A Letter to Frank Schaeffer about Jesus and the Bible

Your father, Francis Schaeffer, was a defender of the Christian faith, and I am therefore so glad to see that you also are a defender of Jesus!

• If Jesus is God as evangelicals and Roman Catholics claim he is, then the choice is clear. We have to read the book–including the New Testament–as he did, and Jesus didn’t like the “Bible” of his day.

Wow, you really threw me a curve ball there. I never dreamed that “Jesus didn’t like the ‘Bible’ of his day. I guess He must have had a different one. Didn’t he say:

• “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 5:17-19)

I guess Jesus must have been referring to a different “Law” and the “Prophets.” Whatever, these might have been, it seems that he must have really venerated them. Are you suggesting then that the Pharisees had a different Bible?

I am also puzzled by this statement:

• “Worship in the Spirit and in truth,” is not about a book, let alone “salvation” through correct ideas or tradition.

I started to wonder what Jesus meant by His teaching that we must “Worship in the Spirit and in truth?” So I went back to John 4 and found that Jesus had contrasted this requirement with the Samaritan worship:

• You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. (John 4:22-23) 

I was surprised to find Jesus telling the Samaritan woman that she had to receive the revelation that had come to the Jews if she wanted to be saved – not very inclusive to me! I had thought that there were multiple ways to be saved, but Jesus keeps coming back to the Bible:

• “It is written [in Deuteronomy 8, right?]: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” (Mat. 4:4)

It certainly doesn’t seem that Jesus hated the Bible. How am I misunderstanding him?

Your next statement really confuses me. Are you saying that the Torah is on the same plain as “church tradition?”

• Every time Jesus mentioned the equivalent of a church tradition, the Torah, he qualified it with something like this: “The scriptures say thus and so, but I say…” Jesus undermined the scriptures and religious tradition in favor of empathy.

You inspired me to go back and to read the Sermon on the Mount, but I couldn’t find where Jesus corrected Scripture with these words: ““The scriptures say thus and so, but I say…” Instead, I found Jesus saying:

• “You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘You shall not murder.” (Mat. 5:21)

Hmm? Perhaps I read that wrong? Or perhaps I have a sub-standard translation. Please, be assured that I am convinced that you would never try to mislead anyone! You have always demonstrated such exemplary love and inclusiveness, that no one could ever accuse you of wrongly battering Evangelicals and Catholics. But I was surprised by your statement:

• In evangelical and Roman Catholic fundamentalist terms, Jesus was a rule-breaking humanist who wasn’t “saved.”

I thought that they did believe that Jesus was saved. I guess I just haven’t been around long enough. You, of all people, certainly understand the Evangelical mind. I’m so grateful that I have been able to learn from you. My own reason seems to serve me so poorly. (BTW, I really do enjoy your painting!)

Frank Schaeffer on Certainty and Marriage: Some Friendly Advice

A letter to Frank Schaeffer:

Dear Frank,

I’m sure that you would appreciate some corrective feedback. Perhaps you haven’t received any in a long time and realize that we all need some correction. So let me just focus on one little statement you just posted in your blog:

• With the acceptance of paradox came a new and blessed uncertainty that began to heal the mental illness called certainty, the kind of certainty that told me that my job was to be head of the home and to order around my wife and children because “the Bible says so.”

Perhaps most obviously, although you claim to bask in “blessed uncertainty,” you seem to be quite certain about what the Bible teaches about marriage. (I guess certainty is that “mental illness” from which none of us can entirely free ourselves.) Although you are correct that the Bible does teach that a wife must serve her husband, it seems that you have totally ignored the husband’s duties towards his wife. Let me just supply a few verses that you might consider:

• Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her… husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself… each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. (Ephesians 5:25-33)

• Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers. (1 Peter 3:7)

• Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them. (Col. 3:19)

I’m sure that you are already familiar with these teachings. However, in the hustle-and-bustle of promoting our own agendas, it is so easy to forget about them.

I don’t think that it’s an accident that women of the Christian West have experienced that greatest measure of freedom and protection. The “why” becomes obvious when we compare the biblical teachings with those found in other religions. Take the Koran, for example:

• [2.223] Your wives are a tilth [cultivated land] for you, so go into your tilth when you like, and do good beforehand for yourselves…

• [2.228] And the divorced women should keep themselves in waiting for three courses; and it is not lawful for them that they should conceal what Allah has created in their wombs, if they believe in Allah and the last day; and their husbands have a better right to take them back in the meanwhile if they wish for reconciliation; and they have rights similar to those against them in a just manner, and the men are a degree above them, and Allah is Mighty, Wise.

