The Christian Mind - Part IV

In addition to direct biblical resources we should also draw upon the many historical resources and authors, such as the early church fathers like Augustine and Thomas Aquinas who wrote the foundation for much of today's church doctrine, or Martin Luther and John Calvin who gave birth to the Protestant reformation and established the foundations of modern evangelical Christianity. These perspectives help us to better understand our own theology and individual beliefs about God and how we as Christians should live.

Consider others in history like William Wilberforce, the man credited with the abolition of slavery in England and author of Practical Christianity in the 19th century or C.S. Lewis who has written some of the greatest works addressing many similar cultural issues facing us today. Reading these authors can help us better understand the application of biblical truth to those common areas of social and cultural conflict. The list of godly men and women that have gone before us is endless and the knowledge that God has provided through their experience and lives is priceless and worthy of pursuit.

It is this deeper understanding of scripture, doctrine, and theology as well as its relevance to all of life that the writer of Hebrews is addressing when he says,

The writer is clearly stating that we are to continue to grow in our knowledge of God's revealed Word and His world and how to live in it. We must take our understanding of scripture beyond the context of religion and apply it to all of reality; everything in the world falls under God's authority and everything is subject to God's design.

When we understand and embrace these broader truths we are able to move from merely living subject to the fallen world and the fundamental secularism that now controls it, to being transforming agents of redemption - salt and light. We become people whom God uses to transform the world; to bring truth, justice and freedom to all areas of God's creation, strengthening the Church and transforming the arenas of business, politics, science, education and the arts. All of these areas are of concern to God and our mandate given in Genesis to exercise dominion over all of God's creation still stands today.

The essential fact is this: the spiritual conflict is fought on the cultural battlefield in profoundly intellectual terms. It is a battle in which, on one level, our adversary, the Devil, seeks control of God's creation, including society for the purposes of deceiving men and leading humanity away from the truth. I am not suggesting that we can win someone into the Kingdom of God through purely reason and intellectual arguments, but 2 Corinthians 10:5 does tell us that false arguments or ideologies can keep people from knowing God and therefore we are commanded to tear those arguments down; to utterly and completely destroy these false pretensions. This is not a physical effort but an intellectual effort like Paul "reasoning" with the Greeks and the Jews. This is precisely the issue that confronts us when addressing the legitimization of homosexuality or the mainstreaming of pornography or any other moral issue. Our response must be rational, reasonable and persuasive and less reliant upon religious rhetoric.

J. Gresham Machen, the professor of New Testament theology at Princeton in the early 1900s and defender of the Christian faith who led in the founding of Westminster Theological Seminary, put it this way:

This demands a rational and intelligent effort certainly guided by the Holy Spirit. However, a mind not surrendered to the Holy Spirit or committed to the intellectual disciplines of faith in Christ will not be effective in this Holy work; a work to which we are all called. If we ignore this work we permit these false ideas to become established. Because they are false and the ideological opposite of Christianity, Christianity then becomes irrelevant. It is relegated to something for the weak minded or non-thinking masses. Christianity may be "tolerated" for a time, but it most certainly will not be admitted into the public square to influence public policy and the moral consensus. What is worse is that this perceived irrelevance ultimately hinders the advance of the Gospel.

Part 4 of 5, to be continued...

This essay is available in the 27-page booklet, The Christian Mind: The Key to Cultural Relevance and Renewal by S. Michael Craven by calling the National Coalition at 513-521-6227

© 2006 S. Michael Craven, All rights reserved. For reprint permission contact Philip Barnett at philip@nationalcoalition.org.