A Response to Dan's Loss of Faith

A couple months back @dan posted the account of how he lost his religion in Why I gave up Christianity. In that post he outlined how his discovery of libertarian philosophy and Austrian economics led to a change in his way of thinking with an emphasis on rationality and consistency.

I appreciate Dan's desire to seek truth and eliminate contradictory thinking. In today's world, where so many believe that truth is arbited by the individual, or that truth doesn't really exist in any sort of traditional understanding of the word at all, it is refreshing for someone to declare an unequivocal support for truth and reality as being something external to themselves. This of course is the great advantage of Austrian economists, who deal with the world as it is, and not as some utopian statist thinks it should be.

As an evangelical Christian who also believes in consistent thinking and rationality of belief, I would like to answer some of the points Dan raises in his post. To make it easier to follow, and easier for me to write, I have copied the section headings that Dan uses and will attempt to respond to his sections in the same order he presents them.

Biblical Support for Liberty

In this section Dan outlines how he finds a Biblical basis for his libertarian worldview. Specifically Mark 12:31, “love your neighbor as yourself”. This is significant as we'll see a little later, but I'll just say for now that everything has to be looked at in context. One cannot take a verse out of the middle of a book in Scripture and spread it across all of life like a giant philosophical blanket.

Take for example the command “Thou shalt not kill” (Exodus 20:13). This is not a universal dictum against the ending of all life. For instance, it doesn't apply to fish. Or sheep. Or cattle. The ancient Israelites were not herbivores and neither were New Testament Christians. Jesus himself is pictured cooking fish on the beach at one point (John 21:9). Nor did this command prohibit application of the death penalty, which was prescribed elsewhere in the Pentatuch for a host of crimes.

Nevertheless, I certainly agree with Dan that love your neighbour as yourself is an excellent basis for a worldview that of course is consistent with the overarching theme of the Bible.

Hypocrisy in the Church

Here Dan accuses some Christians of worshipping government. I can't say I've ever encountered a government-worshipping Christian. Most Christians I know are deeply disappointed in government. However to those Christians who worship government Dan is right to condemn them. The correct response to a King, President, or Dictator who demands your worship is that of the Jewish deportee Daniel (no relation) who refused to pray to Darius the Mede. You may recall that Daniel wound up in the lion's den, but sometimes there is a price paid for being committed to principle.

Dan also condemns Christians who support government as being sinful in light of the 2nd greatest commandment, and asks how he can attend a church that 'subjugated' itself to the government. Support and subjugation to government are not evidence of hypocrisy, however. They are in fact evidence of consistency in obedience to Scripture. The Bible makes it abundantly clear that we are to be “subject to the governing authorities” (Romans 13:1) and that “there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.” Keep in mind that the books of the New Testament were written during a time when the land of Palestine was under the control of the Romans, and that many of the emperors of Rome were extremely immoral, even by today's standards, and were vicious persecutors of Christians. Paul himself who wrote Romans spent many years in prison and eventually was martyred. Yet he recognized that obedience to God's commands overruled any desire he may have had to advocate for reform of temporal government along Christian principles. God did not call Paul to preach social revolution, but personal repentance.

Would God let 99.99% of Pastors miss the Mark?

I'm going to give Dan the benefit of the doubt and assume that the “99.99%” figure is hyperbole, if for no other reason than I've never come across such a high level of agreement in any organization outside of North Korea, let alone the church in America. Let's just say that Dan believes most pastors are wrong when it comes to their support of the (U.S.) government.

I think it quite possible that most Christians around the globe agree with Dan in the sense that they feel that American evangelicalism is often too closely intertwined with American politics, especially the Republican party. Even Billy Graham, who has met and prayed with every U.S. President since Truman (that's 11) says if he could go back and do anything over again, he would steer clear of politics.

American evangelicals have fallen for the same temptation that Dan is arguing for in his post: turning the secular government into a Christian government. Dan withholds support from his government because they do not conform to his Golden Rule Worldview. American evangelicals have tried to influence and coerce the U.S. government to follow a Christian worldview by electioneering and lobbying, and to the extent that they believe the U.S. constitution and system of government reflects that worldview, they have supported it. And when America was attacked on 9/11, Christians hopped on the bandwagon with everybody else and largely supported the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.

