The Wilderness Teaches Us to Pray

I recently led a little Bible study at our Wednesday evening prayer meeting entitled “What the wilderness teaches us.” I leaned for the main point on a little section in Zack Eswine’s The Imperfect Pastor, because it was a profoundly helpful point for dealing with difficulty and trial, or the wilderness. Hopefully you agree. 

Context

Luke wants to show Jesus as the Son of God, seen in the fact that unlike Matthew’s genealogy (which shows Jesus’ Jewishness by taking him back through David to Abraham), Luke takes Jesus all the way back to Adam, who is then called “the son of God” (3:38). While that might seem strange, it shouldn’t be. Israel is called the son of God at several points (Ex. 4); and being the first made in God’s image, we should expect that Adam is son-like in a way that the other species are not. 

But immediately after the genealogy, which is itself a break in the narrative, following Jesus’ baptism where the Spirit of God came down on him, Luke says that the Spirit then drove Jesus into the wilderness for a time of testing. So: a) Spirit is on Jesus at baptism, b) Jesus in his humanity descends from Adam the Son of God. c) Then the Spirit drives him for testing. And the first thing the devil says is “If you’re the Son of God…” (4:3). It’s clear what Luke is saying: To give the Holy Spirit He has, Jesus has to endure the same kind of temptations both Adam and Israel, God's sons, did. For how could Jesus save humanity if he wasn’t tested like we are? 

Testing

This testing continues for 40 days (4:2). Imagine a month and a half of no relief, just constant testing, all day, every day, and hunger. And these temptations were the same types of ones we go through (Heb. 4:15). The essence of sin is getting things God promises us not on God’s terms; so temptation will be consistent with that. Thus the devil says, “I’ll give you the kingdoms of the world if you’ll bow to me.” Jesus would get the world as his inheritance eventually, but he had to wait so he could receive it on God’s terms. Satan’s temptation is essentially, “The Father is lying to you—he won’t give you the kingdom; you need my advice,” similar to Genesis 3: “God’s lying to you—he won’t give you eternal life; you need my advice.” 

As an aside, Jesus’ withstanding temptation means that he can truly help us in temptation (Heb. 2:18). When we’re tempted, the temptation ends one of two ways: Either we use our God-given escape rout (1 Cor. 10:13), or we give in. But Jesus, as Thomas Goodwin said, truly knows how to defeat it because he stared it down and never sinned. Therefore only he knows how strong the pull is. 

Afterward

Back to Luke: He survives the temptation, then it becomes clear that he is a man of prayer. See Luke’s comments in 5:16 and 6:12: Jesus prays a lot. He prays so much that the disciples ask him to teach them (11:1). Why did the Son of God, of all people, need so much prayer? 

Here’s Eswine’s answer, and I think it is beautifully said: In Jesus’ time of great testing in the wilderness, a time of testing beyond what we can imagine, he learned to bring all of his burdens to His Father in prayer. The wilderness taught him to only have God (Ps. 73:26, 143:6). Then when the testing was over, he’d had enough practice that prayer was second nature even to his human nature. 

This is exactly why Hebrews 5:8 says he learned obedience through what he suffered. It isn’t that he had been disobedient before. But that in his testing, he learned to submit himself to His Father’s will. Imagine, “Father, will this ever end?...Okay, I guess I have to wait.” In so doing, he learns to step into God’s will and trust him. 

Teach Us

This all explains his answer to the disciples asking “Teach us to pray.” He gives them the so-called Lord’s prayer, which is a deferent submission to God’s Kingdom, will, and leading, where the pray-ers only self-concern is for forgiveness, essentials, and holiness (11:2-4);. After teaching them the Prayer, Jesus then gives them a lesson on asking, seeking, and knocking; and then he promise the Holy Spirit to those who ask the Father (11:13). 

