I wrote an article for the Spring 2010 print issue explaining why To An Unknown God does not have a statement of doctrine. Darren Hsiung has challenged some of the arguments I made in that article, helping me clarify a few thoughts. The exchange also makes me believe it would be worthwhile to publish a post explaining my understanding of what a statement of doctrine is and what its proponents hope it will accomplish. (Again, within the context of explaining why To An Unknown God does not have a statement of doctrine.)

A statement of doctrine, statement of faith, confession of faith, creed, or other similarly-titled document is a summary of the beliefs subscribed to by a particular organization or church. The most famous such creeds (from credo, Latin for “I believe”) are the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed. As summaries or explanations of beliefs, creeds may be helpful, but my concern is that they often become something more: a means to stymie discussion and silence opponents.

The Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed

The church existed — and flourished — for a long time without the aid of any creeds. The Apostles’ Creed, despite its name, did not originate with the apostles but rather was first formulated around the year 150, several generations later. The Nicene Creed was not formulated until the fourth century.^[1]

The earliest creeds were developed in response to contemporaneous beliefs that were considered heresies. Those creeds were originally baptismal vows intended to distinguish true believers from the heretics. For instance, a close examination of the Apostles’ Creed shows that it was constructed as a reaction to the Marcion and Gnostic heresies, which accounts for many of its particular phrasings and explains why certain statements were chosen for inclusion in the creed.^[2] Likewise, the Nicene Creed was a reaction to Arianism.^[3]

Those gathered at the Nicene Council who opposed the Arians found that they were unable to clearly reject Arianism using only Scripture.^[4] The Arians relied on verses such as Colossians 1:15, John 14:28, and Proverbs 8:22 to argue that Jesus was not God himself but rather was the first created being. Although many of Jesus’ claims about himself do point to his divinity and to the doctrine of the Trinity, nothing in Scripture clearly explains that doctrine. The Nicene Council was nevertheless determined that Arianism had to be soundly and forever rejected. Those at the council therefore considered it necessary to adopt a statement of doctrine that went beyond Scripture.

The Nicene Creed states that Christ is “begotten” of the Father and that he is “of one substance with the Father.” Both of these beliefs were hotly debated before, during, and after the council. For instance, some feared that the Nicene Creed came close to denying the doctrine of the Trinity by proclaiming that Christ was “of one substance” and they instead suggested the phrase “of a similar substance.” Their opponents countered that “of a similar substance” suggested the existence of three gods and thus rejected monotheism.

Even today, there are important controversies about what it means that Jesus is the “Son of God” or “begotten” of the Father. For example, the February issue of Christianity Today reported on the active debate over translations of the Bible that refer to Jesus not as the “Son of God” but as “the Beloved Son who comes (or originates) from God.” The latter translation is more palatable to some Muslims who viscerally reject the notion that God had sex with Mary to give birth to Jesus. Christians, of course, also reject that notion, but do we really understand what it means that Christ is the Son of God? Or could we explain how our conception of “Son of God” is different from the translation “the Beloved Son who originates from God” that Christianity Today reports many Christians have rejected as heretical?

Although many Christians mouth the words in church every Sunday, few could give even a passing explanation of what it means that Christ is “begotten” of and “of one substance” with the Father. I might go so far as to argue that those statements lack meaning except insofar as they were once helpful to declare certain beliefs heretical. Can we humans really presume to describe the substance of God?

As the above examples show, even the earliest confessions were reactionary efforts to delineate between true believers and heretics. I do not object to creeds insofar as they represent attempts to summarize or explain certain Christian doctrines. The problem is that creeds have never been used simply as summaries or explanations — they have consistently been used to exclude, and in that capacity, they have often gained more weight and authority than Scripture itself. Some of the beliefs codified in these creeds are not clearly contained anywhere in Scripture, yet these creeds are used to marginalize and silence those who oppose them — even if the arguments of those opponents are rooted entirely in Scripture. It is to this reality that I object.

The Westminster Standards and a Contemporary Example from the PCA

A significantly longer statement of faith that has achieved particular prominence within certain Protestant denominations is the Westminster Confession of Faith. The Westminster Confession itself runs about 12,000 words, not including the two catechisms, the Shorter and the Larger (together, these documents are referred to as the Westminster Standards). As would be expected of such a long document, it draws significantly more inferences from Scripture and makes more judgments about theology than the much shorter creeds. Yet it is still primarily used as a reactionary document. It was for allegedly violating the principles of the Westminster Standards that Peter Enns was suspended and later dismissed from Westminster Seminary in Philadelphia.

The Westminster Standards have their roots in a political compromise reached during the English Civil War. In 1643, the parliaments of England and Scotland signed the Solemn League and Covenant. Part of this agreement pledged to “endeavour to bring the Churches of God in the three kingdoms to the nearest conjunction and uniformity in religion, confession of faith, form of church-government, confession of faith, form of church-government, [and] directory for worship and catechising.” A group of more than a hundred clerics was assembled by the English Parliament for the purpose of writing a statement of faith that could be agreed to by both the English and the Scots. The underlying purpose of the English Parliament in signing the Solemn League and Covenant was to secure the loyalty of the Scots against Charles I.^[5]

The confession written by the assembled clerics was eventually adopted, with amendments by the English Parliament (including an amendment that followed Parliament’s request for the clerics to add Scripture references to back up their statements). As originally adopted, it declared that the Pope was the Antichrist and that civil rulers have the authority to root out heresy in the church. Of course, it was nonetheless an admirable distillation of many important theological concepts, albeit in much longer form than some of the earlier creeds.

In light of its history, the contemporary reverence some denominations accord the Westminster Standards strikes me as particularly odd. As with other creeds, it has often come to supplant Scripture as the final arbiter of religious disputes. For instance, it was not against Scripture that the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) recently measured the work of theologians such as N.T. Wright, but rather against the Westminster Standards. Although acknowledging that the Westminster Standards are subordinate to Scripture, the committee charged with evaluating N.T.Wright and the Federal Vision theologians reiterated that the Westminster Standards have been adopted by the PCA “as standard expositions of the teachings of Scripture in relation to both faith and practice.” From their treatment of the Westminster Standards, it appears the committee actually viewed those Standards as superseding Scripture, since the report (which was eventually adopted in whole by the PCA General Assembly) used only the Westminster Standards to critique the views of N.T. Wright et al., on its way to concluding that those views were incompatible with the Westminster Standards and were thus not to be taught by pastors in the PCA.

