There is a sin, so destructive that it rips apart families, destroys friendships and decimates entire covenant communities. There is a sin, so reprehensible, that God associates it with the worst sorts of wickedness. There is a sin, so heinous, that God gives only the most epistemologically self-conscious reprobates over to it. There is a sin so pervasive that it is gleefully practiced in every evangelical congregation in America. That horrible, filthy, and monstrous sin is being sticking your nose where it does not belong.

Now, of all the great temptations afflicting the modern evangelical church, heresies, faithlessness, idolatry, false worship, being a busybody SEEMS as if it is a minor kind of sin. After all, everyone does it, including pastors and elders (and most notoriously, pastors’ and elders’ wives). Yet, unlawfully meddling in other people’s affairs is in fact condemned with the harshest sort of language in Scripture.

Consider for example Peter’s statement in 1 Peter 4:15 where he says, "by no means let any of you suffer as a murderer or thief or evildoer or a troublesome meddler." Do you not find it interesting that in a list of sins which include murder, theft and general "evil doing," Peter tacks on "troublesome meddler?" In other words, he is equating a person who unlawfully involves himself in some one else’s affairs with the most extreme forms wickedness! The context of the 1 Peter passage is suffering; the list above are all reasons NOT to suffer. In the very next passage, Peter says that if someone does have to suffer, let him suffer "as a Christian." Did you get that? If you suffer for being a murderer, thief, evildoer or troublesome meddler, in effect, you are NOT a Christian!

In 2 Timothy 3:3, when warning of coming apostasy, Paul says, "For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness although they have denied its power; avoid such men as these. For among them are those who enter into households and captivate weak women…" Please notice that in this horrendous list of terrible sins, sins that are a sign of the worst sorts of moral apostasy, Paul includes malicious gossips and warns of men who unlawfully enter households to take advantage of weak women.

Finally, look at what Paul says about the consistently reprobate in Romans 1:29; "being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips." Again, we have a divinely inspired Apostle creating a ghastly list of horrendous sins as representing the epitome of "all unrighteousness" and "wickedness." And at the end, he says "they are gossips." God says through the Apostle Paul that gossips are equated with every other pernicious evil.

And of course there are other passages that deal with the same problem; Proverbs 20:19, Titus 2:3, 2 Corinthians 12:20, and 2 Thessalonians 3:11, etc. all of which state that unlawfully meddling in someone else’s business is a sign of wickedness, godlessness and an unregenerate heart. Clearly, Christians need to rethink the "peccadillo" of gossip and meddling; apparently, God thinks these sins are far more serious, far more deadly and far worse than does the average believer.

Now some may object that I am including gossip with being a busybody; and it is true that they are in fact distinct. However, both stem from the same basic problem; an ungodly desire to usurp dominion over another person’s life; in other words they are distinct symptoms of the same disease. "Meddling" is directly attempting to influence or control a person; literally "prying into another’s affairs." It is involving one’s self in matters that are literally, "none of your business." Yet, gossip is also unlawfully being involved in another person’s affairs by sharing negative information to people who are not a part of the problem or a part of the solution. God forbids it, not just because it is hurtful to another, but because it is none of the gossip’s business, he has no lawful right to talk about "the problem" and he has no right to involve other people in it either.

Meddling and Original Sin

Some may wonder what the difference is between LAWFUL involvement in another’s life and being a "busybody" unlawfully "meddling." To answer that question requires us to take a step back for a moment and discuss the nature of sin itself. All sins are violations of God’s Moral Law; this is basic Christian theology. However, what many Christians have not considered is the fundamental sin that gives rise to every other sin; the sin of Adam in the Garden. When Adam ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, he was not just breaking some legalistic rule God had set up; instead, he wanted to be AS God, knowing good and evil for himself. Thus, the first sin was idolatry; an attempt to usurp the privilege of God and to BE God, determining good and evil based on his own criteria.

Original sin was not just stealing a piece of fruit from a tree; nor breaking an arbitrary rule but committing a revolutionary act whereby Adam wanted to become a god in his own right. Adam committed a huge sin, blaspheming the nature of God by trying to take to himself the attributes of God. And every human sin, in some way or another, can be traced back to this sinful orientation inherited from Adam. Every time a man sins, he does so because he wants what HE wants, rather than what God wants. Sinful men want to call evil "good" and good "evil;" just look at our modern culture embracing fornication, adultery and sodomy and persecuting those who refuse to accept these "alternative" lifestyles. All the great kings and emperors of history attempted unlawful dominion over others to glorify their own names; remember when God had to put Nebuchadnezzar in his place for self-exaltation?

Each and every one of the Ten Commandments are prohibitions of sinful desires to be as God; to worship as one pleases rather than as God wills, to rebel against lawful authority that God has established, to take the life, wife, property or reputation of others because WE want what WE want, when we want it. Never mind for a moment the pragmatic arguments for the superiority of the Moral Law as a social and legal code (and of course it certainly IS a superior way to live); God in the Ten Commandments shows how our sinful orientation opposes His will because we want to BE God.

Now, when Christ through His Spirit enters a sinful heart and breathes new life into it, giving a man the ability to understand and receive the gospel, that basic, sinful orientation is changed. Rather than being enemies of God seeking to dethrone Him and replace His authority with our own, now we become "sons of God" and want to live in humble submission to Him. However, the process of working out that salvation in fear and trembling takes a lifetime; in fact, though we do not have time to discuss this here I would argue that it takes multiple generations for sanctification to work itself out in every aspect of a culture. Here though we need only note that though our basic orientation is changed, every one of us needs to learn HOW to bring every area of life into submission to King Jesus.

And that is where the problem comes in; for though our heart has been changed, often our thinking, priorities and values have not yet been sanctified. And therefore, even though forgiven and restored to a proper relationship with God, many of us will struggle with this old sinful desire to be as God, determining good and evil based on our own subjective standards.

And one way that many of us will struggle is the temptation to take unlawful dominion over others. This is the basic motivation of the gossip, busybody or meddler. They are not satisfied with living their own lives or dealing with their own problems, but they want to involve themselves with the lives of others, criticizing, judging, condemning, finding fault, etc. Now, maybe there is some psychological problem here that adds "fuel to the fire" in that some of us learn how to get the heat off ourselves by lighting other people on fire. I have certainly met a lot of people during the past thirty-three years of being a Christian who were so busy "taking the splinter" out of other people’s eyes that they never seemed to notice the huge logs sticking out of their own!

Whatever the reason, spiritual or psychological, a lot of Christians seem to get upset, angry, bitter, frustrated or depressed because they are unlawfully concerned with what is happening in other people’s lives. If the object of their meddling will not submit to their unlawful attempt at dominion, they will then use gossip and slander to ruin the person’s reputation with others. Oh, all this is often couched in the most "spiritual" of terms because the meddler "really" has the best interests of the other person at heart. Thus they may want to "share a prayer request" for "poor brother So and So."  But at heart, they want the other person to SUBMIT to them; and they can be quite vicious if they do not get their way.

Lawful vs. Unlawful Involvement

Now, someone is bound to ask here that as Christians, bound together by the Holy Spirit into one spiritual temple, are we not supposed to be involved in each other’s lives? Well, the short answer is "yes and no" or better yet, "what do you mean by ‘involved?" There are many exhortations, encouragements and commands for Christians to love each other, stand by each other, speak the truth in love for one another and even to correct, rebuke and admonish one another (e.g., Col 3:16). So clearly, if a brother is in sin, then we have a moral responsibility for his own spiritual welfare, to speak to him (to HIM, privately, not anyone else Matt 18:15ff) seeking to win him from his folly.

However, believe it or not, the problem we are discussing is not confronting sin, but rather that a busybody applies his own subjective values, priorities or beliefs to another. There are many things in Scripture that are left to personal discretion and no one is to judge another one way or the other. For example, in Romans 14, the Apostle Paul specifically addresses a first century problem that threatened to cause schism between Jewish and Gentile Christians; whether or not it was proper to eat meat sacrificed to idols. The Jews held a very sincere belief that it was WRONG; the Gentiles knew that some pagan priest muttering a prayer to some non-existent god didn’t change the fact that meat was just meat! Paul actually sides theologically with the Gentiles but he does not rebuke the Jews for their sincere but mistaken belief. Instead, he told the Gentiles to stop feeling so smug and superior and not to use their liberty in Christ to cause their Jewish brothers to do something that went against their conscience.

Today of course, this particular controversy is irrelevant; at least I have not heard of anyone having a "crises of conscience" over whether some pagan had prayed over his sirloin before he threw it on the grill. But the principle remains; there are many issues that God has left to individual conscience and we are free to make decisions in these areas; decisions that NO ONE here on earth has the right to judge or criticize.

But the busybody will have none of that. He will judge another, cast doubts on the person’s maturity, integrity, and character just because that person does something that does not meet the meddler’s approval. The meddler may be upset because the other person watches TV programs he does not find "edifying", or read something other than super-spiritual theology. He may allow his children to play sports (or may not allow his kids to play sports). He may not maintain his house the way the meddler thinks it should be maintained (either being too finicky or too lax). In other words, the busybody wants to force others to live the way that HE thinks is good, wise and proper.

The fact that occasionally (in my experience, rarely) the busybody may actually be RIGHT does not justify his meddling. Sure, if the other guy had your brains, your talent, and your life experience, he just might dress, act and work, JUST LIKE YOU! But you know, he is not you - he is the person God providentially created. And if the Lord did not declare something to be a part of His Moral Law, then no one has the right to tell other people how to live their lives.

Hence, there is often a tremendous sense of arrogance amongst meddlers; even the most super-spiritual, "kindly" ones. They do not seem to understand or appreciate that people are DIFFERENT, with different backgrounds, basic abilities and life experiences. Not everyone can do what you can do; not everyone is always going to be as smart as you are, as talented, as motivated, as diligent or as disciplined because they are DIFFERENT! And since only God can read the hidden recesses of the human heart, only HE can judge whether a person has been faithfully discharging his responsibilities before God. Sometimes I wonder if the meddlers, even the best intentioned ones, understand that other people may not achieve their level of "success" in life for a number of legitimate reasons that exist solely in God’s providence. Sometimes, I am amazed at how blind some meddlers can be to their own short-comings as parents, Christians and friends (the worst sort of busybodies seem oblivious to their own sins; but that’s going back to splinters and logs again).

The Lawful Limits of Authority

God as the sovereign King of Creation delegates authority to certain spheres; family, church and state. Tyranny occurs whenever one sphere attempts to unlawfully involve itself in the legitimate activities of another sphere. The family does not run the church; and the church is supposed to teach, but not run the family. The State has a duty to act as an avenger of evil but may not dictate to the church or the family. Of course in this wicked, modern world, the State has unlawfully attempted to tyrannize both the church and the family; but most of us Reformed Christians have been speaking out against that for years.

What we have not been so good at declaring is that the same sphere sovereignty works within our communities and our relationships. One man may no more lawfully involve himself in the household affairs of another, than one State can dictate terms to a neighboring State; or one church dictate how another church may worship.

