Discernment

On the Brink of a Quantum Singularity with Calvin and Arminius

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Last year, the well-known physicist Stephen Hawking admitted he was wrong about one of his pet theories concerning black holes. In the rarefied academic air, this amounted to a near recanting of biblical proportions. But Hawking’s admitting that his formulas can’t accurately describe what takes place in the physics world within a black hole was no death knell for his career. The truth is, no one has been able to accurately describe what happens on the brink of a quantum singularity.

If you don’t already know, black holes form when very large stars die and collapse in upon themselves, creating an incredibly dense piece of matter—a quantum singularity—whose mass is so enormous that it warps the fabric of space itself into a giant, nearly bottomless well. If you’ve ever seen one of those parabolic coin games where you roll a coin along the edge and it progressively travels in tighter and tighter circles until finally falling into a hole at the end of the funnel, then you’ve seen the basics of a black hole at work. Once matter gets trapped beyond a certain point of the black hole’s tug of gravity (the “event horizon”), that matter, be it dust or even a massive star, can’t escape the gravity grip of the singularity, in the process possibly being totally destroyed even down to the subatomic level.

Physicists for years have tried to explain the physics behind black holes and their singularities with astonishingly little success. The problem is that all the physics we hold dear (from Einstein’s relativity theories to Maxwell’s equations) cease to work the closer one gets to a quantum singularity. Physicists see cracking the physics behind a black hole as one of the true Holy Grails in physics. Whoever manages to do it will join the pantheon of greats right up there with Albert E. himself.

This brings us to John Calvin and Jacobus Arminius.

You’ve probably heard those names tossed about if you’ve been a Christian longer than a year or two. Both of these men proffered different takes on the “quantum singularity” of Christian theology, how people technically come to (and stay with) Christ.

Let’s take a look at the basics of each:

Five Points of Arminianism

  • Conditional Election – Election is based on the faith or belief of men.
  • Universal Atonement – The atonement is for all, but only believers enjoy its benefits.
  • Saving Faith – Man, unaided by the Holy Spirit, is unable to come to God.
  • Resistible Grace – The drawing of the Holy Spirit can be resisted.
  • Uncertainty of Preservation – This doctrine was left open to inquiry.

Five Points of Calvinism

  • T = Total Depravity – Man is completely a sinner, without any hope of helping himself.
  • U = Unconditional Election – God elected saints to salvation when they had no merit at all. God did not look down upon the earth and see some sinners believing, therefore elected them to salvation, but He looked down upon the earth, and saw all were sinners, therefore elected some to salvation.
  • L = Limited Atonement – The atonement is limited to the elect.
  • I = Irresistible Grace – It is impossible for a sinner to resist salvation once the Holy Spirit begins drawing him.
  • P = Preservation – A saved person will be saved forever, and will live a holy and Godly life.

(Thanks to Pastor Wayne Reynolds for the quick overviews of Calvinism and Arminianism.)

These two streams of belief divide the Protestant world almost in half (there are other belief systems that don’t adhere perfectly to either stream, but they are not majority groups.) Most American denominations that arose out of the Second Great Awakening follow Arminianism and, technically at least, are the Evangelicals we hear so much about. Churches like The Assemblies of God or Methodists are representative. The “Old Line” Presbyterian or Reformed churches are Calvinist, but have muddied the water by occasionally assuming the title “Evangelical” in order to sound like they are up to date with the rest of the Protestant churches out there.

These two streams have slugged it out for a long time. Interestingly enough, the blogosphere is becoming a battleground for these two points of view, with blogrolls developing that highlight bloggers who ascribe to one view or another. I have read so many blog posts lately that can be condensed to “Only Calvinism is Truth” that I have lost count. Anyone who has stumbled into such a debate can attest to the viciousness that often results in defense of one position or another.

Now comes the point in this post where I alienate every single one of my readers.

A physicist like Stephen Hawking is brilliant enough to be able to describe the way virtually all of the universe works from a physics standpoint. He can tell you how it is possible to hit a kilometer-wide target on a moving planet, something NASA does effortlessly (most of the time). He can tell you how gravity works, and light, and the weak force, and electromagnetism…in short, virtually everything we know about how the universe works, he can explain. But he can’t explain what happens on the brink of a quantum singularity.

Likewise, I wonder if John Calvin and Jacobus Arminius are not in the same bind as Hawking when it comes to theology. I contend that perhaps what Calvin and Arminius are trying to describe are the edges of where Jesus wants His true followers to be. It is possible I think, that God never intended us to be hanging out at the brink of the theological quantum singularity Calvin and Arminius address.