Seems like a strange promise: Why the Holy Spirit? Because to live like Jesus, seeking God’s will and Kingdom, it will lay you low like Jesus was, and you will need His empowering Spirit. In essence, the disciples say “Teach us to pray,” and he says “Okay, but you’ll go through the wilderness, and you’ll need the Holy Spirit. And the Spirit will, therefore, be God’s answer to your prayers.” 

That probably didn’t excite the disciples very much, especially considering that the next thing after the Spirit’s leading Jesus into temptation was Jesus proclaiming the Spirit’s presence on him for the jubilee year, which almost got him killed (Lk. 4:16ff., cf Is.61:1ff.). But the wilderness teaches obedience to God’s leading, and trust that He will be your defender and defense. And that is the purpose of the Father giving us His Spirit.

Or in other words, it is through the wilderness that God's Spirit teaches us to pray. 

Vos on Eschatology and Soteriology

“It is not biblical to hold that eschatology is a sort of appendix to soteriology, a consummation of the saving work of God. Eschatology is not necessarily bound up with soteriology. So conceived, it does not take into account that a whole chapter of eschatology is written before sin. Thus, it is not merely an omission to ignore the pre-redemptive eschatology; it is to place the sequel in the wrong place. There is an absolute end posited for the universe before and apart from sin. The universe, as created, was only a beginning.”**

So Vos begins his chapter on the presence of eschatology (which means “study of the end-times”) in the pre-fall state of Adam and Eve in Eden. The containing book is a collection of Vos’ thoughts on eschatology from the Old Testament. I can’t recommend the book enough. But I know that since Vos bores a lot of people and most of my readers simply wouldn't have the motivation to look him up, I should instead unpack some thoughts of his here. 

Vos’ point is to say that the study of the end-times should not be understood as a sort of “next chapter” or Appendix after we understand gospel doctrine (or soteriology, that is, how one is saved). To make eschatology a later chapter in the book of redemption, or even an appendix, is, as he says, to “put the sequel in the wrong place.” The truth is that the creation of the universe had a goal from the beginning, a “plan from the fullness of time to unite all things in (Christ)” (Eph. 1:10). Salvation is for the sake of that goal. So eschatology, to be more precise, is a study not just of what will come at the end, but a study of the nature of God’s purposes for His creation. It is actually theology, because it asks the question, “What does God want for His creation?” as well as a related question, "What does he save us for?" 

Only in this context can soteriology be understood. If someone asks me, “Scott, why should I come to Christ?” The answer is not merely, “So that you can be forgiven of sin,” but instead, “Because God created the universe and you in it. Since the creation has a goal in His eyes, you should make sure you are in sync with it. To get in sync, you find Christ who came into the world to find you. Once you do, you get a glorious future of increasing joy and fullness as you know and walk with the God who is joy and fullness.” 

Or in other words, "Christ died, the righteous for the unrighteous" (that's soteriology) "that he might bring us to God" (that's eschatology) (1 Pet. 3:18a). 

May we let the horse—eschatology—pull the cart—soteriology. It’ll get to its destination. 

**Geerhardus Vos, The Eschatology of the Old Testament, James T. Dennison, ed. (Philipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 2001), 73. Emphases added. 

Growing in Faith

(What follows is adapted from a recent Wednesday night Prayer Meeting Bible Study) 

“Increase our faith!” - the disciples, to Jesus (Lk. 17:5-6)

I read something recently where a pastor made the case that while we can know and trust in the Lord with “little faith” (Matt. 6:30), we are, however, called to grow in our faith: “Your faith is growing abundantly” (2 Thes. 1:3). In the earlier text, Jesus says, quite clearly, that God cares for those even with little faith (praise God). But in the latter text, we find that this faith is to grow, and the Lord gives the growth.

Therefore, the New Testament everywhere calls faith a gift bestowed by God alone: 

-Phil. 1:29 “It has been granted you…to believe in him.” 

-Ac. 18:27 “He (Apollos) greatly helped those who through grace believed.” 

-Eph. 2:8-9 “…saved by grace through faith and this is not your own doing. It is the gift of God.” 

