The burden of conscience

Some fellow named Henry tracked back to my open letter about TNIV here at the blog, and I go a kick out his response. Not “got a kick” like “I enjoyed it a lot” but a “got a kick” like “I can shoe you his shoe print”. I’m sure he wasn’t trying to be mean, but I think he wound up being something worse than mean. And I’m not going to get a chance to do his whole post on this subject before I’m off for the week, so this little bit is going to have to be enough.

Let’s take a look:

A friend tipped me off by e-mail to a post, and I think it is appropriate to respond. The poster, Centurion, expresses his concern about Christian booksellers and publishers, and their choices in terms of what to offer their customers, especially considering that many of them regard their business as a ministry as well.

Let’s keep something in mind here: CBA and ECPA both represent themselves as ministries – so to hedge one’s bets and say “many of them regard their business as a ministry as well” is somewhat distracted from the actual facts.

There is also another problem: who, exactly, wants to but books about faith and life from someone who’s in it “as a business” instead of “as a ministry”? I don’t know anyone like that – even people who shop Amazon for price on their religious books. When you ask them, “do you think that Amazon demonstrates any discernment about the kinds of books they sell,” those people will tell you flat out: “I don’t shop Amazon for anything but price. But I only buy things from them that come from Christian publishers.” What does that say about what people think Christian publishers are doing?

In their mind, there is a level of discernment going on someplace. And that is the problem, isn’t it? Let’s read more from Henry:

I’m a Christian publisher, a very small one, offering 15 titles at this point, some of them my own, and I certainly do have a conscience about what I publish. My conscience, however, seems to tell me something substantially different than Centurion’s.

I need to address a couple of minor points, but then I’m going to simply tell you what my conscience as a Christian publisher requires of me.
Centurion says:

That’s my second point: the two most-vivid proclamations of the Gospel in the NT are unquestionably Acts 2 and 2Cor 15 — and both of those proclamations place the authority of God’s word as the centerpiece of how and why Christ died. That is to say: whatever it is Christ did (died for our sins, was buried and was raised on the third day) was “in accordance with Scripture”: it happened because Scripture said it would happen. In that, Scripture is our most precious possession in the Christian life. . . .

This is an example of the most bizarre set of statements I have seen about the gospel and the place of the Bible in Christian life. (I refer to a set of statements because I have seen quite a number of similar statements over the years as well as recently.) I’m sorry for the strong term, but I simply can’t think of anything less forceful that nonetheless expresses what I see here. Let me illustrate. I’m going to travel to Atlanta, Georgia in a few weeks. As I follow the highway from here to there, I will proceed “according to the road signs.” But those signs will not become the center of my trip, the purpose of my trip, nor will they be my “most precious possession.” They point the way. Jesus is the object of our faith; the Bible is one of the things that points the way to Jesus.

Think about this: someone who calls himself a “Christian publisher” has branded the statement “Scripture is our most precious possession in the Christian life” bizarre! I’m sure he thinks Spurgeon, Piper, Owen, Hodge, Warfield, Luther, Calvin, Bunyan and the Westminster divines are all equally “bizarre”.

In Henry’s view, you can come up with the Gospel without Scripture. The odd thing, really, is that Paul and Peter disagree with him. However, it is very insightful to find someone like Henry who is willing to put all his cards on the table in the first round. Scripture isn’t necessary in his view: it’s only useful, and other things can be sufficient to do the work that Scripture does.

But further, Centurion appears to believe that this somehow means that Christian book stores should avoid the TNIV and possible new and different bindings of the Bible because they don’t fit in with that agenda. He’s not very clear as to what he thinks dealers should and should not carry, other than putting the TNIV front and center in his general complaint.

Interestingly, that’s not what I said at all. The context that I am writing as a Christian retailer who sells many different kinds of bindings in Bibles, and frankly a wide variety of translations, is somehow lost on Henry even though the preface of my open letter says it is in response to the “going back and forth between some fellow Christian Retailers on an e-mail list I belong to.”

