We are having a revival of feelings but not of the knowledge of God. The church today is guided more by feelings than by convictions. We value enthusiasm more than informed commitment. This is a quote from a 1980 Gallup poll on religion. In our society, feelings have replaced logic and reasoning. If you can make someone feel like it is the right thing to do, regardless of whether or not it really is, people are going to do it. I guess today, in a sense, I am going to be giving a persuasive speech about persuasive speaking, and not just any persuasive speaking but particularly about evangelistic speaking. There is a problem that is running rampant today among American society, and especially among American Christians. I don’t know if it is something that we have forgotten how to do or if we just stopped doing it because it isn’t exactly the easiest thing in the world to do. Whatever the reason, I do know that we have stopped thinking logically and reasonably about our faith. This is a problem and it needs to change. And it isn’t just that we have stopped thinking about our faith, we have stopped thinking about things very hard at all. Because of the mindlessness of our culture, people do not persuade others of their views (religious or otherwise) on the basis of argument and reason, but rather, by expressing emotional rhetoric and politically correct buzzwords. Reason has given way to rhetoric, evidence to emotion, substance to slogan, the speech writer to the makeup man, and rational authority (the right to command compliance and to be believed) to social power (the ability to coerce compliance and outward conformance). We must retrain ourselves and teach those around us to think and know things for themselves and know why they believe what they believe. Today I want to trace how we got to this stage of mental lackadaisicalness, what it has done to the church and our culture and how we can fix it.

At the arrival of the Pilgrims, Protestant believers prized the intellectual life and its contribution to the Christian journey. The literacy rate among men in early Massachusetts and Connecticut was between 89 and 95%, this is according to Neil Postman in his book Amusing Ourselves to Death . These are the people who founded our first colleges, who studied art, literature, science, philosophy and other fields as a way of loving God with their minds. However, in the middle of the 1800 things began to change dramatically. Preachers like George Whitefield from the first Great Awakening began planting the seeds through popularized, rhetorically powerful and emotionally directed preaching. Please don’t misunderstand me, these Great Awakenings were a great thing and many people were saved because of them. The problem I have with them is that immediate personal conversion to Christ was overemphasized and there was no time for a period of reflection and conviction. Sermons shifted focus from intellectually careful and doctrinally precise sermons to emotional, simple ones. Personal feelings and a relationship to Christ were pushed instead of a deep grasp of the nature of Christian teaching and ideas. As historian George Marsden said “anti-intellectualism was a feature of American revivalism.” I don’t want to come off as that person who is completely against anything that has to do with the emotional side of our faith. I put a lot of stock in emotions but almost tend to put more stock in the logistical side of it. History has proved me right. Because of this focus on emotion and not on why what we believe there arose two “factions” of Christianity from the Burned Over District of New York City. These are, of course, Mormonism, which arose in 1830 and the Jehovah’s Witnesses in 1884.

The emerging anti-intellectualism in the church created a lack of readiness for the full-scale intellectual assault on Christianity that reached its head in the late 1800s. These attacks came from the philosophical ideas of men like David Hume, from German higher criticism that brought the historical reliability of the Bible into question, and from Darwinian evolution that emerged to make the “world a safe place for atheists,” as one contemporary Darwinian atheist has put it. Instead of responding to these attack with an intense intellectual counter punch, most believers became suspicious of any kind of intellectual of issue. Obviously, Christians must rely on the Holy Spirit in our intellectual pursuits, but this does not give us a free pass. We still need to be willing to expend some of our own mental sweat as we learn to defend our faith. Because believers in the late 1800 and early 1900s were not willing to put this energy toward fighting the rise of the non-believers, we are now facing a huge number of militant atheists in our society who give Christians no credit at all. What kind of impact has this had on the church as a whole? Let’s look and see.

