After the game, Steve Young talked about how Brees “threw open” his receivers. I had never heard this phrase before. Neither, apparently, had his MNF co-host Stuart Scott. So Scott asked Young to explain what it meant to “throw someone open.” Young defined two ideas behind the phrase. First, throwing someone open protects the receiver. The receiver can trust that when he runs toward the thrown ball, no defensive back is going to come out of a blind spot and thump him. Second, though not entirely distinct from the first idea, throwing someone open is a way to get the receiver into the clear. The receiver can trust that he will be more open running toward the thrown ball than if he stayed where he was.

I was still marinating in this phrase today and thought perhaps there is a bit of pastoral application. Sheep should be able to trust that when their shepherd leads in a particular direction, they will become more Christlike than if they stayed put. A pastor should protect his sheep, leading in a way that, even if they can’t see a certain temptation or difficulty coming, they are kept away from threats as much as possible. He should always lead his sheep to a more holy place on the field. In other words, pastors should throw their sheep obedient.

• The Earth is Not Flat
• Six Lies Teenagers Believe
• Implications of Adolescence on Youth Ministry (Pt 1)
• Implications of Adolescence on Youth Ministry (Pt 2)
• Resolutions Towards Young Adulthood

The thirteen books of my Confessions whether they refer to my evil or good, praise the just and good God, and stimulate the heart and mind of man to approach unto Him.

The entire book is a prayer to God, and contains, as we would suspect based on the title, confessions of his sin. But unlike so many modern self-absorbed testimonies, Augustine is not the hero, or even the main character of the story. He portrayed himself as wicked and in need of help. When he found himself doing well, he directed the credit away from himself. For example, he encouraged his friend Darious in a letter (AD 429),

Accept the books of my Confessions which you have asked for. Behold me therein, that you may not praise me above what I am.…If there is anything in me that pleases you, praise with me there Him whom I wish to be praised for me–for that One is not myself. Because it is He that made us and not we ourselves; nay, we have destroyed ourselves, but He that made us has remade us.

The Confessions were, therefore, primarily about God, not Augustine.

[It is the very purpose of this book] to give the impression that Augustine himself was a weak and erring sinner, and that all of the good that came into his life was of God…this whole account of his life history…up to its crisis in his conversion is written…not that we may know Augustine, but that we may know God: and it shows us Augustine only that we may see God. (BB. Warfield, Studies in Tertullian and Augustine, vol. 4 in The Works of Benjamin B. Warfield (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1920; reprint, Grand Rapids: Baker, 1991) 267).

Not only does Augustine’s depravity unfold, but also his intimate love for God emerges in little phrases like, “God of my heart,” “God my sweetness,” “[God] my late joy.” (Brown, 167) The Confessions narrate the change in Augustine’s heart (Brown, 169), and exhibit the enormous difference between confessions that focus on God and confessions that focus on self.

On the first page of Confessions, he swiftly and succinctly summarized man’s greatest joy, and the reason why men so often fail to experience that joy.

You stir man to take pleasure in praising You, because You have made us for Yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in You. (I. i.)

Men are made by God to worship Him, not out of duty, but for their delight. The Confessions are Augustine’s personal testimony of his restless heart’s journey to that delight in God. It is the story of empty, yet enslaving sinful pleasures that kept him from the greatest pleasure, God. It recounts the increasing misery and unhappiness of his soul with “ferocious honesty” (Brown, 171).

As he grew from infancy into boyhood, he noted:

I myself was meanwhile dying by my alienation from You, and my miserable condition in that respect brought no tear to my eyes. (I. xii.)

He had heard the truth, but he preferred “seductive delights” (I. xv.). He understood that it was part of God’s judgment to let men remain in blindness: “By Your inexhaustible law You assign penal blindness to illicit desires” (I. xviii.). Yet the Lord disciplines those He loves. “There can be no surprise that an unhappy sheep wandering from Your flock and impatient of Your protection was infected by a disgusting sore” (III. iii.).

But he still could not escape his lust. “The single desire that dominated my search for delight was simply to love and to be loved” (II. ii.).

I was in love with love, and hated safety and a path free of snares.…I was without any desire for incorruptible nourishment not because I was replete with it, but the emptier I was, the more unappetizing such food became. So my soul was in rotten health. (III. i.)

Sin makes a man stupid. Even though the further one moves away from God, the more miserable he becomes, he also becomes less interested in returning to God. God gave Augustine what he (thought he) wanted in order to make him more miserable.

