W W W W World Wide Web Witness Inc. Home Page Contents Page for this Volume What is New
THE BIBLE:
NOT THE DECLAMATIONS OR DISTILLATIONS
OF MAN,
BUT THE DOCTRINE OF DEITY
SIN is merely an INTRUDER:
For MAN, SAINTLINESS is NECESSARY!
Chapter 2
News 401
The Australian July 16-17, 2008
The Prime Minister of Australia Feb. 13, 2008
APOLOGIES THAT DID NOT MAKE IT
In a letter to The Australian, someone proposed that the infamous (but not so in that person's eyes) day of THE APOLOGY or The AUSTRALIAN APOLOGY, that of PM Rudd, who defamed the work of Churches in his studied arrogance towards the truth about past work with the aborigines, should perhaps be turned into a national celebration, a holiday or some such thing.
How invidious! Is it not enough to say sorry for all separation of children from parents, in the case of aborigines (for some reason the idea does not seem to apply to ALL cases where this occurs with parents, not of that particular race), and thus to abuse those many people who did well to help the outraged, reduce the suffering, give opportunities to the disregarded or ear to the cries of parents wanting more help for their children outside their communities!
Must this misled nation apologise for what is right and good and kind and helpful and advantageous and even ASKED FOR, given at sacrifice and performed with pity! Are criminals to be the criterion and the masterplan for all ? Is right to be forgotten in the name of wrong!
Is this to be the price of the lie of gesture ? Is the mind not to accompany the heart in such pseudo-electrical discharges of cultural and almost cultic desire ? If MANY were abused in many ways, and many did not esteem as they should the children who were taken, is that the same as saying ALL ? Is it some necrosis of truth which is to accompany the expression of sorrow for cases which, as in many other spheres of life, have been treated irresponsibly ? Are politicians to say 'sorry' for the amazing lack of foresight and planning they often display ? Are they to express sorrow for ALL politicians who EVER had plans, because some failed and did not abysmally ? I think not.
This blight of saying sorry with emotion not equipped with fact is merely an expression of the lie. In this, that it defames many who are or were Christians in their day, and some Churches as well, as if some politician who debased his party by graft were the type and prototype of all, were to be 'covered' in such a way that the party apologised for all its people who ever handled money, in whatever way.
Consider these words from the APOLOGY, which Rudd as PM wrongly gave in the name of a country which is far from united at his distortions. The italicised words are so treated purely in order to help the reader discern the relevance to our topic.
The time has now come for the nation to turn a new page in Australia’s history by righting the wrongs of the past and so moving forward with confidence to the future.
We apologise for the laws and policies of successive Parliaments and governments that have inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians.
We apologise especially for the removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their families, their communities and their country.
For the pain, suffering and hurt of these Stolen Generations, their descendants and for their families left behind, we say sorry.
To the mothers and the fathers, the brothers and the sisters, for the breaking up of families and communities, we say sorry. And for the indignity and degradation thus inflicted on a proud people and a proud culture, we say sorry.
The apology was not only unqualified, but was stated to be unreserved.
Would it have been so very difficult to have said instead something like this, at the point in view.
While we realise that, as with other races, there are those who molest, abuse, mistreat and disregard the very humanity of the young, and in no way wish to idealise, either to overlook the many who have had a grossly unfair attitude to aborigines in the past, or to minimise the extreme dangers of the present from within their own race, yet we do have ground for believing that not one, no not two or three score, but very many aboriginal children in the past have wrongly suffered. Many have displayed wrong attitudes, wrong actions and wrought unfeeling travesties of careless care, or assault.
Many were taken without due regard to the particular situations in their homes, without parental consent or even sure ground that any intrusion was required against that consent, for the action taken. We realise likewise that many were abused when taken away, so that the 'remedy' became in itself an offence.
In dealing with history, it is sometimes difficult to be sure of all the facts, but in this case there appears nothing too spectacular in the way of difficulties, for this. SOME aborigines were wrongly taken, SOME people were wrongly abstracted from their place of culture, SOME intrusions were made and they were many. SOME aborigines when taken out, were exposed to harm, and some actions were taken which did not respect the integral relation of parent to child.
In these particular cases, it was as if to perform either a civic, a secular mission or a religious one on some of the children, rather than seeking in more spiritual ways to bring to them what all people need {he is reputedly a Christian, and this is biblical, so why speak unless you mean it, when relevant and crucially to the point}, which in my own personal view is Jesus Christ, neither white nor black, British nor aboriginal, neither of Western civilisation nor Eastern.
