Blind Guys and an Elephant

Several blind men took a bet that they could not correctly identify an object by touch. They were led to an elephant, and they began to feel around to try to figure out what it was. As they were doing this, the elephant spoke to them (because this is a special elephant, and anyway it's my story and I want him to, so there) and said "Hey guys, let me help you out - I'm an elephant."

Ignoring the elephant's words, the blind men began to touch its body. One of them touched the elephant's leg and proclaimed, "I know! It's a concrete pillar!" The elephant tried to correct the man, saying, "No, I'm an elephant. Like I already told you. Not a pillar, an elephant. That's my leg." But the blind man continued to ignore him, insisted that it was a pillar, and wondered what manner of capital adorned the structure.

Another touched his trunk, and announced that he had found a large snake. The elephant yelled "No! That's my trunk, not a snake. Listen guys: I am an elephant. E-L-E-P-H-A-N-T. Elephant!" The blind man continued to disregard him, debating whether he had found a python or a boa constrictor, and whether such a distinction really mattered for the bet anyway. "Of course it doesn't matter" said the elephant, "because both answers are completely wrong. It doesn't matter which you pick, you lose." The blind man decided to go with 'python'.

Others took their best guesses, suggesting that the elephant's tusks were spears and that the ears were old canvas tarpaulins. All along the elephant kept trying to correct them, and the blind men kept completely ignoring him. Finally the elephant let out an exasperated bellow, which the blind men thought might be the brass section of the London Philharmonic Orchestra. "Oh for crying out loud! LONDON?!? Yes, blind men, the streets of London are just overflowing with elephants. Are you even trying? No, you're not, or else you would have listened when I told you the answer. Forget this, I'm out of here." And the elephant stormed off.

The blind men submitted their answers to the bet. Since they couldn't arrive at a consensus answer, they decided that each would just answer whatever he wanted, because they all were right in some way. That way, they would all win the bet!

But no, they all lost. You know, because they were all completely wrong.

When the verdict was announced, the blind men indignantly protested, "Why didn't anyone try to tell us?"

Any way you want it?

The story of Cain and Abel has always fascinated me. The lightning-fast descent of humanity from the purity of the Eden is astounding. By generation two, we had already sunk from true communion with God, all the way to murder. Think about that. You can start reading our history from the time before sin, and within about two minutes you get to where we're killing each other. If you want a good illustration of the depths of our depravity, there you have it.

There's something in this story that's real easy to gloss over, but if you slow down and think, it can reveal a lot about our natural state. We'll pick up the story in verse 3:

In the course of time Cain brought to the LORD an offering of the fruit of the ground, and Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions. And the LORD had regard for Abel and his offering, but for Cain and his offering he had no regard.

This is the first thing we read about after Adam and Eve rebelled and were banished from the garden. They had kids including Cain and Abel, who then grew up and offered sacrifices to God. Why did they start sacrificing? Scripture doesn't explicitly tell us, but there's no reason to think they came up with the idea themselves. Most certainly God told them what to do and how to do it - He was the one to institute the sacrifice.

Now why did God regard Abel's offering and not regard Cain's? Although we don't know exactly what they were commanded, the most reasonable conclusion is that Abel obeyed and Cain didn't. This is reinforced in the NT, where we are told plainly that Cain was evil and Abel righteous. Abel obeyed God and worshiped the way God commanded, while Cain disobeyed and worshiped the way Cain wanted. And God only accepted Abel's worship, while completely rejecting Cain's.

Now how would you react if God had clearly let you know that your actions were disobedient and unacceptable? Would you be repentant? Ashamed? Convicted? Or perhaps the reaction would be denial, self-justifying, trying to make excuses? Let's see how Cain responded:

So Cain was very angry, and his face fell. The LORD said to Cain, "Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it."

Interesting. Cain disobeyed, God called him out on it, so Cain was very angry. Now who was this anger directed at? Certainly Abel to some degree - no doubt he was jealous that little brother was the one God accepted, and this jealous anger led to the first murder.

But above all, Cain was angry at God. 'Who does God think He is, not accepting my sacrifice? Sure, it's not what he told me to do. But isn't my way good enough? I should be able to worship Him however I want!' Again we see how quickly and thoroughly we were corrupted. Just a couple chapters ago we were created out of dust, and already Cain is trying to dictate terms to God, and upset when God doesn't bow to his wishes. The clay is furious at the potter.

Cain's reaction should make us vomit in terror. The audacity of being angry with God, as though He were in any way answerable to us... And yet, how easy is it to see this same thing going on today? All you have to do is point out the Biblical teaching that salvation is only through faith in Jesus, and watch the fur fly. Oh, that's so unfair! What about people who do this and that other thing? God wouldn't reject them! If God is truly good, he wouldn't be so cruel as to condemn people just for rejecting Jesus. Well fine, if God won't accept such and such, then I don't want anything to do with him! Who does God think he is, anyway?

God's amazingly gracious response to Cain says it all. If you obey, will you not be accepted? It's really not that complicated. God will decide how God is to be worshiped. What right do we have to complain or get angry at the rules our sovereign creator has established? Is it not enough that, while we are all deserving of instant death and condemnation, He has graciously provided a means for salvation and worship? When we complain that the way God has appointed is insufficient, that He should accept worship any way we offer it (as long as it's sincere!), we are no different from Cain.

