Morality and Religion - Part V

Now I must turn to the ultimate question. What if the Bible did give clear direct and uncompromising moral commands? Would I then be prepared to accept that I must live in moral submission to a religious directive?

This brings us to a harsh reality and it is a question that ultimately brings us to the very edge of humanity, salvation, and authentic spirituality. I wish I had an easy answer, but life is not full of easy answers. I do not wish to dodge the issue, so I will answer it right away and then an explanation will follow.

If the Bible contained such a quality as was mentioned above it would be more of an indicator that such a quality was a sign of false spirituality rather then the reverse. I would doubt the Bible before I doubted moral autonomy. This is a very hard line to draw, and there is a part of my Christian conscience which has a lump in its throat right now even relaying this information, but it is not without justification.

I would begin by saying that every man needs to decide for himself what parameters exist for religious devotion. For instance, we have no problem asking this question about moral commands as it concerns the Bible, but what if we rephrased the question? What if, we asked, "If the Bible gave a clear direct and uncompromising command to kill an innocent child would you do it?" The problem with "what if" question is that we are rightly obliged to consider other options that could set a clear example of how such situations work in my favor. But all this does is set a standard for us where we can accept that there should exist such religious standard whereby we can say, "This is wrong! It should not exist in the Bible." I believe such a stance is representative of genuine faith, rather then the opposite.

A person who can clearly and intentionally stand on the principles of his faith and if need be turn aside from his particular religion because it does not live up to the par is more qualified to be a genuine believer in God then not. Such a person's devotion is less likely to be coerced and manipulated and encourages a sense of honesty and self-awareness in religious devotion.

Now before you boo me off the stage consider what the alternative means. If the right attitude to have concerning our sacred text is blind devotion then what is the arbiter of disagreements and inter-faith conflicts?  A person who simply obeys their religious directives without question is not worthy of praise for their devotion is empty. And such an attitude actually promotes and encourages disunity, division, and conflict among our partners in faith.

What I am proposing is not a human standard by which we can judge God, but rather it is in the spirit of worshiping God. What I hold in suspencion is not the existence of God, or the virtue of God. For me, a person can completely hold religious devotion up to a standard without encroaching on the holiness or glory of God. In a rather stark contrast it is religion that must live up to a moral standard rather then morality living up to a religious standard. Admittedly this runs counter-intuitive to what we think of religious devotion, especially if you are of the conservative fundamentalist variety. But what needs to be considered are the appropriate categories by which we enter into relationship with God.

First, we have faith. This is the initiator. A person can still maintain faith in God and a desire to serve and please him regardless of his religious devotion. Faith does not call us to blindly follow religious dogma, but rather draws us near to God. If we must in this process adhere to religious dogma then, of course, that would be appropriate, but this only exists conditionally. So one can seperate himself, if need be, from religious devotion in order to preserve ones faith rather then destroy it. So it must be accepted that in some cases the right thing to do is suspend religious direction in order to appeal to a higher order relational standard between us and God.

Next, we have God. God is the source, the fire, and the energy of life. He is the meaning and the infinite. The eternal. God exists above religion (The Sabbath was made for man). This is probably difficult for most Christians to accept, being a revealed religion we naturally think that Christianity is God's religion, too, but that it not the case. God is a living God. He reveals Himself, not religion. Christianity is a response to God, and an appropriate one, but Christianity is not the essence of God. Thus, if Christianity is even abandoned then God is not effected. He is not thwarted. He is the same. Thus, we can bring no dishonor to God if we in good conscience have to suspend our religious devotion even to his revealed religion in order to, in the end, live honestly with our faith.

Last, we have religion. In phenomenological terms, religion is the cult of the sub-conscious. In existential terms religion is our connection with ultimate reality. In process terms religion is the finite timelessness. People who fall back to the superficial cliche that they have a relationship and not a religion are fooling themselves. A relationship with God is what a religion is. It is the definition of religion. All relationships have rituals, customs, and taboos which make up the essence of the relationship and provides for relational environments. Religion is the relational environment we have with God. Now a relationship is the development of affections, but not necessarily the origin of affections. Admittedly, if a person suspends themselves from a relationship there will be heartache and pain, but this is the risk we accept for all relationships. There is no reason why a relationship with God should be any different. Except with God, we believe he will always be there for us. So the affection we have for God can remain in tact and the faith which perserves our affection can remain authentic and genuine.

