Israel in the Land of Canaan: Perfect Spot to be a Light to the Nations

The nation of Israel, in the land of Canaan, was God's institution for His worship, for passing on the truth about the coming Messiah, and for preaching the gospel to the nations both in picture through the sacrificial system and through direct calls to the nations to repentance and faith in Christ in texts such as: "Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little.  Blessed are all they that put their trust in him" (Psalm 2:12); see Truth from the Torah here for more information).  Have you ever thought about the location in which God put the land of Canaan in relation to His purpose that Israel be a light to the nations?

The location of Israel was perfect for reaching Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Near East.  It was also the center of international trade routes.  Have you thought about how much less effective of a location the nation would have had if God had put it, say, in Madagascar?

Fairbairn comments as follows:

Proceeding, however, to a closer view of the subject, we notice, first, the region actually selected for a possession of an inheritance to the covenant people. The land of Canaan occupied a place in the ancient world that entirely corresponded with the calling of such a people. It was of all lands the best adapted for a people who were at once to dwell in comparative isolation, and yet were to be in a position for acting with effect upon the other nations of the world. Hence it was said by Ezekiel¹ to have been “set in the midst of the countries and the nations” the umbilicus terrarum. In its immediate vicinity lay both the most densely-peopled countries and the greater and more influential states of antiquity,—on the south, Egypt, and on the north and east, Assyria and Babylon, the Medes and the Persians. Still closer were the maritime states of Tyre and Sidon, whose vessels frequented every harbor then known to navigation, and whose colonies were planted in each of the three continents of the old world. And the great routes of inland commerce between the civilized nations of Asia and Africa lay either through a portion of the territory itself, or within a short distance of its borders. Yet, bounded as it was on the west by the Mediterranean, on the south by the desert, on the east by the valley of the Jordan with its two seas of Tiberias and Sodom, and on the north by the towering heights of Lebanon, the people who inhabited it might justly be said to dwell alone, while they had on every side points of contact with the most influential and distant nations. Then the land itself, in its rich soil and plentiful resources, its varieties of hill and dale, of river and mountain, its connection with the sea on one side and with the desert on another, rendered it a kind of epitome of the natural world, and fitted it peculiarly for being the home of those who were to be a pattern people to the nations of the earth. Altogether, it were impossible to conceive a region more wisely selected and in itself more thoroughly adapted, for the purposes on account of which the family of Abraham were to be set apart. If they were faithful to their covenant engagements, they might there have exhibited, as on an elevated platform, before the world the bright exemplar of a people possessing the characteristics and enjoying the advantages of a seed of blessing. And the finest opportunities were at the same time placed within their reach of proving in the highest sense benefactors to mankind, and extending far and wide the interest of truth and righteousness. Possessing the elements of the world’s blessing, they were placed where these elements might tell most readily and powerfully on the world’s inhabitants; and the present possession of such a region was at once an earnest of the whole inheritance, and, as the world then stood, an effectual step towards its realization. Abraham, as the heir of Canaan, was thus also “the heir of the world,” considered as a heritage of blessing.^1[1]

Learn from the location in which God put Israel His purposes of grace toward the entire world through His chosen people and His ultimate chosen Servant, the Lord Jesus Christ (Isaiah 42; 53; 61), and the perfection of all the Divine works.

TDR

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¹ Ch. 5:5.

¹ Rom. 4:13.

^[1] Patrick Fairbairn, The Typology of Scripture: Viewed in Connection with the Whole Series of the Divine Dispensations, vol. 1 (London: Funk & Wagnalls Company, 1900), 332–333.

The Deliberate, Convenient Ineptitude of Professing Christians at Applying the Lust Passages of Scripture, pt. 2

Part One

Sanctification, the practical outworking of actual salvation, which surely proceeds from justification, Paul characterizes in Romans 6:12:

Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof.

Essentially the Apostle Paul is stating the expectation of the reality of true salvation in someone's life, commanding someone to cooperate in practice with what God has already done.  A verse I quoted in part one speaks of this, Galatians 5:24:

And they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts.

Saved people, "they that are Christ's," "have crucified the flesh with the. . . . lusts."  Sin won't reign in the body of a person where the flesh with its lusts has been crucified.  "Crucified" is aorist tense, so completed action at one point in time.  In Romans 6, this is what Paul said in the previous verse (v. 11):

Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.