"But wait," I can hear someone objecting, "In the church we are supposed to be a body, interdependent and needing each other. We even take solemn vows of membership that require us to help one another!" Yes, all that is true; but it still does not give anyone the right to dictate how someone else lives his life unless there is sin. Meddlers jump in and want to tell other people how to raise their children, treat their wives, use their finances, determine their calling, etc. You think I am being extreme? I know specific ministries full of dedicated, motivated Christians who are CONVINCED that they know what color your house should be painted, what model and make of car you should drive and even the proper, "spiritual" color of socks you should wear!

In the same way, I have met numerous people over the years who want to dictate the kinds of decisions others should make. I have received many phone calls from meddlers who are concerned about someone making a decision of which they disapprove. Furthermore, they want me to use the authority inherent in the Session, to make these others change their minds. The issues can be as diverse as which college another person’s child should attend, or what kind of major he should have, or whether or not a particular young man or woman is a suitable mate. I have had busybodies calling me asking me to tell certain other people that they need to change jobs or even careers, sell their homes, and yes, even "So and So needs to get his lawn in order!"

And each time one of these calls comes in, I have to patiently explain to the caller that really, it is none of their business. Now, this has to be done gently and tactfully, but with firmness. There may be a fine line between legitimate concern over the welfare of a brother or sister in Christ and unlawful meddling; but the line does exist and those who tread over it are showing something unsavory about their own spiritual character.

Now granted, brothers and sisters in Christ may lawfully discuss their problems, challenges, and difficulties in life requesting and receiving advice and counsel. Solomon is clear that only a fool refuses to seek wisdom and counsel from his brothers. However, in this case, the other party INVITES their brother’s input. Furthermore, while a godly man will ASK advice from others, he is simply not required to TAKE that advice, no matter how "wise" we think our counsel may be. He is NOT a "fool" simply because he does not follow our advice; perhaps we did not really understand the situation, or properly apply the relevant Biblical principles. How arrogant to think that WE have the "right" answer?

Gossips, Busybodies and Personal Responsibility

In the average church, meddlers can usually be discerned because they are gossips; they love to criticize the way that other people live their lives. They may or may not actually TALK to the people involved; but every facet of another person’s life is open to their criticism, objection and judgment. Furthermore, almost NEVER are their "observations" based on the objective standards of the Moral Law; instead, these people had the audacity to simply do things differently than the meddlers.

Take for example domestic duties; a godly man will seek to bring manage his own household well, having his children under control with a wife who respects and submits to his leadership. OK, fair enough, these are ideals that presumably all of us are committed to emulating. However, the meddler will often criticize other households, equally committed to these SAME ideals, but who simply work them out in different ways. No, the way another family does things may not be YOUR way; but is it necessarily wrong? I have learned over the years that some of the people for whom I had the greatest reserve in the way they raised their children, ended up with godly kids DESPITE my misgiving. Some couples have the kind of relationship I would find personally intolerable, but you know, it seems to work for them! In some cases, my assessment might have been right; sometimes it may have been wrong. Either way, unless there was sin involved, it was and is NONE OF MY BUSINESS. Yet meddlers are perfectly willing to see themselves as having everything together and therefore qualified to point the finger at anyone and everyone who dares do things differently. As a pastor, and visiting these people and seeing just how they DO manage their own households, I often have to bite my tongue from expressing some serious concerns of my own.

There is a difference between someone coming to a brother in Christ and asking counsel and advice; something that ought to be a common part of Christian fellowship. Hopefully, God will gift the average church with wise men and women who have learned how to apply Biblical principles in their own life and experience and they can pass that wisdom on. However, unless there is a violation of the Moral Law, advice is just that; advice. It has no authority to compel another’s actions; each of us, ultimately stands before God responsible and accountable for how we lived our lives, the decisions we made, and why we made them. Advice can be helpful and accepted, or a person may decide that it is NOT helpful, and therefore lawfully rejected.

Granted, over the years I have met a number of Christians who did not seem to know how to use their liberty in Christ wisely and productively for the Kingdom. Some in fact, had a "slave" mentality where in one sense, they really would have been better off with someone else making their decisions for them. But self-government is the most basic form of sanctification; the ONLY people who are given specific responsibility for others, outside of the family, are elders who "watch over souls" (Hebs 13:17). But even the Session of a local church has authority ONLY to preach and teach the truth and discipline according to the Moral Law. No Pastor, elder, Presbytery or General Assembly has the authority to bind people’s consciences where God has granted liberty, or require things of men that God has left to conscience.

Think about this, God thinks SO highly of family authority that godly women are not allowed even to ask questions of their own elders! That’s right, if a woman wants to understand something said in church, she must ask her OWN husband (1 Cor 14:34-36)! God protects the legitimate authority of the family even from the very people He established to "watch over our souls." So if God Himself did not give even His Church the lawful authority to interfere with the bonds of family sovereignity, He certainly does not grant it to meddlers and busybodies.

Conclusion

Meddlers are a boil on the body of Christ causing conflicts, divisions and destroying relationships because of their criticism and gossip. Despite all their rhetoric about their concern for the welfare of others, in reality, the fundamental motivation is the same that brought death and destruction into Creation.; wanting to be as God determining good and evil for themselves, and others. Christians need to learn to stay out of the affairs of others UNLESS there is some clear violation of the Moral Law; and even then, they need to stop gossiping and actually follow Matthew 18:15 to resolve the problem.

Right now, Christian piety is at an all time low since the darkest age of medieval superstition. While the Christian church is growing exponentially across the world, our actual spirituality is being destroyed by counterfeit experiences, comfortable conformism or intellectual irrelevance. I may be wrong, but I believe that God has NOT given us more dominion in the world, because we have not yet learned how to properly exercise godly dominion in the spheres of life already entrusted to us. We either take too little or two much; either way, we are not yet ready for broader dominion in the world.

Jesus said that we would be known as His disciples if we had love for one another; and that love has always been the very foundation of true Christian victory in the world. Certainly one aspect of that love requires us to respect the limits that God Himself placed on every human institution. Meddlers and busybodies are arrogant and prideful, the very antithesis of Christian self-sacrificial love. They are in YOUR church, talking to YOUR friends, and probably even to YOUR elders. And every time they open their mouths, they spread poison, dissent, and division.

Obviously, the first step is learning to shut our own mouths and to stop talking about others. Genuine Christian concern for another means going to THEM and standing along side being willing to help, if God gives grace. There is almost NEVER any reason to share ANY negative information to ANYONE about another person’s problems, trials or difficulties. Just learning to guard our own lips could revolutionize the fellowship of the average church, literally over night.

However, that will not solve the problem of the meddlers. They can only be stopped if the rest of us REFUSE to listen to them. Meddlers are bullies, who have gotten away with their tyranny because they intimidate other people. However, one of the most basic ways of dealing with a bully is simply to stand up to them and show that YOU won’t back down. In the same way, all it would take to stop the meddlers in their tracks is a few hardy souls saying "No, that is gossip; that is certainly none of my business and it is none of yours!" If enough Christians just had the moral courage to take a stand on this one issue, I believe we would see one of the greatest revivals in history. The gossips, slanderers, meddlers and busybodies would get upset, angry, embittered but eventually fed up and leave. If they were truly believers (just unsanctified in this area) then they would repent, and be changed. If in fact they were wolves masquerading as sheep, then the constant correction of the godly would drive them out of the fold.

When the meddlers leave, the whole spirit of the church changes; problems that once seemed insurmountable are laughed off with a recognition that we all sin, we all fall short, and we all need forgiveness. Bitterness, envy and jealousy fade away as the fires burn out, with no one constantly fueling them. Factions, divisions and schisms disappear. People begin to open up and become vulnerable with one another because they no longer fear that any sign of weakness or imperfection will become ammunition for the gossips. Christians actually start confessing their sins to one another in humility; and kindness, gentleness and true Biblical love becomes the norm. And all it takes is for the righteous simply to refuse to listen to sin!

I hate painting. I really do. And I only do it under protest. Recently my lovely wife pointed out that the mold on the basement walls had grown so large it was demanding voting rights and welfare benefits. She then sweetly inquired what I thought we should do about it. I tried saying that mold too were God’s creatures and had a right to a full and meaningful life. Besides, we might run afoul of some endangered species law. Elaine simply held up an article I had written on hunting and said, “Dearest, if you can shoot fuzzie little wild animals, surely, a big strong man like you can take dominion over the basement.”

So, armed with a spray bottle of bleach, brushes, rollers and six gallons of basement sealant paint I grudgingly walked down to the utility side of the basement. My ten year old had hung a sign over the door saying “Abandon Hope All Ye Who Enter Here,” while my seven year old clung to my legs saying, “Don’t go in there Daddy, you’ll never get out again” both grinning from here to here. Oh yeah, they’re real cards, are my kids. They inherited their mother’s looks, but their father’s sad sense of irreverent humor.

My nine-year-old daughter however, didn’t like her brothers taking the Mickey out of dear old Dad and said, “Daddy, can we help you paint?” Well, misery loves company, and remembering Tom Sawyer I replied, “Of course, you can, sweetheart. In fact you can all help, but this is a special job and it will cost you something.” Unfortunately, my kids are too well read (I knew there was a down side to home schooling) and wouldn’t buy it. However, the prospect of playing with all that paint, on all those walls, and doing it legally, ended up being enough incentive all by itself.

After a few hours of washing, scrubbing and disinfecting with bleach, the mold turned out to be a good Republican, easily covered by white wash. Over all, the painting went as well as could be expected, except that we should have thrown away the brushes and just let the five-year-old roll around. He managed to get covered with paint. (”Hey Daddy, look at me! I’m Casper!”)

All and all, it was good for my sanctification. At one point, I noticed a set of handprints on the wall. “OK, ” I roared,. “Who leaned against the wall?” For a moment, there was a pregnant silence, followed by all FOUR of the oldest kids slowly holding up their paint smeared hands!

Eventually, after finishing the first coat, I stumbled upstairs to my office, exhausted, drenching with sweat and glad to be able to get back to my computer and books (meanwhile, my long suffering wife was still downstairs, cleaning up the mess and mumbling something about a nunnery). It struck me that though painting the basement was a dirty, disgusting job, my wife was perfectly correct; it was also absolutely necessary. And in one sense, that basement is a microcosm of the task facing Christians today. The basement had once been painted, a whole generation ago. But decades of neglect had allowed a small problem to become a big one. If the walls had been washed with disinfectant once a year, the mold, mildew and alien life forms setting up colonies would never have had a chance to become established. But because I had abdicated responsibility, now the clean up work was far harder then it ought to have been. But now the dungeon was clean, bright and useable. All it took was some dedication, hard work (and four coats of paint!).

Sitting in my office thinking of these things, I turned on the Idiot Box to catch the late afternoon news while downloading my email. I wasn’t really paying much attention to the One Eyed God until I heard something about over-population, and that sparked my interest. It seems that inadvertently, the channel was tuned to one of those late afternoon talk/shock shows that specialize in the bizarre. (I say, “inadvertently, ” because I wouldn’t want to admit in public that I watch this kind of freak show intentionally.)