I aspired to honors, money, marriage, and You laughed at me. I those ambitions I suffered the bitterest difficulties; that was by Your mercy–so much the greater in that You gave me the less occasion to find sweet pleasure in what was not You. (VI. vi.)

I was full of my punishment, but I shed no tears of penitence. (VII. xx.)

God was systematically showing him what sin really looks like.

You took me up from behind my own back where I had placed myself because I did not wish to observe myself, and You set me before my face so that I should see how vile I was, how twisted and filthy, covered in sores and ulcers. And I looked and was appalled, but there was no way of escaping myself. If I and You once again placed me in front of myself; You thrust me before my own eyes so that I should discover my iniquity and hate it. I had known it, but deceived myself, refused to admit it, and pushed it out of my mind. (VIII. vii.)

He was a slave to his sin until God delivered him in Milan. At the end of August, 386, he and a small group of friends hosted a Christian man, Ponticanus, who told Augustine and his friend Alypius about the monks in Egypt and of their founder, Saint Anthony. While Augustine listened, his heart burned with guilt and he withdrew into a garden beside the house. The following is one of the most memorable testimonies in church history.

I threw myself down somehow under a certain fig tree, and let my tears flow freely. Rivers streamed from my eyes, a sacrifice acceptable to You, ad (though not in these words, yet in this sense) I repeatedly said to You: ‘How long, O Lord? How long, Lord, will You be angry to the uttermost? Do not be mindful of our old iniquities.’ For I felt my past to have a grip on me. It uttered wretched cries: ‘How long, how long is it to be?’ ‘Tomorrow, tomorrow.’ ‘Why not now? Why not an end to my impure life in this very hour?’

As I was saying this and weeping in the bitter agony of my heart, suddenly I heard a voice from the nearby house chanting as if it might be a boy or a girl (I do not know which), saying and repeating over and over again, (Tolle lege, tolle lege) ‘Pick up and read, pick up and read.’ At once my countenance changed, and I began to think intently whether there might be some sort of children’s game in which such a chant is used. But I could not remember having heard of one. I checked the flood of tears and stood up. I interpreted it solely as a divine command to me to open the book and read the first chapter I might find.…So I hurried back to the place where Alypius was sitting. There I had put down the book of the apostle when I got up. I seized it, opened it and in silence read the first passage on which my eyes lit: ‘Not in riots and drunken parties, not in eroticism and indecencies, not in strife and rivalry, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh in its lusts’ (Romans 13:13–14).

I neither wished nor needed to read further. At once, with the last words of this sentence, it was as if a light of relief from all anxiety flooded into my heart. All the shadows of doubt were dispelled. (VIII. xii.)

God can even use the “bulls’-eye” approach to Scripture reading. God granted him repentance and faith brought peace to his previously restless heart.

You called and cried out loud and shattered my deafness. You were radiant and resplendent, You put to flight my blindness. You were fragrant, and I drew in my breath and now pant after You. I tasted you, and I feel but hunger and thirst for You. You touched me, and I am set on fire to attain the peace which is Yours. (X. xxvi.)

Last year in one28 we were Starting at the Beginning. This year it’s time to move ahead. It’s time to make progress.

But making progress is difficult, especially in the Christian life. The world is against us. The evil one is against us. Our own flesh is against us. We travel a hard road. The path is narrow, often steep and slippery. The way is lined with naysayers hurling insults and discouragements toward us. We are afflicted, perplexed, persecuted, and perhaps even struck down and dying.

And yet, the difficult Christian journey demonstrates God’s perfections more than if there was no journey (meaning if God took us to heaven immediately) or if the journey was always triumphant (meaning if crowds applauded and praised us all along the way).

One compelling witness to the demanding and God-exalting Christian journey was John Bunyan. In his autobiography, Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners, Bunyan wrote about preparing for life in the Bedford Prison (pictured above) for his unwillingness to give up preaching the gospel.

Before I came to prison, I saw what was a-coming, and had especially two considerations warm upon my heart; the first was how to be able to endure, should my imprisonment be long and tedious; the second was how to be able to encounter death, should that be here my portion.…[T]hat saying in 2 Co. 1:9 was of great use to me, “But we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but God which raiseth the dead.” By this scripture I was made to see, that if I would ever suffer rightly, I must pass a sentence of death upon everything that can properly be called a thing of this life, even to reckon myself, my wife, my children, my health, my enjoyments, and all, as dead to me, and myself as dead to them.

The second was, to live upon God that is invisible.