"Reckon" is also translated "count," so count yourself as dead already unto sin.  It only counts if it's real and it's real when it isn't "lust."  This is big.  For further understanding, Galatians 5:16:

This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.

Someone walking in the Spirit will not fulfill the lust of the flesh.  Romans 8:14 says, "For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God."  In v. 1, same chapter, Paul said, "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit."  Those with no condemnation, in Christ Jesus, walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit, which is that they don't fulfill the lust of the flesh.  Again, saved people don't fulfill the lust of the flesh.

One should assume that we can know what lust is.  I'm saying people do know.  Not obeying lust and not fulfilling lust takes application.  What is lust?

What Is Lust?

I've read several definitions of lust through the years.  Lust itself is sin, but it also isn't sin.  Someone is not to lust.  That is how it is sin.  On the other hand, lust isn't in and of itself particular sins.  Abstaining from lust, which Peter commanded (1 Pet 2:11), is not the same thing as abstaining from particular sins.  Paul said that lust occurs through making provision for the flesh (Romans 13:14). 

Another way to describe "make provision" would be "to indulge."  Lust is a desire that we should not have.  Someone I read said it was a desire untethered to the purity of Christ.  It can be just directed toward the wrong object.  This would relate it to affections not set on things above (Colossians 3:1). The desire comes from indulging ourselves in something.  Consider a classic passage on sin, James 1:14:

But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.

Someone is going to sin when he is first drawn away of his own lust.  Paul commanded Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:22, "Flee youthful lusts."  That is a command.  Lusts are to be fled.  When one is being drawn away by lust, that is something he defeats by first separating from the source.  The world is offering objects that draw someone to them and not to God.  Allowing ones self to succumb to these desires becomes addiction.  Instead of God controlling, the desire or the thing desired controls.  In 1 Corinthians 6:12, Paul writes:

[A]ll things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any.

Something may be lawful for a believer, but except for Jesus Christ, it must not take power over a believer.  Allowing the draw is forbidden, I'm saying.

Applying Lust Passages to Music

I googled the words, "lustful music."  I had not done it before, but I assumed results, and there were 16,200 of them.  The words "lust music" brought 35,200 results.  These aren't mainly Christian sites mentioning this music.  The world produces lustful music and lust music.  The world wants the music to be popular, so it makes the music addictive with targeting the flesh.  It doesn't do that in so many words, but that is what the world does.  Satan uses the world to do this, and there is where we get the world, the flesh, and the devil working in harmony.

Fleshly music, music that appeals to lust, is very dangerous to a Christian.  It is addictive.  I know many people, professing Christians, who started to listen to the world's music, and they couldn't get victory then in their Christian life.  It's possible they were never saved in the first place, so they don't have power over the flesh and over lust (see first part of article).

A common answer from professing Christians and even church leaders is that the Bible does't tell us what lustful or lust music is, so this evaluation is going beyond what scripture says.  Just the opposite, scripture is profitable for correction and instruction for everything in life, including music.  Scripture applies to music.  A related argument is that some Christians listen to this lustful or lust music and they still live a good Christian life.  I don't think it is a good argument, because I think it is possible, but it's still wrong to do.

Just seeing and hearing, righteous Lot vexed his righteous soul (2 Peter 2:8).  This matches what Peter says earlier in 1 Peter 2:11 with fleshly lust warring against one's soul.  Even if lust doesn't wipe out a Christian life, it wars against the Christian life.  Bad music appeals to the flesh.  Acceding to that appeal is a wrong precedent for a Christian.  This alone doesn't please God.  It is of the flesh and not of the Spirit.

The reformer, Martin Luther, whom I'm not giving an endorsement by merely quoting him, wrote (from Luther's preface to the Chorgesangbuch (1524) of Johann Walter (1496-1570)):

Young people. . .  should and must receive an education in music as well as in the other arts if we are to wean them away from carnal and lascivious songs and interest them in what is good and wholesome.

I use that quote because it is a commonly understood matter, that there are "carnal and lascivious songs."  To put all this in a very simple way, carnality doesn't blend with Christlikeness.  To live godly one must mortify "inordinate affections" (Colossians 3:5), which is the same word, epithumia, translated "lust" everywhere else.

One application I'm making here is stop listening to carnal music.  That is not fleeing youthful lust.  That is not mortifying inordinate affection.  That is being drawn away of lust.  That is not abstaining from fleshly lust.  That is sin.  It is not led by the Spirit, but by the flesh.  It isn't saved behavior.  It's even worse if this is being played and sung in the church, but it shouldn't be listened to by believers.  It is not a "common grace" as I've read by certain evangelicals.  Grace is not an occasion to the flesh (Galatians 5:11).