My complaint about the TNIV, as you can read for yourself, is that it whitewashes the controversial nature of its methodology. Now, if the Bible is just a "signpost", my complaint is, of course, nit-picking. What the Bible says isn’t actually of first importance but of far secondary importance – if it is not the actual words of God written down, not meant to be sufficient to equip the man of God for every good work.

The problem is that this is exactly what the Apostles taught about Scripture. Isn’t that odd that Paul and Peter actually hang the integrity of God on His word and whether or not he keeps it? (cf. Acts 2, Romans 3)

So let me be somewhat clearer here. What does my conscience require of me as a Christian publisher. First, I do include some of my own writings on my list of publications. This is because the original purpose of my company was to publish materials necessary for classes and seminars offered by Pacesetters Bible School, Inc. As I continued to work, that list expanded, and I very quickly heard this question: Are you going to publish things that you disagree with? People who knew my own doctrinal positions, and knew that I was publishing some of my own material, thought that I would publish only books that supported my own view. But my conscience would not allow me to do that. [Emph added]

Let’s think about that for a minute: his conscience would not allow him to publish only books which had doctrine he agreed with.

That’s somewhat staggering. What scope is he talking about here? For example, would be publish a book which denies the resurrection? How about a book which denies the consequences of sin – a book which says that sin is not a death sentence for man in and of itself? The extraordinary thing about his complaint, of course, is that he pleads conscience in this matter!

Isn’t our conscience exactly what we are supposed to use to separate the false from the true? Even in Henry’s view where conscience is formed by nature and history and the bunnies and the puppies, conscience is what keeps us from doing what’s wrong. And apparently, it is far more wrong to refuse to publish a book because it is doctrinal pap than it is to publish something which will confuse or mislead the reader.

Let’s be clear about something here: I don’t think that it’s wrong to have a publisher who is willing to publish Baptist, Presbyterian, Methodist and Lutheran titles – I’d actually admire someone who could do that well. My concern -- and it ought to be the concern of pastors, elders, and teachers in the church -- is that Henry is plainly advocating for the liberty to print anything without regard to its doctrinal substance.

For example, it was irresponsible to publish Jim Rutz’s Mega Shift. Its ecclesiology was reckless and waters down the effectivity and ministry of the local church; Barna’s last book Revolution was equally irresponsible. I have reviewed both of these books here at the blog if you are interested in more detail on those complaints. It is also irresponsible to publish books by people who have been proven to be fraudulent prophets; to publish teaching books by people who demonstrate a lack of concern for the Trinity; to publish books which apply deconstructionist literary theory to the Bible; to publish books which claim that Christ died to make you rich, happy and healthy.

And in the end, my complaint about TNIV centers on this kind of error, not the problem of paedobaptism vs. credobaptism or some other such important-but-not-deal-breaking denominational doctrinal application.

My conscience as a publisher suggests the following:

Let me also say that if your conscience is only suggesting things to you, it’s not worth listening to.

* Respect the ability and responsibility of the individual believer to make choices as to what they read and study

That’s an interesting assertion. Does Henry really believe that a 16-yr-old who has just made a confession of Christ has the same ability to discern truth from error as a 30-yr-old believer who has spent his time since his confession of faith being discipled by men of good conscience who have been faithful to the Gospel?

If the reader has a responsibility to be exercise discernment, why does the publisher not actually have that same responsibility? For example, when a writer says something like, “your Bible is only a guide; Christ is the real object of faith and you should seek Him whether your Bible helps you or not,” don’t you think that the publisher has some obligation to consider that even Catholics affirm that the Bible is more than just a signpost and is critical to the formation of faith in Christ?

Publishing books is a form of teaching. In exactly the same way that a University tacitly promulgates what its faculty teaches as truth, a Publisher is tacitly promulgating what it prints and distributes as truth. There is a duty attached in the Bible to being a teacher, and that duty includes a higher standard for representing the truth. (James 3)

That's all I have time for. Listen: be with the Lord's people in the Lord's house on the Lord's day. And try to find more use for your Bible next week while the sidekicks are running the asylum than as a bookend. And be kind to them -- they're not used to the spotlight, such as it is.

attack of the sidekicks

BOOYAH! Next week I'm on vacation, and I have fired up the bat-signal or whatever it is we use here to call in the SIDEKICKS to blog next week.

