Love God with Your Minds

I absolutely love to read. I cannot even begin to describe the importance of reading excellent books from great men of God. God has given us incredible wise teachers and we should take advantage of that. Millions of people have walked this earth before us. While here, they have learned powerful lessons. Here's the cool part: some wrote about those lessons.

Proverbs 27:17 says, "As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another." Men can sharpen one another. Books are from men. Books can sharpen us.

I have read countless Christian books over the past several years. God has used those books to edify and grow me in ways that I cannot even begin to describe. However, a couple of months ago I needed a break. No, I did not need a break from edification and spiritual growth. God help me if I ever need a break from that. Rather, I needed a break from Christian books.

Let me explain so as not to be misunderstood. Since coming to college, I realized that I love to learn. I love it. In fact, it pleases God for us to learn. I believe we are disobedient when we are not learning. God gave us a brain for a specific reason. He gave us a brain so that we could glorify Him with that brain. Mark 12:29-30 tells us that one of the ways we love the Lord our God is with our minds. I think it is unfortunate that Christians do not realize that one of the ways in which we love God is by learning. Donald Whitney says, "God is glorified when we use the mind he made to learn of Him, His ways, His Word, and His world."

In our culture, we have unfortunately overemphasized experience, heart, and emotions and deemphasized learning. Think about it. The smart students in school have been thought of as "nerds." They are unpopular because they are intelligent. It's the underachievers and class clowns that get the attention.

This sort of thinking has played well with the postmodern church. Often the most popular Churches are the ones where the preacher has humor, stories, and "personality" (whatever that means). Rob Bell is the favorite among my generation. Because of his theology? No, it's because he dresses cool and his sermons tickle the ears. Miller's Blue Like Jazz is adored by many young emergent's, Young's The Shack tells a great story. The theology it teaches is adored because it is shallow and doesn't hurt anyone's feeligns. Grudem's Systematic Theology, though, is too rigid. I don't think I would compare Rob Bell to Joel Osteen, but he fits into this category as well. Joel Osteen certainly does not have good theology. He can tell a good joke at the beginning of his sermons and make you feel happy though.

Theology and doctrine are just not relevant to American "Christians." Do you really go to Church to learn? Even among those who would not follow Rob Bell's Postmodernism or Joel Osteen's Prosperity Gospel, many Church goers simply do not go to actually learn. They go to make sure the Pastor doesn't say anything that will upset them. They go to mark it off their check lists. They go because they have always gone. Richard Foster says: "[Christians] may be faithful in church attendance and earnest in fulfilling their religious duties and still they are not changed…. Why? Because they have never taken up one of the central ways God uses to change us: study."

What is the point I am making? Recall the quote I used from Whitney earlier. He also says, "A biblically balanced Christian has both a full head and a full heart, radiating both spiritual light and heat." In other words, heart is absolutely important within Christianity. But without the head, it is often dangerous and ignorant. If we want to be faithful followers of Christ, we must use the head that God has given us and learn. We need to learn about theology. We need to study the Bible. We need to know the proper way of interpreting it. We must understand the context in which it was written. We need to know how to fight off heresies and false teachers. Proverbs 18:15 says, "The heart of the discerning acquires knowledge; the ears of the wise seek it out." If we want to be discerning, we must have knowledge and we must be wise.

I believe with all my heart that Christians should be transformed by the renewing of our minds (Romans 12:2). As a Christian, I want to read much about God, the Gospel, and the Bible. I want to read the Bible and know it with all my heart. It is, after all, God's Word. But I also want to know more about the World and history and science. I want to be able to have intelligent conversations with a wide range of people on a wide range of subjects. As a Christian, I view the world through a very specific lens. Everything- politics, history, science, math, ect.- I view through my Christian, Biblical worldview. I want to learn and apply my worldview to my newfound knowledge and see what God can teach me through that.

It is with that attitude that I took a few months off of reading Christian books in order to read secular books. I wanted to see what spiritual applications I could draw from a wide range of topics. A few days ago, I began reading Christian books again. I thoroughly missed them and have been devouring pages from Christian books since I took them up again. But I have a new desire to implement scheduled times within my calendar to read through various secular books. I just want to learn.

____

With all of that said, I want to show how spiritual applications can be drawn from secular books. I would like to demonstrate how to read various books from a specific worldview. One of the books I read was a true story called, Public Enemies by Bryan Burrough. The book is about America's Greatest crime wave and the birth of the FBI in the early 1930's. Stay tuned for my next blog post to see how it will work.