Thus, there should be no reason why we should reject the idea that we can hold moral autonomy as an arbiter of authentic religious devotion. Thus, I can stand more firmly on the foundation that if the Bible did in fact reveal moral norms that I disagreed with the authentic response would be to hold the Bible in suspension rather then my moral inclinations... BUT!!! I am not rejecting religion wholesale with this argument. Though I accept a person is justified in acting in such a way, given my previous post that a person is a composite and a unity, it is not so easy to divide our life into compartimentalized segments. Just because a person has a moral reason to suspend his religious devotion does not mean he should simply cut the cord and be done with those silly superstitions. I believe this to be a dishonest response. Don't do yourself the disservice of blind selfishness. What I reject is all forms of blindness... blind faith just as much as blind egoism.

Religion is a glue that binds people together and I believe at the heart of religion is the brotherhood of man, rather then a set of ideological concepts. If you disagree with a religious morality then you owe it to yourself to be accountable to your family in faith.

We have just about ended our journey. We have faced a difficult problem and come out beaten but standing. It is hard to bring ourselves to the reality that our religion may be wrong, but we have to face this if we are to be true believers. I wish to end this by facing up to the specific issues everyone is probably dying to hear about. What about the specific norms themselves. I have hinted at their existence and sidelined them through this whole process. I touched on them at the beginning at have seemingly ignored them the rest of the way, but I know in reality most readers will not accept this argument unless I address specific issues, and that is where we will end this discussion.

Why I am no longer a fundamentalist - Part 1: What is more fundamental?

Christianity and fundamentalism almost go hand in hand in our culture. For most people who are unbelievers when they mock Christianity or deride the faith what they have in mind is typically a fundamentalist version of religion. I think the reason for this is that for the most part the fundamentalists are active and public. They have no problem going on the news and saying things like, "Hurricane Katrina was God's judgment", or "God hates fags". Granted, I understand that for the most part this is even a fringe part of fundamentalism and in no way can be said of even fundamentalism, itself, but this is the impression people have, none the less.

I do have problems with fundamentalism, regardless. And I feel that public opinion is indicative, though it does not explain what exactly are are issues I have with fundamentalism. But before I get into that, I think it is important to say that at one time I was certainly a fundamentalist. I was also at one time a charismatic. There have been times I have been an atheist, an Objectivist, and an essentialist. Some think that such "adaptability" is a weakness, but my heart has always been to follow the truth where ever it leads me. Currently, I am an existentialist, philosophically, and Neo-Orthodox, theologically. But I am no longer a fundamentalist, and here is why...

The basic heart of fundamentalism is that the most "fundamental" understanding of a document is the correct one, and this is a very virtuous undertaking. But when we come to defining what is actually "fundamental" we come into issues. For me, I always figured that the most fundamental rendering of any document would be the intentions and contexts of the author and the perceptions and culture of the audience. And though I am sure most would agree with me on this, what is often played out in the fundamentalist pool is that "fundamental" often means basic or plain. Hence the fundamental rendering of a document is its plain message. When a text says a "in three days I will rise again" we are to read that with the understanding that the basic wording of the text is the most important, or most pervasive, understanding of the message itself.

In many ways, liberal Christians are just as fundamental as conservative ones. They just disagree as to what is the fundamental interpretation of the text. But for all intents and purposes it is the conservatives who have taken the mantel of fundamentalism, and upon this point I do not disagree. I only wish to point out that even if a person is not a fundamentalist this does not mean that they are not interested in the most fundamental or basic interpretation. In fact, case in point, I came away from fundamentalism because of my desire to read the Bible in the most accurate and correct manner.

Now I will admit that there are liberal Christians who have no concern for the Bible what-so-ever, and to be fair I think the fundamentalist extremists show just the same denial even though they believe their beliefs come from the Bible. So just in the same way that fundamentalists do not want their extreme varieties to be used against them, so too liberals are caricatured and misrepresented. And to be honest, I would not classify neo-orthodoxy as a form of liberal theology. Historically, neo-orthodoxy arose as a reaction to liberalism, in an effort to counter its a-religiousness.

Now there are many things which can be said about the distinctions between liberal and conservative theology, but what stands as the most pressing issue is the interpretive methods of reading the Bible. This is truly the only link between liberal Christians and secular humanists. So if, fundamentalists wants to truly have a pure faith then this task should be as equally important to them. For the liberal the integrity of faith should draw us to a deeper unity with everyone and the disclosure of methods and theology should be just as vocal and apparent as we see for the fundamentalists as well. Both sides have a reason to integrate and converse with the other, and no one does anyone the benefit of isolation. We both believe we are interpreting Scripture "fundamentally". It is time we try yo figure out what that means...

