Posted on by Christina Adams

How William Tyndale Changed Our World

I was listening to a podcast by the Rebel Alliance recently and heard them talk about a story of William Tyndale (1494-1536). It’s a story about an interaction Tyndale had with a cardinal at a dinner party where they were discussing whether the Bible should be written in the common language of the people or not. The cardinal said it was dangerous to let uneducated people have access to it, but William Tyndale was adamant about placing the Bible into the hands of even a plough boy (who would then know more about the Scriptures than the cardinal did).

I’m a little familiar with the life and work of William Tyndale and had heard this story before, but hearing it this time hit me. Tyndale went on to translate a good portion of the Bible into English and he was able to mass produce his work, which he sent back to England. He was ultimately betrayed and handed over to his enemies who burnt him at the stake. But his work had started a fire that could not be put out. The people who had his translation had read the Bible and could know when what they were being taught matched the Bible or not. Then because the English people knew the Scripture, they stood up against the Catholic church under Queen Mary I (who reigned from 1553-1558) and were themselves killed for that knowledge. Those of them who could, fled persecution. They became known as Puritans and then managed to travel to the New World where they placed a high importance on education. Why? So that all the common people could read the Bible for themselves.

Going back to England, even the whole purpose of Sunday school when it was originally started was to teach kids who worked in factories six days a week to learn how to read, from the Bible, and to do math. The drive to educate each generation had been for the purpose of allowing them to know the Bible for themselves. This was one of the primary purposes of schools in America in the early years to the point where we have become so used to placing an emphasis on reading it seems common.

And all this despite the fact that the cardinal was originally right to a degree. By permitting uneducated people to also read the Bible has allowed for some people to read it wrongly, to take verses out of context, to use verses for their own personal projects, and to misapply what is really said and to spread their inaccurate knowledge to the masses. But William Tyndale was also right because by him being willing to trust the common people, although really it was to trust God’s ability to protect who are His and to teach them what is true, so many more average, generally less educated people have been able to learn and grow spiritually. Tyndale was willing to entrust normal people with great knowledge without forcing them to do all the work of education, language learning, and theology first.

It struck me that without Tyndale’s goal to place the Bible in ordinary hands that we might not have our current society today. If the Bible had never been translated into English, there would be no reason for people to read and no reason to send all the children to school. There might not have been a reason to travel from Europe to America since there would not be as many common people who were willing to resist the Catholic teachings and needed a place to go where they could be free to teach and learn the Bible. I’m not saying that America would have never been found, as that happened two years before Tyndale was born, but that the people and circumstances of America’s founding would have been different. We might not have sent teachers to open school houses on the frontier. We might not have founded our Ivy League schools as most of them were originally seminaries. We would have no reason for libraries. We would not have had the honor and dignity of the average man in view when we formed our union. We would not have been willing to let the common, uneducated people participate in the maintenance of a new government if they had even less education. And we would not be living in a day when our literacy rates are so high in comparison with the literacy rates of the world during Tyndale’s day. This is not to say that the Bible would have never been translated into English, as there already were English translations before Tyndale’s translation, but it was Tyndale’s goal that made a difference.

Since Tyndale’s time, we have raised the average, common people to a high, educated status and entrusted them with responsibility. Granted there is always more education to be had, but if anyone can read, they can learn about anything even to the point of becoming an expert. However, we have also in more recent years returned to the mentality of the cardinal. We are quick to point out when our neighbor is not an expert. We are quick to suggest that our neighbor just trust those who are experts and to not think for themselves. We are quick to dismiss any real observation into a topic that does not come from a specific type of expert. In general, we no longer want to trust the average garbage collectors and hair dressers with the ability to make up their own minds.