J.P. Moreland defines five major characteristics that capture the essence of the impact of anti-intellectualism on today’s evangelicalism. I want to spend the next couple of minutes going over these.
The first of these is a misunderstanding of faith’s relationship to reason. Faith is now defined as an act of blind will, a decision to believe something that is either independent of reason or that is a simple choice to believe while ignoring the lack of evidence for what is believed. In contrast to the secular idea of faith, the Bible defines faith as a power or skill to act in accordance with the nature of the kingdom of God, a trust in what we have reason to believe is true. When we look at it this way, we can see that faith is built on reason. If this is the case, if our faith really is built on reason, sermons should target people’s thinking as much as their wills and feelings. Apologetics should be a regular part of every discipleship group. Local church after local church should be raising up and training a group of people who serve as apologists for the entire congregation. We sing, “In my heart, Lord be glorified,” but when was the last time you heard someone sing, “In my intellectual life, Lord be glorified”? This misunderstanding of the relationship between faith and reason has led to an even more sinister trend among modern evangelicals.

A lack of intellectualism has also brought about a separation of the secular and the sacred. The withdrawal of the corporate body of Christ from the public sphere of ideas is mirrored by our understanding of what is required to produce an individual discipleship. Religion has become personal, private, and too often simply a matter of “how I feel about things.” In contrast the culture encourages me to invoke my intellect in my secular, public life. The weakening of world missions is also a major form of fallout from the lack of intellectualism in our society.

Anti-intellectualism has spawned an irrelevant gospel. Today, we primarily share the gospel as a means of addressing felt needs. We give testimonies of changed lives and say to people that if they want to become better parents or overcome depression or loneliness, then Christ is the answer for them. This is a very true statement and we are right in presenting it that way, but it is inadequate for two reasons, It does not reach people who may be out of touch with their feelings and it invites the response, “Sorry, but I don’t have a need.” If truth and reasonableness are not uppermost in the presentation of the gospel to a pagan culture already predisposed to regarding religion as a set of private feelings, then we will consistently hear this response: “Well, that’s fine for you if having those feelings helps you.” Religion is now viewed by many as a placebo or emotional crutch precisely because that is how we often pitch the gospel to unbelievers.

Lastly, anti-intellectualism has led to a loss of boldness in confronting the idea structures in our culture with effective Christian witness. It has drained the church of its boldness in witnessing and speaking out about important issues in the places where ideas are generated. And for those who do have such courage, anti-intellectualism has created a context in which we Christians often come off as shallow, defensive and reactionary instead of thoughtful, confident and articulate. This is because we are unfamiliar with the things that people want to talk about. We live in our own little box and when we try to stick our heads out and get involved in our world, one of two things will happen. Either we will be completely ignorant about the topic at hand, but continue to try and debate, thus making ourselves and Christians in general look bad, or we will have no clue whats going on and will keep our mouths shut for fear of turning out like the first example. This second option is only marginally better than the first. When people learn what they believe and why, they become bold in their witness and attractive in the way that they engage other in debate or dialog.

How then can we make a change and start to once again think in deeper ways? We must train our minds to think again. The spiritually mature person is a wise person, And a wise person has the savvy and skill necessary to lead an exemplary life and to address the issues of the day in a responsible, attractive way that brings honor to God. We must familiarize ourselves, not only, with the issues that affect us and that are pertinent to our faith, we must also be familiar with the arguments and ideas of those who would come against us. This means not only reading intellectually engaging books that support and confirm what we believe, we also have to read and understand things that go in stark contradiction with what we believe. If we are to debate and defend our faith, we must understand what our adversaries believe and be familiar enough with their ideas to deconstruct them. We have to teach ourselves to read again, to listen to and critique debates, to think and know and act, but always in ways that bring honor to God.

Anti-intellectualism is a disease of complacency that has spread into the very heart of the American Church. Since the mid-1800s the mind of the American Christian has dwindled away, giving rise to Mormonism, the Jehovah’s Witnesses and today’s militant atheists. Through the attacks of these militant atheists our society has become one ruled by complacency instead of compassion, who is affected more by the pursuit of a flat stomach that by the pursuit of a robust mind. We, as students here at Ozark Christian College, are in a unique position to make huge steps in changing this grisly trend. We have the chance to make huge steps to fight this continued rise of anti-intellectualism. We are the leaders of tomorrow. While we are here, we must train ourselves to think much deeper about the heavy stuff of our faith. We need to think about things like the duality of Christ’s nature, the Trinity, the Historical Jesus and His resurrection. I would ask that you invest time every week to talk with others, people older and wiser than yourself, about things that you normally would not think about. Doing so, being able to think and know and understand things about our faith will ultimately give you respect among your peers and lead to a more successful ministry. One of my personal favorite songs by the O.C. Supertones called “Grounded” puts it like this: “There are kids in universities drowning in an ocean of apostate philosophy. We need apologetic instruction, mental reconstruction to stop the mass abduction of evangelical minds. Wisdom and truth have been vandalized by the unevangelized. No truth in a world that is randomized. Expose their lies no matter how they are disguised.” We must rededicate ourselves to being deeply spiritual people of whom it can truly be said that “Christ is formed” (Galatians 4:19). And, given the times in which we live, we must also obey Jesus’ admonition to be as wise as serpents and and innocent as doves (Matthew 10:16).

