Quote of the Day: What Kind of Child Are You?

 

It’s amazing how the legend of “fire and brimstone” preachers carries on in a world where such men (nearly always men) are so few and far between. It probably isn’t because colleges are still teaching Jonathan Edwards’s “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.” That sermon was assigned in one of my college English classes but that was a very long time ago.

But popular culture still keeps such cliches alive. Until last year, I had been writing a blog about churches in films. And sin-obsessed clergymen were still very common characters. In the 2016 film, Brimstone, Guy Pearce played a pastor preoccupied with sexual sin in his sermons, denouncing its evils to his congregation. (It just so happens he’s also a psychotic killer who terrorizes poor Dakota Fanning, but that’s how they are, you know.)

But there are very different preachers in the world today. Particularly in big cities, it isn’t very difficult to find a mainline denominational church with a rainbow flag out front that will assure the congregation that God loves them just the way they are. He isn’t looking for them to change in order to please Him. Gender, sexual identity, and activity are all about the feels.

I was thinking of these things when I read a quote from Tim Keller in his book, Forgive: Why Should I and How Can I?

He wrote this: “Perhaps it is too simplistic (but not by much) to say that if you believe only in a God of love, you will live like a spoiled child, but if you believe only in a God of wrath, you will live like an abused child.”

We believe popular culture’s accounts of churches in the past that were mean-spirited hotbeds of bigotry that concentrated on sexual sin above all others and railed against such sin, warning of God’s unquenchable wrath. I believe Keller is right that if we do think only of God’s justice, His rightful anger at sin, we will live in fear, always worried that our actions and thoughts are being judged by the cruel King on high.

But that isn’t what is typical in our current culture. Rather we have people who, if they think of God at all, think of Him as kindly, not-too-bright fellow who loves everyone and just wants people to know that their feelings are the most important things in the world.  Which explains much of the nature of the spoiled brats that seem to rule in the majority on social media and in most of our major institutions.

Only when we understand that God is a God of love and justice, that God loves us so much that He desires us to live abundant lives confronting sin and seeking righteousness, can we live as healthy people, not victims or brats.  The only happy and fulfilling way to live.

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  1. Bob Thompson Member
    Bob Thompson
    @BobThompson

    Eustace C. Scrubb:

    I was thinking of these things when I read a quote from Tim Keller in his book, Forgive: Why Should I and How Can I?

    He wrote this: “Perhaps it is too simplistic (but not by much) to say that if you believe only in a God of love, you will live like a spoiled child, but if you believe only in a God of wrath, you will live like an abused child.”

     

    And for those who haven’t really been paying attention at all,  perhaps they are living their lives like an unguided missile.

    • #1
  2. Percival Thatcher
    Percival
    @Percival

    Eustace C. Scrubb:

    I was thinking of these things when I read a quote from Tim Keller in his book, Forgive: Why Should I and How Can I?

    He wrote this: “Perhaps it is too simplistic (but not by much) to say that if you believe only in a God of love, you will live like a spoiled child, but if you believe only in a God of wrath, you will live like an abused child.”

    That is problematic.

    Only when we understand that God is a God of love and justice, that God loves us so much that He desires us to live abundant lives unhampered by sin, can we live as healthy people, not victims or brats.  The only happy and fulfilling way to live.

    That is not.

    • #2
  3. Quietpi Member
    Quietpi
    @Quietpi

    I have a saying: the heart makes a terrible substitute for the brain.  

    I’m off to church now.  On security detail this morning, because we’re so loved in this current culture.

    • #3
  4. Buckpasser Member
    Buckpasser
    @Buckpasser

    I don’t know about anyone else, but I need a little fire and brimstone sometimes.

    • #4
  5. Eustace C. Scrubb Member
    Eustace C. Scrubb
    @EustaceCScrubb

    Percival (View Comment):

    Eustace C. Scrubb:

    I was thinking of these things when I read a quote from Tim Keller in his book, Forgive: Why Should I and How Can I?

    He wrote this: “Perhaps it is too simplistic (but not by much) to say that if you believe only in a God of love, you will live like a spoiled child, but if you believe only in a God of wrath, you will live like an abused child.”

    That is problematic.

    Only when we understand that God is a God of love and justice, that God loves us so much that He desires us to live abundant lives unhampered by sin, can we live as healthy people, not victims or brats. The only happy and fulfilling way to live.

