exegeek::godmatic

Modern theology, as far as the mainstream goes, has made every effort to denigrate humans, to make them something less valuable than they actually are. The end result, as far as I can tell, is to turn humanity into some kind of creature that may be abused to the nth degree without second thought.

 

As far as I’ve been able to tell, this degradation of man almost always leads to one end: it serves to justify God’s wrath towards certain people or groups of people in such a way that he can be made to commit acts that the Church would tolerate from no mortal, but can thoughtlessly applaud when enacted by a sovereign God.

 

This trend has manifested itself in three ways:

 

1.Total Depravity

St. Augustine, and later John Calvin, taught that mankind inherited its sinful nature from Adam, and that man himself was basically of zero worth in an unredeemed state. This is a belief commonplace in Christianity, and I have no illusion about that. I am in the minority in my views on this. What many have not been given to consider is the reason that Augustine may have believed this.  Before his conversion, Augustine belonged to the philosophy of Manicheanism, which itself was a form of Gnosticism, which taught that matter (especially man) is evil, and it’s only through spiritual revelation that the spirit of man can get a foot up on it’s depraved shell of flesh. When this belief was Christianized, we end up with a human whose carnal nature is inseparable from his sinful nature. This is, in fact, quite problematic in some translations of scripture (SEE: Sarx to be You – 01/27/09) which use the idea of flesh and sin quite interchangeably, and wrongfully so.

 

2. Unintentional Sin

In Leviticus 4, we see something called “unintentional sin,” which seems to contradict the idea that sin is willful transgression against God. In short, the term adopted for “unintentional sin” in Hebrew, was used primarily as an archery term that meant “to miss the mark.” The actual word “sin” is only inferred by the similarity of it to the Hebrew word for “an offense.” In the Mosaic Law, there were some sins which could be committed accidentally, and while there was atonement for these “sins” there is no real mention of forgiveness. The best parallel that I can think of today is if I were to accidentally spill coffee on your carpet, I might seek forgiveness (“I’m sorry. Forgive me?”) from you. If I’m honest, I might even attempt to make some kind of atonement (“I’ll pay to have it shampooed out.”) But I do not need to ask God for forgiveness of such an act, because there was no malice in my heart.

 

3. The False Dichotomy of Matter Vs. Spirit

In the same way that Gnosticism invaded Christianity in Augustine’s day, we’re seeing it invade Christianity again in our own. In some churches, often charismatic ones, though the phenomenon is certainly not confined to spirit-filled assemblies, the physical is downplayed in preference to the spiritual, because it is in the spirit that the gifts primarily work. This leads to a false correlation between one who is spiritual and one who is mature. The phrase “…so heavenly-minded as to be no earthly good” springs to mind. N.T. Wright, who I frequently reference, reminds us in his book “Surprised By Hope” that there is value in the physical, because it is the physical in which we were created, and it is in the physical that we will be resurrected. This is, of course, a different thing than that which we mentioned when speaking of total depravity, thought it does become easy to forget under total depravity’s reign. The time in which we will be spirit only is so brief, eternally speaking, as to be the blink of an eye from death to resurrection.

 

So why does this matter?

When the church devalues man, in spite of God’s statement of blessing “It is good,” in Genesis 1:31, they take a position foreign to God’s opinion. It is no surprise, therefore, that this justified abuse turns many seekers away. Morally, they understand, or at least want to understand, that man is good, and not some stain on the rug to be shampooed out. When a non-believer turns away from the rabid pessimism of PETA or VHEMT—two secular groups that say men are evil—only to find the same attitude in the church, they wonder if they’re alone in the world, and turn away again, thinking that the church’s view is identical to Christ’s.

 

In that light, we have to ask, if we are worthless, did Christ die in vain? Did the King of Glory and Firstborn from the Dead die for something that was worth less than the cross to which he was nailed or the crown of thorns upon his brow? If Christ is rational, we must say that mankind is worth redeeming, even if only because we are loved. God’s love for us, and His image in us, is exactly what makes us valuable, even through the sinful marinade in which we have soaked ourselves.

 

When we think of ourselves as worthless, we have a quick but ruthlessly incorrect response to any objection to the acts of an Old Testament God.

 

God flooded the earth? Well, they deserved it.

God incinerated Sodom? Well, they deserved it.

God demanded Isaac to be killed by his father? Well, he deserved it.

 

This last one makes me wonder if there aren’t some who would have found a great deal of justification in Isaac’s murder. But in that logic lays another problem: what stops it from taking that same position on abortion, euthanasia, human trafficking, or hurricane relief? Who would we be to put a stop to something that these dirty sinners so obviously deserve?

 

There are better answers, more glorifying answers, answers wrapped in true justice, for when we ask why God did certain things in the Old Testament era. They have nothing to do with sweeping generalizations about mankind. And they do not require us to throw our neighbors, children, or me, under the bus to get there.

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 15th, 2009 at 12:52 am and is filed under Doctrine, goDmatic. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.