Quote from Forum Archives on February 12, 2004, 2:57 pm

Posted by: bhfbc <bhfbc@...>

NARROW MINDED
February 8, 2004

Text: 1 Corinthians 1:10 - 2:5

In our day and time in the land in which we live, there is hardly a worse
label to be tagged with than that of “narrow minded.” At least, according
to some, that is the worst thing that can happen to a person. I spoke
about education a few weeks ago; we are all aware that the halls of many
prestigious colleges and universities are filled with some men and women
who believe it is their role in life to try to demolish any belief in any
kind of absolute truth, especially in the arenas of religion, ethics, and
morality. Unfortunately, this has happened in some religious institutions
of higher learning as well as secular institutions. To be labeled “narrow
minded” in some of these places is to receive a form of scarlet letter or
kiss of death.

I do a fair amount of reading editorial columnists and letters to the
editor. I do some letter writing myself in both the paper and through
e-mail. So I am familiar with many of the recent objections to opinions
that are labeled “narrow minded.” Although not the only one, a common
topic these days is homosexuality. A common response to anyone suggesting
that homosexuality is Biblically forbidden goes like this: “My God is a
God of love and not a God of judgment.”

In response, I say that such a person is free to worship whomever he
pleases. If such a person wants to make up his own god who will let him
do as he pleases, then that is allowed in our land. In fact, it has been
done for thousands of years. My question to such a person is, “Where did
you find this God without standards?” Certainly not in the Bible. Open
your Bible to any page, and you will quickly see that God makes demands
on His people. He sets limits on our behavior and holds us accountable.

I suspect these writers create their own gods from their imagination.
This puts their lords in the same class as a rag on a stick in Botswana,
a volcano in the South Pacific, or a statuette in a Singapore apartment.
God-making has a great appeal. The created god can look like anything we
choose and approve whatever we want to do.

Writing in Pulpit Helps magazine, Joe McKeever included a letter to an
editor from a Mr. Ray Whiting. Mr. Whiting took issue with a previous
letter which had claimed, “The Jesus of the Bible is the Christ, the Son
of the Living God, and is compatible with no other religion.” Mr. Whiting
responded, “It is my belief that the Jesus of the Bible is merely the
retelling of the ancient sacred myths of divinity, told and retold
through the ages in every language and every culture. The Jesus depicted
in the Gospels is an image compiled from the earlier myths, not a real
person who walked the earth 2,000 years ago… I would suggest to Mr.
Hanberry that his version of Christ is both shallow and impotent. If his
Christ cannot embrace us all, his Christ is insufficient for the need. On
behalf of all Buddhists, Muslims, Hindus, Jews, Wiccans, [and] pagans I
beg him to find a bigger Christ.” (Joe McKeever, “Narrow-Minded? All
Believers Are,” Pulpit Helps, vol. 20 no. 2, February 2004, p. 21)

Interesting how Mr. Whiting incorporates these other religions into his
letter condemning a “narrow” Christ which through their own doctrines and
traditions exclude their respective unbelievers. But it is not at all
unusual for anyone attacking Christian truth to incorporate odd lapses of
logic into their platform. Anyway, I would like to ask Mr. Whiting where
exactly he located this Christ who embraces all religions without
expecting anything from any of them. Certainly not in the Bible. And,
since the Bible is the only book in the world giving information about
Jesus the Christ, how did he manage to find a Christ different from the
one presented there?

Anyone doing even a cursory reading of the Gospels sees that the story of
Jesus is presented as historical fact. He lived in a certain place, at a
certain time, with people who knew him and knew about him. The men and
women who knew Jesus and followed him told others who passed the word on
to others who told their friends. This process has continued right down
to the present day. Ancient myths and fables were shared around campfires
and dinner tables for a few generations, and then died out because they
were only tales. They had no basis in fact, and people found no reason to
prolong their existence. Christian faith, on the other hand, is founded
upon truth and fact. Even in areas where it should have died out, such as
in places where Christian faith was made officially illegal, it has
continued to be passed from believer to believer just as in the earlier
days. This is the same foundational basis for Paul’s proclamation: “Jews
demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ
crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to
those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God
and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s
wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.”