I’d like to take a moment to examine in detail the apparent logic of the leaders of the PCA. They acknowledge that the Westminster Standards are subordinate to Scripture. When some well-respected theologians, however, make sound arguments from Scripture that seem to be at odds with the Westminster Standards (at least as interpreted by one committee — others took issue with their analysis), they instruct the pastors in their denomination not to preach the views of those theologians, warning them that it is their duty “to condemn erroneous opinions which injure the purity or peace of the Church.” Why? Because the views of those theologians disagree with the Westminster Standards, not because they disagree with Scripture – as noted, the committee did not even attempt to address whether the theologies subscribed to by N.T. Wright and the Federal Vision theologians were consistent with Scripture. So, what is subordinate to what in the PCA?

The above incident in the PCA is ironic in light of the fact that the Westminster Confession itself declares: “The Supreme Judge, by which all controversies of religion are to be determined, and all decrees of councils, opinions of ancient writers, doctrines of men, and private spirits, are to be examined, and in whose sentence we are to rest, can be no other but the Holy Spirit speaking in the Scripture.” (I.10). In other words, the Westminster Confession itself commands that the Westminster Standards are not be used to determine religious controversies. Instead, the Westminster Confession commands that the Bible is to be used.

Conclusion

As I hope the examples above demonstrate, statements of doctrine are often, in practice, used to silence or ostracize opponents. It is because these are the primary uses of creeds and statements of doctrine that I believe they are particularly unsuited for a Christian magazine whose purpose and very name dedicate it to being an open forum for discussing Christianity.

When Paul confronted the Athenians, he stood before an idol dedicated “To An Unknown God” and declared: “What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you.” He proceeded to engage the Athenians in dialogue, even quoting their own philosophers and poets. Likewise, we will not silence those with whom we disagree but will rather engage them in conversation, hoping that it may help them, and us, better understand the mysterious gospel that we proclaim.

Footnotes

[1]Justo L. Gonzalez, The Story of Christianity: Volume 1, The Early Church to the Dawn of the Reformation (New York: HarperCollins, 2010), 78–79.

[2]Ibid., 77–78.

[3]Ibid., 188–189.

[4]Ibid., 188.

[5]Justo L. Gonzalez, The Story of Christianity: Volume II, The Reformation to the Present Day (New York: HarperCollins, 2010), 204.

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See you on the flip side.

“Well,” I said, “they say the author is going to argue that no one goes to hell at the end. It’s actually pretty controversial, because Rob Bell is an evangelical pastor, not just a liberal or something.”

“Just looking at the back,” she said, her voice rising somewhat, “I mean, I want to know more.” The back of the book has a picture of Rob Bell in profile, wearing a black suit vest and a white dress shirt, with unbuttoned sleeves scrunched up and the collar undone. His head is shaved, his glasses are those same heavy black frames as usual, he is wearing what – at my church in Berkeley – the pastoral staff calls “the Britney mic,” and he is under a spotlight. The rest of the cover fades into black. Beside the figure of Rob Bell is the following text: “‘God loves us./ God offers us everlasting life by grace, freely, through no merit on our part./ Unless you do not respond the right way./ Then God will torture you forever./ In hell.’/ Huh?”

“Oh, yeah, well, it’s pretty talked about,” I responded.

“Okay,” she said, “if you have a problem with your purchase, you have thirty days to return it. And —” she hesitated, “if I’m on shift when you come in, could you tell me more about the book?”

“Okay,” I said.

Commentators, ranging from Mark Driscoll to John Piper to Donald Miller to, well, everyone with a Christian hat, it seems, have been anticipating that Rob Bell was going to make a universalist apology for the non-existence of hell from an evangelical perspective.

Love Wins isn’t that. It’s something far more complicated and far less interesting than that.

I thought about writing a post, when I began reading this book last night, about several different ways of reading Bell’s sermon/poemish/apology thing, but I’m not sure that this text is amenable to that kind of treatment. So this post isn’t a review, it’s not a position, it’s my thoughts after reading. So far.

1. This book took me four hours to read at a leisurely pace. At two hundred pages, it goes down easy. At first, anyway. At first, I found the book pleasurable. I knew what it was, a highly accessible affirmation of God’s grace and ultimate restoration of all things that finally found a way to gloss hell in such a way that it was no longer offensive or surreal. He kinda did this: I mean, really, it was more or less The Great Divorce and maybe “The Weight of Glory” by C.S. Lewis, just more “postmodern” and less well-written. Then I found the book irritating. Then I disagreed with a position he took, and then became even more irritated because later it turned out that he hadn’t actually meant what he meant when he said what I disagreed with, and had in fact just been unclear. Then afterward I felt greatly perturbed and angry, and found more and more to take exception to.

2. For one thing, as a book, as a book-artifact, Love Wins displeases me. I think the cover design is unappealing. Also, I really dislike the font, and the paper quality is terrible. I mean, the paper-grade is hardly better than that of a trade paperback, and this book is priced as a regular hardback. And I really dislike the font, I think, especially because Rob Bell uses a similar font in every single book he’s published. It tends to be a sort of unremarkable but large sans-serif that disturbs the flow of reading because it looks unlike most fonts used in mainstream books, but at the same time is unlovely, so its difference is more an irritant than a point of aesthetic composition of the book as a book artifact, which clearly Rob Bell has always been interested in. As can be seen in the way which he often has the paper in his books gilded on the edges not with… um… gilt, but dyed in bright primary colors. Or the way Sex God is printed on pink paper in pink ink, which really grossed me out when I picked up a copy when he came through Berkeley my sophomore year. I didn’t buy that copy because of the way the book looked, even though I had found his talk interesting, particularly his reliance on Jewish ritual. It was all… cream and pinks and made me feel uncomfortable.

3. This isn’t me nitpicking, or there’s a reason why I’m nitpicking. If this book really were about its message, then I don’t think he would have made all these blatant choices about its packaging that are so clearly supposed to be aesthetic choices. I just don’t know why. I mean, I am completely unmoved by it, except to be kind of irritated and puzzled.