It’s time we let our neighbors be free. We can trust God to take care of those who will abuse and distort what is right, true, and real. But we can also trust that God can and does direct our neighbors in the paths that are best for them, not necessarily the right paths for us. Yet they must be allowed to make their own decisions, to think their own thoughts, to focus on their own directions, because they are the ones who have to live with the consequences of their actions. We don’t. Let’s bring trust back, following Tyndale’s example, and honor our neighbor’s dignity and responsibility.

Posted on by Christina Adams

“Love Your Neighbor. Get Vaccinated.”

Lately, I’ve heard the argument that the only loving thing a Christian could do is to get vaccinated, specifically with the Covid vaccine. This idea has been pushed by celebrities like Jen Hatmaker, in a recent Relevant article, and by many others. Often the assumption behind it is that if everyone was vaccinated then we could end the pandemic completely.

And on the surface, it makes sense. If people can spread a virus to others without knowing, then it seems better to not spread it, especially when there is a small portion of the population that could die from it. As Christians we love other people and do not want to cause the death of anyone.

The argument looks something like this:

  1. This current virus is dangerous
  2. It can be spread unknowingly
  3. There is a vaccine for this virus (and it’s safer than the virus)
  4. It is more loving to care about the health of others by getting the vaccine

Conclusion: Every Christian should get the vaccine so they can be loving and do not cause danger to others by spreading it unknowingly: Love your neighbor. Get vaccinated.

Now, there is one thing to note in that the majority of people in America at this moment are not planning to spread this virus knowingly. There is no intentional spread. There might be the usual “I’m not feeling as good as I did yesterday, but things still need to get done” mentality that we have all done and used before 2020. But this is not the same as knowingly spreading the disease because it could just be that person was out in the rain a little too long the day before, or it could be allergies, or it could be a host of other reasons that might not be contagious or Covid. In the last year and a half, how many people did not do regular activities and instead got a negative test?

If I were to take the above argument and really flesh it out, there are direct connections that could be made and more proofs that could be given for why the premises are believed to be true, but these premises seem to be the general reasons for why someone ought to be vaccinated. Like all debate arguments the premises matter because the conclusion, i.e. that everyone ought to be vaccinated, depends on them.

Just from a medical and scientific position, there are some issues with these premises and while I do not intend to focus on them long, they are worth mentioning.

On the first premise that the current virus is dangerous: The virus is actually not dangerous for most of the population. We have known the stats for people younger than 65 to be less than 3% almost since the beginning. There will be some people who will reject the vaccine based on not accepting this premise.

On the second premise that it can be spread unknowingly: The scientific community has released conflicting information on whether the virus cannot be or is rarely spread by those who are asymptomatic. However, we also know that the vaccine does not protect others as much as ourselves, i.e. those who have the vaccine can spread the virus unknowingly as well. Vaccinated individuals are more likely to spread the virus unknowingly because the vaccine prevents them from having symptoms. There are some people who reject this whole argument based on not accepting the use of this premise in only applying to the unvaccinated since it could then be unloving to knowingly not have symptoms.

On the third premise that there is a vaccine and it is safe: There are some who still question the individual side-effects of the vaccine and the benefits/health-risk of it. Implicit in the third premise is the assumption that the vaccine is safe and good for everyone or most to take and this is not completely true. There are people with allergies, people with health conditions, and people for whom getting the vaccine would be worse than getting Covid. A vaccine study cannot observe every single type of person, they only take a sample of the population and they tend to take those who are not on the fringes with potential issues. We know that the studies for the current vaccines did not test pregnant or nursing mothers. There are some people who have looked at the VAERS (Vaccine Adverse Effects Reporting System) numbers of deaths, hospitalizations, miscarriages, and complications that have happened after vaccination and are not sure that the vaccine is safe for them or their loved ones. For those who have looked into this they would disagree with the third premise that the vaccine is safe.

These are just some of the reasons why people might not agree with the first three premises and why they would then disagree with the conclusion. There is a degree to which our underlying beliefs come to bear on whether we are more or less willing to trust the government or science from the start. But it does not mean that those who are not yet vaccinated haven’t thought through the argument at all, nor does it mean that those people are unloving. They just disagree with some of the premises that support the argument.

