contending for the faith
Gary:
You are listening to a special edition of Search the Scriptures Daily, a radio ministry of The Berean Call. Still to come, Dave and Tom continue their weekly in-depth study of the doctrine of salvation, please stay with us. We return now to our program series from 2000 and:
CONTENDING FOR THE FAITH
In this regular feature, Dave and Tom respond to questions from listeners and readers of The Berean Call. Here’s this week’s question: Dear Dave and Tom, Our church wants to send our youth pastor to a national convention for youth pastors, and after looking over the activities, from secular look-alike, sound-alike music groups to psychologized and Roman Catholic led workshops, I noticed they are going to have a prayer labyrinth. According to the brochure, this maze like device idea is taken from a medieval cathedral, and is to be used by our kids as an aid to contemplative prayer, as a spiritual exercise, or as a form of pilgrimage. What can you tell me about prayer labyrinth?
Tom:
First of all, a prayer labyrinth is a path set in a concentric circle pattern which is about 30 feet in diameter. A person begins from the outside of the circle and follows a path to the center where there are meditation cells and then follows the path to exit the labyrinth. Historically, so-called Christian labyrinth, developed in the 13th century in cathedrals of the Roman Catholic Church. This came about because the crusades were taking place, and that prevented Catholic from making pilgrimages to the holy land. So the labyrinth enabled one to make the pilgrimage, at least metaphorically, and it probably included whatever indulgences were given for the actual pilgrimage. The labyrinth revival in America is being led by the Reverend Lauren Artress of Grace Episcopal Cathedral in San Francisco. She walked her first labyrinth at a conference hosted by New Ager Jean Houston. Later that year she visited the Chartres Cathedral in France and observed the labyrinth pattern in the stone for the church. So that’s some background, Dave. Now we have this going on at the Evangelical Convention for Youth Pastors, and this is by the biggest organization claiming to be Christian in the country.
Dave:
What do you mean the biggest organization, who are they then?
Tom:
Well, this is Group Magazine, this is Youth Specialties, and probably every youth pastor gets their magazine, so this is the going thing.
Dave:
Yeah, Group has of course, promoted visualization, visualizing God even.
Tom:
Well, part of it promotes the contemplative approach to spirituality.
Dave:
Right. So now, Tom, we’re back to what we talked about a few minutes ago when we were dealing with exorcism. We’ve got techniques, we’ve got rituals, [and] somehow, I am looking to this labyrinth now.
Tom:
Spiritual tool, they would call it.
Dave:
Right. Somehow I can’t walk with the Lord, I can’t just trust Him, and I’m not growing by reading His Word, feeding upon His Word, and that Christ died in my place, and that I have died with Him and I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, but now Christ lives within me. This living the life by faith, and the wonder of the miracle of what Christ does in me. Somehow it doesn’t work, and I feel dry and empty, or frustrated or whatever it is, and what the Bible offers doesn’t work. And now someone came up with this, well it’s in the Chartres, Cathedral there, and it’s been in other cathedrals and now we’ve got a technique, we have a ritual. It’s some kind of a pilgrimage and as I enter onto this journey I begin to meditate and—
Tom:
To look within, it’s a major part of it, searching your heart, your spirit within, whether it’s the Holy Spirit or not, I rather doubt.
Dave:
And then, what do you know? Things begin to happen. We could probably refer to a lot of things. You could go back to a book, how many years ago, thirty, forty years ago written by Korzybski, a brilliant man, Modern Semantics, it was called. And he showed that if you just get a new perspective on something, just a new way of looking at things, you know, a semantic twist to something, why it can transform your life. It just changes the way you see this. So I’m not denying that these people entering upon this labyrinth, they have hope now, they are expecting something, and what do you know? They may have some experience, they may have some insights and so forth that they think, but did it come from the labyrinth or how often do I have to walk this thing? Where in the Bible does it suggest a labyrinth? Did Paul use them? Did Paul take a canvas around with him and have people walk this labyrinth? So, on the one hand, I’m sure you will have testimonies of people who say wow; it just was like a spiritual breakthrough, I just felt closer to God, and so forth. On the other hand, I’m afraid it takes them away from the simple faith, the just shall live by faith. It takes them away from the truth and the reality of God’s Word, and they’re relying upon a technique. I know it’s not biblical, I don’t believe it is healthy for a Christian, and it could open them up to other spirits. That’s one of the problems, because now they have opened themselves up to some kind of spiritual transformation through walking this labyrinth.
