Truth Really Matters

The current cultural dominance of identity issues derive from an ancient question, “Who am I, really?”  Psychologist Nola Passmore writes, “The heart cry of the human race is for meaning and purpose, a sense of belonging when human relationships fail to satisfy, a need to know we are unconditionally loved in spite of our circumstances, a need to know that we are not an accident of chance but people of design, a need to know that we have a future and a hope even when everything around us seems to be falling apart.”

Regular readers of this site will note that this theme of purpose and meaning is central to my Christian worldview and my interests.  One might object, “But what about the vast numbers of people who don’t think like that, who respond with a contemptuous ‘Whatever,’ when challenged about the point of their lives?”  Well, I simply don’t know how to reach the ‘whatever’ crowd.  Apathy is a killer, an eternal killer.  I can only hope to persuade those who care at least somewhat about life, death, Heaven, Hell, God, and eternity.

I pulled the Passmore quote from John Lennox’s 2015 book, Against the Flow:  The Inspiration of Daniel in an Age of Relativism.  As per usual in this essay, I’ll pull some nuggets from the book that I found intriguing.  I do recommend the book, along with everything else that Lennox writes.  My principal caveat on Lennox:  He’s a compromiser on Genesis 1-11, firmly in the Intelligent Design camp, neither a friend to creationists nor to literal Biblical history before Abraham.  Clearly, though, he does embrace the history and prophetic verities of Daniel.

Lennox, a professor of mathematics at Oxford, once gave a lecture on the relationship of science to theology.  He was asked by a physicist how he could possibly be a mathematical scientist in the 21^st century and hold to Christian beliefs, for example, that Jesus was simultaneously human and God.

Lennox replied that he would be delighted to respond if the physicist could answer an easier scientific question first.

Lennox:  “What is consciousness?”

Physicist:  “I don’t know.”

Lennox:  “Never mind, Let’s think of something easier.  What is energy?”

Physicist:  “Well, we can measure it and write down the equations governing its conservation.”

Lennox:  “Yes, I know, but that was not my question.  My question was:  what is it?”

Physicist:  “We don’t know, and I think you were aware of that.”

Lennox:  “Yes, like you I have read Feynman and he says that no one knows what energy is.  That brings me to my main point.  Would I be right in thinking that you were about to dismiss me (and my belief in God) if I failed to explain the divine and human nature of Christ?”  With no response from the physicist, he continued, “Well, by the same token, would you be happy if I now dismiss you and all your knowledge of physics because you cannot explain to me the nature of energy?  After all, energy is surely much less complex than the God who created it.”

Physicist:  “Please don’t!”

Lennox:  “. . . (so) why do you believe in the concepts of consciousness and energy, even though you do not understand them fully?  Is it not because of the explanatory power of those concepts?”

Physicist:  “I see what you are driving at.  You believe that Jesus Christ is God and man because that is the only explanation that has the power to make sense of what we know of him.”

Lennox:  “Exactly.”

Against the Flow is primarily a commentary on the book of Daniel.  Lennox brings in a significant amount of historical insight.  In Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylon, the temple priests enjoyed enormous power and property.  At the Spring festival, the emperor submitted to a ritual public humiliation by the priests, whereby they slapped him hard enough to bring tears.  The people were reminded that the priests were the power behind the throne, and only then could the great banquet begin.  Such a spectacle would certainly bring spice to American politics!

Babylon’s progenitor, Babel, was led by a people who demanded to “let us make a name” for themselves (Gen 11:4).  In contrast, Abraham was willing to let God rename him and determine his identity and significance.  Abraham trusted God and God marked Abraham as the archetype of faith . . . and faith is the foundation principle of God’s New Jerusalem.

Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl believed that the primary human motivational force is the search for meaning, and that the greatest thing we can do for others is to give them hope for the future.  God gave Abraham hope and then fulfilled His promises.  Abraham left Mesopotamia at God’s call and traveled to the land that became named after his grandson, Israel (Jacob).  Daniel, in contrast, was taken forcibly from the land of promise back to the land that Abraham left.  Daniel’s call was to live his faith in God, publicly, in a wicked land.  And so we have the many lessons from Daniel’s life for us in the godless West today.

