its Origin

This child was born of two pagan and godless parents,  “an Amorite” for a father, and ”a Hittite” for a mother.  “Your orgin and your birth are of the land of Canaan.”

It was a baby born of the enemies of God’s people  It was a baby born of the pagans who worshipped and sacrificed before idols, pouring the blood of infants on their altars.   A wretched and grotesque picture to behold!  The origin was deplorable.  Who would want this baby?!

2.)  Its Condition

When it was born, its cord was still hanging from its middle. “…your cord was not cut.”  This paints the picture of a quick and inconsiderate parent.  Not even the umbilical cord was worth cutting.  It stuck out and hung there like some symbol of a sluggard too lazy to clean itself.  It was a sad picture, and a grotesque reminder of depravity and rejection.

When it was born, the baby was dirty. “…nor were you washed with water to cleanse you…”  It was a filthy child.  Combined with the dirt and sludge of the streets.  Blood dripping from its tiny digits.  Who would want this baby?

When it was born, it was not purified.  “…nor rubbed with salt…”  Salt purified.  It was in impure entity.  Some defiled child lying helpless in black sin.  No one dared look at this unwanted creature.

When it was born, it was naked and unkept.  “..nor wrapped in swaddling cloths.”  It was some naked and uncovered hairless animal.  No one even covered it!  Despite its ugliness, it was too ugly to cover.

3.)  Its Rejection

Who dared look at this creature? “No eye pitied you, to do any of these things to you out of compassion for you…” No eye dared look with compassion.  This seemed some pitiful sight to behold, yet no eye even dared to behold it!  No eye considered its origin.  No eye considered its filth.  No eye considered its impurity. No eye considered its nakedness.

What happened to it? “…but you were cast out on the open field…”  It was thrown like some shiny and grotesque rubber humanoid, cast away in a death field.  Thrown from memory, the baby was left in the open where no eye dared look.

How was it considered? “…for your were abhorred, on that day your were born…”  This creature was not just too ugly to consider.  It was not some indifference to which it was to be held.  It was with a real feeling, with a real emotion and consideration.  What it was it? Of what was its consideration?  Abhorrence.  A biting hatred that cast it out in darkness.

4.)  Its Resurrection

But, Lo!  Who is that who approaches this baby, this pitiless fossil?  “And when I passed by you and saw you wallowing in your blood.” Who is this “I”?  When asked to recount this story, Ezekiel is told: “say, Thus says the Lord God…” This “I” is the Lord of heaven and earth.  It is the holy one of Isreal who approaches.  He sees the creature there.  He passes by and looks.  When no one else dared approach, when all others abhorred and rejected this things in the field, the Lord comes nigh and sees.

But, behold! Does the Soveriegn One simply walk on by?  Does he just see and reject and abhor as all the others did?  Does he do what he should? Does he kill it and throw it to sheol where it belongs, this pagan baby?  Look! He bestirs his holy powers and opens his mighty mouth and gives one word, “Live!”  Where was this creature when this word poured forth? “I said to you in your blood, ‘Live!’”  While this bloody reject lies wallowing in filth, the Lord says one word, and what he says, he accomplishes.

5.)  Its New Life

What becomes of this creature?  What does the Lord do for it? ”I made you flourish like a plant of the field.”  It flourishes with life and beauty.  It comes forth through the dirt and grime, giving evidence of newness.  It lives! Not only that, it flourishes.

“Your breasts were formed and your hair had grown.” Suddenly, it is no longer an “it.”  It is a “she.”  She is a beautiful young woman with life and vigor.  She grows into elegance and femininity.

Yet, what remains of her.  She is now grown, but she is naked.  She is still open and uncovered.  “yet you were naked and bare.”

6.) Her Covering

When she is older and comes “at the the age of love,” the Lord passes by and covers her.  “I spread the corner of my garment over you and covered your nakedness.”  She is vital.  She is ready for loving and holy covenental union.  The Lord covers her.  No one can look upon her now.  Why?

7.)  Her Union

Why must she be covered? “I made my vow to you and entered into a covenant with you, declares the Lord GOD, and you became mine.”