Too tired to reach for the remote control, and against my better judgment, I began watching the program a little more closely. It seems that the day’s episode dealt with a weird religious cult concerned about there being too many people in the world. As a solution, they recommended vegetarianism, suicide, sodomy and, grab your stomach, cannibalism. One man, dressed in a clerical collar, walked around with a rubber chicken crucified on a large cross. A really ugly woman was screeching about meat packers being modern day Nazi’s (later it turned out that the ugly woman was really a male transvestite).

The specific issue revolved around a young woman interested in joining the cult and her boyfriend’s attempts to discourage her. He failed; she was inducted into the cult and immediately dressed herself in a dominatrix outfit (and shame on you if you didn’t have to look that word up!). In the interest of “equal time” the program brought on a Christian little old lady who with tears in her eyes, told the cannibals that Jesus loved them too (personally speaking, I think He has a special place in Hell for them, right next to the abyss where talk show hosts are kept).

Now the host and the audience were having a wonderful time being outraged by these refugees from a psycho ward, but believe it or not, I found myself in sympathy with the cannibals. Both they and the audience began from the same basic assumptions; i.e., man is merely an animal, human freedom means doing just what each individual wants, there are no absolute moral judgments to be made, there is a genuine ecological crises coming that demands radical solutions, etc. While the audience didn’t like the cannibal’s conclusions, they shared the exact same premises; premises taught in every public school, State University, and highlighted nightly in all the “mainstream” media. There is no logical stopping place between what the premier academics of the past hundred years have been teaching and what the cannibals are proposing. If you grant the cannibals their premises, then logically, their solutions are not only reasonable, but in many respects, inevitable. The cannibals were simply more consistent, and more honest than the bland, middle American audience jeering and hooting at them.

If man is just another animal, and there is no moral difference between the two, and if humans have rights, then why not animals as well? And if eating animal meat is moral, why not eat the flesh of dead people? That way, people who want to eat meat can, without hurting all the poor little innocent animals. Isn’t it better than just burying all that good protein in the ground? (Well, actually there are good, medical reasons for not being a cannibal, but since when do facts ever enter into this kind of religious debate?). If there are no moral absolutes apart from the individual, why shouldn’t teenagers commit suicide when depressed and despondent? Who’s to say that they are wrong for killing themselves because they didn’t get a date for Friday night? And if there really are too many people in the world, and if there is no sovereign God whose Law reigns supreme, why shouldn’t you abort babies or encourage sodomy as an alternative to normal heterosexual relations?

The simple fact is, that the Cannibalistic, Vegetarian Sodomites are simply being epistemologically self-conscious modernists. They are just taking the next, logical step in the humanist attack on the sovereignty of God. Neither the audience, nor the holier than thou host, have any moral basis to criticize their position. They may choose not to adopt the same behaviors, but they have no basis to call them immoral. For both groups deny God and His Kingdom, and one is just a little more consistent in promoting the fruits of their rebellion than the other.

What neither group wants to realize is that you cannot have the fruit of Christian culture, without the root. The world before the gospel was a vicious, nasty place, filled with the most horrendous acts. The ancient Greeks exposed their children to be eaten by wild animals while extolling the benefits of pedophilia. The Romans raped and pillaged their way through the ancient Mediterranean world, enslaving everyone they met. The Celtic tribes in Europe butchered people like hogs in their worship of demonic forces. The Aztecs in the Americas sacrificed entire nations by ripping out people’s hearts in bloody worship of the sun. Even the charming Inuit people of North America left their parents on ice floes to be eaten by polar bears, or freeze to death in the Arctic weather. It was only with the coming of the gospel of Jesus Christ that concepts such as liberty, justice, and protection of the innocent became cultural norms.

It is one thing to read in history, about the last days of a decadent culture, just before God brings the hammer down. It is something different to actually experience it. You see, like the long neglected basement walls, Christians have failed to disinfect this culture. We have allowed the rot of humanism to grow and flourish in the dark, dank places while we went merrily on our way. And now, we’ve got a lot of work to do to clean up the mess and put things back to rights. Granted, the people we are talking about are kooks (and their bizarre beliefs, a form of street theater to “raise people’s consciousness” about their social agenda). But what is said today in jest is practiced tomorrow in sincerity. When a culture turns its back on God, He turns His back on them, allowing them to become foolish in their speculations, darkening their hearts, and giving their bodies over to impurity and judgment (cf. Rms 1:20ff). These are the people who will be running this culture for the foreseeable future. And we are the ones who let it all happen.

Do these wackos frighten me? No, they are pathetic little people, hardly to be taken seriously. They are mere footnotes in the history of the death of a culture. But they are a symptom of a much greater evil, the evil of a flourishing god-hating philosophy subsidized by Christian capital because we were too lazy to clean up the mess. And like the mold on a dark, dank, basement wall; they are something that needs to be scoured clean and washed away with all the other filth. But it will take a lot of work; dirty, tiring and unglamorous work, but absolutely necessary work unless we want the cannibals to win (for a time); and our children, and grandchildren, to grow up in their world.

There is a new world coming. God IS in control. He sits in the Heavens and laughs at the foolish schemes of wicked men (Psa 2:1ff). The suicides will kill themselves, the over-population nuts will abort their future, the sodomites will emasculate themselves and the cannibals will eat each other. Our destiny is to inherit the earth. The kingdoms of this world WILL become the kingdoms of our God and King. Our Great Commission is to DISCIPLE the nations, teaching them to obey Jesus as Lord (Matthew 28:19-20). Now all we have to do is stop messing around and start working at cleaning up this mess. God will bless.

And every one of them is asking for YOUR financial support.

So, you weed out the liberals, and the socialists and the ministries that compromise on evangelical doctrine, and you are STILL left with five worthy ministries begging for your support.

So which ones do you give to, and to which ones must you say, “Be warmed and be filled and I will pray for you brother?” J

Well, believe it or not there is an entire philosophy to motivate charitable fund-raising. First, there are the “starving orphan” ministries that show you poignant pictures of cute little kids in desperate circumstances. Surely, nobody is hard-hearted enough to turn their backs on these pitiful souls?

Hence, a person then is motivated to give because of guilt. The subliminal message is “Give money to OUR organization and it will relieve YOUR guilty feelings about living in affluence and comfort while little children suffer in desperate poverty.” Of course, whatever you do, DON’T look behind the curtain because enormous amount of the money given is often sucked up by the organization itself in salaries and administration costs.

Secondly, there are appeals to support what could be called “traditional” ministries such as missionaries. Most evangelicals rightly want the gospel to be shared, and sincerely pray “Here am I Lord- send Bob” Furthermore, Christians have a “romantic” view of missionary work which various mission boards capitalize on to motivate giving.

The image the sending organization wants you to have is of an intrepid soul, cutting through the bush with his machete to reach some tiny village oppressed by demonism and the local witch-doctor. In reality, MOST Western missionaries reside in the cities (after all- that is where most people live), in air-conditioned homes, and often have servants (labor is the one cheap thing in developing nations). In fact, the ONLY time many missionaries ever go into the “bush” is to get some nice pictures for the supporters back home! This is not to denigrate a missionary’s real work; but most Christians are in love with an ideal, than the real. So the “ideal” is offered as a reason to support these works. And again, few people know that missionaries have to raise considerably more than their salaries to support the “home office.”

One well known evangelical Presbyterian denomination just spent 5 million dollars building a new headquarters; and who do you think paid for it? We are not here arguing about the rightness or wrongness of a foreign mission’s board buying property but it is pretty hard to sell that “vision” to the people who give to the work. So, 20% or more is taken off the top of what the missionary raises to pay for “over-head.”

Thirdly, there are those ministries that try to target specific interests in the Christian community. Whether college campuses, discipleship ministries, political action groups, Christian education, etc., the Christian church is broad enough that somewhere, there is a group of people who are interested in some worthy endeavor and willing to support it. Again, the average donor might be surprised about how much money goes to pay for the organization’s office space, computers, secretarial and administrative staff; not to mention the executive salaries of the “head honchos.”

Finally, there is the last type of ministry, always under-funded and desperate just to survive. These are the research ministries; the ministries of men who are actually trying to work out the implications of a Biblical worldview.

The late Dr. Rushdoony noted that it was always difficult for Christians to see the importance of supporting the Christian scholar. Most Christians think that seminaries and Christian colleges already support Christian scholarship, but one only has to look at what is being produced in the Christian academic world to realize that much of it is hopelessly irrelevant. Men spend years becoming ever more expert in ever narrower fields of study. But seldom do such men actually think outside the limits of their own fields and attempt to apply Biblical principles in the real world. And when they do, it can be embarrassing. There were many conservative evangelicals (some of them Reformed) who offered abortion as a legitimate moral choice BEFORE Roe vs. Wade. And after that historic decision, how many seminaries or Christian colleges came out strongly against abortion until the average Christian in the pew took to the streets?

You see the problem here is that in order to get those prestigious degrees so loved by the credentials committees, the professors had to attend secular universities for their PhD’s. And as a consequence, many of them drank deeply of the well of humanism. When they finally got to teach, many times these men had compromised the faith-and hence many Christian colleges and seminaries offer warmed over Marxism, theological liberalism and humanism mixed with a few Bible verses. In fact, Christian colleges are usually adept at raising money in direct ratio to the success of their sports teams!

It could be argued that some of the BEST work being done in advancing a comprehensive and consistent Christian worldview is by pastors who try to squeeze in a little time for quality reading, and writing between visits to the hospital, meetings with the deacons, and trying to get enough people to attend their churches so that they can survive. Because they are working in the real world every day, most pastors are aware of the desperate state of their congregation’s souls. Some pastors hunger for a more consistent application of the faith; many just give up and try to survive. There are precious few men who can actually keep body and soul together while doing the kind of work that is necessary for real cultural transformation. There are even fewer who are willingly supported by their churches. After all, the average Christian thinks, “we hired YOU to minister to US-not to go around having a ministry to others!”

Nobody ever gets excited about scholarship; and few people see the need to support it. And even when they do, there is always the problem that some men think that they ought to be supported just so they can sit home and read good books, and occasionally pontificate on certain subjects.

The question must be asked of such “ministries,” what are they producing that is of actual benefit to the church of Jesus Christ? Sure, someone just might have an insight here or there, or might be able to critique some aspect of medieval theology that no one else noticed before-but how is it going to change people’s lives?

Well, allow us to offer some reasons why we think OUR ministry should be supported; a ministry like some others that is trying to focus on ideas and research. First, Highlands-Reformed really DOES support its pastor, taking on the burden of paying his salary, and covering administration costs. They really believe that it is worth paying their pastor to teach other people’s children through the Institute’s college course programs, lecture at various conferences and occasionally coordinate a ministry trip overseas because they have a vision that they ought to serve other Christians; not just serve themselves. And as a consequence as a church, we are able to minister to Christians from many different back-grounds and beliefs, slowly nudging them towards a more consistent Biblical world and life-view.

