The Irrational and Self-Refuting Worldview of the Secularist

That our modern world, with life in its multitudinous forms is the result of chance has become dogma in the United States, taught in public schools and accepted as the educated belief in the media. To deny the secularist orthodoxy is to place yourself in the inbred gap-toothed hillbilly camp for most people.

Okay, so it is orthodoxy, but is it true? Are their rational reasons for denying it? Is there a possibility for the self-respecting Christian to hold to a different worldview?

Yes, too all of those questions.

Science and education require a consistent, rational, predictable universe, exactly the opposite of chance. Yet the secularist blocks that incompatibility from his mind, lest the foundations of his worldview be shaken.

The creation is intelligible exactly because it was created by a personal, rational God. Chance could not produce an understandable universe. It is just as we know that the straight furrows of a farm require an organized mind to have made them. Unbelievers avoid this basic logic because it implies an absolute God to whom they are accountable. They want a self-existing universe because then there could be no morality or accountability. Yet reason requires a rational universe. Therefore, they depend on the biblical worldview to provide a context for reason and morality, but then deny that same worldview to maintain their myth of autonomy. 

In other words, if the secularist worldview is true, then it must be false, because it cannot sustain itself. The secularist worldview can only be sustained if the biblical, Christian worldview is true. However, again, if the Christian worldview is true, then the secularist worldview is false. No matter how you examine it, the secularist worldview is unsustainable, and, therefore, irrational. 

Polytheism and the Mormon Hermeneutic

Mormons claim that there are gods other than the God of the Bible. They deny, on the other hand, that their belief makes them polytheists, because they only worship one god. However, even that is not quite true, since they claim that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are three distinct gods, and they worship all three. But that is beside my point.

It is true that the Bible refers to other "gods," i. e., the idols worshiped by pagan nations. Furthermore, it describes them in active, anthropomorphic terms, such as Psalm 97:7: "Worship Him, all you gods!" As when the Bible talks about the body parts of God, Mormons insist that these references are literal. 

However, that assertion runs into trouble when the whole Bible is considered, rather than just isolated prooftexts. 

For example, there is a plain, nonpoetic reference in Jeremiah 2:11: "Has a nation changed its gods, even though they are no gods? But My people have changed their Glory for that which does not profit." Yes, that prophet tells us, the nations have gods, but they are not real gods. Surely, in a rational hermeneutic, the statements of plain narrative should take precedence over statements in poetry. Yet, that is not the hermeneutic of Mormonism. 

Perseverance in the Good Hands of Jesus

I have discovered that there are people who will fight against the doctrine of perseverance with every ounce of energy they can generate. Frankly, I just don't get it. The doctrine that they are fighting is security in the hands of Jesus. But, in its place, they defend a Christian life of terror, the belief that you can fall from grace at any moment. They believe that you might be saved today, but you can know nothing about tomorrow. How is that better?

No matter what they might claim, the Bible says no such thing. It presents a Christian life of peace with God, though in conflict with the world. This is all over the Bible. The strongest assertions of it are in the words of Jesus in John 10:27-30: "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one." And in the words of Paul in Romans 8:38-39: "I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord."

But, in addition to these prosaic promises, we have beautiful poetic expressions of security in the Psalms. 

Psalm 37:28, "The LORD loves justice; He will not forsake His saints. They are preserved forever, but the children of the wicked shall be cut off."

Psalm 97:10, "O you who love the LORD, hate evil! He preserves the lives of His saints; He delivers them from the hand of the wicked."

Psalm 145:20, "The LORD preserves all who love Him, but all the wicked He will destroy."

In these and so many other beautiful words, the Bible tells us that the saved man can never fall permanently back into unbelief. Never.

Love Versus Antinomianism

Dispensationalism has had an unfortunate longterm impact on Evangelicals, at least in America. Folks of that persuasion love to quote the second half of Romans 6:14, while glossing over the first half: "Sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace." People walk around repeating, "not under law but under grace," like a mantra to keep away evil spirits. Yet, the first half of the verse shows that Paul is talking about a source of power. The Law does not, and cannot, enable us to live righteously; Only grace can do that. There is nothing in that verse about dismissing the Law of God as a rule of life (see I Timothy 1:8-10). Yet, the dispensationalist will deny even that, because, he repeats, "we are not under law but under grace."

But let's consider another verse: "This is love, that we walk according to His commandments; this is the commandment, just as you have heard from the beginning, so that you should walk in it" (II John 1:6).

So, we have a logical dilemma. If the dispensationalist is correct, that "we are not under law but under grace" means that the Law has no application to the Christian life, then what about love? John says that love - i. e., to one another, verse 5 - means keeping the Law. "This is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome" (I John 5:3).

Sovereign Grace, the Trinity, and the Christian Life

"Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who are elect exiles of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the

sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with His blood: May grace and peace be multiplied to you."