I could go further with entertainment.  Christian need to apply the lust passages to entertainment.  However, even before I go there, I've got to write more about carnal (lustful) music.

More to Come

The Deliberate, Convenient Ineptitude of Professing Christians at Applying the Lust Passages of Scripture

The Bible doesn't say what lust is.  It assumes we know, because we do know.  Not knowing is either blindness or feigning ignorance.  Blindness or feigned ignorance won't work in the end with God.  He knows we know.  People can understand and apply the passages on lust.  They don't want to give up their lust.  I'm asserting a deliberate, convenient ineptitude of professing Christians at applying the lust passages of scripture.

Application of scripture itself is taking a hit.  This last week, I listened to a panel discussion among FBFI leadership on "The Fundamentals," which is now a synopsis of the discussion in transcript form.  The following are the pertinent sections I ask you to consider:

Hankins: When you come back to what would be primary points of concern now, I can think of two important issues. We need a theological articulation of a right view and practice of worship and the same concerning worldliness. We need a theological articulation of the nature of worldliness and what characterizes it. This seems to be a watershed issue to me. 

Schaal: The advent of American popular culture took worship that had been consistent for millennia and turned it upside down. It took worship outside its normal and commonly accepted bounds, and now we are forced to define what aberrant worship looks like. 

Hankins: I think we have been at that point for several decades now. I might be missing something, but I do not think we have gotten the job done of articulating the theology of worship and the practices that should grow out of it.

Later they continue on this theme:

Schaal: So, back to the issue of worship. Is worship a bigboundary issue? 

Shumate: There are two questions. In principle, is it? And second, how do you apply it? Worldliness and ungodliness in worship is a very serious issue. 

Bauder: Worship includes doctrine (orthodoxy) and having our practices right (orthopraxy), it also includes loving God rightly (orthopathy). 

Schaal: Having our passions right. 

Bauder: Yes. Loving God wrongly becomes a boundary-level issue if someone or something is subverting our love of God sufficiently gravely. 

Shumate: I think worship clearly is a big-boundary issue. After all, what is idolatry but a false worship? It was having an altar to Baal and an altar to Yahweh in the same courtyard and mixing those together. There is a great deficiency theologically in defining what idolatry is all about. We have a shallow understanding of idolatry.

I watched the original discussion on video, which they've cleaned up to turn into an article.  The vital verbiage I recognize as included in the transcript.  The tell-tale expression from what I pasted, I believe, came from Shumate:  "In principle, is it?  And second, how do you apply it?"

So far some fundamentalists and others are willing to agree on the first part, that worldliness in worship occurs in principle, and in principle fundamentalists are against it.  The rub comes in the application.  What is worldly music?  This is what Hankins further above calls a "theological articulation of the nature of worldliness and what characterizes it" (emphasis mine).  If you can't know what worldliness in worship is, then you can't expose it, separate from it, or stop it.

A, if not the, chief characteristic or attribute of the things of the world from the things of God is lust, like John writes in 1 John 2:16-17:

For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.  And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.

Worldliness corresponds to or smacks of the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes, which passes away.  The "passing away" is described in Revelation 18:14:

And the fruits that thy soul lusted after are departed from thee, and all things which were dainty and goodly are departed from thee, and thou shalt find them no more at all.

Further down in the same chapter of Revelation, John writes:

And the voice of harpers, and musicians, and of pipers, and trumpeters, shall be heard no more at all in thee; and no craftsman, of whatsoever craft he be, shall be found any more in thee; and the sound of a millstone shall be heard no more at all in thee.

Some of what souls lusted after, that are departed from them in the end, are the voice of harpers, musicians, pipers, and trumpeters.  This is not the end of all music, just the world's music.  It will end because God rejects it, had already rejected, despite its acceptance by people who call themselves Christians.  Godly music will continue.  The above panel is saying in essence that we know the lust is wrong, but we're not saying exactly what that is, because we haven't articulated that.  It isn't communicated in the discussion even though the panel is agreeing that it is a fundamental boundary of Christianity itself.