For every single case where one or other of these evils was wrought, I should like to express a bitter regret to the aboriginal people. Many of those intruding were so involved in Darwinian theories, to say no more, without proof, that they had conceptions about races which led to a host of indignities, as if to be aboriginal might imply a certain lack of the very quality of humanness. For this outrageous preconception, which ruled in the minds of many at that time, and may have been back of some scientific investigations for which it is entirely possible murder may have been committed, I again express deep regret, as for its application to this situation for our aborigines, by some.
However, not all scientists were or are of this approach, not all governments held such views, not all children were removed for wrong reasons. In some cases of removal, it was to deliver them, educate them, give to them opportunities and some went freely, evidently with parental consent and hope for help for their own kith and kin.
I cannot express regret for what is good without being hypocritical, for obviously I am glad for that. I cannot state what is not assured truth. It is therefore not removal of children in itself, for which I offer my keenest sympathy and concern, since as with other races as already noted, this is sometimes necessary because of abuse, coming from whatever cultural norm or individual abnormality in a parent or relation. It is however for each case where errors of thought or action, degradation without ethical ground were made, that I give my own personal and I am sure, my widely representative expression of heartfelt regret to those among the removed persons, who suffered from the governments or individuals or bodies guilty in these affairs.
Nor should we forget that many societies in times past, and indeed some in the present one, have governmental or cultural or racial or tribal practices or approaches which degrade humanity, interfere with the individual's conscience, freedom or purity, and distort for the gain or pleasure of some, the lives of others. We cannot therefore generalise, but we are determined not to stigmatise and not for one moment are we going to assume that all cases of removal were either justified or helpful, any more than assume that none were.
It is our hope that this aboriginal people will realise that we all suffer from this or that race, attack or change, and many of us have been at the near edge of invasion by forces openly and decidedly hostile to our welfare, in vast wars where millions were not merely displaced from their families and homes, but from this earth. Our part in any aspect which has in the process of seeking to erect new civilisations and make new uses of a vast land, been hostile to this race, been hostile to aborigines, we here deplore. While this land was not made by or for this or that race in general, but for all, so that none have proprietary rights, and our civilisation did not invade a settled nation governing it all, and it is one for the use of which all are due for answer in the day when judgment comes to this race, the approach has often been insensitive with much to be deplored.
We seek that overcoming our often obvious differences of cultural background and past access to education, we will all without prejudice, now co-operate as made from one original stock, the human race, so that all seek to use the God-given gifts with keenness, as we in our civilisation now more and more seek to give to the aboriginal people every opportunity to adjust, adapt, and find value for the capacities we all share, and all must use that our nation may escape the invasions which so often threaten, the listlessness which is so readily found when objectives are unclear, and the brutalities which may come either from within, or at the hand of hostile forces. These may come, as they have come to many a nation, in the last 60 years, to dictate to us.
May Australia be a place of forgiveness and function, as in many ways it has been, but alas far from consistently, of hope and vision for all.
Such instead of the misleading apology, could have been said, or something with this or that revisions, of this type.
Being factual can be enlivening, and being balanced in expression can be a stimulus to joy and hope. Gestures obviously incorrect, unqualified by reality, not sifted with facts to ensure accuracy, but rather the result of emotion which implicitly attacks the godly works of many who were sacrificial in spirit and goaded by goodwill: these merely submerge the truth, without which no disease or distemper does well! Diagnosis must be accurate, if there is to be hope for a satisfactory remedy.
When politics is not careful about the truth, for whatever reason, it is quite parallel to a law court which may, seen in historical perspective, be found to have done the same. Such may be viewed with something like loathing, as some poor citizen may be given 20 years for this or that, on Devil's Island or some other. We do not hear of the famed Dreyfus case in France, with equanimity, for it was a gross outrage and a resounding disgrace. However, whatever the causes of this betrayal both of truth and of justice, so well exposed in Emile Zola's famous press denunciation, it does not in itself constitute a reason for the abuse of the names of all judges in France in that period. If it were made so, it would be a piece of clowning so gross as to deserve contempt.
If it is well that what DID go wrong, and what DID have racism at base, or for that matter, convenient suppression or hedonistic satisfaction, might be regretted and effort made to remedy what one could. It is well that this be clearly differentiated from acts of mercy, charity and kindness, reliability and reasonableness, pity and help to the afflicted which others in that profession may have attempted, either by reform of attitude or law or personal acts. This is not a matter, in kind, for Australia only, nor should it be permitted to appear generic.
To idealise a situation does not help it. Nor does it help to bedevil it. Truth is always preferable, does not cease to endure, will be used in that divine judgment which never errs when the time comes, and is not the subject of a dream-world apparition to sate guilt or satisfy the pleasures of a culture, or those in it with a particular bent. This is so whether we think of the coming of our civilisation to this country, or of the present time, whether different social mores flutter their flags, and even these have by no means a uniformity throughout the nation or its actions.