Tom:
Dave, my concern here is particularly for Christian youth. In the past we’ve talked about Taeze, now we have this prayer labyrinth, so called.
Dave:
Any technique, let’s come up with a new technique now.
Tom:
Something novel, something.
Dave:
What will we have next?
Tom:
And the people, particularly youth pastors who are taking these things in and then promoting it among their youth, I’d like them to do a little research here. If they begin to look at any of these techniques, what’s the background of it, what is being promoted? I would think it would make their hair stand up, if they would take the time and effort to look at this, whether it be Taeze going back to meditative techniques, going back to the contemplative. All they have to do is read Ignatius’ Exercises. That should scare them to death, because it has to do with parking your mind over here and believing whatever is going to come to you.
Dave:
Tom, let’s explain. You were referring to Ignatius of Loyola, who was the founder of the Jesuits.
Tom:
But also, with this particular technique. This was really started or a revival of it was started by this woman pastor, Episcopal pastor at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. Now if you just go to her website and look what she’s promoting. For example, you can sign up for a tour to Chartres Cathedral, but here’s the topic: Let’s Walk With Mary 2001. So she’s taking a group over there, and they are going to be walking and meditating upon all that Mary is, all that she did, not the Mary of the Bible. This is a Roman Cathedral; this is the Mary of Catholicism, which is not the Mary of the Bible.
Dave:
Well, Tom, why is the Mary of Catholicism not the Mary of the Bible? I mean, you put your foot in it, now you had better explain it.
Tom:
All right, we don’t have much time here, but if people out there want to know, the October newsletter from The Berean Call, that the article is titled, “Mary Who?” And I believe I give out enough information, so at least some who are interested in getting to the bottom of who Mary is, then start with that article.
Dave:
You’re not putting down the Mary of the Bible.
Tom:
Not at all.
Dave:
No, but the Mary that the Catholic Church has built up, a perpetual virgin contrary to what the Bible says, Jesus had brothers and sisters, it tells us that. She now appears all over the world. This Mary says I will be with you always. No, that’s what Jesus said. The apparition of Mary comes with her peace plan for the world. No, Jesus is the Prince of Peace; there will never be peace without Him. She comes offering salvation and promoting, in fact she is the originator of many of the unbiblical techniques, such as the rosary and so forth.
Tom:
Right, some of the major dogmas within the Catholic Church.
Dave:
So this is not the Mary of the Bible, this is the Mary who is the Queen of Heaven, who has a little baby Jesus on her lap in heaven, who looms larger than God, as the Catechism and Vatican II say, and I’m quoting them. “This is the mother of God.” No, she’s the mother of the body that Jesus took. God was around long before Mary was. She is the one that says, “Known as the Virgin” now I am quoting, “to whom the faithful fly in all their dangers and needs.”
Tom:
Dave, to finish this up, we’re out of time here, but my point in this is that this, some people may look at it as well, it’s just a simple technique to get people more into more prayer. No, if they begin to look at the background of all these, it’s going to lead off into directions further and further away from God’s Word, and that’s my concern.
Dave:
Amen.
Gary:
You are listening to a special edition of Search the Scriptures Daily, a radio ministry of The Berean Call. Still ahead, Dave and Tom continue their weekly in-depth study of the Doctrine of Salvation, please stay with us. We return now to our program series from 2000 and:
CONTENDING FOR THE FAITH
In this regular feature, Dave and Tom respond to questions from listeners and readers of The Berean Call. Here is this week’s question: To whom it may concern: I caught your radio broadcast a few days ago. I thought it sounded good until I heard one of you gentlemen say that Jesus was resurrected on the eighth day. I was shocked! Then I even heard you say it a second time. If you’re going to make statements over the air like that, don’t you think you should explain what you mean? Otherwise you could lose a lot of listeners including me.
Tom:
Dave this is “To Whom It May Concern,” but I think it’s to you. I mean I’m backing off from this, particularly from this irate inquiry here.
