inContext Magazine - Fall 2012 by Andy Bannister

inCONTEXT The Canadian Apologetics Magazine | Fall 2012

MORE thanWORDSrequired A tellin g Psal m anUNSPEAKABLEreview

Isn’t it Arrogant of God to Demand our Worship?

NARCISSISM

27 3 PLACES

QUESTIONS

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rzim.ca

inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

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inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

EVANGELISM SPIRITUAL DISCIPLINES TRAINING APOLOGETICS

THE RZIM TEAM IN CANADA

DR. ANDY BANNISTER

CANADIAN DIRECTOR / LEAD APOLOGIST

andy.bannister@rzim.ca

NATHAN BETTS APOLOGIST

RZIM Canada exists to reach people for Christ through showing the credibility and beauty of the Gospel. We therefore seek to address the heartfelt concerns and intellectual objections to Christianity from both seekers and skeptics alike, so that people can have an unobstructed view of Christ.

nathan.betts@rzim.ca

RICK MANAFO

PROGRAM DIRECTOR / APOLOGIST

rick.manafo@rzim.ca

DONNA ISENOR OFFICE MANAGER

donna.isenor@rzim.ca

BRITTANY LAWRENCE

OPERATIONS AND EXECUTIVE ASSISTANT

brittany.lawrence@rzim.ca

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From university open forums to TV and radio debates, from seminars to conferences to church events, through speaking, writing, print and online, the RZIM Canada team works across the country (and further afield) to help the thinker believe and the believer think. Why not consider inviting RZIM Canada to partner with you in helping you reach your community or train and equip your group to articulate the Good News of Christ with clarity, conviction and compassion in a world of competing ideas? We’d love to discuss ways we could serve you — drop us an email at info@rzim.ca or call the office on 416-385-9199.

a word from Andy

ne of the questions I sometimes struggle with is the “what do you do?” question. It pops up often. My job involves a lot of travel and frequently, in conversation with the stranger next to me on a plane, the question soon arises: “So, what do you do?” Over the years I’ve experimented with different answers. “I’m a Christian evangelist.” You can see the look of terror cross the eyes of your fellow passenger. “I’m an Apologist.” “An Apolo-what-ist?” “I’m a speaker and writer.” A little voice in my head shouts “coward!” I’m now experimenting with the reply, “I answer questions for a living.” That can often intrigue people enough to enquire further and the conversation develops more naturally. That there are actually answers to the deep questions of life or to the skeptical challenges thrown at the Christian faith often surprises people. We live in a culture in which “faith” and “reason” are seen as opposites and many of our fellow Canadians think that faith is what you rely on if you don’t have evidence. Yet “faith” is not the opposite of “reason”. Irrationality is the opposite of reason. You can be an irrational believer. You can also be an irrational atheist. But most Christians have been thoughtful believers and have always tried to give reasons why they believe what they believe—as scripture commands (1 Peter 3:15).

inviting your friend to meet for coffee to discuss what they made of what they read. If you’d like extra copies of the magazine, just let us know. If you’d like to go further with some of the ideas in the magazine, you’ll also find details within about Engaging Culture, our regular half-day seminars—ideal if you’re near Toronto. Or if you live further afield, talk to us about how we can partner with you in your area. Want to go deeper still? Check out the Canadian RZIM summer school, launching in 2013 in partnership with McMaster Divinity College. As ever, we value your prayers for the ministry. Here in Canada, we’ve a whirlwind schedule coming up, with university events at McGill in Montreal, Simon Fraser in Vancouver, and the University of Toronto to name but a few. We’ll be speaking at a Parliamentary event in Ottawa as well as numerous other audiences, ranging from sceptics to believers, across the country. Please pray for God to open doors and open hearts. Around the world, the RZIM team is busier than ever with Ravi and our colleagues finding more and more opportunities to address the big questions. Thanks for your prayers and for your support.

Questions get to the very heart of the Christian faith. Christianity addresses big questions: Is there a God? What’s he like? What does it mean to be human? Is there a purpose to life? How do we discern right from wrong? Being a Christian is all about an answer to a question— Jesus’ question, directed at his disciples but also aimed at each one of us: “Who do you say that I am?” (Mark 8) It’s to tackle deep questions that we’re offering inContext in magazine format this first time—to allow more space to address some of the challenges to faith. Questions like: Why is there evil and suffering? Is it arrogant of God to demand worship? We also hope to showcase some ways you can start discussions about faith with unchurched friends. We hope and pray that you’ll find inContext Magazine a rewarding read which you will come back to time and again. Pass it around in your church and share an article or two with unchurched friends. Try lending it out and then

Dr. Andy Bannister | RZIM Canadian Director

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table of contents MORE THAN WORDS REQUIRED 5 ARROGANCE OR REALITY 11 27 PLACES-3 QUESTIONS 14 NARCISSISM 17 AN UNSPEAKABLE REVIEW 23 A TELLING PSALM 24 inCONTEXT Magazine is a communication vehicle of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries. Mailing Address: Ravi Zacharias International Ministries Suite 315 | 50 Gervais Drive, Toronto, Ontario M3C 1Z3, Canada

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Andy Bannister Nathan Betts Andy Bannister Stuart McAllister Nathan Betts Rick Manafo

thanWORDSrequired

DEALING WITH THE PROBLEM OF EVIL by Dr. Andy Bannister

Evil Is Still A Four-Letter Word. For all of our technological sophistication, evil and suffering remain huge problems that confront us, as individuals and as societies. When I opened the newspaper this morning, the headlines were full of the aftermath of a shooting at a cinema in Denver where 12 people were killed, another shooting in Toronto which saw two killed and 23 wounded, multiple bombings in Iraq that killed 100, and a child abuse scandal at a major university. Bad things happen frequently. Suffering affects innocent people. Evil runs amok and tragedy strikes without warning.

Two Problems of Evil. It is worth commenting as we begin that there are actually two problems of evil. There is the philosophical problem of evil and the emotional problem of evil. The first is a logical puzzle: How can we reconcile the existence of evil with the existence of a good God? Over the centuries, some very powerful answers have been worked out.¹ On the other hand, there is also the emotional problem of evil. That’s the level at which many people experience the problem.

How does one reconcile the existence of pain and suffering with the existence of a loving God? This is one of the most common questions I get asked as an apologist in Q & A’s and open forums and discussions with people of all faiths and none.

Don’t Mix the Two Up. When it comes to our personal experience of evil, there is an existential force, an emotional punch to pain and suffering that begs for more than just a philosophical answer. For example, despite all of his philosophical brilliance, when inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

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C. S. Lewis lost his wife to cancer, the questions that hit him were raw and emotional, not logical: Sooner or later I must face the question in plain language. What reason have we, except our own desperate wishes, to believe that God is, by any standard we can conceive, ‘good’? Doesn’t all the prima facie evidence suggest the opposite? What have we to set against it? 2 So, it is vital to keep in mind these two aspects to the problem of evil—the emotional and the philosophical. Two Mistakes About Evil. It is also important to note that there are two traps people sometimes fall into when thinking about questions of suffering, and evil and pain. The first trap is “utopianism”. Many people assume the world is simply going to get better and better, until one day we have fed the last poor person, eradicated the last disease, stamped out the final injustice and ensured that the Maple Leafs win the Stanley Cup. The other trap is “dualism”, dividing the world into “good people” and “bad people”. Evil is carried out by “bad people,” but we are “good people,” so we are okay. The twentieth century, it has to be said, shattered both of those assumptions. Scientific and technological progress contributed to two world wars, the Holocaust, the killing fields of Cambodia and a host of other evils. Hundreds of millions of people were killed or displaced. So much for utopianism. But the twentieth century also showed us how evil is so often perpetrated

“It is worth commenting as we begin that there are actually two problems of evil. There is the philosophical problem of evil and the emotional problem of evil.” not by monsters, but by ordinary people. The whole subject of evil and suffering is by its very nature a difficult one. But any response to the question “why do bad things happen to good people?” needs to begin with honesty and a willingness to face the question head on. A helpful way to do that and focus in on the core issues is with a story. {6}

