The Limits of Science (John Blanchard)

   The kind folks at Evangelical Press sent me this book to review: Is God Past His Sell-By Date by John Blanchard.  It is a shorter version of his award-winning Does God Believe in Atheists?  The former is around 230 pages while the latter is around 650.  Is God Past His Sell-By Date is intended for skeptics, people who doubt or question the Christian faith, the existence of God, the person/work of Jesus, and so forth.  The book mostly deals with creation, humanity, evil, science, suffering, and the gospel.  Even though I’m not a skeptic, this book helped me think through some of my own doubts and questions I have about life in general as well as the Christian faith.  At the end of each chapter there is a short testimony written by different Christians who used to be skeptics.  I appreciated these testimonies; they were “real life” examples of how God brings people out of doubt and into [the] faith.

One section that stands out for me is where Blanchard discusses the limits of science (p. 64-5).  Drawing on several scientists themselves, he lists the following limits (which I’ve edited for the sake of space):

1) Science can tell us nothing about why the universe should have come into being.  It cannot answer the question that Stephen Hawking asked (and could not answer himself): “Why does the universe bother to exist?”

2) Science cannot explain the fundamental facts about humanity.  Even the three billion letters that make up the human genetic code can tell us nothing about the really important things in life.

3) Expanding on #2, science cannot explain the existence of each person and a unique being; it cannot answer the questions, “Who am I? Why am I here now and how did I get here – where will I go when I die?”

4) Science cannot explain why the mind exists and functions as it does.  Science can tell us much about the biological aspect of our brains, but cannot really intelligently and dogmatically explain the mind or human consciousness.

5) In spite of all the technological advances it has spawned, science can add nothing to the overall quality of life.  How can science overcome greed, violent anger, selfishness, and other harmful characteristics of humans?

6) Science cannot explain human purpose, meaning, and value.  It cannot explain the principles involved in human behavior.  It cannot give ultimate foundations for justice, good, evil, goodness, or love.

By way of summary, Blanchard quotes one atheist genetic scientist who admits,

“It is the essence of all scientific theories that they cannot resolve everything.  Science cannot answer the questions that philosophers – or children – ask: why are we here, what is the point of being alive, how ought we to behave?  Genetics has almost nothing to say about what makes us more than machines driven by biology, about what makes us human.”

This is a book worth owning and reading if you’ve not read Does God Believe in Atheists.  I’d recommend it to our readers who wrestle with the questions of science, creation, evil, suffering, and purpose in life.  Blanchard writes clearly and carefully – he isn’t out to demonize anyone, but lead them towards the living God revealed in the Word: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  This book will strengthen the faith (and weaken the doubts!) of Christians, and point skeptics in the right direction.  To be sure, it is an intermediate book - not really for beginners, but skeptics who are willing to engage a detailed book that will challenge them.

Again, my thanks go out to Evangelical Press for the review copy.

shane lems

Redeeming Singleness

  A friend from church who has a vested interest in the subject asked me to read this book: Redeeming Singleness by Barry Danylak.  She said it was OK, but not overly helpful.  Anyway, I thought I’d give my feedback here.

Redeeming Singleness is basically a biblical theology of singleness.  The subtitle explains it well: “How the storyline of Scripture affirms the single life.”  Danylak walks through redemptive history from the garden, to Sinai, to the prophets, to Jesus, and then to Paul (his section on 1 Cor. 7 was very well done, by the way). In each of these sections, he discusses marriage and singleness.  I do appreciate a redemptive historical perspective, but to me this book wasn’t overly stimulating since I’ve read quite a few books that cover redemptive history better. 

If you’ve never read anything on redemptive history or singleness, this will be helpful; if you have, it won’t be terribly helpful.  In fact, if you are well read in these areas, you could probably do this type of study on your own by searching out the texts in the Bible that have to do with the single life.  Or, you could simply do a redemptive historical study and end up on 1 Cor. 7 and Gal. 3.28 to see the ways in which singleness is a viable option for the Christian.  In other words, if you know the basics of the Bible’s storyline and you’ve done some study on what the Bible says about singleness in the Christian life, you probably won’t need this book. 