I drive a 1992 Dodge Dakota. It is white with quite a few sizable chips in the paint. As I sit in it right now, starting this article, it has 365,539 miles on it. This is not a typo. It runs great with only a few minor glitches that are easily handled. I can run it down I-40 coming home from Joplin at 75 (or 80…..) mph with cold air blowing on my face and good music pumping through the stereo system. It can do pretty much anything that I ask it to do. To be honest, it had been a fantastic first truck and I really enjoy driving it, that is, until I pull up next to a 2009 Dodge Ram Rumble Bee edition…..All of a sudden my truck isn’t so cool or nice. My pastor refers to this phenomena as “automotive envy” and while we cannot be sure, we are almost positive it is a sin. We all suffer from it whether it be automotive, electronic, housing or otherwise. We all think that our stuff is pretty nice until we compare it with the newest and the best. We spend so much money and time trying to accumulate stuff that we forget what is really important.

Starting in Matthew 5, Jesus begins preaching the Sermon on the Mount and for the next 3 chapters he delivers one of the most powerful sermons ever. From the Beattitudes to law, anger, lust prayer and divorce, there is nothing that Jesus neglects to address in his sermon. In Matthew 6:19-21 Jesus says:

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

The first part of this verse is pretty easy to unpack so I won’t spend much time on it. Basically, “Don’t worry about worldly possessions because worldly possessions don’t matter.” The second part, however, is vitally important and, I think, often times misinterpreted. The average, materialistic American mind would read the second half of this passage and think, “Oh well, apparently worldly possessions mean nothing, so I can just use the time that I would spend getting rich, doing good things in the world so that when I get to heaven my crown will be prettier, or maybe I can even get a bigger mansion.” My friends we are dillusional. We understand when Ephesians 2:8-9 tells us that we cannot work our way into heaven but we still think that our works will be compensated for in heaven through materialistic and physical means. I don’t know about you but all the compensation I need is for Jesus to look me in the face and say “Well done good and faithful servant.” Please don’t get me wrong, our works are important: how else are we supposed to show our faith? But our works can’t save us and our works can’t get us a better seat in heaven. We read this passage and think that is is about money and time management. Ladies and gentlemen, this is an evangelical message! Any ideas as to what the treasures in heaven could be? I don’t know…..how about the souls that we are, for lack of a better term, responsible for!! What greater reward treasure could you think of than a soul that you baptized in a frigid mountain pond when you were 19 years old running up to you and thanking you with everything they could muster for the time that you invested into their lives? You may not even remember what you did but it does not detract from the importance that it was in their life. If we as Christians would spend the time that we usually focus on personal gain evangelizing and being serious about our faith instead, the Christian faith would be much more highly regarded and well though of, not to mention much more advanced.

In the late 1800’s and early 1900’s men would give up everything they owned and move their families hundreds of miles across treacherous plains and deserts to mine the rivers of California and eventually up into Alaska. They would sell off all their possessions except for some food and a couple of pans to search for gold with. To them, that was all they needed, at least until they hit the “Mother Lode”. What faith they had! They were supremely confident that they would find what they were looking for and find it fast.

Ladies and Gentlemen, why can’t we do this? Would our care increase if we truly believed that a life could be saved? We have been provided with all that we need. God has given us his tools, that is, His Word, His Holy Spirit, and our intellect and reasonableness. All we have to do us utilize these. The SpiritFire Revolution is armed and standing on the banks of the huge river of secularism with sleeves rolled up, ready to dive in and recover the treasure that we know is buried deep within. We can’t wait to see what we can find, but the question begs: Will you join us?