I know for myself, Scripture has opened up wide avenues of spiritual growth for my faith. A more modern exegesis is definitely humbling when it comes to understanding the "supernatural" component, but it is able to elaborate on the human connections that often go unseen in the Biblical narratives and these connections provide much theological insight and clarity to help guide my walk and new pilgrimage. I am not a lukewarm Christian. The Bible is just as important to me now as it was before, and a case could be made that it is more alive to me now. I have not compromised my faith and I have not deceived myself. I am an honest Christian who is simply no longer a fundamentalist.

I believe in miracles... kinda.

Believe it or not, but most church belief statements do not have a section that indicates that as Christians we have to believe in miracles. This may seem odd, because by definition don't Christians HAVE to believe in miracles? Surprisingly, not necessarily. It is a highly controversial matter, to be sure, but it is not without sound reasoning.

I want to set aside some wreckless criticism that some Evangelical theologians have lodged against this view. William Lane Craig has said that some "liberal" theologians have done away with miracles because they have a predisposition to physicalism. This is false. In fact, I think it can be turned around to apply in the opposite fashion. Those who all too easily believe in miracles cling to "evidences" which manifest themselves in the physical world making them cling all the more to a materialistic faith. It can be argued, granted perhaps very weakly, that belief in miracles is more indicative of physicalism then the non-belief in miracles. But it is not my position that miracles do not exist. Rather, I do not think they are necessary for the Christian narrative.

Now, I dare say that I believe that a willingness for miracles is necessary for faith. But this does not prove the existence of miracles. I believe in miracles to the extent that I believe they are possible and I desire to see them, but I do not believe in miracles in the sense that they are proven through a historical analysis. In fact, I think such ideas are silly when we take an honest look at the realities.

So I begin from a humble position. I accept that miracles are possible, but I need adequate evidence in order to affirm that a miracle has actually happened.

Let's begin with the most obvious question. How can I call myself a Christian and suspend belief in the historicity of miracles? For the lay reader I fear that my answer may seem like a parlor trick.

Let's begin with the resurrection. Jesus' body was not put in a tomb. It was buried and God exalted the spirit or soul of Jesus into heaven, and it was this exaltation which became a spiritual resurrection the moment Jesus "appeared" to his disciples. For all intents and purposes a spiritual body is the same in both narratives. And the "appearances" were private events. They could have just as easily been visions that received legendary embellishment through the Jewish practice of midrash.

What about Jesus' miracles? It was prophesied that the messiah would heal and cast out demons, so the disciples who knew Jesus to be the messiah because of his resurrection did not lie or decieve, but in a very Jewish fashion crafted the narratives of his life to already possess the qualities which they already knew existed in him. The miracles themselves are similar to previous miracles performed by Moses or Elijah. They were crafted with the intent of informing their audience that the same God who was with Moses was also with Jesus. Jesus is the new Moses, or the new Elijah.

What about prophecy? The books of the prophets represent a tradition of social justice that was realized after the exile in confrontation with the secular world stripping the Jews of their religious heritage. The Jews were thrust into the world of history and they had to craft a new narrative which demonstrated God's everlasting care and concern for his people, even though such an experience was not available to them. Prophecy casts the plight of the Jewish people in the framework of a timeless reality. Writing of events already past as though they were future events, or current events as though they existed as future realities built the framework for the Jewish people that their history, culture, and reality would be forever and timeless. The message of the prophets was to forge ahead with a broken faith. The Temple had been destroyed and their heritage lost. This reality given the interpretive problems of prophecy make it a plausible fact that there is no "future-ness" to prophecy at all, but a realization in the present moment of God's timelessness and our solidarity with man because of our infinite nature.

Surely creation was a miracle! I can agree to an extent, but we have no reliable scientific account in the Bible which affirms a physical creation. Genesis was written in the context of many competing origin myths. The writer of Genesis masterfully crafted this narrative to demonstrate aspects of God's love and compassion for humanity as opposed to other myths which are similar, and believe me, there are many similarities. So even if I can agree philosophically that physical reality was supernaturally created I have no indication that this is a part of the Christian narrative.

