The view of Biblical Christianity is under attack. What is it that draws such fire from our culture? It is not intolerance. It is not hypocrisy. It is not social action or inaction.
The primary reason Biblical Christianity is under attack in our day is its unrelenting focus on Jesus Christ. The bible refuses to allow us to smooth over or overlook the God-Man, Jesus Christ. The bible points clearly to the fact that all of us are marred by sin and there is one hope: the substitutionally death of Jesus on our behalf.
Alvin Plantinga is a world renowned christian philosopher. He is the John A. O’Brien Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at the University of Notre Dame, where he taught for 28 years, and is the inaugural holder of the Jellema Chair in Philosophy at Calvin College, where he recently retired from in 2010. He is a philosophical beast, to say the least. Plantinga explains the classical components of christian belief and the uniqueness therein.
Classical Christian belief includes, in the first place, the belief that there is such a person as God. God is That person, that is, a being with intellect and will. A person has (or can have) knowledge and belief, but also affections, loves, and hates; a person, furthermore, also has or can have intentions, and can act so as to fulfill them. God has all of these qualities and has some (knowledge, power, and love, for example) to the maximal degree. God is thus all-knowing and all-powerful; he is also perfectly good and wholly loving. Still further, he has created the universe and constantly upholds and providentially guides it. This is the theistic component of Christian belief. But there is also the uniquely Christian component: that we human beings are somehow mired in rebellion and sin, that we consequently require deliverance and salvation, and that God has arranged for that deliverance through the sacrificial suffering, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, who was both a man and also the second member of the Trinity, the uniquely divine son of God. – Alvin Plantinga
Stay focused on Christ, friends.
“What is it that draws such fire from our culture? It is not intolerance. It is not hypocrisy. It is not social action or inaction.”
Actually, yeah, it’s all of those things. And breaking the law. And discrimination.
I say it is not those things, not to say they don’t exist, but to say that the root cause for friction with culture goes far beyond them. At the heart of the matter is the fact that Jesus confronts the sin in our lives and we don’t like it.
The church is not perfect. True. But the message that we are all called to “Repent and Believe” remains the same. Yet many people do not want to hear this message. Therefore, Biblical Christianity is becoming increasingly unwelcome in the public arena.
The linch pin is Jesus Christ, not any social issue or perceived idea about Christians. What you do with Jesus is the one decision that will resound in eternity. I hope you can see that He offers the only hope of freedom from sin and purpose in this life.
“For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” 1 Cor. 1:18
” At the heart of the matter is the fact that Jesus confronts the sin in our lives and we don’t like it.”
And I disagree.
“Yet many people do not want to hear this message”
We hear it. We just don’t care, Keep saying it all you want. Change the things that are causing problems, and I won’t ever tell you not to say it.