Oh yeah: my only fear is that they'll blog better than I do and you'll all realize what a fraud I am after they get through telling you exactly what they think of this so-called world we live in.

One more post this week, and then I'm off to cause terrible woe for Innkeepers and commoditizers of religion. I'm sure it'll be relaxing.

open letter

I was shovelling out my e-mail this morning and was reading some of the chatter that was going back and forth between some fellow Christian Retailers on an e-mail list I belong to. The topic was TNIV, and there were some people saying that it's not a great translation and they aren't carrying it; others were somewhat angry that a retailer was making a content decision (take your astonishment to the meta), and yet a third group appeared -- saying that an argument like this was dishonoring to Christ.

yeah. So I sent the following e-mail to that list, and I thought you people might enjoy it as the first post of substnace this week:

Oh brother. When I read emails like this topic has inspired, I think that we retailers are doing more harm than good for the sake of the Gospel -- but not in the way implied by some. I have a couple of thoughts on this subject, and believe me when I say that I have no one in particular in mind as I spin these notes out to the list. You can throw rotten produce at me when I present on Strategy at CPE. :-)

The first thing to say about "arguing" is this: we are supposed to contend for the faith, amen? The Gospel is not some truth-less blanket that just gets thrown over things, and whatever happens to be under it this morning as we cast it out wide is not "the Gospel for today". The Gospel is the power of salvation for everyone who believes. But believes what?

That's my second point: the two most-vivid proclamations of the Gospel in the NT are unquestionably Acts 2 and 2Cor 15 -- and both of those proclamations place the authority of God's word as the centerpiece of how and why Christ died. That is to say: whatever it is Christ did (died for our sins, was buried and was raised on the third day) was "in accordance with Scripture": it happened because Scripture said it would happen. In that, Scripture is our most precious possession in the Christian life. While we have an interior witness of the spirit, the Gospel doesn't go out by means of interior witness: it goes out by the Gospel being proclaimed. What gets proclaimed -- if we follow Paul's example and his own words -- is the testimony of Scripture.

Third, that means the truth of Scripture doesn't change -- it's not a mutable template which we can upgrade. We receive a Gospel we are expected to then declare. The question is: how does this apply to translation efforts? For example, what's the purpose of the a translation -- is it to provide the Gospel in the context of "every tribe, tounge and nation", or is it a somewhat-worldly pursuit to remarket a product?

This third point is the critical issue for those of us who are Christian retailers who profess to be in a ministry. Without naming any vendors, let me say that we must discern whether or not a publisher is trying to remarket an existing product at the expense of fidelity to the mission of spreading the whole Gospel to the whole world.

For example, let's assume (not conclude) that all translations in print today are generated by the motive to evangelize (an assumption, I suggest, that is faulty): are new binding types a violation of the kind of spirit we want to see cultivated in the body of Christ? That's a hard question -- because what it really asks us is if we are trying to make disciples of men or consumers of product -- who are hungry for the next big thing.

That is a hard question -- because personally I sell a lot of "new" bindings. You know: duotone, tru-tone, gripper, 16 different kinds of "leather", etc. People like new bindings -- especially in the context that 60% of Bibles are given as gifts. But are we marketing a binding, or are we being the beautiful feet of the Gospel?

When we look at the question in this way, we have a larger problem: how "new", exactly, is the TNIV? Did the NIV need an update? Why? Who is the target of the TNIV? Do those people have a theological persuasion?

There is not one person on this list which sells the New World Translation (the Jehovah's Witness bible) because it's not "just another translation": it is a faulty translation with a theological agenda. By no means is the TNIV as-bad as the NWT, amen? It's not a cultic corruption. But it is something we need to be aware of: a translation which takes ecclesiastically-volatile subjects like the gender-specific language and in many ways glosses over the problems.

So when we think about this problem, let's specifically think about what we are doing for and to the body of Christ. Is it more controversial to take a stand against marketing the Gospel, or is it more controversial to simply ignore legitimate controversy and simply let things pass through our stores which do more to confuse people than to help them grow in faith.

