I once had a wonderful English Literature Professor during my years in graduate school at the University of Oklahoma. I shall not mention his name, because he and I were great friends, and his nature would not brook puffery. I shall refer to him as The Professor.
He served, dear man, on my doctoral committee, though we often disagreed. Suffice it to say, he was a Jew, and I was then, and am now, a biblical Christian.
His subject was Charles Dickens, upon whose fiction I doted. I had written a paper on David Copperfield, in which I had found Christian symbology. He, a Freudian, disagreed, and asked me to rewrite the paper. I did. It was called, "If Not God, Then Agnes." I got an A.
Shortly after this incident, The Professor called me into his office. I sat down. He asked: "What kind of Christian are you? I don't understand you at all."
I laughed. I understood him all too well. And I replied, "I'm a Miltonian Christian. I believe in Grace."
Our talks were often and fun. I never remember his trying to convert me, and I knew it was not my job, nor my place to convert him: In my view, the "Great Commission" is not stuffing theology down someone's throat, but simply "being ready to give an answer."
I came to Christianity in my late twenties. By that time, I had been married to a minister who got his graduate degree in theology from Yale. (Women were not allowed to attend at that time.) I heard all the arguments regarding "inconsistencies," the JEDP Theory (which basically says that whoever was in power at the time of the writing of a certain book, rewrote it to fit their ideology--no "inerrant Scripture" there), and the most horrendous teaching of all: that Christianity and belief in an actual God was the best possible ethical system around, for it kept the masses in order, and so, we (the intellectuals) should continue to provide the masses with this religious crutch, which they so desperately needed.
I learned that "Isaiah" was not written by a prophet named Isaiah, but by three Isaiahs. Why? Because "the prophecies contained in the one book were too accurate to have been written by someone not living at the time." The so-called "miracles" were the products of imagination or attempts to explain something to the ignorant people around them. Jesus didn't walk on water: He walked on a sand bar. Jesus didn't rise from the dead: his disciples came and got him. (Anyone read or hear of The Passover Plot?) Of course the Roman guard stationed beside the tomb to guard it had a small problem, i.e., any one of them would be killed if they fell asleep on the job. But the disciples would have had no problem overcoming them easily, and then rolling away the stone, which had been rolled down an incline to cover the cave in which Jesus lay dead. Of course not.
But maybe after being crucified, tortured, and stabbed by a Roman Centurian to make certain He was dead before he was taken off the cross was just rigged? Surely Jesus was strong enough after all that to simply roll this gigantic bolder uphill from inside, overpower the Roman guard, and heal Himself before telling the disciples it was all just a hoax for the benefit of centuries of fools who would believe anything.
Even the most avid Atheist must see there are definite logical and logistics problems with this mode of thinking.
But that doesn't stop anyone from saying or writing the following: Genesis does not talk about literal 24-hour days, but is an imaginative story to explain the beginnings of things to an ignorant populace spanning several thousands of years. We all know evolution does a much better job...(big knowing smile here from the speaker).
My husband, now deceased, did not believe in God, but he was an ordained minister. In fact a lot of ministers, priests, rabbis I have known do not believe in any God, certainly not the God of the Bible.
All of which brings me to my points--sorry, but there are several.
I am not an idiot, unschooled, ignorant, stupid, easily deceived, or emotional. (You may argue with that later.) I also have no axe to grind, except with those people, whether genuinely deceived (they are myriad), deliberately deceptive, hypocrites, hypocrites who use the name of Christianity to enrich themselves, modern Pharisees, legalists, and some TV evangelists who, if they ever truly intended "to win people for Christ," should have gone about it quietly rather than making themselves and my faith seem ludicrous, money-grubbing, and intolerant of those who most need God's Grace, and last, but not least, those who hold themselves above the "common herd" as authorities, but who hide behind "tolerance" when asked directly what their own credo is.
False prophets abound. It is not surprising; the Bible clearly states that they will come. It also states that many false messiahs will appear, claiming to be the Christ. Cults abound in the name of Christ, leading people down a false highway to ruin and disappointment. (I could name names, but libel laws prevent me. It's difficult to prove Truth to so many who are willing to believe lies.)
So, do I have the corner on Truth? Am I smarter than everyone else? Nope. I'm just a modern day disciple, which doesn't mean I'm anything special; a disciple means a "committed learner." And I am that.