4. Does anyone know what is up with the constant line breaks? It’s like he thinks he’s writing a poem if he puts every new clause on the next line, and will do it at regular intervals, but to be perfectly honest, the cadence and rhythm of doing this is very much lost on me. I read poetry for fun and such, write it occasionally, so usually I pick up on why line breaks like this are supposed to be meaningful or at least have a musicality and affective power to them. Even a reviewer referred to this as a “poetic masterpiece.” How so? I wouldn’t even call this a prose poem, even though there are a few lines that made me stop for a second. Here, I marked a few:

“That’s why wealth is so dangerous: if you’re not careful
you can easily end up with a garage full of nouns.” (pg. 44)

“Paul [...] mentions Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom he has ‘handed over to Satan to be taught not to blaspheme.’ (Something in me wants to read that in a Darth Vader voice.)” (pg. 89) [This is sort of funny, but he did use “whom” wrong, which is one of the more pretentious of fails. (Or wait, is that the correct usage of “whom”? Because a more pretentious fail, of course, is to incorrectly correct someone’s use of “whom.”) Did HarperOne even care about this book? Did it even get copy-edited?]

Actually, those were the only two lines I marked, and they’re not that good. I mean, not really poetic masterpiece, in my opinion.

5. Speaking of how much HarperOne put into this… there are other odd things about this book. For one thing, Rob Bell took a photograph of some super-tacky, mass-produced painting his grandmother had (because he wanted to make fun of Thomas Kinkade and also, I guess, Dante) and discuss its creepiness. This was sort of interesting, but apparently HarperOne or HarperCollins couldn’t find the painter or the copyright holder, so they just stuck it in with a little blurb under permissions that said “if anyone happens to know what this is, let us know, and we’ll correct it and put it in future editions.” Almost literally, they said that. I mean, maybe it is difficult to pinpoint where a painting like that would come from, but are the standards of attribution in a hardback book from an imprint of a mainstream publishing house really equivalent to those of, I don’t know, Tumblr? (Not to knock Tumblr: it’s just that it’s, you know, Tumblr. And I didn’t pay $22.99 for Tumblr.) Also, in the acknowledgements, Rob Bell thanks some of his friends for giving “perspectives and feedback” on drafts. (He uses the word “perspectives” a lot in this book.) Not suggestions, not criticism, not assistance. Perspectives. Also, there were no end-stops after each of the acknowledgments, as if each person’s contribution were a floating sans-serif thing unto itself in pulpy off-white space.

6. Words he uses a lot: brilliant, beautiful, unnerving, disturbing, multilayed, multi-BLANK, perspectives, streams, intricate, “love wins,” “Which is it?”, here, now, mechanism, etc. He uses a lot of adjectives. I wanted to take him aside at the end and say, “you know, just because you repeat a set of adjectives about the thing you are talking about, that doesn’t necessarily mean that what you are talking about corresponds to those adjectives.” For example, I’m not sure the gospels are beautiful and brilliant, or that the biblical Jesus is either of those things. This comes up a lot in Christian contexts, “beautiful Jesus.” Why exactly is Jesus beautiful? I was under the impression that he was sort of uncultured, short, and unattractive. I think this actually kind of bothered people at the time when he claimed to be the Messiah. Didn’t add up.

7. This book doesn’t particularly add up, either. For one thing, I found myself highly confused as to how extensively Rob Bell reads. There are no footnotes, which I guess is okay for this kind of thing, but I found myself writing in the margins: “Hegel, Hegel, René Girard, Donald Miller, Buddhism?, that sacramental theologian who wrote For the Life of the World because he also repeats the phrase “for the life of the world” a lot when speaking of the Eucharist, Hegel, Talmud?, Marx, Jean Baudrillard?, Huh?” But mostly Hegel, or a highly simplified Hegel, flavor of Hegel, which made me wonder, “is this guy dumbing his ideas down, or is he just sort of picking up on some ambient intellectual vibe, or am I just really reading into this too much?” This is particularly confusing because at the end of the book, he suggests for further reading Tim Keller, C. S. Lewis, and N. T. Wright among others (but not many others), who are all fairly vanilla sorts of Christian writers. Did he do this in order to shore up his evangelical street cred to make his controversial book somehow not controversial? And if so, is he not aware of how this book is being sold in the first place? As controversial? Is he really suggesting he came to this position via Timothy Keller?

8. Also, I didn’t miss the fact that Bell did not gender God. He gendered Christ, obviously, but did not use a pronoun to refer to God at all. This is sort of cool, but it’s so sneaky, and annoys me.

9. I find it rather telling that I simply cannot engage with his central argument. I’ve written seven paragraphs on style, technique, and execution, and I am simply loath to actually try and say something about his argument. I keep on thinking, any number now, that I’ll get to it, but really I just want to criticize this book as a book and as a piece of writing. I want to find his little distinctions and choices and point out how I think they fall short or make me feel weird. This is, actually, exactly what Rob Bell does in this book to the dominant evangelical narrative of heaven and hell. He introduces doubt, problematizes a totalizing hermeneutic by pointing out inconsistencies in scripture, reframes and redeploys all sorts of concepts, such as hell itself, so that… well, it’s just hard to really hold on to any one strand of thought, which he says is his intent. At the same time, his final word is that we should trust God – who at one point he actually compares to The Force in Star Wars, by the way – and God’s love for us. That’s nice, but after having read the book, I don’t feel trusting. I feel uncomfortable, because his whole approach was to knock his reader off-center to get them to come to a new perspective, any new perspective, as along as it’s different from the one they already hold. I don’t know what that has to do with trust.

10. I think what really bothers me about this book is that the questions he is addressing are serious questions I want an answer to, that I want engaged with in great depth. And he gives slick, unequivocal answers and gives me little evidence as to why I should trust them. And that bothers me.

In conclusion, I leave with you a question: Do they have better fonts in hell?