This brings us to the last and fourth premise that it is more loving to get the vaccine than to not get it. I am covering this premise differently because it is less of a medical or science-based premise and more of a theological and definitional argument because it depends on what ‘love’ means and what the ‘most loving’ action to do in this situation is. This premise is also difficult because it is true that we should and should want to love others. It is very easy to assume that because we want to love others whatever else is said after that is something we should be doing too. Consider these phrases: Love your neighbor. Protect them with a gun. Or Love your neighbor. Stop using your car. Or Love your neighbors. Pay for their bad habits. All of these second statement are not cut-and-dry, right-and-wrong positions to take. Yes, it is true that it could be a loving thing to protect with a gun, not drive, or even pay for a bad habit, but they might not always be the most loving thing to do, or even loving at all.

There are a couple of underlying premises that need to be addressed before taking on this argument as a whole. The first is the question of who is the most important one we should love. We should love our neighbor, absolutely, however, our first and most important love is God and Christ, period. If we do not love and honor Him above all others, then we are not really loving others. And loving others is not a substitute for loving Christ. There are some who would suggest that by loving others they are loving God. Indeed, there is a verse in I John that seems to say that, but if we place our eyes on our neighbor and use God as a means to the neighbor’s ends, if we are concerned more with what happens to our neighbor or what our neighbor will think of us than what God is doing or might be thinking, we are no longer loving God and our neighbor has taken the place of God and Christ in our lives. Christ should be our first hope, our first source of refuge, our first concern, our first definer of terms.

Christ is capable to see through all that is true and false and He is willing to guide us in the direction He would want us to go. And because of Christ we are capable of making decisions about the vaccine and our own health without a doctor’s (or society’s) approval. Even the most simple-minded believer who listens to Christ is able to follow Him correctly. Anyone who believes that all people ought to be forced to get the vaccine, is not trusting that Christ might be leading some people toward the vaccine and others away from it.

In this regard, the safest thing for the most people is to let them ask God what to do since God made their bodies and knows more about science than all the scientists put together. God knows what is best for everyone. Also, God can warn us when He knows we might spread the virus and God can preserve us if we get it, just as He can preserve us with the vaccine potential side-effects. This does not mean that since God can preserve us either way, we should all get the vaccine, because there are consequences for not listening to God when He warns us not to do something. This is true too for anyone that God might tell to stay home and who ignore Him.

The argument then that we ought to love our neighbor by getting vaccinated is not a God-centered argument. No one has yet said, “Love God, get vaccinated.” If we took the latter argument, how would our vaccination be a show of our love for God, and a God who will not be affected either way by our vaccination status? Instead, we ought to love and honor God by asking Him how best to love our neighbor. Our first and primary concern ought to be our relationship with God and when we have that relationship right, we will love our neighbor right too.

The second underlying premise is that we should ‘trust the science.’ This is a phrase that many are using now, but it goes back to the same issues above. Which scientists do people tend to mean? The ones that agree with their current position. Both the pro-vaccine and anti-vaccine people have scientists and medical professionals who have presented evidence that supports their vaccination position. Neither side is actually anti-science. It is only a matter of what science we are looking at and who we trust more.

In addition, the phrase ‘trust the science’ is never placed under God. It’s not ‘trust Jesus and the science.’ Ultimately, this phrase encourages Christians not to look to God first as our source of help and salvation from the virus. This does not mean that we should ignore scientific evidence at all, but if we are just automatically believing whatever science says and acting on it without taking it to Christ first, then we are not honoring Christ as we should. If we have to chose between trusting Jesus or trusting the science, only one will last forever. Therefore, the proper Christian perspective is to trust Jesus and to evaluate and consider science.