Hence Paul can say in the 2 Thessalonians text that he rejoices that the Lord has grown their faith and love, even as they endure afflictions. Further, this is the reason why the disciples can ask Jesus to increase their faith: While faith can be little (because saving faith doesn’t depend on the size of the faith but the size of the God in whom the faith is), God is effective at growing the faith of His people. 

The question is this: How does our faith grow? Or perhaps a more pertinent question is this: What can we do to increase our faith? A lot of data shows that in late modern times, it is becoming more and more difficult for people to believe in God because we depend so much on empirical data (that which relies on the senses) to determine what is real. Therefore many of us struggle with faith. How can we grow? 

1. Seek the Lord, and ask

The writer of Hebrews famously says that in order for one to believe in God, they must believe two things: First, that He is (in Greek, it is the third person form of “I Am”). That “He is” is not the same as saying, “He exists,” because the writer says that in order to believe in Him (that is, to believe in His existence and to truly know him), they must believe He is. The point is this: One must believe that He is the I-Am of the Old Testament. They must know His nature as Creator God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Secondly, they must believe that he rewards those who seek him. God is not a trickster or a prankster. If one asks, seeks, and knocks, the door will be opened (Lk. 11:9). God is not forcing you to learn some magic language before He allows blessing to be pried from his cold clenched hands. He rewards those who seek him. 

So if you ask him to help you believe, He will. How He’ll do this is up to him. But He will, nonetheless. 

2. Give glory to God 

In Romans 4:17-21, the apostle highlights Abraham’s faith to show that God has always saved by faith in His promises. Abe had been promised a son although he was himself about 100 years old, and therefore did not have much empirical security that it would be so (because who could easily believe such a promise?) But Abe, according to Paul under inspiration, “hoped against hope” (4:18), and “no unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God” (4:20). This means there was unbelief present in Abraham, but he did not let it keep him from believing the promise. Instead, he “grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God could do what he promised” (4:20). 

That is to say that Abraham doubted his doubts, of which he had to have some; otherwise Paul would have said, “He did not have unbelief.” Instead he said, “No unbelief made him waver,” implying he had some. But it did not win. Instead, he doubted himself and turned his attention to God’s faithfulness throughout his own life and the lives of his ancestors. 

Note also that Abraham had direct revelation from God, and yet he still had some unbelief. We have revelation given to us via Bibles passed down. Don’t be so hard on yourself if you have doubts. Jesus can handle that, and as you give glory to God, you’ll grow in your faith. 

3. Do your duty 

This takes us back to the original text from Luke 17. The disciples ask the Lord to increase their faith after He told them of their responsibility to forgive indefinitely. So it runs like this: “Forgive indefinitely.” “Lord, you’ll have to increase our faith if we’ll do so.” He then reminds them of the graciousness of their salvation by telling them a parable of servants who did not take extra glory for merely doing their duty (Lk. 17:7-10). Jesus’ point is that the doing of our duty—in this case, forgiving indefinitely—does not make us righteous before God. Instead, it shows our closeness to him. Hence, the effect of it will not be on Him but on us. In what way? It will increase our faith, thus showing that Jesus’ parable is in answer to their question. In effect, Jesus is saying, “If you forgive simply because I say you must, you will grow in your faith because you’re trusting me more than your own instincts.” 

This whole discussion reminds me of Bonhoeffer’s famous imagined conversation between a pastor and a parishioner. The parishioner comes to the pastor saying that he is struggling with doubts about his faith, and the pastor says, “Well you must believe the Word as it’s preached.” The parishioner says, “I try, but I can’t get anything out of it. I’m struggling with it.” The pastor then says, “Then you must not want to hear it,” to which the parishioner says, “No, I do.” Whereas the pastor usually keeps in his mind the truth that “Only those who believe can obey,” meaning that we only obey God when we believe in Him, this doesn’t speak to the present situation. The pastor is at a loss. They might break away from each other here. 