His imprisonment lasted 12 years. In effect, his wife was a ministry widow like few others; his children–the oldest blind–were pastoral orphans. How did he endure? The key paragraph of Scripture that informed his resolve was 2 Corinthians 4:16–18.

So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

Integrating Paul’s call to look to the things that are unseen, and Bunyan’s commitment to live on God that is invisible, we get our 2009-10 theme: Living on Unseen Things.

To live on means to survive solely by consuming a certain thing. Unseen things are the “not” seen, things hidden from sight. In the spiritual realm, the unseen things include gospel promises, gospel principles, and God Himself, all of which are eternal.

• Gospel promises include: eternal life, eternal inheritance, and final transformation.
• Gospel principles include: death shows life, weakness shows power, pain increases pleasure, suffering increases capacity for glory.
• God Himself: understood as the righteous Judge, understood as the merciful and preserving Savior.

We will not work and pray and suffer and sojourn and die to the glory of God unless we live on unseen things. The theme will weave throughout our ministry year as follows.

Living on Unseen Things

The 2010 Snow Retreat will take the same name as our year’s theme: Living on Unseen Things–The Key to John Bunyan’s Christian Journey. Bunyan’s life and teaching are of great profit for our own pilgrimage.

Pilgrim’s Reading

In preparation for the 10SR, and because it’s devotionally good for the soul anyway, we’ll be reading The Pilgrim’s Progress as a ministry. The link above provides a schedule for finishing the book the week before the retreat begins. Small groups are encouraged to talk about the reading at their bi-monthly meetings.

Genesis

Sunday mornings we’ll continue our trek through the Book of Beginnings. Though he’d never seen rain before, Noah lived on God’s word that a flood was coming. And assuming we get to chapter 12 sometime this year, we’ll see that Abram (and family) left their country and kindred for a land unseen as the LORD directed.

1 Peter

On corporate one28 Wednesday nights, Jonathan Sarr will preach through 1 Peter, an epistle written to elect exiles (pilgrims), about an yet-to-be-fully-revealed salvation and an eternal inheritance (in a Celestial City). Though we have not seen Christ, we love Him (1 Peter 1:8–9) and follow His example as He entrusted Himself to the (unseen) One who judges justly (2:23; 4:19).

Devoted to Prayer

Our GBC Saturday seminar this year is titled, Devoted to Prayer–Wearing Knee-Holes in Hardwood Floors. Apart from rightly dividing God’s Word, I can’t think of any more pivotal exercise for living on unseen things than prayer.

Within a short month of announcing the theme to the one28 staff, the challenge to live on unseen things has been furious for me. I’m going to need this theme like the diseased need a doctor. My guess is, so will you. Though there’s a year-full of meditation and application ahead, the following quote from Bunyan’s autobiography paves a clear path.

I had also this consideration, that if I should now venture all for God, I engaged God to take care of my concernments.

Let us make progress and venture every step this year for God.

If God hadn’t promised never to flood the earth again, would He see that the wickedness of man is great in the earth and that our intentions and thoughts and are conduct are evil and destroy us today? Are we really less corrupt than those in Noah’s day, or are we as bad as, or maybe even worse than, the sinners in Genesis six?

There’s no doubt about it: the weight of wickedness in Genesis 6:1–8 is crushing. First of all, the corruption was so bad that God flooded the earth and destroyed the entire population, save one family. That’s a fact. Their extreme evil warranted extreme judgment.

Second, the depth of depravity is divinely described as “every intention was only evil continually.” Their evil was exhaustive (each and every thought), exclusive (without exception), and extensive (all day, every day).

Third, there was demonic influence, and offspring, among men. Driven by sensual lust, the “sons of God” had offspring with the “daughters of man.”

Fourth, men had hundreds of years to “perfect” their sin, to invent new ways to be wicked, to hone their corruption. Even though Moses didn’t list the years of Cain’s descendants–he only does so for Seth’s line in chapter five–the average lifespan was long enough to make 120 years a significant punishment by limitation (v.3). It’s hard to imagine how soiled a soul would be after 200, 500, or 800 years.

Fifth, though not all, many of those in Genesis six lived lives that overlapped with Adam himself. They could have seen and talked to Adam about the exquisite garden, and about the deceiving serpent. They could have heard firsthand experience about how much better fellowship with God was compared to forbidden fruit, from someone who lost more blessing than anyone due to his disobedience. Yet other than Noah, men rejected in-person revelation, the likes of which have never been since.

It’s no wonder the LORD was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and it grieved Him to His heart.

