Who wants to be moral?

Every now and then the argument breaks out again, in some form or other.

It might be on the internet somewhere (as it was when Tullian Tchividjian, Kevin de Young and others crossed swords at The Gospel Coalition), or it might just be in your Bible study group.

Person A will be getting animated about some aspect of Christian living or holiness or corporate godliness, and how Christians are falling down in this area or that. And then Person B else will respond that the Christian life is all about grace and not good works, and that by emphasizing obedience we are falling back under the law.

Person A will reply that faith without works is dead, and Person B will say “Yes, but it’s still all the cross from beginning to end, and Jesus died to redeem us from our failure to be moral”.

And on it goes.

What’s the answer here? You can see that both people have a point. But is there a way to articulate with clarity the nature and motivations of the Christian life?

Very often the discussion unfolds by discussing the theology of justification and sanctification, or Paul’s view of the place of the law, or the continuity and discontinuity between the old covenant and the new covenant. And these are vital subjects of course.

However, what does Jesus himself teach us about these questions? After all, in the Gospels Jesus frequently finds himself confronting those uber-moralists, the Pharisees, and vigorously critiquing their performance-oriented legalism. And yet this same Jesus urges his disciples to have a righteousness that surpasses the Pharisees, and even to “be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matt 5:48).

How does Jesus himself teach his disciples to be moral without being moralistic? How does he urge obedience and discipleship without fostering an anxious ‘worksy’ culture of legalism and performance?

That’s what Peter Bolt will be exploring at our final Centre for Christian Living (CCCL) event for the year, on October 22 in Wollongong and October 28 at Moore College (same content). Peter is one of the world’s leading authorities on Mark’s Gospel, and this opportunity to benefit from his expertise in this vital area is too good to miss.

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Our CCL tagline (and everyone needs a tagline) is ‘Bringing biblical ethics to everyday issues’. But what is ‘ethics’ exactly? And what would make them biblical?

One common view is that ‘ethics’ covers all the stuff that isn’t in the Bible. There are things that the Bible clearly tells us to do (like “do not steal”), but then there are all those other issues we face that aren’t specifically mentioned in Scripture—like euthanasia, abortion and same-sex marriage. And that’s where ethics steps in.

This is one of those statements that is quite wrong, but also reflects an important truth.

It’s wrong, because ethics is about far more than hard-case controversial moral issues. It’s about every aspect of ourselves and our actions that can be thought of as ‘moral’ (as relating to what is good and right and wrong and evil). And even though many of the moral issues or questions we face today aren’t specifically named in Scripture, God still has a great deal to say about them through the Bible. In fact, we can be confident that by his divine power God has “granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence” (2 Pet 1:3).

So this common view of ethics is inadequate, but at the same time it does express an important truth—namely, that ethics is concerned not only with ‘what is in the Bible’ but with the world outside the Bible that the Bible address. That is, ethics is concerned with the world of action and relationships and character that we inhabit day by day; it’s concerned with what we do with the convictions and promises and truths of Scripture in our daily lives.

Every day we face situations or circumstances in which we face the challenge of acting—of doing something that could be good or right or desirable or commendable, or something that could be evil or wrong or blameworthy. It could be deciding how to treat our child when they have been disobedient; or how to react to the driver who cut in on us; how to order our priorities in spending our money; or complex situations like how to approach IVF if we are struggling with infertility.

And as we are confronted by these multiple and variegated circumstances, we have a framework of beliefs and convictions in our heads and hearts about what is true and good and right—convictions that, if we are Christian, should be formed by Scripture.

Ethics is really the process of thought that connects the two—that is, by which our (biblical) convictions drive and shape our contextual action in the world.

Much of the time, this process of thought happens quickly and without us being much aware of it—for good or ill. But we will do better, both in our instinctive moral reactions, and in the more complicated situations that require some considered thought, if have a good framework or thought process for bringing the truth of the Bible to bear thoughtfully, coherently and consistently to the issue at hand.

That’s what we’re seeking to model and to teach at the Centre for Christian Living—a good and consistent thought process that brings the theological convictions of Scripture to bear on Christian-living issues we face every day.

(Click here for details of our next CCL public event.)
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What’s the one thing that will never be mentioned in any discussion of Christianity in our mainstream media (such as on last Monday night’s Q&A program on the ABC)?

Only the one truth that makes Christianity what it is rather than something else.

Without this truth, it might be possible to view Christianity as an uptight morality movement, or a mystical dance with the life-force of the universe, or an earnest attempt to earn the favour of the gods, or an invented mythology to keep the masses in line, or a religious expression of humanity’s progressive instincts, or all the other false labels that Christianity has been plastered with over the centuries.

This one truth not only peels off those labels, but explains the world and our culture to itself. It locates and describes what our lives are for and about. It is the answer and the key to everything.

And yet because of the power of secular humanism in Western society, this most important of all words cannot be uttered in the ‘public square’—that is, within the public discourse of our society that is shaped and presented to us in the mainstream media. It is a truth not to be uttered or discussed, let alone evaluated or responded to. It lies definitively outside the boundaries that are set for conversation.

