Noel and Ryan’s wedding is this weekend, so blogging may be light for a while. In the meantime, Denise has written a good essay at her web site: Take A Rest.

Many of you liked the essays I did on “The Gospel and Appalachia.”

The Gospel and Appalachia
The Gospel and Appalachia: Can The Culture Change?
The Gospel and Appalachia: Four Christian Responses

Amy Welborn links to a National Catholic Reporter story on a ministry here in the mountains that we work closely with: Christian Appalachian Project. Amy adds her comments.

I think the article raises very, very important questions. I agree with much of what is said. I do not have any criticism for CAP, but I completely agree that ministries of mercy have to be aware of what it means to look at a problem “beyond band-aids.” Appalachia is a culture sunk into depravity and corruption. It can only be changed by the Gospel, and that means an army of missional Christians coming to the mountains for decades to come.

Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 1
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 2: A Map For the Road
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 3: One More Question
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 4: The Law and The Prophets
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 5: Jesus
Divorce, Remarriage and The Gospel 6: More Jesus

One of the struggles that I notice among contemporary Christians is how to adequately come to terms with the context of Paul’s letters. As the kids would say, these people had issues…and Paul was trying to help them deal with those issues. Do we have the same issues? Were Paul’s words to his first century churches meant to carry on, throughout history, to other churches and other cultures and contexts? Or is Paul’s specific advice so conditioned by what was going on at the time, that we should be cautious in how we apply his words?

When we say that the letter to the Corinthians is “God’s Word” for us now, do we mean that the Corinthian’s situation is part of God’s Word? What about things Paul believed- like the impending end of the age- that may have shaped his answers? If your view of inspiration is all about the words, then these matters don’t enter into the picture. If your view of inspiration is- like mine- about how the text communicates the Final Word, Jesus Christ, then these situations have to be considered and examined as we hear these texts on the subject of divorce. [Continue reading]

Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 1
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 2: A Map For the Road
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 3: One More Question
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 4: The Law and The Prophets
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 5: Jesus

At this point, the road is going to fork, and you are going to have to make some decisions. There’s no avoiding it. IVP’s Divorce, Remarriage: Four Christian Views can show you four of these forks in the road, and you can understand them all in a basic way without immense amounts of study.

All these positions have scripture, reasonable interpretations and strong arguments in their corner. All are believed and taught by people who are equally submissive to the authority of scripture and equally committed to the Gospel. None of these arguments rest upon a rejection of the Lordship of Jesus or a dissolving of the authority of scripture.

Still, you will make up your own mind, starting at the point of Jesus’ own words on divorce and remarriage, as to what is really going on here. [Continue reading]

UPDATE: A substantial response to and critique of Ehrman’s views on textual criticism can be found in this essay by evangelical New Testament Greek scholar Daniel Wallace.

Bart Ehrman is rapidly rising up the list of names appearing frequently in the watchblogosphere. As Ehrman gets more attention on the secular media, more apologists and defenders of the faith invoke Ehrman’s name and contend with his work in New Testament studies. A recent post at a well known watchblog took off from the Washington Post’s coverage of Ehrman.

Ehrman’s rise in public visibility is due to several factors. He’s an ex-evangelical, which the MSM finds irresistably appealing, having attended MBI and Wheaton, but losing his faith in later graduate school at Princeton. Today he describes himself as an agnostic, though I detect no antagonism or resentment toward religion or zealous need to convert others to unbelief.

Ehrman is a prolific author, rivialing NT Wright in production, with a whole basket of best-selling titles generated in the last few years, many riding the wave of interest in radical Jesus studies, Gospel revisionism, gnostic Gospels, The DaVinci Code and other “hot” media topics. Publishers know that Ehrman is gold with a segment of the reading public, and he has been obliging with works on DVC, Mary Magdalene and The Gospel of Judas. [Continue reading]

Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 1
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 2: A Map For the Road
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 3: One More Question
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 4: The Law and The Prophets

And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. (Matthew 1:19)

“It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery. And whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. (Matthew 5:31-32)

And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one’s wife for any cause?” He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?” He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.” The disciples said to him, “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry.” But he said to them, “Not everyone can receive this saying, but only those to whom it is given. For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let the one who is able to receive this receive it.” (Matthew 19:3-12) [Continue reading]

Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 1
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 2: A Map For the Road
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 3: One More Question

The old covenant law has many mentions of divorce. Only a few of these passages are ever mentioned when Christians discuss this topic. Instead, most of the passages dealing with divorce are passages on the Biblical view of marriage. Of course it is important to know the Biblical basis of marriage and to uphold a Biblical standard of marriage. It is, however, frequently distorting to act as if the reality of divorce was not part of the ordinary life of ancient Israel. These old covenant passages correct that distortion.

Many Christians are shocked to discover that there are more verses in the Bible about divorce than a rather free wording of the King James version translation of Malachi 2:16: The Lord hates divorce. In fact, the old covenant has a lot more to say about this topic. Here are the majority of the relevant passages. Read them all. Some are without context, so take some time to put each passage into the Biblical story. [Continue reading]

With all the discussion of the horrors of bad language being tossed around the reformed Baptist watchblogosphere these days, I hate to tell everyone that the final word on this matter was written long ago, in the dim mists of time that began this blog.

Yes, one leif “Eric” rigney penned “A Guide For The Cussing Christian” and took my readers down a complete list of pros and cons, and did so with wit, humor and Christian thoughtfulness.

So if you are tired of a discussion that sounds like a convention of Pharisees debating whether popping a zit is working on the Sabbath, check out and pass along this “Best of InternetMonk.com” classic.

(Sorry for the missing picture. I removed the pictures for these older essays a while back.)