    That is not.

    It certainly is not all of it, as this a short post. I don’t talk about, which Keller does, the way to forgiveness for our sin through the Cross, and  many other aspects of Christ’s call to discipleship. Looking at what I again though, I will change that bit about “unhampered by sin” because that is never happening in this world.

    • #5
  6. Percival Thatcher
    Percival
    @Percival

    Eustace C. Scrubb (View Comment):

    Percival (View Comment):

    Eustace C. Scrubb:

    I was thinking of these things when I read a quote from Tim Keller in his book, Forgive: Why Should I and How Can I?

    He wrote this: “Perhaps it is too simplistic (but not by much) to say that if you believe only in a God of love, you will live like a spoiled child, but if you believe only in a God of wrath, you will live like an abused child.”

    That is problematic.

    Only when we understand that God is a God of love and justice, that God loves us so much that He desires us to live abundant lives unhampered by sin, can we live as healthy people, not victims or brats. The only happy and fulfilling way to live.

    That is not.

    It certainly is not all of it, as this a short post. I don’t talk about, which Keller does, the way to forgiveness for our sin through the Cross, and many other aspects of Christ’s call to discipleship. Looking at what I again though, I will change that bit about “unhampered by sin” because that is never happening in this world.

    Or “unhampered by our inevitable sin…”

    • #6
  7. Richard Easton Coolidge
    Richard Easton
    @RichardEaston

    I hope you don’t mind a personal story. In 1997, I was reviewed some material at the Beinecke Rare Books Library. My contact let me hold the original manuscript of “Sinners”.

     

    • #7
  8. Vance Richards Inactive
    Vance Richards
    @VanceRichards

    Eustace C. Scrubb: “Perhaps it is too simplistic (but not by much) to say that if you believe only in a God of love, you will live like a spoiled child, but if you believe only in a God of wrath, you will live like an abused child.”

    I would say I had a pretty good father. Looking back, in many ways I was spoiled, but then, Dad was someone to be feared as well. A former Marine (or perhaps I should just say “inactive” or “retired” as he never stopped being a Marine), Dad had a temper and I knew if I screwed around, there would be consequences.

    I didn’t come to faith until me early 30’s, but when I did, I did not see  any contradiction between a God of Love Who is also the God of Wrath.

    • #8
  9. Nanocelt TheContrarian Member
    Nanocelt TheContrarian
    @NanoceltTheContrarian

    Jonathan Edwards was much more than a fire and brimstone preacher. He was arguably the foremost natural philosopher with a religious grounding of his time. For example, his treatise “On the Nature of True Virtue” puts Adam Smith’s “Theory of Moral Sentiments” to shame. Smith’s work is trivial and sophomoric in comparison. Edwards anticipated Smith’s rejection of Hutchison’s concept of an innate moral sense in humans (Smith, an atheist, utterly rejected Hutchison’s–Hutchison was Smith’s teacher and predecessor in the chair of Moral Philosophy at the University of Glasgow– embrace of that concept, and mocked him as a casuist for employing it, grounding his theory of moral sentiments in our emotions, nothing more, which has proven to be ephemeral, indeed, and one of the fundamental causes of the shifting ground and unstable culture of  moral relativism of Modernity) and grounded his view of true virtue in the human capacity to perceive beauty, and expanded his view from there to an all encompassing, universal, understanding of virtue that is sublime and not relative at all. His view was of a timeless beauty manifest by God’s creation, and unreserved embrace of that creation which included all life, and our ability to perceive and understand it. Edwards was a polymath. He had read Newton’s “Optics” as a teenager, and marveled at the intricacies of the eye and the nature of light elucidated therein. He anticipated the English Romantic poets, such as Worsworth (My heart leaps up when I behold a rainbow in the sky…), of the following century.  Edwards’ treatise on True Virtue was written before Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments (which expanded on Hume’s constrained and highly dubious view of human cognition, and embraced his very twisted views on Christianity and Deity).  Edwards died (1758) before Smith’s treatise on Moral Sentiments was published (1759), so he never saw it. Edward’s treatise on True Virtue was published posthumously and after Smith’s “Theory of Moral Sentiments,” though it was written before Smith’s work.   But Edwards, in that treatise, effectively refutes Smith, as well as Hume (of course Hume contradicted himself so thoroughly and repeatedly that he refuted himself–it continues to amaze me that Modernity has so completely embraced Hume and knows nothing of Edwards except hell fire and brimstone).