From The Global To The Personal. October 2nd, 2006, was a normal fall day in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. The school day was just beginning at the West Nickel Mines Amish School when the doorway was darkened by the figure of Charlie Roberts, a milk truck driver who served the local community. Nine years earlier his wife had given birth to their first child, who had lived for just twenty minutes. Roberts had never forgiven God for his daughter’s death. Today he would get revenge. Drawing a gun, he forced the adults and boys to leave and had the remaining ten girls lie down on the floor of the classroom. Roberts told them he was sorry for what he was about to do, but he was angry at God and needed to punish some Christian girls to get back at him. One of the older girls bravely responded, “Shoot me first.” As State Police arrived, Roberts began shooting, before finally turning the gun on himself and committing suicide. When the gunshots subsided, five girls, ranging from 7 to 13 years old, lay dead and five were hospitalized. The story does not stop there. In the aftermath of the tragedy, the Amish community stunned the world by responding not with anger or bitterness, but by extending forgiveness toward the perpetrator. Amish community members visited the Roberts family to comfort them in their loss and a trust fund was set up for Roberts’ wife and their three young children. On October 13, 2006, the Roberts family sent this statement to the Amish community Our family wants each of you to know that we are overwhelmed by the forgiveness, grace, and mercy that you’ve extended to us. Your love for our family has helped to provide the healing we so desperately need. For this we sincerely thank you.³ I tell that story because I think the questions it raises focuses the mind perfectly. Why do bad things happen to good people—good, innocent children? How do we make sense of it and what of the Amish response of forgiveness, compassion and love? How on earth does that work? Where does the power to respond that way come from? A Stick To Beat God With? The problem of evil and suffering—the question of why bad things happen to good people—is often used by skeptics and atheists as a stick to beat God with. The skeptical argument is quite easy to understand: If God was all-good, he

would prevent evil. If God was all-powerful, he could prevent evil. But evil exists. Therefore, an all-powerful, all-loving God cannot exist. This is one of the most common challenges to the Christian faith.4

one, it will not prevent war and famine, nor will it stop human trafficking. All that rejecting God does is to remove what is arguably the most powerful resource we have for tackling the suffering and injustices we witness.

But wait, there is a problem: the very question assumes the ability to tell the difference between good and evil. For example, most skeptics would agree that murder, rape or child abuse is evil. But why is it so for the atheist? The very attack against God assumes we have a standard by which we can determine good from evil. In other words, it assumes a moral law. But a moral law has to come from somewhere. It requires a moral lawgiver. In other words, the skeptic’s argument only makes sense if God exists. Otherwise the question is meaningless.

A Problem For Everybody. The reality is that everybody, whatever your worldview—atheist, Buddhist or Hindu—not just the Christian is confronted by the problem of evil and suffering as it is arguably the most serious question of all. How do the major worldviews tackle it?9 For Eastern worldviews, like Hinduism and Buddhism, evil and suffering are either denied (reality is simply an illusion, a doctrine known as maya) or suffering is the result of something you did in a former life (the doctrine of karma). Both

Within the biblical worldview, however, the question can be raised. Indeed, it often surprises our atheist friends to dis“The reality is that everybody, whatever your cover that some of the most powerful worldview—atheist, Buddhist or Hindu—not questions about God, suffering and evil are to be found within the Bible itself. just the Christian is confronted by the problem The Bible is quite forthright about the of evil and suffering as it is arguably the most problem. Whether it is Moses questionserious question of all.” ing God about the suffering of his people,5 Job crying out from the midst of his pain,6 Jeremiah puzzling over the prosperity of the wicked,7 or Qoheleth’s pessimism are horribly bleak answers. Do we really want when he sees the “tears of the oppressed,”8 the to say that the Amish schoolgirls deserved their biblical writers and prophets do not shy away fate because they slipped up in a previous life? from raising the problem of suffering, but are Can we really close our eyes and pretend that willing to raise it before God. One of the most their cries were merely an illusion? When you reflect soberly on the idea of maya and karma famous examples is found in Psalm 22:1-2: you perhaps begin to realize why it is that Hinduism and Buddhism have not generated a traMy God, my God, dition of human rights. These answers simply do why have you forsaken me? not work in the real world. Why are you so far from saving me, so far from the words of my groaning? So what about the atheist worldview, the worldO my God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer, view of naturalism? For the atheist, suffering and by night, and am not silent. evil are simply a natural part of the universe in which we find ourselves. Human beings are the Confronted by misery and rejection, the psalm- result of time plus chance plus matter plus natuist cannot understand his suffering and so raises ral selection—the brutal survival of the fittest at his mournful cry to a heaven that, in the heart the expense, very often, of the weak. As atheist of his pain, seems empty and silent. Similar cries Richard Dawkins put it: can be found across the Psalms—Why, Lord, Why? If there is mercy in nature, it is accidental. Thus the atheist’s question is neither new nor Nature is neither kind nor cruel but indifferunique. But there is a further problem for those ent.10 who would use suffering as a stick to beat God with. If you remove God from the picture, you That’s pretty bleak, but it gets bleaker. The uniare still left with the evil, the pain, the suffering. verse we inhabit is moving towards destruction Denying God will not bring back a dead loved and extinction, such that one day everything inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

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will end in a fiery death. An atheist of a previous generation, Bertrand Russell, wrote this: All the noonday brightness of human genius, [is] destined to extinction in the vast death of the solar system … Only within the scaffolding of thi[s] truth, only on the firm foundation of unyielding despair, can the soul’s habitation henceforth be safely built. 11 Within such a worldview, what’s the answer to evil? Well, quite simply there is no such thing as “evil” and there is no ultimate answer to suffering. So grin and bear it, whistle in the wind, eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die. When you compare worldviews like this you cannot help but notice the huge differences. Not every religion, every belief, every ideology is the same. Rather they are profoundly different. What you believe matters. On this most profound of questions—the problem of evil— atheism, Hinduism and Buddhism differ sharply. Perhaps the only thing they have in common is a lack of any satisfying existential or intellectual answer at all. The Bible and The Problem of Evil. So what about the Bible? Well, the biblical worldview stands radically opposed to these other worldviews. It does not simply disagree

tively wants to cry out, “No!” And, says the Bible, that cry, that instinct, that reaction is Godgiven. Evil, suffering, pain, and sickness, which ultimately end in death, were never God’s intention. The Bible realistically names evil as “evil”. Evil exists. Simply coming to grips with this can change you profoundly. The English poet, W. H. Auden grew up in the church but rejected it as a young man, becoming an atheist and a humanist. He believed that humanity was getting better and better and that mankind could be morally improved. Auden moved to a German part of Manhattan and in 1939, found himself sitting in a cinema, watching a newsreel playing before the movie. It showed Hitler’s tanks rolling into Warsaw and German SS troops bayoneting Poles. To his horror, the German audience began yelling, “Kill the Poles! Kill the Poles!” Suddenly and in shock he realized two things: First, evil—real evil—exists. And second, his humanism could not explain it. “I knew,” he said, “that there had to be reason why Hitler was wrong.” Exploring this led him back to the Christianity of his youth. Only a God outside of the world, Auden concluded, can define good and evil in such a way that it can explain what we see— and enable us to name “evil,” evil. 12

While the Bible is very honest in naming evil, it does not set out to explain it—although it does give us some hints. One of the most powerful is the key biblical idea that the supreme ethic—the ultimate ideal “When we are faced with evil or suffering, is love. God created us desiring that we pain or injustice, what most of us want are would love him and choose to follow him. But you cannot coerce somebody not clever arguments, but action. The Bible to love you. Love requires freedom does just that.” and freedom requires the possibility of choosing something other than love. By creating us genuinely free to love with their “answers”. It radically opposes them. Him and free to love one another, God allowed First, the Bible is very clear that the world is not the possibility that we might exercise the gift of as it should be. It declares that God’s creation freedom to choose hatred, violence or evil. was good and wonderful and beautiful and that evil is an alien intrusion—a cancer that has That is a very helpful approach, but ultimately spread throughout creation, affecting both hu- the Bible is not interested in philosophical or man beings and the natural order itself. Evil is lofty theological answers to the problem of evil. entirely and flagrantly counter to the character When we are faced with evil or suffering, pain or injustice, what most of us want are not clever and purposes of God. Evil is not natural. arguments, but action. The Bible does just that. As you reflect on this, you realize is it is profound. It sets out to tell us not so much what God says Our first instinct when we see the death of a in- about evil, but what God has done about evil. fant, a traffic accident, an earthquake, some terrible injustice, is not to say with the atheist The Cross and the Problem of Evil. “oh, that’s just life.” Something inside us instinc- As it sets out to explore what God has done {8}

about evil, the Bible tells the story of the one event in history where the themes of love, freedom, and evil converged. It is the story of how God sent his son, Jesus Christ, and how the powers of evil did their worst to him on a cross there on a Judean hillside. Because of his great love for us, Jesus chose to submit to the worst that evil could do to him. Suffering and pain led to death—a death punctuated with that same quotation from Psalm 22 that we saw earlier, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”13 In the death of Jesus, God condemned evil and passed sentence on it. It was “God’s great ‘No!’ to evil.”14 Evil did its worst to Jesus and was exhausted. Death lost its power. This is why Jesus rose from the dead. Jesus’ resurrection was no random miracle. The resurrection happened because evil had been defeated and forgiveness and freedom made possible.

we are all invited. Only there, can Jesus deal with that dividing line in the human heart—that twist in God’s good creation that lies behind all the problems. The biblical story is also a powerful challenge to utopianism or any notion that if we just try hard enough, humans can solve the problem on their own. The twentieth century is the bloodiest reminder of that notion’s failure. We cannot get to the new world—restored creation—by mere progress. Instead, God’s future new world has broken into the present in Jesus. God’s glorious future—new heavens and new earth—can shine their light into this world and our lives if we allow him in. The Power to Change a World. Which brings us back to where we started with the story of the Amish School Shooting: How does all of this reflect on that story?