Some aborigines have expressed from time to time, no small concern at the multitudes of words or gestures at the present time, it seems, to this extent: that they are not accompanied by workable and consistent solutions. Such things have been reported. It has been reported that some aborigines in far off regions stated something like this: it was better for them in the day of the missionary provisions for them, treatment they received formerly, than it is in this governmental one, so slow and gesturing.
Is it surprising when Howard, as PM, saw fit to enter the scenes of admitted disgrace among aborigines, in the treatment of children in multiplied cases of sexual and physical abuse, and was seeking to act to purge such evils, before being replaced, that what at least bid fair to act when the election consolidated the approach, there was hope ? Now the mode of discussion and apparent dismantling of what was at great expense was beginning to achieve something is being questioned. HAS it led to reform ? HAS it acted to deliver children with that sense of urgency which each individual horror induces, or should stir ?
Whatever the method, it is necessary that it should work. It is not enough to substitute carelessly expressed sorrow, and to do, as in the opinion of some aborigines, not so well at all as did the missions! One prominent aboriginal body has not only sought to have back an appointee in the Howard government's time, someone given for their assistance, but has requested him to act as their delegate in Canberra. This man, they felt, had a stunningly effective approach. The language of approval was not slight!
They feel that he had immense understanding of their position, and had strong emotional attachment. The concept of parley with many leaders, now so strong, may have its merits; but it has also its perils when cases seem to multiply, where precisely some in authority have been those who have abused others of their own race, supported by prestige. Whatever be used, it is necessary to be effective as well as precise about facts.
NOT APOLOGY, BUT REPENTANCE,
NOT FOR SOME THINGS, BUT FOR ALL,
NOT UNQUALIFIED TO MAN, BUT TO GOD
The Bible does not sanctify error, or untruth. It is not a book of gestures but of grace that acted in a supremely practical and sacrificial manner. It is not a Manual of proclamatory substitutes for effectual action, but a divulgement of wisdom. The good Samaritan did not make a speech about the need to improve race relationships (as he well might have done!), while setting up a committee to discuss the best community-endorsed way of having people do more and be more careful about thoughts about things. He provided. This is more delicate ? In some ways, this may be so, in that it is more extensive, but the racial relations in the Samaritan case were both subtle, substantial and erosive. Agreement is often a substitute for what ought to be done, a sad sop of compromise of evil and good: and to what might it be compared ? Is it possible that it could begin to have resemblance to the infamous case of Mugabe, where some are suggesting a COALTION of murderer and the one elected, and his people.
To be sure, this was in the direction so foolishly followed in World War II, when the maestro of murder, Joseph Stalin, was taken into the counsel of the Allies and fought with them, and they for his cause. The Cold War was the bill, and not this only, but the entire pragmatic substitute for faith and righteousness which this represented. It sowed attitudes, glorified stark evil and led to a whole immersion of many, not least in universities, in the folly*1 of the atheistic blundering of a cruel State.
Philosophies of the 'way to go' can vary. You can idolatrise leadership with magnetism, or with flair, or with panache, or even with measure of wisdom as of a scene seen at a distance, or you can idolatrise man with his committees and abandon leadership till every subverted character or group is content. You can be led or lead. You can lead with arrogance or humility, or you can mislead with the same qualities, or at least their appearance.
Important however, is this: that IN acting, you do not by time wastage or method-idolatry, waste your opportunities to act. What is so no less is this: that in so acting, you avoid arrogance in the performance, just as much as weakness and vagueness, wandering witless or unsure in subversion of vision of what is needed. It is necessary with due address which considers each wrong to each child as one would if it happened in front of one's nose in a street, ardently to seek means to perform with truth and address matching the needs of the case. That ? it is a deliverance. There is to be no 'sensitivity' about 'morals' as if yes, it could be understood if sexual misuse of children of quite tiny years were a question for debate. Postures and gestures are not to the point: informed action on truthful bases with practical outcomes, these are.
The nostrum that a base civilisation entered a wonderful culture is ludicrous. NO culture is wonderful, emitted by mere parts of mankind. What is wonderful is Jesus Christ, and the spiritual sensitivity based on truth which He deployed, and the fact that this is not news, but a basic thrust of our civilisation, however woefully unperformed by many. How long is it before this nation will realise that one of the chief reasons for its COMPARATIVE eminence is just that fact, of Jesus Christ and His enormous influence first on Britain and then on our 'colony'. That it had ludicrous contradictions is freely admitted; but for all that, many and vast were His influences from which these distortions were freely made to appear what they were.