Those like Mr. Whiting insist that truth must accommodate all the
religions of the world, otherwise it is not truth. Fascinating reasoning,
is it not? Only in religion, and in no other field of inquiry known to
man, must we claim that all beliefs are equally valid and demand that
they all be given an equal share of the pie. Try that on medical science.
All schools of medicine must teach voodoo, quackery, superstition, and
opinions as well as the proven principles of sound medical practice. The
witch doctor who spreads animal droppings on open sores and drills holes
in the head to cure headaches is to be given the same hearing as the head
of Johns Hopkins or the Mayo Clinic.

Try it on the physical sciences. Every opinion carries equal weight.
There are no absolute answers and no definitive way to determine the
orbit of a planet, the makeup of a chemical compound, or the equation for
unraveling a math problem. Pity the astronaut who stakes his life on the
collected ignorance of every person in the world with an opinion on
physics.

Only in matters of faith is there this odd insistence that there can be
no absolute truth, that those who claim to possess truth are narrow and
bigoted, and that whatever “works” for a person must be, therefore,
“truth.” In no other area of life would we fall for such foolishness. Not
in the kitchen where we insist on standards of cleanliness and
tastefulness, not in construction where workers must follow regulations
to make buildings safe and dependable, not in matters of health or safety
or a thousand other fields. Yet, claim you have found absolute truth
about God and you are automatically branded “narrow.”

Well, guess what? “Narrow” is precisely the right word. Scientists have
observed that all truth is narrow. In base ten math, two plus two always
equals four. The space shuttle’s descent from orbit must coincide with an
incredibly narrow slit in time and space, otherwise the mission
tragically fails, as we have witnessed. The nuclear power plants in
operation follow complex and strict guidelines. The manufacture of
medicine is a precise business. An organ transplant follows exacting
procedures. The tolerances on transmission parts manufactured down the
road from here are quite precise. Truth is always narrow.

Look at John 14:6. The same Jesus who was revealed in human history
claimed, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the
Father except through me.” This is narrow minded. Likewise, in Matthew
11:27, we hear again Jesus’ own words. “All things have been committed to
me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows
the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal
him.”

The issue is Jesus, make no mistake about it. He makes himself the issue.
Whether he is who he claimed to be - the Messiah, the Christ - or whether
he was just another religious fake is a question each person must answer.
But this much is clear: the Scriptures are neither neutral nor ambiguous
on this subject. They clearly express and articulate a particular and,
yes, narrow, truth. Those who hold opinions to the contrary and cry
“narrow minded” consistently fail to divulge the source of their insight
and revelation. “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who
are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”

One of the 20th century defenders of the Christian faith, C. S. Lewis,
responded in a letter to a friend who had questioned the deity of Jesus.
Lewis wrote, “What about Mark 2:18-19? [Jesus had said, ‘No one need fast
while I am here.’] What man can announce that simply because he is
present, acts of penitence, such as fasting, are ‘off’? Who can give the
school a half-holiday except the Headmaster? The doctrine of Christ’s
divinity seems to me not something stuck on which you can unstuck but
something that peeps out at every point so that you’d have to unravel the
whole web to get rid of it.” (C. S. Lewis’s Case for the Christian Faith,
by Richard L. Purtill, p. 48).

The early Christians put it simply: “Jesus is Lord.” Indeed, we are
narrow minded.
(Adapted from Joe McKeever, “Narrow-Minded? All Believers Are,” Pulpit
Helps, Vol. 20 No. 2, February 2004, p. 21)

Rev. Charles A. Layne, pastor, First Baptist Church, Bunker Hill, IN

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