But even more to the point, the difference is that we want to make a difference in YOUR life! That’s right, a difference, a real difference, a practical difference by showing you how your Biblical presuppositions OUGHT to work out in various areas of life.

God said through the Apostle Peter that “judgment begins with the household of God.” If Christians do not understand and apply a consistent Biblical worldview, paganism, humanism and Islam will pass us by, and not in the far distant future either. For over twenty years, we have been saying that the key to cultural reformation begins within the individual heart and life of the believer.

Thus we are writing books on Restoring Relationships, Restoring the Family and Restoring the Church. These are books that the mainstream Christian publishers will not touch just because they call for a radical re-thinking of life. And the sad reality is that most modern American evangelicals do not want to change, they want to be told that they are nice people, that God loves them and accepts them right where they are, and that when things get really bad, He will rapture them out of trouble.

Our message is a little harder to sell. We think that the current deplorable state of Christian civilization is a direct result of believers abandoning a comprehensive Biblical worldview and that as a culture; we are literally selling out our children’s future for a philosophy of personal peace at any price.

But at the “Institute” we are calling men to change; and that is not a comforting message. We are telling Christians that if they do NOT change, their nations might end up like those in the Middle East; once Christian, now poverty stricken, oppressive tyrannies lost to Islam.

Furthermore, we are actually HELPING Christians TO change in Developing Nations by reaching the highest levels of their national governments and teaching them about capitalism, and hard work and obedience to God’s moral law.

But it is pretty hard to get people excited about middle-aged men giving dull, boring lectures to stodgy members of various members of parliament, or sitting at computers writing books, articles and essays. That’s why we have been putting extracts of some of our work in this newsletter; we think we have something to say that needs to be said; we just need some help getting the message out. It is a daunting task; even dramatic, exciting Christian ministries such as Frontline Fellowship have had truck-loads of Bibles and humanitarian relief sitting in warehouses because they did not have the gas money for a mission’s trip.

So why SHOULD you take the limited amount of money you can afford to give to support all the worthy ministries that are crying for your dollar and entrust them to us?

You shouldn’t. That’s right, you should not give to us because you feel guilty, or because you have a romanticized ideal of what we do, or even because we happen to be ministering in an area you think important.

You should only give if you believe that Christian culture is something worth supporting and advancing. You should only give if you think that the materials we produce are accurate AND effective vehicles to relay God’s principles. You should only give if you think that we are saying things that need to be said, things that a lot of other-wise worthy ministries are not or will not say.

You should only give if you think living in a nation of freedom, prosperity and peace is something worth preserving and that giving other nations the same opportunity, is something worth working for.

I admit freely, that all our work in other nations is an attempt to send a “wake-up” call to American Christians. Call me naive, or simple; but I really sincerely believe that Western civilization as a whole, and American Christian culture in particular has been one of God’s greatest blessings to the world; just as Western humanistic culture has been one of the worst curses ever inflicted on man-kind. I really believe that the preservation and advancement of Christian civilization is worth the investment of my time, my energies and even, if God so wills my life.

Do you share that vision? Do you want your children, and grand-children, and yes even GREAT-grand-children to live and love and work in a society based on Biblical principles, or one dominated by paganism, humanism or Islam? Do you want to see the gospel flourish in the rest of the world? Are you excited about actually discipling the nations as our Lord commanded?

If you share our vision, please consider supporting us with prayer, and also as the Lord allows, financially. No, we have no pictures of starving children, no big buildings, not even an intrepid missionary likely to be martyred; but we are committed to doing what we can to preserve the best aspects of Christian culture, and reforming the rest until that day that every knee bows, and every tongue confesses, “Jesus is Lord.”

Support for the International Institute for Christian Culture and Highlands-Reformed Church can be sent to:

Highlands-Reformed

PO Box 279

Colbert, WA 99005

Professor-Emeritus of Systematic Theology, Queensland Presbyterian Theological College (Australia) and formerly Advocate of the Supreme Court of South Africa
The December 1996 issue of the British Reformed Fellowship News Alert (pg. 6) opposed the new British Firearms Amendment Bill being enacted, in the wake of the tragic massacre at Dunblane. It rightly records that “while the Christian foundations of our country are being smashed” — the Christian Voice was giving an “excellent witness” in pointing out that the new Bill is “unjust” and “un-Constitutional.”

The new Bill should have grabbed gangsters — not the guns of the good guys!

In 1991, the Presbyterian Church of Queensland in Australia called for the re-introduction of the death penalty for murder. For God is not only loving; He is also a righteous avenger. Gen. 1:1-5 to 4:14.

He reveals Himself also through His living creatures, such as plants and animals. By His law of nature, He gives many of them toxins and fangs for their own self-defense. Gen. 1:l1f & 3:18.

God created humans to image His love and His power, also by subduing. Gen. 1:26-28 (Hebrew redoo = to trample down, cf. Jas. 3:7). He intended mankind not just to “dress” but also to “keep” or guard the environment. Gen. 2:15 (Hebrew ãleshomr~£, to police).

God became angry when both man and wife neglected to resist Satan from invading their home. Cf. Gen. 3:1-14 with Rom. 1:18 to 2:16. Then God promised He would Himself become man and crush Satan’s skull. Gen. 3:15 cf. Rom. 16:19-20.

Meanwhile, God expelled man from paradise. At its gate placed guards armed with swords to block man’s way back. Gen. 3:24 cf. Rev. 22:11-16. God then cursed and punished Cain for unrighteously killing Abel, and wiped out violent criminals by justly putting them all to death in the great flood. Gen. 4:5-14f cf. 9:6 & Num. 35:16-27 & Mt. 23:24-26 & I John 3:11-15.

God commands all human communities to retaliate against all violence against men — by terminating all animals that kill men, and by shedding the blood of all persons that murder human beings created as divine images. Gen. 9:5f. God requires mankind to exact life-for-life death penalties from all intentional killers. Ex. 21:12-23 & Lev. 24:17f. He declares that if a thief breaks into a home at night and there and then gets wounded and dies, no blood shall be shed because of him. Ex. 22:2 & Mt.24:43.

Christ taught He had not come to break down the Law, but to give it full effect. Mt. 5:llf (compare the Westminster Confession of Faith 19:5-7). He requires restitution to the last cent. Mt. 5:23-26. “Turn the other cheek!” is not a sinful invitation for a smiter to come and wound also the other side of one’s face, but rather a divine command to protect one’s own right cheek after a smiter has already sinfully struck it once. It is to be protected, by turning it away from the next anticipated blow. Mt. 5:39 cf. Acts 16:27-28.

Jesus told His disciples to buy swords — a command to acquire and to bear and to use arms. Lk. 22:36-38. This must be distinguished from Peter’s later abuse thereof. Lk. 22:49-51 & Mt. 26:51-53. Indeed, Christ did not at all disagree with the penitent robber on the cross — who admitted he himself still richly deserved the death penalty. Lk. 23:40-41.

The Apostle Paul approved of the death penalty for capital criminals. Acts 25:11,16,25 cf. 23:39 & 26:31. He instructed also pagan governments to use the sword as avengers against evil-doers. Rom. 13:1-10 (cf. I Pet.2:13-14). Indeed, Christ Himself ordains everlasting punishment in the lake of fire for all hardened sinners — which more than vindicates the appropriateness of the death penalty for murder here and now. Rev. 21:8 cf. Heb. 10:28-31 & 12:29 & 13:8-11.

In 98 A.D., Tacitus (in his Germania 13) described how at Common Law the Anglo-Saxons gave spears and shields to all their youths. In the 880 Code of King Alfred (19 & 36 & 42), each Englishman was expected to have “his weapon” and was not culpable for “carrying his spear” — if “level” and “without danger.” All Freemen had the right to bear arms. Historians’ History of the World, The Times, London, 1907, XVIII, pg. 160 — cf. Ex. 32:27 (“every man his sword at his side”). See too the guided missiles in II Chron. 26:14-15.

The 1215 Magna Carta (12 & 37 & 61) restored the Common Law rights of Englishmen infringed by the tyrannical government of King John, and reasserted the private right to possess arrows and knives. It prohibited all further seizure of such and other possessions; it guaranteed the privacy of the home; and it justified rebellion against tyranny. And what is an arrow in a bow, if not a guided missile?!

Now an Englishman’s home is his castle. So too is an American’s — and an Australian’s. Ex. 21:22f & 22:3 & John 2:13-16. Faithful Presbyterians believe with the Westminster Larger Catechism QQ. & AA. 135f that “the sins forbidden in the sixth commandment (thou shalt not kill) are all taking away the life of ourselves or of others except in case of publick justice, lawful war [and] of necessary defence…. The duties required” include “just defence.. . against violence.” Psalm 82 says “save the poor and needy; rid them out of the hand of the wicked!” And also Proverbs 24 says “if you neglect to save those that are…ready to be slain…, does He Who weighs the heart not notice this?”

The 1688 British Bill of Rights (art. 7) says that “subjects.. . may have arms for their defence.” Also the 1787-91 Constitution of the United States of America (at its 2nd and 7th Amendments) re-emphasizes that “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed” than “according to the rules of the Common Law” of England.

In the recent (1953) Coronation Oath, Her Majesty the Queen was given a Bible and a sword and told: “We present you with this Book, the most valuable thing that this world affords With this sword — do justice; stop the growth of iniquity; protect the holy Church of God; help and defend widows and orphans; restore the things that are gone to decay [such as the right of law-abiding citizens to own and bear arms]; maintain the things that are restored; punish and reform what is amiss!”

God save our gracious Queen,

Long live our noble Queen,

God save the Queen!

Send her victorious,

Happy and glorious,

Long to reign over us,

God save the Queen!

O Lord, our God, arise!

Scatter her enemies,

And make them fall!

Confound their politics,

Frustrate their knavish tricks,

On Thee our hopes we fix,

God save us all!

Thy choicest gifts in store,

On her be pleased to pour,

Long may she reign!

May she defend our laws,

And ever give us cause,

To sing with great applause:

God save the Queen. Amen!

Cordially in Christ’s service,

Rev. Dr. Francis Nigel Lee

Visit our website — http://www.dr-fnlee.org

“God Uni-Trine, at the beginning, created the tri-universe” (cf. Gen. 1:1-3)

This then leads us to our first principle; Christians must seek wisdom. Ok, I agree, this does not seem like rocket science, but I am amazed at the number of Christians who do not understand that wisdom is obtained by diligently seeking for it. It does not come automatically over time just by gaining life experience nor do we soak it up by osmosis just by listening to a few good sermons (or reading a few good books!). Most Christians know James 1:5 which says, “but if any lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives all men generously and without reproach and it will be given him.” And I am sure, that you yourself are familiar with Christians praying and asking for wisdom; you have probably done so yourself many times.