It has been sad to hear from various aborigines of my acquaintance, of their contempt for do-gooders, as they might seem to regard some officials, or naive practitioners of law or aid. Why ? It is because they seem to them, to be so easily outwitted, manipulated or bypassed. Nothing stings. Easy excuses can be fabricated. There is apparently a certain diffuseness about the intentions of many which is neither inspiring nor effective. Morals immersed in a sick culture do little.
Sympathy without reality is a recipe for frustration. Harshness and arrogance is another. It is not necessary to imagine that there are no other recipes. Realism is always precious, about the past or the present, and pretentious approaches do nothing more for a social situation than they do for a medical or a spiritual one.
In fact, there is no substitute for love, nothing on offer to replace pardon, not by you to others, but of others to you, nor of the ground for seeking this for oneself, that cleansed, one might the better act with truth and understanding. Which race has not had imposters, preposterous traitors of reality, who wish to sponge on others, or lie to them or to manipulate them or to use their work for their own gain! It is impractical to try to build a misconception of a people as angelic or holy victims, when that is neither true nor near it, when the overall situation is considered. It is as unwise to act as if our own civilisation were not impregnated to a significant degree with the goodness of God. Lapses both social, political and personal have been many; disfaith has had its mould-like ruin far too freely.
Indeed, many of us have been grossly mistreated by own own race, or church as it fell into liberalism, or by some other race or nation. This does not absolve us from being responsible, or make it necessary to overlook endlessly our failings or misconceptions, or to view lightly their remedy. Nor does it make it right to impose without feeling. It is necessary really, if there be any expression of regret, to have it include that for the glorification of the spirit of timeless dreaming or other, as has been attributed to the aborigines, with unqualified enthusiasm by some who view materialism*2 and the rat race as endemic in our land. Extreme views and extreme reactions are no excuse for unrealism, surrealism or hyperbolic generalities.
It is true*2A that some aboriginal concepts included, by all evidence, much on creation itself, and that is good. That some of the concepts are interestingly contrary to some current social follies can also serve as a useful jolt; but glorification of this or that culture, often with undiscriminating filtration of the evil, is not the answer where truth is just the beginning of remedy, and its application its continuation.
It is neither true that ALL of these had some sort of spiritual basis providing stimulus for good and drive for excellence in morals and life, nor that none could draw help from such things. How much help, and with what grounds, that is another question. Comparisons are not racial in character, but must be accurate in fact. It is not invidious to follow the truth. When you know God, and where to find Him, then only is it so much as available!
Because of this trend to idealise what seemed so different, many aborigines have been allowed to feel both immune from responsibility and divorced from any real endeavour to earn their keep, use their talents. One has seen such things. There is a sort of ennui, a bored interest in drugs or drink or casualness or self-affirmation, combined with a sense of having been wronged, which may even extend to the concept of requiring as a right, to be supported in reasonable style and without any kind of supervision that is effective, which the Australian cultural kings seem to inject.
What has good fruit is worthy of consideration; but this is not of that kind. It is not even at all sure that this sort of attitude would have existed, or certainly, that it would have become reasonably extensive, had it not been for this glorification concept among those who, being perhaps in some cases materialistic, had an innate AND understandable longing for something more spiritual.
Of course, you cannot apologise for someone else. You can apologise for errors YOU made, or express regret for what some body which continues, for what it did in the past, which you have neither part nor place in; but to apologise for the errors of others is meaningless. You can detest or condemn, expose or excoriate, seek to help victims as so often done; but for your own good deeds, in terms of the errors of others, you cannot apologise.
This, It is misleading, giving a sense of guilt where not necessarily in THIS respect, does ANY exist in very many. This encourages hope of revenge or manipulation. You could say that the Australian nation felt a deed not only of sympathy but of concern for the results of some actions in its past, which despite a mass of kindness and sacrifice wrought by some, leaves a gap which the nation would like to fill by special help and means of redress where such help can be fruitful.
Apologise however for what is not only factually imprecise, but personally not attributable, is merely to confuse the issue. There IS an issue; and it is far more complex because of these trends for materialism to glorify vague concepts of another kind, and for apologies to corrupt reality by using the term ineptly.
Better than misnamed apologies, are rightly named remedies.
Expressions of regret to some for some things, if accurate, have their place: here inaccurate, they have nothing such. However, it is not apology, but repentance is needed, and this not primarily to man but to God, where an unqualified repentance is the minimum requirement with which to begin the return which is supra-racial but not supercilious, contrite and without extenuation. To misplace however, what is due to God, to man, is not wise. Vilification and glorification can readily become outrageous with man.
When however the approach to God makes no excuses, seeks no exceptions, see the spirit of man for what it is, and absenteeism from the personal life in the Lord as an atrocity wrought before it comes to birth, then there is fair play. It is this approach which is neither misplaced, as if one were some other person in some other time, nor wrongly unqualified, as if one were not cast in sin (cf. Psalm 51), with whatever desires, ideals and desiderata. It is one which is divinely required. Without this, you reject your place, and so do not receive His grace, which depends on truth, and is wrought in no other manner.
