Begging the Question

Okay, time to squeeze in a post:


As I mentioned earlier, every argument has to stand on two legs: it must be true and it must be valid. The Gospel is already a foolishness in the eyes of the unsaved (as foolish as, say, spending 120 years building a landlocked boat?); we don't ever want our inept handling of It to be an excuse for the lost to reject it.


One prominent example of really bad reasoning -- in fact, a prevalent one -- is the fallacy of begging the question. This happens when we assume our conclusion in our premises. I'm going to give an example that I encountered recently, but as I do so please remember the difference between TRUE and VALID. I am pointing out that the argument is INVALID, that the author is begging the question. I am not saying his argument is untrue--that is a separate issue entirely.


Here is the substance of the argument: the modern translations of the Bible are to be rejected because they (or, in some forms of the argument, their underlying texts) contain deletions or changes from the correct text.


Do you see how this is begging the question? How do we know the King James Version (or its underlying texts) is "the" Word of God for English-speaking people today? Because it does not contain deletions or changes. How do we know that the more-modern translations do contain deletions or changes? Because they do not contain words found in the King James, or they contain different words. It's begging the question; it's arguing in a circle. The fact is, modern translations contain differences. Whether or not they are deletions is a factual question that cannot be answered by arbitrary declarations.


Slipshod arguments such as these do nothing but swell one's ranks with the gullible. And it is unfortunate, since this opens a grand masterpiece of the translators' art to ridicule when it is not the King James Version that is ridiculous -- it is the sloppy thinking of a (thankfully) few.

I Can't Wait

It looks like the people who gave us "Flywheel" and "Facing the Giants" have done it again! Check out the trailer for Fireproof.

That Time of Year Again . . .

As homeschoolers my wife and I are gearing up now for next year -- evaluating curricula, compiling booklists for each child, and, most importantly . . . hitting you-know-where for deals!

Maybe It's Our Approach

My brother-in-law sent me this vintage Prohibition poster. Now I'm not one for changing how we do church. I'm not by any means a fan of the seeker-sensitive group. But just maaaaaybe the way we've approached the world is not the wisest, most winsome approach at times.

Back to Back to Basics

Picking up where I left off earlier, one of the most needed areas in Christianity is a tune-up in our thinking skills. This became apparent once again as I read several Christian non-fiction books recently.

A thorough introduction (is that an oxymoron?) to principles of logic would help preachers avoid some of the interpretive fallacies into which they are oft prone to fall. It would strengthen the apologetics skills of the men and women who go into the frontlines of the secular workplace every day. And it would put a much-needed end to some of the wacky non-issues that burn up so much pulpit time. A great little primer on the subject is Norman Geisler's Come Let Us Reason.

I think a good place to start is by recognizing that every argument must stand on two legs: it must be both true and valid. Absent one of those two legs it does not stand. Let's start with a standard argument (syllogism) as an illustration:

If it is raining, the street outside is wet. (major premise)
It is raining. (minor premise)
Therefore, the street outside is wet. (conclusion)

It must be true. That is, the premises must conform to reality. For example, if I claim that it is raining outside and it is not, in fact, raining outside, then the argument fails.
It must also be valid. That is, the premises must be free of fallacies, of errors in the way we have reasoned. For example, let's re-cast the illustration this way:

If it is raining, the street outside is wet.
The street outside is wet.
Therefore, it is raining.

This argument doesn't stand. Why not? Isn't it saying the same thing as the first illustration? No -- there are a lot of reasons that the street could be wet. Perhaps someone's sprinklers are running; perhaps I've just chased my sons around with my Super Soaker. This is a fallacy called "affirming the consequent". We've switched the "if" and the "then" and twisted the argument out of shape. And once again the argument fails.

This isn't hair-splitting. This is a fallacy that popped up a number of times in the arguments of several Christian books I recently read. And when you are witnessing or defending the faith in the workplace or preaching a sermon, that is the WORST time for the sloppy thinking that too often discredits the Truth by presenting it as an irrational thing.

Tighten up your thinking, Ambassador.

So Much for Appearances

So I'm typing my notes for Sunday morning's sermon and listening to my new Paul Potts CD in the background. If you're not familiar with that name, check out the video below. THIS is why you don't judge people by their outward appearance!

Facing the Freedom

It is often easier for someone brought up in conservative circles to follow Biblical principles that will paint them as right-wing, hard-nosed, etc, than it is to follow Biblical principles that will paint them as more liberal. Yet it would be just as much a matter of COMPROMISE to abandon Biblical teachings or, in "doubtful things," to violate your conscience, for the sake of being thought more conservative.