What about prayer, tongues of fire, signs and wonders, raising people from the dead, and so on that we see in Acts? Were there no miracles in the early church? Again, I am not doubtful of whether or not miracles existed at certain points in history. That will be discussed later. I am doubtful that these miracles are a part of the narrative of Christianity. I doubt that Acts records genuine miracles. Since we have established a way of speaking of spiritual activity as though it were "supernatural" in order to convey the message and hope that God is with us and working in us we have no reason to think that Acts would be any different. Tongues of fire when read in conjunction with the story of Babel paints an interesting story that rebuilds the Christian origins as undoing the catastrophes we read about in Genesis. The birth of the church is the new unity for mankind, just as Babel was the birth of its division. In this sense, no literal tongues of fire need exist. The power of the story is consistent with Jewish spirituality.

I guess Revelation is just a book of made up non-sense! Not exactly. Many of the aspects of Revelation represent current trials the Christian church was facing at that time. Persecution, martyrdom, and exile. Revelation is like any other apocalyptic book written in that time frame. It was common to depict current trials as though they existed as future cosmic events of ultimate significance and meaning. A king who persecuted Christians would become the embodiment of the anti-Christ and he would have to do battle with the forces of haven to ultimately loose. This kind of story telling provided comfort and meaning for the first Christians and is in many ways an embodiment of the prophetic spirit during the Jewish exile.

So you see. We can cast our Christian narrative in a light that possesses no miracles. Whether or not we are justified in doing so is another issue. This will largely depend on whether or not the use of Higher Criticism is an appropriate hermeneutical method, or not. But this article is not about that.

So why would I believe that miracles as historical events are improbable?

This is a much more nuanced response. And there is plenty of philosophical debate concerning the matter. I wish I could give it more attention, but to put simply I am more inclined to believe that miracles can only be accepted on a personal basis. I have to experience the miracle in order for it to be valid, and in such instances only the miraculous can be preserved in me. Certainly, my experience can pass through the ages and be seen as a watershed moment for my life, but the reality of the miraculous ends with my personal experience of it.

Why would I hold to such a limited view? The difficulty for this comes from the fact that no matter the descriptions we supply for the miraculous we have no way of distinguishing a miracle from an illusions, conspiracy, or deception. And in the end, all these other "highly improbable" events are still more likely to have occurred rather then an actual miracle. And the biggest reason for this is because if God were a miracle-inducing God then why would his activity be limited to a singular event at a particular time and specific place. God has the power to literally appear to everyone at the same time and at all places at once, but he works in such a way where is activity can be doubted. This is the oddest of all miraculous circumstances. Now historically we have to consider the limitations of finite events, but God is an infinite Being so we have to consider that there are literally no limits to his power. Thus, if God were to move at a particular time for the benefit of a particular person and such an event were included in God's saving activity of man to the degree that future generations would need to believe that such events took place in a miraculous context then one is completely validated in asking why God would limit such activity to that moment and that person. If God truly desired to save us, and belief in miracles is necessary for that saving activity then why not perform a miracle for each person so they can experience it for themselves. Obviously, God has no problem performing miracles, if we believe he did them in the past. Obviously, He had no moral taboos about human freedom and relational integrity in the past as it concerns man's free and willing choice.

Theologically there is no logical reason to think that miracles are necessarily a part of a salvation narrative. God could simply perform miracles randomly without an overall plan to save mankind. And we have no reason to think that in order to save mankind a miracle must be preformed. The association of the miraculous with salvation is only incidental at best. People claim that in order for God to save mankind he would have to act on our behalf, but even if this were true how does this indicate that miracles happen? God could spiritually act on our behalf. If he were to simply forgive us, this would be a spiritual act. But! we would have no certainty of that forgiveness, you might object. And this brings us back to the problem of certainty and why God wouldn't just appear to all of us at once to inform us of his forgiveness. The basic problem is not avoided by including a salvation model.

There is a positive reason to think that miracles are not an aspect of Christian spirituality. The Bible!!!

Jesus was tempted to prove himself through miracles by the Devil. Jesus rejected him. This reveals to us the negative side of miracles. Jesus' critics asked for miracles and he denied them. Jesus told parables deriding miracles, even a physical appearance of a resurrection body! Paul warns of an appeal to the miraculous as being a pagan practice. Paul emphases a simple acceptance of God's grace without an appeal to the miraculous and in fact teaches that the miraculous would detract from the event of God's forgiveness and not the other way around.