But, as Bonhoeffer says, it is at this point that the pastor should reverse the statement: Only those who obey can believe. We only grow in our faith if we’re willing to obey the Lord even if we struggle in our faith. Is there an area of sin in your life that you are keeping back from Christ? Maybe you’re not obeying him there, and thus you cannot hear him. Or maybe he’s silenced his voice to get you to treasure hearing it even more. In any event, you must obey Him now, if you want to believe again.** Keep seeking him, availing yourself of the means of grace, and don't give up. He will reward.

In other words, if you go by his word (like Abraham did), you will find your faith growing. But wait until your faith grows and you might not ever obey. 

**Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship (New York: Simon and Schuster edition, 1995; orig 1959 SCM Press Ltd), 69.

Can I Forget What Lies Behind?

“One thing I do: Forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead” (Philippians 3:13b) 

If you’re a human being, there is a chance that you’re dogged by bad memories of past traumas.  Either things done to you or things that you’ve done. If you’re a Christian, you cling to the promise that if you come to Jesus, your sins are forgiven; and you also are aware of your need to forgive others their wrongs against you. Jesus even—perhaps surprisingly—makes forgiveness of others a prerequisite for forgiveness with God (Mt. 6:14-15; though this statement has to be contextualized with the parable of the forgiving steward in Mt. 18:23-35, where the steward should have forgiven because he had been forgiven). In any event, our Lord has kept short accounts of our sins, and requires us to keep short accounts with others, regardless of how painful those sins might be. 

A cursory reading of the Apostle Paul’s life experience as recorded in the New Testament shows that he has both types of past traumas: He did a lot that would be hard to forgive, such as harshly persecuting Christians and trying to destroy the Christian faith; he also, after becoming a Christian, had a lot done to him that might be hard for him to forgive (see, for instance, the list in 2 Cor. 11:23-28, or the events of Ac. 14:19). If anyone had a reason to despair of God’s grace over himself, it’d be Paul; but on the other hand, if anyone had reason to be bitter toward others, it’d be Paul. 

But our passage above shows us how Paul was able to deal with those past traumas. Simply, he lets the past be the past, and sets his hope on future grace. Reading this passage the other day I was struck that Paul would say that forgetting what lies behind is something that he does. Forgetting does not happen actively, but passively. We don’t purpose to forget; it just happens. 

But the greek gives us a little further light into Paul’s point. The word for “forget” is epilanthano, which is a compound of lanthano, which means to escape notice, and the prefix epi, which means “over” or “above” (think about how epi-dermis means “the skin above.”) So the idea here is that Paul takes hold of what is in the past, and puts it where it belongs: In the past. In essence, he neglects the past. Whether talking about what people have done to him or what he’s done to people, it doesn’t matter. The past is the past. Paul lets it live there, and doesn’t drag it into the present unless it will serve the gospel.

And further, he “strains forward to what lies ahead.” Again, in greek, it is epikteinomenos, which means to “reach forward.” But the “epi” prefix seems to suggest the reaching happens from above, so that, as in being above the memories, so the reaching forward happens from above the present. Indeed, the presence of the future, the Kingdom of God, dominates the present for Paul. 

So how did Paul deal with his past sins and past sins against him? By letting the past be the past, and by focusing his attention on Christ’s future coming. If Jesus bore my past sins at the cross, then I don’t need to bring guilt upon myself for those sins again (and if I fall into sin again, he promises that I can simply bring those sins to him and he’ll forgive me, 1 Jn. 1:9). But if Jesus called on God’s grace for the forgiveness of those who crucified him, then I know that walking with him and living like him requires a sameness of aversion to condemnation. And since, if I believe in Jesus, I must “walk in the same way in which he walked” (1 Jn. 2:6), I have a responsibility to show grace as He did and does.