You know what I believe. If you don't, you can read my "Pam's Box Theory: the Theological Version" on this site and find out. Unlike many, I'm not afraid to state my beliefs, even if it means a drop in readership (horrors!) or worse yet, being branded a "fundamentalist."
What I do have is a job to "extract the precious from the worthless," and believe me, there's a lot of worthless out there lately. Trying to find the precious in the dungheaps is not a job for the squeamish. You have to have waders sometimes. But there is a shard of Truth hidden in much of the waste.
This is something you should know: many lies contain a shard of Truth. It's the Truth which makes them believable, so that you walk right into the muck, oblivious that you are not in an apple blossomed lane.
Shall we take a case in point? Why not?
Allison DuBois is a public figure now as well as a psychic or medium; the term is not a problem. Is what she experiences and says real? You bet it is. And it's very real for her, and it is not a fun job. But there are a few problems with what is going on with "The Medium." If we take the TV show as giving us a version of actual psychic happenings, then we see a heroic woman, fighting with unseen forces, trying to figure out why she has this "gift" and what "the purpose" is behind it. She finally decides, even though she doesn't believe in any "religion" necessarily, that it must have been given to her by a "higher power" for a reason. That reason, she soon discovers, is to work with law enforcement people to find where the bodies are buried, who did the crime, foretell events which may or may not come to pass, and she does it all for "good" purposes--to save lives, to give the dead peace, to uncover the truth.
For those of you who think I'm about to condemn her, think again. For one thing, it's not my job. For another, she's honestly doing what she thinks is right.
Deception is not easily detected. Good is used for evil purposes, which the doer never intends.
I'll give you an example from a recent episode of the "Medium" in which DuBois discovers a serial killer, but the problem was that the man she knew did the killings hadn't committed them yet. In fact, he wasn't going to kill anyone for several years. So DuBois confronts him. (I'll have to paraphrase here, since I don't have the script in front of me.) "You may fool these people, but you and I know who you are. I don't know who the fiend is or what happened to you to make you into what you are, but you are this killer. You know you think about these things all of the time. You know you do, and you will do these things. I have warned the girl you plan to kill...." It goes on. But the basic problem is this: DuBois senses that something turns this guy into a killer. It never occurs to her that she and her reputation for never being wrong could be the straw that does it. The powers of suggestion are great. He's just been told in no uncertain terms that he's going to commit these murders. Wouldn't you think about it?
So, at the very least, DuBois has set the factors in motion. Did she intend to? Of course not. Will this guy actually turn into a murderer? The chance is there, but so is free will. She's just made it harder to choose not to kill.
The more publicity, the more her "predictions" come true (Satan can and does cause these things to come to pass so her credibility will grow), the greater the chances are that this man, who's done nothing wrong yet, will, if he doesn't break the chain, become the murderer she foresaw.
The other problem with her "gift" from "a higher power" is that she doesn't seem to be able to save anyone. She knows a lot after the fact. In fact, she gets distracted by one "vision" which keeps her from actually saving an innocent.
I agree with DuBois that her power is from a "higher power." But not all "higher powers" are from God or have anything to do with Him. She admits she is not religious, but feels that her "gift" must have a reason. It does. But it's not the one she hopes for.
How do I know this? I was once an Allison DuBois. My "saving grace" was that I had my "gifts" from birth, and I knew they were terrible. I lived in terror for 27 years of my life, always believing and told by other ligitimate psychics that I was having this terror only because I didn't understand how to use my gift. I went to psychiatrists hoping to be told I was crazy. The result? A sane-as-they-come, card-carrying, lab-tested psychic. Oh joy.
I even had one minister in Connecticut ask me to conduct a seance in his sanctuary. I remember telling him, if he believed that my gift was from God, then he believed in another God than the one I'd always heard of. As it turned out, I was right.
I had the nightmares...always between 3 a.m. and 4 in the morning. I was always accurate with Tarot cards, not so much without. I couldn't walk up to someone and tell them what they were thinking or what they were going to do. But when I knew something, I knew it. Totally. Every detail clear. I knew it before it happened, and always too late to do anything about it. And I had witnesses to "visitors" from the "other side." Yes, other people could see them.
Was I excited about this gift? No. Did I try to study and perfect it, so that I could help? You bet. Did it work? No.