The third underlying premise is that we can damage the health of others through our actions. And this premise is true to a point. The things we do and the decisions we make absolutely have consequences, yet it is never outside of the view or action of God. This premise assumes that if a person has the virus and is around others that those people will get it and some of them may die. It also assumes that God’s own interaction, preservation, power, and sovereignty is a non-factor. Whatever God calls a person to do, that person can do. A completely contagious person can walk through a nursing home, hugging and kissing, without killing anyone if God wants that person to do that. In other words, God is able to keep us and those around us from sickness and death even if our actions might have unintended consequences in a world without God.

The fourth underlying premise assumes that health is the goal for all people. Now it is true that health is considered better than sickness, but Jesus did not come to wipe out all disease. The body we currently have is not built to last forever. And for some, sickness is what brings them to Christ. The best thing that can happen to some is for their body to decline while their soul is restored. This obviously does not mean that we should then spread Covid like a wildfire nor that we should rejoice when others become sick and not care for their physical needs, but it is meant to point out the reality that our and our loved ones’ physical health is not the only goal that matters. In fact, next to the goal of a right, deep relationship with God, the goal of physical health is pale and frail. God also will use sickness in our lives to teach us and to guide us closer to Him, so He will not always protect us from everything for our own immortal good.

Similar to the fourth underlying premise is a slightly different assumption that caring for the physical health of others also trumps caring for their freedom, social needs, and emotional health. A person is more than the physical. There is more at stake here than just whether people get vaccinated or not. There are the questions of mandating the vaccine, of future quarantines, of isolation, of government or societal retaliations for those who do not give up freedom of choice, of how people can live in fear, and of how people can live in anger. There is the fact that we have stopped touching each other and that we avoid interactions with others in public. Each of these also have to do with our neighbor and the right way to love them. Can it be loving to care about our neighbor’s freedom enough to fight for it when they are not willing or unable to protect it? Can it be loving to our neighbor to live without fear and interact with them even if they have germs? Is it loving to force our neighbor to make a medical decision with consequences that we will not have to live with for the rest of our lives? The assumption that unvaccinated Christians are automatically not loving their neighbor is a poor view of all that love can be.

These underlying premises are valid reasons for not accepting premise four on its face value. We do want to love others, but not to place the needs of others over our relationship with God, our honoring Him as our source of guidance and help, our awareness of God’s sovereignty, and our view of humanity’s eternal condition including seeing our neighbor’s needs aside from the physical.

Thus, the primary argument that those who vaccinate are loving and those who do not are unloving is false and boarders on maligning some members of Christ’s Body. It requires others to live by our definitions and implies they are wicked if they don’t. Therefore, it is an unloving statement and a false assumption that relies on a limited and narrow human understanding of what loving our neighbor means.

This does not mean that everyone who has gotten the vaccine because they believed it would be the most loving thing to do for their elderly neighbors is wrong (at all, this is a noble thing to do for others if you feel like God has called you to do this), nor that those who have not vaccinated are right. Only that those who would tell Christians who have not vaccinated that they are not loving their neighbor are using a poor, man-centered argument. At the very least we ought to remember that for all of us who love God He is able to keep us from falling no matter what mistakes we make, no matter what wrong theological positions we hold, no matter what medical choices we pick. And that we should be cautious of how we expect others to live by our definitions, standards, and judgements and not criticize them when they have prayerfully considered other things that we have not.

Christ has defined what loving our neighbor means. He will guide us as to what we can do to love others. We can trust that God will guide and direct our brothers and sisters. We can trust that His will is accomplished in them and in us. We can trust that He is able to bring us through our current time safely to the end. For we are always safe with Him. Maybe not always physically or emotionally safe, but there is nothing we might lose that God cannot restore a thousand times when we are with Him forever. No matter what Christ reigns, even now.