This might seem like a cross-centered framework for life, and in one sense, it is. “I’ve been crucified to the world, and the world to me,” says Paul (Gal. 6:14). But it is worked out from beyond the tomb under the presence of new life in the resurrection. The reason why Paul can forget what lies behind is because the cross happened, but that was not the end of the story. Paul can let the past be the past because Friday gave way to Sunday, and those in Christ live in the shadow of Sunday. Now, God is doing a new thing (Is. 43:19), so that all who are in Christ are themselves identified with what is new (2 Cor. 5:17). So the neglect of the past is possible because I’m alive in the present with the risen Christ living in and with me. Thus the verse before our text has Paul’s confidence that Christ has made him his own (Phil. 3:12). If I belong to Jesus and he belongs to me, then my past sins are no longer mine, nor is whatever it is that others took from me when they hurt me. 

I guess it comes down to one question: Do you believe that Jesus is alive and you’re alive in Him? You might believe it, but Jesus needs to be, like a radio volume knob, turned up louder than your doubts and/or hurts. That happens over time as your faith in him grows. For now, your job is to recognize the need to let the past go, bring your hurt to the Lord (who cares for you, 1 Pet. 5:7), and believe that He will lead you into all that He has for you. You might feel like such an endeavor is impossible. “I can’t, Scott.” That’s okay - neither can I. But Jesus can. “With God all things are possible if you believe” (Mk. 9:23).

Paul Washer on Young Ministry Lions

“The young lions suffer want and hunger…” (Ps. 34:10). 

Click here to view a short clip of Paul Washer's caution against a wrong missionary/church-planting mindset. 

In the video, Paul Washer, president of Heartcry Missionary Society, confronts the phenomenon of young men who sense a call to missionary church planting because they “love the church,” and want to plant churches that will plant more churches that then plant more churches. Notwithstanding how admirable such a desire is (1 Tim. 3:1), Washer has been around the proverbial block enough times to know that even a few months of committed local church work can quell the ministry fire raging in the hearts of such young lions. So he suggests that a person’s love for the church be judged less by words and more by patience with local church people who disappoint the pastor/planter’s discipleship paradigms and church vision. Washer asks, paraphrasing, “Will you still love the church member if they’ve not grown in grace for years, and are still asking the same theological questions after 20 years? THAT is the test of if you love the church, not if you want to see churches spring up everywhere.” 

These comments are especially poignant in an age where youthful ambition is often baptized by Christian ministry. Ambition that fails to first say, “But not my will, but yours be done” is sinful. This is exactly what James cautioned against when he said, “Instead (of saying that you'll live in this city or that city), you should say 'If the Lord wills, we will live in this city..'" (Jms. 4:13-15). The point is not that planning is a bad thing. The Proverbs repeatedly show God highlighting the wisdom of planning (4:26; 16:1,9; 19:21) and He is himself the Master planner (though with a caveat; he doesn’t experience a succession of moments like we do, so he is not planning for the “future,” from his perspective). But the godly mindset says, “Lord, here is what I want to do, but what would you have me do? If these two ‘do’s are not consistent, have your will instead of mine, and it is best.” 

As you might expect, there were some...interesting...comments under the video. Based on my own experience of having to overcome youthful ministry ambition, I understand some of them. A lot of them ask, “What about Paul’s ministry? He went from town to town. Does Washer not have a category for him?” But the reality is that Paul had less of a call to the pastorate and more of a call to the Apostolate. Washer is addressing men who have more in common with Pastor-Timothy than with Apostle-Paul. Is it possible that these Twitter commenters think of themselves more like Paul than like Timothy? I know that when I began senior pastoring 11.5 years ago, I did. My, how local church ministry crushes our tendency toward self-flattery. I’m reminded of Spurgeon’s great quote, where he reminds young pastors of small churches that when they come to the end of their lives, even though their personal ministries never reached the heights that they had originally hoped for, nevertheless when they stand before God to answer for the 75 souls over which they presided in their local church, they will have had enough. 