Think of all the occasions in which Christianity does get a look in (such as on Q&A). Among all the many issues that are haggled over, this one crucial, unique, universe-changing truth will never be mentioned, not even by Christians who appear in these forums, and who agree to play by the rules of the game.

The truth is simply this: that we live in a world in which a man has died for sins, risen from the dead, and now sits at God’s right hand as the Lord of all reality.

We cannot and must not stop proclaiming this truth with all its implications.

This coming Wednesday night May 4, Moore College’s Centre for Christian Living will present an evening in which we (once again) seek to do just that.

New Testament lecturer Peter Orr will speak about ‘Jesus Now’—on where the risen Jesus is now, what he is doing now, and how that changes everything about our lives.

Go here for a quick interview with Peter on what he’ll be speaking about.

And to register for the event (to come in person or to watch via Livestream) go here.

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A couple of weeks ago I posted a little parable called “#cakeforeveryone”, with a promise to write something more prosaic in due course.

Perhaps the best way to do so, now that the digital crowd has drifted away with puzzled looks on their faces, is to explain what I was getting at. (And if you haven’t read the parable, it might be worth doing that before reading on.)

I know that parables are meant to have only one main point, but I confess there were two related things in my mind as I wrote about my fictional efforts to provide cake for the multitudes.

The first was about the nature of love and action.

James 2 warns us of the danger of generous words without generous deeds: “If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace, be warmed and filled’, without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that?” (Jas 2:15-16).

My offer of cake to Jim was better than a pious wish, but not by much. What Jim needed was someone to listen to him, uncover his needs, help him turn his life around, speak the gospel to him, disciple him—someone, in other words, to love him with discerning practical action in relationship over time. The fictional ‘I’ of my parable wasn’t remotely interested in offering this kind of time-consuming nitty-gritty help—the kind that actually makes a difference in people’s lives. I just wanted to reassure myself that I was compassionate, and advertise my righteousness on the street corner of social media (thus performing the neat trick of transgressing James 2 and Matthew 6 at the same time).

This is one of those sins (like viewing pornography) that the internet didn’t create but certainly nourishes and enables. For all its advantages, social media does make it temptingly easy to sprout opinions, express outrage, and generally position ourselves positively in relation to trending social problems or moral causes—without ever having to love any living soul in any real way at all.

The debate over asylum seekers is as good an example as any. It costs nothing to criticise governments for not showing more compassion and humanity in dealing with refugee boat arrivals (and both sides of Australian politics have suffered this criticism over the past five years). It’s easy and satisfying to share barbed memes and heart-rending photos, with #letthemstay attached.

By way of contrast, I know of a conservative evangelical church—one of those places that is mostly on about evangelism and discipleship, that supposedly has no social conscience—whose members and staff visited a local refugee detention centre for years, getting to know asylum seekers, helping them practically, going with them to court, sharing the gospel with them, and seeing an amazing number converted to Christ. Hardly anyone knows about this ministry and its effects, and that is how it should be—because they didn’t do it to make a point or to create a shareable. They did it in costly, time-consuming love.

This is what genuine love is. It doesn’t boast, or seek praise; it goes beyond words to costly sacrificial actions for the good of the other. It gets its hands dirty in the complex, messy business of people’s lives and needs.

This brings me to the second point.

Loving one person well (like Jim) would not only be time-consuming and costly, but complicated. Who knows what sort of factors led Jim to be homeless and destitute? And who knows how long and winding the road would be for him to find his way out? In fact, it’s very likely that no-one would ever be able to properly fix Jim. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try, or that we couldn’t make a real difference for Jim. But such are the realities of evil, and the limits of our knowledge and capacity, that we should proceed with a realistic degree of humility about the path ahead. The fictional me discovered this soon enough in seeking to expand my cake distribution efforts beyond even a few people.

Now scale this up to a larger group or to a whole society. The complexities multiply dizzyingly. Difficult compromises and trade-offs will be required to retrieve as much good as possible in circumstances where any viable outcome is less than ideal.

This is the burden of judgement that God has give to those in political authority, and why we should spend more time praying for our leaders than lambasting them on facebook.

For example, what a terrible choice our leaders have been recently faced with: on one side, the evil of rampant people smuggling and multitudes of desperate people dying at sea; on the other, a strict detention policy that subjects vulnerable people (including children) to unpleasant and debilitating conditions for months and in some cases years. Does the strict policy retrieve more good from a difficult situation than its opposite? Which is preferable: for 2000 to die at sea or for 10000 to spend a year in detention?

These are agonising and difficult choices, but ones that must be made. It is not adequate for us to tweet #welcometherefugee or #letthemstay without offering a meaningful and workable response to these real and difficult questions. It’s the equivalent of saying #freecakeforeveryone.

And if we feel that we lack the information, background, knowledge or experience to offer practical solutions to these complex policy questions, then perhaps that (again) should lead to a degree of thoughtful reticence before we blurt out our next status update.