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Posted on by Christina Adams

Living for God’s Approval

I have been trying to live my life in such a way that I no longer dwell in a state of stress, but dwell in a knowledge of Christ and His constant care for me. Some of this means changing the things I say. It is possible that I often sound more stressed than I actually feel. I will make side comments about finances or difficulties with broken things I used to rely on. I do such things often for the fact that it makes a funnier story or because I am hoping for a certain kind of response. Which would then be another thing I need to adjust. What would my life look like if I wasn’t hoping for a laugh or a comment of concerned sympathy?

All this goes to show just how much I hope to change inside. I want to be content with God’s attention, to not overstate my case, to let the sense that God is taking care of me on the inside show on the outside. Sometimes I can even believe my own words or at least they can distract me from keeping my mind and eyes on Christ just by hearing myself say them. Because then I think about the words. I think about whether they are true or not, whether I got the kind of response I was hoping for, often I don’t. And then, if I am not paying attention, I will try to double down to get the desired response.

But how much better would it be to have a habit of caring more about what God thinks? There isn’t that immediate sense of connection with the person next to me, but there would be no let down afterward either. I could speak freely and plainly about all that is true and I would never regret what I said, how I said it, or what things I was really implying by it.

It is hard to live with God in mind for the simple reason that the approval and good feelings don’t tend to come in the moment. In some cases, we have to wait years and years under the hope that we will be approved of one day. It is easy to see all the failures now and to let them occupy our minds rather than treating ourselves in the way that we have hopefully learned to treat others.

Just as we don’t live for the approval and applause of others, neither do we live for the approval and applause of ourselves, and at least for me, myself is quite willing to go overboard on both approval and condemnation and at the wrong times every time. But how do we live when we don’t live for our own sense of success or approval?

It’s odd too, because we have come to learn that whenever we feel we shouldn’t do something, like steal a candy bar or hit a sibling, that we should listen to that ‘voice.’ Whenever we feel a sense of pride at accomplishing something well it seems that we ought to feel that way too. And so, we can live with both feelings as our guide. Whenever we feel disappointed at ourselves, we take it to heart and the opposite is true too. But we are not meant to blindly trust those feelings either. We can feel truly disappointed with ourselves all the while doing exactly what God would have us do. We can feel really good about getting stuff done without seeing how we are treating others while we do it. In both cases neither feeling is an accurate reflection of the way God sees us.

As I have gotten older, the phrase Paul said about not even judging himself has become so much more profound. Really the best way to live is to act as much as I can in the way God would have me act, to think in the way God would have me think, and leave the results and the approval up to Him. It can be hard, but living with myself when I am disappointed with myself is probably harder. This is why life with Christ, with His burden, will always be lighter, more peaceful, and more restful for our souls.

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Posted on by Christina Adams

More Thoughts on Sphere Sovereignty

I’ve posted two different posts on sphere sovereignty before that you can check out, here’s the first and here’s the second, where I go into more detail about the context of where I have seen it and my initial thoughts. But after quite a few days of thinking, and discussing this topic with others, I’ve had some broader thoughts that are related, yet not in the same way.

I’m really not sure where I stand with whether or not sphere sovereignty is true or false or true in some ways, but not all. I will probably need to read Kuyper’s argument along with others for that. The idea is interesting and has a certain appeal because it can draw certain lines that place ideas and responses into clear, black and white, cut and dry areas, spheres actually. But it is also this ability to delineate one thing from another that makes it hard for me to accept.

It is true that there are some mentions of hierarchy or a system of order in the Bible. Governments are ruled best when not all the people in the nation have the same input over every decision. Parents ought to have the choice of decisions over their children. Christ is clearly portrayed as being over His Church. But these examples do not automatically prove sphere sovereignty as the whole concept. They prove a certain order.

What is not clear to me is how we can determine the lines for all the spheres in areas where the Bible is silent. What makes one area of life fall under the government, the church, the family, or individual sovereignty? In other words, if we think through the concept of sphere sovereignty as applied to other areas, would we discover that the lines between one sphere and the next are not as clear as we thought?