The emperor forced name changes on Daniel and his three peers, working to erase their Hebrew identities.  They had to learn the Chaldean language and communicate publicly only in that language.  Today’s culture attempts to force certain words and concepts into and out of our language, and will cancel those who do not comply.

Lennox contrasts ancient Greek theology with the Hebrew faith.  The Greek gods were inside the world.  Jehovah wasn’t just about monotheism, but that He is external to the world, creating it and defining its meaning by His will.  God gives meaning to the world, but in the pagan system, the meaning of the system cannot be found inside the system.

A popular atheist objection to Christians goes like this:  “You are atheists with respect to Artemis, Baal, Diana, Wotan, Zeus, and thousands of other gods just like we are.  We just go one god more.”  This is a fallacious argument, because God is not just a part of the system.  He created the universe and sustains it each moment.  In paganism matter is eternal and began in formless chaos.  Some gods ‘arose’ out of the chaos (evolution), but these gods are still part of the stuff; “and so, in some sense, everything is god.”

God as revealed in the Bible is not made of matter-stuff.  He is self-existent, eternal, and Spirit.  God was first.  Everything derives from Him.

Physicist Paul Davies, considering the apparent fine-tuning of the physical laws and constants of the universe famously said, “The impression of design is overwhelming.”  But asked about the nature of said intelligence, he suggests it may be superhuman, but not supernatural.  Davies may well be in sync with Babylonian theology.

Nebuchadnezzar’s dream explores the relationship between reason and revelation.  Atheists often try to pit these two concepts against each other.  But they are not in the same category.  The Babylonian advisors were quite eager to employ their reason on the data available, but the emperor would not reveal the dream.  Unaided reason was helpless.  Daniel, though, understood that God knew both the dream and the meaning and could choose to reveal the data.  Daniel never suspended his reason, but employed it to interpret the meaning of the dream’s symbology in the Chaldean language.

Lennox mentions the fictional detective Hercule Poirot who uses his “little grey cells” to find patterns in the evidence.  Poirot acquires his data by interviewing people who provide him with invaluable revelations of what occurred before the detective arrived on the scene.  Lennox:  “To say that reason and revelation are antithetic does not even rise to the dignity of being false.  It simply doesn’t make sense – it is a confusion of categories, as the philosophers say.”

When young Daniel, in his early 20s, was brought before the throne of Earth’s mightiest emperor, he was likely confronted with live lions chained to each side, adding to the intimidation. He confessed that no man had the power to know and reveal the secrets of the king’s dream, “But there is a God in heaven that reveals secrets . . . But as for me, this secret is not revealed to me for any wisdom that I have . . .” (Daniel 2:28, 30), but that it is God’s will to make known to Nebuchadnezzar and his generation what God would do in future history.

Lennox points out that the Jews had failed in their task to witness to the Gentiles, but then there were individuals, like Daniel, who still served faithfully.  The case is analogous today.  Western Christians have singularly failed to preach the Gospel boldly, faithfully, and Scripturally to the last several generations.  But any one of us, individually, may choose to be faithful.  All the gods and worldviews of this age are just as impotent as the pagan religions of Daniel’s day, yet God is the same God as He always has been . . . commanding us to proclaim His message.

In Nebuchadnezzar’s dream there is a stone cut out of a mountain without hands, that smashes the statue representing the coming kingdoms of man, and then fills the Earth.  This speaks against false eschatologies, amillennialism and postmillennialism.  Man’s kingdoms are not God’s kingdoms.  Jesus will come in His own power to establish His own kingdom.  Our mission is not about power or politics, but to prepare born again children to enter His kingdom by preaching the Gospel.

