TRUSTING IN THE FACE OF EVIL

In light of the descent of our world to chaos, I feel a great and overwhelming need to drink deeply from the truths and assurances of Psalm 37. How much better to than to write on it:

**Fret not yourself because of evildoers; be not envious of wrongdoers! For they will soon fade like the grass and wither like the green herb. Trust in the Lord, and do good; dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness. (Psalms 37:1-3; ESV)

I grieve painfully and angrily over the injustices and hypocrisies tearing apart our society. I want to fight and respond with fist, but I am no more than a passing mist, an inconsequential cry in the darkness.

However, my Lord tells me to not fret or lapse into desperation. He still reigns. The gravel is in His hand and He will deliver the concluding symphonic cord. He has written the final chapter. His purposes are so entirely unassailable that He laughs in the face of rebellion.

Therefore, we must be about His business. We must do good in the face of evil and love as hatred breathes its rancid breath upon our face. But how? By trusting in the Lord and clinging to His Word like a life-raft for the drowning. There is no other sanctuary.

The ultimate answer: trust in god

* Trust in the Lord, and do good; dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness. Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him, and he will act. (Psalms 37:3-5, ESV)

If we trust in God, He will act on own behalf. This is antithetical to trust in ourselves, our usual default, our normal mode of getting things done.

What does it mean to trust in God? It means to trust in what He tells us to do. If we trust in our Doctor, we will do what He tells us to do. If we refuse to do this, it means that we don't trust in him.

However, we will not trust in God if we continue to trust in ourselves. If we think that we have the answers, we will not solicit answers from another. Why should we?

Therefore, we need to take the painful pill of self-despair. This pill opens our eyes to the truth about ourselves. We are not worthy of self-trust. We cannot believe our desires and hopes. What we think will make us happy enslaves us.

When we trust in God, His desires begin to replace our own. His agenda gradually pushes our agenda into the ditch, where it belongs. His desires become ours. Thereby, He will fulfill the desires of our heart, and my heart will truly be fulfilled.

Looking patiently towards eternity

* Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him, and he will act. He will bring forth your righteousness as the light, and your justice as the noonday. Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him; fret not yourself over the one who prospers in his way, over the man who carries out evil devices! Refrain from anger, and forsake wrath! Fret not yourself; it tends only to evil. (Psalms 37:5-8; ESV)

I fret, get angry, and am tempted to wrath. This is why the counsel of this Psalm speaks to me. It comforts and soothes. It melts my anger into a mountain spring. It waves its wand over my wrath, reducing it to bubbling gurgles.

My Lord counsels me to wait, assuring that all will be righteousness and goodness in the end. Meanwhile we are slandered and hated. Yet, our Lord comforts us with the knowledge that our cup will overflow with His blessings before our humbled despisers (Psalm 1:4-6).

For how long will our blessedness endure? While the New Testament is explicit about heaven, the Old is less so:

* For the Lord loves justice; he will not forsake his saints. They are preserved forever, but the children of the wicked shall be cut off. The righteous shall inherit the land and dwell upon it forever. (Psalms 37:28-29)

We will live on a rejuvenated "land...forever." Despite the many hardships we must endure, these will be only a temporary flicker, a preparation for eternity.

Meanwhile, keeping the destination in sight as the prizefighter suffering bloody blows, but for an eternal glory, for the peace, joy, and love, which will always cradle us in its arms.

WHY THEISTIC EVOLUTION SHOULD BE CONSIDERED A CULT

In order to support their points, many cults insist that they alone have the necessary Keys to unlock the Scriptures.

The theistic evolutionists (TEs) are no different. However, they have their own set of keys. They insist that the correct understanding of Scripture requires that we strip Genesis 1-11 of its teachings about the physical world, even of its history.

However, we are warned throughout Scripture against tampering with God's Word:

* Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart. But we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God's word, but by the open statement of the truth we would commend ourselves to everyone's conscience in the sight of God. (2 Corinthians 4:1-2; ESV)

When we deny the history of Genesis, we fail to make an "open statement of the truth."

However, the TEs insist that Genesis was never intended as history but theology, but does the Bible provide any support for this. Not in the slightest! The entire NT has commented on Genesis as history. (The genealogies also testify to the historicity of Adam and Eve.) For example, Paul had written:

* For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. (1 Corinthians 15:21-22)

Although many insist that TE is part of  "mainline Christianity," by tampering with the Word, without any Biblical justification, they have joined hands with other cults.

Unfortunately, lacking Biblical maturity, and perhaps even antipathy towards the Bible, many have been taken in.

SECULARISM AND A NEW REIGN OF TERROR

A Yale professor recently admitted that he has come to believe in the inestimable value of each human. Not having encountered such a belief among the classical philosophers, he acknowledges that this belief finds its origin in Scripture.

Scripture reveals that the value of humanity derives from the fact that we are created in the “likeness” of God (Genesis 1:26-27). This also implies profound moral obligations:

·       With it [the tongue] we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people who are made in the likeness of God. From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things ought not to be so. Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and salt water? Can a fig tree, my brothers, bear olives, or a grapevine produce figs? Neither can a salt pond yield fresh water. (James 3:9-12)

Taking this thinking one step further – the Bible is the only available basis for this necessary belief. However, many secularists will object:

·       We can simply decide that humans have inestimable value. We don’t need a God to tell us to do this.