My Thoughts on Soulforce

By Matt Tyler

Today, I was interviewed for my thoughts on Soulforce coming to SBU. For those who do not know, Soulforce is an organization that by "relentless nonviolent resistance, works to end the religious and political oppression of Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and questioning people." Every year they go on an "Equality Ride" in order to visit campuses to promote Soulforce's cause and beliefs. Many of the colleges visited are members of the Counil for Christian colleges and Universities. In other words, they believe my university's policies are discriminatory against LGBTQ students.

Much can be said about this and I am quite certain that I will have future blog posts on this subject, especially as the day approaches. Today, however, I was interviewed about my thoughts on Soulforce coming to SBU. Once the article is written I will try and get permission to post it on the blog, but for now I will post some of my responses to these questions. I took with me some notes (okay, more like paragraphs) on the points I wanted to make sure to stay on. I did not say everything I wrote down and I said things I did not write down, but this is a general overview of my thoughts on the subject (I added a bit from the draft I took with me to clear some things up).

What are your personal beliefs on homosexuality?

I want to make sure that I go back to Scripture for everything. My Christianity affects my outlook on all aspects of life. So I want to see what the Word of God says about it. The Bible is God breathed and therefore my ultimate standard. My standard is not science, popular opinion, or the fear of hurting others' feelings. The Bible is clear in both Romans 1:26-27 and 1 Corinthians 6:9 that homosexuality is a sin. Those verses are clear. Romans 1 is clear that, when people continue in sin and unbelief, God "gives them over" to their wickedness in order to show the hopelessness of life apart from God. Of course, I also believe that all sinners, including myself, are deserving of God's wrath. Our sin is offensive to God and we deserve to be punished for them. The good news, though, is that all people, including homosexuals, can be forgiven, on the basis of God grace, if they turn from their sins and trust in Christ for salvation. And God promises victory over sin to those who trust in Christ (1 Corinthians 6:11). However, the Bible is clear in Romans 6:11-14, Romans 8, and 1 John 1:5-7 that those who truly have repented and trusted in Christ will not continue in sin. While all Christians fight sin, and they will so until Heaven, true Christians will not live a lifestyle that is characterized by sin. Therefore a practicing homosexual, along with anyone who continues practicing willful known sin, is not a true believer. The difference is that a Christian fights, struggles, and falls into sin, while the unbeliever blatantly continues to sin refusing to acknowledge God. The normal pattern of life for the Christian is a progressive growth in sanctification.

How do you feel about Soulforce coming to SBU?

This is a question I want to be as clear as possible on. SBU has been working very hard since Soulforce announced they were coming. I know a lot of work has gone into this, a lot of things have been discussed; hopefully a lot of prayers have been prayed. There are factors that I am sure I do not know. In addition, I am a student with limited info. And so for those reasons I don't know if I have a right to speak definitively on this situation. I have sat in a few RA meetings with other students, as well as in a meeting with faculty and staff, and I have personally talked with Rob Harris. I have seen and heard things in those meetings that have both encouraged me and discouraged me. Overall, I think that SBU has handled this situation with care. I am certain that there are things that I probably would have handled differently. Perhaps there are things that should have been considered that were not. But let me put it this way: Whether or not it is appropriate that SBU is allowing Soulforce to come, at this point, isn't the point. SBU has made that decision. And whether that decision is right or wrong, they are allowing Soulforce on campus. So looking at it in that light I think they are and have handled the out workings of this process well and will hopefully continue to do so.

How do you hope for SBU's student body to respond to Soulforce?

I hope and urge every person who reads this to spend an extended time reading, meditating, and praying over 2 Timothy 2:14-4:5 and then responding appropriately by applying to their lives the Truths that those few chapters contain. Summarized, these verses say we are not to quarrel, babble irreverently and we are told to not have anything to do with foolish, ignorant controversies for several reasons, all of which can be read in that passage. Instead, Christians are told to present ourselves to God by handling the Bible rightly and unashamed about what the Bible says. We are to treat people with kindness, we are to teach patiently, correcting those who are wrong in hopes some will be saved from hell. We should remember the warning in 3:1-9. We should flee sin in our own lives and depart from iniquity and MOST IMPORTANTLY we are to preach the Word of God to all people at all times regardless of whether we think they have heard the Gospel or not. In other words, we are to do our Christian duty of verbally sharing the Gospel with all people. The Gospel being that men and women can be reconciled to God because of the work of Christ when they repent of their sins and trust in Christ for their salvation. Christ lived a perfect life when we could not, died on the Cross, bearing our sins in his body, and absorbing the wrath of God due to us. He arose three days later defeating sin and death. When we trust in Christ and turn from our sins we will be saved.