But I do not think James 1:5 can be understood in isolation from what the rest of the Scriptures also teach about wisdom. James knew the Proverbs, and understood what Solomon had written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. James was not contradicting Solomon, but rather reminding Christians, that wisdom comes from God. Yes, wisdom comes from asking, and God promises to give it; but that wisdom is not some sort of supernatural revelation that appears out of nowhere; it comes from diligently seeking it in the Word.

Sadly, Christians are not well known for doing the diligent labor necessary to acquire wisdom and often suffer the consequences in living foolishly. This does not mean that we are necessarily fools; but we might well have been ACTING like one; i.e., people can act like a fool, without being a fool, simply because they might not know any better (perhaps no one ever taught them any better). Perhaps they are just doing what they have always done, which is the widely accepted way of doing things and have never thought anything about it.

For example, the idea that germs cause disease, universally accepted today, was a radical concept just over a hundred years ago. The simple act of a doctor washing his hands before treating different patients was considered ludicrous. Scalpels and other surgical instruments were routinely wiped off with a dirty cloth before the doctor operated on the next patient. Not unsurprisingly, infection, gangrene and post-operative death was common. Even the smallest wounds could fester and kill the patient. Wounded soldiers routinely had entire limbs amputated because there was no way to treat the infection from a small bullet hole. Woman and babies routinely died as doctors unwittingly carried diseases from one mother to the next. But were these men “fools?”

Well, some of them were, because when one doctor pointed out the correlation between cleanliness and disease, they ridiculed him to the point, literally, of driving him insane. Remember, one of the Biblical definitions of a fool is someone who refuses to learn from his mistakes. But eventually other doctors saw that there was a relationship between washing one’s hands and a decline in infectious diseases. They then changed their behavior and have since saved millions of lives. However, for a long, long time, thousands, no, hundreds of thousands of people DIED because doctors acted foolishly. They did not understand the way that God’s creation worked, and as a result, people suffered unnecessarily.

We can legitimately extrapolate this to the way Christians live their lives, and the effects it has on their socio-economic situation. Christians may well be ACTING foolishly, not necessarily because of any moral problem on their part, not because they are in willful sin or rebellion, but because they lack wisdom. They do not know how to get the wisdom that God promised and consequently, are living contrary to the way that God has established His creation to run. They then suffer the inevitable result.

Think of it this way; you promise to feed your children. Your ten-year-old son asks for some breakfast. You tell him to go to the cupboard, pull down a bowl, then go to the pantry and get some cereal, and then go to the refrigerator for some milk. You have provided just what you promised, he asked for food and you told him where to find it, but it requires a little effort on his part to obtain. What would you think of a child screaming and crying “My Daddy won’t feed me?” If the child refuses to do what you told him to do and goes hungry, it is not YOUR problem, but his. And as a good father, though you would rebuke and correct your son, you would let him go hungry until he got off his chair and did what you told him to do! And if he still sat their whining and crying, you might even have to spank him a bit, to give him an incentive to obey you AND feed his tummy!

Sadly, many Christians appear to expect to be spoon-fed their entire lives. God promises wisdom to those who ask of Him, and then gives it richly in the Scriptures (with the Proverbs being one of the clearest places). But most Christians will not take the time, or the effort to study those Scriptures. They then go spiritually hungry, complain about their situation but never do what they have to do be fed!

Now getting back on track; as mentioned before, the difference between a fool, and a man who just lacks wisdom, is that the godly man will LEARN from his mistakes, while the fool continues in his folly. A fool WILL NOT CHANGE. He will not take advice (26:12, 16, etc.), he does not seek after wisdom (1:22), he is perfectly happy doing the same thing over and over again no matter how disastrous the outcome (26:11). One of the classic definitions of insanity is someone doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting a different result. Yet, many professing Christians live just this way. They are in one financial emergency after another, their lives are an ongoing economic disaster, and yet they continue to do the same dumb things sometimes it seems without ever “getting” the connection between their actions and their situation. Often, they will not seek counsel, but delight in speaking their own mind. They want to justify, rationalize, find mitigating circumstances why what they did was “OK.” However, the one thing they will not do is change the behaviors that impoverish them.

Take for example a family that does not control their spending; let’s call the father “Bob.” “Bob” allows his family to amass considerable credit-card debt, paying exorbitant interest rates every month, because he does not carefully budget their finances. Say “Bob” then receives financial counseling to take out a small mortgage on his house so that he can replace the high interest rates of his credit cards, with the significantly lower interest of a home equity loan. Now the family still has debt, but “Bob” is in effect saving hundreds of dollars of month with a lower interest loan. However, if “Bob” does not change the behaviors that got the family into trouble in the first place, their situation could get even worse. If they continue to live beyond their means (and if they are so foolish so as not to tear up their credit cards) then they could well end up amassing NEW credit card debt on top of their new mortgage payments! Now they have a mortgage AND high interest debt!

Sadly, all too many Christians live just this way. They rob Peter, to pay Paul, using one credit card to pay off another. They risk losing everything, not to mention the stress and pressure of living in daily debt because they will not change the behaviors that got them into trouble in the first place. Such people often complain about their situation, but are not willing to change the attitudes and behaviors that keep getting them into trouble.

These people need to read carefully what is being written here. Maybe they are just unfortunate souls who lack wisdom, and do not know any better. But maybe, just maybe, they are fools, who need to be rebuked and not coddled. Christians have to ask themselves some very hard questions if they want to change their economic situation; are they willing to seek wisdom, to value it, to cherish it, and then do what is necessary to apply it in their lives? Will they receive sound, godly, and wise counsel and make the necessary changes, or will they insist on continuing to do things their own way? The answer to that question reveals whether a man is poor because of a lack of wisdom, or destitute because he is a fool.

But what is this “wisdom” that is so important to have? Though we gave a brief definition earlier, a more detailed explanation is perhaps now in order. I would argue that the Scriptures define wisdom as understanding, accepting and applying certain unchanging and universal principles based on the character of God that are built into the very fabric of creation. Proverbs 3:19 says, “The Lord by wisdom founded the earth, by understanding He established the heavens…” All creation was designed by God to reflect His nature, being and glory (Psa 19:1ff). Proverbs 8:22 says of wisdom, “The Lord possessed me at the beginning of His way, before His works of old. From everlasting I was established, from the beginning from the earliest times of the earth.” Thus not only did God USE wisdom in creating the earth, He also POSSESSED wisdom as a part of His immutable nature. Therefore, since all of Creation reflects God’s nature, and wisdom is a part of that nature, it is a part of the very fabric of reality.

Wisdom is the knowledge of the One True God and of His ways; “the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Pvbs 1:7). God, because He is God, is the standard by which all other things are measured. Thus, the way that God does something IS the right way to do it. Men must then conform their ways to God’s or suffer the consequences. They must submit to His Law. They must humble themselves before Him, and in the words of the Apostle Paul, “walk in a worthy manner” (cf. Eph 4:1).

Now, God’s ways are NOT our ways, and His thoughts are not our thoughts (Isa 55:8ff) and much of what we “know” to be true, isn’t really. Sin is the basic orientation of men to be as “gods” themselves (cf. Gen 3:5) wanting the world to revolve around them and to determine good and evil for themselves. It takes a sovereign act of God in His grace to redeem man from this self-orientation. Sanctification is the process whereby we put off the old nature in rebellion to God, and learn to walk in the new nature of Christ (cf. Eph 4:17ff). Therefore, it takes time, diligence and conscientious attention to study the things of God to achieve wisdom.

In Joshua 1:8 God says, “This book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you shall make your way prosperous, and then you shall have success.” God gives us His Law (i.e., the entirety of His commandments, statutes and ordinances revealed throughout Scripture) by which we are to govern our lives. It takes time and thought and attention to detail to work out all the implications of His commands, and by the grace of His Spirit conform our lives to it. Notice that prosperity is conditional upon being careful to do according to “all that is written in it.” The “all” is important. It is not just academic understanding of theology that is required, but conforming our lives to God’s ways. Sadly, some Christians just do not seem to get the connection.

There is much confusion and misinformation about the Law that God required Joshua to meditate upon. Some see it as a legal code given to ancient Israel and therefore no longer relevant to us today. But think with me, if the Law were a straightforward legal code, why would Joshua have to meditate on it? When a traffic sign says, “55” mile per hour, you do not need to think about it, you just have to obey it! But God commands us to MEDITATE upon His Law, so that we might be careful to do according to all that is written in it. What is He getting at?

The Old Testament Law is NOT really a legal code (at least in the way we think of such things) but rather specific applications of certain unchanging moral laws built right into the fabric of Creation. These moral laws are summarized in the Ten Commandments, but the Old Testament also gives us “case laws” which are specific ways that this summary is to be worked out in various situations. We are to study what God tells us to do HERE, so that then we can figure out what He wants us to do THERE. That’s why they are called, “case laws”; they give specific information about how the moral law (i.e., the Ten Commandments) is to be applied to specific situations or “cases.”

The Westminster Confession requires us to study to determine the “general equity” of the Old Testament Law and see how it applies today (WCF 19:4). The Confession understands that there were certain unique laws given to Israel but others that apply to all people, in all ages. Many portions of the Old Testament Law was largely typological in that they pointed to Christ; i.e., contained pictures and shadows of Jesus and was intended to lead the people to Christ (e.g., the oft called “ceremonial” laws that concerned certain aspects of worship). But at the same time, were God’s commandments just arbitrary rules and regulations that are simply irrelevant now that Jesus has come?

Think about this example; one of the Old Testament case laws required a railing to be placed around the roof of a house (cf. Deut 22:8). Is this just an obscure “ceremonial” law applicable only to ancient Israel? Or were there reasons why God gave this specific command; reasons that apply to everyone, in all times? Let’s look at this situation in more detail; in those days, roofs were flat, and when the weather was pleasant, people went up at the end of a day to eat and fellowship where it was cool. The roof was actually like a modern living room. Now if you walk around a flat roof at night, when the lighting is poor at best, and with no railing, it is likely that someone is going to fall off and be seriously injured or even killed. The Law stated that if the homeowner did not put a railing around his house, and someone fell off and died, he was considered “blood guilty.” This meant that he was responsible to the civil magistrate and could be held accountable.

Now does God require railings around roofs today? Generally speaking, no, because most of us have peaked roofs, and we do not entertain up there. But what about the situation where we happen to have a deck off one of our upstairs bedrooms? Does God require you to put a rail around that deck? I would argue, yes, He does. The general equity of this Law here is that we are required to take certain actions to prevent accidents, and if we do not, then we can and should be held liable. The specific law is no longer applicable (at least to most of us) but the principle (or “general equity”) behind it remains valid and binding. If you live in a city up North where it snows in the winter, you probably know that if you do not clean the ice off your sidewalk, and someone slips and injures himself, you can be sued. This is a direct modern application of this same Old Testament Law.

But to understand these things, you have to think about them, to meditate upon them. You have to know what God says about roofs and railings, and consider how this applies to other principles that concern how we are to treat one another. We must then prayerfully consider what it is that God is getting at. You then need to think through how this universal, unchanging principle applies to YOUR situation. The result of this process is called “wisdom.” Thus wisdom is, understanding how God’s commands apply to specific life situations. It also implies a willingness to change our lives accordingly; there is no virtue in having knowledge, without application (1 Cor 8:1).

