Eternity - December 2013 - Issue 43

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NUMBER 43, DECEMBER 2013 CIRCULATION 100,000 ISSN 1837-8447

On Facebook we asked readers to help us find Christians who are

Changing the world And they told us about people who ARE ...

Changing it one child at a time

...and other extraordinary ways ...one bottle of water at a time

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DECEMBER 2013

OPINION

Obadiah Slope

Too many Crossways: There’s a large multi-campus Crossway Baptist Church (in Melbourne), and more recently a large multicampus church of Anglicans (in Sydney) who have adopted the same name. Then there’s a US-based publisher, which publishes the ESV Bible, called Crossway. For a while, the college formerly known as Bible College of Queensland took up the name Crossway College but has changed it to Brisbane School of Theology. Good move—it was getting complicated there for a while.

Power Hungry: Student worker Richard Glover blogged about Stanley Hauerwas who gave this year’s New College lectures, and described how the modern University teaches students to seek power. The Christian life by contrast may be one of humble service: “The example Hauerwas gives of this politics in practice is the hard, patient work of learning to live with those suffering intellectual disabilities. Such work requires the humility to place the needs of the intellectually disabled above our own, not asserting our power but forsaking it for the good of the other.

Again, this is in contrast with the life of ‘power people for the future,’ who learn to assert themselves, climb the career ladder and make their mark on society in tangible, impressive ways.”

Slippery Slope: This is the place for Obadiah to confess that before he read the above he was thinking he might sleep in rather than look after a bunch of Special Olympics kids in the morning.

New condensed version: What's this?

“Foreign girl wins Israeli edition of The Bachelor, thanks to savvy stage momin-law. Oh, and BTW? Women rock.”

It's the book of Ruth, as a tweet message. There are at least two versions of the Bible with each book condensed to a tweet in the twittersphere. One by Aussie theologian and blogger Ben Myers and one by US-based Mormon Jana Riess who tweets every chapter.

The above Ruth summary is from Reiss’ "The Twible" which, ironically, has been issued as a book. Ben’s tweets use the hashtag #Canonfodder.

A prayer for the persecuted church Patrick Sookhdeo On 21 October 2013, Islamist rebels linked to al-Qaeda invaded Saddad and Haffar, two Christian villages in Syria.

One week later, dozens of Christians were dead, thousands of families had been forced to flee or used as human shields. Far from being an isolated incident, the siege is part of an accelerating trend of targeted anti-Christian violence in the country. The very existence of the Church in Syria is under threat.

If nothing is done to reverse this trend, Syria could go the way of Iraq.

Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Christians have been forced to flee because of a huge surge in anti-Christian attacks since the US-led invasion in 2003. The Christian community in Iraq has been reduced to a quarter of its size. Many Christians fled to Syria, where they are seeing history repeat itself.

In Pakistan, our brothers and sisters are reeling from the country’s deadliest anti-Christian attack. More than 100 Christians were killed, or died later of their wounds, when two suicide bombers targeted All Saints Church in Peshawar on 22 September 2013.

Some worshippers who came to church that morning with their entire immediate family, returned with nobody. The Pakistani Taliban, responsible for the attack, said it would continue to attack “foreigners and non-Muslims” until US drone attacks in the region ceased.

In Nigeria, atrocities are committed weekly by the violent Islamist group Boko Haram. In its attempt to create an Islamist state in the North, the group brutally attacks Christians and other targets in Northern and Middle Belt states. In 2012, almost 1,000 believers were killed, making Nigeria the most lethal country for Christians.

We must ask why our brothers and sisters are being so mercilessly targeted.

Although persecution has many causes, one major contributing factor is perhaps a surprising one: Western foreign policy. Western intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan has made the Christian minorities in these countries more vulnerable. In Syria, Western governments are backing the side that aims to destroy the church. The revolution in Syria may have been begun by pro-democracy activists, but the opposition is now dominated by Islamists, who are fighting to create a state in which Christians would not be welcome.

The influence of political Islam since the Arab Spring has also led to Christian persecution. Although Islamists played hardly any part in the revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia, their power

E H T N I O J ER B M E C DE ING H C T A M E G N E L L CHA

Heretiq

Sunday: Obadiah thinks that honestly answering the question “What did you do on the weekend?” is one of the easiest ways to declare our faith. Idly looking at an old copy of Quarterly Essay, I came across an example of doing it in style. Responding to a piece on Kevin Rudd, Peter Martin (economics correspondent for the SMH and The Age) writes: “George Megalogenis berates Rudd (and Howard) for spending too much time feeding the media. And he is right. With Rudd in office, not a Sunday morning passed as I left church without an email alert…” Belated congratulations to Peter.

St Thecla monastry in Maaloula, a Christian village northeast of Damascus, Syria.

Taken by Al Qaeda linked rebel forces in September, retaken in turn by the Syrian Army, the Jihadists, then the army again. in those countries was strengthened.

Anti-Christian attacks and arrests for blasphemy increased during Egypt’s year of Islamist rule, and since the second revolution, Christians have been scapegoated for the fall of former President Morsi and attacked.

The effect of violence on our Christian brothers and sisters is devastating.

Threatened or actual attacks create fear and uncertainty about the future.

Christians forced to flee are often left desperately poor. In Nigeria, Egypt and Pakistan, they must live with the possibility of full-scale insurgencies leading to civil war. And for many, as for the victims of the attack on All Saints Church, following Jesus in a hostile context has cost them their lives.

And the expression of anti-Christian persecution is not limited to violence.

Oppression and harassment by the authorities can be devastating. In Saudi Arabia and North Korea, Christian worship is outlawed altogether. The authorities in many Communist and exCommunist countries are often strongly opposed to religious freedom. And persecution is sometimes implemented through the legal system; for example in Indonesia and Central Asia, church registration is compulsory yet almost impossible. In India, anti-conversion laws are misused to restrict legitimate Christian evangelism. And wherever sharia law is enforced, Christians face official discrimination and many restrictions, with converts gravely endangered.

So how should the Western church respond? We must be moved by concern and empathy for our brothers and sisters. In a world where mainstream media largely ignore the plight of Christians, we must make sure we stay informed. We must advocate politically for believers in need, and we must share with them the material blessings God has given us. Above all, we must pray continually (1 Thess 5:17). Join me in praying for persecuted Christians: “Almighty and most loving God, the Father of mercies and God of all consolation, whose compassion never fails, save your persecuted people. As they pass through the waters of adversity, may the rivers not overwhelm them. As they walk through the fires of affliction, may the flames not consume them.

“Give them your aid, for they are needy, your strength, for they are helpless, your hope, for they are in despair, your deliverance, for they are in danger.

“O God, make them firm in their faith, joyful through hope, fill them with Your love, protect them from the wiles of the devil and the conspiracies of men.

So that, passing through the waters, they may come at last to the land of everlasting life, there to reign with You forever.

“In the name of the all-powerful and triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.”

This article is adapted from a talk given at the Global Anglican Futures Conference in Nairobi in October 2013.

As they walk through the fires of affliction, may the flames not consume them.

It’s Time.

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DECEMBER 2013

NEWS

BRIEFS

Miroslav One voice from the typhoon Volf to visit Sophie Timothy Yale theologian Professor Miroslav Volf says the church has two malfunctions: idleness and coercion. Either we wrongly make our faith private and idle, or we make it coercive, lording our beliefs over others. His vision, on the other hand, is for a thoughtful faith, practiced with integrity in community.

It is this vision of a robust public faith which will be at the heart of a new conference to be run next year in Sydney.

Volf will be the keynote speaker at this new conference, called Re:Thinking: a public faith, and hosted by the Centre for Public Christianity, Arrow Leadership and World Vision.

