Savage Equality

It may very well be that outgoing Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta's last act will prove to be his most impactful. Secretary Panetta has ordered to remove the ban on women serving in combat. The responses vary from zealous approval to pragmatic reservation. But I submit that stronger statements are needed. Let me be as clear as I know how to be. This is not a political mistep or strategically ill-advised. This is utterly barbaric. This is a savage equality.

Let me clarify what I mean by that. Not all equality is savage. In fact, the right kind of equality will save us from savage equality. It is a true and faithful saying that all men (and women) are created equal. Likewise, manhood and womanhood are equally valuable. However, they are not equal in the sense of indentical or interchangeable. But they are equally important and indespensable. Failure to grasp this truth will lead to barbarism.

I'm becoming more and more convinced that feminism and chauvinism are not opposites but two sides of the same horrific coin. They both deny the complementary of sexes and their roles and replace it with the Darwinist doctrine of survival of the fittest.

The chauvinist says that the roles of men and women aren't equally valuable and so he just slams those women folk into subjection. The feminist says that the roles of men and women aren't equally valuable and so the woman must act like a man. But the result is not harmony and fidelity. It's violence and savagery.

Engaging in combat is not a right or even a privilege. It's a horrific duty and I applaud all those who have served in our nation's armed forces. However, it's not a duty that should be trust upon just anyone. Likewise, it's not a statement about the value of a person.

David established a principle in I Samuel 30:24. The ancestor of our Lord divided the spoils of war equally among those who had fought in the front lines and those who had guarded the supply lines. Thus, differences in role (including in warfare) does not necessarily suggest a difference in value.

Thus, women should not be in combat. Not because they are incompetent, but because of the weight of responsibility God has placed upon men. Combat is a horrific thing and in all civilized nations (certainly all Christian nations) men have shielded women and children from its devastating effects. Only a barbaric society would tell women to protect us, rather than protecting them.

Increasingly, we are becoming a culture of violence. Guns are the scapegoat, used to trickour senses to believe that these string of mass shootings is just an external problem and not a systemic, heart-level catastrophe. We've become a culture of rape, violence and abuse. The aggression of masculinity is no longer tempered and channeled by the virtues of responsibility and self-sacrifice. Thus, women are left to fend for themselves.

We shake our fingers at the Roman coliseum and Aztec temples without realizing that we've become a culture of barbarians. I'm not trying to be melodramatic or over the top. I simply know no other terms that due the issue justice.

So, what are the people of God to do? Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them. (Colossians 3:19). Men, take responsibility and do the hard jobs so that others won't have to. We are in a battle between "women and children first" and "survival of the fittest". Which does your life best portray?

Dealing With Thunder Puppies

Doug Wilson and Justin Holcomb talk about  thunder puppies HERE in this ten minute clip. What's a thunder puppy? you say. Well, I'm glad you asked. Watch and learn.

Here's the punchline: the biblical view on gender roles in as much the opposite of chauvinism as it is the opposite of feminism.

Pomosexuality: A Roundup

"If culture is religion externalized, as Henry Van Til observed, homosexuality (and other forms of deviance) are the perfect manifestation of an evolutionary, re-invent yourself kind of paganism, which is the religious worldview our nation is in the process of adopting." That was Doug Wilson's summary of the current cultral climate, which he calls "pomosexuality". I would like to draw your attention to some very interesting stuff by some very smart people on this very important issue.

Earlier this year, Pastor Wilson did a series of lectures at the University of Indiana about this issue. And some people weren't too happy about it, as you can see in this trailer:



Gotta love tolerance, eh? You can watch the lectures and the Q&A HERE. Wilson also did a very nice follow-up interview which you can read HERE.

However, my fear is that many Christian don't realize just how deep the issue goes. We lost the highground on this issue before I was born. Egalitarianism was the battering ramp that tore down the door for homosexuality to rush in. That's the issue that John Piper, Russel Moore, Ligon Duncan and Greg Gilbert address:

Why Is God A "He"?

So, lately I've been thinking a lot about this particular issue. It's come up in several of the books I've had to read for school. But the tipping point was this video with Mark Driscoll and Doug Wilson*:



So, this does raise the question: Why is that - The Shack not withstanding - God is consistently referenced as male in the Scriptures? It's God the Father and God the Son. Likewise, male pronouns are always used to describe God the Spirit. For our family members who believe that gender is merely biological this makes absolutely no sense. After all, God is a spirit. He doesn't have an anatomical structure and therefore speaking of God in terms of male or female is ludicrous. Right? Well, apparently the Holy Spirit doesn't think so, because He inspired the holy men to portray God in male terms.

So, how do we explain this? Well, it becomes a lot easier when recognize that gender is a symbol for something greater. After all, God loves matter, as C.S. Lewis said, and He uses matter to convey truths about Himself.

Elisabeth Elliot, the wife of martyred missionary Jim Elliot and one of the greatest writers and speakers of her generation, does an excellent job of arguing this position in her classic The Mark of a Man:

"Psychologists sometimes describe belief in God as a father as nothing more than a projection of the sterotyped father. It never seems to occur to them that if two things are alike, one ought to ask whether the first is copied from the second or the second from the first. Why should it not be at least as logical to assume that human fathers are copies of the Original? Those who take the Bible as their rule see God as the archetype. From Him are derived all ideas of what fathers ought to be."

The argument goes that the genders are symbols of something much greater than biology. The functions of the genders actually reflects the nature of God. Within the Trinity there is equality, love, unity and other-centrality but there is also structure, order, submission and, yes, authority (I know, that's a naughty word in our culture but just bare with me). Therefore, this same dichotomy is mirrored in the relationships between the genders.

Those who hold to this view also recognize that consistently throughout Scripture - literally from Genesis to Revelation - men are given the responsibility of initiation. That brings us back to original question of why God is always portrayed as male.

C.S. Lewis said, "God is so masculine that all creation is feminine by comparison." What could he possibly mean by that? He meant that God is the Ultimate Initiator. He initiates our salvation, our sanctification - shoot! - He initiated our very existence. The fate of every human being is decided by how we respond the initiation of God. Therefore, we are all feminine (responders) in comparison to the Initiating God.

But I can almost hear people saying, "What a chauvinist! He actually thinks that men are like God!" No, no, no! Sure, lots of men think they're God, but God knows better. This isn't about men, this is about God. My goal in this post is not to spark a debate over gender roles. If I wanted to do that I would have started off with loads of bible passages and quotes from Greek experts. What I want to do is point you to marvelous design of God.

When men act like men and women act like women, we're actually displaying the very nature of God. It's a like a painting, showing the majesty of the Real Thing. Or a song that causes emotions to rise up unbidden. Or a monument which testifies to the greatness of an awesome God. Gender is a work of art, giving us hints at the beautiful character of the Artist. Praise His name!

I know that this has been a very quick summary of very deep and intense issue, but if you get nothing else out of this, pay attention to this: Gender isn't about biology. Like everything else, it's about God.

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*I always feel the need to say that just because I link to someone doesn't mean I necessarily endorse everything about that person.