Conclusion; Christians can suffer from economic troubles because they lack wisdom, and live foolishly. They do not live according to the way God has created His world to operate. Wisdom will take time and diligence to acquire. The fool is a man who refuses wisdom.

Proverb for Further Consideration

8:32 “Now therefore, O sons, listen to me, for blessed are they who keep my ways. Heed instruction and be wise, and do not neglect it. Blessed is the man who listens to me, watching daily at my gates an, waiting at my doorposts. For he who obtains me finds life and obtains favor from the Lord. But he who sins against me injures himself all those who hate me, love death.”

11:14 “Where there is no guidance, the people fall, but in abundance of counselors there is victory.”

Owning a firearm for self-defense is politically and culturally risky; even though the number of armed Americans increases almost daily, STILL the popular conception of a firearm-owner is some kind of paranoid “red-neck” gun-nut who is more danger to his family and neighbors than to any criminals. Of course, the statistics that show firearms being legally used millions of times a year to prevent assaults, rapes, burglaries, etc., never enter the mainstream consciousness because the media refuses to acknowledge that private ownership of firearms serve a vital function in ANY society. But the reality is that more often than you think, owning the RIGHT kind of firearm can mean the difference between life and death.

This was brought home to me recently by a friend who lives “back East.” Moving from the crime infested big city to a friendly rural area where the biggest story on the evening news is the moose walking down Main Street, my friend “Bob” has never felt so secure. However, not too long ago, it seems that he was awoken in the middle of the night by one of his dogs barking outside. Usually, just shouting “Stop that Noise!” is enough to make his well-behaved dogs shut up and go back to sleep. This time, one of the dogs refused. Wearily he got out of bed to see what the problem was when he heard a “chuffing” noise near his garbage; sure enough, a six hundred pound black bear was rooting through the rubbish.

Now “Bob” grew up on a farm and is not unused to wildlife of various sorts. And let’s admit it, a bear in your backyard is really kind of “neat;” so while he was watching the bear, his wife got the camera and took some interesting pictures that would make a great story for friends and neighbors. However he was a little concerned, he has small children and bears CAN be dangerous (see my essay, “Wild Animals”). But at that point, he didn’t think too much about it other than the excitement of seeing some wildlife in his front yard.

Well, bears are some of the smarter animals and they soon learned that “Bob’s” house was the ursine equivalent of MacDonald’s; every night a different one would show up and sample the latest gourmet offerings of the trash cans; annoying but still, kind of “neat.” A few nights later, they heard the dog barking again and so my friend and his wife went out on the deck to take some more pictures.

As they stood on the deck overlooking the trash bin watching the bear rooting around, suddenly, the bear noticed them! Rather than running away (as one might expect), the bear reared up and started climbing OVER the deck rail (about 6-8 feet off the ground) coming directly towards “Bob’s” wife. Now just think what COULD have happened here; and what HAS happened many times before. Say all you want that “the wildlife was here first;” this was an extremely dangerous situation. Wild animals are only cute and cuddly in Disney Movies or when safely observed from behind bars at a zoo. This bear was not making a false charge to threaten or intimidate but insisting that HE was going to have dominion over “Bob’s” property and “Bob” and his wife were seen as a threat to that dominion; a threat it was perfectly willing to “neutralize” with gruesome force. “Bob” and his wife were in imminent and otherwise unavoidable danger of death or grievous bodily harm. Furthermore, he had less than a second to make a decision and act. Should he run and try to get back inside the house? Should he wave his arms and try to out intimate the bear?

Thankfully, Bob understands some things that a lot of people do not. First, because he knew bears are dangerous, he had picked up his handgun BEFORE he went outside. He wasn’t looking for trouble, just taking precautions.

Secondly, and in this case, even more importantly, he understood that guns are not magic devices that when waved in the general direction of a problem will make it go away. The average person purchasing a firearm for self-defense is more likely to have developed his understanding of the function, purpose and usefulness of a weapon from television and movies. Hollywood creates all sorts of myths about the destructive effects of magical guns that blow massive holes through walls, make cars explode or throw a 200 pound man ten feet backwards from the shock of being hit with a bullet weighing a fraction of an ounce.

In reality, a gun is simply a device that uses the application of certain basic principles of physics. It is a way of concentrating force. For example, if you hit a man in the chest with your fist, you might hurt him, but will unlikely cause him any serious injury because the force of the blow is spread out through the knuckles and fingers and across his chest and ribs. However, if you hit a man in the chest with a knife, you will seriously injure him, possibly even fatally, because the same force is concentrated in the point of the blade to a specific point on his body. That’s the reason why sharp blades are more effective than dull ones; sharpening something allows more force to be placed on a smaller area. The more that the force is concentrated the more effective it is in penetrating or cutting.

A gun works the same way; it is not REALLY the type of gun that is important, as the type of round that is being used. Sure there are differences between makes and models of firearms; some are more inherently accurate, some more reliable, some more ergonomically designed, etc., but whether some people like to admit it or not, the LOOK of the gun actually has more influence on their perception of its effectiveness, than anything else. How else to explain the “assault weapon” ban in America? The so-called “assault weapons” are simply semi-automatic rifles that are otherwise perfectly legal, EXCEPT they look, really, REALLY mean. (See sidebar #1 on the Assault Weapon Ban)

Because certain guns LOOKED bad, then therefore some people were convinced that they must BE bad! They unconsciously adopted a myth about firearms and then enacted that myth into law. But many others on the opposite side of the gun-issue also believe in pretty much the same myth. All one has to do is peruse a random copy of any gun magazine to see various companies capitalizing on the “look” of the firearms they offer for sale. The naïve buyer assumes that the effectiveness of a weapon is tied to its appearance.

For example, I have known a number of gun-owners to spend a lot of time and money deciding which pistol to buy, but never give ten seconds of thought as to which rounds they are going to use in it. I have known some otherwise very smart, well educated people spend a small fortune for an expensive pistol for self-defense, and then only use full metal jacked rounds! (See side bar #2 for the history of bullets…). At best, they simply ask the gun store owner for his advice, or the advice of the “gun store cowboys” who always seem to be hanging around. But too often, they go to Wal-Mart or such and just pick up the cheapest box of ammo they can find.

Full metal jacketed rounds are the LEAST effective bullets ever devised and were only “invented” in the first place to make guns LESS lethal! British soldiers had discovered in one of their colonial wars that if they cut a cross-shaped notch in the tip of their bullets, it would literally blow a hole in the enemy. The notched bullets expanded upon striking, increasing the diameter of the bullet, thus making a significantly larger hole and obviously increasing the possibility of catastrophic damage. These bullets, called “dum-dums” (possibly because they were developed at the “Dum-Dum” arsenal in India) were horribly effective; so much so that international law forbid their use in military conflicts. Thus modern day military weapons are required to have “full metal jackets” (bullets composed of a soft composite core surrounded by a thin copper jacket). These bullets will not normally expand when hitting something; in fact, they will often pass right through a body leaving only a small hole. Now as they enter and exit something, they WILL impart a portion of their energy to that body, causing serious damage. But they are not the instant killing devices as commonly supposed.

During the battle in Mogadishu, dramatized in the movie, “Black Hawk Down” some American soldiers reported firing entire magazines into attacking Somalis gunmen before they would go “down.” The high velocity M-16 bullets are small and punch nice, neat little holes in a person that eventually, may kill them, but often will not stop them when they are pumped up with adrenaline and drugs (as many of the gunmen were). Full metal jacked rounds are politically correct, but are not terribly effective.

Americans should know better; after all we faced a similar problem in suppressing the Moro guerillas in the Philippines at the turn of the 20th century. More than a few US Army officers armed with .38 caliber revolvers were killed after emptying their revolvers into machete wielding fanatics hopped up on drugs. The bullets simply lacked sufficient force to stop an attacking adversary. As a result, the US Army developed the .45 ACP which was our standard pistol round until the 1980’s-when it was replaced by the Beretta 9MM. Actual battle use has shown that the 9MM is not an adequate caliber in its military format; the high velocity 9MM full metal jacketed round simply will not stop an attacker. While the target may later bleed to death from his wounds, those wounds will not stop him before he does a little wounding of his own.

My favorite story about the 9MM comes from an Israeli army officer during one of their wars against the Arabs whose command bunker was attacked by a suicidal fanatic. He said, “I don’t know why you Americans are so against the 9MM. Why, I shot him 7 times and he went right down!” He was using an UZI, a 9mm machine pistol with a large capacity magazine. I do not know about you, but if you HAVE to shoot something, do you really want to have to shoot SEVEN times before you can stop the attack? Will you even have TIME to shoot that many times?

Special Forces in the US military and Police SWAT teams have now gone BACK to the .45 just because though they are still restricted on the type of bullets that can be used, they know that a BIGGER bullet, means a BIGGER hole; it ain’t rocket science. While bullet placement is ALWAYS important, the simple fact is that a bigger hole means a quicker stop.

Now having said that, the 9MM CAN be quite effective with the right round, and careful bullet placement; even a 9MM full metal jacketed round in the head or heart will most likely cause instant death. But no matter how good one may be punching holes in paper targets on the range; few shooters in the real world can achieve that kind of accuracy in the stress of a lethal force encounter. I have seen numerous police gunfights caught on the dash-mounted video-cameras of patrol cars where officers, extensively trained, emptied 14-18 rounds of 9MM at point blank range at armed felons, and MISSED! Not for a moment am I disparaging these brave men’s professionalism or expertise; it is a whole different world when the target is firing back!

But if you are involved in a lethal force situation, you do not have the luxury of having a platoon of men surrounding you with rifles, machine-guns, tanks and artillery. And now thanks to our gun laws, you probably do not have a high capacity magazine available, either. All you have is what you are carrying on your person. You do not necessarily want to KILL your attacker, but you do not have the luxury of wounding him in order to demoralize his comrades. You have to STOP him, and the cowboy myth of shooting the gun out of his hand, or wounding him in the arm or leg will get you killed (nothing makes a bad guy angrier than being shot; they tend to take it real personal).

Therefore for self-defense you must have three things; a caliber that is large enough, with enough power behind it, and a bullet that will dump the energy into the target to stop the attack as quickly as possible. Granted, people have been killed by even the smallest calibers like .22’s (a weapon designed for shooting rabbits, squirrels and other small varmints); but there are enough cases on the book to show that men have been shot 20 or more times with a .22 and still killed their victims; better not depend on “mouse guns” in an emergency. (See Side bar #4 on Non-Lethal Use of Force)

Thus when purchasing a handgun, forget the looks, instead focus on the caliber (how large a round it fires) and the type of bullet you plan to use. For the average person, that means some sort of “hollow-point” ammunition. A hollow-point is a bullet with the center scooped out; essentially capitalizing on the “dum-dum” concept invented by the British. When a “hollow-point” round hits a target, the force makes the edges peel back, increasing the diameter of the bullet, thus making the hole larger in the target larger as well as increasing resistance and imparting more energy. You do not want a bullet that travels through the attacker, exiting out the back and then possibly hitting someone standing behind them. You do not want a bullet that will expand too quickly and thus not penetrate deep enough to cause disabling damage. You want something that will if possible, impart sufficient energy into the attacker to increases the likelihood of the wound being catastrophic enough to cause unconsciousness or death almost instantly.