Since worldliness is lust, worldliness is wrong and worldliness must be rejected, then lust can be understood, characterized, and identified.  This is the application of the lust passages of scripture.  Church leaders and churches haven't been doing it.  It's not just a matter of articulation, but also enforcement.  Churches and their leaders won't enforce what scripture teaches on lust.  They've treated the subject like it is too uncertain, so that they would be wrong to do anything about it.

It's worse.  Churches and church leaders have used lust to entice for the purpose of promoting and sustaining membership.  The FBFI leaders are discussing whether this is a boundary issue, which means separation from those churches.  Will they call this a "gospel issue"?  The Apostle John makes it a boundary issue, but will those who call themselves fundamentalists?

In Romans 13:14, the Apostle Paul writes:

But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof.

This verse can be applied and is especially applied in music and entertainment.  Listening to or watching much of the world's music and entertainment is in fact making provision for the flesh and fulfilling the lust thereof.  Why?  The Apostle Peter commands in 1 Peter 2:11:  "abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul."  Earlier in the same epistle, he writes:  "As obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to the former lusts in your ignorance."  The Apostle Paul further teaches first in Galatians 5:24 and then in Titus 2:11-12:

And they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. 

For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world.

Christians of the past were discerning of what I'm writing here.  They made application to crucifying the flesh with the affections and lusts, and denying ungodliness and worldly lusts.  Peter Masters, pastor of the Metropolitan Tabernacle in London, has written and preached on this subject, decrying the state of churches all around the world and their capitulation in this area.

Young people are encouraged to feel the very same sensational nervous impact of loud rhythmic music on the body that they would experience in a large, worldly pop concert, complete with replicated lighting and atmosphere. At the same time they reflect on predestination and election. Worldly culture provides the bodily, emotional feelings, into which Christian thoughts are infused and floated. Biblical sentiments are harnessed to carnal entertainment. . . . When you look at their ‘favourite films’, and ‘favourite music’ you find them unashamedly naming the leading groups, tracks and entertainment of debased culture, and it is clear that the world is still in their hearts. Years ago, such brethren would not have been baptised until they were clear of the world, but now you can go to seminary, no questions asked, and take up a pastorate, with unfought and unsurrendered idols in the throne room of your life. What hope is there for churches that have under-shepherds whose loyalties are so divided and distorted?

Very often today I hear Christian leaders, who are even sympathetic with what I'm writing here, say that this application of lust passages to be very "difficult."  I understand the statements.  They might not say what is difficult about it.  What is difficult, I've found, is that people don't want to give up their lusts, which have become even their addictions.  I don't think or believe that it is difficult to apply lust passages.  We can know what is fleshly lust or worldly lust to make not provision for it or abstain from it.

People make a choice.  They either choose the Lord Jesus Christ or they choose lust.  To say that those do not contradict is now fashionable in a majority of professing Christianity.  They can both have Jesus and their lusts.  It isn't true though.

What occurs when lust and Jesus are syncretized is the shaping of a different Jesus in the imagination.  Churches today are responsible for doing this through their worship, which is false worship.  This syncretization is akin to what Aaron did at the bottom of Mt. Sinai and what Jeroboam did in the newly formed Northern Kingdom of Israel.  People have the name of God and of Jesus, but they have shaped a different God and Jesus through syncretizing lust with the name of God and of Jesus.  People then worship a different Jesus and in a short time have a different Jesus, a different one than who can and will save them.  This is how false worship changes the gospel.

In my title, I've said a deliberate, convenient ineptitude exists among professing Christians.  I'm saying they are not inept.  I'm saying they choose ineptness.  It's deliberate.  It's also convenient, because staying inept allows for the perpetuation of the lust.  This is an addiction.  They shape a Jesus that accepts the addiction.  He doesn't exist, but they still worship "him."  This is in fact worshiping and serving the creature rather than the Creator.  The Creator Himself contradicts the lust.

I haven't myself made specific application of the lust passages of scripture in this post.  I think people know.  I'm not saying they aren't deceived.  They are.  The more they feed their lust, the more that their conscience is seared or salved and stops warning of this lust.  At one time, they rejected the fleshly and worldly lust.  They have continued past the warning of the conscience until they don't hear it anymore.  That is how they are deceived.

Furthermore, the feelings of the lust are confused with the workings of the Holy Spirit.  A feeling proceeding from lust is considered to be an interaction with the Holy Spirit.  Churches offer lust through the music and what people feel, they think is God.  This is akin to what occurred in the Babylonian mysticism of the false worship in Ephesus and Corinth.  Ecstasy, tied into lust even to the extent of temple prostitute activities, is seen as an encounter with God.  This is common today in churches.  They think they have an intimacy with God, but it's actually just their lust.