I’m no judge of these young men pushing back against Washer’s point; like I’ve implied, I was one of them (and in a lot of ways, still am). But Washer is saying that ministry is about, to borrow from the title to the famous Eugene Peterson book, a long obedience in the same direction. God does not call most men to get something started big and good and then move on towards things that are even bigger and better. Most men are called to either pick up where someone left off, or start something new and stick with it. 

I think that that is why Paul told the Ephesian elders to pay careful attention to themselves and to all the flock (Ac. 20:28a). The verb at the beginning of the sentence is prosecheto, from which, I think, we get our word “prosecute.” The meaning is to intensely focus on, take to task, and face intently. Obviously it has to do with attentiveness to godliness and and growth in grace (2 Pet. 3:18), not grilling, like in a courtroom! So, Paul says, elders, intensely focus on your own discipleship and the discipleship of the flock (by the way, the word here for “flock” is poimo, which could be translated “micro-flock”; sounds like a small local church - not that it must be small, but most will be.) There are so many ways that you and your people can veer from the Lord’s truth. Look around. How many counter-sermons—that is, cultural messaging that is contrary to the gospel—are people hearing every week? So, elders, focus on staying on the narrow path, and keeping your people there, too (Matt. 7:13-14). When all is said and done, you will have had enough.

And if this doesn’t sound like Jesus’ post-resurrection restoration of Peter, I don’t know what does. “Peter, do you love me?” And you know the rest; Jesus tells him three different times, using varying terms, to feed his sheep (Jn. 21:15-19). When Peter gets stuck in comparison-mindset (21:20-21), Jesus reminds him of the simple phrase that he used when he first called him: You follow me. Don’t look around, Peter. You follow me where I lead you. Ministry has always been about loving the ones God has put in front of us, which is the way that we love the Lord and His church. When we demand a bigger platform or a greater recognition in ministry, we will, like Washer cautioned, resent our people for getting in our way. The young lion will, as the Psalm warns, suffer want and hunger. 

But when we take as our task faithfulness to the micro-flock before us—and this is a point that can be adapted to not only refer to a pastor with a small flock, but to a dad with a family, or any other kind of Kingdom stewardship—the flock gets fed and we do, too. Love the church, yes. But make sure that you don’t really just love your ministry in the church. 

A Middle-Man Post On Christian Nationalism

Greetings all, 

It has been a while since I've written on here - I last wrote at the beginning of September and missed all of October. Things have been exceedingly busy in and out of my office. Between preaching, teaching, writing (just sent my fifth and second-to-last dissertation chapter to my doctoral mentor), and church administration, I simply haven't had time to write. 

So this post is a Middle-Man post; that is, I want to recommend you read someone else's post. The context is this: Among conservative evangelicals, especially Reformed-leaning ones, there has been a substantial amount of dialogue on so-called Christian Nationalism. In general terms, CN is a poorly-defined term (though, see Stephen Wolfe's book here) that describes a system where a national government enforces on its nation Christian ethics and metaphysics, i.e. both tables of the Law (the Ten Commandments; the first table of the Law includes commands that assume Monotheism, and in CN, identify Jesus with the God of Israel). Such an idea is clearly offensive to some (most?) Christians, while being the seemingly logical conclusion of other Christians. If the first group says, "Only believers can confess Christ (1 Cor. 12:3), so how could a state do so?" the second group says, "If Jesus is King, should the state not recognize him as such?" Debate ensues. 

Joe Rigney, who is the president of Bethlehem College and Seminary, has recently been in a friendly articular debate with Jonathan Leeman, who is a well-published pastor and leader with Nine Marks Ministries in the DMV area. Leeman represents the first group above, and his take on CN can be read here. Rigney's response, not necessarily from a pro-CN perspective, but from a "Let's be careful what we're rejecting here so that we don't throw out the baby" perspective, can be read here. While I recommend that you read both posts, I strongly recommend you read Rigney's. Note how he responds to the usual charge against a national Christian confession (that the "nominalism" it normalizes makes ministry all but impossible): Through history, this has simply not been the case. Ministry has thrived where nations acknowledged Christ. It is when Christ the King of kings is rejected that it is more difficult to let His kingly and priestly influence be allowed into the public square. 