Now I could get really graphic here and describe from my research library, all the gruesome details of what happens when a bullet hits a human body; but what is the point? I enjoy a good steak, but have little interest in the details of how beef goes from the feedlot, to the slaughterhouse, to my grill. I just would rather not know. In the same way, I’d rather not know all the medical facts behind bullet injuries; all I want to know is that if I ever HAVE to use my firearm for self-defense, it will do the job quickly and effectively with minimum risk to me, my family, or my neighbor down the street. We all pray that we will never be placed in a situation where we have to use lethal force, but sometimes, we simply do not have a choice. Either we take the shot, or we, or someone we love, is going to die.

Which brings us all the way back to “Bob;” Bob never hesitated. Before coming to look at the bear, he took his .45 caliber pistol out loaded Federal Hydra-Shock bullets. He jacked one in the chamber, and was ready. He was not looking for trouble, but just taking a sensible precaution. Federal Hydra-Shocks are well-tested hollow pointed ammunition, and in a .45 caliber round, have a well deserved reputation for effective stopping power.

Thus, when the bear jumped over the railing of his deck, at a range of literally 36 inches, Bob shot the bear once in the head; settling once and for all the .45 vs. 9MM debate- the bear dropped down dead. OK, maybe someone could find fault with a man taking pictures of a bear eating his garbage. Maybe he could have called the county animal control officer (though where he lives, they would have probably told him to shoot the stupid brute and not bother them over such trifles). But remember, he has little children who play outside all the time, and now a family of bears had determined that his home was their new picnic area. Furthermore, all the myths of “Gentle Ben” went out the window when that bear charged his wife holding the camera.

But “Bob” didn’t believe the myths; either about wildlife or the magic stopping power of guns. He had enough “gun,” and enough “bullet” to do the job. He had practiced with his weapon and knew what to do when there wasn’t enough time to think. He saved himself, and his wife, from a vicious mauling or even death.

That makes him a hero in my book; and a smart one at that. Did I mention that he had a friend staying over that night-a friend who was armed with a 12 gauge shotgun loaded with triple ought buckshot to back him up? “Bob” is no fool; if something went wrong (as it did), even his .45 might not be enough to stop a charging bear so he had “back-up.” Even a .45 is no GUARANTEE against something as large as a bear (see Sidebar #5 on the most effective handgun rounds).

If you are going to have a weapon for self-defense, make sure it can do the job you need it to do, when you need it to do it. I hate to think what would have happened if “Bob” had been like certain people I know, carrying a small caliber pistol with full metal jacket ammunition. This story might have had a far different ending; and a more gruesome one. As it is, “Bob” survived a lethal force situation, protected his family, and even has a great “war-story” to tell because he understood the difference between gun myths, and reality. Do you?

Sidebars: Interesting Stuff

Sidebar 1: Assault Weapons

Technically speaking, an “assault weapon” is a fully automatic rifle that allows the gun to continuously fire when the trigger is pulled. The weapons banned under the Clinton Régime are “semi-automatic” rifles that require the trigger to be pulled for each round fired. These weapons are perfectly legal to own in America just as long as they do not LOOK like their military counter-parts.

The Germans developed the “Assault Rifle” concept in World War II to counter Russian human wave attacks. The Russians had armed many of their troops with bulky “machine-pistols” which were high capacity, automatic weapons firing a pistol cartridge. This means that though the range very short, if the Russians could get close enough, these weapons were devastating because of the sheer number of bullets they could fire; especially since the German soldier was armed with a bolt action Mauser rifle that had been in use for almost fifty years.

Thus the Russians could overrun German positions because the Germans could just not fire fast enough to stop them; not even with “machine-guns.” Technically speaking a “machine-gun” is an automatic weapon that fires a rifle round; a “machine-pistol” (or “sub-machine gun”) fires a pistol round. Rifle rounds are larger, with more powder and heavier bullets, but they also have more recoil. Though it might look really “neat” in action movies to have the hero man-handle a machine-gun and mow down hoards of enemies, in reality, you just cannot reliably control a machine gun unless it is resting on something as you fire. Pistol rounds are usually much more controllable but because they are smaller, do not have the energy needed to reliably stop an enemy. Also, machine-guns are expensive, bulky and there is usually only one for every 5-10 soldiers. Machine pistols are cheaper, easier to manufacture, and do not require so much training to use effectively. But because of their short range, they only have a limited use on the battlefield. But put LOTS of machine-pistols in a numerically superior enemy (as the Russians were in World War II), and the sheer volume of fire can overwhelm a defender.

So, some bright German engineer decided to go the Russians one better by inventing a weapon that shot an intermediate round somewhere between the ones traditionally used in a pistol and the ones in a rifle; and still accurately fire on full automatic; hence the first “assault weapon.” You could “assault” a position by overwhelming the enemy with the sheer number of bullets being fired that were longer ranged than machine-pistols. Conversely, you could stop an assault on your position by the same means. Today’s militaries across the world have largely adopted the assault weapon concept and the rounds used today are significantly smaller than the rifle rounds used in World War’s I and II.

And in CERTAIN situations, an assault weapon might be a good idea; American forces in Korea also faced human wave attacks when the Chinese entered the war. We were a little better prepared than the Germans had been because our troops had semi-automatic rifles (meaning that a round was fired with each pull of the trigger). However, even that was not enough, because American soldiers found that they ran out of bullets faster than the Chinese ran out of bodies. So the US military eventually ended up with the M-16; an “assault weapon” that originally could fire on full auto with a round that was light enough not to cause TOO excessive recoil.

The point is of course (we DID have a point with this historical digression) is that it is perfectly legal in America to own a fully automatic weapon, provided one pays the proper license fees. But 99.9% of the “assault weapons” that were banned are NOT assault weapons; they are simply semi-automatic rifles that LOOK like their military, fully automatic counter-parts. To meet the new regulations, they simply have to take off some of the “military” features such as a bayonet lug, pistol grip, flash suppressor, etc., NONE of which affects the lethality of the weapon in ANY way!

Sidebar 2: A Brief, Over-Generalizd and Not Too Technical History of Rifles and Rounds.

For the average person who doesn’t pour over the latest edition of “Guns and Ammo” magazine, a full metal jacketed round is the type required by the Geneva Convention for military forces. In the old days, bullets were made of soft lead. When fired from the black powered firearms of the 19th century, this meant that the bullet traveled relatively slowly (when compared to modern firearms) and therefore had less kinetic energy. To make up for the low kinetic energy, the bullets were larger. The soft led balls deformed on impact, creating a large hole, but usually stayed within the body.

Interestingly enough, (if you have a gruesome bend) the bullets used in those days frequently did not directly cause death. Instead, when the bullet entered the body, it often carried with it bits of cloth from the victims clothing; clothing that was usually dirty. Granted, these bullets could be lethal enough, but people often died of gangrene and infection from the dirty clothing rather than from their actual wounds. That’s why the only hope for a wounded man in those days was amputation; surgeons cut off the wounded limb before the infection could spread and kill the patient. People suffering from otherwise non-lethal chest or belly wounds invariably died of infection.

As an interesting side-note, if you saw the movie “Gods and Generals” Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson was accidentally shot by his own pickets when coming back from reconnoitering the lines. He actually survived the many wounds he received (though losing an arm) but died a few days later from infection.

Thus, the older, black-powder guns firing soft lead bullets could be deadly if they hit a vital spot; but were not necessarily all that effective. Which by the way of another interesting tangent, explains why American marksmen, who had grown up with hunting as an important source of food, were so much hated by the British during our war of independence.

American units could often not afford to be equipped with the smooth bore muskets that were all the rage for civilized countries. Instead many soldiers had to use their own smaller caliber, rifled weapons that were developed for hunting. British troops were used to standing about fifty yards from their opponents firing in volleys; while no particular musket could be reasonably expected to hit much beyond that range, the sheer volume of fire was guaranteed to eventually wear down the enemy.

Furthermore the British trained their troops to fire an unprecedented three rounds a minute and hold their ground even while taking enormous casualties. No army in the world could stand up to the British in a “fair” fight. Every time the Americans met the British in such a battle, we came out the worse for the experience (with only a couple of exceptions to prove the rule).

Where we Americans really excelled was at using rifles; weapons that had a thin spiral groove cut on the inside the barrels that imparted a spin to the bullet, thus stabilizing it in flight. The bullet therefore could travel further and hit targets accurately at unheard of ranges. When combined with wearing buck-skin clothes that blended into the trees and forests, and shooting from behind stone walls and trees at ranges the British could not hope to hit anything at, one can see why they were so upset with us; it just wasn’t playing fair!

Americans also “cheated” by using “buck and ball;” they would load two .32 caliber “buckshot” with their regular bullet therefore sending more lead downrange. While the additional buckshot was not necessarily lethal, it did cause additional wounds which caused a serious morale problem for the British.

However, fast forwarding from the War of Independence to the late 19th century, eventually, “smokeless powder” (nitroglycerine soaked in cotton fabric) replaced black powder, and all firearms (apart from shot-guns) had rifled barrels; both developments meant that guns could shoot at longer ranges, more accurately and still hit their targets harder than ever before. Bullets could then be smaller because the “powder” was more effective; i.e., more force meant the bullets traveled faster and therefore imparted more energy even though they were smaller in diameter. For example, in the 18th century, .50 caliber musket balls were common; by the end of the 19th century, .30 caliber bullets were common. Today, .22 caliber rounds are standard for military purposes (caliber refers to the diameter of the bullet; e.g., a .50 caliber bullet is ½ inch in diameter).

Again, it is all a matter of physics; the effectiveness of any weapon is based on two criteria; the amount of energy produced and the kind of projectile that is fired. If you INCREASE the energy, then there is more force available and potentially, more damage can be caused; just think of the difference between being hit by the proverbial 90lb weakling and a 250 pound professional boxer. One definitely has more, potential power available than the other. On the other hand, if you “improve” the projectile, even though there is less force, you can actually increase the damage; give the 90lb weakling a pointy stick and put boxing gloves on the wrestler!

Sidebar 3: On The Philosophy of Wounding Rather Than Killing on the Battlefield.

Now to be fair, the military has a method to their madness; they understand that killing an enemy takes one man off the battlefield, but WOUNDING him takes two or three off the battlefield. Warfare is not about killing, really; it is about imposing your will on the enemy. The first one to loose their will to fight, loses the war (hence it can be said that we “lost” the Vietnam war even though we won all the battles; we lost the will to continue and therefore the North Vietnamese “won”).