The condition on the ground among professing Christians in their lack of applying the lust passages is far worse than what I'm describing in this post.  They listen to and watch almost everything and treat it like it is neutral.  They are not applying scripture and, therefore, they are disobeying scripture.  At the same time, they profess to be a Christian.  Many, if not most of them, are not Christians.  The two can't coexist.  Teaching, assuming, or accepting that they do coexist confuses people in the most fundamental way, fooling them into thinking they are followers of Jesus, when they are not.

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I'm going to go further in applying the lust passages.  This is an introduction.  I ask that you watch Scott Aniol's sermon at the Metropolitan Tabernacle in March.  I agree completely with what he says here.  You'll have to follow the link, but I'm going to see if I can post the sermon here below. 

The Trip to Europe Continued (Twenty-Fifth Post In Total)

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The Allies landed on the beaches of Normandy in an invasion of Europe on June 6, 1944.  This week marked the 75th anniversary of D-Day, the beginning of the end for the Axis powers in Europe.   Less than a year earlier, on June 20, 2018, Tuesday, I left our apartment in Mountrouge and walked to a car rental business, a Europcar that was in the basement of a parking garage in the Jules-Noël Sports Center there.  Car rental and driving was a greater adventure in England, but France presented its own challenges.

I picked up the car that morning right when the car rental opened and drove it to the front of the apartment to pick up the family and began our drive to the American Cemetery at Normandy.  Almost all of the trip was on a toll road that looked similar to an American one.  I found it hard to gauge the speed limit on these freeways.  The tolls are paid mostly with coinage and sometime a window with a person in it, who does not understand English.  If you are ever making that trip, you better get the proper coinage figured out to put into the machine.  Some of them will take credit cards, but I also found that the credit card wouldn't work on some of these.  The French are not, I repeat not, in general sympathetic to Americans.  Maybe it's everybody they don't like, but one can get the distinct impression that they do not like Americans.

As multicultural as the United States. as leftist as it is in France, France isn't multicultural.  The French like their language and and their culture.  I don't like a lot about it, but it is a culture that the French have, a unique one.  I'm reporting only what I saw.  I'll write more about it.  I don't think I went into it with a bias toward the French.  When we visited the church on Sunday morning, I was blessed to see what I believed to be true conversions and a genuine evangelistic effort there.

It was about a three hour trip by car from Montrouge to the cemetery.  If I was going to compare the northern coast of France to anything that I knew in the United States, it would be closer to parts of the East coast of the Middle Atlantic states than the West coast.  With the time that we had to get there and back in one day, we decided to do two things.  We would visit the American Cemetery and then Omaha Beach, which is right underneath the cemetery, down the bluff.

I've been into military cemeteries.  I've been to burials in military cemeteries.  I've visited Arlington National Cemetery in Washington, D.C., Gettysburg National Cemetery where Lincoln gave his speech, and then the military cemetery at West Point.  Nothing moved me like the American cemetery.  The presentation in the museum there was very good.

There is a lot of parking at the cemetery, but there aren't normally a lot of people there to visit, because it's an American cemetery in France.  Mostly people visit from the United States, and it isn't easy to get there.  There are also lots of places to tour around Normandy, several museums and various cemeteries.  Someone could spend weeks there just looking at D-Day related sites.  I can tell you only about the two sites we saw.

We walked first to the cemetery building, which was the museum.  The museum gives an excellent presentation of what happened on D-Day.  It is very well organized to put the events in chronological order.   At the end is a small theater with a very well done film that is very emotional.  I cried all through the museum.

When we left the museum, we walked out to the cemetery, which is kept in immaculate condition.  There are grave stones mostly in the form of crosses, made out of a unique marble.  The rows are so, so straight.  The order and symmetry in themselves, green fields filled with white crosses, moves.  We caught up with a tour that starts with a large map that overlooks the beach below and out onto the English channel.  You can imagine everything from that vantage point.  Then we walked to the variious memorials there and our tour guide, a French woman, who spoke excellent English with an a French accent, talked at every point.  She stopped at certain crosses and told stories about the one whose body rests there.  Tears continued to run with her talk and the sites all around us.

We went back to our car and drove down to the beach and parked there.  There is a memorial on Omaha beach.  There are some symbolic metal objects there.  Besides that, it's just a beach.  It's like someone talking about ground where some major event occurred.  The ground itself is hallowed by the men who died there.  That's the feeling I had even though it was an ordinary beach.