One issue with sphere sovereignty is that is seeks to separate what might seem connected and to connect what might seem separate, to divide what is united and to unite what is divided. Is it possible for the individual to be separate from the family, the church, or the government? To what degree do each of those spheres have claims over the individual? The same is true for the family, the church, and the government. What might seem a clear line to me, might be questionable to you and we could both provide biblical support for our positions. And what happens when we start to view all the areas of life and culture through a lens of separate sovereignties? Will we limit our own interactions because it is not our sphere’s authority?

Another issue with sphere sovereignty is what the concept says about the Trinity, and this is perhaps the most important point to me right now. How we view God determines what we try to become more like. Sphere sovereignty relies on a concept of hierarchy with specific roles given to each position. If this is implied to the Trinity, then each Person in the Godhead is seen as filling either in a position of authority or a position of submission (not that I am saying submission is wrong or that submission does not occur within the Trinity only that the concept of authority and submission become more central to defining the Trinity). Despite being told that being first, at the top of the chain, with the most authority does not make any person in general or member of the Trinity better than the others, not many people aspire to the lowest spot. If we cannot take first position in the Church or the family, then we ought to go for second, but no one hopes to stay in third. If we see the Trinity as a hierarchy, then we will try enter into hierarchies that benefit us. We find our success in having others who follow or listen to us.

Perhaps my real question is, then what is the good of humility? Jesus humbled Himself, yes, but does the Father under a hierarchical view of the Trinity? And then which one should we try to be like if He doesn’t? Is Jesus the father in the prodigal son parable? How could Jesus be an exact representation of the Father if the Father does not humble Himself? And if the Father does humble Himself, then how important is the hierarchical structure to Him? It seems to me that a concept of hierarchy is antithetical, at least in human practice, to an attitude of humility. It would make thinking of others as better than yourself difficult if you hold the position everyone else wants because they are under you.

These are just some of my thoughts. What are yours? Have you ever thought through sphere sovereignty? Are there other angles I could consider?

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Posted on by Christina Adams

Unity and the SBC

Last week the Southern Baptist Convention voted for a new president. It was an event that I watched from afar. While I don’t identify myself as Southern Baptist, I used to go to a church that affiliated with them and I attended Southern Baptist Theological Seminary for two years. I had also read Voddie Baucham’s Fault Lines and knew some of the issues with Resolution 9 from the SBC Convention in 2019, so I was interested in hearing what happened in this year’s convention. Both the rejoicing and discouragement over the victory of Ed Litton as the new president reveal much about the current division within the Southern Baptist denomination. It was a fairly close race (52-48) and one that could swing back in the other direction next election.

The point is not that the right or wrong man was voted in as the next president of the SBC, nor that the next election could correct this error, rather the point is that we consider voting within the SBC and the Church to be a valid method of revealing God’s will. Consider what an election is. It is a consent to the majority, a popularity contest of sorts. The kind of people voting determine the kind of majority that there will be. But even beyond that, are people voting for what they believe? Or what they or those they represent want? And how many people vote based on what Christ wants?

This does not mean that God can’t or won’t use an election, because He has and will whenever it fills His purpose; however, Christ’s Church has not been left up to the dictates of a popular vote. We follow Christ and we all ought to be in the habit of allowing Christ to lead, not the majority. Learning how to follow Christ in making a decision means waiting on Him and being patient as we wait for others to hear from Him too.

Thus, the idea of voting ought to be considered. For Christians to vote on a matter that pertains to the rest of the Body of Christ and then go with whatever the majority says means that if God is speaking to and solely directing the minority that they are ignored. It could even be a minority of one person. Yet even with only one person, add God and it is the kind of minority that will succeed. Any branch that does not bear God’s fruit will be cut down, it’s just a matter of time. And every branch that is bearing godly fruit will be pruned to bear more.