The question is, then, how do we compare? How heavy is the weight of our wickedness?

First, who says that “every intention of the thoughts of (man’s) heart (are not still) only evil continually”? Scripture doesn’t ever reverse or repeal the Genesis 6 statement after the flood. In fact, none is righteous, no not one. No one seeks God. All have turned aside. Men are slaves of sin, tyrannized under it’s corrupting power. Men walk in sin, follow the course of this world, follow the serpent, and live in the passions of the flesh and are children of wrath by nature. This is not better.

Second, demonic assault is no less a threat today. We may not talk about it as much or see demonic offspring walking among us, but Satan’s schemes are no less effective and destructive. We wrestle not against flesh and blood but against cosmic powers over this present darkness against spiritual forces in the heavenly places. The devil prowls no less today like a lion, seeking prey to devour. That’s not better.

Third, men may have had hundreds of years to fine tune their sin, but we have hundreds of cable TV channels to tune into other people’s wicked ideas, thousands of movies to rent and songs to download, and millions of websites with the ugliest, most God-dishonoring trash in the universe. We need not apply creative energy toward corruption, we can adopt from (and pay) those innovators before us. We can soil our souls in an unimaginable number of ways that those in Noah’s days couldn’t have dreamed of. That’s not better.

Fourth, we may not have met Adam, but we reject the inspired Book that includes Adam’s story. In fact, unlike those in Genesis 6, we reject a complete canon of God’s special revelation. More than that, we live after God’s incarnate revelation of Himself, God the Son, God in flesh, God among us. His life and work are recorded for us, yet we reject the living and written Word. That’s not better.

Finally, though the sin in Genesis was so bad that God destroyed the earth’s population in one swell flood, *our sin is so bad, so offensive, so wretched, so God-dishonoring, that God wounded His only Son for our transgressions*. He crushed Christ for our iniquities. He laid on Jesus the iniquity of all us who believe. One death was far more brutal, more painful, and more severe than all the combined deaths in the flood. That’s not better.

Maybe a comparison between pre-flood depravity and modern day depravity isn’t quite apples to apples, but we can say for certain that things were bad then, and things are bad now. There is no place for smug self-righteousness on our part. For whatever else Genesis 6:1–8 works in our souls, it should convict us, humble us, and cause us to seek God’s mercy for our own rebellion. We would be wrong to see the pre-flood wickedness and not consider our own corruption. We would be wrong to see God’s sorrow over, and seriousness about sin and not grieve over, repent from, and seek forgiveness in Christ for our own soiled souls.

The Roman Empire, c. AD 395

THE CHRONOLOGY OF AUGUSTINE’S LIFE

354 — Thagaste

Augustine was born November 13, 354, in Thagaste, a small city in northern Africa. His father, Patricius, was a poor, unbelieving farmer, though his mother, Monica, was a devoted Christian in the Catholic church (which was the only orthodox church). Augustine was 16 when his father professed faith; he died a year later. Augustine later lamented that his father

did not care what character before You I was developing, or how chaste I was so long as I possessed a cultured tongue–though my culture really meant a desert uncultivated by You, God. (Confessions, II. iii.)

366 — Madera

From 366 to 369, between the ages of 11 and 15, Augustine went to school in Madera, about 20 miles from Thagaste. His father desired that his son to have the best education possible; education was the only way out of poverty for a young man like Augustine. He was “acutely anxious to be accepted, to compete successfully, to avoid being shamed, terrified of the humiliation of being beaten at school” (Peter Brown, Augustine of Hippo, 35). After those three years, he spent a year at home (370) before leaving for additional schooling.

371 — Carthage

Carthage was the big city. Boys from small towns all over northern Africa came to study, and to play, in Carthage. Augustine came to Carthage as a 17 year-old full of lust.

I went to Carthage, where I found myself in the midst of a hissing cauldron of lust.…My real need was for You, my God, who are the food of the soul. I was not aware of this hunger. (from his Confessions, quoted in Piper, 47)

Augustine discovered the theatre in Carthage, and wrote “it was a world ‘full of reflections of my own unhappiness, fuel to my raging fire’” (Brown, 39). His only shame was that he wasn’t as bad as his friends.

I went on my way headlong with such blindness that among my peer group I was ashamed not to be equally guilty of shameful behavior when I heard them boasting of their sexual exploits.…I went deeper into vice to avoid being despised, and when there was no act by admitting to which I could rival my depraved companions, I used to pretend I had done things I had not done at all, so that my innocence should not lead my companions to scorn my lack of courage, and lest my chastity be taken as a mark of inferiority. (Confessions, II. iii.)