• [2.282] …call in to witness from among your men two witnesses; but if there are not two men, then one man and two women from among those whom you choose to be witnesses…

• [4:34] Men are in charge of women, because Allah hath made the one of them to excel the other, and because they spend of their property (for the support of women). So good women are the obedient, guarding in secret that which Allah hath guarded. As for those from whom ye fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them…

I will not even cite Koranic verses regarding the permissibility of rape, lest your righteous indignation be aroused and you literally lose your head in the process.

No need to thank me. Instead, it’s a pleasure to serve an atheist who believes.

Salvation by the Correct Ideas

In a recent interview with Brian McLaren, Frank Schaeffer claimed that “salvation by correct ideas” was one thing that had turned him away from biblical Christianity. After all, thinking the right thoughts in order to be saved seems so removed from everything that we regard as meaningful – love, justice, goodness, and relationships. Also, damnation by having the wrong ideas or beliefs seems completely unfair, unjust, and beneath the dignity of God.

There is even some basis for Schaeffer’s indictment. The Bible claims that we are saved by grace operating through faith (Eph. 2:8-9). Faith, to some degree, entails embracing right ideas about Jesus. Doesn’t this mean that we are saved by having the right ideas? Besides, this would also mean that, to some extent, we are damned by having the wrong ideas, right?

Behind Schaeffer’s charge is the assumption that what we believe is arbitrary and therefore, should not carry any moral weight or guilt. Along with this, he asserted that, “Knowing doesn’t make you a better person.” Why then should anyone be penalized for not knowing, especially since knowing isn’t really possible, as Schaeffer claims.

But is there a moral dimension to knowing? Should we be held responsible for not knowing? Sometimes, not knowing is justly punishable. If a student fails to regurgitate the right answers on a test because he didn’t study, he is understandably penalized. However, does this principle also pertain to the Christian beliefs about Jesus? Should we know these facts? Are we accountable when we don’t have them?

What if there is a God who loves us and died for our sins, and what if these truths are knowable? Many say:

• I am content to know that there is a higher power. I don’t need to know all the specifics. In fact, I don’t think that there is anything we can really know about God.

But what if God is knowable! He was certainly knowable during the ministry of Jesus. He had performed so many miracles that they are acknowledged even by His detractors and their Talmud. These miracles were so compelling that His adversaries wanted to put Him to death because of them. After Jesus brought forth Lazarus from the dead after four days, these adversaries reasoned that He had to be stopped:

• Therefore many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him. But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. Then the chief priests and the Pharisees called a meeting of the Sanhedrin. “What are we accomplishing?” they asked. “Here is this man performing many signs. If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him.” (John 11:45-48)

If miracles did not speak persuasively about Jesus’ divine identity, they would not have constituted a threat to the religious establishment. Nor would the people have believed. Instead the evidence would have to be extinguished.

Clearly, belief and non-belief represented two sides of a great moral divide. Belief loved the light and came to the light. Unbelief detested the light of the evidence – the truth - and wanted to eradicate it.

Unbelief is equated with a refusal to believe despite the overwhelming evidence. The evidence was so compelling that Jesus stated:

• “Do not believe me unless I do the works of my Father.  But if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me, and I in the Father.” (John 10:37-38)

Knowing was more than a possibility; it was a duty, a moral obligation to accept the truth. To reject the light of truth brought guilt, as Jesus affirmed:

• “If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin; but now they have no excuse for their sin… If I had not done among them the works no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin. As it is, they have seen, and yet they have hated both me and my Father. But this is to fulfill what is written in their Law: ‘They hated me without reason.’” (John 15:22-25)

To reject the evidence of Jesus’ miracles, was to hate Him “without reason,” and this carried moral culpability. However, many argue:

• Well, I have no way of knowing whether or not these miracles really happened. I haven’t seen any, and so I can’t be held accountable for what I don’t know.

As Jesus indicated, ignorance is an adequate excuse, but are we really ignorant? The Apostle Paul argued that we are not:

• The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them.  For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. (Romans 1:18-20)

God is angry because we do know a lot about Him and yet reject Him. He has stocked our conscience, mind, and the creation with adequate evidences, and yet, we “suppress the truth by [our] wickedness.” In light of this, we are, in a sense, saved by correct thinking, but this correct thinking is available to all. Some will acquiesce to the truth, while others will reject it. Of course, many protest:

• I don’t have this knowledge of God, and it is not right for you to indict me as if I do have this knowledge.