CPX has wanted to bring Volf to Australia for some time, making his appearance at the Re:Thinking conference in March a muchanticipated event. Apart from Volf, Re:Thinking will include sessions from the ABC’s Managing Director, Mark Scott, Vice-Chancellor of Sydney University, Michael Spence, Melinda Tankard Reist (Collective Shout), Tim Costello (World Vision) Mark Sayers (Red Church) and Centre for Public Christianity’s John Dickson and Justine Toh. The Centre for Public Christianity’s Simon Smart said, “Overcoming caricatures, being able to speak in a way that recognises the resentment that’s out in the public towards Christianity and the misunderstandings and trying to overcome those, which is not straightforward. I think that’s the biggest challenge.” www.rethinking.net.au

Above: Damage at Palawan. Insert: Viola Coquilla, “Lord, since you’ve saved us, please continue to save us.”

Philippines Bible Society This is the story of Mrs Viola Coquilla, 60 years old, resident of Barangay 70, Anibong Point, Tacloban City.

Anibong Point was wiped out by the storm surge. She lost her husband, daughter, son-in-law, and a grandchild.

She said they are still missing but she also thought that maybe they were among those retrieved and buried in one of the mass graves. Because she has no way of knowing where the retrieved bodies were, she could not identify them.

When I asked how she is now, she smiled and said, “Bag-o nga kinabuhi.” (“New life.”).

She narrated her family’s Yolanda (the Filipino name for Typhoon Haiyan) ordeal. One thing she remembered

while sea waters were raging around them and while clinging to whatever they could, was crying out to God for help. God still cares, she said, and continued saying in Waray language, “Lord, imo man kami ginsalba, padayona man kami pagsalba. Si Lord harani.” Translation: “Lord, since you’ve saved us, please continue to save us. God is near.”

“If you have already done your part in sending relief goods to help the Filipino people, thank you. From the bottom of our hearts, we thank you for your generosity,” says Dr Nora Lucero, from Philippines Bible Society.

For Christians providing direct aid: www.samaritanspurse.org.au, www.febc.org.au, www.worldvision. com.au, compassion.com.au Bibles for the Philippines: biblesociety. org.au/philippines

Saturday 18th January 2014 10am - 12:30pm AC Central 30 Cowper Street Parramatta NSW

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A goat for your MP: This Christmas, Micah Challenge and Make Poverty History are joining forces in a campaign that encourages advocates to send a Christmas card to their MP, and include a gift card from one of Micah Challenge’s partner agencies’ catalogues. By making a personal contribution to ending poverty, supporters can remind politicians of the desire for the Government to match that generosity. micahchallenge.org.au/christmasaction.

Cool evangelism: An imitation Moleskine journal (the notebook that is trendier than a mobile phone) called The Search is the centrepiece of an evangelistic push for 2014. The Search contains the Gospel of Luke, with questions, notes and a direct link to video resources. It’s part of the “Jesus Brings” campaign which the Sydney Anglican diocese is running next year. The Bible Society team which produces Eternity is pleased to have produced it for them. www.jesusbrings. info.

New principals: Richard Gibson, who has persuaded many students in Sydney that learning New Testament Greek is almost fun, has left Moore College to become the new principal of Brisbane School of Theology. Tim Patrick will be the new head of the Bible College of South Australia, travelling from Melbourne via Cambridge where he studied for a PhD. Through the wardrobe: As Eternity goes to press, a Narnia evening in Melbourne kicked off a series of celebrations for C. S Lewis who died 50 years ago.

Read more at biblesociety.org.au Mr Melbourne: Salvos commander Brendan Nottle is Melburnian of the Year. The official citation describes him as “providing unseen but vital help to those in need.”

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DECEMBER 2013

social justice special

10 ordinary Aussie Christians changing the world 8. Bottling faith

Kaley Payne

1. Welcoming refugees

2. Volunteering at 90

Wyn Finlayson – Volunteer of the Year Named as this year’s Volunteer of the Year by the Fundraising Institute, 90year-old Wyn Finlayson from WA has volunteered hundreds of hours to Compassion Australia over 25 years, seeing more than 230 children sponsored.

When age began making it difficult to be as active as she once was, Wyn decided to sell homemade jam—from a recipe passed down from her mother— to raise money for Compassion’s work.

“When you think that 19,000 kids die every day from preventable things, you’ve got to do something,” says Wyn, “Last year, I gave $900 altogether from my jam money. It’s a little, isn’t it? A drop in the bucket. But like Mother Teresa said, ‘The ocean would be much less without that drop.’”

3. Advocating for carers

Mary Lou Carter – Carers advocate Christian parents played a crucial role in advocating for the introduction of the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS). Mary Lou Carter is one such parent, caring for her severely disabled son Nicholas for 21 years full time.

She has passionately advocated for children with a disability and their families and carers, founding and leading the Carers Alliance political party and running for the Senate in the 2010 and 2013.

She says caring and loving those who aren’t perfect is what Jesus had in mind.

“He didn’t discard them...so I know my purpose is to help.”

Flavio Takemoto

Brad Chilcott­­– Welcome to Australia Brad Chilcott is a pastor in Adelaide and founder of Welcome To Australia, a movement encouraging Australians to actively welcome asylum seekers, refugees and other migrants.

Chilcott also acted as an advisor to former Immigration Minister, Tony Burke, during the Minister’s threemonth stint in the role, tasked with helping the Department release as many children as possible from detention. 409 unaccompanied children were released in that period.

In the increasingly hostile politics surrounding asylum seekers, perseverance from the church is needed until change comes, he says.

“We might feel that we can’t change what our leaders are doing but we can continue to befriend and welcome asylum seekers.”

Brad Chilcott

4. Meeting with politicians

Sarita Hales – Micah Challenge 18-year-old NSW student Sarita Hales is doing her bit to change our Government’s attitude to the global poor. In the gaps in her study timetable, Sarita has met with her local MP many times, first with Maxine McKew and three times with her new MP John Alexander, expressing the passion in her electorate to end global poverty.

“It can get discouraging thinking that I’m just one person—what could I possibly do? But through something like Micah Challenge, you can see the difference so many people can make together.”

5. Safe maternity in Africa

Dr Andrew Browning – Surgeon Dr Andrew Browning is an Australian obstetrician and gynaecologist working in Ethiopia and Tanzania with women suffering obstetric fistulae, a childbearing injury affecting up to 3 million women. A fistula is like a hole in the bladder or rectum that causes a woman to leak urine constantly. In many parts of Africa, women with the condition are shunned by society and ostracised from their families.

Dr Browning first worked with Dr Catherine Hamlin in the Addis Ababa hospital and has since formed the Barbara May Foundation, working with his aunt, Valerie Browning AM, to establish a network of maternal health care services in the region.

“I’ve always thought I could be a Christian missionary doctor...I fell in love with the work, and really thought what a wonderful way to serve God.”

Wyn Finlayson

Mary Lou Carter

Sarita Hales

6. Hope in addiction

Bronwen Healy – Hope Foundation Queenslander Bronwen Healy was in rehab for heroin addiction and had pulled herself out of life in a brothel when she met Christ.

She now runs the Hope Foundation, a charity reaching out to women struggling with addiction or working in the sex industry, who are seeking life change: “We want them to know they are loved, valued and created with a purpose,” says Bronwen.

Hope Foundation has a drop in centre, and also offers practical assistance with legal matters, care packages, counselling and activities to help women get back on their feet. “It’s a ministry…it’s been a beautiful journey, watching these women choose life and choose God.”

Andrew Browning

Bronwen Healy

Christine Caine

7. Against trafficking

Christine Caine – The A21 Campaign Christine Caine is a founder of The A21 Campaign, an anti-human trafficking organisation aiming to abolish slavery in the 21st century.

She has worked to establish shelters and transition homes all over the world for those coming out of human trafficking, ensuring access to legal services to represent victims and prosecute their traffickers. The A21 Campaign has also conducted over 800 awareness events, educating vulnerable young people on how to avoid human trafficking.

