Publicity-seeker?

Arminian NT scholar and blogger Scot McKnight has a guest post by Ruth Tucker impugning John Chau as a publicity-seeker:

https://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2018/11/28/john-allen-chau-a-missionary-historian-perspective/

Unless I'm misremembering, I believe Ruth Tucker is an apostate. She wrote a book about her defection from the Christian faith several years ago. That doesn't mean her observations about Chau, Jim Elliot, and Elizabeth Elliot are necessarily wrong, but she does have an ax to grind. I find it odd that McKnight would host her diatribe without any awareness of the conflict of interest. 

Modern Reformation goes off the rails

The current issue of Modern Reformation (September-October, 2016, 25/5) has an article by Jerry Walls promoting purgatory: "The Imagery of Heaven in C. S. Lewis". I'm curious as to why an ostensively Reformed periodical is providing a platform to boost purgatory. The same issue has an article by Arminian Scot McKnight. How very ecumenical. Makes you wonder who's minding the store at Modern Reformation these days. 

Strange bedfellows

You can tell a lot about people's sympathies by their alliances. Notice Scot McKnight siding with Jonathan Merritt:

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2016/06/07/tgcs-blocking-brigade/

Each has an unspoken agenda that coincides at this point. 

Jonathan Merritt is an outed "gay Christian" propagandist. McKnight is an Arminian feminist. Somehow I don't think that's coincidental to their criticisms.

Because TGC participates in the culture wars, defending gender binaries and heteronormativity, Merritt views TGC as an obstacle to his social agenda. 

McKnight's theology predisposes him to be hostile to a complementarian, Calvinistic site like TGC. That, in turn, motivates him to side with Merritt's attack on TGC. 

McKnight becomes a tool of Merritt. Is he simply unaware of Merritt's social agenda? Or do his own priorities line up with Merritt's at this juncture? 

I'd add that that Twitter is not a serious medium for substantive debate. 

This doesn't mean TGC, or individual contributors thereof, should be above criticism, by any means. But a social vandal like Merritt is the wrong vehicle. 

Confusion over Calvinism at McKnight's Blog

http://www.hollowayquarterly.com/2015/12/calvinism-and-confusion-at-mcknights.html

Upending the good?

On Facebook, Christian philosopher Jeremy Pierce commented on a post by (or hosted by) Arminian/Anabaptist NT scholar Scot McKnight:

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2015/12/30/calvinism-and-pantheism-and-the-good-wesley-walker/

Pierce responded:

This is utterly weird. Scot McKnight issues a challenge to a view he keeps calling Calvinism, but it's a particular version of divine command theory that he turns out to be criticizing, not anything to do with Calvinism. 

The issues are not tied together in any way. They're about different things. One is about God's relationship with the events that take place in creation. The other is about God's relationship with moral truths. Calvinists hold that God is sovereign over every event that occurs, even our free choices. Divine command theorists hold that God's commands are what make moral truths true. You can be a divine command theorist without being a Calvinist (as John Locke was), and you can be a Calvinist without being a divine command theorist (as Gottfried Leibniz was). 

And not even every version of divine command theory would be subject to McKnight's objection. Robert Adams and Bill Alston's versions of divine command theory wouldn't be, since they ground God's commands ultimately in God's nature and not in arbitrary, groundless commands. So it's just a mistake to think that these are arguments that are even about Calvinism, never mind serious criticisms of it.

"Christian Zionism and American Evangelicalism"

Arminian Bible scholar Scot McKnight quoted a boilerplate attack on Israel by former Sojourners' editor, "journalist," and "social justice" activist Ryan Rodrick Beiler:

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2015/03/25/christian-zionism-and-american-evangelicalism/

This, in turn, elicited two corrective comments from a reader:

Luke
Scot, I was on the tour (mentioned in the article) that visited Alex Awad in Bethlehem. One of the things that the article missed is that while many of the people in my group could agree with Alex on points of theology i.e.. Jesus fulfills the need for a sacrifice, etc. The nationalism that permeates much of the Palestinian Christian church turned a lot of people off. It is a complicated conflict, but if Christians are going to argue for a Palestinian state they need to do so on the basis of basic human rights. Unfortunately, those human rights are absent from the Palestinian Territories apart from anything Israel might be doing. The PA has promised that a future state would be based on Sharia. It regularly intimidates journalists who challenge the corruption within the leadership. The PA has also promised a future state would not permit Jews to live there. So it is difficult for me to see how one can argue about justice for a people that promises to be unjust to its own people. Please [be] more thoughtful. 

