Cooling Twilight

Tag: love

  • Why Homosexuality Isn’t A Sin

    Why Homosexuality Isn’t A Sin

    Rothko - Pink, Gold, Red

    We all have an innate sense of right and wrong, of good and evil. We all have moral law written on our hearts. We don’t all have perfect knowledge of that moral truth and we all fall far short of living up to moral standards, but in general we recognize the universal and transcendent nature of morality.

    We know what is sin and what isn’t. We have a deep intuitional realization that murder and rape and theft are wrong. We know that when we hurt another person, whether through words or actions, we’ve done something wrong. We don’t need the Bible to tell us that, we don’t need the church to tell us that — we already know it. This is why the Bible isn’t, and doesn’t need to be, an exhaustive rule book. It’s why the Greatest Commandment resonates so deeply within us — not because it’s something we’ve never heard before, but because it’s something we already knew, whether we realized it or not.
    (more…)

  • “These enemy dogs who reject the things of God”

    “These enemy dogs who reject the things of God”

    Conquistadors praying before a battle

    Janie B. Cheaney, in her World Magazine post “How to lose an argument” seems to have just discovered that Mark Driscoll is a “lightning rod.” This is a surprise to her because in her mind Driscoll’s focus has always been on spreading the gospel.

    She links to my piece on Driscoll’s dismissal of careful exegesis of controversial texts, labeling it as “rather creative.” Is that doublespeak for “deliberately manipulative”? It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve been accused of taking Driscoll’s words out of context, but I have yet to see someone explain exactly how I did so. The most substantive argument against my criticisms has been similar to the one Cheaney employs: that Driscoll is preaching the gospel so we should simply ignore his verbal faux pas.
    (more…)

  • Are you planting trees or just cutting them down?

    Are you planting trees or just cutting them down?

    Oak tree

    Are you planting trees or just cutting them down? 

    Are you making coffee or just drinking it?

    Are you the main character or part of the supporting cast?

    Are you reading sentences but missing the story?

    Are you talking about Jesus instead of showing who Jesus is?

    Are you teaching the “truth” instead of living love?

    Are you looking to the future and ignoring the present?

    Are you waiting for heaven after death and missing heaven during life?

    Are you trying to save people from going to hell when they die instead of trying to save them from the hell they’re experiencing now?

    Are you praying for what you want instead acting how God wants?

  • Rebuke Him!

    Rebuke Him!

    Christians often cite Luke 17.3 as commanding us to condemn sin in the lives of other Christians: “If your brother sins, rebuke him.” This is sometimes followed by a reference to Ephesians 4.15, where we are admonished to “speak the truth in love.” Given these clear teachings, Christians are to eschew timid tolerance in favor of boldly confronting the sin in our fellow Christian’s lives. We are responsible for holding one another accountable for our actions and we are remiss if we let obvious transgressions go unchallenged. Surely if we had some unknown sin in our own life we would want to be told about it — so we have a Christian obligation to do the same when we see sin in others.

    Or possibly not. (more…)

  • Love vs. The Bible

    Love vs. The Bible

    I’d like to take a more focused look at one of the criticisms I discussed in my post All You Need Is Love. Specifically, progressive Christians are often accused of overlooking, ignoring, tolerating and even accepting clearly sinful behavior because of their infatuation with love. This is perhaps no more evident than in the ongoing debate within Christianity regarding homosexuality. (more…)

  • All You Need Is Love

    All You Need Is Love

    One criticism that I’ve heard leveled against progressive (liberal!) Christians is that they have an “all you need is love” theology — that they essentially neglect the Gospel, overlook sin and ignore God in favor of vague platitudes that advocate peace and love at the expense of Christian orthodoxy.

    If one understands this position as strictly reductive (i.e. you need nothing other than love), then yes, such a statement is indeed problematic. (more…)

  • Who’s Your Neighbor?

    Who’s Your Neighbor?

    “A man was going down from Great Falls, Montana to Boise, Idaho and ran off the road in a snow storm. He crashed into the ditch and lay there, bloody and wounded and half dead.

    “Now by chance a Baptist preacher was going down that road, but when he saw the accident he passed by on the other side. So too a Catholic priest, when he came up to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. (more…)