Admittedly, the secularist can decide to believe whatever he wants. However, he cannot rationally maintain this belief. Why not? Because, as a materialist, only what is perceivable and measurable is rationally allowable! However, when he looks at his fellow humankind, he does not see inestimable value. While he might perceive value in some, he will also perceive a profound lack of value in others.

Based upon his perceptions of his fellow humans, a “rational” materialistic assessment would justify him cursing some and blessing others, treating some with contempt and others with commendation.

When our beliefs are contradicted by our worldview and its perception of reality, they cannot be sustained. Look forward to another reign of terror.

THE THEISTIC EVOLUTION BIOLOGOS FOUNDATION IS JUST ANOTHER CULT

Biologos does not interpret Scripture through the lens of Science, as they claim, but through THEIR interpretation of science. This is very different.

Christian growth requires that we identify and leave behind our own personal lenses in order to see Scripture for what it really teaches. This, of course, is a very gradual process and requires years. It took me years to even identify my own biases, and the process goes on.

However, Biologos takes us in the opposite direction by IMPOSING an additional set of biases upon how we read Scripture. We are told that in order to understand Scripture, we have to read it as non-science and non-history, even in light of the fact that the rest of the Bible reads Genesis 1-11 as history. Just look, for example at the genealogies which go back to Adam! By doing this, Biologos tells us that we cannot read the text as it seems (and how Scripture requires) but as Biologos instructs us to read it.

This is just what many cults do. For example, in The Divine Principle, Sun Myung Moon has written that he had been given the key to understand the Scriptures:

·       “The Bible is not the truth itself but a textbook teaching us the truth.” [What is needed] “is a new truth that can elucidate the fundamental contents of the Bible so clearly that everyone can recognize and agree with it.” “This new truth has already appeared. With the fullness of time, God sent His messenger to resolve the fundamental questions of life and the universe. His name is Sun Myung Moon. For many decades, he wandered in a vast spiritual world in search of the ultimate truth…He came in contact with many saints in Paradise and with Jesus, and thus brought into light all the heavenly secrets through his communication with God.” (James Sire, “Scripture Twisting,” 117)

Biologos has done the same thing. In order to remove any contradiction between the Bible and the theory of evolution, Biologos has taken the position that Genesis 1-11 should not be taken as history but, instead, as mere theology. To support their claim, they denigrate the teachings of the Bible as errantly influenced by the “science” of their day, the Ancient Near-Eastern cosmology.

Biologos has violated the numerous Scriptural injunctions to not tamper with Scripture:

·       You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the LORD your God that I command you. (Deuteronomy 4:2; 12:32; Rev. 22:18-19)

While Biologos claims that Genesis 1-11 is not an historical account, taking away from the Word, the Bible provides no hint of such a thing. Instead, the Bible generously quotes Genesis as history, for example:

·       For man was not made from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man. (1 Corinthians 11:8-9; 1 Timothy 2:13)

In most instances, the NT derives theology from the history, showing that history and theology are inseparable, contrary to the assumptions of Biologos. Therefore, where history is denied, so too is theology.

Consequently, where Biologos and theistic evolution have tread, the Church has suffered. In Bruce Malone’s DVD, “Explosive Geological Evidence for Creation,” he claims that 81% of church youth do not believe in moral absolutes. From 65 to 95% of these youth leave the church entirely by the end of their fourth year at college. Perhaps even worse, 63% of the youth attending Christian schools do not believe that Christ is God; 58% believe that there are many ways to God; 65% don’t believe in Satan! Malone understandably laments:

·       “By not emphasizing the creation, the Fall, and the Flood as real historical events; the Bible has lost all credibility to the world when it relates to anything dealing with the physical world.”

Even worse is its impact on the Church. Malone further claims:

·       “When you throw out what the Bible has to say about the physical world, the world will throw out what the Bible has to say about the spiritual world.”

Sadly, theistic evolutionists have brought this into the Church with disastrous results.

THEISTIC EVOLUTION AND ITS INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE

Theistic evolutionists (TEs) believe that in order to understand Scripture correctly, we must view it through the lens of modern science. However, this is placing the theory of evolution above Scripture, requiring that Scripture conform to it. To accomplish this, they require that we regard Genesis 1-11 as non-historical.

How do we interpret Scripture? We interpret it the way we do any other form of literature – by the intent of the author. How do we interpret the intent of the author? There is only one way to do it – from the perspective of the ENTIRE body of the author’s work. This is also what it means to interpret Scripture by Scripture.

However, you are interpreting Scripture through a “higher” and more authoritative lens, the lens of the present-day scientific consensus on evolution. For the TE, this lens has become determinative about how Scripture is to be understood, as if the findings and conclusions of this Consensus are more reliable than Scripture.

As such, the TE has imposed upon Scripture an alien taskmaster coercing Scripture to agree with the Consensus.

As a result of the TE is doing what the typical cult leader does. They too claim that the Bible is the Word of God, but they also claim that it can only be understood by using their Key to the Scriptures. For example, the rabbis claim that the real meaning of Scripture is deep and spiritual. It is not to be found on the surface. However, they too claim that they have certain formulas to penetrate into the depths.