I don't want to influence your thinking too much on this. Let me just say that if General Revelation (that God has revealed himself to all people through nature) is true and is perfected by Special Revelation (that the God of nature has revealed himself perfectly through Holy Scripture), then there needn't be such a strong arm against states, countries, and nations acknowledging the Messiahship of Christ. That doesn't mean that there is an official relationship between the church and the state (nor should there be, in my opinion). It just means that Christ's kingship, attested by the fact of the Resurrection (Ac. 2:36), and therefore His Lordship as the source of all that is right, deserves acknowledgment at a broader level than just churches. A lack of this is why, as Rigney notes (echoing Carl Trueman in his monumental Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self), the United States have in the last 50 years seen the breakdown of the family unit, including but not limited to No-fault Divorce, Obergefell, and looseness-without-consequences, also known as the Abortion Genocide (which "rights" constituted the second most important topic on peoples' minds in this past week's elections). 

The question is this: Is Jesus King, or is he not? It is true that His kingdom is a spiritual one in the present (Jn. 18:36), and it will come in fullness in the End. But at some point, if you are a Christian and you think that the nation should operate according to Christian morals, you have to acknowledge the source of these morals. And the fact that the United States is essentially split down the middle at a moral/ethical level shows that "common sense" simply won't do as an explanation. 

But I digress. Please read Rigney. 

On Joe Rogan, Aaron Rodgers, and Why Christianity Is True

I was listening to Joe Rogan’s interview with Aaron Rodgers last night and something Rogan said struck me. 

First, let me be clear: I enjoy Joe Rogan’s podcast because he often engages social issues with his own alternative takes that don’t neatly fit into either a conservative or liberal point of view. While my conservatism is based on my reading of Scripture’s diagnoses of man, how peace comes, and what God wants from us, that doesn’t mean I only listen to conservative voices. And it often is the case that if someone comes with a take that would probably make enemies on both CNN and Fox News, I’m interested. I don’t watch either channel, but usually get my news from a mixture of Daily Mail, Tim Poole, Twitter, and Real Clear Politics. What endeared Rogan to me over the last couple of years was that he, like me, wasn’t buying the COVID keep-up-with-appearances anarchy. Even though I had COVID about 10 months ago, and still from time to time have minor inconvenient symptoms, I think the virus was weaponized politically and was sensationalized based on a naturalistic worldview, forcing a lot of decisions in the public sphere that were driven entirely by appearances. 

That is part of the reason I was interested in listening to Rogan’s interview of Rodgers. Rodgers, undisputedly one of the greatest NFL quarterbacks of all time (no other player has more NFL MVPs except Peyton Manning, both having inexplicably won separate MVP awards ten years apart), got COVID from a vaccinated teammate in late October 2021 about the same time I had it. Since Rodgers is allergic to one of the ingredients in the mRNA vaccines, he had to go about immunization a different way. When it came out that he was therefore “unvaccinated,” he had a slew of criticism from right and left, and a stain on his integrity in the public eye that, as he states in the Rogan interview, will probably never go away. All that to say that I find him to be an interesting guy not just for his football abilities. 

But before I move into the main reason I’m writing, let me make a second disclaimer: Aaron Rodgers and Joe Rogan both believe in using natural psychoactive and entheogenic drugs to connect at a spiritual level with reality. They talk about this around 1:40:00 in their interview (it is a long interview), and it is a very clear endorsement of a brand of transcendentalism: A view of the world that depersonalizes God, instead opting for a framework that says that we all comprise God as aggregate humanity, and once we accept this, it will foster peace among us. Such a framework is similar to various Hindu religions, and has some things in common with the practice of yoga and with George Lucas’s Force, popularized in the Star Wars franchise. In the practice of these psychoactive drugs, people feel that they connect with reality at a deeper level, which is why many view such drug use as a type of religious experience. Indeed, in one sense, it is.