In other words, for love to be genuine, it must be expressed in relation to reality, with all its complexity. And this inevitably requires what ethicists call ‘practical reason’—the thought process that is alert to the moral dimensions of each situation we encounter, that seeks to see via the spectacles of Scriptural truth how the good and the right might be sought or achieved in those often complex circumstances, and then resolves by the enabling of the Spirit to take action.
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What do Ancient Near Eastern history writers have in common with modern day sports commentators? Listen to this “From the Archives”, to find out.

At the beginning of 2015 CCL relaunched, under Tony Payne’s leadership, by considering the topic: Can we talk about Islam? As part of the evening Andrew Shead, Head of Old Testament at Moore College, presented a short talk (about 20mins) titled ‘Does Christianity have a violent past?’ Andrew brought his extensive understanding of the Old Testament and the Ancient Near East to bear on the topic. He did not shy away from the destruction that came at the hand of the Israelites but by illuminating the nuances of Joshua and Judges, he demonstrated the purposes and plans of God through the conquest. With clarity, insightfulness and humour, Andrew explained the nature of Christianity’s violent past in the Old Testament and reminded us that the God we follow is both just and merciful.

To discover why the Ancient Near Eastern history writers are similar to modern day sports commentators, or to understand the justice and mercy of the conquest, visit the resources page for the video of Andrew’s talk.

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It happened again this week. It will doubtless happen many times in the weeks and months and years to come.

A Christian dared to elaborate publicly on why he thought homosexual practice was morally wrong, and was greeted not with counter-argument or rebuttal, but outpourings of abhorrence and anger, as well as regret and apology on the part of the event organizers (that such a view had come to be to be expressed on their platform).

In this instance the perpetrator was respected Oxford philosopher and professing Christian Richard Swinburne, and the context was a conference of the Midwest Society of Christian Philosophers.

When even the Christians start apologising for the faux pas of allowing someone to expound traditional Christian moral teaching, and when Christian philosophers give up reasoned argument in favour of name-calling, you know that something profound has happened to our public discourse—to the way our society talks about moral and political issues, and in particular to the way it deals with dissenters to the prevailing orthodoxy.

It’s not just that Christians are being shouted down or silenced or in various ways vilified for saying only what every orthodox Christian for 20 centuries has believed and said. That is happening, and will in all likelihood happen with increasing regularity and vigour in the coming years in Western cultures.

The more insidious effect on Christians themselves will be self-censorship. We will learn very quickly what the Midwestern Christian Philosophers have apparently already learned: that dissenting from certain unchallengeable cultural truths is a bad idea, that it will only get us into trouble, and that therefore we will do better to stay quiet, or to express our disagreement only in the mildest terms.

Rod Dreher, writing about the Swinburne incident quotes Polish author Ryszard Legutko on how strikingly similar the current tendences in Western liberal-democracy are to the communist rule he grew up under:

Today, when someone is accused of homophobia, the mere fact of accusation allows no effective reply. To defend oneself  by saying that homosexual and heterosexual unions are not equal, even if supported by most persuasive arguments, only confirms the charge of homophobia because the charge itself is never a matter of discussion. The only way out for the defendant is to submit a self-criticism, which may or may not be accepted. When the poor daredevil is adamant and imprudently answers back, a furious pack of enraged lumpen-intellectuals inevitably trample the careless polemicist into the ground.

Prudent people — both then and now — anticipate such reactions and made a preemptive move before saying anything reckless. Under communism, the best tactic was to start by condemning the forces of reaction and praising the socialist progress; then one could risk smuggling in a reasonable, though somewhat audacious statement, preferably wrapped in quotations from Marx and Lenin. In a liberal democracy, it is best to start with a condemnation of homophobia followed by the praise of the homosexual movement, and only then sheepishly include something commonsensical, but only using the rhetoric of tolerance, human rights, and the documents issued by the European Parliament and the European Court of Justice. Otherwise one invites trouble.

The characteristic feature of both societies — communist and liberal democratic — was that a lot of things simply could not be discussed because they were unquestionably bad or unquestionably good. Discussing them was tantamount to casting doubts on something whose value had been unequivocally determined. ((From Legutko’s book, The Demon in Democracy, (Encounter Books, 2016) quoted without page references in Dreher’s article.))

Such is the climate in which we have to figure out how to talk about ‘same-sex marriage’—not just in the context of the forthcoming plebiscite here in Australia (if that ever happens), but in our homes and schools and communities, and in our broader society for years to come.

Perhaps our climate is becoming uncomfortably similar to the one that Peter describes in the New Testament, in which the Christian confession and its moral implications were regarded as despicable (e.g. 1 Pet 2:11-12; 4:1-5).

And perhaps Peter’s encouragement to his readers is therefore also encouragement to us: “Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed” (1 Pet 4:12-13).

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Our next Centre for Christian Living event on “Can we talk about same-sex marriage?” is coming soon, on October 19. See here for details.
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