I agree with the woman who let me borrow it: it is OK, but not overly helpful.  I was disappointed that this book didn’t include much practical discussion on singleness in our sexually messed up culture.  The book really isn’t in the category of practical theology (i.e. counseling); it is more of a 200+ page book that shows how the Bible says singleness is an OK option in the Christian life.  Probably most Christian singles already know this.

Who is this book for?  I’d recommend this book to those who don’t know much about the big storyline of the Bible and who haven’t studied the topic of singleness.  For the rest of you, it may not be what you’re looking for in this area.

shane lems

Does worship really need to be exciting?

I’ve been reading through Kevin Roose’s book The Unlikely Disciple: A Sinner’s Semester at America’s Holiest University.  If you have an interest in learning about evangelicalism and fundamentalism, this book, written by a Brown University student who enrolled at Liberty University for a semester, is a great volume to read.  Informed by George Marsden’s more historical Fundamentalism and American Culture, this is a fun and witty memoir of someone who decided to “act the part” of a Christian fundamentalist for a semester.

I was especially struck by Roose’s contrast between the simple, Quaker worship meetings of his youth and the contemporary worship at a local megachurch.  He writes:

You can see why I didn’t go to [Quaker worship] meeting[s] much.  As a kid groomed on cartoons and video games and Little League, an hour of motionless silence was excruciating.  At Thomas Road, on the other hand, there’s almost too much stimulation.  The stage lights, the one hundred-decibel praise songs, the bright purple choir robes, the tempestuous bellowing of Dr. Falwell – it’s an hour-long assault on the senses.  And all you have to do is sit back in your plush, reclining seat, latte and cranberry scone in hand, and take it all in.  It’s Church Lite – entertaining but unsubstantial, the religious equivalent of a Jerry Bruckheimer movie.  And once the novelty wears off, once the music becomes familiar and the motions of praise become pro forma and mechanized, you start to realize that all the technological glitz and material extravagance doesn’t necessarily add up to a spiritual experience. [emphasis added]

Today, from my perch in the Thomas Road choir loft, my mind wandered back to the little brown house with stone steps.  I think I’d appreciate the minimalist Quaker worship more now than I did as a kid.  It didn’t have Jumbotron screens or a five thousand-watt sound system or a cafe in the lobby, and it wasn’t run by a world-famous televangelist with millions of followers.  But at least it felt real.

The Unlikely Disciple, pg. 199.

Bravo, Kevin!  You have nailed it to the wall.

It is only tragic that it takes someone posing to be an evangelical to point out something that the “experts” themselves either can’t understand or chose to suppress – i.e., that the excitement of contemporary “worship” is more driven by consumerist impulses than genuine gratitude or spirituality.

If you’re drawn toward exciting, contemporary worship settings, know this – we all are!  But this is not because it is right; not because it is proper; not because God is truly putting a burden on our hearts to pursue worship of him in this way … it is because all of us prefer to worship ourselves!  All of us are idolaters who fashion gods in our own image!

If we like video clips, well then God must want us to watch those while worshiping him.  If we like rock music, God must like it too.  If we like to sit in church with our feet up, drinking a cafe mocha, then there can only be one reason for this – God must want nothing more than for us to sit in church with our feet up, drinking a cafe mocha!  Whatever we like to do, God likes to do it too, right?

After all, we’re too genuine to be self-centered, right?  Idolatry is only practiced by people out there, isn’t it?  What we want to do just feels so right – how can you argue with that?!?!

_______________
Andrew

Where There is Fellowship, There Is Strength

 William Gurnall (d. 1679) has a great paragraph on the fellowship of the saints in his book, The Christian in Complete Armor. In one section, he discusses what he calls “recovery of declining grace.”  In other words, if a Christian is not wielding his armor as he should, or if it is getting rusty, what is he to do?  How can he grow in grace after languishing?  He mentions repentance, faith, and meditation upon Scripture.  He also mentions Christian fellowship, the ”communion of the saints” in the language of the Creed.  I’ve modernized the words to make it a bit easier to read.

