Posted over at my other blog. Here’s an excerpt:

Everybody has a faith story. For some people that means talking about how God showed up in their lives but for others it means talking about how God seems to have disappeared. For many in the second category the church has become irrelevant, God is an entity that has yet to prove his own existence, and Christians a pack of wolves out for a hunt. Too often that last part is true.

Read the rest here.

__________________

The “other blog” features only my longer pieces of writing, some of which have been published in print and others that are waiting to be published. The post frequency is about once a week. So, if that’s the kind of thing you’re looking for…

Go and take a look here.
You can subscribe by email here.
You can subscribe by RSS here.
You can Like the Facebook page here.

Enjoy!

I had a bit of fun with Anne Rice’s recent apparent turn towards Emergent a couple of weeks ago. Truth be told, I am a great respecter of her life of Christ novel series and I can recommend that you read them – not necessarily for their doctrinal perfection, but for their excellent imagining of who Jesus was at various stages of life.

Christianity Today recently interviewed Anne Rice on following Christ without Christianity. A great quote from the interview:

Are there any other religious authors you read?

I read theology and biblical scholarship all the time. I love the biblical scholarship of D.A. Carson… I still read N.T. Wright. I love the Catholic theologian Karl Rahner. I love his writing on Jesus Christ. It’s very beautiful to me, and I study a little bit of it every day. Of course, I love Tolstoy and Dostoevsky.

You mentioned D.A. Carson, Craig Keener, and N.T. Wright. They are fairly conservative Protestants.

Sometimes the most conservative people are the most biblically and scholastically sound. They have studied Scripture and have studied skeptical scholarship. They make brilliant arguments for the way something in the Bible reads and how it’s been interpreted.

I don’t go to them necessarily to know more about their personal beliefs. It’s the brilliance they bring to bear on the text that appeals to me. Of all the people I’ve read over the years, it’s their work that I keep on my desk. They’re all non-Catholics, but they’re believers, they document their books well, they write well, they’re scrupulously honest as scholars, and they don’t have a bias.

Many of the skeptical non-believer biblical scholars have a terrible bias. To them, Jesus didn’t rise from the dead, so there’s no point in discussing it. I want someone to approach the text and tell me what it says, how the language worked.

Read the rest of the interview here. (HT: Aaron Armstrong)

Well, so are the rest of us… but as Hitchens puts it, “the process has suddenly accelerated on him.”

Some “Christians” are apparently “happy” about this (the ones that don’t use quotes around the words Christian and happy.)

I am certainly not happy about it since I quite admire Hitchens as a writer and hope that God gives him many more years to write and explore and think. Take a look at this interview:

Click here if you can’t see the video

Peter (whose more famous brother is Christopher) has a book coming out with Zondervan.

(HT: Doug Wilson)

Christopher Hitchens’ brother, Peter, is about to release a book called “The Rage Against God: How Atheism Led Me To Faith”.

“It begins with the day when, as a teenager at my boarding school in England, I set fire to my Bible…”:

When experienced journalist and Christian William Lobdell asked to be put on the religion beat for the Los Angeles Times, the last thing he expected to discover was that his doubts would become stronger than his faith.

In a 2007 article in the Los Angeles Times, Lobdell described the initial excitement of the job. “I had been on the religion beat for three years,” he says, “I couldn’t wait to get to work each day or, on Sunday, to church.” Investigating a case of clergy sexual abuse changed all that.

The clergy sex scandal would become the primary source of Lobdell’s disillusionment. As his investigation turned up credible sources that revealed the lengths to which the church had gone to protect a priest, his disappointment grew. This particular scandal has been hugely detrimental to the church, a problem further exacerbated by investigations and subsequent revelations of blatant cover-ups and the shuffling of guilty priests to other dioceses.

All this led Lobdell to a question that deserves to be answered or at least explored by people of faith: “Shouldn’t religious organizations, if they were God-inspired and -driven, reflect higher standards than government, corporations and other groups in society?”