The New Testament does not offer us a philoso- First, only the Christian worldview is unflinchingphy. Instead it tells a story unique among all the ly honest. Only it enables us to name “evil” as world’s religions and ideologies—of how the “evil.” Unless we can identify the problem with creator God took responsibility for sin and evil, utter directness, we cannot begin to address it. for what has happened to creation and has borne that weight on his own shoulders. “One of the most insidious things about evil

is how it can lock us up in bitterness and reThe Problem of Evil and Us. On one level, elements of the problem sentment. The past can all too easily foster of evil are still a mystery because the anger, bitterness, resent and hurt. How can problem includes us. We are personally affected by evil, caught up in it and, at we let go? The cross points the way.” times are part of the problem. So, the biblical response challenges us personally. It is a story that powerfully challenges any notion of dualism that tries to divide the world Second, only the Christian worldview tells us into “goodies” and “baddies” (including our- that God has decisively dealt with and judged selves, of course, in the former!) Aleksandr Sol- evil by way of the cross. Evil has been defeated, zhenitsyn, the Russian novelist and survivor of meaning that its days are numbered and justhe gulags, famously wrote: tice will prevail. If only it were so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.15 The problem of evil is not an abstract one. It affects each one of us. Each of us has the potential for great good and for great evil. The line runs through each of our hearts. The answer to that fracture, says the Bible, is the cross, to which

Lastly, only the Christian worldview answers the other question we asked of the Amish School Shooting: How did the families find the power to forgive? One of the most insidious things about evil is how it can lock us up in bitterness and resentment. The past can all too easily foster anger, bitterness, resentment and hurt. How can we let go? The cross points the way. In 1939, Corrie ten Boom lived with her father and sister in the Netherlands, where her father ran a watchmaker’s shop. Holland fell to the Nazis in 1940 and attacks on Jews became inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

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commonplace. Committed Christians, Corrie and her family helped to smuggle Jews out of the country, hiding many in their home. But in 1944, disaster struck. They were discovered and were arrested by the Germans. Her father died very quickly, but Corrie and her sister, Betsie, were shipped to Ravensbruck Concentration Camp. There they suffered terrible abuse and atrocities—and Betsie eventually died an agonizing death.

spark of warmth or charity. And so again I breathed a silent prayer. Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give me Your forgiveness.

Corrie, however, survived and was eventually released and began a post-war career as an evangelist, speaking about God’s love. Then one day, something shocking happened. Let me quote Corrie’s own words:

And so I discovered that it is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness that the world’s healing hinges, but on Christ’s.16

It was at a church service in Munich that I saw him, the former SS man who had stood guard at the shower room door in the processing centre at Ravensbruck. He was the first of our actual jailers that I had seen since that time. And suddenly it was all there—the roomful of mocking men, the heaps of clothing, Betsie’s painblanched face. He came up to me as the church was emptying, beaming and bowing. “How grateful I am for your message, Fräulein”, he said. “To think that, as you say, He has washed my sins away!” His hand was thrust out to shake mine. I tried to smile. I struggled to raise my hand. I could not. I felt nothing, not the slightest

As I took his hand the most incredible thing happened. From my shoulder along my arm and through my hand a current seemed to pass from me to him, while into my heart sprang a love for this stranger that almost overwhelmed me.

The Bible does not answer all of our questions. We are not ultimately told all the answers as to why radical evil was allowed to break free in God’s good creation. But we are told that the deathblow has been struck to evil and there will be ultimate justice–that God is remaking the world and that the decisive step has been taken.. It will be a world in which forgiveness and reconciliation will form the bedrock. This healing comes from the already completed work of Jesus—the cross and the resurrection—where evil was broken, death defeated, and forgiveness made possible.17 Evil is still a four-letter word. But so is love. And love is God’s last word. Dr. Andy Bannister ______________________________________

Perhaps one of the best answers to the philosophical challenge in recent years is Alvin C. Plantinga, God, Freedom and Evil (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001), which even many atheist philosophers acknowledge has largely answered the question. 2 C. S. Lewis, A Grief Observed (London: Faber & Faber, 1961) 26. 3 See ‘The Amish School Victims and the Aftermath of the Tragedy’ www.800padutch.com/amishvictims.shtml, accessed 28 April 2011). The story is told in detail in Donald Kraybill et al, Amish Grace: How Forgiveness Transcended Tragedy (San Francisco: Josey-Bass, 2007) 4 A classic atheist formulation of it can be found in J. L. Mackie, The Miracle of Theism: Arguments For and Against the Existence of God (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1982) 150-155. For a classic Christian response to the challenge, see C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain (Glasgow: Collins, 1977). 5 Exodus 5:22 6 Job 7:1-21 7 Jeremiah 12:1 8 Ecclesiastes 4:1-3 9 For an introduction to worldviews, see Ellis Potter, 3 Theories of Everything (USA: Destinée Media, 2012) or James W Sire, The Universe Next Door: A Basic Worldview Catalog., 5th Ed. (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2009). 10 Richard Dawkins, A Devil’s Chaplain: Reflections on Hope, Lies, Science, and Love (New York: Mariner Books, 2004) 9. 11 Bertrand Russell, A Free Man’s Worship (Available online at www.nd.edu/~afreddos/courses/264/fmw.htm, accessed 23 July 2012). 12 Cited in Os Guinness, Unspeakable: Facing Up to Evil in an Age of Genocide and Terror (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2005) 212-214. 13 Matthew 27:46 and Mark 15:34 quoting Psalm 22:1. 14 N. T. Wright, Evil and the Justice of God (London: SPCK, 2006) 88. 15 Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago, 1918-1956: An Experiment in Literary Investigation, Vol.1 (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1998 [1973]) 168, emphasis mine. 16 Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place: 35th Anniversary Edition (Grand Rapids: Chosen Books, 2006 [1984, 1971]) 247-248 17 Wright, Evil, 108. 1

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ARROGANCE orREALITY? by Nathan Betts

few months ago I was speaking to a group of university students and was asked one question that I have not forgotten: “Isn’t it arrogant of God to demand our worship?” Interestingly, this is a question asked by Christians and non-Christians alike. So, what does Christianity have to say to this objection? To give a sufficient answer to this question we need first to understand what Christian worship really is. For this, I turn to the former Archbishop of Canterbury, William Temple, who wrote extensively on worship. Here is how he describes worship: For to worship is to quicken the conscience by the holiness of God, to feed the mind with the truth of God, to purge the imagina-

tion with the beauty of God, to open the heart to the love of God, to devote the will to the purpose of God.1 Worship covers everything we are. Its starting point is found in a clear understanding of who God is. Scripture is full of stories that demonstrate how, once people truly catch a glimpse of God, they respond with worship. In Saint Matthew’s account of the Christmas narrative, he illustrates this in his telling of how the wisemen responded to the Christ child.2 They first “saw the child” and then “fell down and worshiped him…they opened their treasures and offered him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh.” The order of things here is important. Worship starts with an awareness of who God is. It then elicits a response. In the case of the wisemen, they fell down and offered everything they had brought. inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