We drove the three hours back and I was able to drop off my family and return the rental car that evening, then walk back to our apartment.  We ate that night at the restaurant on the first floor.  The next day we would visit the Palace of Versailles and the Eiffel Tower.

Jessie Penn-Lewis: Spirit-Baptized Woman Preacher (part 3 of 22)

The content of this post is now available in the study of:

1.) Evan Roberts

2.) The Welsh Revival of 1904-1905

3.) Jessie Penn-Lewis

on the faithsaves.net website. Please click on the people above to view the study.  On the FaithSaves website the PDF files may be easiest to read.

 

You are also encouraged to learn more about Keswick theology and its errors, as well as the Biblical doctrine of salvation, at the soteriology page at Faithsaves.

When Someone Is Said to Be Divisive

Most of the time when someone is said to be divisive, it isn't the person who is divisive.  Don't get me wrong.  Some people are divisive.  But most of the time, it isn't a person who is dividing.  Stay with me.

Scripture talks about divisive people.  It is the heretic of Titus 3:10-11.

A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject; Knowing that he that is such is subverted, and sinneth, being condemned of himself.

The term heretick isn't in scripture that much.  It's a word thrown around quite a bit though, usually, I've found, as a pejorative, calling someone a "heretic."  In fact, and I've written about this a few times on this blog, a heretic is a divisive or factious person.  That is who it is in Titus 3:10-11.

I've pastored for 33 years, one year in seminary and 32 years in California since starting the church here, and I've seen the violation of Titus 3:10-11 in a church, like Titus 3:10-11 read.  Factious people enter into a church and cause division.  Usually it isn't doctrinal, but personality based.  Someone doesn't want to do what he's told or fit into the body.  The whole church wants to remodel the kitchen except for one vociferous personality.  Sometimes one person is a regular critic of leadership and it drags everyone down.

The main kind of heresy in a church is personality and pride.  Someone doesn't want compatibility with everyone else.  He wants to stick out and make it about him.  In the few usages of heresy, doctrine also divides.  Someone will divert off the path of truth and try to take people with him.  This could be a perversion of the Trinity, inerrancy, or the gospel.  I think that is the usage of Acts 24:14:

But this I confess unto thee, that after the way which they call heresy, so worship I the God of my fathers, believing all things which are written in the law and in the prophets.

When the word "divisive" is used today, I don't see it mainly as almost ever used in a scriptural way, either way.  When someone says that you're divisive, they aren't using it according to scripture.

If a biblical doctrine divides, that’s no fault of the doctrine but of those who defect from it. Doctrine may divide, but biblical teaching can’t be divisive. The divisive are those who defect from the truth. To say a particular doctrinal stance is divisive is misguided rhetoric.

— Mike Riccardi (@MikeRiccardi_) June 5, 2019

I read this retweeted in a twitter feed, and it's something I've been talking about for years.  The "divisive" one, the heretic, is the one who divides off biblical and historical doctrine.  Just because there is "division" doesn't mean that someone is being divisive.  If I point out unbiblical doctrine, I'm not being divisive.  It's the person who has moved off or from biblical and historical doctrine who is divisive.  Usually it's something new.

After Riccardi got my attention with this tweet, I read another one he made within the same week that dovetails.

The first human sin consisted in (1) doubting God’s Word and His goodness, (2) rejecting His Word as the authority for life, (3) asserting man’s own autonomous reasoning as the authority in place of God’s revelation, & (4) breaking God’s law. Every sin since consists in the same.

— Mike Riccardi (@MikeRiccardi_) May 28, 2019

When God confronted Adam and Even for their sin, God wasn't the divisive one.  It is at least a wrong viewpoint.  Jesus came to bring a sword (Matthew 10:34).  In other words, Jesus requires separation based upon doctrine, but He's not the cause of the division.  Adam and Even caused the division.  I want to add to Riccardi's thoughts, because here is how I've seen this claim of division occur the most.  I'm going to use the second person to speak to you.

Scripture stands as authority.  You divert from scripture.  However, you want acceptance.  When you don't get it, you say someone is causing division with you.  You don't want to face biblical division, what Jesus brings and requires, so you pervert and confuse biblical division with a wrong kind of division.  You are calling biblical separation, heresy.