As the Body of Christ, we all ought to be willing to give up the things we want, the ideas we champion, the directions we long to go all for the sake of Christ. It is often more important for us to cultivate unity with our brothers and sisters, to go at the slow pace that they are capable of going, than to rush on ahead. We may long for changes to the Body of Christ around us and we should work toward helping those who need help. It is only that we cannot work quickly with those who are not yet capable of moving with us.

We also need to cultivate a willingness to wait on Christ. No Church vote should be won by majority. It ought to be 100% and nothing less. If Christ is in me and in you and we are equally submitting to Him and equally willing to listen to Him, then He will direct us both to the same answer. The issue comes when I put my goals first, perhaps even in the name of Christ, and push for them no matter how honorable or good they may seem over my willingness to wait patiently for Christ’s direction and leadership to be revealed.

This does not mean that there is not disagreement or even parting ways, because where God wants you and where He wants me may be two different places. This might be His means of revealing His different directions to us. But it does mean that if you and I seek to obey Christ, yet we are angry at each other and we refuse to listen to each other and we also refuse to consider that we might need to give up what we are championing, then we are not obeying Christ’s command for unity nor are we considering others as better than ourselves.

Unity is not something that can just happen. It takes work and effort on everyone’s part. Unity is also not something that can be had if some love Christ and others love the world. We need to know when and where the line is on that as well. But if we love Christ then we ought to seek to be unified with others who love Him. Not to shove deep inside us what we really believe to be true for the sake of a false peace, but to grow and challenge others in growth. Our love for and obedience to Christ is and always is the goal.

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Posted on by Christina Adams · 1 Comment

Is Sphere Sovereignty Necessary to Oppose Lockdown Restrictions?

In a recent podcast of The Rebel Alliance, which everyone should check out here, one of the commentators mentioned that having an understanding of sphere sovereignty was so important to knowing how to discern and judge this time. The best way to know what we as the Church should be doing is to learn about Kuyper and what sphere sovereignty is. This is a topic that I addressed earlier here, so I won’t be going back into the basics of what sphere sovereignty is again, but I did not go as far into the topic as I thought I could. I also thought a breakdown of the argument might be interesting.

First though, I would like to say that we all should be praying for the Church in Canada as well as the Church in any nation where pastors are having to decide whether to stay open or closed and having to face government enforced consequences for that decision. I’d also like to say that I am unified with the conclusions that the guys at The Rebel Alliance have come to. The Church should honor Christ as King over all governments. Christ has commanded us to gather. Gathering may have consequences physically, but those are up to God. It is up to us to trust that God will provide for us and that God can and will provide for us whether we are healthy or sick, through life or death. We serve the Creator of all things and we should not live in fear of a thing that cannot destroy our souls. Our health is not promised to us, but our obedience is required of us.

However, the conclusion is reached, the guys at The Rebel Alliance have an argument that, to the best of my knowledge, goes something like this:

  1. God is the Ruler over all things
  2. God has given different spheres of life some of His authority to rule in that sphere’s area
  3. These spheres are sovereign inside this area only and are not sovereign over other areas
    1. These spheres include government, family, and the Church, etc.
  4. To try to take power or authority from one sphere to give to another violates God’s separation of spheres and is a usurpation of God’s order that ought to be rejected and opposed
  5. The Canadian government is trying to usurp power from the Church by dictating how the Church can meet, particularly when it is not doing so for other institutions, thus violating God’s separation of spheres
  6. Therefore: the Canadian government ought to be opposed by the Church, and by all pastors, because it is the Church’s responsibility to honor Christ and be obedient to Christ over the Canadian government

I sincerely hope that I have expressed this argument accurately and as I said before I agree with the conclusion. I also ought to add that the reason the sovereignty of the sphere ought to be honored is because of God’s ultimate rule over all things and so the spheres are important because God has made them important. My question is: Can the conclusion be reached without the concept of sphere sovereignty?