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This point is present throughout the whole of Scripture and it often comes in the form of a question: Who is God? The disciples are the quintessential exemplars of this theme as they are constantly asking the question, “who is this man?” Alister McGrath makes the point that the Gospels operate like a “who was he” story similar to “who dunit” detective stories.3 The disciples of Christ, as seen in the Gospels, long to know who Christ is on account of all the extraordinary things he does. But in the Old Testament, the question has a slightly different starting point: God’s instructions for worship are so extravagant and lavish that one is forced to wonder, “Just who does this person think he is?” Perhaps you remember the story of YHWH giving instructions for the tabernacle in Exodus. The details for the various fabrics and hardware are so specific and great that it only makes sense for one to ask, who it is that is making all these requests.4 Then think of Isaiah 6 in which we find Isaiah having a vision. This is how the chapter begins: In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. The entire chapter is full of rich imagery but we only need to read this one verse to see that whoever owns this robe must be someone special; the train of his robe fills the temple! This is a very long robe, which begs one question: who does this person think he is?5 The answer to the question posed in the Old Testament is the same to the question posed in the New Testament: Who does he think he is? The answer is, He is God. Arrogance carries with it the idea of having a distorted view of one’s self. God, to the contrary, has a clear understanding of who he is. Worship, therefore, is not a response to arrogance but, instead, a response to reality. This gets at the significant problem built into the question from the start. The question of God’s arrogance is an important one but fails to seek understanding of who God really is. Once this is understood, worship will not be seen as an unreasonable demand, or as God taking something that is ours. Worship is a response to God’s generosity. The more we understand God, the more we will understand just how much he has given us. This will lead us to worship him. Author, Paul Copan makes the point that just {12}

by looking at the creation account in Genesis we see God’s generosity. By God creating us in his image he equipped us for two roles: the first is our kingly role and the second is our priestly role. He explains these functions thus: Being made in God’s image as priest-kings brings with it the ability to relate to God, to think rationally, to make moral decisions, to express creativity, and (with God) to care for and wisely harness creation. This is privilege, not bondage!6 Christian worship is our response to God welcoming us into an extraordinary relationship— one that flows from generosity, not arrogance. Perhaps you are familiar with the story of the gentleman waiting to board a plane at an airport.7 While he waits, he decides to get a bag of small doughnuts and a coffee. After making the purchase he discovers one problem: there are no open tables at the coffee shop. He finally manages to find an empty seat at a table at which just one other man is sitting. The man sits down at this table and begins to peel the lid off his coffee cup. He takes a sip. He puts his hand into the bag of doughnuts and takes out one doughnut and starts eating. Then something absolutely absurd happens. The man sitting across from him puts his hand into the same bag of doughnuts, he smiles, takes out one doughnut and starts eating. The first man is taken off guard. He does not know what to do. This is the first case of doughnut theft he can think of. He then makes a point by giving the other man a look that could kill. Then he takes a doughnut from his bag of doughnuts and eats his doughnut. But before he has time to finish eating his doughnut, the other man once again dips into the first man’s bag of doughnuts. The doughnut-theft victim now is baffled. He is outraged. He is envisioning years of professional psychiatric care. He thinks, “what is the world coming to? We are now stealing doughnuts from each other?” Surely this should be the end of the story, right? Well, the doughnut thief gathers his own belongings as he needs to catch a flight. He smiles politely at the burgled victim, gets up, and then once again dips into the bag. There is only one doughnut left! He breaks the doughnut in half and leaves one half in the bag and then leaves, but not without another seething look

from the doughnut-burgled victim. The doughnut victim is, of course, in shock. But he has his own flight to catch. He bends down to get his suitcase and, when he does, he notices that his own bag of doughnuts is on top of his luggage. The apparent victim was complaining that the other man was stealing his doughnuts when, in fact, the other man was sharing his doughnuts.

gance involved in worship, it is found in our hearts, not God’s. We arrogantly think that God is taking something that is ours, when in reality we are giving something back to him that is rightfully his. Once we realize this, the only logical response, then, is to worship him.

The point of the story is this: God owns all the doughnuts! This story tells us something of true Christian worship. If there is an issue of arro-

Email: nathan.betts@rzim.ca, Twitter: @nathanbetts09

Nathan Betts

______________________________________

William Temple, The Hope of a New World (Kessinger Publishing, 2005) 30. See Matthew 2:1-11 3 This is a point that he made during a devotional lecture at the Oxford Centre for Christian Apologetics. 4 See Exodus 38 5 I am indebted to Bible scholar and pastor, Sunder Krishnan, for this point. He compares the audacity of the robe found in Isaiah 6:1 to a train of a bride’s dress. Imagine yourself at a wedding. You see the bride coming down the aisle and the train of her dress stretches throughout the entire building. It will not be too long before at least one person thinks, “just who does this woman think she is?” 6 Paul Copan, Is God a Moral Monster?: Making Sense of the Old Testament God (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2011) 29. 7 I first heard this story told by the British Evangelist J John. 1 2

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PLACES

QUESTIONS by Dr. Andy Bannister At this time of year, our deck is one of my favorite places to read on a weekend. I love the view of our garden and the rambling, overgrown pathway that leads into the small woods that lie at the rear. I love the sound of the wind in the trees and the patterns of sunlight cast by the leaves as they dance and sway. And I love the feel of the warm wooden boards of the ancient, creaking deck beneath my feet. It was sitting there in the sunshine last weekend, idly reading the Saturday newspaper, that my eye was drawn to an article on the front page. “Twenty-Seven Places to See Before You Die,” announced the headline and, always drawn to a potentially good travel piece, I turned to the article.1 There, accompanied by some stunning photography, was laid out an amazing collection of beautiful locations — Yosemite Valley, Cape Tribulation, the jagged peaks of Torres del Paine; even the English Lake District. The beauty of the photographs aside, I was encouraged to discover that I had visited seven of those 27 places. (In fact, I have walked and climbed and swum so much of the Lake District that I can revisit almost every summit, crag, valley, tarn and stream in my mind’s eye alone.) 7 out of 27! I felt like a seasoned world traveller. Then a thought occurred. This year I turn forty. That means that, quite probably, almost half of my life has gone and I’ve only seen a quarter of the sights on this list! Then came a subsequent thought: Why does that matter? The whole tone of the article was one of urgency: “Look at these amazing, beautiful places. Aren’t they astonishing! Aren’t they sublime! Wouldn’t you regret it if you got to the end of your life and hadn’t visited them all or had merely seen seven?” Understand that, as well as being a lover of nature, I am also a questioning soul and as I sipped my coffee and {14}

gazed at the photographs in the newspaper, three little questions occurred to me. The first question was why? Why do people compile lists like this—“Things To See Before You Die”? This is the theme of the 2007 movie, The Bucket List, in which Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman play two old men, Edward and Carter, who meet in a hospital ward where both are being treated for terminal lung cancer. Carter decides to write a list of things to see and experience before he “kicks the bucket” and the film tells of the friendship that develops between the two men as the initially cantankerous Edward helps his new friend achieve his goal. The movie is playing with the same idea as the newspaper article: Wouldn’t it be terrible to die and not have seen or experienced these things? But here’s the question that nagged away at me. If death really is the end, if this life is all there is, if all that awaits us beyond the grave is literally non-existence, then what does it matter? It’s not as if your first reaction on dying and realizing you haven’t visited Venice will be regret or annoyance. Your first reaction after death will be the same as your next reaction: precisely nothing at all. As an atheist blogger put it recently: “Atheism teaches that your loved ones will die, your friends will die, your family will die, you will die, and that the universe, too, will ultimately die, empty and cold and alone. Nothing survives.” He then added: “This is why atheism is not exactly an easy sell.” But if this is true, why worry about life and ensuring we pack it full? There’s no vantage point beyond the grave

love of natural landscapes. “In the distant past,” he explained, “our Neanderthal ancestors would have looked at lush fields and winding river valleys and known this meant a good place to find food and water. Our love of beauty is simply a misfiring of this ancient primordial instinct.” When I heard that remark, I instantly thought back to my time trekking in the Himalayas. The Everest region has a wild and untamed beauty, it’s jagged snow peaks have drawn artists and photographers and climbers for centuries. But as much as I love the classic view of Everest’s north face, I have no illusions that it might be a good place to find water or to hunt game. I wonder if, once again, we see in natural beauty—real, genuine beauty and the wonder it can inspire—another glimpse of the transcendent.

from which one will look back and regret. You see, lists like “Things To Do Before You Die,” show that many people’s outward atheism is only a thin shell. If we’re not careful, we’ll find experience poking holes in that outer shell—holes through which the transcendent can begin to shine. One of the places where the transcendent sometimes shines through concerns the second question that occurred to me as I continued to read the newspaper that morning. This time the question was what? Specifically, what is beauty? Clearly these 27 places had been selected for the list because they were spectacularly and sublimely beautiful. Nature is certainly full of beauty. I can sit on a mountain summit and happily contemplate a view for hours on end. Natural beauty can render us speechless, move us to joy or tears, lift us beyond ourselves and instill awe at something greater than ourselves. But what is beauty? It’s clearly more than just subjective personal opinion. Otherwise, this list of places simply tells us about the journalist’s personal preference and not anything about the places themselves. Beauty is, as Roger Scruton put it, “a real and universal value”.2 But that raises a deeper question: Where is that value grounded? In what is it rooted? If not in my personal opinion, then where? I remember hearing an atheist philosopher attempt to provide a “secular” explanation for our