To your question, within the Palestinian Christian community there are several key groups. One group is the old churches like the Catholic, Orthodox, and Lutheran churches. This group is largely nationalist and very influenced by Palestinian Liberation Theology,ie "Palestinians are crucified every day..." type rhetoric. The second group would be the Evangelical churches that are evangelistic to a degree, but are reluctant to criticize the PA and are very anti-zionist. The third is the Evangelical churches that are overtly evangelistic and are not anti-Israel. There is a surprising number of these churches. The most famous among those of us that engage in this stuff is Bethlehem Baptist Church. As you might imagine those groups do not get along well. 

When my groups went to Bethlehem we met with leaders from the two Evangelical camps. It was a stark difference that my group picked up immediately. The anti-zionist Evangelicals spent a lot of time talking about their struggle with the occupation (which I accept is significant) while the evangelistic Evangelical church talked about his outreach to the community, the small groups and small businesses they were trying to assist. So the issue was less theological and more political. The less political the church, the more pressure they receive from their own side (if you are soft on Israel you are seen as a collaborator), but the gospel is changing hearts. By nationalism I am meaning that sense you get when the political seems to be the priority focus and the gospel is used as a political tool. 

I could go on... The situation is very complex and deserves more than all Christian Zionists are heretics and all Palestinians are terrorist type rhetoric. If you can avoid that stuff you will help greatly.

And the walls came tumbling down

In my judgment, the only way to counter this for the inerrantists is to prove that the historical and archaeological evidence supports that account as it is in Joshua 6.  

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2014/08/06/the-inadequacy-of-the-inerrancy-model-pete-enns/ 

On the problem passages, I have one big comment: inerrantists tip toe and tap dance around the fall of Jericho’s walls and end up denying the overwhelming conclusions of the archaeologists. Pete Enns is right here to challenge dust-in-the-eyes proposals of resolution to these sorts of problems. 

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2014/08/13/well-versed-inerrancy/

Several issues:

i) There's the question of personal and professional ethics. McKnight used to teach at TEDS. That's a seminary committed to inerrancy. Yet he's attacking inerrancy. Has he changed his mind? Or did he dissemble about his true views when he was there?

ii) Biblical archeology is a wonderful discipline. But it has inherent limitations. Unless we know what Jericho looked like in the 2nd millennium BC, from one century to the next, we don't know what it looked like before or after the Conquest. Not to mention over 3000 years of subsequent erosion, reuse of preexisting materials, &c. So what's the basis of comparison? 

iii) Do proof and disproof have the same burden of proof? Does archeological proof that something happened, something existed, have the same evidentiary onus as archeological disproof that something never happened, never existed? 

iv) Josh 6 is, in itself, historical and archeological evidence for the event in question. Written records are a major source of archeological evidence. 

v) Why are inerrantists required to supply corroborative evidence? The area where I grew up has changed drastically in just 50 years. Many of my old haunts are now unrecognizable. From memory, I can mentally reconstruct what used to be there. But only someone who lived through that period is in a position to do so. And when that generation dies, those memories are lost. That knowledge is gone. 

vi) Incidentally, McKnight is a prominent Arminian. Once again, I'm struck by the fact that Arminians, especially in academia, are more liberal then their Calvinist counterparts. 

Prayerless Arminians

Christians used to think God controls nature. To take a classic example, a farmer would pray for rain.

Likewise, if you were about to be overtaken by a tornado or hurricane, you would pray that God spare you and your family. If there were wildfires threatening your neighborhood, you would pray for divine protection. In the same vein is the pious belief that God can heal.

By the same token, if you were spared, you gave thanks to God for answering your prayer.

Recently, however, some high-profile Arminians have removed natural evils from God’s jurisdiction.