Adding to his growing cynicism was what Lobdell discovered about Trinity Broadcasting Network, who went so far as to ask people already deeply in debt to make donations on their credit cards. At the same time, network co-founder Paul Crouch and his wife enjoyed $180-per-person meals paid for with tax-free donor money.

“As the stories piled up,” Lobdell says, “I began to pray with renewed vigor, but it felt like I wasn’t connecting to God. I started to feel silly even trying.” This led to the consideration of another possibility: “Maybe God didn’t exist.”

This consideration, one suspects, is not all that uncommon in today’s world, as books by atheists have become best-sellers and major topics of conversation. Obviously these authors have tapped into a growing irritation with the actions of people who claim to represent Jesus. Lobdell’s loss of faith stands as but one story of a growing number.

Listen to an NPR interview with Lobdell.

Full article in SLATE here. A couple of interesting quotes:

On the “Christian Right”: “I have discovered that the so-called Christian right is much less monolithic, and very much more polite and hospitable, than I would once have thought, or than most liberals believe.”

On his respect for Doug Wilson: “I much prefer this sincerity to the vague and Python-esque witterings of the interfaith and ecumenical groups who barely respect their own traditions and who look upon faith as just another word for community organizing.”

I am rarely disappointed when reading Hitchens.  There is always something of note in what he writes. He is a far more honest and articulate adversary than Dawkins.

A question for discussion:

Is it wise for Christians to engage with atheist perspective material (i.e. reading Dawkins or watching Religulous), or should Christians avoid these things out of concern that this engagement could create doubts and some might persuade to stop believing in God?

Here is the audio from the sermon I preached last Sunday – my first ever on a Sunday morning.

The sermon was based on James 5:13-20 and the title of the was “The Prayer of a Righteous Person”

Download audio file (Michael%20Krahn%20-%20The%20Prayer%20of%20a%20Righteous%20Person%20%2807-29-2009%29.mp3)

(Direct download here. Right click, then “Save As”)

If you would like to see some discussion that happened in preparation for the sermon, click here.

I’ll post the notes and some thoughts about sermon prep (with pictures) in a while.

We can define immutability in general terms by saying that it is “the quality of being incapable of mutation.” In theological terms, it is defined as “the doctrine of classical Christian theism that God cannot change; this has been variously interpreted to mean either that God’s nature cannot change but that God can, or that God himself cannot change at all.”

In this post, I will interact with the idea as Wayne Grudem defines it: “God is unchanging in his being, perfections, purposes, and promises, yet God does act and feel emotions, and he acts and feels differently in different situations.”

Support From Scripture

Numerous references to the concept of immutability are found in scripture:
- Psalm 102:25-27 speaks of God outliving the universe he created, comparing it to a garment that will wear out in comparison.
- In Malachi 3:6 God establishes his trustworthiness by telling Israel that they are not consumed because he does not change; his promises remain, regardless of the faithfulness (or faithlessness) of those to whom he made the promise. This provides “a solid foundation for his people’s faith and hope.”
- In James 1:17 God is called the “Father of lights” – indeed, the very source of light – and is not outshined by any other light that it might cast a shadow by him. This is similar to Psalm 102 in that it refers to that which we find glorious as something less significant when compared to God.
- 1 Sam 15:29 is somewhat problematic in saying that God will “not lie or have regret” since in the same chapter it says that God regretted making Saul king (vv. 11 and 35). Notes in the ESV Study Bible explain as follows: “Thus the term as used in 1 Sam. 15:11, 35 describes God’s own feeling of sorrow or regret that Saul had turned out as he did… while in v. 29 God will not regret or change his mind concerning a decision once he has made it.”
- In Hebrews 6:17-18 God demonstrates the unchangeable character of his purpose by guaranteeing it by two unchangeable things: himself and an oath.
- Hebrews 13:8 is distinguished from the other references in that it alone refers to the person of Jesus, saying that he is “the same yesterday and today and forever.”