I mentioned three questions. Why? What? And lastly, Who? As I sat reading the newspaper, enjoying the deck and the garden, the sunshine and the coffee, it occurred to me that the natural reaction to joy and wonder and pleasure is thankfulness and gratitude. I was grateful to my wife, who had made me the coffee; grateful to the previous owners of the house for building such a lovely deck and having the wisdom not to landscape the garden but to leave it wild and rambling. Gratitude seems to flow naturally. But then, if I was grateful for the deck and coffee and garden, what about the sunshine and wind, what about nature and even beauty itself and what about these 27 spectacular landscapes in that newspaper spread? As somebody once said, the problem for most of us is not that we have nothing to be thankful for, but rather that we have nobody to be thankful to. If the atheistic account is true, there is no answer to that conundrum. My sense of thankfulness is nothing but a Darwinian “misfiring”—just the random chemical bubbling of the aging collection of synapses in my head.3 On the other hand, if the Christian story is true, then there are answers to all three of my questions. We sense that we are made for more than just this life and so we yearn, we long, we write our bucket lists. We encounter beauty and it makes our heart sing and our soul ache and we feel something that words cannot fully express, and through it we catch a glimpse of reality. And … if the Christian story is true, there is Somebody to thank—to thank for the warmth of sun on our skin, the whisper of the wind in the leaves, the taste of fresh coffee, the smell of pine trees and the sights and splendor of creation. ______________________________________ “Places to See Before You Die”, The Telegraph, www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/ picturegalleries/9398827/Places-to-see-before-you-die.html. The actual list was compiled by CNN and widely reported across the media that week. 2 Roger Scruton, Beauty (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009) x. 3 Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion (London: Transworld, 2006) 252. 1

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hristianity demands a change of focus and orientation. The scriptures call for self-renunciation as a core aspect of the life it envisions. The heart, and its ordering, is of course central to this. The tragic view of humanity, and the understanding of the heart’s inclination or orientation, means we need to be careful in monitoring what captivates and captures our heart. Ken Boa points out, as did Augustine long before him, that the central call of scripture is to love God supremely, to learn to love Him correctly, and to love others practically. The Christian life is a love story, and the struggle exists over who, what, and how we love. The exhortation of the Proverbs as wisdom to “guard our hearts,” is a serious warning and a vital concern across time (Proverbs 4:23). The prophet Jeremiah tells of Jehovah’s people repeatedly turning from Him to other loves. This remains an ongoing problem.

Luke records Jesus’ central teaching in terms of self-denial (Luke 9:23-26; 14). As Dallas Willard has pointed out, it is a central condition of spiritual formation. With this in mind, we need to consider our cultural moment; its dominant mood, and the difficulties it creates for such a vision of discipleship. Let’s begin exploring this challenge in light of the story of Narcissus. The tale of this Greek legend is as opposite of the above as we could get. Attractive as Narcissus was, he was oblivious to the love of others and their woundedness as he scorned or ignored them. A prayer from Nemesis (the mythological spirit of retribution) on behalf of one of those wounded ones said, “May he who loves not others love himself,” and this is what happened. Fixated by his own reflection in a pool of water, gazing in adoration at his own beauty and magnificence, he was unable to hear Echo’s call and fell in and drowned. He died a lonely, self-absorbed death—consumed in the end by his own self-infatuation. inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

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inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

As we move from ancient wisdom to modern times we note that the last 200 years in Western cultures have shown an increasing focus on the place of the individual, on the role of choice and on the demand to be personally happy at whatever cost. Old moral and social restraints have been rejected, weakened or targeted as instruments of oppression. Nothing should hinder the life we want. The outcomes, however, are somewhat suspect. Looking good and feeling good, have replaced being good and doing good, and most cannot tell the difference. For many, appearance and feeling have become supreme. One of the results has been what Christopher Lasch famously and controversially called “The Culture of Narcissism.” We see it in the infantile and self-obsessed characters of popular culture such as Peter Griffin in “Family Guy” or Sheldon in “The Big Bang Theory.” “Seinfeld” and “Friends” seem to make a virtue out of the quirkiness of self-absorption. The final episode of “Seinfeld”

Ravi Zacharias asks the question, “Can man live without God?” The Narcissist... asks the question, “Can man live as God?” was an indictment on self-absorption. The endless cycles of “Reality TV” shows invite us all to a feast of self-absorbed personalities who live to win no matter what. Lasch described the new kind of dependency that this kind of culture was producing. He wrote: Narcissism represents the psychological dimension of this dependence. Notwithstanding his occasional illusions of omnipotence, the narcissist depends on others to validate his self-esteem. He cannot live without an admiring audience. His apparent freedom from family ties and institutional constraints … contributes to his insecurity, which he can overcome only by seeing his ‘grandiose self’ reflected in the attention of others, or by attaching himself to those who radiate celebrity, power, and charisma. For the narcissist, the world is a mirror …1 However, the world is less malleable than we think, and things don’t bend to our will as we {18}

want. It is an unhappy condition. Plagued by anxiety, depression, vague discontents, a sense of inner-emptiness, the ‘psychological man’ of the 20th century seeks neither individual self-aggrandizement nor spiritual transcendence but peace of mind, under conditions that militate against it. Therapists, not priests … become his principle allies in the struggle of composure; he turns to them in the hope of achieving the modern equivalent of salvation, ‘mental health’.2 Ravi Zacharias asks the question, “Can man live without God?” The Narcissist mindset seems to ask the question “Can man live as God?” So how would we define Narcissism? Gordon Marshall says, It is used in everyday life to indicate selflove and egoism. The dominant personality type of modern society is said to be internally impoverished, fluctuating between exaggerated self-love and selfhatred, consequently needing parasitic relations to reinforce the former; it is unable to tolerate frustration, inadequacy, and strong feelings, due to a lack of egodevelopment.3 This is not a philosophical definition, but it is a very graphic sociological and psychological profile. I believe, particularly in America, that Narcissism is the problem of our age. It leads to serious problems. Lasch sheds light again for us here: Chronically bored, restlessly in search of instantaneous intimacy—of emotional titillation without involvement and dependence—the narcissist is promiscuous and often pansexual as well, since the fusion of pre-genital and Oedipal impulses in the service of aggression encourages polymorphous perversity. The bad images he has internalized also make him chronically uneasy about his health, and hypochondria in turn gives him a special affinity for therapeutic groups and movements.4 There are varieties of the manifestation of this. Some of these I have alluded to in the culture. The church has its share too. People “consume” services, seminars, and messages, but rarely do anything and commit to little. There is a fixation on personality and celebrity. The emptiness

of the modern worldview and the life it offers shows its inadequacy. The heart cries for more! The notion of a “hungry soul” is a powerful one. Lewis and Chesterton were quick to perceive what they saw to be the misfit between modern philosophies, ideas or ideologies, and modern men and women. The patient was being diagnosed with problems, which were supposedly reducible to material or social influences alone. The massively felt discontent provides an apologetic point of contact or a bridge. The agony, the frustration, the inadequacy of our public beliefs to meet our private needs is revealed in our music, our movies and our literature. John Eldredge says: “There is a secret within each of our hearts. It often goes unnoticed, we rarely can put words to it, and yet it guides us throughout the days of our lives. This secret remains hidden, for the most part, in our deepest selves. It is the desire for life as it was meant to be. Isn’t there a life you have been searching for all your days?”5 Our desire tells us something about life. Gerald May puts it this way: “There is a desire within each one of us, in the deep center of ourselves that we call our heart. We were born with it, it is never completely satisfied, and it never dies. We are often unaware of it, but it is always awake…Our true identity, our reason for being, is to be found in this desire.”6 However, life under modern conditions is subject to the endless stimulus and intentional bombardment of marketing. Somebody loves you (the you they want you to be) and has a wonderful plan for your life (resources). Our legitimate needs, longings, fears, wishes and hopes are studied, analyzed and utilized as strategies against us. Our desires are misdirected, relocated, and sadly misguided. At stake are core identity issues: What am I? Why am I here? It speaks to issues of calling, the quest for meaning and purpose in life. The testimonies and witnesses to our deeply felt unhappiness are many and void. Consider the following: “Unhappiness is not knowing what we want and killing ourselves to get it”—Don Herold.7 If we don’t know what we are (Imago Dei), and how we are supposed to function, then we find ourselves constantly searching for satisfaction or significance, but unable to find it. The quest has an insistent demand and drives us with relentless energy.