BEYOND THE WHITEWASH
AND THE CULTURAL COMMISSIONS, TO THE BIBLE
Having witnessed an Australian Christian mission in Western Australia, and lived for a little time there, one must freely note that here was something entirely different from the special cases of ennui that one has so often met in the social meanderings among aborigines, so often replacing a better thing. This is not to be condemnatory. It has been apparent that the attitudes, often seeming amoral or merely procedural, sometimes illusory, practised by many who seek to act in this sphere, have engendered some of this unhappy result. Lack of expectation, and an empathy which is immersed in error as if its mother, can be deadly. But this was not found in the case in view.
Instead, there was in that community such a sense of purpose, of direction, of joy in education, of glowing faces and joyful hymns that it was a special pleasure to mix with these different but stirred people, who seemed somehow of one's own race, because of the sympathy and understanding of what was common to all, in each. That, it was the sense of correct diagnosis of sin, not generalised but specific, correct remedy and restoration to fellowship with the same God with the same power toward all, influencing all towards affection and interest, each in the other. There was no sense of patronage in it. Nor was there any sense of manipulation.
Man was not playing god, with a broken violin, but presenting himself to the God of creation and redemption, on the path provided, one common to all, Jesus Christ, through whom there is a new fellowship. This is not specifically between races, as if this were the real question, but between redeemed sinners of any race, the spiritual unity being the resultant force, because the underlying problem was being solved in the same spiritual way.
In the young, one could sense a keenness of mind because of an open heart. Here was a message to one and to all, to the facades and failings of this culture and that, without having to be ultra-specific on their relative features. ALL have sinned, ALL have meddled with reality in this way or that, and ALL need the God of their creation, and salvation. This helps to bind as nothing else does, when it is SINCERE, and when not of the type of cultural-spiritual combination which has for so long by so many churches been spat out in contravention of the Bible and contradiction of its demands to keep strictly to its vision.
Let us however leave this particular illustration, and consider the biblical concept of sin and salvation, of need and the workable, of responsibility and of reality, for all.
The Bible, which unlike any particular Australian government, whether of the right or the left, radical or conservative, arrogant or helpful, knowledgeable or ignorant in its disposition, has been unchanged for millenia, is applicable here. Its message is not subject either to political pulsations or drab middle of the road urbanities, lacking all vision, or to invasion by this or that people, or to distortion through repulsion of invasion. It is moreover for one race and for all, glorifies no race, either for its industry or commerce, special gods or their cleverness, its culture or its attainments.
There is no racism here (Galatians 3:23 cf. Going with God ... Ch. 1 , SMR pp. 1175ff., Light ... Ch. 6, *1, Of the Earth, Earthy ... Ch. 13). ALL have sinned. ALL peoples have strayed.
God has appointed times and seasons if by any means SOME might find Him from WHATEVER culture. Some may tend to suppress others, to repress them, or to help them express themselves; but in none of these things as such is wisdom to be found. It is not a matter of one's race or country or self. It is one of the disposition of one's heart, the orientation of one's spirit, to honesty, to integrity, to reality, to knowing and relating to it. This is IMPOSSIBLE for one who invents his own gods, whether materialistic or mystical. There is then always the fact that one's self, surrogate, nation or culture has invented them. There is relativity in this, and arrogance, ambition or resentment become partners readily.
WHEN and only when, the race is not the redeemer, nor the culture, nor the ideas nor the symbols nor the thought of man, but the ACTION of his Maker, is there is a humbling of all and scope for a helpfulness built neither overtly or covertly on what has more of this or that result in which it may glory. When it is realised that MANY are the ways of sinning, whether in materialistic irrationality*2, *1, or in spiritistic New Age or other philosophies*3 , unsupported by reason, not equipped with validity*4, then there is less trend either to debase the more or to exalt unduly, the particular path which any person or culture has chosen.
When it is realised that ALL face not more or less merit, but such a deficiency of merit that death is the correct result (a thing not normally so very popular, for the standards of God are so high that the standards of all cultures appear as ant-hills beneath the brilliant skies*5), then there is less credibility to any concept of racism. What does it really MATTER whether this or that race had this or that philosophy, the extermination of the unfit as in the Nazi application of Darwinism, or the extenuation of the evils of the cruel, as in social reactions, or the apathy of the unmotivated: ALL have sinned.