Every morning, I go for a swim at a nearby pool. The earlier I arrive, the better chance I have to get a whole lane to myself. But as I arrived late on the day in question, the pool was full; I was forced to share a lane. Huffing and puffing in frustration, I descended into the water. Mind you, this pool is mostly utilized by those falling into the elderly category, so even though I am no Olympic swimmer, I usually am the fastest guppy there. On this day however, there was one other young girl, though she was also very slow. But she was beautiful. And since she was in a swimsuit, as we all were, her outfit didn’t leave much to the imagination – she really was exquisite. Immediately, I felt a jolt of insecurity. I mean, I’m there to swim, not to show off, and so I’m sure I look pretty ridiculous with my violet swim cap and rainbow suit (hand-me-down, courtesy of my mother). Anyhow, I suppressed the feeling, and began to freestyle. At least I’m faster than her, I thought, subconsciously.

There were three of us there in the lane: me, the beauty, and a woman of age (and I mean a lot of age, to put it delicately). The lane was very narrow, and so it was very hard to avoid contact as we passed each other. I had to choose between being kicked or swimming into the wall to avoid human touch. I would have had to slow down my pace to let someone pass without bruising.

Yet I refused to alter my routine. I needed to swim 1000 meters (50 lengths) in 25 minutes, or someone was gonna get hurt (probably me)! My frustration grew with each stroke, as I had to continually (and uncomfortably) rotate my head to check if one of them was in my way. Each time I passed one of them, my subconscious would utter either ah, what does this old lady think she’s doing! or why does the prom queen have to come to this pool? The older woman was a bit on the large side, so I resented the fact that she left me so little room. And the young girl, in contrast, had such beautiful legs, that I was full of envy every time we crossed paths. Then, there were times when they were both at the end of the lane, leaving me no room to touch the wall and keep my momentum on the round-about! So I would instead stand up, turn around, and start flopping towards the other side, obviously demonstrating my anger.

I realized though, as I neared my 1000th meter, that the reason I am so much happier when I have the whole lane to myself, is because I don’t have to share or accommodate anyone else. I can swim as sloppily as I want, without having to consider anyone but myself. But instead of getting that from the get-go, I harbored anger towards them both, feeling superior to the elder, because I’m younger and stronger, and feeling inferior to the young lass, because she was so beautiful, even in a swim cap.

It’s interesting how, often, we are more prone to sin when in the context of others. There is no opportunity to compete when we are alone, but in community it is so easy to feel either inferior or superior, and we hold so much at stake in our egos, that we forget about God, that He created us as we are, and that it is not arbitrary that I look as goofy as I do in a swim cap.

This post is not going to be very long, and it’s not intended to be all that formal, or to take any kind of extreme or even fully articulated position. I think I’ll be posting my reponses to this book (once I get it) and the controversy surrounding it for a while, and probably with less sarcasm, though maybe not. I have a simple question I want to pose to whoever reads this. I don’t know if it’s too simple or not, but it’s something I wonder a lot:

Orthodoxy means going the right way, and heterodoxy means going a different way. It has to do with being “in” a certain current of thought within a certain group of people, or being “out” of it. It has to with being part of a group, or being outside a group (or part of another group, vaguely designated as, for example, Christian universalism).

So my question is, what’s so particularly Christian about that?

For these reasons, I am going to make yet another attempt to explain why I think stewarding our donations carefully is important and why I think it is imperative that all Christians, even those who are only able to give a little, make an effort to investigate whether the organizations to which they give actually use their donations wisely.

I think there are several reasons why some have struggled to understand my arguments.

First, many of us feel that our own contributions are so insignificant that our influence is but a “drop in the bucket.” These thoughts make us feel powerless and voiceless. We may even believe that we are excused from culpability for donating unwisely: after all, what difference could we really make?

The problem is that if every donor thinks this way, no one will ever investigate what a charity does with its contributions, and charities that misuse their money will never be held accountable. I hope we can agree that there are ministries that do misuse contributions. For instance, in recent years, there have been news stories about a pastor who drives a $350,000 Bentley and receives a salary of almost $1 million per year. Or about another pastor who receives a similar salary and owns a private jet. In addition to their financial excesses, one of those pastors has been credibly accused of sexual misconduct and the other of taking illegal “kick-backs” from a housing program associated with his church. If no one did any investigation before making donations, such ministries might continue to flourish while those whose leaders are so committed to their missions that they live in poverty so that they can serve the poor might receive nothing.

On the other hand, if all donors believed that their voices did matter, donors could profoundly influence how organizations steward their contributions. As I have suggested, donors who discover that an organization does not use its money wisely should consider several courses of action:

• Write a letter to the organization expressing concerns about how it uses its resources.
• Spread the word. Write a blog post informing others about how that organization uses its money. Encourage others to also express their concerns directly to the organization’s leadership.
• Withhold donations in favor of other organizations that make better use of such money.

Over time, if all donors followed these steps, organizations that misuse donations would either reform themselves or cease existing. At the same time, organizations that steward their donations well would flourish, bearing much fruit for the Kingdom of God.

Even if the ways some organizations “misuse” contributions are less extreme that the examples I give above, I still think Christians should follow these suggestions when giving. These suggestions will help keep organizations accountable to their real missions: serving God by meeting the unmet physical and spiritual needs of a hurting world and thus spreading the gospel. When we consider that almost 3 billion people in this world live on less than two dollars a day, we realize that small decisions about how organizations use their money really do matter. Even several dollars can make the difference between life and death for people who are living in extreme poverty. Likewise, small amounts of money can go a long way toward spreading the gospel in such areas.

Second, some misread my arguments because they do not understand the concept of “opportunity cost.” Opportunity cost is a term borrowed from economics to describe a simple concept that we all apply every day, whether we are conscious of it or not. The basic idea is that we all have a limited amount of resources (time, money, etc.). Whenever we use a given resource, we are forfeiting opportunities to use that resource to do something else. The opportunity cost of a given choice is the next-best alternative that we pass up in order to make that choice.

For instance, think about what you did last Saturday night. What would have done had you not been doing what you actually did? The answer to that question is the opportunity cost of doing what you did. So, if you watched a movie instead of going to a party, going to the party was the opportunity cost of watching the movie.