A genuine Christian doesn't want to cause division, since unity is important to God.  God requires unity.  This instinct not to divide is reflected by Paul's writing in 1 Corinthians 12:25, "That there should be no schism in the body."  Schism is the wrong kind of division that is being accused.  I want to further digress and use the second person again to speak to you directly.

You want acceptance, not biblical unity, so you are corrupting the grace of God.  You want toleration of error.  You are saying that the person who won't tolerate error isn't being gracious.  Furthermore, you are saying that contradictory doctrines or positions are both supposed to be accepted.  You are expanding a list of questionable doctrines, the ones you want to disobey and still be accepted.

Some of these newly tolerated doctrines, the ones now accepted to avoid being called divisive, are actually also related to the gospel.  The gospel is being perverted and if someone separates over that, he's being called divisive.  I see this trend in the area of the grace of God.  A person who is truly gracious will accept divergent doctrines, because of newly designated uncertainty.  Riccardi started with "doubting God's Word" (see second tweet above).  Doubt removes authority.  Then a person can believe and do what he wants.  False doctrines not in play are now in play and are tolerated.  If I don't accept them, I'm the divisive one.  Do you see how this is happening?

"Divisive" is weaponized by false or cheap grace adherents.  They can disobey true doctrine and practice and get away with it, even be considered orthodox, because doctrinal diversity is this new unbiblical grace, what its adherents are calling "scandalous grace."  As Riccardi said above:

Doctrine may divide, but biblical teaching can’t be divisive. The divisive are those who defect from the truth. 

My Liking of Jordan Peterson Is Not Fellowship or an Endorsement of Him: Why?

Maybe every next generation is a new and troubling day.  I don't want to overestimate the degree of perversity of the present generation.  However, I think we have taken a unique plunge into the abyss.

You've perhaps heard of Moore's law.  The Wikipedia article states:

The observation is named after Gordon Moore, the co-founder of Fairchild Semiconductor and CEO of Intel, whose 1965 paper described a doubling every year in the number of components per integrated circuit and projected this rate of growth would continue for at least another decade. In 1975, looking forward to the next decade, he revised the forecast to doubling every two years.

His "law" has proven true, but in 2015 Moore "foresaw that the rate of progress would reach saturation," and said, "I see Moore's law dying here in the next decade or so."

Perhaps as Moore's law has materialized, to the same degree of progress in technology has occurred a parallel spiritual regression.  Moore's law portrays a steep trajectory upward as we have fallen off a cliff in the other direction morally and biblically.  The two might even be interrelated.

In a day such as today, Jordan Peterson could seem to be a bright alternative.  Only in such darkness would he come off as light, when in fact he is a near or sort of modernist.  I've read modernists.  I know how they read.  I hear modernism in Jordan Peterson.  Only in such dark days does a possible modernist seem bright in comparison to postmodernism, nihilism, and political correctness.

I wrote here that I attended a Jordan Peterson speech in San Francisco, and I did on May 2. I had written some things about him since he burst into public awareness a short time ago (here, here, here, here, and here).  Someone gave me his book for a gift for my birthday, which was a little less than a month before the San Francisco speech, and I read it before his speech.  His speech isn't posted at youtube yet, and we were told it was unlawful to record, so I didn't even though I had a digital recorder with me.  I listened carefully and got the gist of what he said, and can remember it.

Someone wrote two critical articles about Peterson at The Federalist that would be worth reading (part one, part two).  I'm not suggesting myself that someone look to Jordan Peterson for his theology or interpretation of scripture.  He's a problem.  I'm glad The Federalist, not a Christian organization, recognized it and allowed the articles they published.

Peterson used Genesis as his authority for his San Francisco speech.  I would not have thought that he would have done that, even though I know he's been renting out and filling a theater for his teaching through Genesis up in the Toronto area of Canada.  His first Genesis lecture is his most watched youtube video.

I agreed with every one of Peterson's points, even though I know he does not have a true or right view of the Genesis account.  The title of his speech was "The Meaning and Reality of Individual Sovereignty."  I think the founding fathers of the United States would have proceeded from similar thinking as Peterson, which some might call "natural law." He said, one, that God created order, two, that God created man in His image with the Word, so, three, God wants man to bring order through the Word just like God.  All that is true.  Everything Peterson says isn't true, but those three points are true, which were the points of His speech.