Another way of looking at this: If you have teenagers or have ever worked with them, you know that on the issue of sex it is inevitable that you will get asked the question, “Well, how far is too far?” Wise people understand that this is actually the wrong question, but the kids don’t. I suspect that this may be the case in the Calvin/Arminius debate, too.

Take a look at the issue of Preservation of the Saints, for instance. Arminians typically believe it may be possible to wander away from God and lose one’s salvation. Calvinists would argue that this is impossible, contending that if such a thing were to happen the original nature of a person’s “conversion” would be suspect.

But isn’t this like the black hole issue? Jesus calls us to be His disciples and the point of being a disciple is to stay at the Master’s feet, not to toy around with “How far can I wander away and still be saved?” Nor is it a matter of saying, “I can get away with just about anything because He won’t cast me out.” Don’t we see how both of those are skirting the edges of where we need to be as disciples? Those are “brink of the quantum singularity” thoughts—not where the Lord wants us to focus. Sadly, a lot of people get sucked out of the rest of the Christian universe and get stuck at the event horizon of such ideas, forever trapped by the power of one stream or the other. This results in a great number of causalities out there in the pews.

We all know people who have been crushed by their struggles at the brink of this theological quantum singularity. But there is a whole universe of faith as a disciple where those forces don’t have to tug us down a hole. In truth, they may very well be moot points for a person who seeks only to please the Lord in all he or she does.

Ours is a love relationship with the Lord of the Universe. This is more important than the mechanisms that get us there and keep us there. Discipleship is like a marriage between Christ and the disciple—divorce is out of the question and the engagement is merely a formality once the marriage is consummated. We can’t live like the man who asked to bury to his parents, or the one who looks back over his shoulder at what is being left behind.We simply cannot live at the brink; true disciples want to be in the center of the Lord’s will. We do what the Lord asks and are content in doing so.

And maybe that is where the Lord would prefer we all be.

I know this is a contentious issue. R.C. Sproul is probably already scratching my name off his mailing list. So if you have comments, please feel free to leave them—with all humility and love for the brethren, of course. (In other words, take a deep breath and count to ten before you post!)

Will the Real False Teacher Please Stand Up?

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Recently, I’ve tried to make any Friday posts I do here at Cerulean Sanctum a little less intense. But after several hours of websurfing last night (I’m under the weather and it beats lying in bed!), I just had to write what I leave for you today.

There used to be a TV gameshow called “To Tell the Truth.” The premise was that a person with an unusual history, job, or reputation would join two imposters pretending to be that person. After a series of questions from a panel of celebrities, the panel would be required to separate the truth teller from the liars. The imposters got money if they managed to fool the panel. What made the show interesting is that sometimes the least likely liars managed to fool all the panel—the janitor manages to convince everyone he’s the former king of Fiji, for instance, when the real former king is sitting right next to him.

The moment of truth, the nexus of tension on “To Tell the Truth” was when the host would finally ask, “Will the real __________ please stand up?”

Last night I followed a link that led to a website critical of several well-known radio and TV preachers. You can’t be a Christian and be on the Internet and not eventually come across a site like this, but in the past I had ignored them.

Not this time.

I decided to Google the names of a few of those preachers mentioned and see how many places branded them as false teachers, heretics, or outright servants of the Enemy. Unfortunately, I started with a preacher I tend to like, Jack Hayford.

I’ve listened to Jack Hayford of The Church on the Way, a Foursquare church out in California, many times. I find him to be a breath of fresh air since he is one of the few charismatics on the radio, and because I have found that a lot of what he says resonates in me. He is a thorough Bible expositor and often mines those little nuggets of wisdom that pass by so many people when they read the Scriptures. He’s not a “charismaniac,” by any means; rather he manages to keep the fire in the fireplace, something I admire in any charismatic preacher.

I lost track of the number of Web sites that called Hayford a false teacher. Most didn’t like the fact he was a charismatic, that he tended toward a pre-trib eschatology (I’d never heard him preach on this, so this was news to me), and that he supported unbiblical political involvement—mobilizing Christians to vote for moral leaders.

Now I’ve listened to messages by Hayford several dozen times. And in all those times, I think I’ve ever truly disagreed with him concerning his message on tithing. Personally, I don’t believe in a New Testament tithe like Hayford does, but rather I see that everything should be open to being given as the need arises. I suspect that my view would brand me a wanton backslider in many institutional churches and denominations, but that is the reasoning I’ve come to. I know that Hayford’s view is far more mainstream, frankly. I’ve not heard every message Hayford’s ever preached, so I cannot say that I know all of his theology, only that I’ve found him to be reasonable and within the bounds of what is usually acceptable in the Church.

But what defines a “false teacher?” And if we apply that criteria to all pastors and preachers out there, would 99.999% of them have to rise if someone asked, “Will the real false teacher please stand up?”