Charles Hodge wrote:

"It is often necessary to assert our Christian liberty at the expense of incurring censure, and offending even good men, in order that right principles of duty may be preserved. Our Savior consented to be regarded as a Sabbath-breaker, and even a 'wine bibber and a friend of publicans and sinners'; but wisdom was justified of her children." Hodge, Romans, 429-430

Just Thinking.

One of the great ironies in fundarnmentalism is the way their anti-intellectualism drives them to found Bible colleges.

Piper on the Rebellion of Nudity

John Piper has written an excellent post on clothing. Here is an excerpt:

"Negatively, he is saying, You are not what you were and you are not what you ought to be. The chasm between what you are and what you ought to be is huge. Covering yourself with clothing is a right response to this—not to conceal it, but to confess it. Henceforth, you shall wear clothing, not to conceal that you are not what you should be, but to confess that you are not what you should be.
One practical implication of this is that public nudity today is not a return to innocence but rebellion against moral reality. God ordains clothes to witness to the glory we have lost, and it is added rebellion to throw them off.
And for those who rebel in the other direction and make clothes themselves a means of power and prestige and attention getting, God’s answer is not a return to nudity but a return to simplicity (1 Timothy 2:9-10; 1 Peter 3:4-5). Clothes are not meant to make people think about what is under them. Clothes are meant to direct attention to what is not under them: merciful hands that serve others in the name of Christ, beautiful feet that carry the gospel where it is needed, and the brightness of a face that has beheld the glory of Jesus. "

Back to Basics

Wow! It has been a while since my last post! Oh, well. Such is the hectic life of the bi-vocational pastor.

One of the areas that has occupied my time lately has been studying the arguments, from both sides of the aisle, pertaining to a particular issue in the area of bibliology. It is troubling that so much pulpit time and study time is wasted on an issue that is little more than what Augustine called "stirring up billows in a ladle".

Now, I'm going to take the high road here: I'm not going to discuss -- or even identify -- the particular issue. I think it would be far more useful to hone our basic thinking skills instead, for if more people would apply principles of sound reasoning (or, if you prefer, discernment) this sort of issue would never see the light of day.

The first objection that inevitably arises is, "Well, I have the Bible [or the Holy Spirit], I don't need man's logic or reason." And that sort of thinking is the root of the problem: logic and sound reasoning is not incompatible with the Bible, nor is it in competition with the Bible or the Holy Spirit. On the contrary, even the most vitriolic opponent of "human reasoning" employs that same reasoning in telling us why we don't need human reasoning.

The laws of logic (more on these later) are a part of the fabric of God's created order. You cannot deny their existence any more than you can deny the existence of gravity, thermodynamics, magnetism, et al. Indeed they are more fundamental even than these, for it is conceivable that God could have chosen to create a universe without gravity; but it is inconceivable that He could have chosen to create a universe without the laws of logic (for example, how would He create a universe in which the law of noncontradiction did not exist?).

The conflict in issues such as the one I was forced to address recently is not essentially one of those who employ logic and reason vs. those who do not; it is a conflict between those who employ logic and reason well and those who apply it badly.

Voices of Praise

This week we kicked off our first Sunday night service at the church (I will pause while indignant fundarnmentalists harumph that we didn't have one, and emergentistas harumph that we do). Our special guests were the Voices of Praise travelling choir from Frontier School of the Bible. The young people ministered in a powerful way, and our church was greatly blessed. As a pastor I am unspeakably thankful for the impact these young people had.

But it wasn't supposed to be that way.

Sunday night services aren't supposed to work. Nobody will show up. And those that do will get burned out fast and start to look at church as a drudgery. At least, that's what we hear. What I found as I began talking to the church about starting a Sunday night service was that the biggest obstacle to having it was the fact that we just knew that it wouldn't work.

But it did. People actually showed up. And they were edified. And God was magnified.

So, when did the Lord's Day become the Lord's hour-and-a-half? "I'm sorry, Lord. But the NFL has bought out your franchise. You can have Sunday morning, but be sure you have everything over and cleaned up by noon or we'll have to raise your rent."

Texts to Avoid

Another text that you need to avoid if you wish to remain comfortably ensconced in the man-centered un-gospel of Arminianism:

1 Corinthians 1:26-31 (NASB)
26 For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble;
27 but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong,
28 and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are,
29 so that no man may boast before God.
30 But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption,
31 so that, just as it is written, “Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord.”