Considering Practicing Affirmation

Our personal history can help us, or hinder us.  I don’t recall my childhood being one filled with affirmation and praise.  I seem quite capable of affirming the kids, but struggle at times when I need to affirm adults.  I’m not sure why that is.  Perhaps because they don’t often learn new things, and much of my affirming the kids comes as they gain new skills.

Many kids today are growing up in an era of “fake affirmation”.  They are affirmed so much for so many things they probably wonder if they can do any wrong.  Maybe I had a graduation ceremony for elementary.  I can’t remember.  But today every little milestone is celebrated so that those that actually have meaning have their meaning minimized.

So there are two errors that can take place: the neglect and over-use of affirmation.  One aspect of over-use is the man-centered aspect of affirmation.  It is into this context that Sam Crabtree has written his long-needed book Practicing Affirmation.  He believes that Christians should practice commending others to the glory of God.   In other words, we commend them for character, attitudes and actions that reflect the character, attitudes and actions of God.  As a result, we are praising God as we commend them.  This keeps us from what he calls idolatrous commendation, and failing to commend (just as sinful as the other extreme).

This is a fairly short book that seeks to facilitate the practice of affirmation.  It is not just defending the practice, though he does do that.  And there are some questions or arguments he spends more time on.  For instance, he spends much time refuting the argument that non-Christians should not be commended.  He rightly asserts that such a conclusion neglects two very important biblical truths.  First, as James 3 notes, people still bear God’s image.  Though unregenerate, non-Christians still bear some testimony to the God whose image they reflect.  Second, due to common grace even non-Christians can grow in relative character and act in ways that are commendable.

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Considering the Naked Gospel Part 3

Part 3 of The Naked Gospel by Andrew Farley is called Crossing the Line.  I thought he’d cross it, and he did.  The section is essentially on his hermeneutic (or method of interpretation).  He crossed the line into what I think is a very bad place.

The matter of interpretive method is very important.  Most false teaching arises from a faulty method of interpretation.  It is Farley’s faulty method of interpretation that gives birth to the various errors in his teaching (and the strange theories he foists upon us to float some of them).

By now you are probably thinking- “get to it already”.  If you are, this is how I often feel when I listen to Glen Beck.  He also has some hermeneutical issues when it comes to theology, but I digress even further.

Farley embraces a view I have only found among hyper-dispensationalists (I’m not saying he’s a hyper-dispensationalist, just that his hermeneutic is very similar).  It is that the new covenant did not come into effect until the cross & resurrection, so (and this is the odd part) the gospels are not part of the New Testament proper.  They are written to Jews, not Christians, so Jesus’ words there are not binding upon us in any way.  The Old Testament is instructive to understand our sinfulness and how God would eventually save sinners.  But the Old Testament is not to be used as a guide for life in any way, shape or form.  We find “a thorough background in how God initiated a relationship with humankind and how we did whatever we could to ruin this relationship.”

In my previous post I forgot to interact with his material on 2 Timothy 3.  But it fits in here very well.  He quotes 2 Timothy 3:16-17, but I’ll put a few more verses in there for context.

14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it,  15 and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.  16 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,  17 so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.  (NIV)

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Considering Hebrews 12

I spent the last 2 Sundays preaching on Hebrews 12, well, the first 11 verses of it anyway, at a local PCA church.  There sermons were The Race of Faith and Instruction Thru Hardship if you are interested.

It was a more traditional environment, and the congregation was generally older.  So, to be all things to all men (1 Corinthians 9), I didn’t have any illustrations from movies or other aspects of pop culture.  You have to speak it so they’ll get it.  I hope I did that.  I changed the tenor of things, but the message is still the same.

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