God bless you all as you think on these things, seek guidance from your pastors and elders, and resolve to do God's work for God's sake and God's glory and not for the approval of men.

The ESV NT -cheap-

ISBN# 1581348355

As promised, I called Crossway books this morning about the 50-cent ESV NTs, and here's the skinny:

I can get them for you at 50-cents each when you buy in lots of 100 (that's the case count), and you'll have to pay the shipping. I don't have exact shipping charges as I do not have a box in my possession today, but I'll have one by the end of the week.

If you are a local and you want ESV NTs, we'll have them in stock priced like this:

1-each: $0.99
10 or more: $0.75 each
25 or more: $0.50 each

My wife will start taking mail orders (full case QTYs only) at the bookstore on Thursday when we have the store set up to make it happen. If you are serious about needing these, you'll have to leave a deposit of half on your credit card (we'll charge the other half when they ship). Continental U.S. shipments only. The bookstore can be reached at (888) 835-5648.

Thank you.

Light reading

Well -- it was a nice weekend in the backyard. I haven't got much to say this morning because I'm trying to get work caught up so I can go on vacation next week.

As I gather my thoughts, let me recommend two books for you:





They have very little nice to say about the state of Evangelidom and how we got here, but they are very informative. I'm sure I'll have a more substantive review or comment on each of them in the future.

I'm on the case of the 50-cent ESV NT today also, so stay tuned for that.

Proud Papa

I suppose I shouldn't care, but the "homeboy" series of t-shirts has absolutely taken off, particularly in infant creepers. Apparently John Calvin is still da bomb.

Spend the Lord's day in the Lord's house with the Lord's people, and don't pretend that you are OK with Jesus if all you do is buy t-shirts from me and look down your nose at the Emergent guy down the street who is watching a Nooma video while you're reading my blog. Go to church, you sinner.

Nobody asked me

But I'm asking you:

[1] In the last 24 hours, Alpha and Omega Ministries was burgled and somebody stole James White's computer equipment. That is: his T5 and his PC Tablet (and apparently his iPod). While I am sure none of you did it, maybe you will run into a guy trying to sell a PC Tablet for cheap in the Phoenix area. I am sure the local police would love tips.

[2] More importantly, AOMin could sure use your help in replacing thoe stolen items. Insurance? Yes, I'm sure they have that, but deductables are the worst. Wander over to their donation page and give a little for the sake of reformed apologetics.

Thanks. Have a nice day.

"like ministry"

K: I was going to TeamPyro this one, but Thursday is Dan day at TeamPyro (somehow I get some Mondays and most Wednesday -- except on the Wednesdays everyone tacks onto my post because they think we're an episode of the Outer Limits or an argument against cessationism or something) and I just can't keep this one in any longer.

I dunno what made Phil think about the symmetry between the anti-intellectualism of the Emergents and the same in Fundamentalism, but I know exactly what made me think of it: interacting with both groups in close proximity in the last seven days.

I was reading an SBC tirade against Calvinism and the deemin likker, and this person started up on SBC bloggers who are not line-toers and tea-totallers and "bible-believing baptists" (such marvelous alliteration). The resounding note this person struck was the fact that he didn't have time to blog -- he was out knockin' on doors (apparently not selling Amway or Shaklee or the Book of Mormon, but F.A.I.T.H. evangelism -- between hunting vacations and the other things he does when he's not keeping office hours). To make sure the reader "got it", he made it clear that he had better things to do with his time -- like ministry.

You know: he doesn't buy t-shirts from my pawn shop. That doesn't hurt my feelings any. But it was an interesting attempt at sarcasm that sort of made me laugh -- like when you watch a kid try to be very angry with you and they spill out a malaprop in frustration.