Ask yourself what you would think of the following military force:
The enemy has taken over every major base, stolen all of their battle plans and made comedy of them, converted a majority of its soldiers to their side, and made a majority of those remaining into willless drones. I am quite sure that you would rightly question the competence of this force, and possibly marvel at the dominance of the enemy force. Well, this is precisely what has happened in our battle with a depraved world. We are the failing fighting force, and this should not be. Now that I have explained what we are, let’s chat about what we are called to be: the resistance. Put your big kid pants on.

“Radical”. We’ve been trained that this is an awful, negative term, symptomatic of a lunatic or unstable person that we should ignore as a “loon”. Now there are certainly realms in which radicalism is negative. We see radical liberalism in the political sphere, and it is extremely harmful, abusing and insulting constitutional principles in the name of…ahem…”justice and equality.” There is radicalism in the animal rights movement that likens the slaughter of cows and pigs to the death of 6 million humans during the holocaust. Radical Islam has a tendency to blow up children because, you know, God told them to. Obviously not all radicalism is good. But as Christ followers, we should be self identified as “radicals”. Writing in 2 Corinthians, Paul ensures that there is no mistake: we are charged to go on the offensive in a radical manner. He writes:

“The weapons we fight with are not worldly. On the contrary, we have the power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. And we will be ready to punish every act of disobedience, once your obedience is complete.”
2 Corinthians 10:4-6

This empowering passage makes it devastatingly clear that we must be fighters. No doubt “demolishing strongholds” and “demolishing arguments” could get us inevitably branded as loud, obnoxious, outspoken, even, dare I say it…radical. Make no mistake, though. We must not lose sight of our love for people. That’s a tough line to toe in spiritual warfare, but Paul reminds us later in the same book, in 2 Corinthians 13:2 and 3, that “we can have a faith that moves mountains…but if I have not love, I gain nothing.” If we are not speaking the truth BECAUSE of our love for Jesus, and our desire to show Him to others, and simply shout truth in HATE, we fail, we fall. It’s not easy, but love must be the reason. That’s a tough one for me personally at times. The depravity and weakness, both within and outside the church, can make it easy for a man of powerful faith to go ballistic, run out his front door, fire his rifle and shout “what the hell is wrong with you people!?” This is not exactly the most effective method, tempting though it is. When we fail at showing love, we get up, learn from our shortcoming, dust ourselves off, and try to do it right next time.

Now, what does all this have to do with being the “resistance”?
1) How do we use spiritual warfare like Paul spoke about to “resist” a depraved world and culture?
2) How do we do go against the flow and retain our LOVE for those whose lives represent what we are trying to fight? Let’s take those one by one.

1) The way to resist a depraved culture is to take up the “weapons” Paul spoke of and surge against the current. We must make it known, through passion, conviction, study, and strength, that we are set apart. People should not know us for five minutes without noticing the fire within us. We must have our arguments fine tuned for battle, our hearts geared for objectivity and understanding, and our spirits united in this cause. We lack this vital element. There are many reasons for this, but a main contributor is, say, a bunch of faux-Christ followers, proclaiming their faith in their cute monkey suits on Sunday, then hurriedly throwing their cash into the community booze and whisky pool on Friday and Saturday, immediately turning the camouflage back on so that they might blend blissfully in with the masses of lost sheep. Great soldiers indeed. Just to kill an argument before it gets off the ground, let me say that I am referring to a lifestyle, not a lapse in judgment. All of us slip and sin. But unapologetically and pathologically engaging in a lifestyle IS very different than falling and getting back up. It’s staying down on the ground, and being okay with it…and that is a disease. In our resistance against this, we must always retain our love, but there is a point at which these people no longer have a place among the body of Christ. Don’t believe me? I’ll hand the floor over to the Apostle Paul once again.

1 Corinthians 5:11 states “…you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral, greedy, or an idolater, or a drunkard or a swindler. WITH SUCH A MAN DO NOT EVEN EAT.”

If those within the Body of Christ, those in our midst as Followers, insist upon living in a worldly fashion, we must acknowledge them as lost sheep, as souls to be won (or possibly re-won), in essence, as worldly, and try to get them back. I went on a bit of a tangent there, but that point is necessary to the cause of resistance to the world and its ways. We cannot stand if the foundation is not steady, or if there is a prominent “enemy within.”

In addition to battling this “enemy within” the Body, we must continue to put the truth of Christ in every public arena we possibly can. We must take up a banner of “No Compromise,” and show the world a passion and zeal for truth, and a desire to spread Christ’s truth and love too all places.

2) In the vein of love, let us explore how to be a militant bringer of truth, and still retain a Christ-like love for people. The solution to this dilemma comes under the flag of an old cliché. Nonetheless, let us keep in mind that clichés are clichés because they are usually true. “Hate the sin, love the sinner”. Whoever originally said this was in a rather favorable state of mind. The most common objection to this position is the argument that it does not work, because people “are what they do”. In the case of murderers and rapists, perhaps this is true. But in Christ we know that our sins DO NOT DEFINE US. Jesus takes our sin, and this drives a wedge between us and sin’s nature, propelling us into a unique individuality, undefined by our sin, but by Jesus Christ in us. Thus, we can militantly pursue and demolish sin and even sin nature (especially in those we love most), whilst loving the child of God in which the sin issue dwells.

I cited the passage earlier, and 2 Corinthians 13:2 and 3 are very clear in their message, that without love we have nothing. Loving them (“the sinner” in the cliché) means genuinely wanting what is best for THEM, not you. It means going out of the way for THEIR inner peace and inner truth. Pursue this “love objective” in a spirit of truth and conviction. Battle their demons alongside them. But keep in mind that some may not want to fight their personal demons. And at a certain point, that wish must be granted.

Without a doubt, fighting and battling for truth, whilst loving the lost, are among our highest calls. Let us prepare ourselves for it, brothers and sisters.

I could come up with “non-conformist” scenarios all night as I sit and type this, (with a little Coheed and Cambria playing lowly in the background…in case anyone appreciates that) but I’m not seeking any kind of creative objective. What you must understand is that, if no one has ever recruited you to fight on this side of the spiritual battle, the right side, I am recruiting you now, believers and non-believers alike. If you want to get active, shoot me an email with any questions. It doesn’t matter where you’re coming from. If God can use an undeserving loudmouth like me for his kingdom, he can use you. He may even help you grow, as he’s helping me, and so many others.

Who are the resistance? We are. Let’s light a fire under our asses and act like it. God Bless.

For those of you joining us without knowledge of our previous site, I will provide a summary of our path to this point. A year ago, we founded www.absolutechristianity.org to push forward with a mission of spiritual revival. As one could expect, we found it difficult to find time to meet, since we not only went to different colleges, but lived in three separate states, New York, Missouri, and Texas. To that degree, we only achieved success in writing a handful of essays, the final number rounding out at fifteen by the time the site became dormant. Early on, we met over a break from classes to discuss what would become a separate entity from the website. We agreed, after much deliberation, on a ministry called the Spirit Fire Revolution. Its purpose: to reignite global enthusiasm for faith in God.

From three nineteen year old students.

Sound sort of… hilarious? Sure. And rather than force-feed you the starry-eyed optimism that I tried at first, I will attempt to explain the rationale behind our charge. We grew up in a society that mocks faith, blinds people from participating in intellectual discourse, and thrives on allowing human beings to behave in their most primal states without cause for remorse. We learned of Jesus in a culture where Christianity is a hobby for Sunday mornings, where men and women yearn to blend into the mesh rather than bring forth their religious convictions, and where the message behind the faith has become so watered down that most churches don’t even help procure a future for Christ-followers.

I am not daunted by the magnitude of the task at hand. I am terrified of the prospect of having to remain silent.

This movement is not for feel-good preachers, nor ‘fire and brimstone’ accusers. We are not called to be quiet or to hold animosity and judgement. We, as Followers of the Way, must try to help mold the body into what it should be. It is time for us to stop this half-hearted lifestyle of following and pursue the act of absolute Christianity.

This is a challenge to all followers and an invitation to all non-followers. Help us bring faith out of docility and instill in it a sense of power, compassion, and dignity.

He took the world’s sin. Now we must retake sin’s world.