- I Peter 1:1-2 

This is the opening salutation from Peter's first epistle. Notice that it is not written to men in general but specifically to Christians, whom he identifies as the true Israel (compare Romans 9:8, Galatians 3:7, 6:16, etc.), gathered by the sovereign grace of God. 

And when I say God, I don't mean in a vague, generic sense. Rather, Peter identifies our election as the work of the triune God of the Bible: the foreknowledge of the Father, the sanctification of the Holy Spirit, and the obedience of the Son, applied, figuratively speaking, by the sprinkling with His blood, an image from the Old Testament sacrifices (such as Leviticus 7:2 and 14:7). Peter does not contemplate a unitary deity, whether of the Arian type or the Sabellian. 

Nor does Peter contemplate any sort of works religion, as is taught by those pseudo-Christian sects. Rather, he tells us that the Father chose us, the Holy Spirit changed us, and the Son fulfilled all righteousness for us, that it might be imputed to us. In just these two verses, Peter teaches us to see our reunion with our God as fully trinitarian and fully by His sovereign grace, which is why he could add, in verse 4, that we have "an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you." The same sovereign, trinitarian grace that saved us also keeps us secure until we reach our heavenly goal."I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ" (Philippians 1:6).

Abortion and Human Sacrifice in the Bible

"Because the people have forsaken me and have profaned this place by making offerings in it to other gods whom neither they nor their fathers nor the kings of Judah have known; and because they have filled this place with the blood of innocents, and have built the high places of Baal to burn their sons in the fire as burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or decree, nor did it come into My mind— therefore, behold, days are coming, declares the Lord, when this place shall no more be called Topheth, or the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter. And in this place I will make void the plans of Judah and Jerusalem, and will cause their people to fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the hand of those who seek their life. I will give their dead bodies for food to the birds of the air and to the beasts of the earth. And I will make this city a horror, a thing to be hissed at. Everyone who passes by it will be horrified and will hiss because of all its wounds. And I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and their daughters, and everyone shall eat the flesh of his neighbor in the siege and in the distress, with which their enemies and those who seek their life afflict them."
- Jeremiah 19:4-9

In this passage, God is announcing His judgment on the people of Israel because of their idolatry, a literal idolatry of worshiping false gods. And what is worse is that part of their idolatry is human sacrifice, the burning of their own children as sacrifices to Baal, the Canaanite deity of storms and fertility. The Israelites were sacrificing their children because they thought that it would bring them rain and good crops.

The minor aspect of this fertility ritual is that an idol can do nothing to help our crops. It is the biblical God, Jehovah, alone who gives rain and makes the earth to be fruitful. As reward for faithfulness, He promises, "The Lord will make you abound in prosperity, in the fruit of your womb and in the fruit of your livestock and in the fruit of your ground, within the land that the Lord swore to your fathers to give you. The Lord will open to you His good treasury, the heavens, to give the rain to your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hands" (Deuteronomy 28:11-12). The Israelites had committed the irrational act of turning from the true and living God who could bless them, to a wood or stone idol which had no power at all.

But beyond the irrationality of their apostasy, the Israelites had accepted the horrific ritual of human sacrifice - and not just any humans, but rather their own children!

Compare this to our own day, in which Americans have largely abandoned the Christian heritage which had long underlain this country. And in its place we have erected many idols, not just of false religions, but also of quick riches, drugs, and entertainment. And for the sake of these idols, we sacrifice our children, washing them down the drains, torn in pieces, and removed from sight at the neighborhood abortionist's office.

What is the effect of such moral perversion?

Here is what God said to those ancient Israelites: "I will make void the plans of Judah and Jerusalem, and will cause their people to fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the hand of those who seek their life. I will give their dead bodies for food to the birds of the air and to the beasts of the earth. And I will make this city a horror, a thing to be hissed at. Everyone who passes by it will be horrified and will hiss because of all its wounds. And I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and their daughters, and everyone shall eat the flesh of his neighbor in the siege and in the distress, with which their enemies and those who seek their life afflict them" (Jeremiah 19:7-9). Where the Israelites had fed their babies to idols who could never answer them, instead they will be forced to consume their own babies, just to survive famine. The curse would be on them and their land.

How will God judge America for the same abominations? I tremble to imagine.

Calvinist Peter on Election and Perseverance

I continue to see people who claim that the distinctive doctrines of Calvinism aren't biblical. However, as I have demonstrated frequently, those doctrines are distributed all over Scripture, in both Testaments, and even in the words of Jesus Himself.

Here is another example: "Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who are elect exiles of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with His blood: May grace and peace be multiplied to you. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to His great mercy, He has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time" (I Peter 1:1-5). 