This concept applies when we think about donating money because the choice we make is not simply a choice about whether or not to give to a certain organization. Rather, the real choice we often make is whether to give to Organization A or to Organization B. Therefore, it is necessary that we not just ask whether Organization A does some good. We must instead ask: is giving to Organization A a better use of my money than giving to Organization B (or C, or D, etc.)? This question is unavoidable: every time we give to one organization, we are forfeiting the opportunity to give to another. There is no way around this fact.

As I have argued before, Jesus gives us a clear command that we are to think wisely about how we use our money.In Matt. 25:14-30 and Luke 19:12-27, a master entrusts his servants with money, goes away, and then comes back and asks them for an accounting. In each case, the master rewards those servants who have used well the money entrusted to them, earning more money. These two parables are often taught in churches, typically with the admonition that we must use our gifts to serve God. Although this teaching is surely faithful to Jesus’ intent, it misses out on the original, more direct application: we are to be careful what we do with “our” money, which is not really ours at all — it is God’s. (See Matthew 25:14-30 and Luke 19:12-27.) I therefore believe it is sinful to blindly give to an organization without conducting at least a cursory investigation of that organization’s ministry. Such an investigation should include questions about how the organization spends its money, what its mission is, how it accomplishes that mission, how central its mission is to the gospel, who its leaders are, etc.

Third, I think a few have objected to the application of the principles I advise because of a gut reaction: well, I know this ministry, I’ve seen that it does good in the world. For instance, I have criticized Franklin Graham for taking a salary of $1.2 million. People may object to my criticism of Franklin Graham because they have been to his crusades or participated in Operation Christmas Child. I’m not denying that such ministries may do some good. I’m saying: let’s help them do more with the resources they have.

How? Well, the pressure that the Charlotte Observer put on Franklin Graham led him to cut his compensation in half and to restructure other parts of his ministries’ finances, including eliminating such wasteful expenditures as spending $1 million per year on lawn care. That’s a lot of money that the Charlotte Observer freed up so that it could actually go to the real mission of those ministries. If Franklin Graham’s organizations now spend $900,000 less on lawn care and $600,000 less paying him, then they have $1.5 million to use for their ministries. It’s as if the Charlotte Observer gave the ministries a check for $1.5 million.

On the other hand, if the Charlotte Observer had been unsuccessful at persuading Franklin Graham to spend his organizations’ money better, donors may have decided to give to other organizations instead. Eventually, that financial pressure may have influenced Franklin Graham to make the same decisions. In the meantime, those donations could have gone to other organizations that were already devoting much more of their money to support the same work. Either way, more money would end up going to the real missions that presumably motivate people to give to Franklin Graham in the first place.

I hope that this post facilitates an understanding of why I think stewardship is important and how we call all take part in holding Christian organizations accountable for the money we give.

In case my argument is still unclear, I have also provided an example here of how these suggestions might work in practice. If you still have questions after reading my example, please post a comment.

Facts

Mary lives in a simple world. She is a citizen of the country Red, which has a population of 10,000 people. The average income of people in Red is $50,000 per year. Mary makes a salary of $50,000. Mary is a Christian, as are one quarter of the people who live in Red.

There is one other country in the world: Blue. The population of Blue is 100,000 people, and most of the people who live in Blue are very poor. About 95 percent of the population in Blue makes less than $100 per year. Many are in constant risk of starvation and lack the money to afford simple medical treatments. About one quarter of the people who live in Blue are Christians.

There are four Christian ministries in the entire world: Matthew, Mark, Amos, and Obadiah.

Matthew and Mark devote their ministries primarily to evangelism. They share the gospel with people in both Red and Blue. In addition to evangelism, Amos and Obadiah also provide food and medicine to the people in Blue who are at risk of dying because they need food and basic medical care.

Each of the organizations had a total budget of $200,000 last year, and this is how they spent it:

Matthew

Salaries: $100,000 to Matthew; $50,000 split between two assistants.
Programs: $25,000 to putting on 5 “crusades” that each drew 100 people.
Overhead: $15,000 for office space and $10,000 for travel expenses.

Mark

Salaries: $25,000 to Mark; $75,000 split between three assistants.
Programs: $85,000 to putting on 34 “crusades” that each drew 100 people.
Overhead: $5,000 for office space and $10,000 for travel expenses.

Amos

Salaries: $25,000 to Amos; $50,000 split between two assistants who work in Red; $25,000 split between 25 assistants who work in Blue, where the cost of living is much lower.
Programs: $85,000 towards food and medicine for people in Blue.
Overhead: $5,000 for buildings and $10,000 for travel expenses.

Obadiah

Salaries: $75,000 to Obadiah; $60,000 split between two assistants who work in Red; $15,000 split between 10 assistants who work in Blue, where the cost of living is much lower.
Programs: $25,000 towards food and medicine for people in Blue.
Overhead: $15,000 for buildings and $10,000 for travel expenses.

Mary wants to spread the gospel to non-Christians in both Red and Blue, and she also wants to help many of the poor people who live in Blue. Mary has 9 Christian friends who each make $50,000 per year. Last year, Mary and her Christian friends each gave away $10,000: $2,500 to each ministry. In other words, Mary and her 9 Christian friends gave, in total, $25,000 to each Christian ministry.

Mary only recently discovered how each of the Christian ministries spends its money. Mary’s friends still do not know what each Christian ministry does with its money.

Issue

How should Mary donate $10,000 that she wants to give away this year? What, if anything, should she say to her friends?

Answer

Mary should give $5,000 to Mark and $5,000 to Amos. She should write a letter to Matthew and Obadiah explaining why she is not giving them a donation this year and encouraging them to emulate the careful stewardship of Mark and Amos.

Mary should also tell her friends how the four ministries use their money and try to convince them to also give all of their donations to Mark and Amos and to write letters to Matthew and Obadiah explaining why they are giving to Mark and Amos instead.

Analysis

If Mary follows the suggested course of action and successfully convinces her friends to follow her lead, and if everything else stays the same, Mark and Amos will each receive $225,000 in donations this year, and Matthew and Obadiah will each receive $175,000.

Because Mark and Amos use their money more efficiently, they will be able to put more money towards the goals of evangelism and helping the poor people in Blue. The additional amount that Mark and Amos devote to such work will more than make up for the amount that Matthew and Obadiah lose.