In addition to Genesis, Peterson mixes in historical thinking and the evidence from other cultures.  He doesn't interpret all of that, just reports it.  I have titled this type of proof, "feeding off the carcass."  I don't think Peterson understands it in a right way, but he is right to promote it.  Other cultures borrowed from the Genesis culture, because they were perversions of the original culture God created.  Based on God's grace, unfaithful people sustained aspects of what God instituted originally with faithful people.  Noah brought a culture to the other side of the flood and was alive at the time of the tower of Babel.  Abraham sent a servant back to Mesopotamia to find a wife for his son, because there was something still there to find.

Peterson explains through his understanding of science, being widely read in peer-reviewed materials. He warns of danger and destruction from departing from ways established and constituted in Western civilization.  They didn't succeed on a whim.  These ways made their way through, revealed in historical archtypes that stand as laws regulating success for people.  Western civilization capitalized on these and in contrast with the failings of the East.  Good enough?  No, and by far not good enough.

From my watching and listening to Peterson, he seems himself like he knows something important is missing in his own life.  He cries more than ever.  Perhaps the internal contradiction breaks him, especially someone who puts such an emphasis on telling the truth.  There is an underlying lie to all of what Peterson says, that is crucial.  One could call it the big lie in contradistinction to little truths that Peterson bravely tells.

The Independent Institute, which sponsored the event in San Francisco with Peterson, asked ticket buyers and members for questions.  In the end, they read none of them, because all of the question and answer time was taken up by a small panel of board members of the Institute and Peterson riffed so long on his answers that he ate up all the time.  Peterson often gives long answers and goes off on related tangents.  However, I sent in this question:

What do you think of what scripture says, the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:17, that if Christ has not been raised, then your faith is useless and you are still guilty of your sins?  Is not meaning lost with mere symbolism and not historic reality and then fulfillment of Jesus' own saying in Matthew 17:22-23 that the Son of Man will be delivered into the hands of men, they will kill Him, and He will be raised on the third day?

I didn't directly quote the King James Version.  I put the question in more modern vernacular, but my point was to evangelize Jordan Peterson and maybe the crowd there.

Peterson at best improves temporal life on a disposable planet with no future.  He doesn't prepare mankind for eternity, so he misses the point of man's existence.  Man can't please God with Peterson's way.  Peterson's common sense brings no power of sustainability, because man can't be or stay good or better on his own.  He needs the gospel.  Without justification, real salvation, man is lost in his sins, and as a result is not close to better off.  His worst days are still ahead practicing Peterson at his best.  This is a lie, a deceitful lie.

I watched Peterson's speech to Prager U and then the interview with Dennis Prager.  Peterson cried a lot.  The tears remind me of the tears of John in Revelation 5, when no man can undo the seals on the inheritance of all things.  The strong angel tells John not to weep, because the Lamb is worthy to redeem the lost world.  All the problems of the world are rescued by a true and real Jesus, not a metaphorical one that is a mere antitype.  Jesus actually died, was buried, and rose again.  God could wipe away Peterson's tears if he turned to Jesus Christ.

The Trip to Europe Continued (Twenty-Fourth Post In Total)

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France was the last stop of our trip to Europe.  We stayed in Montrouge, just south of Paris, right next to the Mairie de Montrouge station.  On Monday, we arose to take the subway to the Louvre, the famed museum in Paris.  This was the only stop where we did not have tickets in advance, so we waited in line outside in the rain.  It wasn't the best thing to do, but it was good to compare just how much longer it takes at a major site without tickets.

The Louvre has a notable appearance with the glass pyramid above ground, marking the entrance to the museum.

The Louvre contains paintings, sculptures, Greek, Roman, and Near Eastern antiquities, and more.   It can keep you busy, but people mainly focus on the most famous works, which include the gigantic Coronation of Napoleon.

More than anything is the Mona Lisa.  It takes up the middle of one room, and it takes difficult effort to get to the front by the rope.  It is amazing how disorganized it is to move closer with actual pushing and shoving.  Louis XIV kept the Mona Lisa at the Palace of Versailles, where it remained

until the end of the French Revolution.  The top of the Louvre Palace has 86 statues of famous men, each one labelled (the middle here, Rousseau and right, Montesquieu).












We left and ate at Angelina, and experienced the world famous hot chocolate there.  Afterwards my wife and I sat at the edge of the River Seine, while our daughters shopped nearby.

The next morning I would pick a rental car and we would drive the three hours to Omaha Beach in Normandy to visit the American cemetery, the beach, and the museum there.