He took a concubine, who we might call a live-in girlfriend, or more palatably, a mistress, and lived with her for 15 years. It was socially acceptable but never acceptable to his mother. In five million words of published works, and even though she bore him his only son, Adeodatus, he never mentions her name.

Augustine was a slave to the praise of men and the love of women. For all his external success and advancement, dissatisfaction grew within him.

373 — Thagaste/Carthage

He went home to Thagaste for a couple years to teach grammar, then returned to Carthage for nine years (374–383) to teach rhetoric. During this time Augustine became part of a religious cult, the Manichaees. Along with other heretical beliefs, these followers of Mani were dualists, teaching an eternal battle between the good spirit and the evil flesh. This temporarily soothed Augustine’s guilty conscience, because Manichaeism claimed that sin wasn’t really the fault of a person, it was the fault of the person’s body. Manichaeism was so dishonorable that Augustine’s mother didn’t even let him back in the house.

Ironically, he grew tired of the apathetic, out of control, rebellious students in Carthage.

383 — Rome

He moved to Rome when he was 29, believing that he would find better students there. He did not. The students often skipped out on the teacher before the final class when their tuition was due.

384 — Milan

Desperate to get away, burnt out by pathetic students and the politics of Rome, he moved to Milan. Most significantly in Milan he met the bishop Ambrose. Augustine enjoyed Ambrose’s teaching style as well as his explanation of parts of the Bible Augustine had misunderstood. Now 30 years old, Augustine realized many of his previous objections to Christianity were based on untrue things.

While living in Milan, his mother arranged a wife for him. Marriage would make Augustine proper in her eyes. In his eyes, it was merely a way to advance his career. He sent his concubine back to Africa though he said, “this was a blow which crushed my heart to bleeding. I loved her dearly” (quoted in Brown, 88). He never married and took another mistress. He was unwilling to let loose of, and unable to escape, his lusts.

That is until 386. His conversion deserves more attention later, but after getting saved, Augustine returned to Thagaste in 388. His mom died in 387, and soon after, his son died.

391 — Hippo (Regius)

Augustine aspired to start an monastery now that he was a Christian. Hippo was a fairly large city, and more importantly, the church already had a bishop, so Augustine figured he would be free from broad, public, ministry responsibility. Much like John Calvin, however, others soon pressed him into the role of assistant bishop (396), and five years later he became the primary bishop. Augustine served the church in Hippo for almost 40 years until his death in 430.

For a number of years he spent his mornings arbitrating legal cases. I can’t imagine how much I would hate that; Augustine hated it too.

Augustine would visit jails to protect prisoners from ill-treatment; he would intervene, tactfully, but firmly, to save criminals from judicial torture and execution; above all, he was expected to keep peace within his ‘family’ by arbitrating in their lawsuits. … Augustine would listen for hours while families of farmers argued passionately about every detail of their father’s will. (Brown, 195, 226)

He spent much time writing against the Manichaean heresy, and during the last few years of his life, he debated Pelagius over the issue of man’s depravity and the place of God’s grace in salvation. Augustine himself listed over eighty heresies he had fought against (Brown, 35–56).

Possidius, a friend of Augustine, wrote about him as a “man who ate sparingly, worked tirelessly, despised gossip, shunned the temptations of the flesh, and exercised prudence in the financial stewardship of his see” (“Augustine,” Wikepedia, accessed January 3, 2009.)

Based on the frequency and tone of his references to Monica, I personally tend to think he was a bit of a momma’s boy. I also suspect that after salvation he swung a little too far toward the “fasting” side and missed out on the “feasting” side of enjoying God’s gifts to His people. Yet I have come to love Augustine as a tenacious pastor and a prolific author, who wielded a worldview always ready to magnify God, and who had remarkably great optimism regarding God’s work in and through the church. He was constantly trying to resolve tensions that were within himself, learning and making progress till his death.

In [Augustine] we discover heart and mind married in an intimate union where deep, thoughtful theology, rooted in Scripture and never afraid of condemning error, nonetheless burns and sings with a spiritual vibrancy that makes most modern piety seem pale and sickly by contrast. (Needham, 43)

But the reason I find him so compelling, the reason I think God graciously chose to use him as an instrument to change the world, is because he saw sin for what it really is. He loathed his sin and lauded God’s grace.