The biggest practical issue with sphere sovereignty is that this idea is not widely known, especially outside of Reformed circles. It then has to be explained and proven for the rest of the Church to get on the same page as those who have read Abraham Kuyper. Putting aside the fact that I am currently not convinced that sphere sovereignty is an accurate reflection of the reality that God has created or that it is strongly supported by the Bible, with no other ways to interpret the verses that might hint at it. The whole sphere sovereignty argument seems like running a figure 8 to reconnect the lines rather than just running a circle.

Here’s the argument without using sphere sovereignty:

  1. God is the Ruler of all things
  2. God has given all authority to Christ
  3. Christ is head of the Church and we are to obey His commands
  4. Christ has commanded us to gather and to honor Him
  5. The Canadian government seeks to take control of how the Church gathers
  6. Therefore: the Canadian government ought to be opposed by the Church, and by all pastors, because it is the Church’s responsibility to honor Christ and be obedient to Christ over the Canadian government

This argument places Christ at the center of our reason for why we ought to continue to gather and it is easily understood and explained to all Christians. It also shows the real conflict, which is not a conflict of sphere power and authority, rather, it is a conflict between the world and Christ. Will we honor Christ as Lord over our Churches, our gatherings, and our lives? Will we obey Him? Or will we place the command to gather aside and obey the whims of the government?

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Posted on by Christina Adams

Called to Business

Dallas Willard’s book on Business!

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Posted on by Christina Adams

Fault Lines Review

Here’s some thoughts on Fault Lines, Voddie Baucham’s new book!

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Posted on by Christina Adams

When Jesus was Persecuted

I was reading today in the book of John chapter 5 and two verses stuck out to me, verses 16 & 18. The first says that because Jesus was healing on the Sabbath this was why the Pharisees were persecuting Him and the second says that because Jesus claimed God was His Father that was why the Pharisees wanted to kill Him. It struck me that Jesus was being persecuted long before He was arrested. I had never thought of it that way before. But for much of Jesus’ ministry days He was opposed, questioned, mocked, and conspired against with traps laid out for Him. I had always known that Jesus would have to move from one place to the other, that going to Jerusalem was often a danger for Him, that attempts were made on his life, but I had not associated these things with persecution because of the intensity of persecution that was still to come. They were all connected to the final act, but they still were persecution even if Jesus had not died by their design.

When Jesus told His disciples that if they persecuted Him they would persecute the disciples too, it was clear what the disciples could expect, just not the extent to which the persecution would go. This is true for us now too. We will be opposed, questioned, mocked, and conspired against.

In thinking about persecution, it is hard not to think about the Beatitude that says, “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and say all manner of evil against you for great is your reward in Heaven. For in the same way they persecuted the prophets” (Matt. 5:11-12 paraphrase). The blessing isn’t in the persecution. Persecution is not fun or joyful in and of itself. It is not wonderful to be continually opposed or mocked.

Rather the blessing is found in the fact that even when such things happen God is with us in a real way. We might be on the wrong side of our culture, but we are on the right side of God. He will still hear us, still comfort us, still provide for us, even when we are in that state. We never have a reason to fear or despair. As Psalm 23 says, He will prepare a table for us in the presence of our enemies, not so we can gloat at having food, but as Dallas Willard says so that we can invite them to eat what is truly wholesome with us. In other words, we have an abundance even in the presence of those who would harm us, and so much so that we could have enough to share even with them.

As we are currently facing opposition in our culture today, we can keep in mind that this is nothing new. We don’t know where this opposition could go yet, but we do know that no matter what happens, God will always be with us. Not to prove we are right, but to prove we are His. His opinion is the only one that matters. If we say things that are true of Him and His reality, we will not be fighting against Him. And we don’t know now how much of what we do that God can and will use to a glorious purpose.

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Posted on by Christina Adams

1984 vs. Brave New World

Here’s a comparison between two books people often try to compare the present to.

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