Now we see.  She belong to him. No else may gaze upon her as some rejected whore.  She belongs to her husband.  They are joined and glory and joy ensues!  “…a covenant…

This, my friends, is the picture of salvation.  You were rejected and unwanted.  You were dead. You were dirty.  Yet the Lord walks by and sees you wallowing in your blood, and he says to in your blood, “Live!”

And thus it was.  Why?  That you may be his.

Friends,  what does this imply? How does this apply?

He had every right to choose to kill…but he didn’t.  He chose life.

What right have we to do murder to our own, when the only one who really has that right chose life?

Choosing life, it seems, is choosing godliness.

Working with you to cherish and choose life,

Vince R.

Viewing “The Shack” through the Lense of Truth

Perhaps you have heard of the book The Shack by William Young.  Apparently, there are Christians who are going completely ga-ga about it.  Here’s how Eugene Peterson (the sole author of The Message) endorses it:

“When the imagination of a writer and the passion of a theologian cross-fertilize the result is a novel on the order of The Shack. This book has the potential to do for our generation what John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress did for his. It’s that good!”

Really?! Are you really making that assertion, Mr. Peterson?  John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress is a cross-generational work of art because it contains cross-generational truth.  Does this book contain truth?

Here’s Jay Leno, exemplifying the pagan culture, giving it a shrugging endorsement:

I have never read it.  I might in the future.  But many men for whom I have great respect because of their godly, biblical, Christ-exalting committment have given it a big thumbs-down.

Dr. Russell Moore, for example, in one of the Albert Mohler programs during late July, said that he was about 100 pages into it, and he couldn’t help but think that he could spend his time much better than reading “this heresy.”

Tim Challies, a Christian Reviewer whom I respect has released his review of the book.

This person posts Challies’ defense of that review after receiving his responses from those who disagreed.

Lastly, Mark Driscoll let’s us know what he thinks about the book:

You know, I completely understand the argument that says that I have no right to endorse these critiques of a book of which I have not read.  Yet the idea remains: Could your time be spent better? Does it deliver what it promises? Does it deliver what it promises in a God-exalting, Christ-centered, biblically faithful way?

I guess that you will have to decide that, but I exhort you to understand how quickly Satan can use anything to turn your eyes from the truth.  I DO NOT give you a recommendation to read the book.  In fact, I will quickly say that I can give you a great onslaught of titles to read which I believe will serve you far better.

Nevertheless, I have read some reviews who have favored the book (swing a dead cat and you’ll hit a thumbs-up review for this book), and I am mostly amazed at many who loved it because of their intimate and personal identification with suffering.  That is the very subject which prompted the writing of the book, and also chronicles the book’s main subject.  (It’s Job without the four friends and the one true God.)

It’s just one man who faced tragedy speaking directly to a god called the God of Christianity inside a Shack.  USA Today gives us some insight here about that issue.

I am deeply moved to empathy by the way Mr. Young faced tragedy in his own life.  I am not distant or cold to that truth, yet I cannot say that I would be responding in love if I were, maybe as his pastor,  to respond to his situation in a way that compromises truth.  This is not love.  “Love…rejoices with the truth.”

The only way to minister to a weary soul facing tragedy is not through allegory or symbolism.  It’s through God’s revealed word which tells us this:

“For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.” Hebrews 2:18

“Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession.  For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” Hebrews 4:14-16

The Lord is not distant from your suffering.  He’s been through it before, and his suffering was the worst there could be.  Most of all, by this suffering, we are brought near to God by grace through faith in Christ.

People like Mr. Young who face the tragic realities of a fallen world will do better for themselves if they find faithful loving pastors and teachers who stay true to Scripture and the one true God.  It is far better than any “fiction” because it is eternal truth that calls us to reconcile and fellowship intimately with the Most High God. That’s the lense through which we must view any suffering.

Working with you to consider carefully what you read,

Vince R.

A “Pregnant Man,” Rampant Confusion, and the Only Answer

What's the Difference?