So the Bible gives us no positive reason to believe in miracles. Theology gives us no positive reason to believe in miracles. Salvation gives us no positive reason to believe in miracles, and most importantly our experience of the physical world gives us no positive reason to believe in miracles, as it concerns historical events. And we do have a positive reason to not believe in miracles as it concerns the Christian narrative and that is the Christian spirituality taught in the New Testament. Thus, it seems to me that the only reason to believe in miracles as being a part of the Christian narrative is because of previous tradition.

This previous tradition does not include any creedal formation. It does not include any repetitive revelation. Nor does it include any practice or form of spirituality that has been seen as necessary, but for some reason fundamentalist Christians consider it the greatest offense to the Christian faith when you question the reality of miracles.

I believe in miracles. I believe God is a God of the miraculous. I consider everyday and every moment a gift of God and for me that is a miracle. I find meaning and depth in the miraculous that surrounds me at every moment. But this has nothing to do with the narrative I believe in, nor does it have to do with a theological distinction between God's saving activity and normal activity. It has to do with my faith. My experience of faith confirms the miraculous for me. My experience of religion and my relationship with God is what serves as the basis for a miracle. I have no way of "proving" these miracles to you and I have no interest in doing so. I have no belief that this is even possible or necessary.

Morality and Religion - Part IV

We are composite beings. We are frustrated. We are free. We are saved. We are sinners. We are spatial. We are temporal. We are timeless. We are mindful. We can speak of our separate attributes and characteristics. I can say, "I was tired today". In so doing, I speak of a state. I speak of a time. I speak of an action. And I speak of a person. It is that last identifier which befuddles all the previous distinctions.

I cannot open up your brain and find that part of you which is a person. Is the person in the brain? Is it in the mind? Is it the mind? The mind exists in active and inactive states. When I am unconscious my mind is altered. Is my person altered, too? It has been the task of philosophers to try and clear up these muddled concepts. Recently, it has become the norm within the science community and in philosophy as well to accept certain holistic axioms which represent complex organizations of smaller components. Without bogging down the argument, we can accept the "person" as a distinct whole without knowing, or being able to pinpoint, the causal relations the person has with the objective world. To state in another way, the person is like an emergent quality which arises due to a highly complex system. This quality is not linked to the system, nor dependent on it. It becomes independent and absolute, but it does remain correlative. An ant colony is typically the most popular example to cite of this approach. Every ant the makes up the colony has no idea of the colonies existence. The ant only knows its job, its function. But as every ant works the colony emerges. As such,right ants, or better ants do not guarantee a right or better colony. Each colony becomes its own thing according to its circumstances and environment. In a similar fashion the condition of our neurons do not determine the kind or type of person we will be. There is thus good reason to accept that the person exists as a whole unit.

What this means is that we cannot easily divide up our lives into religious, moral, family, and social obligations. In the end what ends up happening is some mashed up goo like creation that embodies our life. We can say its our moral obligation to obey the speed limit, but how does this work out when get off work from a long day and you know your wife is at home with the kids all day and they are terrorizing her and everyone is passing you, including every car that has some religious bumper sticker on it. Now I am one to advocate moral integrity, but at the same time we cannot fall into the trap of thinking that a moral norm is an absolute mandate that must be obeyed or we forfeit our right to exist. What about the mandate to care and provide for my family? To ensure that the mother of my children remain in good mental health? What about the mandate to conform socially? If everyone is allowed to speed should I be the one to ruin it for everyone? What about the mandate to be united to my religious kin? Should I scoff at their irreverence for the law, and hold myself in a higher position? Or should I join with them in solidarity taking their path to ensure that no matter the outcome the fact that we face it together is what is more important? All these questions reflect a moral system, but more importantly it shows how morality really exists as a conversation rather then as a demand on a persons life.

Now it just may so happen that the moral obligation to follow the speed limit overrides all these other counter-points, but this does not negate my argument, but only goes to demonstrate it. The fact of the matter is that for any given moral choice there is likely to be other moral conflicts, and the person as a whole has to experience not just the moral integrity of choosing right, but also the moral embarrassment of dishonoring one's self. What this means is that morality cannot be confined to a set of laws, norms, or systems. It is as living as we are, and as such must always be taken in context. This is not relativism. There must always be moral demands on a persons life, but morality is living, none the less. And we must experience morality rather then simply understand it. It is one thing not to kill, but it is another to grasp the sanctity of life.