Although…

In seeming contrast to these examples, the following passages show that while God himself does not change, a divine change of mind is possible:
-    Gen 6:6-7 records that God was sorry that he had made man on the earth
-    1 Sam 15:11,35 (see notes above re: 1 Sam 15:29)
-    In 2 Sam 24:16 God relents from destroying Jerusalem
-    Joel 2:13 again describes God as slow to anger and one who “relents over disaster”
-    In Jonah 3:9-10 it says that “When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that he had said he would do to them, and he did not do it.”

We can conclude from these contrasting passages that when God describes himself as unchanging, he is referring to his essential character and not a complete set of predetermined actions, decisions, and events.

God himself never changes even though he may change his mind about a matter. In human terms, changing our minds about a matter may change us – for better or worse – since a change of mind often occurs after new evidence is discovered or a new insight realized. This of course is not the case for God since he knows all, and since he knows all there are no new insights for him to realize.

Questions

So if, as Grudem holds, God does not change but his “attitude or expression of intention” will change if the situation changes, this seems to call into question his foreknowledge of a given event.  An example of this is found in the story of the prophet Jonah in chapter 3, verse 10: “When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God relented of the disaster that he had said he would do to them, and he did not do it.”

If God decides not to do something that he previously decided he would do, doesn’t he already know he is not actually going to do it from the beginning? How can God both know what will happen in the future and change his mind because of the actions of man?

In addition to this, if God knows or has predetermined what will happen in the future, why pray? John Piper addresses the issue as follows:

It is not the doctrine of God’s sovereignty which thwarts prayer for the conversion of sinners. On the contrary, it is the unbiblical notion of self-determination which would consistently put an end to all prayers for the lost. Prayer is a request that God do something. But the only thing God can do to save a lost sinner is to overcome his resistance to God. If you insist that he retain his self-determination, then you are insisting that he remain without Christ. For “no one can come to Christ unless it is given him from the Father” (John 6:65,44).

In Piper’s view then, when we pray we ask God to interrupt the depraved and rebellious self-determination of a sinner and then to cause him to turn to God. This makes some sense of the matter but still leaves the question of whether or not we have any input in the determination of our fate.

It is via this foothold that “open theism” climbs into the picture. “Open theism”, according to Piper, contends that “God has made himself ‘open’ to a future that is yet to be determined by both his and our choices. The ‘open’ future is largely indeterminate until God and his free creatures collaborate in forming it.” Passages such as Jonah 3:10 could certainly lead one to believe the same.

Summary

In summary, whether we believe that God has predetermined every action, decision, and event, or we believe that God determines the future I collaboration with out choices, his immutability God applies to those things in which we can place our faith: his promises. That God is sovereign and will on occasion change his mind according to his good purposes is not a matter that should decrease the confidence of our faith. That God might change his mind when we pray should be a matter of great comfort rather than a matter of disappointment or disillusionment.

Although we may not be able to reconcile the idea of foreknowledge on one hand, and changing his mind based on a change of circumstances on the other hand, surely both are taught in scripture and as such both must be believed.  His immutability is firmly taught in scripture, although not without some problematic passages.

In the comments of the post “Dealing with Difficult Scripture” John said:

“We’ve been talking a lot about the atheist vs christian views but what about Christians who are struggling with a lot of the same questions?  I classify myself as a skeptical christian.  I get the ‘by grace through faith’ concept – mostly – but I would really like to _understand_ as well.  So I guess I’m hoping for some of the answers DH has been asking for but from a slightly different perspective.

Mike has already challenged me to reread the bible from cover to cover, and that’s valuable but I was hoping for more discussion along those lines.  The question of OT genocide still bothers me.  In the mean time I will review some of the suggested reading…”

Is “Christian skeptic” a paradox or a legitimate position?

Discuss.

To be honest, I have tried to like Rob Bell’s work many times without much luck.  That’s probably a bad way to start a review.