If some seem better, and nurture more and with more care - and it is true that the avoidance of rapacity IS something in itself better in the realm of violence- in some things, this is well. But does it cleanse from the other flaws, faults, blemishes, contrivances, errors of pride or plausibility, superficiality or spiritual blindness ? and who is judge of that! He has ALREADY judged what rejects the remedy of God, which is based on a debit balance of sin warranting death! (John 3:18). Nor is this rejection the institution of guilt, but its coping stone! Without even that, 'the wages of sin is death' and 'all have sinned' (Romans 6:23), as shown extensively in Romans 5.
Is the moral security of being judge of lesser beings grant in its presumption, even reality to the mighty ? Is confusion king! or is the moral refusal to judge anything while wondering how to make others meet some standards for which one can supply no real ground, being immersed in relativity and the anaesthetic of naturalism, any better ? Then you are ostensibly trying to avoid making any culture or view mandatory or better, while seeking to help people to you know not what, or if you do know it, you know not how you know it; while in any case, you feel it would be better not to formulate what you do, in case you are being directive! Small wonder there is so much confusion, illusion and so little advance in these not so engaging attempts at do-gooding!
What does the Bible say of the case where there is a lack of vision in a people ? This: they will perish. Proverbs 29:17-18 declares this:
"Correct your son, and he will give thee rest; yes, he will give delight to your soul.
Where there is no vision, the people perish: but the one who keeps the law, happy is he."
If you are to correct something wrong, you need to know what wrong is. If you do not, you lack vision. Where a fast-flying aircraft is unaware of its destination, or even the reason for the flight, there is unlikely to be much real progress. Wisdom lacks; fulfilment is obscure. Practicalities are to some extent irrelevant, like some vast governmental programs which are based on philosophies not even tenable, for some sort of common lowest denominator for all the divergencies among the nation.
NOT THE INVENTION, BUT THE
INCARNATION,
NOT MUTABLE BUT CHANGELESS
It is no accident that both the British Empire and the US of America became prodigious in power at times when SOME measure, indeed significant measure of godly and Christian, biblical and Gospel truth was most active in the land. Patriotism might have many bases, but when these not only CAN be, but ARE formulated and expressed and given a logical basis and a spiritual expression, then it has a far greater cohesion. It is then that it is far more a matter for concern to the death in a war, lest what is so good and godly be turned instead into an invader's tyranny, and blindness. Such an attitude of informed bravery was to some extent, the case in Britain's fighting Hitler. Churches were not filled in the extremities for no reason. God was not deaf. Dunkirk did happen.
It is likewise no accident that now there is a vast erosion of major churches, that ludicrous contradictions of the Bible are being propounded even by large and once exceedingly influential church bodies, diversions not only divergent from what is written but in the most flamboyant contradiction of it. After a century of innovation even in Christ's own name, these nations have lost their eminence, much of their admirability, their cohesion and their point. Their power, though not gone, is nothing like what it was in relation to that of their adversaries, which now are not only many, but ruthless with novel forms of power, which are like ironic parallels, almost parodies in assault, of the impudent abuse of the very Bible many professed to instal, while the nations once so firm fled as if from a plague, more and more, till they rushed.
VISION, understanding of the nature of our creation, our Creator, our Gospel, our Lord, is essential. If you reject, then there is no other*6, that stands, even logically. If you inhabit the wasteland of scurrilous seductions of some of the Bible to ally it with various philosophies and additional or contrary mouldings, then the mould is there, and it is like that which turns bread to a mildewed mass, and not the moulding in concrete towers, purpose built. The departure from meaningful insistence on BIBLICAL inerrancy and sufficiency, that when God speaks we need no surrogate, that when Christ ONLY is Master (Matthew 23:8), we dare have no other for our spirits, from Protestantism to an unbalanced admixture of various idolatries and heretical creeds, is merely a prelude to the new assault of Islam, one of these*7.
The SENTENCE on sin does not cease to apply because in mind it is voided (John 8:24). Cancer does not depart if one refuses to recognise it (Jeremiah 2:35*8). I recently had a biopsy taken of a mole that had grown in a shadowy sort of way, the heart of which had been shown to have certain atypical elements. In other words, it was changing, and could have cancer in other parts of it, though the whole was relatively small. From small things, however, the whole body can be colonised and killed! In my case, it was found when the whole was removed, that it was not cancerous, but merely had some mild abnormalities. This was good. The diagnosis could now be given with authority, the prognosis prepared with knowledge, actions could be taken with confidence relative to this situation.
It was necessary to TEST, check and ascertain. God leaves us in no doubt about the cancerous character of sin: it eats, it extends itself, it stretches, it ramifies, it ascends, it is mighty, it charms its way, it asserts its arrogance, it respects nothing, and often not even itself. It asserts itself, it is deft, and deficient (cf. Jeremiah 17:9, Romans 6:23, Ephesians 4:17-19, Psalm 51, Romans 3, 7).