In navigating the currents of morality there is something I would like to highlight, and that is that we cannot simply divide our life into simple segments or compartments. Religion will ultimately leak into morality and morality will spread into religion. This is a natural occurance and one that should not be avoided, but this reality does not delineate from the truth that we are morally autonomous. Religion and morality relate to one another and will converse together, but the conversation is ultimately between two seperate parts of our life, though we may experience them as conjoined.

And for this I think I have an explanation. I stated earlier that there is a difference between "not killing" and sanctity of life. On the surface a morality can simply be a set of rules to follow and when you follow those rules you are a good person, but as we saw earlier. Following rules always means breaking others in one way or another, and the cost can be dire. Especially if unforseen circumstances place us on the wrong side of the moral grey area.

Now you can go deeper in morality and find the principles that forge the rules into existence. The rule not to steal is forged under the principle of property rights and so forth. These principles are like lamp posts the lighten up the pathways we are supposed to be walking. So instead of following the signs (rules) we simply examine the light (principles). There is a shift in moral awareness at this point where a person takes upon himself the responsibility of examining the best course instead of simply following signs, but the problems remains the same. A principle does not secure that the right paths will be chosen. Many principles can be connected to a single rule, and so it can confuse the selection of which principles are the right ones anyways. One can easily get lost in a sea of competing principles that can all result in a myriad of available rules and norms. In this endless labyrinth of abstract principles it is all too easy to forget the real life impact of our choices and the inner world that exists within us. We can get "lost" at sea, tossed by the waves as though we were simply apart of the ocean. When this happens we are no different then the forces which we thought we were in control of.

Above all this, we have a moral center. This is the force of morality. The fount. The wellspring of where our moral drive comes from. Above the norms and principles of morality exists a land that is uncharted. This is typically considered to be meta-ethics. It is the primary source of morality. Some think it is life, others think it is unity, and still others might say, love. The idea at this point is that we can look for moral justification in the embodiment of such a pure motive. This center brings us back to our human experience and it takes us out of the rote obligations of normative ethics. The problem here is that it is almost impossible to ever significantly prove that such a center exists. Even if we can admit that there is a center, there would be no objective way to actually demonstrate it. We can blindly thrust forward, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but moral responsibility seeks to cling to something to hold unto.

What I bring us to is a distinction between what I would call moral content and moral intensity. The content of morality is largely what we experience in our moral life. It is the norms, the principles, and the selection of what we might call a moral center. But there is something else. There is an intensity to morality as well that in many ways shapes the honesty, passion, and integrity of our moral system. There is an energizing factor that invigorates the whole system. This intensity largely comes from the reality of a moral well spring.

Now I would claim that our moral autonomy makes the content of our morality up to a responsible evaluation on our part, but the intensity of our morality should not be thought to come from us, or from our own choice or creation. This wellspring should be thought of in religious, or symbolic terms. Religion calls us and pulls us toward morality and morality in turn is empty and meaningless without a narrative to guide it. Morality does not need religion to establish norms, but it calls out for a correlative mythos to be grounded. Just the same religion is not validated by specific morality, but it is responsive to moral awareness and virtue.

So in no way should we think of moral autonomy as being indifferent to religion, or as religion being indifferent to morality. The two compliment and urge each other on. I am driven to become a moral person because of Christianity, and I am driven to be morally pure and righteous, but I am only driven to these realities within the framework of honesty and responsibility. I own my moral direction and purpose, but I acquiesce to the intensity of my morality being involved in a dialectic and narrative of symbolism and even religious fervor. Religion may not be able to tell me what to do, but it just may be the only thing that can tell me why to do it.

Morality and Religion - Part III

Everything is permissible, but not everything is beneficial (1 Cor. 10:23). Do you believe this? Do you really? Most Christians are confused by this statement of Paul. If everything is permissible then what about the injunctions in the Bible which do not permit us to break? How can it be permissible to be gay when the Bible says we can't be gay? I think most Christians conclude that the second part of this verse answers the problems that arise in the first. It's permissible to disobey the Bible, but it is not beneficial.... why? I think the general assumption is that if you disobey the Bible then God will punish you in one way or another. Either in the after-life, or in this life through trials.

