Down-under round-up: 3 June 2015

Issue of the week

As I said last week, the Australian marriage debate has heated up, with legislation for same-sex marriage introduced into Federal Parliament. Among the stack of articles published by Christians here and abroad, here’s my pick. Firstly, 'Six initial thoughts on the gay marriage debate’, by Nigel Fortescue. I don’t think his concluding hope is remotely likely, but here are his six points in brief:

1. Disagreeing is different to hating or bigotry.
2. People who hold a view sincerely can be sincerely wrong.
3. Emotional hurt is no reason to say yes.
4. Marriage is a thing.
5. Marriage has a purpose.
6. Marriage equality is a misnomer.

'I oppose same-sex marriage (and no, I'm not a bigot)’ was not author Michael Jensen’s choice of headline. But his article makes the point that so-called marriage equality will be no such thing, since the new reality will be significantly redefined and different. At the same time as Michael points out the lack of ‘deep’ rationale among SSM proponents, his article also has helpful reminders regarding perspective for Christians. 'How same-sex marriage makes orphans of us all’ by Jeff Shafer argues strongly that same-sex marriage ideology, alongside the biotech reproductive revolution, denies the meaningfulness of biological ties and gender differences for human identity.

Making disciples of Jesus

In 'How to disciple with a book’, Mike Pettengill argues for how important reading a good Christian book with one or two others can be for growing as followers of the Lord Jesus. I especially appreciated his advice to have a Bible open and ready, so that when verses are cited, you look them up! And given the excellent number of short books under 100 pages from publishers like The Good Book Company and Matthias Media, I think this approach can still work well with those who do not identify as strong readers.

A long piece by Stephen McAlpine, widely recommended on social media and well worth your time if you missed it: 'Stage Two Exile: Are you ready for it?’ If you can’t read it all, understand this: McAlpine’s thesis is that Stage One Exile was the church being marginalized, whereas in Stage Two, arriving now, the church is seen as an enemy of society. His three points:

1. We assumed Athens (uninterested) not Babylon (despising)

If the primary characteristic of Exile Stage One was supposed to be humility, the primary characteristic of Second Stage Exiles will have to be courage.

2. We assumed a neutral culture not a hostile world

Simply put, we assume that we can have more impact on culture than it can have on us. That is dangerously naive thinking. Jesus never said the culture will misunderstand you; he said the world will hate you.

3. We loosened our language just when the cultural elites were tightening theirs

That junking of language categories was a crucial error. If our God is a speaking God then language is deeply theological and deeply moral. It’s no mere play-thing to put to one side when we are uninterested in it. We use it or we lose it—to others.

Image of the week

The good old Anglican bishop’s words grabbed me two weeks in a row!