Therefore if you demoralize the enemy, or remove his will to fight, then you win. Wounded soldiers scream, cry out, take up precious resources, and demand to be evacuated. They require doctors, hospitals, nurses, and medicine. There are few things as demoralizing as watching a friend die from his wounds in horrible agony because YOUR leaders do not have the time, resources or compassion to take care of someone who fought at their instruction. Therefore, the goal is often to wound as many soldiers as possible, rather than kill them.

Besides, soldiers rely on their machine guns as their primary weapons; the riflemen are there to protect the machine-gunner. And in all modern wars, artillery is the actual real “killer” on the battlefield. Rifles are often seen as a way of keeping the enemy pinned down until the artillery can finish off the job.

Thus in many armies, pistols are more of a badge of authority for officers and therefore their effectiveness (or lack thereof) on the battlefield is simply irrelevant. They simply do not care that their 9MM pistols are not terribly effective because it is not really intended to be used. You however, do not have a 105mm howitzer to come to your defense and hence YOUR pistol is all you have. Therefore choose wisely and try to get the most out of what you have.

Sidebar 4: Non-Lethal Use of Force

Firearms are used lawfully millions of times a year to prevent rapes, burglaries and other assaults. Clearly, in the vast majority of instances, the weapons are not fired, merely used to intimidate an attacker. If an assault looks likely (i.e., a person is in imminent and otherwise unavoidable danger of grievous bodily harm or death), then, simply drawing one’s weapon and pointing it at the attacker may well help him decide that “discretion is the better part of valor.” Thus even “mouse” guns can serve an important function in discouraging an attack. I certainly do not want ever to be shot with ANY caliber bullet! And since the myths we have been discussing are so prevalent, a case can be made that even “mouse” guns are better than nothing in certain situations because the bad guy fears the “magical” effects we have been discussing.

However, this brings us to another situation: again, despite the myths; guns are not magic wands. If you draw your weapon you had better be prepared to use it IF necessary, otherwise, it is likely that the professional criminal will sense your doubt and risk the danger to take it away from you and then using it on YOU.

Therefore, BEFORE you decide to be armed, there is a mental preparation you must undergo; can you do what you are threatening to do? Granted, the situation you are facing must demand the lawful use of force, but just as important are you WILLING to take the next step.

Therefore, there are several things to keep in mind. First, stay out of “bad” areas. If you do not want to ever have to use a weapon, stay away from the places where you are likely to meet felons. Walking alone through strange cities or dark alleys at night is an invitation for disaster. Staying AWAY from trouble is infinitely preferable to having to draw a weapon to get you OUT of trouble.

Secondly, remember that you can and MUST walk away from conflicts, if that option is available. A man standing on a street corner making a crude remark about your wife or girlfriend does not justify YOU escalating the situation by getting into a fight which could lead to a lethal force situation. A minor loss of pride is nothing compared to the psychological guilt of wounding or killing a person; not to mention the legal problems.

Thirdly, never brandish your weapon JUST to threaten or intimidate. The weapon is there ONLY as a last resort to prevent grievous bodily harm or death. If you threaten someone, and do not have justification, they might well report YOU to the police and you could be convicted of assault.

Finally, if you HAVE to use your weapon, your primary purpose is to stop an assault. If drawing your gun does not work and you have to fire, you want to do everything you can to make sure that the attacker loses all interest in continuing the assault as quickly as possible. This is as much psychological as physical; an angry man full of adrenaline (or on Methamphetamine or PCP) might receive a lethal wound, yet never feel it until after he has pummeled or knifed you to death. On the other hand, some criminals might drop to the ground and cry like a baby with a minor injury to an extremity.

Since you are likely to get only one shot, you want to make sure that it will do everything possible to discourage further action; hence our disdain for “mouse” guns. Simply drawing your weapon might end the situation in SOME cases, but actually having to fire it, even multiple times might not be enough to stop a determined attacker.

However, having said all the above, an argument can be made that it is better to be dependant on carrying even a “mouse” gun, than having no gun available at all.

Sidebar 5: What Are The Best Handgun Rounds?

Trying to determine the “best” handgun rounds is a risky endeavor because EVERYONE has an opinion, usually with statistical tests, actual case-histories of police shootings and just darned prejudice to prove their point.

However, after doing extensive research (I called my friend “Dave”) here are my picks for reliable, effective rounds for the most popular calibers.

I have left out brand names instead focusing on the bullet weight. Bullets are weighed in “grains.” An ounce has 437.5 grains. So for example, a 240 grain full metal jacketed round weighs more than half an ounce.

As you will see, when you go DOWN in caliber, the choices become more important because the weight of the bullet is less, and therefore needs more power behind it to make it both penetrate and expand.

The +P designator is an American affectation which essentially means “high pressure.” Most ammunition sold in other countries would be considered +P in the United States. However, because of the high internal pressures generated, please make sure your firearm is in good condition and was built to handle +P ammunition.

.45 Any bullet weight as long as it is a hollow-point

.40 Any bullet weight as long as it is a hollow-point

9MM 115, 124 grain hollow points (+P helps but not required)

.38 158 grain semi-wad cutter hollow-points (out of a 2” barrel, 125 grain +P jacketed hollow-point)

.380 (9MM short) 90 grain hollow point (but this is getting risky-.380 is a marginal caliber)

.32, .25 .22, etc., are known as “mouse” guns because they cannot be relied upon to stop anything larger than a rodent. Hollow points will not reliably expand because the rounds are too small to propel the bullets with enough force. These can be fun guns to shoot, and if they are all you have, then you have to make do; but as we say, “mouse” guns are dangerous-you could put an eye out with one!” Or as Massad Ayoob, world expert on the use of lethal force puts it, “friends don’t let friends carry mouse guns…”

]]> http://christian-civilization.org/articles/self-defense-myths-and-realities/feed/ http://christian-civilization.org/articles/presuppositions-epistemology-and-alternative-medicine/ http://christian-civilization.org/articles/presuppositions-epistemology-and-alternative-medicine/#comments Tue, 13 May 2008 04:28:35 +0000 Rev Brian Abshire http://christian-civilization.org/?p=94 How To Know whether Your Therapy Works

It is amazing that so many well-read, highly educated, obviously intelligent and articulate Christians can be so easily scammed by charlatans, quacks and con-men when it comes to health issues. One might think that the critical thinking skills so often used to expose theological error would have some crossover value in other areas of life. Yet, nevertheless, hardly a month goes by without some friend, colleague, or reader sending me the latest “holistic,” or “naturopathic” treatment. They will GUARENTEE these “alternative” treatments will ease my aches, clear up my allergies, restore my vigor, increase my intelligence, remove my warts, trim my waistline, restore the hair on the crown of my head and turn me into a regular stud-muffin in the bedroom.

Sadly, when I ask these obviously sincere people how they KNOW that this herb, vitamin, hormone, or whatever will do what it purports to do, they will offer me glowing testimonials from various people that THIS treatment really works! Even more sadly, six months or a year later, these same friends will be touting a NEW panacea and this time, they KNOW it really, REALLY works. And the cycle goes on ad infinitum.

Perhaps these intelligent, sincere and otherwise respectable people do not understand, nor perhaps they have never dealt with the implications of epistemology on alternative medicine. Epistemology is that aspect of philosophy that concerns how we know, what we know.

The genius of Van Til, (and his greatest student, the late, great Dr. Bahnsen) was to demonstrate that we can know, only because God knows. Christian Theism is true, because it is the only worldview that is consistent and coherent within itself. Every other worldview argues either inconsistently from its own presuppositions, or makes arbitrary statements that cannot be verified. For example, have you ever argued with a pagan who insisted, “There are no absolutes”? But wait a minute; he just made an absolute statement! Therefore, he is inconsistent with his own presuppositions. Almost invariably when you point out this logical contradiction, the pagan will turn around and say, “Well, there are no absolutes EXCEPT the statement, ‘there are no absolutes!” But now he is just being arbitrary! How does he know there are no absolutes, except this one? How does he know anything? That is the quandary of the man without God.

The Christian however, has as his most basic presuppositions, the reality of the Living Triune God who spoke authoritatively in His Word the Bible. We can know true things, because God Himself, who cannot lie, told us those things, in Scripture.

But although Scripture is true, it is not exhaustive. Because God created the world as a reflection of His own immutable nature, there are things we can learn by studying that creation. This knowledge is not inspired, and cannot overturn the revelation that God Himself gives in His Word. But on the other hand, we can learn certain “truths” from a systematic study of the way that God has ordained His creation to operate.

The scientific method is uniquely a product of a Christian theistic worldview. We believe that God created all things, and since He is a God of order, and not chaos, a systematic study of the way His providence governs creation can give us true knowledge about that creation. The materialist, naturalist and scientist can discover true things about God’s creation only by thinking inconsistently with their own presuppositions about the ultimate nature of reality.

Now, think with me for a moment; what we think we “know” about creation MAY be true, or false, depending upon the accuracy of our observations. For example, two hundred years ago, spontaneous generation of life was widely assumed in the scientific community. It was obvious; leave some meat out and in a few days, maggots would be all through it. Obviously, life spontaneously came from non-life. This was the universal consensus till one bright boy wondered what would happen if he kept the meat separate from flies and other contaminants; surprise, surprise- when flies cannot get to the meat, no maggots. Today, the only time one ever hears of spontaneous generation is when evolutionists need to fall back on it as an explanation of the origins of life. But everywhere else, we now KNOW that life must proceed from life.

Therefore, sincere men may study the creation, and arrive at incorrect conclusions. The scientific method is an attempt to make our observations more rigorous by clarifying just exactly what it is we are studying. We then propose certain tests to determine if what we think we know can be actually verified by direct repeatable observations.

Now, what has all this to do with alternative medicine? Well, first, let me give a caveat; I am no mindless fan of modern, American technological medicine. I believe (we’ll talk about the importance of belief in a moment) that Westerners have been sold a suspect bill of goods. I would argue that modern medicine doesn’t KNOW anywhere near what they THINK they know about diseases and cures. IN fact, it could be argued that many in the medical profession has become (at least in their own minds) the new “priesthood.” There is a reason why many health professions insist that “M.D.” really stands for “Mostly Divine.”

Yet, even so, Western medicine is sometimes wonderfully effective because it is based on the scientific method, itself possible only with Christian presuppositions. As doctors and researchers study diseases, they develop theories, test them with various drugs and therapies, and use good statistical analysis to determine whether the treatment really does help “cure” the disease or not. Over time, as these studies are replicated and clinical trials conducted, they develop a body of information that appears to meet the rigorous standards of controlled observation.

For example, say a doctor postulates that if a person’s body does not produce a particular hormone, all sorts of nasty things will happen. The doctor can then TEST that hypothesis by giving a number of people with the disease a hormone replacement. If the sample size is large enough, he can then see if a statistically significant number of people improve. If they do, he may be onto something.

But for the experiment to be verified there needs to be a control sample of people with the same disease who did NOT get the same treatment. Then, THEIR recovery rate needs to be compared with the grou