The Lord has passed sentence on the human race, and in this, all its components and classifications, diversities and varieties. Many marvel at its sufferings; for my part, I marvel at the extent of His mercies, that at least for many, the discomforts and plagues to come have had relatively small results, though manifestly they are growing. Yet the sufferings of many are not only a horror of our increasingly mutant age, mischievous in wilful ignorance of God, but a portent. It is not at all a mere matter of climate control as vast forces are unleashed through what one expert has declared most categorically is the result of man's foolishness, of increasingly affected drought and fire areas, of deficient water and increasing smog. These are symptoms, like skin disturbances on the surface. It is what lies underneath which matters.
When this sentence on sin is ignored by any in this race, then, it tends to leave innumerable 'cells' of confusion in the uncontrite soul. It can of course, being repressed, come out like a rash in many cases of depression, however multiple may be the causes of that particular, spiritual disease. It can manifest itself in domestic violence, because patience is gone because vision being vitiated, there is no understanding of the whole point of patience and love, or even desire for longsuffering and helpfulness in love. It can lead to paranoia, where the soul having sinned its way into delusion, brooks nothing and asserts itself above all, in whatever category it takes interest, man or god. It is when the latter is in view, when man asserts his own divinity, as foretold in II Thess. 2:4ff., that climax is reached. Toward that end, man is now increasingly seeking aggregations of nations, so that the declaration of apostasy may be made the more clearly by a representative for many!
It is not merely error which is in view, in a simple behavioural fashion. It is when the salvation from the sentence on sin is likewise ignored, that it becomes like one who having an actual cancer, who refuses its removal, arrogantly self-sufficient, while it proliferates in who knows what 'organ' of the soul, repository of the psyche, area of the spirit.
When you put dictators in Russia or Zimbabwe, you can have the latter refuse to step down, basing the action on hate of what others did in former times, as if this gave ground for endless insubordination against one's own people; or the former have his authority provided, for talk of setting missiles directed at Europe. Is it so hot that a Cold War extension is desired ? Alas the heat does not so diminish!
Why is this so ? It is ostensibly at least, because he does not 'like' the sense of some small measure of security against atomic warfare from a predatory Iran, too near for safety for some nations near to his own. Predatory ? ANY nation which declares from its own glory and sufficiency, through its President that it wishes to destroy another is predatory. What else ? Such is the case with Iran. Verbal missiles thus chase the construction of physical ones, and hatred animates the deadened lives of the mighty, fear and folly as if twins born of the combination.
Thus, these being merely two examples of a world of multiplicity of the inappropriate, of the provocative, while the cyclotrons of escalation or the posturing of untruth, exaggerations and the like expand their wares, there is nor escape. There will be engineering of almost everything to be imagined, both literally and politically. Biblically and assuredly there will arise the same sort of intolerant regime as showed its pretentious face in Mao of China, Hitler of Germany and Stalin of Russia, one which will seek to control the world.
Hitler and Stalin, yes and Mao too, managed to secure a totalitarian control over much of the earth - indeed, less than half, but they tried, oh indeed, they tried. Hitler came nearer than some realised.
These experiments in irrationality and predatory power, whatever their alleged bases, so deemed because of their behaviour, not their songs, have shown clearly enough how VERY vulnerable a survival of the fittest sort of culture, so widespread in this world, can become to the onset of mere force. Indeed, in Russia right now (The Australian, July 17, 2008), there is reported a contest between past figures of the great leaders, to see who gains the most popularity in a quest. Nicholas II is currently ahead, but Stalin is not only not too far behind, but reportedly forms topic for possible request that the Russian Orthodox church ... That ? it is to canonise him, to canonise one who destroyed thousands of its churches! Such is sin, that its stench lingers, its heartless massacres can be overlooked, and it can be deemed perfume.
This is the ultimate plague (cf, Romans 1:32): for the initial cause is joined by its ultimate effect (cf. Revelation 6 - 9), and the effect mirrors it. It is multiform, with contributions from many nations, the ancient and modern maladies looking ambitiously for new syntheses for evil.
The idea is sown; the result is shown. It kills millions, tortures thousands, impales the psyches of more millions, creates endless stories of the invasion of hearts by loss of hope, loved ones, joys and richness of life. Some resent. They seek revenge, redress and condemnation. They act. Others react. The story is repetitive. Corrie ten Boom was one who, originally with her sister in a German concentration camp, though vastly misused, gained the vision of a ministry in the name of Jesus Christ, in which reconciliation to God and to each other would be prominent. By a miracle, a clerical error it seems, while Corrie's sister died while in the Concentration Camp, Corrie herself marched out free and she had time to re-organise her life. Then, after a little, her ministry impacted heavily throughout much of this world for many years.