Dave:
Well whoever it is Tom raises a good point and how many times has it happened? Sometimes my wife tells me what I said and I say did I say that? And sometimes you’re trying to talk fast and your brain gets ahead of your words or your mouth gets ahead of your brain, one or the other. And I probably said it because this is a well known way of expressing the fact that Jesus rose on the first day of a new week which is the eighth day. Saturday is the seventh day so Sunday must be the eighth day, but I can understand it that it could cause confusion so probably when I said it in my mind I know what I mean, and I think everybody else does or you don’t have time to explain, but it is a good point. So we ought to explain it. In other words, I do believe that Jesus rose on the third day. The third day after he was in the grave three days and three nights and the third day He rose from the dead. It wasn’t eight days, but from another standpoint, even a biblical stand point; He was the firstborn of a new creation, the eighth day that’s referred to in the Bible as a new beginning. This is the new creation and so I’ve been used to expressing it that way also. My apologies to anyone out there that I made imagine that I thought Jesus was in the grave eight days.
Tom:
This brings up another point. There are things that we say and Dave you and I have been not in radio per se but we’ve been working together for a long time and we assume each other understands what we are talking about and we forget there’s a whole new group out there that’s kind of just joined us so we apologize for that. There’s the medium as well. It’s a little bit hard to always repeat, always qualify, always give all the documentation to what you’re saying and I’d have to say well just hang in there with us, eventually we’ll get to it, or if you write to us and voice your concern, we’ll try and respond either on the radio program or if we can get to it, we’ll do it personally.
Dave:
But we really appreciate this.
Tom:
Yes, absolutely!
Dave:
Because if we say something that’s confusing, doesn’t sound right, or God forbid is not biblical, please, please tell us. We would not consider that to be an attack, but a kindness. If we’ve miss spoken or if we really have some wrong idea from the scriptures and you can show it to us we would be grateful for that. We don’t want to continue on in error. But we certainly don’t want to make faux pas—well I don’t think it was a faux pas, it was a true statement. He was resurrected the eighth day, but you do have to explain it and I failed to explain it.
Tom:
Well I do faux pas all the time, but Gary, in editing this he gets some of them, but some of them do get out. The other point of this Dave is, our heart here is that people would search the scriptures, that they would be discerning growing discernment, not just buy what we say. We referred to this earlier, but not buy what we say just because we say it because the heart here is that if we are accurately—if we are not accurate get on us big time. But if we are accurately pointing to underscoring what the Word of God says then, as we have said before, the argument out there is not with us. It’s with the Word of God and we want to do this as accurately as we can so that we can be corrected by the Word of God as well as anybody else who has a problem with it.
Dave:
You know Tom one of the things that I appreciate most about this letter from whomever, whoever sent it—the person that sent it at one point sounds like they’re going to write us off completely as heretics. Well, they say Jesus was eight days in the grave and [they] said they almost did that, but at least they wrote to us for an explanation and I think it’s a good point for us to consider. I don’t want to be too quick jumping on somebody saying oh, the guy’s a heretic, I just heard him say this or that. I want to at least check it out and make sure that I really fully understand what the person said and that’s what I appreciate about this writer and so I would just urge anybody else out there don’t write us off too fast. But if we say something that you think isn’t correct please, write us, give us some help so that we can make an explanation at least, or be corrected. And I do appreciate that very much.
Tom:
Right.
Dave:
We do like to hear from our listeners as well.
Tom:
Yes, Dave one more comment along that line and this is the problem with the medium. We have seven minutes maybe in one segment to talk about an issue and some things we could talk about, if people could hang in there with us, we could talk about all day and certainly bring the wealth of documentation, the wealth of research that we’ve done but we can’t always do that. That’s why it isn’t just—the radio program is one medium. We have another one that’s called the newsletter. We’re on the internet at www.thebereancall.org in which we have archives of information, research that we’ve done and people can access that. Or you know if they get impulsive, just write to us and we can at least direct you to where we have more documentation, more information for you.
Dave:
Yes, very good.
Gary:
You are listening to a special edition of Search the Scriptures Daily, a radio ministry of The Berean Call. Still ahead, Dave and Tom continue their weekly in-depth study of the Doctrine of Salvation, please stay tuned. We return now to our program series from 2000 and
CONTENDING FOR THE FAITH
In this regular feature, Dave and Tom respond to questions from listeners and readers of The Berean Call. Here is this week’s question: Dear brothers in Christ, In past programs I have been greatly edified by your discussions of what seemed to be contradictions in the Bible. Here is another one I hope you will address. In Romans Chapter 3, verse 11, it says that “There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God.” Yet in Jeremiah 29:13, it says: “And ye shall seek me and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart.” How is this reconciled?