That great physician of the soul, Blaise Pascal, offers a powerful comment here: Man is so great that his greatness appears ever in knowing himself to be miserable. A tree has no sense of its misery. It is true that to know we are miserable is to be miserable; but to know we are miserable is also to be great. Thus all the miseries of man prove his grandeur; they are the miseries of a dignified personage, the miseries of a dethroned monarch… What can the incessant craving and this importance of attainment mean, unless there was once a happiness belonging to man, of which only the faintest traces remain, in that void which he attempts to fill with everything within his reach?8 Pascal sees our disordered desires as a symptom of our brokenness and as evidence of a fall from greatness; a focus that Abraham Kuyper also addresses as to whether the world is in a normal or abnormal condition as we encounter it? Who defines the norm, the standards, or the lines by which we measure? This is a worldand-life view issue—one that has serious consequences. Our cultural moment and its many voices reveals a deep restlessness with what is or how things are. Augustine describes different kinds of unhappy people: “the title happy cannot, in my opinion, belong either to him who has not what he loves, whatever it may be, or to him who has what he loves if it is hurtful, or to him who does not love what he has, although it is good in perfection.” As we know, one man’s trash can be another man’s treasure and happiness and unhappiness come in different forms and shapes. Augustine expands on the classes of unhappy people: “For the one who seeks what he cannot obtain suffers torture, and the one who has got what is not desirable is cheated, and the one who does not seek what is worth seeking is diseased.”9 The culture of Narcissism fosters discontent, hunger and restlessness as a constant condition. Even knowing this, many of us still fall prey to its powerful seductions. They are so ... well … so much fun! If we are happy and content, if we begin to enjoy what we have, to like how we look, to live with less, we may not feel the urge to consume. As we know, “When the going gets tough, the tough … go shopping”. inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

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inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

Let’s examine this a bit more closely. One of Kings 21). Naboth refuses to sell his vineyard bethe tests of a world-and-life view is its livability. cause it is his family’s inheritance and, contrary The “modern” and now the “post-modern” eras to the Mosaic Law, Ahab, unable to secure his have struggled greatly with finding a workable “desire” (1 Kings 21:4) goes into a huff like a model for a truly satisfying life. Assured that the toddler whose desires are thwarted and rushes past was largely bad and all wisdom lives in home to his bed. His whole world stops because creativity, the moment, the “now”, we are left he can’t get what he wants, right away, right slaves of our limited horizons. Narcissism is one now! His submission is to himself and his passion: of the results. As a condition, it results in an inordinate, over-blown and exaggerated self-love. Mental health requires that the human will It eclipses all other considerations and allows submit itself to something higher than itself, feelings, one’s own preferences, desires or self. To function decently in this world we will, to always be must submit front and center ourselves to (if possible). It is a Western culture...recognizes that something is some princiserious soul disorple that takes der. The book of deeply wrong. It is as if there is a destructive precedence Romans charts the social virus—a seed that carries with it its own over what we path of descent might want at that follows inevi- undoing. any given motably in the path ment. For the of ignoring, rejectreligious, this ing or turning from God. In Romans 1:18-25 we principle is God, and so they will say, ‘Thy see that humankind’s response to the public will, not mine be done.’ But if they are sane, knowledge of God is not received as expecteven the nonreligious submit themselves, ed. Humankind does not “honour Him as God” whether they know it or not, to some ‘highor “give thanks,” which would express continer power’—be it truth or love, the needs of gency, dependency, and gratitude. They preothers or the demands of reality.11 fer their own reason or the “reasons” they find around them (the creation). It is an inward turn. Lewis, in “The Abolition of Man,” saw this comGod therefore gives them over. They can have ing. He wrote of “Men without chests”—those what they want (and all the consequences that whose reason was captive to passion unreentail). The downward and inward pull, takes stricted by virtue (hence no chests). We are all submitted to something; the question is who, or over and becomes predominant. what? The danger, the trend is that we get lost However, as those made in the image of God, in self. they are tormented, and left, with infinite longings bounded by finite capacities. Desire’s Western culture, and analyzers of it, recognizes reach is so much greater than life’s confined that something is deeply wrong. This is as true in Europe as it is in the United States or Canaability to deliver (without God). da. It is as if there is a destructive social virus— Humanity submits to something as the central a seed that carries with it its own undoing. The guiding or driving principle or force, for their life. French Philosopher Chantal Delsol has written The famous psychiatrist M. Scott Peck submits, eloquently about this: “There are only two states of being: submission The emergence of the individual, supposto God and goodness or the refusal to submit edly freed from the culture that weighed on to anything beyond one’s own will, which rehim, reflects a false sense of sufficiency: the fusal automatically enslaves one to the forces individual believes himself to be the source of evil.”10 of both the questions and the answers, to contain within himself the alpha and omeHowever, the contemporary era has preferred ga, and to provide himself with his own Nietzsche over Jesus—the “will to power”. The points of reference. He wishes to bind himovercoming hero as the self-created and selfself to others only through a voluntary conruled individualist is the icon of our time. The Old tract, a contract he can nullify if he no lonTestament shows a glimpse of this “personalger wishes to be a party to it. In other words, ity”. The wicked king Ahab is like so many of the he rejects the bonds that preceded him infantile “moderns” we see on our TV daily (1 {20}

and any debt to which he has not agreed.12

conduct towards other men? Nothing but his desires and lusts.15

Rejecting all bonds and commitments, and restricting obligations, the Narcissist wants to be free, unrestricted, left to choose without hindrances or limitations. All outer, external or inherited (traditions) reference points are lost or simply don’t matter. Christopher Lasch shows an example:

This is so perceptive. The once so-called “seven deadly sins” become the seven desired intentions. It is like putting King Ahab on meth! We glorify the ugly, the sordid, the crude and we pursue it with gusto. We mock morality and praise unlimited self-expression. However, we are reminded, “God is not mocked.” The Bible In a study of 250 managers from 12 major recognizes this phenomenon and names it. It companies, Michael Maccoby describes is the cardinal sin of the Bible and the greatthe new corporate est threat to the faith leader, not altogether and faithfulness that unsympathetically, as “It’s all about me,” and of course exists. It is idolatry. Tim a person who works within this world-and-life view, what Keller defines an idol with people rather as “anything more than materials and else is there? important to you than who seeks not to build God. Anything that an empire or accumulate wealth, but to absorbs your heart and imagination more than experience ‘the exhilaration of running his God, anything you seek to give you what only team and of gaining victories’. God can give.”16 Idols are manufactured and served up to us on a constant basis and our culIn a telling comment he goes on, “He works to ture embraces the diversity of options and the be known as a winner, and his deepest fear is freedom of choice. to be labeled a loser. Instead of putting himself against a material task or a problem demand- Narcissism finds a welcome home in many ing a solution, he pits himself against others, out hearts. How do we resist? What can we do to of a need to be in control.”13 face the challenge, choose alternatives, and embrace a different way? The Narcissist believes, “it’s all about me,” and of course within this world-and-life view, what First, 1 John 2:15-17 reminds of the battle against else is there? It all has vast cultural consequen- the “lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and ces, as we reap what we sow. We elevate these the boastful pride of life.” To combat Narcissism, “winners,” these “success champions,” as our we must take love seriously. We must think more primary source for emulation. They played the deeply and act more intentionally in ways that lottery of life and won. Harold O. J. Brown docu- cultivate deeper love of the right kind. Augusments what he describes as “The Sensate Men- tine wrote that rightly ordered love or charity tality.” He writes, “It is interested only in those (caritas) was the secret of a holy and a fulfilling things, usually material in nature, that appeal to life: or affect the senses. It seeks the imposing, the impressive, the voluptuous; it encourages selfDo not love what is not to be loved, or fail to love what is to be loved, or have a greater indulgence.”14 love for what should be loved less, or an equal love for things that should be loved We have seen this in the Wall Street meltdown, less or more, or a lesser love for things that in the tragedies of Enron, Worldcom and a host should be loved equally.”17 of others. We saw it in Bernie Madoff and in many others paraded before us as the models of what we should aspire to. Brown expands, Most believers would never think this way. They lack the tools to diagnose a problem correctly If a person has no strong convictions as and to find the necessary spiritual solution. In a to what is right and what is wrong, if he culture of narcissism, with churches impacted doesn’t believe in any God or absolute by its invasive power, we need help and pracmoral values, if he no longer respects contice (disciplines) to learn to love the right things, tractual obligations, and finally, if his hunin the right order, and in the right way. The curger for pleasures and sensory values is parrent trend towards formation and discipleship amount, what can guide and control his augurs well in this regard. inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

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inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

Let me suggest some counterpoints to the press of Narcissism: The first would be a clarified sense of identify and calling. 1 Peter 2:912 speaks powerfully to this. So many live “the unexamined life” and are being “conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2) because they do not intentionally focus on “being transformed.” We are not consumers (by definition). We are not mere individuals or some product of a marketing campaign. We are made in His image, to worship Him, serve Him, do His will, and glorify His name. We are His, we are called! Os Guinness says that, “…God calls us to Himself so decisively that everything we are, everything we do, and everything we have is invested with a special devotion and dynamism lived out as a response to His summons and service.”18 The second counterpoint would be that active resistance is essential—1 Peter 5:8-9. This requires serious attention and intention. We are to “be on the alert”—watching, evaluating, considering. We need to recognize that warfare is real and that we are targets. There are many forces arrayed against us and they are unrelenting. The command is to “resist.” But we are not alone. We do so in the context of a praying, supportive community. This is not an option. The lone wolf gets devoured.