“Join the fellowship and communion with the saints in your area.  It is no surprise to hear that a house gets robbed when it has no other houses around it.  He that walks in communion of saints travels in company, he dwells in a city where one house keeps watch over another.  The devil knows the damage he does in hindering this great ordinance of communion of saints – in doing this he hinders the progress of grace, indeed, brings that grace which Christians have into a declining, wasting state.  The apostle couples these two duties close together, to ‘hold fast’ our ‘profession,’ and to ‘consider one another, to provoke unto love and to good works’ (Heb. 10:23-24).”

“Indeed, it is a dangerous step towards apostasy to forsake the communion of saints; so it is said of Demas that he ‘hath left us, and embraced the present world’ (2 Tim. 4:10).”

There are many good illustrations that show that Christian fellowship is good for our faith, spiritual strength, obedience, and sanctification.  A soldier is weak apart from his unit, a coal gives off little heat alone, the ship that strays from the convoy is often sunk, predators go after the prey who has left the flock, and so on.

In another place Gurnall summarizes it well.

“God so orders things that we should need one another.”

These quotes were taken from The Christian in Complete Armor (or Armour depending on where you live!), pages 241 and 350 of the Banner of Truth one volume edition.

shane lems

Church Membership – Really?

 Many people today have all sorts of memberships.  From monthly Netflix plans to smart phone contracts to fitness clubs to political movements, not many people hesitate to sign the dotted line that binds them to certain membership obligations.  However, when it comes to being a public, professing member of a local church, quite a few people hesitate and even snicker: “What if I don’t want to join?!”  To make a long post short, I strongly believe church membership of some sort is a biblical thing.  I like what Marion Clark has to say about this in chapter four of The Communion of Saints. 

“If the church is established by God, ruled by Christ, and governed by the Word of his Spirit, then how can anyone refuse to join it?  For Christians so to refuse is to fail to meet one of their fundamental obligations as followers of Christ.”

“Christians who resist the idea of formal membership sometimes question whether the Bible says that they officially have to join the church.  However, it is clear from the New Testament that the first Christians believed in church membership and kept careful track of their members.  Already at Pentecost, new converts were described as ‘being added to their number’ (Acts 2:41, 47; 5:14).  The appointment of the first deacons was in response to the danger that some members who were on the rolls of the Jerusalem church were being overlooked (Acts 6:1-7).  Timothy’s church at Ephesus maintained a list of the widows under its care (1 Tim. 5:9), which is not surprising, given that the apostle Paul had addressed them as ‘members of God’s household’ (Eph. 2:19).  When there was a case of grievous sin at Corinth, Paul instructed the church to ‘put out of [their] fellowship the man who did this’ (1 Cor. 5:2).  He assumed that the elders could distinguish between those who were inside and those who were outside the church, a differentiation that requires fellowship on some sort of formal basis.  Similarly the apostle John was able to discriminate between those who ‘belonged to us’ and ‘did not really belong to us’ (1 John 2:19).”

He concludes,

“It only makes sense: if elders must ‘give an account’ (Heb. 13:17), they must know for whom they are accountable.  To put this another way, shepherds must know who their sheep are.”

There is biblical support for some sort of membership in a local church.  What really makes this hard today is when churches themselves no longer worry about membership.  People end up coming and going from church without anyone really knowing who’s who – there’s no accountability and it’s impossible to do solid shepherding in these types of situations.  So I’m an advocate of church membership and the church I serve takes it seriously.  I’d even suggest that if your church has been neglecting this aspect of its fellowship, contact your elders and/or pastor(s) and discuss this topic with them.

Of course, I recommend reading this chapter (four) of The Communion of Saints for futher stody.  The entire book is also worth reading; it is a biblical and Reformed discussion of what it means to say the phrase in the Creed: “I believe…in the communion of the saints.”

shane lems