Thus, in the end, more people will hear the gospel and more people will receive needed food and medical supplies because Mary chose to give her money to Mark and Amos instead of Matthew and Obadiah and because she convinced her friends to do the same.

Chances are, Matthew and Obadiah will do some soul-searching as a result of receiving 12.5 percent less in donations. The letters from Mary and her friends will explain why they received less money and tell them what happened to it. It is likely that Matthew and Obadiah, especially if they are led by an independent board of directors instead of by Matthew and Obadiah alone, will decide to trim their expenses and make their operations more efficient.

Therefore, in the following year, they will devote a higher percentage of their money to their core mission, and even more individuals will hear the gospel and receive food and medical treatment.

My position on Rome in the Holy Catholic Church

Before proceeding with an account of the UiC deliberations, I wish to give my position as I stated it on my blog before the vote:

To deny [Newman] membership without clear and rigorous principle, I think, would be both sectarian and bigoted. It’s my hope that, with the progress of dialogue and theological growth in the Holy Spirit, Rome will be reformed of its errors and impieties – including its claims of supremacy in [God’s] Church – and its bishop [i.e. the Pope] take his [proper place among the bishops].

Many Protestants and Eastern Orthodox Christians, I think, could agree with these sentiments, both the hope for genuine unity and the demand for theological and practical reform in the Church of Rome. As faithful believers in an idolatrous Israel were called to pray for God’s mercy and Israel’s repentance rather than ceasing to identify with Israel at all, so I believe it necessary for those of us who are not in the Church of Rome to reason with our brethren rather than practically disclaim connexion to the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.For more detailed discussion, I direct the reader to Bishop Joseph Hall’s No Peace with Rome (1611). In this book Hall wrote that the catholic Church, of which the Church of England formed a part, had fallen into corruptions, of which the Church of England had now purged herself, and that the Church of England should denounce the errors of the Church of Rome without denying her catholicity.

The hitches in principle

Without clear principle, nothing can reasonably bar any part of the Church, however different, from fellowship with any other part. The principle potentially barring Newman from membership at the time of the vote was related to UiC’s mission and Statement of Faith, to which all member groups formally subscribe.Though I would prefer the Apostles’ Creed, the Nicene Creed, the so-called Athanasian Creed and additional material from the Augsburg Confession, UiC has its own Statement of Faith drawn from scratch. The purpose statement at the head of the UiC Constitution begins as follows:

We, the Christian communities and fellowships of UC Berkeley, united invisibly by Christ in His body, establish this group, Unity in Christ (UiC), to provide a visible structure for our mutual fellowship and sharing of gifts. The purpose of UiC is:

(1) To promote unity and fellowship of Christians around Christ;
(2) To assist and support one another in prayer, service, and evangelism;
(3) To facilitate and provide support for new students seeking churches and Christian fellowship.

The first item listed is unobjectionable but often bland in practice; the second and third vary in difficulty according to theological difference: a Calvinist, for instance, may easily object to some of the ways in which an Arminian teaches the faith in evangelism, and a Charismatic may find it very hard to endorse a fellowship whose leaders are Cessationists. Nevertheless, the constitutionally stated purpose of UiC is the context in which to understand the UiC Statement of Faith as well. To the purpose articulated, the Statement of Faith includes the following article for members to subscribe to:

God’s mercy is only because of the righteousness of Christ imputed to humankind, and this justification is received by faith alone.

Newman’s leaders and designated contacts have always claimed to be able to subscribe to this article in good conscience. Though not doubting their sincerity, I continue to have concerns, concerns that have not been eased by the answer given to a question posed as to what Newman took to be the requirements for salvation. The answer had three distinct ideas, which I shall treat in turn:

(1) Disclaimer: Within Newman there may be different personal views.

This first statement, while a necessary corrective how many Protestants view Roman Catholics, is irrelevant to the question. Diversity of views is normal in any church: what matters is whether the group’s official position allows its leaders to subscribe to the UiC Statement of Faith. As far as I know, this position must include the doctrines defined by the Council of Trent in the 16th century, with any dogmatic adjustments made by subsequent councils of the Church of Rome (e.g. Vatican II).

(2) The one definitive factor is (profession of) faith in Jesus as Lord and God.

This second statement is unclear. It certainly accords with statements made by Protestants,Indeed, this statement from the Newman contact person attaches even more weight to the self-conscious profession of faith than I would as a firm Protestant. but the question at hand applies more specifically to the UiC Statement of Faith, and whether Newman’s leaders can subscribe to all its articles, including the article on justification. Part of the fault lies with the question, since it asked more broadly about the doctrine of salvation, not particularly about the doctrine of justification, but the answer did fail to address the issue of the meritorious grounds for a believer’s justification.

(3) Acts and works of kindness will come from true faith: with God’s compassion and Jesus’ gift to humanity, how would you not want to express God’s love to others?

This third statement, while true and affirmed by all, is irrelevant. The question is not whether works follow from faith but whether the Christian believer is reckoned righteous on the sole grounds of Christ’s righteousness outside the believer, a righteousness received through the believer’s faith. In essence, can a believer be reckoned righteous for Christ’s merits alone, without reference to any merit, internal to him, for which God owes him something by right?

Newman’s subscription to the UiC Statement of Faith requires first understanding of the ideas it contains and then assent to those contents.Whatever the statements set forth by the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, this requirement holds in the particular case of Newman. While I question the idea of Christ’s righteousness being reckoned to all mankind (except in a general sense, by the Incarnation as completed in the Crucifixion), preferring to state (1) the reckoning of Adam’s sin to Christ and (2) Christ’s obedience as the sole meritorious grounds for God’s declaring the Christian righteous,Double imputation, the notion that god the Father regards Christ’s good works as having been done by the believer, has been and still is a matter of disagreement among Protestants, but the sole source of merit according to Protestant doctrine is the perfection of Christ: ‘Forgiveness of sins being previously given, the good works which follow have a value different from their merit, because whatever is imperfect in them is covered by the perfection of Christ, and all their blemishes and pollutions are wiped away by his purity, so as never to come under the cognizance of the divine tribunal. The guilt of all transgressions, by which men are prevented from offering God an acceptable service, being thus effaced, and the imperfection which is wont to sully even good works being buried, the good works which are done by believers are deemed righteous, or; which is the same thing, are imputed for righteousness.’ still I can subscribe to the Statement in good faith. It is not clear, however, that the Newman contact, for his part, understood the required article well enough to speak officially for his group’s subscription to the Statement.