READ: “A Guide For The Cussing Christian” by Eric Rigney, M.A.

My DaVinci Code Review. (Thanks to Nathan Bell for the Photoshops.)

I was going to write a review that attempted to be a coherent narrative, but considering we are talking about The DaVinci Code, one of the worst movies I’ve seen in years, that would be handing the film something it definitely didn’t give to its audience. I will, instead, give you a collection of impressions, and you, the reader, can supply the connections, by breaking a mysterious code or something.

Be warned. You won’t be getting any little signals that there’s been a sudden break in logic and worldview with the previous paragraph. Again, much like this film. Just imagine you have severe ADD or that you kept dozing off and waking up in a different film. [Continue reading]

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Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 1
Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 2: A Map For the Road

On my way to the post office this morning, I got to thinking about Bible study- the #1 hobby of serious American evangelicals- and a basic question that should be asked before we spend hours and days chasing cross references and looking up types and shadows in Leviticus 18.

Once we get this information out of the Bible- about divorce and remarriage- what are we going to do with it?

That’s a very good question. Basic, but important. Since there isn’t a quiz, the point is going to come down to real life, and there we don’t always do so well.

I ask it for a personal reason. My fundamentalist church upbringing zeroed in on divorce as big sin #2. (#1 was beer.) Divorced people- like my dad- had little hope of coming to two services without hearing at least 2 minutes on the evil of divorce, and the even worse evils of remarriage. This was the most obvious line between the pure, holy folk and the sinful compromisers with ruined lives: divorce and remarriage. [Continue reading]

Divorce, Remarriage and the Gospel 1

Before we take on this topic, I want to spend some time preparing to use the Bible correctly. It won’t be acceptable to simply pick passages and read one of them authoritatively. This is a complicated question that involves many different Biblical texts and important questions of interpretation. In this post, I will…

1) Discuss the basic presuppositions that apply to this question.
2) Identify the kinds of Biblical material we will encounter.
3) Note the principles of interpretation that apply specifically to the topic of divorce and remarriage.
4) Suggest how these various texts will work together in concluding what should be our beliefs and practice. [Continue reading]

For those who dream of seeing the gospel take new root in a postmodern, pagan America, Mark Driscoll has written a superb, exciting and impressively helpful book.

A few days ago I read an interview with Covenant Life Church pastor Josh Harris, and he was asked what he had to say to young church planters. His answer: “Just keep saying to yourself, I’m not Mark Driscoll.”

From one standpoint, that’s good advice. Driscoll’s Mar’s Hill Church in Seattle is THE story among younger evangelicals these days. Everyone wants to say Driscoll is on their team. The Truly Reformed watchboys at Fide-o proclaimed Driscoll a “Fideo-ite” several weeks ago. (Note to Reformed friends: If you have problems with the “tone” of the BHT, DON’T get near this book.) Driscoll’s name is still tossed around by the Mclarenesque faction at Emergent, even though Driscoll has made his parting of the ways very plain (especially in the book being reviewed.) Fans of John Piper can legitimately say that Driscoll is one of their own, as Driscoll seems eager to get Piper in front of as many of his young pastors as possible. I won’t be surprised to see a story in Baptist Press that Driscoll is actually a Southern Baptist missions success story, and the Mars Hill sound system was purchased with Lottie Moon money. [Continue reading]

His name was Charles, and he worked with the Boy Scouts in our state. A troop was starting to use our building, and I was the staff liaison. Charles and I met together every month, and I found out that he was a Baptist preacher and a serious Christian. Over the years, I watched Charles walk through the nightmare of his wife leaving him, divorcing him, and marrying another man. He lost his ministry and was a broken person.

What I remember most is a discussion we had one day when Charles kept referring to the woman who was now married to another man as his wife, and continued to talk about his hope of reconciliation. She had abandoned him. She had divorced him. She had married another man and started another family. Charles refused to recognize any of these things as a “done deal.” He had no plans to move on with his life or to recognize these events as “final.” In his mind and heart, he was a married man, praying and hoping for reconciliation and a return to ministry.

You won’t be surprised, I’m sure, that I told Charles he needed to accept what had happened as real and over. I urged him to recognize that his marriage was over, his wife was now living as the wife of another man, and God wanted him to move on. Waiting for his wife to leave her new family and come back to him was not the path God had set before him. His way forward was to accept the tragedy and to find the good gifts of God in a new chapter. [Continue reading]

How far is too far in using creative methods to “reach” people?

Tom Ascol has been posting some good posts about some of the more extreme forms of sincere, but outlandish pragmatism to be found in the cause of church growth and evangelism. In the comments, the inevitable question appears: OK- how do we know when the line has been crossed? How much is too much in the cause of church growth and evangelism? [Continue reading]

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My admiration for Touchstone Magazine grows daily, and among Touchstone’s writers, no one comes close to S.M. Hutchens for speaking to my own journey into, around, and sometimes out of evangelicalism. [Continue reading]

Nevertheless, young people do not feel disenchanted, lost or alienated in a meaningless world. “Instead, the data indicated that they found meaning and significance in the reality of everyday life, which the popular arts helped them to understand and imbibe.” Their creed could be defined as: “This world, and all life in it, is meaningful as it is”, translated as: “There is no need to posit ultimate significance elsewhere beyond the immediate experience of everyday life.” The goal in life of young people was happiness achieved primarily through the family…The researchers were also shocked to discover little sense of sin or fear of death. Nor did they find any Freudian guilt as a result of private sensual desires. The young people were, however, afraid of growing old. – Recent article in the London Times.

“I am a deeply religious nonbeliever…. This is a somewhat new kind of religion.” -Albert Einstein

Romans 3:11 no one understands; no one seeks for God. [Continue reading]