So, at the end of the day, anyone who says a natural or man-made disaster, calamity, catastrophe is from God must be thinking either that it was an arbitrary act of God, done for no particular reason other than perhaps to create fear (which still doesn’t explain why that particular place), or that it was in some sense God’s judgment.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/rogereolson/2012/03/further-thoughts-about-catastrophes-and-gods-judgment/

That particular but pervasive understanding of God’s sovereignty is what might be called “meticulous” (or “exhaustive”) sovereignty. In regards to this subject, there are only two real options: either God determines everything (meticulous sovereignty) or God does not determine everything. A well-known example of meticulous sovereignty can be found in various statements made by notable evangelical leaders in the wake of natural disasters, such as hurricanes from Katrina to Sandy. If one affirms meticulous sovereignty, then one must also believe God decided, desired, and carried out the weather conditions, the speed and direction of the winds, the deluges of water, and precisely which homes would be destroyed and which homes would escape.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2013/05/20/a-long-faithfulness-preface/

The first point immediately confirmed in my heart was theological: God did not do this to my child. God is not the author of evil. God does not terminate sweet lives with a pulmonary embolism. Pulmonary embolisms are a result of the bent nature of this world. As Ann kept repeating, "God is not the problem; he is the solution."

One primary reason I am not a Calvinist is that I do not believe in God's detailed control of all events. Why? First, because I find it impossible to believe that I am more merciful or compassionate than God. Second, because the biblical portrait shows that God is pure light and holy love. In him there is no darkness, nothing other than light and love. And third, the words, "The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away," from the lips of Job (1:21), are not good theology. According to Job 1, it was not God but the Devil who took away Job's children, health, and wealth. God allowed it to happen, but when Job said these words, as the rest of the story shows, he was not yet enlightened about the true nature of the source of his calamity and God's actual will for his life. God's will for him was for good and not for harm.

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2012/april/when-a-daughter-dies.html?paging=off

As you can also see, their position is cast in explicit contrast to Calvinism. The motivation is, of course, to exempt God from the problem of evil.

However, your doctrine of providence runs in tandem with your doctrine of prayer. If God isn’t responsible for drought, then presumably a farmer shouldn’t pray for rain. That’s not God’s department.

If God isn’t responsible for tornadoes, hurricanes, or wildfires, then we shouldn’t pray for divine protection. And if we do escape, we shouldn’t be grateful to God. We just got lucky. God had nothing to do with it.

Likewise, if a friend or relative is deathly ill, we shouldn’t pray for healing. That’s none of God’s business.

Praying for rain

Last month, Scot McKnight plugged a new book he’s written, attacking Calvinism:

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/2013/05/20/a-long-faithfulness-preface/

Here are some comments I left on his post:

Dr. McKnight said:

“If God determines everything (as in the meticulous sovereignty approach), then God not only permits but must determine that some young girls and boys will be abused while others will be spared, that some adults will suffer more in this life while others will suffer less. For this essay’s purposes, it is not relevant how tragic situations are explained (e.g., that we are all sinners who deserve these tragedies and even worse; or that God wants to make an example of humans as depraved). What is relevant is that—in this understanding of divine sovereignty—God determines everything, that God can do otherwise but chooses to bring about awful conditions and events.”

How does Dr. McKnight distinguish between the morality of God permitting child and God determining child abuse?

God knows that if he intervened to stop a child abuser, the child would not have been abused. Absent divine intervention, the child will be abused. Therefore, divine inaction ensures the abuse.

How, then, is ensuring the outcome morally distinct from determining the outcome?

Dr. McKnight said:

“That particular but pervasive understanding of God’s sovereignty is what might be called ‘meticulous’ (or ‘exhaustive’) sovereignty. In regards to this subject, there are only two real options: either God determines everything (meticulous sovereignty) or God does not determine everything. A well-known example of meticulous sovereignty can be found in various statements made by notable evangelical leaders in the wake of natural disasters, such as hurricanes from Katrina to Sandy. If one affirms meticulous sovereignty, then one must also believe God decided, desired, and carried out the weather conditions, the speed and direction of the winds, the deluges of water, and precisely which homes would be destroyed and which homes would escape.”

i) Jesus said God sends sunshine and rain (Mt 5:45). Doesn’t that mean God controls the weather?

ii) God answered Elijah’s prayer to end the drought by sending rain (1 Kgs 18:42-45). Doesn’t that assume God controls the weather? Indeed, doesn’t v.1 explicitly attribute the rain to God?

iii) According to Scripture, some natural disasters are divine judgments. Noah’s flood, as well as the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, are paradigm-cases.

Confining ourselves to the subset of natural disasters that are divine judgments, does Dr. McKnight deny that God was behind these particular events? Presumably he doesn’t think the natural disaster which destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah was just accidentally punitive. Doesn’t its function as a divine judgment mean God was responsible for when and where that happened? That God directed the outcome?