This is a wrong interpretation, because it is a wrong view of God. God is not a God who is sitting waiting for us to do wrong so he can punish us. He is not a God who all the sudden "feels" His holiness being impugned and must, for the sake of justice, destroy the evildoer. Paul is the last of anyone who would depict God in such a manner. For Paul God is a God of grace who can even forgive him! Paul had to have had an extraordinary view of God's grace. Paul killed Christians. He was an enemy of the cross. If there was anyone who God would not forgive. It would be Paul.

But!!! You may exclaim. The benefits and punishments of God are not based on grace, but on God's holiness. God will punish Christians even though they are still under grace. After all, in the verse mentioned above Paul already assumes grace, because it is to Christians he says that everything is permissible. So even if some one is under grace God must still act justly according to his holiness.

Now, I would not in any way seek to malign the holiness of God, but I have to wonder why holiness always equates to justice for most Christians today. Holiness is not a specific virtue. It does not denote anything specific. Holiness does not describe a quantity of virtue, but rather a quality of virtue. It adds to an overall virtue structure. There can be a holy love, a holy desire, a holy anger, and so forth. The word "holy" is more directed to describe the intensity of a virtue rather than what specific virtue is holy. For instance, when I say that "God is holy." I am not saying, "God is just." Though I am not denying it either. Since this word is most characteristic of God the intensity is generates is God-like intensity. It can either be thought of an exemplary or infinite, whereas a holy love would be an exemplary love, and so on. So the description that "God is holy" does not, nor should it, automatically point to any virtue, but rather direct us toward an understanding that only God is the source of exemplary virtue.

Thus, an appeal to God's holiness becomes meaningless at this point. For all of God's characteristics are holy. His grace as well as his justice. It is faith in all things that allows us to accept God's works in our lives no matter what they may be, and we have no reason to think that they must be self-exclusionary. If we are inclined to think that God punishes us during hard times we have no basis to assume that God's grace is not as equally active in such affairs as his justice. We have no reason to ever think that God is "against" us, withholding his benefits from us, because at all times He is holy! His holiness demands that we always recieve the most from our Father. So in my view, an appeal to God's holiness actually turns on its head. If we follow the intended path we will come to the conclusion that it is exactly because of God's holiness that moral independence exists.

If we abandon the notion that the phrase "not everything is beneficial" somehow alludes to the crude idea that God is waiting to punish us should we step out of line then we can accept this message exactly for what Paul intends it to mean, and that is that we as Christian are free to live as we want, but are not free of the consequences. This freedom is not simply an oversight by God, or an indifference. God is concerned about how we live our lives. Moral independence does not mean that God does not care about how we live. Just the opposite is true. As a father, I raise my children to make their own choices. I do this because I love them. My love for them holds them in the highest respect and forbids me to ever think of my children as malformed or incapable of making up their own mind. Because I love my children I must see them as capable and excellent in independence. My willingness to let them lead their own lives is not a sign of my neglect, but a demonstration of my love for them.

Now at this point what I want to suggest is that the weight of Biblical evidence supports the idea that man and Christians are morally independent creations of God. This will be seen in the conclusion. We have no obligations except those we choose for ourselves and the only "cost" we have to face are the consequences of choosing wrong. Punishment in this sense does not come from above, but from the events that our choices set in motion. This idea is confirmed by Paul, it is realized at the Jerusalem Council, and it is established by the character of a holy God.

So what then do we say of the parts of the NT which clearly establish a moral norm for us to live by!!! It sounds like I am saying what is true for you is true for you and what is true for me is true for me. If it is all relative what is the point? If God does not have a moral standard for us then what is sin? What cause does God have to be separate from us? These are all valid points, and I can at the very least accept that at the current moment moral independence should at least exist on equal ground of moral submission. At that if we can come to an accounting of the moral norms described in the Bible then I would have effectively won my case. But this will have to remain to be seen.

I do want to highlight briefly that which I will expound on later. God giving us freedom is not a declaration that there is no moral standard. In fact it is a call to the highest moral possibility. If we realize the alternative that God could place on us any moral norm he desires and then we would have to unbendingly submit to it regardless of the personal and spiritual damage it would have on us then we accept this freedom in joy and gratitude, not because it means we can now do as we please, but because we realize that God trusts us! God is on our side. He is a friend of man, and a savior. Also, moral independence should not ever be seen to mean that we are now allowed to live hedonistic lives. The Biblical witness is clear that we must face our own consequences. Now I trust in the sensibilities of reason to ensure that when combined with a moral responsibility we can and must come to a moderate moral system. This is all part of God's plan and his holy love and grace for us to experience daily as Christians!