I have done a few things since April 1st. Much of my time in April and May was spent preparing for June, because in June I spoke 25 times in 21 days starting June 5th with the Grace Academy high school graduation. The next morning I flew to Fresno to meet up with my friend Greg Perkins, youth pastor at Grace Community Church in Madera. We headed to Silver Spur Camp and Retreat Center in Tuolumne for his junior high and high school summer camp titled, Branded: What it means to live like Christ.

The following Thursday I flew from Fresno to Columbus for our seemingly annual summer trip to Ohio (see my posts from 2006, 2007, and 2008). Mo and the kids flew from Seattle on Friday to meet me. The next speaking go-round was for the Reformation Conference at Faith Bible Church. Last year they asked me to preach on the five points of Calvinism. This year they asked for follow up messages. I titled the series: We Are Not Our Own: The Implications of Calvinism, driven by this quote from Calvin in his Institutes:

We are God’s: let us therefore live for Him and die for Him. We are God’s: let His wisdom and will therefore rule all our actions. We are God’s: let all the parts of our life accordingly strive toward Him as our only lawful goal. (3.7.1)

The audio for each session is available if you’re interested.

• The Heart of Calvinism — How to Live Like a Whole-Hearted Calvinist
• God May Perhaps Grant Repentance — How to Correct Opponents Like a Calvinist
• For the Sake of the Faith of God’s Elect — How to Tell THE Story Like a Calvinist
• Created to Walk in Good Works — How to Obey Like a Calvinist
• Born Again to a Living Hope — How to Suffer Like a Calvinist

After the church conference I traveled with the youth from Faith Bible to Cedar Lakes Conference Center in Ripley, West Virginia, home of the best Gino’s pizza parlor. This year was the tenth time I’ve spoken at their camp and I covered The Myth of Adolescence.

We flew back to Washington a week ago tonight, but returning home has been little rest. One of the things requiring much work is the serious remodel at our house. I took the following video on my (new 3GS, yeah, that’s right) iPhone to provide a small glimpse into our new, but hopefully only temporary, look.

That’s it for now. It was something, and that’s the deal I made with myself earlier today. If you’re reading this in Google Reader or the like and are thinking about clicking through to leave a comment about how glad you are to see a post from me or share some other encouraging word, don’t bother. Comments are now closed indefinitely. Maybe I’ll have more to say about that decision later, maybe not. For that matter, the old Void posts are absent, though they will eventually reappear from the www abyss. Feel free to email me if you have questions or concerns or well-wishes, or send me a Facebook message, though you should probably keep in mind that I don’t do Facebook any more than I do découpage or herbal tea.

The condensed version aired on ABC was almost useless, overhyped and overedited. As long as you can stomach multiple BlackBerry commercials, watching online is the way to go.

For the record, I think Driscoll spoke graciously, boldly, and biblically on the issue at hand, especially while sharing a stage with the “super-spiritual.“¹ Deepak has no problem loving himself, and his love cup appears to be full as ever. Most importantly, Driscoll proclaimed Jesus as the only way of salvation and the ultimate Conqueror of Satan. His unaired closing statement, in which he read 1 John 5:19–20, could not have been better chosen.

But one particular part of the night keeps percolating in my head. After the opening statements from all four participants, the moderator pursued the Why? questions with Driscoll. I don’t know if he wanted to jab Driscoll with the apparent lunacy of believing in a good God who allows Satan to run amuck, or if he was giving Driscoll a bona fide head start. Either way, he volleyed the question back multiple times.

I haven’t found a transcript of the debate anywhere, so I (unofficially) typed out the interchange of interest, the beginning of Part 3 titled: Fairytale Versus Faith. I’ll be right back after these messages.

Moderator: Pastor Mark, if God is a loving God, why would he create Satan?

Driscoll: I think he created angels and people, and He gave us the capacity to have free will. For their to be virtue, there must be the possibility of vice. And that’s what distinguishes those of us, people and angels, from other forms of creation: trees, animals and the like. We have volitional will, we have consciousness, we have moral decision-making. And so God didn’t create evil, God didn’t create injustice or tyranny or oppression. He created free will in angels and people. And Satan and the demons and humans beings have chosen to disobey, to rebel, and that’s the source of the trouble.

Moderator: And so He can create us, and He could create the devil, and we can engage in evil, but He didn’t create that, the results?

Driscoll: No, initially, according to the teaching of the Bible, Satan was an angel. Angels are perfectly good. Those that didn’t rebel, the Bible says that they honor God and they help us and they are spirit beings that assist in God’s purposes on the earth. So Satan started as one of those, and then went astray. And so he walked away from God’s intention for him, he’s a rebel.