Christine told Hillsong’s Colour Conference that the plight of those who have been trafficked “stirred her heart...I don’t know how we can be alive on the earth and allow human beings to be shipped around the earth and sold.”

Daniel Flynn – Thank You Water At 19, Daniel Flynn founded Thank You Water, a social enterprise selling sustainable products and committing the profits to changing lives in the developing world.

A bottle of Thank You Water provides one month of safe water to someone in need. In 2012, 3 million Thank You water bottles were sold. By August this year, 60,000 people had been granted access to safe water by partnering with World Vision, Red Cross and Oxfam.

They’ve now added food and hygiene products to their range. “...In my discovery of the world water crisis and through my faith, I was challenged to throw my ‘career plan’ away and pursue this dream...Now I wake up everyday and work on something that exists for others,” he told Eternity.

9. Heroes amongst villains

Don Owers & Andrew King – Anglican Ministers and whistleblowers Two of the bravest whistleblowers in the fight to expose child sexual abuse in the church have been Adelaide Anglican Ministers, Don Owers and Andrew King. After failing in a four-year-long attempt to get the church to admit the seriousness of sexual abuse cases in the Diocese, Owers and King went public, holding a press conference in defiance of their Archbishop, Ian George.

An independent inquiry set up in the wake of Owers and King’s press statement said of the Diocese: “Often, its first priority seemed to be one of protecting the church at all costs.”

The Archbishop resigned. Victims were compensated. King has now passed away, while Owers is Principal of Tabor College, Adelaide.

10. Real choices for women

Daniel Flynn

Don Owers

Helen Parker

Helen Parker – The Babes Project Helen’s Parker’s The Babes Project has helped over 100 women in crisis pregnancy since it opened in Croydon, Victoria in February 2012.

Statistics suggest that one in three women will have an abortion in their lifetime. After feeling well-supported in her own unplanned pregnancy experience, Helen recognised thousands of women don’t get the support they need.

“It’s time to actively promote parenting and adoption as positive alternatives to abortion. I wanted to do whatever it took to see that reflected in the choices made by women in our communities.”

Now Helen spends her days talking to women about their options for pregnancy, looking after their practical needs and giving them a safe place to talk.

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DECEMBER 2013

MERCY

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Healthy, wealthy, but wise?

Tim Costello

Bridie Walsh/World Vision

When Typhoon Haiyan hit the Philippines a month ago, it brought total and utter devastation. People lost everything, and now, after the event, health concerns are a major problem.

Many of us are familiar with the saying, “If I’ve still got my health, nothing else matters.” When we think about the most important things in our lives, our health tends to rank highest on the list.

In the past, we confused human development with just wealth. Now we use the Human Development Index, a more holistic measure that considers not only income but also health and literacy.

As far as economic indicators go, we all know that in Australia we are wealthy. In October, Credit Suisse ranked Australia number one in the world in terms of median, per capita wealth. We have an average per capita wealth of more than US$200,000. You might think, “Well, that’s not me!” but overall it is what Australians average.

And when it comes to the Human Development Index, Australia ranks number two in the world.

So what we know is that we are wealthy and we are healthy. The really big question I want to pose is, “Are we wise?” Wisdom, I think, comes from a deep sense of gratitude. It is having the perspective to be grateful to live in a wealthy country where the level of health and wellbeing is also high. That

God hasn’t given up lived out in love. It is this love which is on this what World Vision is about. When I was in the Philippines recently following the world... typhoon, it struck me that the distribu-

The provision of supplies to those in need is as close to the Gospel as you can get. gratitude and perspective enables us to look beyond our own needs and say, “how do I allow myself and this nation to really focus on being wise?”

At Christmas, we focus on Wisdom coming into the world as a vulnerable, poor baby. Jesus is the personification of all that is wise. Wisdom is ultimately

tion of clean water, medicines and food to people who had lost everything is as close to the Gospel as you can get. It was love in action (1 John 3:18).

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But it is not just people in the Philippines who are in desperate need. World Vision Australia works in more than 64 countries where access to clean water cannot be taken for granted.

In many of those countries, if you are sick and have a preventable disease, you can’t assume that you’ll get treatment.

Nor can parents assume that they can provide adequate nutritious food for their children. Imagine the sense of moral panic a parent might feel when they’re unable to protect their children from hunger or illness.

Paradoxically, as the developing world makes economic progress, we are seeing more people suffering from what are termed non-communicable diseases.

These are the health consequences that flow from changes in diet and lifestyle, those more familiar to us in the rich world, like diabetes, heart disease and cancer.

The good news is that we are also seeing great progress. In 1990, 12 million children died each year. Today, it is 6 million children.

In daily figures, that means 30,000 children were dying each day, and now, less than 19,000 children die. The reason is because we have focused on those basic issues of water, nutrition, and getting medicines to people who would otherwise die.

So I take great heart, and I hope you do too, in that extraordinary moral leap of saying the world can address the plight of those living in absolute poverty. God hasn’t given up on this world.

That is what we celebrate at Christmas.

Wisdom has come into the world to renew, restore and remake.

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DECEMBER 2013

MERCY

Has the Left Karl Fasse

Lay Htoo/World Vision

World Vision’s distribution of relief in the Philippines is an example of love in action.

In Australia, our health concerns are often more to do with mental health.

Loneliness and lack of relationship, the feeling that there is no one taking an interest in you, is a profound health challenge. But the Christmas message says that we are never alone: God is always with us. As St Paul says in Acts 17:27, God is not far from each one of us.

It is crucial for the wellbeing of all people that we understand that we are social and spiritual beings. We are people who need relationship. We need to know we matter. That knowledge nourishes, not just the human spirit, but the body as well.

Two thousand years ago, God looked

at this world and didn’t give up on it.

Jesus came preaching the good news that the kingdom of God is at hand. In him, renewal has come.

Because of Christmas, our lives have purpose, our aloneness is removed, and the vulnerable are offered the hope that things can and will be better—as we all work together, with God, to make his kingdom of love a reality.

Have a blessed Christmas.

Your continued prayers and support for the Typhoon Haiyan Appeal are still needed for the ongoing relief effort in the Philippines.

Visit https://emergencies.worldvision. com.au/index.html#/typhoon-haiyan

We need to know that we matter.

In 1974, a meeting of evangelical global leaders was held in Lausanne, Switzerland. It was convened by Dr Billy Graham in response to Church leaders who had been calling for a moratorium on mission. Dr Graham wanted to be sure that the global Church remained committed to Gospel ministry and called evangelical leaders across the world to this gathering. One of the outcomes of the gathering was the creation and signing of the Lausanne Covenant, written by a team led by the late John Stott. While I was much too young to be there, I have heard many times the story of key Christian leaders—some from Australia—challenging the original draft because it did not represent the whole Gospel. The statement did not reflect the Bible’s concern for the poor, marginalised and dispossessed.

In response to this criticism, it is my understanding that the first draft was changed to include these concerns.

The global evangelical Christian Church has come a long way since that meeting. While there were skirmishes during the 70s & 80s, by the 1990s it had become widely accepted that the Gospel and the prophetic word of the Church ought to reflect both word and deed. God’s concern is for the whole person—their eternal salvation, their present lives, their right to justice and freedom from oppression. The chal-

lenge of the Christian left to the Church was one that was rightly heard and heeded. It was a gift to the Church and one the Church desperately needed.

Now it’s time for the Christian left to consider the challenge of how they are prophetic to the present community.