Whether through the Holy Roman Empire or Marxist utopias or an American social gospel, man’s futility is relentless in ignoring the Great Commission.  There will be no paradise on Earth through man’s efforts.  Utopian attempts produce only carnage, poverty, and tyranny, as we see in Western politics right through to the present day.  I believe that if Christians in America would fulfill their responsibilities under the Great Commission diligently, God might just grant us some political freedoms and peace within which to do the job He gave us.  But there is no danger of that, and judgments are falling quickly on our nation.

Last century, The Times newspaper of London asked its readers to answer the question, “What is wrong with the world?”  G.K. Chesterton wrote in:

Dear Sir,

I am.

Yours faithfully,

G.K. Chesterton

Our problem is us; no, not those dastardly skeptics and heretics and cultists and Democrats and Marxists.  It’s us . . . us Christians.  We might just trigger the power of God to turn things around, if we really want to.  But I see http://nonprofit-success.com/s_ne.php no indication of a coming revival in the West, despite the continual hype that infests evangelicalism and pentecostalism.

Nebuchadnezzar decided to take that vision and glorify himself.  That idolatry cost him dearly.  The philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach (1804–72) had a great influence on Karl Marx.  Feuerbach declared, “The beginning, middle, and end of religion is MAN.”  Also, “MAN is man’s god.”  Pure idolatry.

A declaration was made at the 1961 Communist Party Congress:  “Until we remove bourgeois moral principles, roots and all, train men in the spirit of communist morality and renew that spiritually and morally, it will not be possible to build a communist society.”  Well, over the last sixty years they have succeeded by a total corruption of the public education system and entertainment media.  I recall conservatives back in the 1960s warning about encroaching immorality and secular humanism in American culture.  Such warnings were typically scoffed at.

By the way, communist morality is the subjugation of every individual to the dictates of the state, absolute conformity, and enmity to any principle or practice with Christian roots.  How is it going?

When Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego refused to bow down before the king’s idol, Nebachudnezzar was shocked.  Surely they didn’t value their religion above their lives?  But he could not force them to bow down.  He could kill them, but the mightiest king on Earth had no power over their conscience or will.  His fury and frustration were pegged.

The additional shock was not that God delivered them from the fire, but that He delivered them in the fire.  The three did not know what God would do, but they knew that they would be in His hands, whether by surviving the furnace or by entering Paradise.  We have similar choices, although not usually of lethal consequences.  Life is not complicated . . . just do right.  And do right again.

All genuine Christians will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.  Daniel chapter 3 is about how seriously we take it.  We’ll get to meet Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah someday.  We’ll doubtless have some appreciative things to say about their story.  When they ask about our story, will we have something to say?

The law of the Medes and Persians plays a role in Daniel’s life (Daniel chapter 6).  Secular histories give undue credit to the Mesopotamians for the origins of legal codes and the principle of equality under the law.  Properly, though, such codes and the principle of equality go back to Moses and God’s exposition of His laws.  In Deuteronomy 17:18-20 we see that the king is subject to God’s laws, just like everyone else, ultimately because we all are made in the image of God.

Daniel 7 looks forward to coming judgments from God.  Most people see judgment as all negative, but for those whose trust is in God, judgment is a cause for joy.  Lennox:  “When you are suffering unfairness, discrimination, harassment, or outright persecution, the uppermost thought on your mind is:  how long is this going to last?  And will anything ever be done about it?”  The New Testament is filled with hope for persecuted saints . . . see 2 Thessalonians chapter 1 for Paul’s comforting promises of judgment for those afflicting the saints at Thessalonica.

We long for justice, but ultimate justice is not seen in our lifetime.  God keeps perfect records and perfect justice will come.  The Judge will be the Son of Man . . . one of us while also God in the flesh.  He has walked in our shoes.  There are no excuses that can deceive Him.

Only the future world government under the Lord Jesus will see justice properly done in day-to-day life.  The world’s elites desperately want to establish their own world government with man at the helm.  They are merely setting themselves up for the Antichrist, whose kingdom will be short and quickly destroyed.

Albert Einstein yearned for peace via a global government under man:  “A world government must be created which is able to solve conflicts between nations by judicial decision.”

