The cowardice of idealism
“Men invent new ideals because they dare not attempt old ideals. They look forward with enthusiasm, because they are afraid to look back.”
- G.K. Chesterton, What’s Wrong With The World, 1910
Making the world old
“Progress should mean that we are always changing the world to fit the vision; instead we are always changing the vision.”
- G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy, 1908
Desperate optimists
“The person who is really in revolt is the optimist, who generally lives and dies in a desperate and suicidal effort to persuade other people how good they are.”
- G.K. Chesterton, Introduction to The Defendant
Criticize yourself
“What embitters the world is not excess of criticism, but an absence of self-criticism.”
- G.K. Chesterton, Sidelights on New London and Newer New York
Extreme repentance
Extreme repentance
The adjective extreme has become popular in recent years. People are proud of being extreme. They engage in extreme sports, listen to extreme music, and watch “Extreme Makeover.” Church youth groups even called themselves “Generation X-Treme,” which gives you an idea of how long the word has been popular in popular culture, since the oldest examples of Generation X are now over 40.
One of the appeals of extreme sports is the adrenalin rush that they give – something that’s lacking in most church activity. Sure, there are extreme short term missions and extreme street ministry, but most church people don’t engage in those. You have to leave home to try them.
Could there be such a thing as extreme repentance? What would it look like? Zaccheus might be a good biblical example. If he gave half his possessions to the poor and repaid his wrongs four times over, how much could he have left?
A nation could practice extreme repentance by dealing with sins that are too costly to seriously consider. Descendants of slaves and aboriginals have asked for it, but no governments has yet to give its land back to the previous inhabitants, or to pay back wages for forced servitude. Many people prefer to believe that the millions of people systematically killed under their nation’s wartime occupation were unavoidable, casual casualties.
What would extreme repentance look like on a personal level? It would be costly. Soldiers and tobacco farmers rarely question what they do for a living. If they do ask questions, the answer always seems to be “Fine.”
The depth of your repentance depends on what questions you’re willing to ask yourself — and how many you’re willing to answer.
Does my life line up with the Bible in every area? If not, how much do I care?
Before I came to faith, did I have any righteousness of my own?
Do other people need a savior more than I do?
Would I be willing to be called a heretic or cultist for obeying the Bible?
Are my unbelieving ancestors in hell?
Do I have any beliefs or practices that I would refuse to question if God showed me they were wrong?
Would I give up my trade or occupation if I came to believe it didn’t please God?
How far would I be willing to travel from my family’s faith if I were convinced it was false?
Could I pinpoint an area of sin, and call it sin, without knowing yet how I could be freed from it?
Does it matter if I continue to do things that displease God?
Extreme repentance requires extreme grace. For most churches, grace usually turns out to just mean that God overlooks sin. But for those who actually want to leave sin, grace needs to mean more. Grace needs to mean that God changes sinners. Otherwise, it means that God can’t or won’t or can do it only part way or only under certain circumstances. Extreme repentance requires a belief in definitive grace. We couldn’t stand to face our corruption honestly, without self-deception, if we thought we would always be corrupt.
Impartiality or ignorance?
“Impartiality is a pompous name for indifference, which is an elegant name for ignorance.”
- G.K. Chesterton, The Speaker, 12/15/00
Excusable disobedience
How many times have you heard a Christian say, “Well, I really shouldn’t, but…” We often say this about dessert. I’ve been thinking about a former church, whose members sometimes said this about dessert. Even though they never said it about the Bible, when I look back, I get the sense that if we just couldn’t manage to obey the Bible right now, that would have been okay in our church. Really, if we felt we wanted to do something, nothing could have constrained us. We said we wanted to obey God in everything, and prided ourselves in that. But we could leave our wives if we felt the Spirit prompting us. A few of us did.
Porn creep
Wikipedia says that porn creep is about sexually explicit content entering American pop culture. It was outrageous forty years ago, but we must not complain about it now, because we might sound prudish.
It reminds me of the common arguments for why society should allow anything that was banned until now, such as homosexuals or women in combat. The common argument is not that our society would be better and happier if we didn’t ban it. The common argument is that it’s been going on for a long time. For example, historians will tell you that some women and some homosexuals have served in early American battles. Pornography has been around for thousands of years, holding an important place in many dead civilizations.
By that reasoning, everything will creep. Everything will become acceptable, given enough time.
I don’t accept that reasoning. Time can’t turn wrong into right.
God would never make you uncomfortable.
Today’s heresy is related to my theory of proportional discipleship, that no Christian’s devotion to God should be more than one standard deviation above society in general. Today’s heresy suggests that God is bound by a similar rule. He will never say anything or ask you to do anything that’s more than one standard deviation outside your comfort zone. Your comfort zone is sacred and God will never violate it. Read the rest of this entry »
Exhilaration
“The act of defending any of the cardinal virtues has today all the exhilaration of a vice.”
- G.K. Chesterton, A Defense of Humilities, The Defendant, 1901