The results

The vote on Newman’s prospective UiC membership took place without another meeting with Newman contacts, a week after the visit I have examined above. At the time of the vote, at least some who had taken part in the deliberations were not satisfied with the information upon which they were asked to make a decision, and it seemed that the answers, whether by design or not, evaded the matters at hand.

While Newman has been formally admitted, I find in the process a lack of clarity that has not served the interest of true concord. Where clarity could have been had, I believe that last semester’s schedule put a premature stop to measured deliberation, and so I had rather that the process had been either started earlier in the fall semester or continued into the spring semester.Whether the awkward timing was part of any party’s intention I do not know, nor do I find it useful to speculate; but if the timing was a political manœuvre on anyone’s part, whether in favour of admitting Newman or against, I call upon those at fault to repent publicly. Some in attendance must have had concerns about the little time given for deliberation, if not about the inadequacy of the answers given by the Newman contact. It is quite possible that these problems have led to unresolved resentment at a vote whose momentum trumped the desire of some for greater caution.

Church unity is hard work. It cannot be achieved by mere momentum, and like marriage will not allow problems to be swept under a rug.

Knowing I am not alone in my dissatisfaction with the answers given by Newman regarding the article on justification in the UiC Statement of Faith, I call for clearer discussion of the matter, even if further discussion reveals facts that we would rather not see. Discussion may even lead to conclusion that Newman was not well admitted at the time of the vote or that the Constitution must be changed because, like it or not, Newman is part of the (reformed and unreformed) Church in Berkeley. What the future holds, I cannot say. Nevertheless I feel compelled to break the silence, because the feeling of Church unity, even enshrined in official documents, cannot stand in for genuine unity. Such discussion as I urge will demand both commitment to apostolic doctrine and willingness to talk honestly without giving unnecessary offence. In the absence of either, the Church here will suffer either an erosion of doctrinal bounds or an unspoken sectarian hypervigilance. And either an overpermissive or a schismatic spirit would lead away from biblical faith and practice and, like all sinful habits, impair our ability to serve God in the way he calls us to serve.

We need to keep talking.

I haven’t read the book yet, obviously, but I’ll tell you right now: Hell totally exists.

I say that Hell exists because I think that Hell exists. As in, when I think about going to Hell, something very much comes to mind. Something like burning, or eternal pressure and repetition of meaningless activities, or a nothingness conceived as either utter black or utter white. When I think about how I do not want to go to Hell, I tend to get very anxious to define exactly where and when the descent begins so that I can avoid falling into the sinkhole, a hand reaching up to catch my ankle and pull me down. But I can only draw imaginary lines on an imaginary map, if I hold Hell in my mind, if I see the sinkhole I wish to avoid. I feel very afraid and scared and paralyzed, and almost frantic to behave myself somehow, somehow, to avoid falling to the demon who I see waiting for me around every unexplored corner. But maybe I see the demon because the demon is already here.

Maybe I think I’m going to Hell because I’m already in Hell. Because I already hold Hell in my mind.

I am told that this is part of the human condition. I am also told that it not part of the Christian condition. I am told that Jesus Christ saved my soul, more than my soul: he saved my entirety, my self, my world. Therefore I must conclude that Hell in my mind is a lie, a demon who must be sustained by mere force of thought. I do not know why I would do so. Hold Hell in mind, and construct the City of God on top or alongside it.

Most Christian pastors, most philosophers in the west (and the east, actually), more or less conclude that this sort of makes sense. It has some sort of purpose, holding nothing in mind around which I or the human race as a whole set up a system or anti-system of thought and behavior.

I do not think they have thought about this enough. It doesn’t make sense to me, anyway.

Pardon my arrogance. Or ignorance, which often, funnily enough, looks like the same thing. I can’t help it if it seems that our intellectual inheritance, or my share of it acquired through the books I’ve read and the four years I’ve spent at UC Berkeley, is incomplete. I can’t help it if the thought has occurred to me that there is really no point in believing in Hell, in feeding Hell, living by its rules, and that its promise of exaltation or degradation to the Man who would throw himself off a cliff to be lifted up by angels is a false one. That this original sin of ours, while real, while universal, is in fact a lie. And that the gospel means that the truth is out. The Kingdom of God is upon us, where he will wipe every tear from our eyes, and the lion will sleep with the lamb, and everything we thought we knew has already been turned on its head if we have eyes to see and ears to hear the good news. Hell is other people, says Sartre. Maybe the good news is that Heaven is other people. Maybe the good news is that it depends on how you look at it.

Maybe Heaven can’t wait.

I actually don’t know, though. I’m not Rob Bell.

Gay and Christian

I am gay and Christian. For many, these are seen as contradictory identities. I must admit that this essay is part of my “homosexual agenda” to normalize LGBT Christians to evangelicals. I’ll make my agenda, both for this essay and in life, explicit at the outset: I want to share my story as I’ve experienced and interpreted it; and I want other LGBT people who read this and have trouble reconciling their faith with their sexuality to be encouraged.These goals aren’t completely accomplishable in this essay or in my lifetime, but this essay is a good start.

I grew up in an evangelical family and church. My experience of evangelicalism growing up actually defies many of the stereotypes: we weren’t anti-science; we weren’t anti-intellectual; we were loving. I’ll admit that we were Republican, though, which is a stereotype. You’ll notice I keep saying “we” in my description of my upbringing. That’s because I’m still proud to identify with my past. My father and mother were great parents, and it’s clear that they loved me. As a child, every night before bed, I’d give mom and dad a hug and kiss goodnight. In high-school, they’d go to my cross-country meets, marching band games, showchoir competitions, etc. They made sure I did my homework, and did it well. We were very involved in church, and as a child, they’d even take me to vacation bible school every summer. I remember accepting Jesus into my heart several times in my childhood, just to make sure I was actually saved. In any case, I’ve had a relationship with Jesus and His Church from a young age.