Moderator: So why would God allow somebody who’s an avowed enemy of God, to continue to exist? Why doesn’t God just stop it?

Driscoll: Yeah, and the point of the cross of Jesus, according to Colossians 2, is that, on the cross, in dying for our sins, Jesus canceled the right that Satan had to rule over us, to influence our thoughts, to have an effect on our eternity. And that ultimately Jesus is coming back to put a final end to Satan and his work. So we’re in the middle of history, and the Bible says that God works out all things for good, and so ultimately Satan will be ultimately, finally, defeated. Sin and all of its effects will be lifted, and the earth and humanity will be returned back to the state God intended, which was very good.

Moderator: So even though God loves us, He does allow Satan to exist in our lives, tempt us, and make us miserable?

Driscoll: And He also sends Jesus to die for our sins, sends God the Holy Spirit to tell us the truth so we don’t believe [Satan’s] lies, to give us the strength to say no to his temptations. And He allows and enables us to win in the battle we are in spiritually.

Moderator: Why create that choice? Why not just let everything be peaceful?

Driscoll: Well, I think if you don’t allow choice, the theologians will say you don’t have love. That love requires volition, and that God does not want automatons, He wants persons. And so the argument is made that if God were not allowing choice, then you wouldn’t have evil, but you would also not have love.

Now I understand that on a stage like this, quick-fire answers are the norm and must be addressed to a general audience. And again, the emphasis on the final defeat of Satan by Lord Jesus is unmistakable and commendable. But I think his answers at this crucial point are weak.

Of course, Driscoll serves the conservative bread-and-butter explanation behind the Why? “For their to be virtue, there must be the possibility of vice.” Men must be able to choice. True “love requires volition.” “[I]f God were not allowing choice, then you wouldn’t have evil, but you would also not have love.” After that last statement, much of the crowd erupted with clapping and cheering. We are not automatons, and “theologians” suggest this gives God greater glory.

I think there are two severe, biblical problems with that answer: man showed no virtue with his choosing ability, and also, man’s love for God, even at its best, is no great demonstration of love.

Man Showed No Virtue with His Choice

Driscoll–and I’m really only picking on him because the Face-Off was recent and seen by so many, as well as because I think his answer does represent the majority position–put forward that there can be no virtue where there is no, at least possibility of, vice. Let’s grant that proposition for the sake of argument.² God created the first man, Adam, placed him in a paradisiacal garden, and prohibited him from only one thing: “of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat” (Genesis 2:17).

As the story goes, Satan lures Eve through a serpent, she bites, and gave to her husband and he ate. With his “choice,” man disobeyed. It’s worse than that, actually.

1. Man rebelled. Adam intentionally defied the only prohibition given to him.
2. Man ran. When the LORD God came to fellowship with man, Adam took his wife and hid. He attempted to conceal himself from God. (Genesis 3:8–10)
3. Man rationalized. Not only did Adam fail to answer God’s questions directly, he blamed the woman and God who gave him the woman. (Genesis 3:12)
4. Man didn’t even repent. After disobeying and beginning to experience the negative effects, you’d think Adam would have anxiously confessed and pleaded for God’s mercy and forgiveness. He did nothing of the sort.

So my question is, where is this great virtue that man displays with his choosing ability?

God showed patience with Adam and pursued him rather than push him away. Though He does punish the man, God also makes preparations to redeem him. God does not wait for us to cry out to Him, because we won’t. Even Adam, pre-fall and pre-sin nature, failed to show any virtuous choosing. The answer to “Why [did God] create that choice?” cannot be to show something noble about man.

Man’s Love for God is No Great Demonstration of Love

Driscoll states that “if God were not allowing choice, then you wouldn’t have evil, but you would not have love.” I think I agree with what he said, but not with what he meant.

What he meant was that robots, if they could “love,” would love because they were programmed to do so, not because they wanted to. If love is going to mean something, it has to mean something to the one loving. Robots carry out a task; they do not care. Who wants affection-less, android love?

But let’s say that Adam didn’t eat from the fruit of the tree, that he recognized his sweet deal: a gorgeous, God-given, perfect partner, the opportunity to steward and rule the planet, a fantastic home, daily, face-to-face fellowship with his Maker, and only one restriction. What degree of love would Adam demonstrate by loving the One who gave him all that?