God owes us nothing. We have earned nothing from Him except wrath. The most spectacular news the universe has ever seen is that God has graciously placed our sin on Jesus on the cross, pouring out on him the fullness of wrath due to us, has counted us as righteous with Christ's own righteousness, and though we had been His enemies, He has through no merit of our own raised us up with Christ to bless us now and forever.

Let us be overwhelmed by the matchless grace God has provided, and stop insisting that we deserve more and better options. We don't even deserve this. Don't be like Cain and think God had better be happy with whatever we offer. Let's be like Abel and glory in the grace and goodness of what God has done.

On Interfaith Prayer Services

In America, one of the more common methods of promoting unity is to hold something known as an "interfaith prayer service". These were particularly common following 9/11 (for anyone from the Obama administration reading this, that was the day when... oh nevermind, you wouldn't be interested), when people of all faiths were called to set aside their differences and call out to God together - Christians, Jews, muslims, whatever Apu is, etc. Sometimes an interfaith prayer service will be called for a community, a college (by the 'interfaith council'), or in extreme circumstances, the whole nation. Annually, there is the National Day of Prayer (apparently it's this week - as usual, Dan Phillips offers an outstanding take on it), in which all Americans all axed to take time to call out to God on behalf of the nation.

My question is, should Christians participate?

Consider for a moment what these events are saying. The fundamental assumption central to an interfaith prayer service is that we all worship the same god and what we believe makes no difference at all. The whole concept necessarily assumes that all prayers are equal, that they are simply generic petitions to generic deity/energy field/life force/gaia. Without this assumption, the entire idea is patently absurd. What business would a Jew and a muslim have praying together, or a Christian and a mormon, or a hindu and a j-dub? If any of those faiths are true, all others are necessarily false (well, hindu and mormonism might be compatible), so why would we think their prayers are of any value?

Frankly, the idea of a Christian claiming that his faith is no different from any other should be nauseating. How dare we set aside the exclusivity of Christ in order to pretend that Islam is just as valid and their prayers are just as effectual? How dare we give false witness to those of other faiths and undermine the gospel by pretending that [generic belief or moralism] is no different than salvation through the death and resurrection of the Son of God for his church? How can we profane the blood of Christ by declaring it to be of no more worth than... whatever it is hindus do?

Can you imagine Paul participating in an interfaith prayer service in Corinth or Athens? Sure, his spirit was provoked within him by all the idols, and he risked his life to confront their pagan idolatry, but maybe for one day he could lead a generic prayer to generic deity, because it's all really the same anyway. Right.

Or maybe Jesus would be willing to participate in one. Perhaps after saying this:

"If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God and I am here. I came not of my own accord, but he sent me. Why do you not understand what I say? It is because you cannot bear to hear my word. You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies. But because I tell the truth, you do not believe me. Which one of you convicts me of sin? If I tell the truth, why do you not believe me? Whoever is of God hears the words of God. The reason why you do not hear them is that you are not of God."

...he could have extended the invitation. Now let's pray together, because our prayers all go to the same place, right? Right. Yeah, I can totally see that happening.

So here's the challenge: provide one scriptural justification for Christians participating in an interfaith prayer service. Surely if one exists, my Biblically-knowledgable readership (at least a dozen strong!) should be able to find it, no problem. Perhaps an example of such a service in scripture would suffice?

I could only think of one scriptural example of an interfaith prayer service. You can find it in 1 Kings 18. How'd that work out?

Despicable King Ahaz

Reading through 1 and 2 Kings, it's tough not to notice that a lot of the kings were just wretched. One that really stuck out to me the last time through was King Ahaz, whose story we find in 2 Kings 16. He's the first of the Ahaz-Hezekiah-Manasseh troika that should drive certain people crazy, namely those who believe that children perfectly reflect the way they're raised (giving credit to the father for the child's righteousness, and blaming him for the child's rebellion). Ahaz was incredibly wicked, his son Hezekiah was the most righteous king Judah ever knew, then Manasseh was beyond evil. But that's a head-scratcher for another day.

As for Ahaz, scripture doesn't really have anything good to say about him. This passage starts off with a description of his wicked idolatry. He was so evil he even sacrificed one of his sons, an act the Bible calls "despicable". In order to obtain a material blessing from a god - usually an abundant crop or healthy livestock - the parents would sacrifice their newborn child to their 'god', killing their child so that they could be better off financially. I'll let you draw your own parallel to a modern abomination. Suffice to say, God does not approve.

Next, we read about when Israel and Syria teamed up to invade Judah. Ahaz got out of it by paying Assyria to attack them, not an uncommon practice in those days. So what's so wrong about that? Well, we read elsewhere a little more of the story. In short, Israel and Syria threatened to attack, and Ahaz freaked out. So God sent Isaiah with a message to Ahaz - don't worry, I'll deliver you, have faith. And Ahaz was told to ask for a sign - anything he could imagine, God would do for him. Just pause and let the magnitude of that offer sink in. Now, consider this - Ahaz blew it off! Instead of asking God for - well, anything - and trusting God to deliver them as He promised, Ahaz decided it would be better to loot the temple and treasury, send the gold to Assyria, and let them handle things. Now that is pure wickedness. (As for the sign that was offered - God decided to give one anyway, one that's a tad bit better than anything Ahaz could have ever dreamed).