Fast forward to junior year at an evangelical college. I had dated three girls by that time, and all of the relationships lacked the physical. By that I mean that I could barely bring myself to touch them romantically – holding hands, hugging, being touchy, kissing, etc. My first girlfriend broke up with me largely because I wasn’t being physical with her at all. My third girlfriend actually got mad at me one night in the car, after almost three months of dating, because we’d never kissed, and she thought I wasn’t attracted to her – I wasn’t, but that wasn’t her fault.

So back to junior year of college. It was then I discovered that I was strongly attracted to men. Yes, it took me that long! I decided the best way to deal with it was to shove it out of my brain, ignore it, keep going after girls, and hope it went away. I did my best to ignore it, but it just wouldn’t go away. How did I discover I was attracted to men? I discovered because one day I caught myself staring at a cute guy and having sexual feelings for him. I wasn’t purposely staring, either. It was just natural and subconscious to me. By the time graduate school rolled around, I was catching myself staring at guys far too often, and in a way that never happened with girls.

It was then that I decided it was time to admit to myself that I was at least bisexual. I figured since I’d dated girls, and talked/joked about them sexually with friends that I must like girls at least a little. Also, I really, really didn’t want to admit I was gay. I figured that if I was bisexual, I could marry a woman, not tell my parents or family, and not live a dreaded life of celibacy. So I started telling friends that I was bisexual. Little did I know, but self-identifying as bisexual is pretty common for gay people as they’re “coming out of the closet.”

Things changed. As I started thinking more deeply about my sexuality and my past, I realized that not only did I only ever catch myself checking out cute guys and not girls, but I’d been checking out guys since puberty. I’d even purposely pick a shower locker next to attractive guys in high-school, and I remembered always having to distract my mind in the gym showers. I recalled also that my physical relationships with my girlfriends were practically non-existent. It was becoming ever clearer that girls were not my main attraction: I was gay. But I desperately didn’t want to be celibate and lonely, which I thought the Bible required of all gay people.

So I started looking at the moral arguments against homosexuality, and then the biblical arguments from pro-gay and anti-gay biblical scholars and theologians. Sure, anal sex seems unnatural. The primary function of an anus is pooping, but that doesn’t mean it’s wrong to use it for secondary purposes, especially when there are good reasons for doing so, such as a desire to have sex with someone whom you love. And Protestants put themselves in a pickle with the “unnatural argument,” because the primary function of semen is reproduction, yet most Protestants think birth control, condoms, oral sex, and masturbation are natural and morally acceptable, even though they thwart the primary function of semen. If they condemn anal sex because it’s unnatural, then why not these other forms of non-procreative sexuality? Sure, marriage and sex are often about procreation, but we let sterile people, old people, and people who don’t want children get married, and most of the time that people have sex, it isn’t for procreative purposes. Besides, LGBT people can and do adopt children. I certainly plan to. Sure, marriage has always involved opposite sexes, but for most of history it was also polygamous and focused on property rights. Most of the biblical heroes were polygamists. Sure, lots of gay people have promiscuous sex lives, but so do lots of straight people, and promiscuity is a chosen behavior, not an orientation. To be honest, all of the non-biblical arguments against homosexuality are very weak. It’s very hard to see how homosexual behavior, in itself, is harmful to self or society.

I’ve found the historical, biblical evidence to be ambiguous. The idea of a homosexual orientation didn’t exist in ancient times. So, the word “homosexual” is never actually found in the original text. Actually, the ancient of ideas of sexuality considered most adult same-sex behavior to be a form of gluttony. They thought it was excessive passion, due to boredom with women. Furthermore, most of the same-sex behavior in Paul’s time was exploitative and pederastic (i.e. man on boy). Paul does call same-sex behavior unnatural in Romans 1, but for various reasons I’m convinced his ideas of what is natural are probably culturally relative. We see a clue of this in the text itself, since the only other place Paul talks about unnatural behavior is in reference to hair length on men and women in 1 Corinthians 11. It’s unclear whether Paul would’ve known about loving, monogamous, marriage-like, same-sex relationships, since there are so few examples in the ancient data. And if he was aware of these relationships, was he referencing them or just the predominantly pederastic form of same-sex behavior?My exegetical examination of the historical data, and take on the few passing references to same-sex behavior is obviously not meant to be detailed. For a more detailed look, I suggest: Sex and the Single Savior by Dale Martin, or Frequently Asked Questions about Sexuality, the Bible and the Church: Plain Talk about Tough Issues.

If we’re going to allow reason and experience to guide our interpretations on evolution, divorce, usury, evil, prayer, slavery, and women, then why not homosexuality? Many who use the Bible to condemn homosexual behavior are a lot like young-earth creationists. They refuse to allow reason and experience to guide their interpretation of the text. They force reality to fit their interpretation of the Bible, and then insist that LGBT people must be rejecting God, and living depressed, promiscuous, and empty lives.

I think Christian sexual morality should be defined covenantally rather than biologically. I think orientation, gay or straight, is irrelevant to sexual morality. As a gay Christian, I strive for the sexual ideals of monogamy, fidelity, covenant, marriage, self-sacrifice, love, and joy. I think the primary purpose of marriage is found in Genesis 2:18: “It is not good for man to be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.”

I am gay and I am Christian. By and large, I live a happy and normal life. Part of my happiness and fulfillment in life is found in the relationship I have with my boyfriend, also a Christian. I admit that I’m a sinner, and I accept Jesus as my Lord and Savior. I accept the Nicene Creed. I try to love God and neighbor, and try to live life as Jesus would. I have an honest and credible disagreement about the historical context of the texts, and I have a credible disagreement about interpretive method. It’s often hard for me to love Christians who condemn my relationships, because sexuality and romantic relationships are such an integral and fundamental part of the human experience. Yet, Jesus calls us to love one another, especially when it’s hard. I pray that as this debate rages in the church, we all learn to recognize legitimate disagreement, and that we learn to genuinely love.If you’re an LGBT person who has left the faith because the church hurt you too much, why don’t you consider going back? Take a look at the Gay Christian Network. Find a Christian church that accepts you as an LGBT person. The Church hurt me, but it’s also the only place that can heal me properly. Healing often doesn’t come by rejecting the community and tradition you grew up in; it comes by working through it. As St. Augustine wisely said: The Church is a whore, but she’s your mother.