Jacques Ellul would call us to “subversive spirituality” as we resist the idols of our time and we would do well to learn from the moral commitment of men like Alexander Solzhenitsyn, who saw the corruption of the Soviet system, who felt the press to surrender and conform but who courageously resisted and said, “let the lie come, but not through me.” Finally, is our need to foster an alternative focus—1 Peter 4:1-3. The willingness to suffer, to be misunderstood, rejected or shamed because we choose a higher, better and more biblical way, offers serious resistance to Narcissism and its encroachments. Jointly is the courage necessary to say, “not my will, but Thine be done” and the attitude of sacrifice and service to others rather than one of self-serving. Jim Elliot said, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.” Our greatest example is Christ, who came to serve (John 13). The culture of Narcissism bids us to exalt self, pursue our own happiness, and neglect all else. The way of Christ--the way of the cross, bids us deny self, take up our own cross, and follow Him. One is a path of tragedy, the other the path of life. Stuart McAllister | RZIM N.A. Regional Director ______________________________________

Christopher Lasch, The Culture of Narcissism (Suffolk, UK: Abacus, Sphere Books Ltd. 1988), 10. Ibid., 13. 3 Gordon Marshall, Oxford Dictionary of Sociology (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1998) 418. 4 C. Lasch, 40. 5 John Eldredge, The Journey of Desire: Searching for the life We’ve Only Dreamed Of. (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Pub. 2000), 1. 6 Gerald May, The Awakened Heart, cited in J. Eldredge, 2. 7 David K. Naugle, Reordered love, Reordered lives: Learning The Deep Meaning of Happiness (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm B. Eerdmans Pub Co., 2008), 36. 8 J. Eldredge, 12-13. 9 D.K. Naugle, 36. 10 M. Scott Peck, M.D., People of the Lie: The Hope for Healing Human Evil (NY, NY: Touchstone, Simon & Schuster, 1983), 83. 11 Ibid, 162. 12 Chantal Delsol, The Unlearned Lessons of The Twentieth Century: An Essay On Late Modernity (Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2006), 60. 13 C. Lasch, 44. 14 Harold O.J. Brown, The Sensate Culture: Western Civilization Between Chaos and Transformation (Dallas, TX: Word Publishing, 1996). 15 H.O.J. Brown, p114. 16 Timothy Keller, Counterfeit Gods: The Empty Promises of Money, Sex, and Power, and the Only Hope That Matters (NY, NY: Dutton, 2009), intro, xvii. 17 D.K. Naugle. 51 18 Os Guinness, The Call: Finding And Fulfilling The Central Purpose of Your Life (Nashville, TN: Word Publishing, 1998) 4. 1 2

The RZIM Canada Team

is looking forward to being at Simon Fraser University From October 14-19, 2012. Please pray for the team as they communicate the great news of the gospel to students and faculty and train others to do likewise.

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anUNSPEAKABLEreview In Unspeakable, Os Guinness explains how the word “evil” has been misused and misunderstood in our culture and sets out to describe what evil is and how one can meaningfully respond to it. He says, “Evil is quite simply the most serious problem in human life, the most serious problem in the contemporary world, and the most serious problem for our deepest human resort in life—our trust in God or in the universe that is our planet home” (Preface). Guinness draws on his own background as a social critic and his own personal experience of evil. He recalls living as a child with his family in Nanking, China, just a short time after the “rape of Nanking”. As a young boy he witnessed war, revolution and a famine in which his two brothers died. In fact, Guinness’ corresponding stories are compelling, explanatory and keep the reader engaged. Unspeakable goes beyond the intellectual and uncovers the existential layers of the question of evil and suffering. It explores how different faiths

and worldviews define and respond to evil and how evil impacts societies and cultures. It shows the importance of making the connection between belief and behavior. It posits the reality of evil as well as the responsibility Christians have with regard to it. In fact, the evangelistic instructions that Guinness lends throughout the book make Unspeakable unique. After describing the counsel Job received from his friends during his time of trouble, Guinness remarks, “To say something when we know nothing is not only wrong but cruel—and an insult to God…if we ever do not know, we should not say. Silence itself is eloquent sympathy.” Near the end of the book Guinness writes, “When we are with anyone who is suffering, we should never give words without love, and we should never give answers without knowledge.” This book really is a must-read for any person wanting to have a fuller understanding of the problem of evil. It challenges the reader at both and intellectual and emotional level. by Nathan Betts

“This is an important book for anyone who doubts the existence of human evil or who has lost faith because of it.” Peggy Wehmeyer, Current host and managing editor, World Vision Report

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inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

A tellin g Psal m

by Rick Manafo

are unique and complex individuals and we each learn in different ways: We listen, we see, we touch and interact, to name a few. Presentations and lectures are incorporating more sensory elements in order to help the audience more fully understand what they’re trying to say. When there is something worth telling, it’s worth explaining it and showing it different ways so that the message will come through loud and clear. “As Christians we believe that there is no greater thing worth telling than the wonder of God. How do we do this in a way that intrigues, engages and challenges people?”

get to our corporate centres, the more we see our own creations and the less we are able to admire God’s. Our monuments to money, palaces of power and sometimes even our relics of religion block our view of what God’s hands have accomplished.

In Psalm 19, David sets out to do just that. He begins by turning our eyes to God’s marvelous creation. David looks to the heavens many times throughout the Psalms. As a shepherd boy, David was surrounded by nature, which served as a constant reminder of his God in heaven.

Creation was a great indicator to the Psalmist. It pointed somewhere—to someone: “The heavens declare the glory of God. The skies proclaim the work of his hands.

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When David looked up, he saw the sky as it was meant to be seen. He saw the stars without the interference of city lights. If we go far enough out of the city, we too can gain such a view and perspective, where on a clear night constellations are deciphered and meteor showers caught. It can be quite breathtaking.

Day after day they pour fourth speech; Night after night they display knowledge”. He added, “The sun rises at one end of the heavens and makes its circuit to the other; nothing is hidden from its heat.” (Psalm 19:1-6)

Scientist Rachel Carson wrote: “Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature—the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after winter.” That is by design, says the Psalm. David is inviting us to look up and discover the one who made the heavens. See what God has done. See who God is. Without the use of space shuttles or high-powered lenses, David saw in the heavens the glory of God. They gave insight and opportunity to grasp the essence of who God is: Designer, Creator, Organizer and so much more. One would think that the more sophisticated our equipment becomes, the more we should see and understand the “glory of God.” But experience tells us that understanding God’s glory doesn’t come from high-powered lenses, or space programs, but rather by our spiritual lenses being opened and focused by the power of God’s Spirit. David eyes were powered by the Spirit when he said, “The heavens declare.” They send out the message that there is an awesome God behind it all. Anyone who has sat down to a meal in a reputable restaurant knows that a great meal doesn’t “just happen.” Those savory combinations don’t just appear. Someone designed what that meal should taste like and how it should be plated—which salad, which beverage, which dessert would compliment and complete the meal. When a meal is enjoyed and appreciated we send our “compliments to the chef,” because we know he or she designed the meal for our enjoyment and satisfaction. When an artist puts their work on display, the artist stands back and waits while a group of art lovers examine their paintings. They listen in as people explain what that piece of art means to them. Some find meaning in every stroke on the canvas—even those pieces that are hard to differentiate from the paint palette itself. Artists appreciate when someone “gets” what they had in mind. A composer or playwright witnesses his or her masterpiece being performed. What do they wait for? They wait for the applause that signifies the audience has appreciated the work they’ve done.