Which brings us to the third abomination Ahaz committed, which is what really caught my eye this time through. It's a sin that never gets mentioned in any list of the worst sins, but really, it can make a good case for being among the most nauseating. What did Ahaz do that was so bad this time?

He made a new altar for the temple.

Wait, that's it? That's what gets me so worked up? Surely that isn't really all that bad, is it? Why yes, yes it is. Just on the surface, we see the heart of Ahaz turned to other gods. He saw the altar at Damascus, a pagan altar to imaginary deities. The altar in the temple at Jerusalem was a pretty plain design, pretty much just a big bronze square, but the pagan altar he saw in Damascus was apparently ornate and beautiful. So Ahaz rejected the altar of God, deciding he'd rather have the better-looking altar of the pagans. To Ahaz, God was just one of many, and it didn't really matter which god he worshipped, or how he did it. An altar was an altar, all the offerings go to the same place, right? What difference did it really make - God's altar, a pagan altar, they're all basically the same. In this act, Ahaz completely rejected God's covenant, despised the call to be a holy people and worship him only. Instead, Ahaz wanted to be just like all the other nations. So he rejected God's altar, and made an altar just like the other nations had. In doing so, he rejected God as well.

That's wicked enough, but there's more. Consider this passage from Hebrews 8:

Now the point in what we are saying is this: we have such a high priest, one who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven, a minister in the holy places, in the true tent that the Lord set up, not man. For every high priest is appointed to offer gifts and sacrifices; thus it is necessary for this priest also to have something to offer. Now if he were on earth, he would not be a priest at all, since there are priests who offer gifts according to the law. They serve a copy and shadow of the heavenly things. For when Moses was about to erect the tent, he was instructed by God, saying, "See that you make everything according to the pattern that was shown you on the mountain."

See there why God would be so offended by the altar Ahaz built? When God gave Moses the designs for the tabernacle and its furnishings, it wasn't accidental or random. Everything in the tabernacle/temple was modeled after the heavenly reality. This includes the altar. As God designed it, the altar was a temporal, physical model of a piece of heaven. So when Ahaz spurned God's altar, he was ultimately rejecting heaven. He looked at the temple furnishings, saw a glimpse of heaven, and decided he'd rather have what the Syrians had. In rejecting the altar, he was rejecting heaven itself. Now that is a sin!

God's design for the tabernacle was deliberate. He gave specific patterns for specific furnishings, because these earthly furnishings were to clearly reflect heavenly glory. Because of the awesome, eternal truth represented by these furnishings, God demanded that all worship be directed through these approved channels. You could not just worship God anywhere in any way and expect Him to accept it. No, to truly worship God, it must be through the way God appointed. God will be worshipped how God wants to be worshipped, and no other.

To equivocate and insist that another way was just as good as the God-appointed way is wickedly insane. When Ahaz insisted that the pagan altar of Damascus was essentially the same as God's altar, he committed blasphemy of the highest order. God had clearly revealed how He would be approached; to claim that another method was just as good was wicked arrogance - to think that sinful man can approach God however we want! To imagine that we set the terms of interaction with God transcendent, our creator! No, we can only approach God as He says, and when He has clearly revealed how we are to approach Him, we need to obey. Trying another method is sinful folly.

So when Ahaz rejected God's clear direction (as did Uriah the priest, who sinned through spinelessness) and insisted the Syrian way was just as good or better, Ahaz was guilty of a heinous sin.

And so are many in the church today, those who are infecting the church with ideas of pluralism and inclusivism. Pluralism is the idea that all faiths are basically equal, all ways lead to God, blah blah blah. Inclusivism teaches that, while Jesus is the preferred way to God, there may be other ways as well, albeit inferior and more difficult ways. Both of these run afoul of the clear scriptural proclamation that we can only approach God through Jesus. God has made it abundantly clear that salvation is through Christ alone. What sort of blasphemous arrogance is required to pretend that another way is just as good? Who do we think we are, if we believe that we choose the terms of the covenant, that we decide how God is to be worshipped?

But that sort of teaching is everywhere today, spurred on largely by modernism and greatly accelerated by postmodernism. Few doctrines are less popular that the exclusivity of Christ, and few questions are intended to hurt and embarrass more than "Do you really believe that good [fill in the religion] are going to hell?" We are derided for believing that one major flaw outweighs all the 'good' they do. Yet this is exactly what God has declared - who are we to think we know better than God?

And so, we are constantly assaulted with the mocking of modern-day Ahaz. We are told that the altar in Damascus is just as good as the one God designed for Jerusalem, and it's purtier, too. And the world will like us more if we stop being so... exclusive. So we need to stand firm, and let God be true though every man a liar. Let us believe God, reject all substitutes, and present the full hope of the true gospel.