That is an example in the other way. it is not based on nothing however, but vision, biblical vision, unchanged vision, totally verified vision, vision which is capable of results that adhere to truth and have no come-back. Many try these things, but do so as if to prostitute purity, that of Christ andHis Cross, for profit or pleasure; but it does not meet such criteria. Neither profit nor pleasure are bad in themselves, only as immoral or misplaced actions in purposes selfish and unspiritual, yes unbiblical.
This too is vain. Vision must be of reality if it is to help, and there is no other option available or needed. If God's sending His Eternal Word to die for sin does not open the eyes of man to his enormities of evil, to repent, to seek salvation and to find God, then this world simply goes to its extinction (Titus 2-3, II Peter 3). But there are some who seeing the need, finding the means, put them together and finding God, are redeemed (Isaiah 51:11, Matthew 13). May the reader be one of these!
NOTES
On Communism, see:
Aviary of Idolatry, Delusive Drift or Divine Dynamic Ch. 5,
News 37. 44, 69, 97 (the exploiters, the fanciful,
the Communists, the de-godders and the realities), 98,
News 150 - Taiwan,
The Grating Grandeur and Aggrandisement of Man,
and the Meekness of the Majestic Messiah Ch. 2
Beauty for Ashes
Ch.
6 (and Hong Kong, and the movement of nations in the last century a
concern),
Tender Times for Timely Truth
Ch.
8;
SMR pp.
925ff.,
971-972;
Beauty of Holiness
Ch.
3
(war and force, rising downwards, Tiananmen and truth),
Ch.
4
(liberty, Tiananmen, worship and its
direction in time, its terms and code of truth); History, Review
and Overview
Ch. 1,
Impossible to Men, Open to God Ch.
5
See also Lord of Life Ch. 8.
On Materialism/Naturalism, see also:
The gods of naturalism have no go!
SMR Ch. 10.
On Atheism: See the above, and
http://www.conservapedia.com/Atheism.
See, for example:
Spiritual Refreshings Ch. 9, *1,
It Bubbles, Ch. 9, *1A,
Repent or Perish Ch. 7,
Christ Incomparable, Lord Indomitable ... Ch. 2,
SMR Ch. 4.
An interesting datum is found in TMR Ch. 8. It is this.
One met an aboriginal President of an Australia-wide denomination. Like the writer, that Pastor had no desire for Western dream-time injections into young aboriginal people, in the form of the metaphysical abstraction of organic evolution.
Interestingly, he provided
a fascinating document from the history of
*3 Cf. SMR 866ff..
Cf. SMR Chs. 1, 3, 5, 10, TMR Chs. 1-5,
The Meaning of Liberty and the Message of Remedy.
Cf. Isaiah 1, 2:9-11, Ephesians 4:7-9, Colossians 2:13-14, Ephesians 2:12, Isaiah 64:6, Jeremiah 17:9.
The comfortable pseudo-Christian assurances either that 'we' are palpably good, essentially fine, or at last better than others are a sort of post-spiritual glow which not only bedizens the quasi-laureate brow of the self-assured, but buzzes with the dizziness that long ago forgot that what made British Empire and the USA so great was not their deviation from their own often affirmed Christian values (whether formal, or bustlingly impressive in their extent), but their adherence to them, as far as they did!
In an endeavour to assure everyone that everyone is 'all right', perhaps for some perverse psychological pressure, not only are morals lost, is God denied but truth is clearly left trussed up.
Suffocation of truth is not the result, however, but abasement of man, of a race or a great empire. Endeavours to dispense with truth, culminating in the crucifixion, always forget the resurrection (cf. 1495), in Christ explicit, definitive, corporeal and fulfilling the foretold glory of God. Ignorance or avoidance of these things makes such a rush of ruin that it is poignant to behold, pity being lessened only by the obduracy of those who will not return to the Lord, being free for anything and bound by many things. These, alas, are in danger in the end, as judgment draws near, at the spiritual level of becoming good for nothing (cf. Matthew 5:13, Luke 13:5ff.).
That, it is purely wilful (cf. Romans 1:17ff.).
See: Design and Deity .... esp. Sections 7 and 8, Light Dwells with the Lord's Christ ....
Cf. Divine Agenda Ch. 6, More Marvels ... Ch. 4, It Bubbles ... Ch. 11 and indexes. The Lord often uses roused up enemies because of infidelity (I Kings 11:1-31, II Chronicles 21:14ff.).
Jeremiah 2:35 has a searching approach, not by man, but by God, and it demands realism, not by meretricious mouthing, but from the heart.
Yet you say, ‘Because I am innocent,
Surely His anger shall turn from me.’
Behold, I will plead My case against you,
Because you say, ‘I have not sinned.’