Van Gogh said, “I dream my painting and I paint my dream.” You can determine what an artist has in their heart through their paintings or sculptures—what a musician has in their heart by the music they produce—what a poet has in their heart through their prose. David sees what’s on God’s heart—what God dreamed up. And here we see what is on David’s heart through his poetic expression. He’s blown away by God’s handiwork. The Psalmist stood back in wonder of God’s creation—the design—the information—the order. He describes how God “plated” the universe and laid everything out in such a pleasing manner. In those opening lines, David basically sends his compliments to the creator: “God, this is amazing work!”

“Understanding God’s glory doesn’t come from high-powered lenses...but rather by our spiritual lenses being opened” Without a sound in the sky, David hears a symphony. He is showered with knowledge. Without uttering a word, creation said everything: There’s life, there’s light, there’s rhythm. It all makes sense. The sun rises in the day and gives warmth to live by, light to work by and for plant life to grow. The rain compliments the sun with water that refreshes, that cools, that nurtures life. The trees give us oxygen and act as air purifiers. I’m not talking about the ones you hang from your rear-view mirror. Drive along the highways and look at the endless acres of trees. They serve a purpose. They’re there for more than just looks. God created a “perfect” world for us. This environment was created for us to live in and to enjoy. However, over time, we’ve made it less perfect. We’ve cut down our trees, built nuclear plants and airports and steel factories and dumped our waste in our waters. Sometimes this might have even been done in the name of progress and growth—but it all comes at some cost. Every time we increase the level of sun-block in our lotions it’s a telltale sign of how we’ve messed with God’s natural sun-block. Every inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

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time we increase the power and size of our filtration plants or add more chemicals or have to purchase bottled water, it’s a sign of how we’ve altered God’s natural filtration system. In a way, we’ve messed with God’s perfect creation. But the Psalm does not stop at creation. David adds another aspect to how he understands God, He writes: The law of the Lord is perfect, refreshing the soul. The statutes of the Lord are trustworthy, making wise the simple. The precepts of the Lord are right, giving joy to the heart. The commands of the Lord are radiant, giving light to the eyes. The fear of the Lord is pure, enduring forever. The decrees of the Lord are firm, and all of them are righteous. They are more precious than gold, than much pure gold; they are sweeter than honey, than honey from the honeycomb. “Perfect” is an interesting word. When you ask someone how they’re doing and they say, “perfect” it means that things are well or even exceptional with them. That means they are doing well amidst all the variables that life can

eat away at those filters—that “spiritual ozone” God has set in place. When that happens, we run the risk of “sin-stroke.” We get burned and we wonder why. Naturalists like Richard Dawkins will tell you there is no design, that there is no transcendent moral law that’s been given to us, but that underlying all we see is “pitiless indifference.” However, when one abandons the bearings of an over arching law that guides and protects, it leaves one vulnerable. Also, without something telling us what is normal or expected—rhythmic—who’s to say what’s normal and what’s not—what’s off-time? We speak of alternative lifestyles, but doesn’t the term alternative imply there is a normal? How do you define alternative if there is no normal? Has society (I leave the particulars to you) messed with the spiritual ozone and that ideal plan that God set out for us? Have we veered a little too far of God’s blueprints? I pose the question for your consideration.

There are those who think the church is simply championing archaic ideas and that talk God as Designer is stifling and overpro“Creation is a picture telling a thousand words of tective and smothering. They believe huand the law of the Lord is a thousand words manity is smarter than that—that we’ve evolved and that we can take care of that paint a picture.” ourselves—that we have and can continue to create our own system to live by. throw their way. When we say the weather So, they’ve taken the Designer of the world and is perfect it means that if one could pick the the Word, in which and by which we live, out of weather conditions for whatever they’re do- their lives. ing, they’d pick those conditions. Usually perfect means that, all things considered, things But far from stifling, overprotective and smothcouldn’t be much better. ering, the Psalmist encourages us to embrace God’s direction because it is life-giving and For David, the God who gave us a perfect cre- soul-refreshing and wise and sweet. For the ation also gave us his perfect word. Just as the Psalmist, creation is a picture telling a thousand sun gives light and warmth to the earth, God’s words and the law of the Lord is a thousand word sheds light and gives warmth to our lives. words that paint a picture. These are not two incoherent thoughts, instead they fit perfectly: The order of creation is a per- They both tell of a God who cares for what fect set up for the order of life. and whom he created. Far from God wanting to keep humanity suppressed or in the dark, The same God who created the world and all God wants to open our eyes and ears to the the systems necessary to sustain life is the same beauty that is all around. God wants us to see God who gave us laws to help us live our lives— the beauty that is in God’s world and in God’s so that both our surroundings and our inner be- word, because they were both given for our ings would be in harmony. wellbeing. The same way God put filters in the world he created, to give us quality of life, he put filters in our lives by giving us laws to live by. And when we sin and ignore God’s directions we {26}

Let’s face it; you don’t have to look far to find things that are not perfect in this world. Every time I look in the mirror, I’m reminded of that. We struggle and make mistakes. We drop the ball

more times than we’d like to admit or count. So we can probably resonate at some level with G.K. Chesterton, who, when asked what was wrong with the world answered, “I am.” None of us are perfect. The Psalmist would be the first to admit that. He says, “People cannot see their own mistakes. Forgive me for my secret sins” (v.12). Who can really know all they’re done wrong or how many people they may have hurt? David himself is admitting that he has hidden faults. When I was in elementary school, a dentist came to our class to teach us about dental health. We were all given toothbrushes and toothpaste and told to go brush our teeth the best we could. This was great because we got to leave the class to do it. When we got back, the dentist gave us a little pink tablet to chew on. Some of you may know where I’m going with this. We did it, then we looked in the mirror and at each other’s teeth, Eewh! There was pink all over our teeth. Then the dentist told us that those were areas we thought were clean, but really they were areas where there was plaque and where trouble could eventually begin. It was a little scary to say the least. That little tablet showed us where we missed with our brushing. It showed us where we needed help—where we needed to pay more attention. It showed our hidden faults. Some kids went right away to try and brush whatever pink they could off. Others thought it was cool and milked the situation and showed off their pink teeth a little while longer. When we think we’ve done good enough, the “law of God” which, by the way, also originally came in “tablet” form, shows us our hidden faults just like those pink tablets did with our teeth. Just when we thought we had done good enough—we were rudely awakened to the fact that we hadn’t. Humanly speaking many people are under the assumption that if they do a good enough job, help enough people and follow all the rules that they get a pass into whatever picture of heaven they have. In Mark chapter 10 we read of Jesus’ encounter with a pretty bright rich man who thought his life was fairly irreproachable. He had followed the law. He thought he was brushed and flossed,

but Jesus saw something the man didn’t know about himself. It was a hard pill to chew on. Jesus didn’t come to get rid of the law—the law was perfect. Jesus came to show the law in its completeness. He came to show people how to live out the Spirit of the law in the kingdom and to live out their God-created identity. But there’s still another important piece to all this for David: The beginning of the Psalm said that the “heavens tell the glory of God.” The middle section said that the Law—the Word of the Lord—is perfect, trustworthy, radiant, precious and sweet. Now, the final verse of this Psalm says, “May the word of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer.” This Psalm ends with a prayer that allows us to be honest with ourselves in the light of everything we know about God and how God is revealed: “O God, I make mistakes, even ones I don’t know I make. But through all those variables of life, I want to be perfect in your sight. So I’m going to fill my mind with your thoughts— your laws. I want what comes out of my mouth to be pleasing to your ears. I don’t just want the heavens to tell of your glory—I want my life to do that too.” You see, we may have messed up the heavens and the earth. That’s why God will one day usher in a new heaven and a new earth (2 Peter 3:13). We may have gone our own way and discarded the laws of God and hard-heartedly dismissed them as some archaic document that is no longer relevant to us. That’s why God writes his laws on newer, softer hearts (2 Corinthians 3:2,3). Things in our lives may have compromised our filter system. But it doesn’t have to stay that way. God still wants what’s perfect and best for us. How will we respond to this invitation? Rick Manafo _____________________________________________

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inCONTEXT Magazine | FALL 2012

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The primary mission of RZIM is to reach and challenge those who shape the ideas of a culture with the credibility of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Distinctive in its strong evangelistic and apologetic foundation, the ministry of RZIM is intended to touch both the heart and the intellect of the thinkers and influencers of society through the support of the visionary leadership of Ravi Zacharias.

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