Over the twentieth century, the culture has produced alarmingly unnatural images and revisionist definitions of the identity of the sexes.  Only this year, it produced what many of you have heard as the ‘pregnant man.’  This is not a man.  This is a woman.  Men don’t get pregnant, but the culture would have the term ‘pregnant man’ printed across its billboards, in its magazine articles, and on its Internet websites.  The culture wants you to think that a ’pregnant man’ is truly a natural occurrence.

Friends, I think we can see from this that when there is no biblical worldview, confusion persists and truth is suppressed.  We must notice, first and foremost, that this wave of media-driven confusion and propagation speaks of the signs of the times.  It is people ‘deceiving and being deceived.’

Our enemy is not this woman who had an operation or her partner who I’m not even sure if it is a man or a woman, but it is Satan and his forces.  We do not war against flesh and blood.  We war against the principalities, the spiritual rulers of this present darkness.  They are actual persons who want lives to be ruined by belief in half-truths and lies about manhood and womanhood.

As such, the topic of my discussion is this confusion; it is a confusion about truth.  It is a confusion about what defines a man and what defines a woman.  The culture will not find truth in the way it is going.  The world and its wisdom is not the source of truth.

Jesus Christ is that truth, and he is that way.  Sorrowfully, I assert that the constant hatred that the culture has for people like me who will boldly say that men and women are different will not cease.  It will only get worse.  With a heavy heart, I truly hate what Satan is doing to those lost souls and most certainly what he will do to that poor baby, whose life will echo more and more confusion because her ‘parents’ are just as confused and blinded by the god of this age.

Satan wants confusion.  He wants disorder and anarchy.  He knows that God took disorder and anarchy and made it into the heavens and the earth.  God is the author of order, not the author of confusion.  He has clearly layed out in his word the definition and distinct purposes of men and women.  It all goes back to the created order of God, but sadly, the culture reflects the fall from that order more and more everyday.  Even more tragically, this fallen worldview has crept into our churches, and numerous Christians are just as confused about manhood and womanhood.

Recently, I heard news about a Christian friend, two years younger than I, who just got pregnant out of wedlock.  This is mostly tragic, not because of the sinful occurrence (which is tragic enough), but more so because of the failure of God’s people to help her understand biblical manhood and womanhood long before this happened. By God’s grace, his people will be there to support and love her in this hard and heavy time.  By God’s grace, the baby will be born and stand as testimony to the redemptive power of Jesus Christ in bringing my friend and her partner through this for his glory and for their good.  May they be saved or sanctified during this difficult time.

It is most sad to me that this topic is not being addressed in our pulpits.  Where it is being addressed, it is mostly ambiguous and curt.  “Don’t have sex until your married,” is the message that we hear.  But how to do that, how to keep a pure heart, how young men are to treat young women with respect and honor, work hard, display integrity, and take leadership, and how young women are to model modesty, support and be led by young men, and display virtuous femininity–these are not being taught. I believe that a pastor must be willing to lose his pulpit over this issue.  It is that important to Christian discipleship, Christian sanctification, Christian maturity, and most of all, the propagation of the gospel to a lost world that needs more of the ordered gospel and less of its own seemingly chaotic self.

Nevertheless, the condition of today’s young evangelical Christians reflects this lack of passionate biblical teaching and discipleship.  As a result, hearts are broken in many ways, and they continue to break up into adulthood, where their children will learn the same confusion. 

Mostly, this is due to young men who are more like little boys.  They are passive, uninterested, and predatory in their minds, viewing women as meat to be seduced rather than hearts to be earned.  They would rather wait patiently during the church services, content with the Lord’s work being done by someone else.  They are consumed with want of possessions (trucks and i-phones), want of comparison (viewing their muscles as more indicative of their character than their hearts), want of women (not with respect but with lust).  Chivalry is dying, and passivity is reigning strongly.  Manhood, for them, is not to be considered until marriage, and it is largely ignored before it.  They’ll play video games and watch funny you-tube sequences before they’ll study their Bibles and cultivate a life in the Word.  They would rather not think of fatherhood or leading a young woman spiritually.  ‘That is too hard, and I’m too young to think about that,’ one of them might say.  Yet for some reason, they think that on that day, when they’re married, they’ll be magically able to lead and protect and provide without any prior training or discipleship from their father’s or from older men in their church.  In fact, they despise any godly advice from their elders.  More so, these fathers and older men often don’t even know how to lead them themselves.  It is the fruit of Satan’s subtle work over many years.