Articles like Tim Costello’s (October 2013 edition of Eternity) rightly celebrate the continued prophetic call for justice, that this is a Biblical mandate for all Christians. As he states in the article, the prophetic call is possible from either a position of influence and power, or from the grassroots. Yet Costello’s article raises the issue of what it means to be prophetic. It seems in some circles, especially the Christian left, that we are called to be prophetic about justice and little else. We rightly speak up on issues of human rights yet remain mute in other areas. Where is the left-leaning Christian voice on issues of morality and Biblical ethics today? Why do they remain completely silent? How is it justifiable to use the Bible as a text to call for justice and yet fail to speak for what the Bible has to say about morality, the sanctity of life and the dignity of the individual? Where are the clear statements about issues such as abortion, euthanasia and same sex marriage? This is not a call for some kind of “Christian state” which forces the community to abide by a biblical framework for ethics and behaviour. But it’s a challenge to those from the Christian left, who seek to be prophets into our age, to say you can’t be prophetic on issues of justice and turn a blind eye to what the Bible has to say about other areas of life. This is just as narrow as the criticism of the

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Rembrandt (1606–1669): Belshazzar’s Feast

We rightly speak up Rembrandt’s painting depicts King Belshazzar from the book of Daniel, as he saw the prophetic word given by the Lord. on issues first draft of the Lausanne Covenant. a prominent member of the Christian question to ask. The response of this of human This position was clearly demonstratleft publically criticised Prater on social Christian leader suggested this was not ed by a social media interaction I had media for asking the question, sugan area we should speak up on, that rights yet with a leading member of the Christian gesting it was not something Jesus was we should refrain from the discussion left around Pastor Matt Prater’s quesconcerned about. Keep in mind that the and be silent. It’s a view that leaders are remain tion to Kevin Rudd on Q&A before question was asked in the context of an hurting the cause of the Gospel to have the last election. Prater asked the then election where Rudd was campaigning views on morality. This is a position that mute in Prime Minister why he was supporting on the issue. It was also asked of Rudd, must be challenged. same sex marriage and the re-definition who labels himself a Christian, and had Like many Christians, there have other of marriage, and many will remember only a couple of months before come been times I have cringed at the way the rude and aggressive way Rudd out about his change of position on the Christian leaders have spoken publically areas. dealt with the question. The next day, topic. This was therefore a reasonable about moral issues. They’ve been easy

targets for the media and the community to lampoon. The enthusiastic and prolific quoting of the Bible in public forums that suggests the whole community must change their moral framework to fit into a Christian worldview comes across as naïve and proscriptive.

Over the past few years Christian groups or individuals who have publicly spoken against the shift to legitimatising and legalising same sex marriage have come in for fierce criticism. And there have been moments where Christian leaders have made public statements that would at best be described as unhelpful. To suggest though that the Church and Christian leaders should refrain from public comment is to acquiesce to the view that says we have no place arguing a moral or ethical position in the public square.

Richard John Neuhaus wrote in 1984, in The Naked Public Square, that political debate without a Christian voice is not secular and free but naked, missing the key prophetic voice of the Christian or religious world view.

It’s time for Christian leaders on the left of the theological spectrum, who believe the Bible and seek to live by its teaching, to be challenged to be true to all of Jesus’ teaching—to be true to his teaching on justice, salvation and morality. Just as it was right for the left to challenge the Christian community in the 1970s to have a holistic view of the Gospel that included salvation, they now need to hear the challenge for them to have a holistic view of the Bible and speak up on issues of morality. To stay silent is to fail to be true to our prophetic calling.

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8

DECEMBER 2013

Xmas gift ideas: for the foodie Kara Martin reviews Eating Heaven: Spirituality at the Table by Simon Carey Holt.

I have seen Simon select ingredients from market stalls and homegrown herbs.

I have seen him prepare food with focus and joy. I have watched him set the table, lighting a candle representing the presence of God. I have held hands around the table to thank God for his provision. I have enjoyed wonderful combinations of scents and tastes, and thoughtful conversation.

I have seen him practising everything he writes about in Eating Heaven.

This book protests against “fast food, microwave ovens and fragmented schedules” and an empty dining room table. But the table beckons because “at its core, the table is about such fundamentally human things as intimacy and family, identity and communication, redemption and friendship, sustenance and celebration, beginnings and endings.” Is your mouth watering yet?

In this delightful book, Holt combines stories, research, biblical references and themed recipes. He deals with all the

... it might be the perfect Author and minister, Simon Carey Holt Christmas different “tables” in our lives, and points gift to get out what is extraordinary about the everyday activity of eating. people as In “The Kitchen Table”, Holt describes growing up with his family, and they plate the significance of meals as a place of formation. He talks about his own disup... cipline of eating as a family in spite of difficult work and social schedules, and

concludes with his mother’s chocolate pudding recipe. Then he moves to “The Backyard Table” where he suggests that the BBQ, or the more modern woodfire pizza oven, might be an antidote to an “ever more paranoid age of cultural suspicion and border protection”.

My favourite chapter is the next: “The Café Table”, since it is a table I frequent!

Holt says it beautifully: “the café is about more than flat whites ... Coffee is about relationship, connection, theatre and community.”

Just when you think Holt has got carried away with the wonder of food, he also challenges our cultural obsession in “The Five-star Table”: “The truth is, where we eat, what we eat, and with whom is an indication of our social standing and the ever-clearer divisions in our society.” He quotes J. Shannon Jung who recommends that we never lose sight of food whose source is God, and its purpose as sharing, given for relationship, and the table is “an expression of community”. Holt adds a desire for the table to be a place of justice and inclusion.

In “The Work Table”, Holt talks about cooking as vocation—he trained as a pastry chef—and this flows into the mood of “The Festive Table” where Holt shares moving stories of weddings and funerals: “... it is difficult to imagine any major or minor alliance, rite of passage or celebration, not marked by the sharing of food and drink.” For Holt,

such feasts are nothing less than “our communal defiance of death and our claiming of life”. And “The Multicultural Table” is a celebration of Australia as the world’s most cosmopolitan society where “food, identity and story” are intimately entwined.

The last table Holt invites us to is “The Communion Table” where he talks about the origin of the communion feast, and Jesus’ radical reinterpretation of the Passover meal. He quotes New Testament scholar Robert Karris’ claim: “Jesus got himself crucified by the way that he ate.” At a time when the table represented social order and religious purity, Jesus broke every rule in society and culture, claiming that God’s table is open to all. In a memorable phrase, Holt describes the table of Jesus as “one that compels, obligates and sends”.

In concluding, Holt skilfully weaves together the lessons learnt at these tables, and concludes that given a choice we would not choose to live without the table: “For life without the table is no life at all”.

This is a beautiful book, one to be savoured and shared. In our foodobsessed culture it might be the perfect Christmas gift to get people to pause as they plate up, and consider how life at the table could move beyond food to relationships, and beyond exclusion to grace.

Kara Martin is Associate Dean of the Marketplace Institute at Ridley.

9

DECEMBER 2013

BOOKS For the politicallyminded

For those thinking about life direction

In God They Trust?

- The religious Beliefs of Australia’s Prime Ministers 19012013

The Thing is

by Tony Payne Matthias Media $14.95

by Roy Williams Bible Society $19.95 For a politically minded stocking-stuffer that points to God, it’s worth picking up In God They Trust? Published by the Bible Society earlier this year, In God They Trust? is written by Roy Williams, best-selling author of God, Actually, and has earned glowing reviews from a wide spectrum of readers, including Kim Beazley, former Opposition leader, and ABC’s Annabel Crabb.

In God They Trust? details the religious beliefs of each Australian Prime Minister, and digs deep into their religion or agnosticism to examine how their beliefs affected their actions, thoughts and political leadership.

The book is thoroughly researched, going beyond the usual stereotypes of religion to examine historical sources, and, when it comes to the living politicians, even includes two extensive interviews with former PMs, John Howard and Kevin Rudd.

Williams has a fluid prose that is a pleasure to read, and as you might expect from an ex-barrister, in the moments he mounts a case, he does so with conviction and with his evidence well at hand.

It would be a good book for starting conversations about God this Christmas, or simply delving into the religious hearts that have guided this country.

Flip open the cover of The Thing Is and the inside front cover poses a question: “What is the purpose of your life?”