    Had the Western World embraced Edwards, and ignored Hume, we would be vastly better off than we are. But the “Enlightenment” above all was a concerted effort to destroy religion, most specifically Christianity. That effort continues apace. 

    At least Edwards had enough influence in his day to contribute to the First Great Awakening, which very much influenced the nature of the American Founding. So in that sense, Edwards lives on and has bequeathed us an incredible legacy. Pity that we have abandoned that legacy. 

    • #9
  10. Eustace C. Scrubb Member
    Eustace C. Scrubb
    @EustaceCScrubb

    Richard Easton (View Comment):

    I hope you don’t mind a personal story. In 1997, I was reviewed some material at the Beinecke Rare Books Library. My contact let me hold the original manuscript of “Sinners”.

     

    Don’t mind at all. That’s very cool, thank you. In 2016, on our church in every state tour, my wife and I visited the First Church of Christ in Wethersfield, CT where Edwards worshiped in 1716 – 1718. They’re in a different building now, but they still have a desk he worked at.

    • #10
  11. Eustace C. Scrubb Member
    Eustace C. Scrubb
    @EustaceCScrubb

    Nanocelt TheContrarian (View Comment):

     

    At least Edwards had enough influence in his day to contribute to the First Great Awakening, which very much influenced the nature of the American Founding. So in that sense, Edwards lives on and has bequeathed us an incredible legacy. Pity that we have abandoned that legacy.

    Amen. Which is why he was still being studied at public schools back in the day (for me at Santa Rosa Junior College.) I just doubt it’s the cas much anymore.

    • #11
  12. Saint Augustine Member
    Saint Augustine
    @SaintAugustine

    Most philosophers don’t bother much with Jonathan Edwards.  But they should. I do know one guy. I don’t myself; too many other books to read, and Augustine is important too!

    I did read The Religious Affections in undergrad.  Good book.

    The rule that you can know a thing by its fruits–good stuff.  William James cites Edwards as getting it right.  He talks about this in The Varieties of Religious Experience.

    • #12
  13. HeavyWater Inactive
    HeavyWater
    @HeavyWater

    My bet is that many of the churches you described, the ones with the rainbow flag on them, do not believe that the Bible is inerrant.

    While they might believe that Jesus existed as a historical figure and that Jesus was divine, they don’t necessarily believe that Jesus said all of what he is represented as saying in the Gospels.

    So, very likely, they would say, “Jesus did say you should help the poor.  But he didn’t say that no one comes to the father except through me.”

    Once the bible is viewed as merely written by fallible human beings, then one can look at certain passages in the Bible and say, “Well, that really isn’t true.”

    My wife is a liberal Christian.  She believes in Jesus, but whenever someone quotes the Bible to her she will say, “We shouldn’t take the bible literally.  Remember, Jesus spoke in parables.  He didn’t think he should be taken literally.”

    My wife’s Christianity is a Christianity where God loves everyone and we can toss out all of the “rules and regulations” because of Jesus.

    It’s a quite different version of Christianity than the one presented by Jonathan Edwards.

    [Full disclosure: I think Jesus was a failed apocalyptic prophet and after Jesus was killed, various legends of Jesus emerged, resulting in Christianity, which evolved and changed over the centuries that followed.]

    • #13
  14. The Reticulator Member
    The Reticulator
    @TheReticulator

    Vance Richards (View Comment):
    I didn’t come to faith until me early 30’s, but when I did, I did not see  any contradiction between a God of Love Who is also the God of Wrath.

    The two are also combined in other relationships.

    In the “Russian” folks song Очи чёрные (Dark Eyes)or (Black Eyes), 1st verse, 3rd line:

    Как люблю я вас, как боюсь я вас (How I love you, how I fear you).  Word-for-word translation: How love I you, how fear I you.

    You’ve probably heard it a few times in one language or another.  Most of the versions on YouTube are rather slow and pompous. The Red Army Chorus does it, but can’t make it light and lively. 

    I put Russian in quotes, because the lyrics were written by a Ukrainian guy (in what language, Wikipedia doesn’t say) and the melody was written by a Polish-German guy (or maybe he was French or Austrian).  But it’s a traditional Russian folk song. 

    • #14
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