The Book of Proverbs also affirms that we have the truth but reject it. Wisdom surrounds us, but it tells us uncomfortable things about ourselves, and so we reject it:

• “Then they will call to me [wisdom] but I will not answer; they will look for me but will not find me, since they hated knowledge and did not choose to fear the Lord. Since they would not accept my advice and spurned my rebuke, they will eat the fruit of their ways and be filled with the fruit of their schemes. For the waywardness of the simple will kill them, and the complacency of fools will destroy them.” (Proverbs. 1:28-31)

Wisdom is available but disdained. It’s painful and exposes the truth about us. It carries a “rebuke” that informs us that we are sinners who need the Savior. Therefore, we reject wisdom in favor of our own narrowly self-serving thoughts. We harden our heart against the truth. However, when we do this, we blind ourselves and stumble to our own destruction.

In fact, Scripture hints that, even in the next life, we freely choose the place of darkness because we hate the light (John 3:17-20). How does this great tragedy occur? We cannot stand to face ourselves – our inadequacies, our moral failures, our guilt and shame. We therefore suppress the truth about ourselves in favor of comfortable fictions and self-justifications. We also suppress the knowledge of God along with His judgment of our sins.

You don’t have to be a Christian to recognize these things. So many psychological studies indicate that we are self-deluded. We hate the light and will take extreme measures to avoid or suppress it. We then conveniently cloth ourselves with an exalted, self-serving set of beliefs about ourselves. Psychologist Roy Baumeister reports:

• There are now ample data on our population showing that, if anything, Americans tend to overrate and overvalue ourselves. In plain terms, the average American thinks he’s above average. Even the categories of people about whom our society is most concerned do not show any broad deficiency in self-esteem.

We do not want the truth if it interferes with our self-esteem. We would rather feel good than think rightly. However, when we reject truth, we also reject God and any correct thinking about Him.

I talk to hundreds of people, even thousands, about God. Although many will admit that the question of the existence and character of God is foundational to all other questions – questions of meaning, morality, behavior, relationships – they refuse to seek God. They protect themselves with excuses like, “No one can really know.”

However, such an excuse is actually a claim to great knowledge, the very kind of knowledge they claim that we can’t have. How do they know that “no one can really know?” Instead, this is a mere excuse, a culpable excuse. In reality, they do not want to know. They correctly sense that the truth might just be too demanding, too confining, or even too accusatory.

In a sense, we are saved by correct thinking and damned by our incorrect thinking. However, this thinking is not devoid of moral significance. Instead, it reflects the very depths of our being, our desires and choices – choices that will either draw us to God or separate us from Him.

Emergent Church, Frank Schaeffer, and the Rejection of Certainty, at least Christian Certainty

Emergent “Christians” don’t like Christian confidence regarding the traditional biblical beliefs of the faith. Along with the rest of  their “progressive” society, they find them offensive. And they have many arguments against certainty.

Frank Schaeffer, the son of the late and famous apologist Francis Schaeffer, argues that “Certainty is the enemy of truth” – a very peculiar statement. What good is truth if you cannot be certain that you’ve found it? You’ll simply wander into another idea and then abandon it once you become somewhat certain about it.

Then Schaeffer paradoxically states:

• If people were certain, there’d be no science, because people would say, “Well, we know everything”…Same in marriage – nothing to learn, nothing to explore. Same in parenthood, and of course for our idea of God.

If we can’t have any degree of certainly, we’d have no science textbooks. Without certainty, they would remain blank. Besides, without the possibility of certainty, there is nothing to learn and we should close down our schools and run around naked like animals.

Schaeffer also commits several logical errors. If certainty isn't possible, he has no business opening his mouth. He must be certain enough about this statement in order to coherently utter it! If he is not certain about it, he should remain silent. If he speaks authoritatively of something he is not certain, then he is not being honest.

Perhaps even worse, Schaeffer assumes that certainty about particular propositions means that we are left with no room to learn anything else. This is bizarre logic. Instead, it is because I have certainty about logic, reason, and the learning process that I am confident about learning more and adjusting my ideas accordingly. Therefore, Janie B. Cheaney writes:

• Human reason always builds on a platform of presuppositions: ideas or principles that reason accepts as self-evidently true. (World, Oct. 5, 2013, 20)

Consequently, without some degree of certainty, learning is stymied. Nevertheless, the Emergent Church is certain about their own theology. Cheaney writes:

• Emergent Christians celebrate a god whose dimensions are too vast to pack into a rigid set of doctrines. At the same time they are pretty sure that God would approve of same-sex marriage and deplore this summer’s Supreme Court decision on voting rights. One might even say they are certain of it. (20)

Meanwhile, Schaeffer is emphatic that we should:

• Create beauty, give love, find peace.

In fact, he seems to be quite certain about it.