Ray a Day - 3:6/4:1

This chapter of Comfort's book, titled "Salvation in Christ - The Promise of Heaven and Eternal Life," is basically just a sermon.  Lots of simple talk about how great God is for allowing us worthless humans into his perfect home in heaven, etc.; not much original or interesting material.  All I want to note here is a very brief discussion of alternate theologies.

A skeptic says, "If 'salvation' is a 'supernatural' act of a 'supernatural God,' then evangelism would be superfluous, no?"  Comfort responds by briefly discussing Armenian and Calvinist theologies.  I'll refrain from giving an exaustive analysis of these, but I would encourage anyone who is interested in looking into them further (that is, if you're even partially as interested in theology as I am).  Briefly, then, Armenian theology (or more commonly Arminianism) and Calvinism have a few differences between them, some minor, some major, depending on your theological persuasion.  Of course, to an atheist, saying that these slightly divergent theologies are "diametrically opposed to each other," as Comfort says, is like saying that there's a huge difference between Scottish folks and Irish folks, when their all just crackers to a brotha.

The interesting point here is that Comfort actually extolls people to not willfully divide themselves over minor points of theological contention.

Sadly, church history has shown us that Christ-centered men of God have clashed over these isssues (e.g., Westley and Whitefield).  More recently, I have seen brethren make a theological stand and much to their dismay, they were marked by their home church as "troublemakers."  Fine missionaries have been pulled from the field, pastors fired from the ministry, and churches have split, simply because of different views of God's sovereignty.

Well Ray, that's a nice thought and all, and personally, as I hinted above, I'm always a little confused when theists of slightly differing theologies so radically divide people into True Christians and False Christians.  However, I find it difficult to give you any points for this statement, considering that:

1.  On page 7, he states that evolution is an 'idol,' and that no one can worship an idol and Jesus at the same time, therefore, you cannot accept the Theory of Evolution and be a Christian.

2.  On page 12, he rants about how Catholics are not Christians.

3.  On page 36, even a Christian who says that, "I think that men who don't have God can be good, normal people, just not perfect," is way off base according to Comfort.  He says that there is no one "good" except for God, and this is apparently such an important theological point that Comfort is made to"doubt the genuine nature of the Christian's salvation, because it seems that he has no biblical knowledge of sin himself."

Onto the introduction to Chapter Five, The Testimony of Holy Scripture.  This will be a very interesting chapter, as it seems to be all about the biblical proof for the existence of God, and biblical questions raised by skeptics.  In the into, here is what he says about biblical commentary on "wisdom:"

There are different types of wisdom.  There is the wisdom of this world ("after the flesh"), and there is the wisdom of God.  The message of the passage is that God has chosen a seemingly foolish message of childlike faith, to confound those proud folks who think that they are wise.

So it seems that at least a portion of this chapter will be all about how badly the Bible abuses the concept of "wisdom."  I've noticed that many Christians are fond of quoting a number of Bible verses that seem to praise wisdom, yet without acknowledging that more often than not, in Bible-speak, "wisdom" means fearing and obeying God, and actual knowledge is called "foolishness."  Comfort makes such a distinction between "Godly knowledge" and "worldly knowledge" here, but without acknowledging that it is "worldly knowledge" that has enabled humanity to improve our civilization.  It is true that there is scientific knowledge, philosophical knowledge, and/or theological knowledge (among others), and they are very different.  Is Comfort really going to argue that out of these, it is theological knowledge that is most important?

Only one other thing to point out:  Comfort mentions, as an example of a shallow example of biblical dificulty raised by skeptics, the story of Japheth, who Comfort acknowledges sacrificed his daughter to God.  Now, first off, Comfort doesn't reference the Bible verses that this story comes from.  Perhaps so that people won't actually read this story?  Judges 11:29-39, by the way.  Secondly, his name is, so far as I know, properly translated as Jephthah, not Japheth.  Third, Comfort's explanation makes no sense.  He claims that the Bible merely recounts the story of Jephthah sacrificing his daughter, but does not condone it.  This is dead wrong - in the Bible, verse 29 specifically states that God 'came upon' Jephthah, verse 30 states that he made this vow directly to God, verse 32 states that it was God who gave the enemy into his hands, and it states several times that he vowed the sacrifice to God.  Not once does God ever forbid him from doing so, set him straight, or save his daughter.  It is impossible to come to the conclusion that God did not approve of the sacrifice, based on an objective reading of the text.

This chapter seems to be all about the difficult questions raised by skeptics concerning the Bible, and proofs based upon scripture.  As I myself rejected Christianity literally by reading the Bible, I admit that I'm looking forward to this chapter.  Stay tuned.