Tom:
Dave, we read Romans 3:11, Gary just quoted, “There is none that seeketh after God” talking about the condition of mankind, but it gets worse. Picking up with Romans 3:14, “Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and misery are in their ways; and the way of peace have they not known: There is no fear of God before their eyes.” This seems to be talking about the condition of man. This seems to indicate you can’t seek after God, but on the other hand God says, seek after me and ye shall find me.
Dave:
Well Tom, let me clarify something from the questioner, first of all, [he] said that he enjoyed our discussion of contradictions in the Bible. We weren’t confirming contradictions in the Bible, we are correcting the fact that there are no contradictions in the Bible.
Tom:
The misperception that there are, very good.
Dave:
So we get that clear with our listeners out there, and this is not a contradiction either. You could go to a verse in Ecclesiastics for example that says, “Draw us and we will run after thee.” So yes, in our natural state man is corrupt, he is perverted; we have no thoughts for anyone but ourselves. There is no thought for God; we don’t even want to know God. But God, as Pascal says has put a vacuum in our hearts. We have a sense of something missing within us, and although our natural bent is to be materialistic, to seek selfish satisfactions in this material world. So, we don’t seek after God, yet God seeks us, and He draws us, and as He draws us with His Word, I mean this is what the Bible is all about: “Choose you this day who ye will serve,” God is revealing himself. God calls Abraham, for example. It doesn’t say that Abraham was a seeker after God; it says that God calls him. It doesn’t say that Saul of Tarsus was seeking Jesus Christ, but Jesus arrested him on the road to Damascus, and brought Saul of Tarsus to the point of being Paul the apostle where he could say oh, that I might know Him, [and] that this was his passion and his desire. So, it’ not a contradiction, it’s telling us what we are by nature, and what we would be if God left us to ourselves. But when God calls us and reveals His truth to us, we certainly can rationally respond, we can evaluate the evidence as we’ve been trying to do just in the earlier segment on this program.
Tom:
Dave, some who lean on this verse that is Chapter 3:11 of Romans, they would say this indicates that man is so totally depraved that he can’t respond, that God has to do something because this man is dead spiritually, there is nothing he can do. Yet God keeps pleading. I mean, I could give you verse after verse where He says, “Seek ye the Lord, all ye meek of the earth which have wrought his judgment, seek righteousness, seek meekness.” How can God say that if we can’t respond?
Dave:
I know this is a controversial item, and I have friends who are on the other side, there are good people on both sides, but I think biblically and rationally there is only one way you could go. There are two points that you’re making here. Number One: Why is the Bible full of pleas for men choose? You turn the whole Bible into a charade if man can’t really choose, if he is so totally depraved that he can’t respond to God, and yet all through the Bible God pleads. He sent His prophets, He pleads with His people to repent, but they can’t possibly repent they are so totally depraved according to this view. So, what is the point of pleading with people to repent who can’t repent? Now they could repent according to this Calvinistic view if God would extend, and only if God would extend irresistible grace to them. Then we have a God who is, I’m sorry, some kind of a—is He playing games with us, is He mocking us?
Tom:
It’s a charade in effect.
Dave:
Yeah, He’s pleading with us to turn to Him, but we can’t unless He extends irresistible grace, but He won’t extend irresistible grace except to certain elect. Well then on what basis does He decide to give irresistible grace to the elect and not to others? Why are they His elect? You cannot find a rational or biblical explanation for this. God is no respecter of persons, and there is no reason within any of us why He would do this. Tom, I’m sorry, it’s like you’re in the bottom of a well and I’m dangling a rope 30 feet above your head, and I’m pleading with you, Tom, please, please, take a hold of it, I want to take you out. But I’ve got it 30 feet above your head; you would think I was mocking you. And how can I explain to other people that I really want to take you out of that well, but you’re the one who doesn’t want to come out of that well. It doesn’t make sense and I don’t think it’s biblical.
Tom:
So, there is no contradictions, God does plead with people, He draws people to Him and we are able to respond by His grace which He provides for all of us.