When Christians put love of country ahead of love of God, they sin. Dan writes that when people who lead the flock, whether pastors, or ministers, or elders, persist in sin – and when there is so many of them doing it – people must not be 'hearing from God'. For surely if God were dwelling in them and they heard the truth, wouldn't they repent?

It is true that “faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” (Romans 10:17). Dan believes when he is speaking to pastors about their illicit support of government, that he is delivering the word of God to them. When they fail to respond, they are nullifying the word of God, specifically the passage in Romans above.

There are several problems with this.

Firstly, is what Dan is telling them in fact the word of God? Since Dan doesn't record exactly what he is saying, we have to extrapolate a bit. I imagine he believes, in light of the Silver and Golden rules, that government is not to: wage war, exact high taxes, coerce the citizenry, or punish people violently. When government does these things it is not behaving biblically, and so Christians, especially pastors, are not to 'support' it. The problem with this is that the Golden Rule is meant for you and I in our daily lives. You and I are to treat one another with the respect and mercy we want for ourselves. We are to forgive "seventy times seven" and "turn the other cheek". Government, on the other hand, is to execute judgement. Romans 13:4 - “For the one in authority is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for rulers do not bear the sword for no reason. They are God's servants, agents of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer.”

This is not to say that there is not good and bad government. The bible explicitly talks about this: “Where the righteous thrive, the people rejoice; when the wicked rule, the people groan.”(Proverbs 29:2). But government is instituted by God, and government is given the right to wield the sword. Utopian ideas about human nature and government notwithstanding, 'wielding the sword' always has, and always will be a feature of government.

Secondly, does merely hearing the truth once automatically mean a person will repent and obey? Nowhere is this idea found in Scripture. Yes, faith comes by hearing, but hearing doesn't always lead to faith and obedience. The disciple Peter lived with Jesus for three years. He saw miracles of all kinds, he heard the most magnificent sermons ever preached, he witnessed the transfiguration of the Christ and the appearance of Moses and Elijah. But when a servant girl accused him of having been with Jesus, he was a coward and denied it. Even after the resurrection and years into his ministry, Peter still had to be corrected by the Apostle Paul for hypocritical behaviour over cultural issues between gentiles and Jews (Galatians 2:11). We don't need Austrian economics to know that sanctification is not an immediate and universal phenomenon in the church. Dan could simply have looked at the fact that there are dozens of denominations in the U.S. alone, all differing from one another in some aspect of theology. At best only one of these denominations is right in every respect. Meaning millions of worshippers every week attend a church that is less than perfect.

Believers are exhorted to “study to show yourselves approved”. Christian growth is not a matter of hearing something once from a parishioner and coming to the realization you've been wrong all along. Even if that congregant is telling you the word of God, it may take further study and prayer before a pastor changes his mind on something. This is not a contradiction of Scripture. This is consistent with it.

Thirdly, as outlined earlier, Christians are not called to rebel against government. We are called to submit to it to the extent that it does not cause us to disobey God. Note that we are not called to submit to the extent that government does not disobey God. This is where it is important that we know our role. It is not our role to impose the will of God on government or our neighbours. It is our role to impose it on ourselves.

Finally, I think Dan's personal experience with Christian pastors is somewhat novel. American evangelicalism is a very small subset of the worldwide Christian church. And it is possible that Dan has been exposed to an even smaller subset of Christianity than that. Patriotism and foreign-policy hawkishness are characteristics of that group that don't necessarily apply to the vast majority of Christians around the world.