It should be no surprise, then, that Rodgers has been extremely critical of his Christian upbringing and with Christianity in general, calling religion a “crutch” that people use to make themselves feel better. I can’t say I disagree that some people use it as such; I just think that to reject Christianity based on that observation alone is extremely dangerous: What if while some use it as a crutch for good feelings, others adhere to it because Jesus of Nazareth really is who he says he is, and he initiated an experience with them? This is the question that still eludes so many people: Despite the alleged abuses of Christianity by so many adherents ("alleged" because, do our failures really abuse it as much as prove it?), is Christianity, nonetheless, after all is said and done, true? And further, what standard are you using to judge the wrongness of said Christians’ behavior, if not a standard given to us? Do you really think we created right and wrong? Rodgers and other critics of religion say Christians have questions to answer. I say the atheists and religion critics have more questions to answer, including these ones. 

But this leads me to the point I wanted to reflect on. Around 00:26:00 of the interview, Rogan and Rodgers come to a place where they agree that people just don’t know how to treat others anymore. And Rogan ponders, “Whatever happened to being a charitable and forgiving person?” 

It’s interesting that until five minutes ago in history, it was the Christians who were known as the charitable and forgiving people in society. I would argue (as would Charles Taylor) that the only reason that charity and forgiveness are considered such virtues in Western society today is because of the influence of the Christian framework over the west. 

But the real reason that Christianity exploded in the first few centuries CE, and why it currently exists in an unprecedented global way, is not primarily because of missionary zeal or because of aggressive evangelism that guilts people into converting (although that does happen). The real reason is that Christianity uniquely explains that what is wrong with humanity is not that we are uncharitable, unforgiving, and socially ugly by nature, but that we are all of those things as a result of the Fall. We were created peaceable and peaceful, but an Enemy came in with a crafty plan to cast doubt on the trustworthiness of the God who created us. And if He can’t be trusted, neither can others. The effect is that now our “feet are swift to shed blood” (Prov. 1:16), and now we “turn each one of us to our own way” (Is. 53:6). 

So no one is immune to this problem. No one, except one man who lived in Judea in the first century CE. His life was a perfect one that flawlessly demonstrated what life is supposed to be: Perfect life-giving love. Hence he is Himself “the life” that was “made manifest” (1 Jn. 1:2). But instead of demanding the respect that he deserved, he let the very people he came to serve crucify him on a Roman cross so that the penalty of man’s sin would be fully paid. It makes sense actually: If all are fallen in Adam, none can pay the price (that is, none can make atonement). So in Jesus of Nazareth, the Word made flesh, God paid it in the ultimate act of charity and forgiveness. 

The irony here is that while both Rogan and Rodgers rightly see that humanity needs to be more charitable and forgiving, both Rogan, who identifies as agnostic, and Rodgers, who purposefully doesn’t identify with any religion, are rejecting the only One in history who has been truly and fully charitable and forgiving. If these men would look inside themselves they’d see that they, too, are neither as charitable or forgiving as they should be (and I think they’d admit this). But that is a proof of why the Christian gospel is true and why it is so needed: We should be charitable and forgiving, but we aren’t. And only Jesus, the only One who ever truly was, can get us there. 

You might remember that in 2005, Tom Brady famously wondered in a 60 Minutes interview why he, in chasing Super Bowls, keeps chasing something that he knows won’t satisfy him. He was dancing around the gospel. Similarly, these other prominent voices seem to also be dancing around the gospel that alone can truly save the world. While I respect that Rogan and Rodgers are seeing through the noise, propaganda, agendas, and narratives that plague American (and more and more, global) society, I echo C.S. Lewis’ famous conclusion to his Abolition of Man: The purpose of seeing through something is seeing something on the other side. To say “People are not loving enough and everyone is a liar” doesn’t go far enough. The next question is, “Why are we like this, and how can we change?” And that is when Jesus walks into the room.