It’s a bold question and one that author Tony Payne answers in this short, fast-moving book about the key questions of life: who God is, who you are, and what to do with your life.

Within The Thing Is, he cuts to the heart of what the Bible says on these topics. He writes on the shape of the Christian life, including where people often go wrong: “Many people today, including some Christians, think this is what Christianity really is—the conviction that God exists for our sake, to bless us, to save us, to make our lives better, and to help us reach our potential.”

Instead, he winsomely argues that the centre of the Christian life is Jesus. As such, God’s purpose for our lives doesn’t compete with our own agenda. Instead: “God’s agenda completely rewrites and replaces ours.” His focus on the Christian life not as individualistic, but as flowing outwards to love others, is also thought-provoking.

Perfect for people going through midor quarter-life crises, or anyone else wondering what difference it makes to be a Christian, readers will be jolted towards thinking about the big questions.

For the Murder mystery reader

For the married, or soon-to-be married

C.S. Lewis and the Body in the Basement

The Best Sex for Life

by Dr Patricia Weerakoon Growing Faith $ 24.95

by Kel Richards Strand $14.95

Kel Richards is probably known to you as an experienced journalist, radio broadcaster and author of bestsellers including The Aussie Bible. Now he can add murder mystery author to his impressive resume.

C.S. Lewis and the Body in the Basement is not a book about C.S. Lewis, so much as it stars the great apologist as an amateur detective, presented with a mysterious murder.

The fictional frame is strengthened by impressive research, and a detailed story that brings us back into Lewis’ England with all its trappings. And the ‘impossible’ murder with all its twists and turns is as compelling as any other in the genre.

However, what marks this out is that Richards cleverly weaves throughout the story an apologetic conversation between Lewis and the narrator, Tom Morris, with Lewis giving a compelling argument for the Christian worldview.

It needs a deft touch to work, and Richards pulls it off, never leaving you too long in that argument before bringing you back to the main plot. The voice of Lewis is convincing as well, echoing the written materials where he has argued for Christendom.

A wonderful present to leave under the tree for the murder mystery fan.

Eternity’s Christmas gift ideas To buy these books and view many more bestselling Christian books and Bibles, visit our online store at shop. biblesociety.org. au or call 1300 139 179.

All purchases help fund the ongoing mission work of Bible Society Australia.

Admittedly, a book titled The Best Sex for Life is probably not a hard sell.

Written by Dr Patricia Weerakoon, a Christian who is one of Australia’s leading sexologists, this book is the culmination of her considerable experience as a sex therapist, speaker, and writer.

Throughout, she gives frank, real advice about the reality of sex, and that to understand sex we must first understand God’s plan for sex, and his creation of us as sexual beings.

She comes back to Scripture’s reminder that the basis of sex is not self, but as an expression of love.

However, this is not merely theoretical, as she discusses with clarity the physical aspects of sex for both male and female.

Her experience shines throughout the book, as she writes of the sexual life cycle of every married couple, from the nervous expectation of the honeymoon period, through to the natural distractions of middle-age, right through to a frank and real discussion that nobody talks about: sex for the 60+.

The appendices here are particularly helpful including “Advice to a porn user”, and a discussion guide for couples to discover how to have better sex.

If you want to have the best sex in all stages of your life, then buy this book.

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10

DECEMBER 2013

BOOKS

How generations have been robbed of the Bible John Sandeman interviews Bible Society CEO, Greg Clarke, about his book The Great Bible Swindle.

JS: Okay, you got me. What is the Bible swindle?

GC: People have been duped into thinking that you can be properly educated without a thorough knowledge of the central text of our culture. In places, it has been a deliberate ‘sidelining’ of the so-called imperialist white man’s book; in other places, it has just drifted out Did you know Nick Cave, Metallica,and Lady Gaga have all referred to the Bible in their lyrics? of view. It’s a swindle because people are being deprived of something very precious. they know the Bible but won’t admit need to know the characters and stories, Who are you writing this book for? they don’t, as well as for those who or you’re not going to enjoy your TV, I started writing it for my classmates, think they don’t need to know the Bible novels and rock songs as you should. years ago when I was a uni student. at all. This last group is still usually a bit There’s rock music that references the Studying literature and philosophy, curious about it, nevertheless.

Bible?

I realised I had a massive head start So what does Uncle Fred need to know All over the place, yes. It always because I knew the Bible. I wanted about the Bible? surprises me that people don’t often to convince them that, whatever your Well, my big point is that they need get that so many of the U2 lyrics they religious views, the Bible was essential to know that it is not just a book, but are singing are quotes from the Bible. to grasping our history, literature, art, a library of books. God’s library, if you Also Nick Cave, Metallica, Lady Gaga music, architecture, language—pretty like. The Bible is an anthology of writhere and there. The Bible’s everywhere. much every element of Western life. But ings which hold together. And they And not just rock. In the book, I sweep not just Western life, either. are different kinds of writing: poetry, across country and western, choral After a while, I realised I was writhistory, wise sayings, biography. The music, gospel (of course, although many ing for the kind of person who, by our Bible is a remarkably diverse collection people still don’t get that!). I’m not laid-back Aussie approach to things, of literature. I try to cover some fairly trying to sound smug, I just think it’s a has been tricked into thinking that they simple but essential pointers about the sign of how entrenched the swindle is already know the Bible when they really Bible: for example, it has two ‘halves’ that people don’t even know that ‘gosdon’t. I start the book with a simple that connect together, the Old and pel’ music is connected to the Gospels, quiz on Bible knowledge. If Uncle Fred, New Testaments. I also make the claim the stories of salvation through Jesus or the smug guy at the desk next to you that the Bible has a centrepiece—Jesus Christ, which we find in the Bible. at work, can’t get 100 per cent on that Christ. When you start to get a grip on You’ve provided a question for uni test, they are victims of the great Bible the claims the Bible makes about Jesus, students to test their lecturers? swindle. Even if he tells you that “he the rest of it starts to come together I say (just being cheeky) that students read it years ago”. around that. should ask their lecturers “What parts Proof_Press_Ad_V2.pdf 1 12/11/13 Apart 10:12 PM So I’m writing for those who think from that, I suggest that you of the Bible are relevant to studying this

...to be a genuinely educated Australian, you need to know quite a bit about the book that shaped us...

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subject?” and see if they can answer. If you are doing film studies on the Coen brothers, you’ll need to know your Old Testament prophets. Or if you are studying law, you’ll need Exodus, Leviticus and the Sermon on the Mount. But it will be rare to find a teacher who realises that, because the swindle has been underway for a few generations. Don’t be too hard on the teachers, though.

They are probably innocent victims of a bad education, just like you!

What should we do about the great Bible swindle?

Obviously, I think the Bible needs to be restored to a significant place in (especially) senior high school education.

I think there should be Bible literacy courses available, probably around Years 9-12.

I’m not talking about Religious Studies; I’m talking about a course that gives you the background for your other subjects. There’s a move for this in the US and the UK, and we need to catch up. It shouldn’t be politicised; both sides of Australian politics have acknowledged in recent times the need for Bible knowledge. I’d like to see the Bible included appropriately in the new History and English national curricula.

It actually isn’t that hard, from an educational standpoint. It just needs to be de-sensationalised.

As a Christian, my beliefs are on my sleeve about the spiritual value of the Bible. But this isn’t primarily about that. It’s just making the claim that to be a genuinely educated Australian, you need to know quite a bit about the book that shaped us more than any other, and it’s a scandal that generations of students have now been denied that knowledge.

11

DECEMBER 2013

GrEAt PrizES to BE WoN! Bible bafflers to bust (or blow) your brain!

1 iPad mini ANd 2 iPod nanos

unt Make it Co in the CEV)

Complete the puzzles and send them in to us (see below for details).

(answers found

How many times... w 1: 1-16? ____ 1: ...are women are referred to in Matthe e 1:5-25? ____ 2: ...does the word ‘angel’ appear in Luk in Luke 2:8-20? ____ 3: ...does the word ‘shepherd’’ appear Nativity account?