You Cannot Trust People

Dan and I are in complete agreement here. And the Bible confirms it. Acts 17:11 the residents of Berea “...received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” What we also have to realize is that we can't trust ourselves..."The heart is deceitful above all things" (Jeremiah 17:9). Our own thinking is darkened with prejudice, preference, past experience, emotion and all the cultural accoutrements that come with growing up in a highly technological, skeptical, liberal society. We also usually aren't as smart as we think we are, and tend to overvalue our own opinions and undervalue others. We also often think our present generation is more intelligent than past generations. But Christianity is not “a bunch of people telling and retelling the same stories for generations. Each generation (choosing) to believe the prior generation.” Christianity is each generation choosing to believe the documents laid down in the first century, by eyewitnesses or their associates. The Christian scriptures have been demonstrated to be remarkably consistent over 2,000 years. They are not the recently transcribed ruminations of elders relayed to the tribe around the campfire or at a coffee shop.

Dan says people believe because not believing would result in becoming a social outcast. While this may be true in some corners of America , it has not been true for the vast majority of people for most of the last 2000 years. Today Christians are martyred in the thousands each year, and even in much of the United States, being a true born-again believer is not a path to popularity. Just try taking a stand for your non-liberal beliefs at Mozilla.

Back to the Bible

In Dan's first paragraph here he claims that the part of the Bible which claims the Bible is infallible was written before most of the rest of Scripture. He doesn't state what verse he is referring to, but my mind immediately goes to 2 Timothy 3:16 “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.” Since 2 Timothy was one of the last books written (of the 66 books, only the epistles of John, 2 Peter, Hebrews, Jude and Revelation were written later) he must be referring to some other passage.

Dan then goes on to discuss how he believes the canon was determined, and how this process was controlled by people in the pay of the government. Here we have a bit of a conundrum. Dan is implying that the Bible as we know it today was censored by the ruling authorities, and is in fact a piece of governmental propaganda. Earlier, however, Dan stated that the Bible actually supported his libertarian, anti-statist worldview and that pastors who studied and taught from this book should stand in opposition to their government's over-reach. So are we to believe then that the minions of the Roman emperor were told to produce a document that was actually liberty-loving and rebellion-inducing? There seems to be some inconsistency in Dan's thinking here.

Shared Delusions

Dan believes that people are very vulnerable to falling into group delusions, especially where the community pressures members to believe. If this is true, it is likely also true for socialists, libertarians, Steemians, and Bitcoiners on both sides of the block size debate. However it seems highly unlikely to be true for 11 Jewish men of the first century who were faced with social isolation and political persecution for following the unique teachings of another Jewish man who faced the most vicious form of execution for the perpetration of his novel ideas. Yes, masses of people will follow their cult leader to the death if they believe what he teaches. No, people will not follow a cult leader to the death if they know their leader's teaching was a lie. The New Testament disciples and apostles were not suffering from a group hallucination for more than half a century. Belief that they were is itself a delusion. They clearly were convinced the teachings of Jesus were real and confirmed by his resurrection. They would not be expelled from the community for abandoning this belief, they were ostracised (and martyred) for clinging to this belief.

Removing People from the Equation

Dan has come to the conclusion that everything that is necessary to know God is available to him “without the need of people”. He also feels that anything that cannot be deduced from nature could not be guaranteed to be from God. These are novel ideas not found in Scripture, and so it is unreasonable to subject the Christian faith – which is based on Scripture – to these Dan-made tests.

You will not discover the message of Christianity in nature. What you will discover is a highly-ordered universe for which the possibility of random chance accounting for its existence is infinitesimally small. So small as to be rationally unacceptable as an explanation. Christianity however is intimately tied to the Word. Both the living Word and the written word. Which is why the apostle Peter was sent to Cornelius, who feared God but had not been baptised because he had not heard the Gospel (Acts 10:10-16).

Interestingly, Dan says he finds in nature a set of moral principles “higher...than” what is taught in the Bible. The question then becomes: who authored these principles? And, who says they are “higher”?

Am I going to hell?

Happily, Dan confesses he is happy to yield to anything God requests of him. This is an important point as many unbelievers would say they won't yield to God even if it can be shown that He exists. Dan's humility here is to be rejoiced over. However Dan makes the demand of God that He deliver His message to Dan the way Dan wants to receive it. God has delivered His message, personally, in the person of His Son and through the written word the Bible. But whether you believe that last sentence or not, to expect that we as creatures can dictate the method of revelation to the creator is, to say the least, illogical.