This is the opening salutation of the epistles of Peter. Notice to whom he is speaking, "those who are elect." So, he is not speaking to men, in general. In particular, those words preclude the unconverted from Peter's message. Moreover, he is speaking not merely to believers, but to those whom he calls the elect, emphasizing the sovereign grace by which we have been made believers. That is the "U" in "TULIP," "unconditional election." Elected by whom? By the Father. By what means? By the Holy Spirit. To what end? To believe in Jesus. Thus, Peter sees believers to be such by a cooperative effort of each Person of the Trinity. Peter could not be describing the deities of the Arian or the Sabellian, but only the triune God of orthodox Christianity. 

On our experiential end, what was the effect of the Father's election of us? To be caused to be born again. "Caused" necessarily implies that the origin of our rebirth is outside of ourselves. On what basis? Was it our foreseen faith? No, Peter tells us that it was out of His mercy alone. Furthermore, that rebirth has brought us into an inheritance that can never be lost, because its keeping isn't in our hands, but is rather preserved in Heaven, by God's power (compare John 10:28-29). That is perseverance of the saints, the "P" in "TULIP." 

Finding such obvious expressions of the Calvinist soteriology throughout Scripture continues to make me wonder at the claims of Arminians to be Bible-believing. Closing one's eyes to what the Scriptures say is not believing them. 

Infant Baptism in Paul to the Ephesians

Among Reformed Christians, the children of believers are baptized, not as a sign that they are saved, but because they are - by right - members of the visible church. Thus, we reject both the errors of baptismal regeneration as taught by, for example, Roman Catholicism, and the view that the children of believers are no different from the children of nonbelievers, as is taught by Baptists,

I have addressed this matter before, from I Corinthians 7:14, but I want to turn to a different text this time.

Paul says, "Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 'Honor your father and mother' (this is the first commandment with a promise), 'that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land'" (Ephesians 6:1-3). This command is addressed to children of Christian parents, not to children in general. Of course, all children should obey their parents, but that isn't the audience of Paul's statement. The children in Christian homes are to obey their parents "in the Lord." That is, they have a relationship that children and unbelieving parents don't have. The children of Christians are in the Lord! Again, that doesn't have to mean that they are necessarily converted. Rather, they are covenantally distinct.

And that is what the Reformed say, that our children are covenantally set apart by God, enjoying the privileges of the visible church, and, therefore, have a right to be baptized. We acknowledge this confessionally, such as Question 166 of the Westminster Larger Catechism: "Unto whom is Baptism to be administered? Answer : Baptism is not to be administered to any that are out of the visible church, and so strangers from the covenant of promise, till they profess their faith in Christ, and obedience to him, but infants descending from parents, either both, or but one of them, professing faith in Christ, and obedience to Him, are in that respect within the covenant, and to be baptized." 

The Bible and the Fair Mormon Corporeal God

I suspect that this topic will be new to many Christians. We often are not exposed to the more extreme views of  pseudo-Christian sects.

This statement is found in the Mormon scriptures: "The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man's; the Son also; but the Holy Ghost has not a body of flesh and bones, but is a personage of Spirit [sic]. Were it not so, the Holy Ghost could not dwell in us" (Doctrine & Covenants 130:22). Nor do Mormons make any effort to hide that teaching. As one of their websites says, "One thing that sets Latter-day Saints apart from nearly all of the rest of Christianity is the doctrine that God the Father possesses a body in human form." Yes, "sets apart" seems to be putting it mildly. Evangelicals find the Mormon view to be utterly bizarre!

As that page goes on to say, the Mormon view isn't just the result of the statement in their Scriptures. Rather, they also take the references to God's body parts in the Old Testament to be literal. In contrast, evangelicals take them as anthropomorphisms, i. e., figures of speech intended to make Him more comprehensible to corporeal humans. In addition, Mormons take the reference to the image of God in Genesis 1:26 to be necessarily a physical image, since humans are physical. This is in spite of biblical usage of "image" to refer to spiritual qualities (e. g., Colossians 3:10). The Fair Mormon website mentions this and talks about Seth's being in the image of Adam (Genesis 5:3). This is a case of shameless begging the question by the person who wrote that website. Note that Seth is made in the likeness of Adam, not God. If the image of God is a physical image, that distinction would make no sense. However, since it was a spiritual image it is completely comprehensible: Adam had been created with the unmarred holiness of God; Seth entered life with the image of his father, now marred by sin, and, therefore, not the image of God in the full sense.

And one last thing, an indication of the silly consequences of the Mormon's assumption of the literal nature of the body parts of God. Here is something else said about His body: "Heaven is My throne, and the earth is My footstool; what is the house that you would build for Me, and what is the place of My rest?" (Isaiah 66:1). The immensity of God is such that He fills the space between Heaven and earth. If His body is literal, then why can we not see such a giant? His feet alone would cover a continent!