Friday, October 9, 2009

The Roots of WARSKYL, 6

Continued from "The Roots of WARSKYL, 5"

Emil has written a comment that I thought deserved notice in a post. He wrote about this comment I made in the previous post:

The objective [of the Great Commission] was not to merge cultures, but to transform them by "teaching them to observe all things" that Christ had commanded."

Emil wrote:

I would argue actually that we, by observing all things that Christ had commanded, are in fact, creating a new culture in and of itself, due to the fact that 'culture' is simply an outward expression of that which you believe. So if you obey Christ, you will be creating a new culture.

If by 'culture' you mean 'racial groups', then I would agree, our SOLE purpose is not to 'merge', but at the same time, I don't quite see the purpose of even addressing that point, or making it a subject to debate... I don't see the importance of whether or not we 'merge'. Maybe I missed something along the way? :D

I realize that I did not make my point clearly, so here I will attempt a little fuller explanation.

My point addresses those who claim that "Western Civilization" is a mixture of Roman, Greek & Christian elements. I believe that the degree to which you can call the West Roman or Greek is the precise degree to which it opposes God and needs further transformation.

You are correct, Emil, in saying that we are to create a new culture founded on the commands of Christ. The Bible, however, identifies certain elements of culture that can be transformed (redeemed, if you will) by reinterpreting them in a Scriptural context.

I'm not talking here about philosophical or religious systems, but things like houses, fields, vineyards (agri-culture?). When God sent Israel into the land of Canaan, they were to obliterate all traces of Canaanite culture. Nevertheless, God did not require that they raze everything to the ground.

And it shall be, when the LORD thy God shall have brought thee into the land which he sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give thee great and goodly cities, which thou buildedst not, And houses full of all good things, which thou filledst not, and wells digged, which thou diggedst not, vineyards and olive trees, which thou plantedst not . . . . (Deu 6:10-11)

Canaanites built houses with god-shelves so that even their houses would deny the manifest glory of the true God (ref. Romans 1:18, ff.). The faithful Israelite would destroy the idol and transform the house into a sanctuary where his family could serve and pray to the Lord of the Covenant.

In our own day, one of the objectives of Christian education is to take the facts of history, biology, chemistry, math, etc. and redeem them by reinterpreting them (taking them out of the secular humanist context of interpretation and placing them in the context of God's creation according to the revelation found in Scripture).

Christians have even subjected language itself to this redemptive process. Martin Luther's translation of the Bible, for example, left an unmistakable imprint on the German tongue just as the Authorized Version (1611) did on the English language.

If this aspect of redeeming or transforming certain elements of culture interests you, my book Christian Methodology presents the mechanics of the Biblical process necessary to do so.

Emil, I hope this clarifies my point and shows that I did not mean to address racial aspects of merging at all in my statement. I hope to address race in my next post on this topic.

3 comments:

Randall Gerard said...

Gravelbelly,

You are quite correct that christians are to transform our culture in accordance with the Word. I would only add, that when Israel was commanded to obliterate caananite culture, they were to start with the caananites themselves. They were not supposed to leave any of them alive. Period.

Of course, they disobeyed God on this point, and caananite culture lived on in the hearts and minds of flesh and blood caananites, who were an ethnic minority within Israel throughout Israel's troubled history.

My point is simple and direct and denied constantly by modern 'multicultural' christians. It is simply this. I maintain it is impossible to separate a blood-line, a race, a people, from the culture they create. The people themselves are an inextricable part of that culture. Culture is more then just the out-working of societal beliefs; it is a reflection of US, biologically, spiritually, and in every other way.

At rock bottom, this truth is WHY Israel was commanded to completely annihilate the caananites. In order for caananite culture to end, the caananites themselves had to be destroyed. When Israel failed to do so, they were commanded by God to never, ever intermarry with the caananite remnant. Why? Because mixing blood-lines is ALSO mixing cultures. God never sought the mixture of His called-out covenant people with the surrounding nations. But, now that the Gospel has gone forth to every nation, many now claim that this intermixture is perfectly fine. It is not. The nations (plural) are His inheritance, not THE NATION. Christians are not called to re-build the tower of Babel, nor did pentecost 'reverse babel' as some lying preachers claim. If anything, pentecost reaffirmed the permanence of the many nations God established, since each individual heard the Gospel being presented in THEIR OWN LANGUAGE. They did not suddenly begin speaking and understanding one universal language. Now THAT would have been a reversal of babel.

The Warrior said...

Understood, gravelbelly! The first made sense, but a clarification is always excellent.

Awaiting your next,

Spencer

Emil Bandy said...

Thanks! yeah, sorry didn't comment earlier, I'm working quite a bit right now :-)