On the other side of the gender, young women are more aggressive, in their words, in their actions and in their hearts.  They would be the ones to make the first move and take the initiative in almost all spheres of social life.  They would be the ones to entice young men with their bodies, wearing clothes that fifty years ago only a prostitute would wear.  They would be the ones to view marriage unbiblically, seeking fulfillment in their boyfriends rather than Jesus Christ, their God-friend.  They despise God’s intent for glad and nurturing motherhood, seeking rather to create a career, a name, and a paycheck.  Many view children as burdens and not as blessings.  Abortions, for this reason, are rampant, and corporations (I choose that word specifically) like Planned Parenthood would have them continue to think that way.  Feminism is killing our churches and ruining the lives of our young women.

In many larger metropolises, the public school system would have condoms and contraceptives in the hands of fifth graders, while the parents merely gawk, jaws dropped to the ground.  Or maybe they’re supportive of this usurpation of parental authority which is even sadder.  Parents may wonder just how raped their children’s minds truly are when their daughter has her first period at age eight or their son asks about a woman’s body at an age when, in my day, I was just enamored with my Star Wars action figures. 

Friends, I’m less concerned about lost people acting like lost people.  I’m more concerned because this is so rampant in our own pews.  Regenerate membership is a dirty idea today, and church discipline is a four-letter word.  This is tragic because those lost people just can’t seem to tell the difference between Christians and Agnostics, both of which are just as involved in pre-martial intimacy.

People will not like what I write in this essay.  My younger friends will call me a ‘twenty-year old fossil’ or a hyper-conservative hung-up male chauvinist because of what I say.  Older folks will say that I’m too young to know what I’m saying, and too inexperienced to have any authority to speak this way.  To them all I say, my only authority is God’s own word.

I’m okay with that now.  It once haunted me to consider what people would think of me because of these convictions for which I stand.  My social popularity is not what is at stake.  Rather, their souls are at stake.  This is because this issue, if you read my recent post on whether it’s 4th order doctrine or not, is so important.  It strikes at the core of a biblical understanding of marriage.  We don’t model this because it’s just tradition.  That is a sorry and pathetic reason to want to do marriage and gender roles like this.

The core issue here is that men and women are to relate in such a way that symbolizes the gospel.  A man must look up at his crucified savior with tears in his eyes and then turn to his wife and say, “That’s how I’m supposed to love you.”  A woman is to look at that same cross with tears in her eyes and then turn and look at her husband and say, “I will be there to support and love you the whole way up that Calvary hill.”

For you see, that is why the world hates the biblical understanding of manhood and womanhood.  They hate it because it mirrors the stumbling block of the gospel of God.   Are we preaching the gospel in our marriages and relationships?  That is the heart of the issue.  Is Christ being made much of in this? That is the goal of the entire institution of marriage.

Here is my thesis:  the only answer to the confusion of biblical manhood and womanhood is the gospel.

The once for all propositional truth of justification by faith in Christ alone is the answer to that scared and trembling young woman with that weight in her stomach as she sits in that cold waiting room at the clinic wondering if she’s doing the right thing.

The truth of penal substitutionary atonement is the answer to that facade of bravado as the young man sits next to that girl just as scared and confused and unable to understand what went wrong because now manhood means more than just seducing girls.

The truth of the resurrection with power is the answer to those comfortable young men who don’t know how to lead and so are just as content letting the girls do everything.

Because of an infantile understanding of Christ’s finished and complete work, all other spheres of life will grow weaker and weaker until understanding of truth has vanished and the church looks just like the world. 

God’s gospel will heal all wounds, will order all chaos, and will model servant leadership for young men, and glad submission for young women.

Go back to the old old story, Christians! That will set you rightly. It’s a biblical guarantee.

Working with you to cast down all confusion and to bow humbly before that old rugged cross,

Vince R.