I’m not a Bell-basher, but I’m not a fan either; I understand his appeal, but it doesn’t appeal to me; I have been to his church, I know some people there, and I like them and have enjoyed worshiping at Mars Hill.

Many who haven’t read Rob Bell’s books are at least familiar with the phenomenally successful series of short films called Nooma (which are quite good). Jesus Wants to Save Christians: A Manifesto for the Church in Exile is the third of his provocatively titled books – the previous two being Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith (my review) and Sex God: Exploring the Endless Connections between Sexuality and Spirituality.

If you’ve ever heard Bell speak, it’s easy to hear his voice when you read his books – his pacing, pauses, and emphases are communicated well by the format of the text. The size and outside cover designs are clever and appealing, making them nice books to be seen with.

In Jesus Wants to Save Christians Bell uses the motif of exile to illustrate the condition of God’s people at present and in times past, drawing parallels between the two. Exile, by Bell’s definition, is “when you fail to convert your blessings into blessings for others… [and] when you find yourself a stranger to the purposes of God.”

Bell wisely recommends that, “a Christian should get very nervous when the flag and the Bible start holding hands. This is not a romance we want to encourage.”  And adds: “For a growing number of people in our world, it appears that many Christians support some of the very things Jesus came to set people free from.”

He does excel at delivering a concise synopsis of Old Testament Biblical events, but beyond that and into his interpretation of the events, I found little of value.  The book does not deliver on it’s promise.

In describing the new covenant Bell says: “No more fear, no more terror, no more thunder. That was the old way, the former thing, the first covenant.” In this new covenant, “the truth will be so deeply etched into people’s consciousness that they will naturally do the right thing.” There is a common thread in Bell’s work, one that is the cause of some accusations that he favors Universalism. There are certainly overtones of that soteriological view and it would be nice to hear Bell explain his thinking on the matter a bit more.

By challenging Bell’s allusions to Universalism, one is put into the position of having to answer questions like “Are you saying you DON’T want everyone to be saved?” That is not the point here. Of course everyone (except the most extreme hyper-Calvinist) DOES hope that all will be saved, but the likelihood of this goes against numerous passages of scripture.  Some will spend eternity separated from God; Bell would do well to mention this more often in his teaching – not as a gleeful condemnation, but as a plea for repentance.

The text on the back cover says the following:

“There is a church in our area that recently added an addition to their building which cost more than $20 million. Our local newspaper ran a front-page story not too long ago revealing that one in five people in our city lives in poverty. This is a book about those two numbers.”

That claim is not substantiated in the pages of JWTSC; it would have been a much better book if it had.

The tone and scope of JWTSC reminds me of two other titles I read. Neither one sold me completely on its thesis and both are secular in orientation, but they challenged my preconceptions more effectively. So if a vibrant screed against the culture of excessive consumption and affluence is what you’re after, you’re more likely to be inspired by reading Naomi Klein’s No Logo or Kalle Lasn’s Culture Jam: How to Reverse America’s Suicidal Consumer Binge–And Why We Must.

When I wrote about Rick Warren including Isa as an equivalent name for Jesus in a previous post, a decent discussion erupted. What a learned from this discussion is that there are regional variances in the use of the word. My point was (from speaking to a Muslim co-worker) that Isa is the name used for Jesus by at least some Christians in Arab and Muslim countries.

For a few examples:

“It is clear from wikipedia and many other Arabic Christian resources that the differences between Isa of the Quran and the Jesus of the Bible are very different and that they are indeed differentiated by those Christians in the Arab world. “

“I got one response so far from my wife’s cousin’s husband who is Muslim (not sure of his nationality)… according to him all of the Arabic Christians HE knows refer to Jesus as Yeshua.”

