October 3, 2006
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The heartbreaking mystery of liberalism
This post is a combination of two thoughts, both of which are rambling, so if you only have a little time, skip it.
1. Al Mohler clearly delineates in this article the emergence of yet another name for the same old people... the new name being "Middle Church, Middle Synagogue, Middle Mosque", and the same old people being "liberals."
Here's a question that has deeply intrigued me... why are liberals and conservatives so predictable? Why is it that so many seemingly nonrelated issues/beliefs are so prevalently combined in the same groups of people? Why is it the case that knowing what a person thinks about the proper interpretation of the book of Genesis or the most appropriate national welfare policies can correlate so highly with that person's beliefs about abortion pills, gun control, the fight against terrorism, or global warming?
I guess these things must be deeply connected somehow...? Not only that, but in spite of all these "correlations," liberals and conservatives keep insisting "don't put me in a box!" "I'm not a stereotypical blue democrat / red republican! I'm purple! Just like Jesus was!"
The stridency of the world is so immensely wearying sometimes.
2. Closely related, the heartbreak and the grief (for me), of/on-behalf-of so many of my friends (especially my Christian friends) struggling through (for lack of a better term) "reactionary postmodern angst".
It's one thing when you see "the world" yelling against God, striving constantly to contradict and circumvent His truth and His beautiful pattern for us, boiling/teeming/laboring like ants to invent "whatever is contrary to sound doctrine" (1 Tim. 1:10).
But it's another thing when close friends go through these struggles... when close friends reject God and the teaching of the Bible, not because they've found something better, nor because they have solid reasons for their rejection, but for various paltry motivations (that we flesh-bound humans are so notorious for)...
"... it doesn't satisfy me emotionally ..."
"... I've just been burned too much in the past by hypocrites who taught this doctrine but lived in sin and selfishness..."
Extending C.S.Lewis' famous quote: "...We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us. Like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot understand what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea."
It's as if the ignorant child, when I sit down to explain to him how wonderful the beach really is, replies to me: "Oh yes, I know all about it. I saw a movie once about the beach. But the theatre was hot and smelly and the people around me were loud and obnoxious. Not for me, thanks. I'll just stick with my mud pies."
I am currently empathizing more than usual with Paul in Romans 9:2... "great sorrow and unceasing grief in my heart..."
Part of it, I am hoping, is the age of my friends - perhaps they are young and inexperienced, and after another decade or two has rolled over them, they will come to their senses and cling wholeheartedly to the truth. Yet I know that many older people have simply become set in their liberal mindsets, irrevocably.
Even more the problem, most likely, is the "spirit of the age" we live in.... Oh, the pain of seeing my dear friends "infected" by the (postmodern, "spiritual", anti-reason, anti-doctrine, cynical, relativistic, emotion/experience-driven, scoffing, sensual, reactionary, nauseating) spirit of the age.
I can't convince them - they won't listen. I can't laugh at them - the love of Christ constrains me. I can't ignore them... splagchnistheis in action. Prayer, patience, acceptance-with-joy the only options. 1 Corinthians 1-3 an encouraging stay.
Comments (2)
wow. this is something i've been thinking/praying through a lot recently. i've seen this tendency in MOST of my friends, and seen threads of it in my own thought as well.
God keep us.
Hi Tim - I grew up in a "very" liberal Jewish family. I was probably the most religious one of the bunch. My dad went to Synogogue on Friday nights or Saturday mornings (out of respect to his father) and I loved going with him. But, now, as a Jewish Believer I am disappointed at the plight of the Jewish nation. You have your Ultra Orthadox; Orthadox, Conservatives, Reform (my upbringing) and now there is the Reconstructionist Movement which ignores the Old Testement completely and relies more on keeping Zionism together. It more like the Universal Church than anything else.
This is why I accepted Christ. I felt, as a Jewish woman, that there had to be more to God than what I learned as a child; that if Jesus was truely the Jewish Messiah, I needed to become a follower of Him.
As my Mom and Dad have gotten older (Dad is 90 and Mom 87), they have gone to many Ecumenical Services in different churches. It's hard to know what they believe. There is now a "new" belief among the Jewish people that Budhism and Judaism are very much a like.
Please pray for the many lost Jewish people who so desperately need Y'shua as their Messiah.
Thanks for your above article. I don't always understand some of it, but, I take in what I can.
In Him,
Mrs. Swift
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