4: ...is ‘Gabriel’ mentioned by name in the

(Luke 1:5-38) ____ e in the Nativity account?

5: ...is ‘King David’ mentioned by nam 2:12) ____ (Matthew 1:17-19, Luke 1:26 -

Advent Calendar Bible Quiz

1. What does the word Immanuel mean?

Looking for Bible-based, relevant, engaging lessons for kids aged 4-12 years.

(Matthew 1:23)

Our Apologies, in the September issue. It should read 'When David became King he built his capital city. Then his son Solomon built the magnificent temple.

r!

GodSpace is the answe au rg. e.o pac www.gods

(Micah 5:2)

Answers found in the CEV.

3. What is the name of the angel who visited Mary? (Luke 1:26-27)

4. What will Mary's son be named? (Luke 1:30-31) 5. What did the angel tell Joseph to do?

(Matthew 1:20)

6. What were the shepherds doing out in the fields? (Luke 2:8-9)

the __ __ __ __ is faithful and __ __ __ __ keep __ __ __ of his

7. What king came from the same place Jesus was born in? (Luke 2:11)

__ __ __ __ __ __ __ __. he is __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __

8. What direction did the wise men come from to find the king of the Jews?

__ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ he has __ __ __ __.

(Matthew 2:1-2)

Psalm 145:13 (NIRV)

9. What were the gifts given to Jesus?

(Matthew 2:11)

If I were A

vIsItor...

Imagin e tha travel t you got to ba and vi ck in time sit Jes u a baby . Wha s as t w you br ing to ould h this ki onour ng?

sus. take Je ld u o you w e what it r w d n Draw a

using the first letter of the word promise create an acrostic to tell parts of the Christmas story.

P R O M I S E

2. What town will the new ruler come from?

find-a-word

TRAVELLED MARY JOSEPH FAITH STAR E SAV G KIN GIFTS SHIPPED WOR IOUR SAV LIFE IMMANUEL RDS SHEPHE MANGER INN in a different colour.) them Circle find? you can s (What other word

ANGEL BETHLEHEM BIRTH

Please visit

www.christmasstory.org.au for more competitions and activities.

For your chance to win one of our great prizes, please complete the following information: FirSt NAME: ____________________________________ AGE: _______ (0 - 16 years) PoStCodE: ________ PArENt / GuArdiAN / tEAChEr Ph No. ________________ PArENt/ GuArdiAN / tEAChEr EMAil: ______________________________________________

E L P E A C B E L L R E M M S U W U A R Y E D T L R M M U R A O E S A V I K R S T D G K J L R V T H H O D E B I R T J R B O A I T H S U M E I P O G V F S O T I E H I A R N N B A O P M T R S J I J S Q F N H A K A B M D S E P H E R E A L I E M S H A I K P Q P L U R S Y Y K F W Q N E Y G H D I E E F F H E E G U T L E V A R W N D E L G E E R E G N A T L E I N N L M G I F T S K E F I L P E W N G S I N G I S R I C H O

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Personal details are for notifying winners only.

Post or email this completed page back

by Friday 14th February to: By mail: Bible Society Australia GPO Box 9874 Sydney NSW 2001 By email: bibles@biblesociety.org.au

10. What will people who have faith in God have?(John 3:16)

Bible Society Australia GPO Box 9874 Sydney NSW 2001

Colour the red circles to find out!

Bible Society Australia and GodSpace working together. Next Wild Bible issue March 2014.

12

DECEMBER 2013

Learning more than ABC Suzanne Schokman In rural China, an elderly lady learns to differentiate between the words Male and Female on public toilet doors.

As she learns more about the Bible in a Scripture-based literacy programme, she picks up new coping skills.

The local Chinese government is supportive of these classes which use the Bible as a key text, and which are held in churches. In place of the usual “The cat sat on the mat”, students start the first lesson with the likes of “God loves me-God loves you-God loves him”.

Bible Society Australia and several other sister Bible Societies support the rural literacy programme in four provinces. Those interested in signing up are never too old or too undeserving of a chance to improve their lot in life.

That’s why seventy-year-old Feng Lian enrolled in a class. As she etched out her first written words, her hand trembled. With the stroke of a pen she overcame a lifetime of illiteracy.

Seventy per cent of China’s Christians live in rural areas. Like Feng Lian, there are many who have never had the chance to read the Bible for themselves.

Yu Lan, who has been a Christian for almost two decades says, “Since I couldn’t read the Bible, the only way to grow my faith was through prayer.

I mostly prayed for peace for my family members, especially the children. I wanted to learn to read so that God’s

“We are getting to know our Bible very well Literacy classes helped De Xie read the Bible after being a Christian for 17 years. while word could bless our family and make it class. “I could only read one or two learning more peaceful, and so that I could love words. I’d never been able to read much to read!” my brothers and my friends more.” of my Bible, but now I’m learning a lot.

De Xie, 74, had been a Christian for 17 years when he started attending the

The teacher leads us in reading a chapter of the Bible out loud together, and

then she explains the meaning of each verse and each character.

We’re getting to know our Bible very well, while learning to read!”

“For many of the elderly, learning to read is like a dream come true,” says literacy teacher Guo Yan. “They say, ‘It’s unbelievable we’re learning new things at our age!’ It takes a year for them to read and write at a basic level.”

Another literacy teacher, Liang Dong, 29, says, “Not being able to read affects people’s faith. They completely rely on what the preacher preaches, and aren’t able to read for themselves.

And they view themselves as outsiders.

Being able to read and write changes them ... they used to sit at the back of the church, but now they feel more confident. They sit at the front and participate more, and ask more questions. It also gives them more confidence in their day-to-day lives.”

Liang Dong says that even those who used to be coarse in their language are changing. Such change in the way the students act and interact is not uncommon, according to those conducting the literacy classes. As people learn to read and write, they also grow in their faith and their way of thinking, and this spills over into other areas of their life.

If you’d like to help Christians in rural China learn and grow, call 1300 BIBLES (1300 242 537) or visit biblesociety.org.au/eternityappeal.

Donations to literacy are tax-deductible.

MANY HANDS MAKE LIGHT WORK Open your hearts and hands to support the Scripture literacy programme as eager participants learn to read and understand the Word of God.

LEND A HAND, DONATE NOW! Donate online: biblesociety.org.au/eternityappeal or phone: 1300 BIBLES (1300 242 537)

13

DECEMBER 2013

When thinking systems fail Michael Jensen

But the gospel So what’s the solution? For some of Jesus postmoderns, it was to abandon all systematising and instead to adopt a grab is not bag approach to thought. Systems are to be treated with suspicion. What matters an ism, to postmoderns is whether ideas work rather than whether they are connected because with some nebulous idea like ‘reality’.

However, postmodernism is an ism it does all of its own, with its own claims about reality and its own ‘system’. It can’t not claim pretend otherwise, unless postmoderns to give simply walk around telling jokes all the time (which some of them did in the the 90s when this was fashionable).

So, simple scepticism to isms and the answers systems of thought they represent won’t do. In fact, it denies the very great value to all of isms.

Isms act like camera lenses: they questions. focus on things about the world that we

Communist iconography showing Lenin, Engels, and Marx. proven to be false prophets.

Marxists gave up politics and took up literary criticism instead.

What came next was a suspicion of all isms, which in turn became an ism of its own: postmodernism.

The movement we call postmodernism was a reaction to isms. Like Marxism, it had a valuable insight: that when we build up impressive intellectual structures that look like they have the answers to everything, we become blind to their weaknesses.

An ‘ism’—what we might call an ‘intellectual system’—can be extremely sophisticated on its own terms and have an impressive coherence. Initiates to the system can find it compelling and fascinating, and they soon describe the world they see in terms of the language and terminology of the system.