From a related post at Phoenix Preacher:

“This is ridiculous. I’ve got on my desk 3 testimonies from Arabic speaking believers (which I cannot share more details of) who referred to Jesus as “Isa.” There are a lot of Arabic Christians in the world who have come out of Islam that call Jesus “Isa.” Are they any less saved than those of us who call upon the English transliteration of the Greek transliteration of the Hebrew name Yeshua?”

“Strictly speaking, ‘Isa’ is the Arabic name for Jesus. However, it is not the name that is ever used in Arab churches – at least, not mine. I believe the reason for that is to distinguish our beliefs from those of Muslims. To the Muslims, “Isa” is a prophet born of the virgin Mary. To the Christians, “Jesus” is the Son of God born of the virgin Mary. There is a big difference between the 2, and to avoid any confusion, Isa is never used.”

“I am extremely surprised to hear this – I have lived in African and Gulf Arab countries for many years, and have never – and I repeat NEVER – heard a Christian refer to Jesus as ‘Isa’.”

“It appears that Warren wanted to be explicitly clear that he was praying in the Name of Jesus Christ and no other name. He probably consulted many former muslims and would have chosen the word they recommended. Regardless, the muslim world knows that Warren was regarding Jesus (Isa, if you will) as God.”

“I lived in Malaysia, a Muslim country, for six years, and ‘Isa’ is the one and only word in the Malay language used to refer to Jesus. This word was borrowed from Arabic hundreds of years ago, and has long been a mainstay in the Malay language. The handful of former Muslims I had the privilege to know, who are now genuine followers of Christ, continue to use “Isa” to refer to Christ. Their understanding of who He is, of course, has dramatically changed, and they affirm with conviction that He is God and the Son of God.

In my interactions with Muslims there (speaking in the Malay language), I did use ‘Isa’ to refer to Christ. With many of my friends, quite honestly, I would have received a blank look had I attempted to use the English name “Jesus” or any other alternative to ‘Isa.’”

Below is a response to my Dawkins posts from a reader who is an ex-Christian atheist. Jump in here and show us how you deal with the implications of these passages – whether from a Christian or skeptic/atheist perspective.

I labeled the passages in question 1 to 5 so in the comments you can answer some or all of them.  The person who asked the question will be monitoring the comments and may jump into the discussion

*************************************

Hey Mike,

I was just curious….I’ve read quite a bit of your Richard Dawkins blogs.  I agree with some and disagree with most but a good read.  I just was curious to get your opinion on these bible quotes.  In my opinion, to be Christian means you must believe EVERY word the bible says or else you are a cafeteria christian (picks and chooses which parts he wants to live by).

1. Exodus 35:2

Six days work shall be done, but on the seventh day you shall have a Sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord. Whoever does any work on it shall be put to death.

2. Deut 21:18-21

18 “If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and, though they discipline him, will not listen to them, 19 then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his city at the gate of the place where he lives, 20 and they shall say to the elders of his city, ‘This our son is stubborn and rebellious; he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.’ 21 Then all the men of the city shall stone him to death with stones. So you shall purge the evil from your midst, and all Israel shall hear, and fear.

3. Leviticus 20:13

If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.

4. Mark 7:9-13

And he said to them, “You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition! 10 For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’ 11 But you say, ‘If a man tells his father or his mother, “Whatever you would have gained from me is Corban”’ (that is, given to God) — 12 then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, 13 thus making void the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And many such things you do.”

5. Isaiah 45:7

I form light and create darkness,
I make well-being and create calamity,
I am the Lord, who does all these things.

If you’re interested in resurrecting the Dakins thread, there is a new comment and some question on the post “The God Delusion – Part 2″.

1. I started dating Anne Marie when I was just short of my 15th birthday

2. I married Anne Marie when I was just short of my 20th birthday

3. In between those two dates, I didn’t always treat Anne Marie as well as could have. I hope I do a lot better now.

4. I get annoyed with people’s idiosyncrasies, and my own as well

5. I sometimes exclaim: “Man, I am SUCH a freak!”

6. I don’t think Johnny Cash really made that great a contribution

7. I demand too much of my little girls sometimes… but much was demanded of me when I was little and I’m now thankful for it

8. I haven’t written many new songs in the last few years and I sometimes worry that the gift is gone. If it is gone, it found it’s way to Shane. Shane writes good songs.