Isn’t that the gist of Satan’s accusations toward Job? “Of course he’ll love You! You’ve given him everything he could ever want!” (Job 1:9–11 It is no surprise when men love those who love them (Matthew 5:43–48), nor is it a wonder that much love comes from those forgiven from many sins (Luke 7:41–47). Besides, why wouldn’t Adam–or we–love the infinitely lovely anyway?³

I agree that the Genesis 3 story is about love. God writes Satan and evil into the script for the sake of love.⁴ But it is not love from man, it is love for man that is the climax. The fall is all about love. However, and here’s the point:

God is not glorious because forgiven rebels love Him. He is glorious because He loves and forgives rebels.

For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die–but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:6–8)

Full demonstration of God’s holy love and the riches of His glorious grace are the reason He endures vessels of wrath. His love is the infinitely eminent love, proven by His initiating sacrifice.

Greater love has no man than this, that someone lays down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. (John 15:13–14)

If Satan and evil and vice exist so that man has choice, and then can choose virtue and love, then that plan failed miserably. Man chose–and we by nature keep choosing–sin. And even if we had chosen obedience, our love for the most worthy-to-be-loved Being in the universe would be no awe-inspiring thing.

Again, the answer to “Why [did God] create that choice?” cannot be to show off something about man’s love. What is amazing and glorious and worth singing about for eternity is that amazing love that bled for Adam’s helpless, unlovely, rebellious race. Rather than trying to defend God by asserting man’s ability for virtue and love, we should settle our feet in the stirrups of a God-centered worldview that enables us to ride through life hating sin and Satan, yet never wavering in confidence (and even celebration) that God is in control over the rough terrain.

All material from the Rightly | Dividing seminar is now available for free to anyone interested. I summarized the goal of the seminar as follows in my original announcement here on the Void:

Rightly | Dividing aims to move believers beyond personal Bible reading to Bible study. There are many useful Bible reading plans, and for that matter, much excellent material is available from good Bible teachers. But this seminar hopes to train people how to understand and depend on the Book, not only on teachers of the Book.

The mp3 audio, m4v files with my slides synced to the audio, and my notes for each session are good to go. Take whatever you want from approximately six hours of teaching, including topics such as how to prepare for study, basic principles (hermeneutics) for Bible study, how to find the point of a paragraph, and recommended tools for further study.

• Session One — Making Preparations for Bible Study
• Session Two — Surveying Contexts in Bible Study
• Session Three — Identifying Genres in Bible Study
• Session Four — Collecting Tools for Bible Study
• Session Five — Embracing Paragraphs in Bible Study
• Session Six — Taking the Next Steps in Bible Study

The second lie teenagers believe is that they are, intrinsically, irresponsible. “Research” shows their brains have not yet fully developed so they can’t be expected to act appropriately. They are not ready to answer for their actions. Experts define adolescence as an extended season for experimentation and prolonged preparation. The teen years are for development and responsibility must be deferred.

Inevitably, the teenagers is a disappointment, whose combination of adult capacities and juvenile irresponsibility sows personal heartbreak and social chaos.” (Hine, 8)

Our government doesn’t hold teens responsible. We’ve created an entirely different legal system to segregate younger lawbreakers from older ones. We’ve written new laws with lower standards because we don’t think they are able to make right decisions and behave appropriately. Many parents, teachers, and youth ministries have done basically the same thing by postponing opportunities to fail, as well as by protecting young people from the consequences of wrongdoing. We’ve gift-wrapped the excuse for them.

Shifting blame and shirking responsibility is as old as sin. Adam did it first when he sidestepped culpability in the garden–and he wasn’t even a teenager (Genesis 3:12). “It’s not my fault; it’s her fault.” And then he went even further and said “It’s the woman You gave me.” Adam was shameless enough to claim his sin was God’s fault.

Teenagers walk a similar path of unreasoning when they disavow responsibility. “I’m just a teenager.” Who does that blame? It implicitly points the finger at God. It’s almost as if they said, “God is in control of how old I am, and since He has me in this stage of life as an adolescent, He can’t hold me responsible.” They also take that to mean no one else can either.

But here is the crucial question: when a teenager disobeys God, is it a lesser offense in God’s sight? Is the penalty for adolescent sin more along the lines of purgatory rather than eternal death? No. God’s law opens no loopholes for teenagers. His standard remains perfection for all His creatures, including those who are still growing. We may be slow to hold teens responsible morally and spiritually; God is not. Church leaders, especially those of us who are parents or youth pastors, do young people no favors by failing to prepare them for God’s judgment.