But the complexity of the system can be misleading for a couple of reasons.

The first is that the really difficult questions for the system as a whole can be avoided, because its premises are frequently assumed owing to the dazzling display of the edifice built upon them.

The second is that the system generates its own list of prioritised questions, but these questions may or may not be of any significance to the world outside the system. And the prioritised list of questions may mean that some really important questions are not heard, or completely misunderstood.

This is what happened to Marxism in the form of Communism, by and large.

Where Communism has survived, it has only done so by being modified.

would otherwise miss. But they also ask us to commit ourselves to claims about the world and to live accordingly. They ask us to be passionate. And in doing so, they bring out some of the best things about human beings.

If total immersion in a system and total scepticism aren’t acceptable, then how can we approach them?

I think we need to treat them not as systems but as traditions of thought.

Let me explain why I think this, and what I mean, because I have a theological reason for thinking it.

Firstly, because I believe in the God who is being, and who knows all things perfectly because he plans and directs all things, I do believe there is a ‘system’.

Everything in the universe is deeply

peterspiro

What are we to do with ‘isms’?

They are everywhere: communism, liberalism, fascism, materialism, hedonism, Calvinism, Arminianism, Thomism. They sometimes grip us, but they also repel us. Some of us think of them as the problem, others as the solution.

Any kid that grew up in the 60s, 70s and 80s knew one thing: that the world was half-dominated by a dark force called Communism. The Olympics included controversy with communist countries, and we stood in awe of their square-shouldered, hirsute female athletes. We gasped as they paraded their weaponry in Red Square.

Communism was the child of the ideology called Marxism, which we dismissed as idiotic at best and evil at worst. But it wasn’t until you got to university that you met people who were actual Marxists. Many of them held professorial chairs.

And then you got to see what Marxism actually was. It was a powerful, all-encompassing intellectual system which generated an answer to any question you threw at it. If you wanted to have a conversation with a Marxist, you were forced to speak on their terms.

You had to understand alienation of labour, proletariat, means of production and historical materialism. Marxists were telling a powerfully coherent and sophisticated story about the world: a story that encompassed everything including social conditions, economic evils, and political theories.

And they tended to be completely immersed in their system. You couldn’t be a part-time Marxist. The system acted like the operating system on a computer: it mapped the connections between different thoughts, and formed new ones.

But, as history surged forward, Communism collapsed as a political system almost everywhere (China being the exception). Any map of the world published prior to 1989 became irrelevant.

With the collapse of Communism, Marxism became discredited as a system of thought. It had missed some obvious things about human nature, such as the tenacity of religious belief and the fact that people quite like being greedy.

Marx and his disciples had prophesied about the progress of history, and were

connected. There is an extraordinary coherence to the world­­­—to physical matter, to history, to the concepts that underpin everything.

Second, because I hold that human beings are made in the image of God and commissioned by him to order and rule the earth, I recognise that we are excellent at seeing patterns in the things of the world. We are good at finding meaning in things, because a) they are meaningful and b) we are equipped to see meaning.

But third, as a theologian I am forced to testify to the human tendency to want to be God. The tower of Babel is an emblem of the human aspiration to arise to the heavens unassisted, and to speak to the true God eyeball to eyeball.

Our making of isms and systems is fraught with this lack of humility. And we see the devastating results dripping in blood across the pages of history.

It is not that the building of intellectual towers is wrong. But it is when we think that by means of these ziggurats of thought that we have attained a God’s-eye view of things that we are prone to cause widespread damage.

This is where the idea of traditions of thought comes in. That is, by using ‘tradition’, I am pointing to the way that systems of thought actually emerge from real people in real places in real history, and are then taken forward.

They are handed on, adopted and adapted. They grow or decline. They cross-pollinate with other isms. They provide a place for us to stand as we try to make sense of the world around us. It is an appropriately human way to think about what we know.

When we see these great systems as traditions of thought we can stand in them and benefit from them while also recognising their limitations.

But is Christianity an ‘ism’?

I knew you’d ask that. I’d say that various sub-species of Christianity are isms, for sure. But the gospel of Jesus is not an ism, because it does not claim to give the answers to all questions. In fact, it reminds us of the tentative nature of all human knowledge. What it gives us is not all knowledge, but the revelation of the one in whom all knowledge resides.

This is crucially different. What we have is not a system, but a person. Our attention is not drawn to Christianity as an ism—although it does generate extraordinary, deeply connected thoughts about the world—but to the one person in whom and for whom and through whom are all things.

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14

DECEMBER 2013

The Big Picture Review by Mark Hadley Ender’s Game is a brilliant science fiction movie about a boy called up to serve in Battle School as humanity teeters on the edge of interstellar war.

It’s superbly acted and supported by benchmark special effects—but if that’s all audiences get from this film then they’ll have missed out on at least one valuable life lesson: You can oppose an enemy with every fibre of your being, but that doesn’t mean you have to hate them.

Ender’s Game is based on the 1985 Nebula and Hugo Award winning novel

by Orson Scott Card, and given the author has occupied the executive producer’s chair, it’s not surprising it has made a successful transition to the big screen. Asa Butterfield (Hugo, The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas) stars as Andrew ‘Ender’ Wiggin, a quietly brilliant third child from a family of prodigies.

He grows up in a world shaped by humanity’s hair’s breadth victory over an invading alien race and the fear that the insectoid ‘Buggers’ will one day return.

Every resource is now bent towards preparing for that eventuality, includ-

ing the world’s children. Harrison Ford and Viola Davis star as officers from the International Fleet searching for a much needed military messiah. They send Ender to an orbital strategy school where he must battle his fellow students to prove he has the leadership qualities they’re looking for. But what Colonel Graff and Major Anderson keep secret is that not all the games Ender plays are as innocent as they seem.

Ender’s Game is a film that has courted controversy on a number of fronts. Orson Scott Card gave his story unintentional notoriety because of his public, Bible-based opposition to same-sex marriage. In the United States gay and lesbian groups have organized cinema boycotts even though the topic has no presence in the film. But other reviewers have criticised Ender’s Game for its seeming justification of violence.

Certainly Ford’s Colonel Graff is determined to do whatever it takes to shape Ender into a heartless weapon: Ender: Sir, you made them hate me.

Graff: We need a Julius Caesar, a Napoleon. We hope that’s you.

Ender: But Napoleon lost.

Graff: Not before he conquered the

known world.

Ender’s Game touches on the immorality of creating child soldiers but Graff maintains that no cost is too great when humanity faces its ultimate extinction. Ender obediently devotes himself to overcoming every opponent, but he never embraces violence the way the film’s critics suggest. Rather, Ender realises that understanding brings compassion: “In the moment when I truly understand my enemy, understand him well enough to defeat him, then in that very moment I also love him.”

Ender extends this love even to the Buggers who are apparently poised to destroy earth. He will do all he can to defeat them, but his understanding of their motivations won’t allow him to demonise them. What the film actually presents is a warrior who reflects the character of Christ.

Why is it that Jesus asks us to “love our enemies and pray for those who persecute you”? Isn’t it because that sort of love flows from our understanding that their selfish, even vindictive motives are the same ones we once held?

Christians are confronted by two parallel temptations every time we come

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into spiritual conflict. On the one hand, pride and self-righteousness can lead us to reject our opponent out of hand, happily abandoning them to the judgement to come.

On the other, we can feel so uncomfortable with conflict that our compassion overwhelms our conviction and we settle for peace at any price. Satan is happy with either approach, but Jesus requires us to walk the middle line with Ender. It is Jesus’ heart that bluntly condemned empty religion and immorality all the way to the cross and yet still prayed, “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

The Christian must stand against a sinful world’s advances with every breath God puts at their disposal—like Card stands against same-sex marriage—but without losing sight of the fact that these are the very people Jesus came to save.

And it is that enduring love that has defeated even the most ardent opponent. By the climax of the film, Ender has become every bit the warrior Graff hoped he would be, but he has added one weapon the Colonel never expected: compassion, even for his enemy.

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15

Hail local heroes Letters

Purity, porn and injustice

Struggle to be pure Thank you for printing Brad Emery’s moving statement “My Struggle for Sexual Purity” in the November edition of Eternity. Brad’s honesty and courage in sharing this was inspiring. I recognised a lot of my own experience in his.

I suspect that it is also the experience of many other Christian men who are sensitive to the power of their own sexuality.

Perhaps it is my advancing age but I have to challenge one of the core ideas that Brad presents that “almost every book in the Bible warns of the danger of allowing sexual sin to take hold.” That’s not the way I read it at all. In fact, I have come to believe that sexual sin is considerably overrated in our imaginations.

Of course all sin separates us from God and from our better selves but many scholars have pointed out that there are many more warnings against the abuse of money and material possessions in Scripture than there are warning against sexual sin. Nor does sexual sin have the power that Pride has, of setting us completely against God. If anything has hard wired our spirits to perversity it is the arrogance of Pride.

I don’t think it helps young people, either, to lump all kinds of sexual sin [as Brad does] together as being equally reprehensible and destructive. Promiscuity is not the same as ogling female workmates and the temptation to do either of these things is not the same as acting on impulse, pressing ahead and abusing another person for one’s own

selfish gratification. To pretend that it is condemns young people who are trying to make sense of their sexuality to a lifetime of guilt and shame. As I understand it, Jesus steps in wherever he can to take away the shame and guilt that has been used to alienate and marginalise people. The woman at the well and the woman who touches the hem of Jesus’ cloak are two such people freed from the corrosive power of shame.

Thank you, Brad, for raising such important ideas in Eternity.

Paul Bland, Annerley, QLD

Porn, law and grace Can I just say that pages 10 (“Grace and the Ten Commandments”) and 11 (“My struggle for sexual purity”) of your November issue were amazing.

As a Seventh-day Adventist minister, I felt that Michael Jensen’s treatment of the balance between law and grace was highly laudable. As an ex-pornography addict, Brad Emery’s column spoke to me. For me, my battle against porn illustrates the relationship between law and grace. The commandment convicted me of adultery. Through the cross, God forgave me. By his indwelling Spirit he gave me power to overcome my sin. The freedom Christ purchased for me because of his great love eventually brought my life more into harmony with his ten commandments than it was before. I praise God He can give us the power to live by His perfect law of freedom.

Pastor Daniel Matteo, Cairns, QLD.

Why endorse Billy?

In the November issue, Kara Martin reviewed Billy Graham’s book, The Reason for My Hope. She says the book finishes with Graham’s own source of hope: “I will hear him call my name ... because ... Jesus has heard my confession of sin ... and he reached down and saved me.” Roger Olsen, on page 30 of his book, Arminian Theology, says that “semi-Pelagianism is the default theology of most American evangelical Christians. This is revealed in the popularity of cliches such as ‘If you’ll take one step toward God, he’ll come the rest of the way toward you.’”

If a theologian like Roger Olsen appears to be describing Billy Graham’s “hope” as based on an heretical understanding of the gospel, why is the Bible Society endorsing Dr Graham’s book by reviewing it? If it’s because Dr Graham is so famous that he can’t be wrong, then it is sobering to read in Christianity Today in 2010 the assessment that the reason that so many American’s are turning their backs on their Christian faith is because they have not been exposed to an authentic gospel in the first place.

Vaughan Brown, North Epping, NSW

Incoming I commend you for including the article

by Greg Lake on the injustices of detention centres. I hope you can stand up to the ensuing flak.

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“ If your gift is ... to encourage, then give encouragement” Romans 12: 6 and 8.

If this newspaper has a Romans 12 gift “according to the grace given to us”, then encouragement is the gift I hope you receive from Eternity.

This month, our cover story features Christians changing the world. Some of them are reasonably well-known but we have avoided the most famous of all and tried to include some who most readers will not have heard of. It is likely that they too are exercising a gift from the list in Romans 12: “if your gift is ... to show mercy then do it cheerfully”. We are convinced that our world-changers are doing their work cheerfully.

I hope that our readers are encouraged by their stories. But as we continue to hold up a mirror so that Australian Christians can see what each of us is doing, some are sure to ask “what about changes that last for eternity?”

After all, the biggest change of all is when someone turns from the world to Christ. That’s why we have so many testimonies in this paper.

So I think a cover story on “people changers” is also a really good idea. To help us, please tell Eternity about walk-up evangelists in your part of the country.

Meanwhile, I think the “worldchangers” should encourage us.

Works of mercy, after all, are God’s work. Among other merits, they commend the gospel and prepare the ears of many to hear the word.

John Sandeman

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16

DECEMBER 2013

Hark away this Christmas, but think about what you are singing Greg Clarke notes as each verse proceeds. It uses poetic devices such as repetition to great effect (“Born to raise the sons of earth!

Born to give us second birth!”). But the real power is in the cosmic hope that the lyrics offer.

We are used to hearing about the ‘newborn King’ at Christmas. The story of Jesus’ birth is less well-known now than ever before, but many people still recognise that the wise men came to worship Jesus as if he were a King.

It’s a potent idea: that a ruler will be provided for the nation. We still love it when a royal pregnancy is announced (yes, even Republicans will admit to a tear in the eye). The Christmas carol offers us this same pleasure, but increases the stakes: the newborn King here has arrived directly from heaven.

‘Hark! the Herald Angels Sing’ casts a vision of connection between heaven and earth, elevating us, as we sit on our picnic rugs in shorts and thongs, to consider that life may be grander, more

wonderful, and more spiritual than we first thought.1 By the time we have reached the dramatic, triumphant conclusion of the fifth verse, we have covered some magnificent territory: • we have sung about the hope for “peace on earth and mercy mild, God and sinner reconciled”, a vision of harmony not just on earth but also between the earth dwellers and their Creator; • we have sung the astonishing words, “Veiled in flesh the Godhead see; hail the incarnate Deity”. This is the unique claim of Christianity, that Jesus embodies the Divine; in Jesus, we see God; • we have sung the wonderful image ‘risen with healing in his wings’. This is a quote from Malachi 4:2, and it captures the idea of Jesus’ resurrection (an Easter idea, really). Just the thought of Jesus as a glorious bird, whose wings shadow you with healing and hope, sends shivers down my back.

All of this is the grand meaning that is attached by believers to the birth of Jesus in the little town of Bethlehem back in the first century. It’s what makes Christmas carols special.

The Bible, whatever form it comes in—sung in Christmas carols, read aloud in church, listened to on a smart

coloroftime

Many people can’t wait for Christmas to come because they get to sing Christmas carols. It’s their favourite form of public singing. Why? Apart from the familiar tunes, it is because the sentiments of the carols make life seem meaningful. They draw people together around themes such as peace on earth, joy in the world, and celebration. But is this just the crowd-effect in action?

Perhaps, like singing choruses at the rugby, the power of the carols simply derives from mass singing. After all, we know that when you get people together in a room, and let them open up their lungs, before long they have their arms around each other, beaming faces and commitments of undying devotion. The crowd effect is very powerful.

But I think there’s more going on.

Rugby songs don’t always bring about happy, healthy crowd behavior. I’m yet to see a brawl break out at a carol service! It’s not only the power of public singing, but also the nature of the lyrics, that make Christmas carols so popular and such a force for good. And those words are often drawn from the Bible.

My favourite carol, and I know I’m not alone here, is ‘Hark! the Herald Angels Sing’. It swells wonderfully, demanding the singer to reach higher

phone, even read as a book—has great power to move us. We just need to stop and realise what we are singing.

This month’s column is drawn from Greg’s new book, The Great Bible Swindle, available from bookstores and www.biblesociety.org.au.

1 With heartfelt apologies to any northern hemisphere readers!

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