9. I can sleep anywhere… and it doesn’t have to be quiet either

10. I have wasted many years at my current job. I plan to fix that problem in the next couple of months

11. I once took too many free balloons from the grocery store. My mom made me take them back. I was frightened and humiliated and that day I learned a valuable lesson

12. Some things that I think are funny are actually mean (peace out Shane)

13. I sometimes shamelessly promote my blog

14. I cry almost every time I hear Counting Crows “Miami”

15. I cry when I watch that cheesy “You… complete me” scene in Jerry Maguire

16. I cried for about 10 minutes – actually I wept – after watching Charlize Theron in “Monster” http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0340855/

17. I can’t find or imagine finding another family as knit together or unique as the Krahns.

18. I have three daughters and no desire to have a son

19. I don’t fear aging, in fact I’m looking fwd to it

20. A few years ago, I almost converted to Roman Catholicism.  I still consider Thomas Merton a mentor.

21. I like books

22. Sleep is a necessary evil

23. Jack Layton makes me nauseous

24. I have a lot of hope for Barack Obama, although I wish he’d change his views on abortion

25. If anything goes wrong in the USA, Jack Bauer can fix it with threats of violence… and violence.

For those of you who don’t know, Rick Warren was asked to pray at Barack Obama’s inauguration. He closed his prayer “I humbly ask this in the name of the one who changed my life—Yeshua, ‘Isa, Jesus [Spanish pronunciation], Jesus—who taught us to pray:” followed by The Lord’s Prayer.

Contrary to this report by Daniel Cordell which seems to be making the rounds, I spoke to a Muslim immigrant friend this morning and posed the question “Who is Isa?” Without hesitation, his immediate response was “That’s Jesus in Arabic. That’s the word used for Jesus in Arabic countries.”

This deserves more research, but one to one I think I’ll take the word of an observant Muslim immigrant on the issue.

In Arabic countries, Isa is the name for Jesus and Allah is the name for God. Without prompting, my Muslim friend also said that Christian preachers in the mid-east commonly use Isa and Allah to refer to Jesus and God, and when they do this their meaning is clear to both Christians and Muslims.
>

Here is Mark Driscoll’s take on Warren’s Prayer.

What do you think?

**These are some additional thoughts on my review of the book found here.**

I don’t agree with the entire book but at many places I found myself elated that this is out there “in the wild” being read by many non-Christians.

I realize how many people around me are against the book, but I don’t think ANY (or many) of them have actually read it.  I have determined not to come out strongly against some books based on the word of others. I just finished Rob Bell’s latest so I’ll be putting something up about that shortly as well.

But this should tell you how much my mind changed on the book by reading it.

I have a tolerance for fiction and personal reflection books, which is why I can read Donald Miller and Anne Lamott and Madeleine L’Engle, etc. and totally disagree with some of their views while still gaining a lot from their writings.  Same goes for The Shack.

Click here to subscribe to this blog                             (What does “subscribe” mean?)

Ok, I’m done now… I told Anne Marie not to let me go out again.

Here’s the academic stack:

…and the other stack. You’ll notice I out the Bell and Pagitt books between some more solid theological works.  I tried to put them closer to MacArthur but there were sparks.

By the way, we’re going Rob Bell’s church (Mars Hill) tomorrow morning. I’ll put up a post about that sometime next week.

I always buy a lot of books at this time of the year.  Tomorrow we’re heading for Grand Rapids where I’ll buy a few dozen more.  Below are spine pics of some that I bought this week.

I picked these up one night at a thrift store and at Chapters in the discount section:

I picked up the ones in the next few pics in various shops in London:

These next few are ones I already have, so these will be to give away: