Ever since Erasmus decided that divorce could be a good thing, Christians and humanists have been dancing a five hundred year long intellectual, spiritual, and cultural tango. Often it looks more like a tangle than a tango, but for better or for worse, we are stuck with each other.
Now it’s finally time to admit that we need each other.
Eak!
Yes, it’s true, my God fearing, Bible believing, Christ honoring fellow believers. We need humanists. Here is why.
Humanists make us accountable. They take what we believe, hold it up to our face like a mirror, and — to our intense embarrassment — point out each and every inconsistency among us.
Some well-known pastor has an affair? Boom! Humanists are on it. A church gets particularly obsessive at raising money? It will be duly noted. And humanists have a hay day with our constant problem with racism in our churches.
To all of that, I say, “Thank you, humanists. You are doing us Christians a great service. You are keeping us honest. Keep up the good work.”
There are counterfeit Christians. Yes. But something that is counterfeit proves the existence of something genuine. There are, after all, no counterfeit three dollar bills, as C. S. Lewis has pointed out. There are massive numbers of genuine and godly Christians and Christian churches that consistently practice what they believe.
So, yes, we Christians need you humanists to hold us accountable. But guess what, humanists? You also need us Christians.
You need us Christians because your materialistic and godless worldview provides no logical basis for the humanity you so proudly celebrate.
From your perspective, we humans are, strictly speaking, just animals and nothing more. And so you have no logical basis for the intrinsic value of humans.
Science, a human achievement that you are so proud of – – and rightfully so — simply tells us what is, not what ought to be. And so you have no logical basis for morality.
Using just your five senses you have figured out the entire history of the universe all the way back to the big bang. Amazing! But your universe is devoid of meaning and purpose and cares nothing about us. By your logic, we humans are the smallest of specks on the smallest of worlds circling one of millions of stars in one of billions and billions of galaxies. It wouldn’t matter the slightest if the entire human race went extinct tomorrow.
Thus the value that you ascribe to humanity doesn’t come from your world view, your a priori assumptions. It comes from us Christians. It comes from the fact that we humans have been created in the image of God. It is why Western civilization has always placed such a massive emphasis on human rights. You don’t want to admit it. You will never admit it. But it’s true.
And so we hold our noses when we are in each other’s presence, us Christians and humanists. We squirm. We argue. We leave the room and slam the door, only to find that we are still in the same building.
We will never truly be at peace with each other. But we do truly need each other.
This post first appeared in NewCommandment.org.
Since 2003 New Commandment Men’s Ministries has helped hundreds of churches throughout North American and around the world recruit teams of men who permanently adopt their widowed and single parents in their congregations for the purpose of donating two hours of service to them one Saturday morning each month. We accomplish this with a free training site called New Commandment Men’s Ministry
Learn how to mobilize your men’s ministry to meet every pressing need in your church here.†
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