This is not a new idea.  In the middle ages the poet and statesman Danti Alighiere (1265-1321) argued that war could be eliminated if “the whole earth and all that humans possess be a monarchy, that is, one government under one ruler . . . he would hold kings contentedly within the borders of their kingdoms, and keep peace among them.”

Philosopher Immaniuel Kant preferred a federal union of free and independent states because he feared that a single power would degenerate into a soulless despotism and crush “the germs of goodness.”

Lennox observes that Daniel 7 is projecting an end-time global tyranny that “will lead inexorably to the greatest state-orchestrated hostility to God that the world has ever seen.”  We see such hostilities breaking out today all over the world.

Friedrich Nietzsche, an atheist, saw the “death of God” as a threat to human freedom and an open door to nihilism and the loss of meaning.

All these issues provide topics for the Christian evangelist.  Everything in the news is connected to unfolding prophecy and the need for lost sinners to find the Saviour.  Only born again children of God will be His co-inheritors when His kingdom is established.  We can challenge unbelievers that they have only two teams to choose from.  One of those teams will rule; the other will be damned.

Daniel 8 predicts the coming rule of Antiochus IV, who ruled over the Jews from 175-164 BC.  He took the title Epiphanes, a claim to divinity meaning “God manifest.”  He was clearly a type of the yet-future Antichrist.

Antiochus shared a difficulty with other emperors, unifying a diverse collection of peoples and religions.  The Jews, in particular, were centered on their Scripture-based God.  Antiochus raged at the recalcitrant Jews, desecrating the temple, and robbing the golden altar and lampstand, along with many golden vessels.

Later he attacked Jerusalem and slaughtered many Jews.  Determined to break their spirit he wrote laws that contradicted vital Jewish religious practices, for example, mandating the sacrifice of pigs and making circumcision illegal.  The temple was rededicated to Zeus.  For the Jews this was abomination upon abomination.

The Maccabean Revolt, led by Judas Maccabeus, led to the recapture of Jerusalem.  The festival of Hanukkah celebrates the victory to this day.

When Jesus arrived on the scene two centuries later, called by His followers Immanuel, “God with us,” along with declaring, “I and my Father are one,” it shocked the Jews.  Was this Antiochus all over again?  Either it was blasphemy or it was true.  They attempted to stone Him and then succeeded in crucifying Him.  In a future day, perhaps not far from now, the temple will be rebuilt and the Antichrist himself will defile it, but Jesus will come in power to establish His righteous kingdom.  It would be best to discern whose side to be on through all these events.

It is noteworthy that in the last century (+ a little), there has been more death and state-sponsored anti-God tyranny than in all of previous history.  It is remarkably consistent how lethally anti-Christian are the tyrannies of Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, and the Kim family, along with local hate-driven persecution all over the world from anti-Christian religions including Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism.  (Subscribe to the monthly newsletter from Voice of the Martyrs to read story after story of how Christians persevere all over the world today.)

Antiochus was just representative of what Satan attempts to do every time he can get one of his minions into power.  Consider the Kim family, notably North Korea’s first despot, Kim Il Sung.   Juche, the official state ideology of North Korea, embraces the core principle that “man is the master of everything and decides everything.”  Kim is seen as a Messianic liberator of all humankind.  His birthplace and life events are commemorated by shrines, requiring pilgrimages by the North Korean people.  Kim’s portrait is in every household and people begin every day by reading his words.  ‘Reflection’ meetings are held wherein people repent of wrong actions and wrong thoughts.

The devil is warming up in preparation for his Antichrist.

We ought to be busy about the Great Commission.  That never changes.

I’ll end here.  Lennox’s commentary and insights are voluminous and rich.  You ought to have his book on your shelf of commentaries . . . and I believe you’ll simply enjoy reading it through.  The main thing about prophecy is that it motivates us to be about the Lord’s work in this present age while souls are so much at stake.  Jesus is coming soon.  Let’s finish strong.

• drdave@truthreallymatters.com