Pick an eschatological scenario, say a pre-trib, pre-millennial outlook. You’ve essentially just called every pastor who does not hold that view a false teacher. Personally, I don’t hold that end times view. Do I call every teacher who teaches what I don’t believe a heretic? Am I even uniquely qualified to make those determinations if hundreds of years of church history have been filled with better men than me wrestling with just those issues?

How many times has the pastor of your church ever said something that was even a fraction off? Is his ministry now disqualified? Is anyone not standing now?

Is John MacArthur a heretic because he’s a cessationist? Is Jack Hayford a false teacher because he’s nota cessationist? If you disagree with “The Bible Answer Man” Hank Hannegraf, are you doomed to forever wander the earth as an enemy of God? Preterist or Amillennialist? Sunday worship or Saturday worship? Who’s in and who’s out?

By now this post has gone on too long, so I’ll cut to the chase.

At what point do we extend grace to teachers and preachers on issues that divide Christians? My reading of the Bible shows that Paul usually only assailed those who were way out there on issues that most pastors or preachers today would affirm as deviant. Is there any wiggle room on some issues?

As much as I believe the Holy Spirit guides into all truth, I just as firmly believe that grace exists for us who teach and preach when we goof up. I know the standard is high, and here at Cerulean Sanctum I try not to ever go down routes that are far off the beaten path theologically. I try to stick with “The Main and the Plain.”

So what do you, those of you who enjoy coming to this blog, think about this issue? At what point does someone become a false teacher, and is there ever any grace for pastors and teachers who stray from the rock-solid truth?

Sanity in the Simple

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If we lose sight of the simple things the Lord has blessed us with, we get sucked into a cyclone of complexity. Yet it is in the enjoyment of simple things in life that joy is found.

It could not have been a more beautiful day today. The weather here was in the high Seventies with a light breeze and very little humidity—hard to believe for Southwestern Ohio in August! Clear blue skies and ample sunshine poured down on the verdant fields and forests surrounding our little homestead. I felt like it was one of those June days when I was barely into my twenties and life was lived in the moment, though it also stretched out dazzlingly before me, a banquet ready to sample. You feel the power of your youth coursing in you and all is well with the world.

Life has a habit of fractalizing, becoming infinitely complex when we examine it with the microscope of time and experience. But this is not God’s way. His voice calls us to come away from the swirl of activity and be one with Him:

My beloved speaks and says to me:
“Arise, my love, my beautiful one,
and come away,
for behold, the winter is past;
the rain is over and gone.
The flowers appear on the earth,
the time of singing has come,
and the voice of the turtledove
is heard in our land.
The fig tree ripens its figs,
and the vines are in blossom;
they give forth fragrance.
Arise, my love, my beautiful one,
and come away.
–Song of Solomon 2:10-13 ESV

This is a call the world does not understand. I used to believe it was merely a spiritual call, but I now believe it is something more

A few years ago, my wife and I elected to pack up and move out to the country. We both feel that Christians have lost something in our bid to keep up with the world. But there is something sane in the simple rural life. There is health in the raising of one’s own food, of breaking the soil, working it, and seeing it bring forth life. When I am out on my tractor, a stillness comes over me as I tend the land the Lord has given us out of His goodness. I wonder if we Christians lost something dear when we forsook the land for the factory, skyscraper, and office park.

Just the other day, we attended a meeting designed to help farmers grow wine grapes. At one time the Ohio River Valley was what Napa Valley is today. As we walked through the local vineyards, the bounty of grapes we saw drove it home for me: There is a fruitfulness that can be had in fulfilling the very first command of God to Adam. As the song “All Good Gifts” says, We plow the fields and scatter the good seed on the land, and it is fed and watered by God’s almighty hand. It is not easy work, but there is a simple fulfillment in it that is lost for so many people.

Jesus said that his yoke was easy, His burden light. Too many Christians have taken on a hard burden in an effort to keep up with the Joneses. We were never meant to be yoked with the world and its mind-numbing complexity. Any ancient farmer could tell you not to mix your work animals in the yoke or else they will pull in a constant circle, getting nowhere.

Not everyone can drop what they are doing and do what we did, I understand that (and if this post has been rambling for many of you, well sometimes the deepest feelings come out that way.) But no matter what, I know with all my heart that God wants us to dwell in peace and rest in Him. What that takes may be different for every person, but I believe that sometimes the best way to still the soul is to be in a place that is more still by its very nature.

Ask the Lord to help you find that place. It will be both in you and outside you. If you look for it by His Spirit, you will know when you find it because peace is there, as is the sound of the Savior’s voice.

Does your life feel like a spinning wheel careening out of control? Simplicity calls you to come away. A more serene life dwells in us if we listen to that melodious voice that calls out, “Come away….”