WARNING:if you have just finished eating, maybe come back in about 60 minutes. Not for the faint hearted (actually, it is intended for the faint-hearted, that is what makes him dangerous Romans 16:18)
Reminds me of what Spurgeon said in Lectures to my Students
Abhor the practice of some men, who will not bring out the letter "r," such a habit is "vewy wuinous and wediculous, vewy wetched and wepwehensible." Now and then a brother has the felicity to possess a most winning and delicious lisp. This is perhaps among the least of evils, where the brother himself is little and winning, but it would ruin any being who aimed at manliness and force. I can scarcely conceive of Elijah lisping to Ahab, or Paul prettily chipping his words on Mars' hill.
I digress.
If you reject the Bible, orthodoxy, truth, the inerrancy of scripture and hold to a squishy universalism, that is not Christianity. Take your big tent of damnable heresy somewhere else.
Clayton said on the website:
"As leaders it’s our task to help break the cycle of anger, of rejection leading to rejection, and to foster a radically different understanding of the heart of Christian faith.”
A radically different understanding of the heart of the Christian faith? What is the heart of the Christian faith? The Cross. The substitutionary atoning death of Jesus Christ the Lord and His resurrection for the justification of the elect. Christ alone, through faith alone. What, pray tell, is your radically different idea? What about your liberal theology are you going to give up to have this big tent? How about you abandon your universalism, repent and trust in Christ alone? See, when heretics like Brian McClaren and Clayton clamor and lisp about for unity, what that really means is abandon truth and unify with our heresy.
This conference is coming to my town. Perhaps the biggest group of heretics in the world, all coming together "e-merging" at one conference, if you will. Tony Jones, Peter Rollins, Keith Ward, Tripp Fuller, Tim Conder, Terence Fretheim, Greg Boyd and Jo-Ann Badley Philip Clayton, Brian McLaren.
It is interesting to wonder why they want to keep the name Christian at all? If you are opposed to the fundamental teachings of Christianity, then why do they insist on being Christians, other than to purposefully deceive and secretly bring in damnable heresies.
I read his bio where it says:
"Philip Clayton is a philosopher and theologian specializing in the entire range of issues that arise at the intersection between science and religion."
and this:
"Above all, Clayton’s books and articles address the cultural battle currently raging between science and religion. Rejecting the scientism of Dawkins and friends, he argues, does not open the door to fundamentalism."
and my PERSONAL favorite:
"As a public intellectual he seeks to address the burning ethical and political issues at the intersection of science, ethics, religion, and spirituality (e.g., the stem cell debate, euthanasia, the environmental crisis, interreligious warfare). As a philosopher he works to show the compatibility of science with religious belief across the fields where the two may be integrated (emergence theory, evolution and religion, evolutionary psychology, neuroscience and consciousness)."Emphasis mine.
So, how does one become a public intellectual? I asked my wife from henceforth to call me by my new self appointed title "Doug Newell: public intellectual". I kind of expected her laughing at me; which is kind of my point. If you are a PUBLIC intellectual, do you really have to tell us that you are in your bio?
This also gives the answer to this "big tent" idea. See, Mr. Clayton seems to be more concerned with being accepted as a philosopher, scientist and a public intellectual than with Biblical truth. He wants everyone to know that he isn't an atheist like Richard Dawkins, but that doesn't mean he has to be one of those crazy people who believe in the authority and sufficiency of Divine Holy Writ.
Want to be a public intellectual, go be one, but stop calling it Christianity.
______________________________________________________________________
Douglas Newell IV
6 comments:
Wow. And to think,it all starts with denying meaning in the text.
But why can't Christians be intellectuals? And why can't we speak up in opposition to groups like the New Atheists in ways that gain attention? I think God's revelation in Christ is a more satisfying answer than Dawkins' humanism, and I'm willing to try to make the case to him and his friends. Is this bad?
-- Philip Clayton
Short thoughts,
2 Timothy 4:3-4 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.
Stories, fables, conversations, turning from doctrine; sounds like the emerging church and post-modern theology.
Phillip Clayton,
Christians can be intellectual, and Christians can be intellectually honest. Christians believe in the authority and sufficiency of God’s inspired word (plenary verbal). Yet in your book, you dismiss this fundamental axiom of Christian truth and attempt to dismiss it because Muslims believe the same about the Qur’an.
You want to be a Christian, but don’t want to believe what Christians believe because that is offensive to the world of intellectuals that want to be a part of.
We ARE in competition with other religions because Christianity is opposed to every other religion, because Jesus said there is only one way to God and that is by him. Other religions send people to Hell. There is only one way to God and that is through Jesus Christ, by grace through faith. It was the substitutionary sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross that purchased the redemption of His people by His shed blood.
This squishy, post-modern quasi-universalism is not Christianity. Stop trying to "transform" Christianity into your own post-modern image.
As an intellectual, you know that in a compromise between truth and error, truth always looses.
Reminds me that a bunch of rotten eggs will never make a good omelet, no matter how clever the arrangement. Of course there will be divisions. As long as there is truth, there it will be this way. Jesus Himself said, "Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law." (Matthew 10:34-35)
David,
Funny how that those that want unity always want it on their terms.
Post a Comment