I became a Christian unexpectedly on a visit to Illinois. I was very wary of "evangelicals, fundamentalists, and bible-beaters." I'd been to Yale, remember? I knew the Bible. I also knew that all my prayers to "God" had gone unanswered.
So why did I become a born-again Christian? I found someone who could answer my questions and who made sense. I found out why Jesus wasn't just part of the Trinity but the Way...the ONLY way to "God the Father." And it made sense. Perfect sense. No leap of faith, which I didn't have, required. Besides, I hadn't tried that particular venue yet.
Guess what happened when I actually decided to make a decision to trust that Jesus was Who and What He said he was? Nothing. No flashes of light. No speaking in tongues.
But a week later, a head appeared (not an unusual sight for me, I'm afraid) on my bedside table at--you guessed it--about 3:15 a.m. I said, "Jesus, would you handle this; I'm really tired." I turned over and went to sleep. I didn't realize until the next morning how astounding that was--the first night in my entire life that night didn't hold terror.
I thought, hum, might be something to this. There was. The "gift" was gone. You'd think that if it had come from God, I would have still had it, wouldn't you?
Oh, I still have discernment and know when something odd is going on, but I don't have "visitors" anymore, and I don't, thank God, know the future.
I can see deception when it occurs, however. I know what Satan and his cohorts can do and what they can't. And I know that he uses "good" people to do horrible things in the name of Christ and of God.
In the Bible, 1 John in the New Testament, you will find John's warning: "You shall know them by their fruit." If they profess a faith in Jesus Christ, but they don't act like Him for a long period of time, you can probably make the assumption that they aren't Christians, or that they are, but they are "worse than non-believers" because they are turning their backs on God. It takes more energy to do that when you're a Christian than it does when you aren't, so Christians who do are worse than any non-Christian.
No one is without sin. I once saw a bumper sticker that was actually Biblically accurate: "Christians aren't perfect, just forgiven." And that's it.
I didn't make the bad things go away; Christ did. I didn't become perfect overnight; Christ and the Holy Spirit are in the process of "perfecting" me. I don't save anyone; Jesus Christ died to save everyone (yes, even you).
How does Christianity differ from other "religions?" Christianity says salvation has been accomplished; all you have to do is accept it as a free gift from God. Salvation is DONE. Other religions always have something you must do to earn salvation. (Clue: You can't earn it.)
How does salvation work? I am saved by Grace--that means I don't get what I deserved which was hell--through believing that Jesus did what the Bible says He did. I believe it; He applies that salvation to me. Did I have a lot of faith? Heck no. Remember? It was just something I hadn't tried yet. You're not saved by some magical "gift of faith," as some would have you believe. You're saved by a choice to believe God or not.
Read the Bible for yourselves. I recommend the New American Standard Version. It's not as pretty as the King James' Version; it's not as contemporary as the New International Version, but it is the closest English translation to the original languages as you can get.
Suppose, just for a moment that God really can do ANYTHING; that He can work real MIRACLES; that He transcends Time, so He can Know the FUTURE, Past and Present, without necessarily causing it. It's sort of like my going into space and taking a picture of Earth five years from now. The picture will be true; did I cause it? No, I merely saw it. God has a Plan A...no Plan B...and all the possibilities and probabilities were taken into account before He made it, so you can't mess it up. But you do have free will. He just planned around your choices.
This weekend is Easter. For me, Easter is the most important holiday in the Christian calendar. Read 1 Corinthians 15 and you'll see why.
Happy Easter, everyone.
PS. Comments and real questions are always welcome. I had questions. Lots of them. I expected answers. I didn't get them. But if you ask me, I'll do my very best to answer you or point you to someone who can.
Hi,
This is Victoria Silvers, Asst. Editor for Christian.com which is a social network made specifically for Christians, by Christians, to directly fulfill Christian's needs. We embarked on this endeavor to offer the ENTIRE christian community an outlet to join together as one (no matter denomination) and better spread the good word of Christianity. Christian.com has many great features aside from the obvious like christian TV, prayer request or even find a church/receive advice. We have emailed you because we have interest in collaborating with you and your blog to help us spread the good word. I look forward to an email regarding the matter, Thanks!
God Bless,
Victoria Silvers
vicky.silvers@gmail.com
Posted by: Victoria Silvers | April 15, 2010 at 11:42 AM