Anyway, I've also been interacting with Matt over at From The Morning (because he thinks I'm a little sneaky), and in his meta I mentioned the specific dimness of Rhett Smith -- and Rhett Smith showed up! It's that cool? Well, Mr. Smith was very stern (as far as ECs get stern, anyway) about my referring to him (apparently I have violated the copyright of his name or something -- see: when he takes a shot at John Piper without first having a private conversation with him, it's all good, but when I mention his silly ideas in the meta of a widely-ignored blog, I'm a scoundrel), and in mentioning it he makes sure to also mention that he has better things to do with his time than debate with people who think he's wrong -- like ministry.

Isn't that strange? I mean -- surely he doesn't mean he's out doing the retail politics thing by knocking on doors and handing out tracts like the unnamed SBC pastor, does he? See: I thought that the Emergents had a corner on the new media -- like ministry in the blogosphere. I thought they at least "got" the idea that we can conduct ministry in cyberspace instead of only in the coffee shop or the punk rock concert or whatever.

I also thought that they had read the Bible -- they complain so much about not being understood and that they affirm the Bible and they "get" the Gospel and all that. But they apparently missed the part where Paul "reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath" (Acts 17:17; 18:4).

But there it is: the same sly inference that somehow blogging about error and being willing to stand up and defend one's point of view is somehow unacceptable -- from both the politically-rabid fundie and the trendy "culture" missionary (whom I will call the "indie" hereafter). Now, since these guys don't ever run in the same circles -- they'd rather be caught dead than be in the same place at the same time -- how is it possible that they both came up with such witty repartee? Coincidence?

Oh brother: if you believe that, let me see your wallet -- I think I left $20 in there and I need it back.

Pay attention, folks, because this is critically important to any continuing discussion on this blog. The reason both the fundie and the indie find the phrase "like ministry" so avant garde is that they both see argument the same way. That is: they see it as something to be avoided at all costs.

Now, why is that? Really, I think they both have the same problem at different stages of diagnosis. The fundie has the problem of rejecting all reasoning as inherently worldly and therefore sinful -- which is both extra-biblical (meaning "not found in the Bible" as opposed to "having extra Bible added") and being duped by rationalism's promise that it can replace God (not to mention that he has to get to those conclusions by ... reasoning them out). The indie has the problem in that he thinks arguments are mean and hateful and therefore sinful -- which is both extra-biblical (see above) and being duped by rationalism's claim that emotions are invalidators of the search for truth (even though, of course, he's validated by his positive vibes in this beautiful day in the neighborhood).

But the are indicative of their movements.

The Fundie thinks he's got truth nailed down -- because he's in the right denomination with the right men who will do anything for the sake of the truth (including, apparently, lie and assassinate the character of those who disagree with them). If the truth's nailed down, there's no room for argument, and the ham-handed "like ministry" snark-o-graph is his way of saying, "you're not worth arguing with".

The indie, on the other hand, doesn't want to nail the truth down -- because he's not really trying to set forth the truth: he's trying to make best buds and get people to hold hands and sing whatever the iPod video podcast equivalent of "Kumbaya Milord" is. And there's only really one reason to have an argument anyway: to set forth the truth. All other reasons pale in comparison. And thus the snark-o-licious "like ministry" is shorthand for "dude: that went out with Howard Jones (except, of course, for the classic 'No One Is To Blame') -- your arguments don't matter to me."

Two dead ends: one tactic. And it's funny, really: who knew they had so much in common? They should have lunch and compare notes -- maybe this time they can really give it to those dirty Calvinists and their stinking propositional affirmations and confessions.

There: I said it, and now you can call my blog a "hate site" along side Slice and the other places which think the EC is harming the body of Christ -- but make sure you mention that I also think wobbly Baptist political attacks against confessional Baptists are equally-dispicable. That way all the right people will be mad at me and I can have a clean conscience.

double-secret technorati tags: emergent SBC

Pawn Shop Update

The Homeboy Collection



Yes, I'm serious. If these go over big, we'll add based on requests -- John Owen, Hodge, Luther even. I might add Luther just because it will make people crazy. Especially Baptists.

---

...updated... Luther added ...
...updated again -- Warfield and Calvin added ...

Too good to pass up

I don't even have to comment on this one. Anyone who wants to comment on this can do so, but I've got nothing to say about it that isn't only half as funny as the article itself.

double-secret technorati tags: vatican