Stop Confessing and Start Walking

By: Matt Tyler

The title of this post is a bit deceiving. I sort of chose it to gather a little bit of attention. Let me make myself clear: I am not opposed to confessing our sins to one another. In fact, James 5:16 talks about confessing our sins to one another. Yet our culture's practice of confessing sin to one another is, I think, different than the Biblical model of confessing sins. In our culture, confessing sin usually turns into a pity party in which Person A confesses his sin to Person B, C, and D. Person A never makes a genuine commitment to change and usually falls deeper into sin. Failing to remind Person A of the Gospel, Persons B, C, and D never help A fight his sin. Furthermore, confession of sins is usually done with peers of the same age. I find this disturbing on a few different levels. As for myself, it is difficult to confess my sins to my peers. Many of them are more than willing to gossip about a wide range of issues, why should I entrust them with my secret sins? In addition, many of my peers struggle with the same sins that I struggle with. They cannot offer me any help or advice because they are struggling with these sins themselves. I find it much more beneficial and useful to go to my parents, an older person in my Church, or my Pastor. They have experience in mortifying the sins I have in my life because these wise people have already mortified them. Bottom line: I am not big on confessing sins with my peers.

I want to focus specifically though on something I said earlier. Often times I see professed believers enslaved to their own sin. Professed Christians are completely willing to whine (yes I used that word purposely) about their sin and never actually change. I know I have been guilty of this. The problem with this is that Christians do not live a lifestyle of sin. A Christian progressively grows in sanctification that results in greater maturity and conformity to God's moral law (thank you Tabletalk!). Romans 6:14 is very clear: "For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace." Go back and reread that verse. This does not mean that Christians do not sin. This means that Christians do not live lives that are characterized by sin. Christians fall into sin; they do not swim in it. When the Holy Spirit convicts a Christian with a sin, the Christian mortifies that sin (see John MacArthur's book: The Vanishing Conscience).

I find it sad that so many are willing to open up about their sin and yet never change. It shows a hardness of heart that would give Pharaoh a run for his money. It demonstrates a lack of maturity. Worse still, it gives evidence to the fact that post-modern American Christianity is not Biblical Christianity.

The solution to this problem is quite simple. When I mentioned it to a group of my friends one time, not only did they not believe me, they flat out denied it. Apparently they haven't been reading Romans: "So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus(6:11)." Romans 6:15-20 basically says to become slaves to righteousness which leads to sanctification. Romans 8: 2 says, "For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death." Romans 8:5 says that those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.

The solution is the Gospel. Jesus lived a perfect life fulfilling all righteousness. We could not do that. He then died on a cross in order to pay for the sins of His elect. Three days later he arose demonstrating victory over sin and death. For those who turn from their sins and put their trust in Christ God will save them. This salvation will result in the Holy Spirit's process of sanctification. Christian, do you want to be free from sin? Walk in the Spirit! Walk in Victory! Unbeliever, do you want to be free from sin? Trust in Christ!

In John Bunyan's classic allegory, the Pilgrims Progress, Christian and Hopeful are walking towards the Celestial City. Somewhere along the way, they veer of course because they believe they have found a shorter path (this is sin). Veering off course brought them to Giant Despair who locked them up in Doubting Castle (this is where sin leads). Having been trapped and beaten for days, Christian and Hopeful find themselves wallowing in their sin fearing that there is no escape. Finally Christian makes a discovery:

'Now a little before it was day, Good Christian, as one half amazed, brake out in this passionate speech, "What a fool," quoth he," am I, thus to lie in a stinking dungeon, when I may as well walk at liberty? I have a key in my bosom, called Promise, that will (I am persuaded) open any lock in Doubting Castle." Then said Hopeful, "That's good news; good brother, pluck it out of they bosom and try." Then Christian pulled it out of his bosom and began to try at the dungeon door, whose bolt (as he turned the key) gave back, and the door flew open with ease, and Christian and Hopeful both came out….Then they went on and came to the King's highway again, and so were safe.'