Theology in the Raw - S2: First Bonus Q & A of 2023

Episode Date: January 18, 2023

Welcome to a sneak peek of the first Bonus Q&A episode, part of the Theology in the Raw premium subscription. Join now here: http://patreon.com/theologyintheraw In the full episode, we discuss: 00:00 Introduction 1:38 What's your take on the historical Adam? 9:20 What is your view on covenant friendships/celibate partnerships? 17:10 Was Paul's thorn in the flesh same sex attraction? 18:15 What is meant by the power assigned to the devil/satan over the earth? 21:12 How could Adam say “man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife” when Adam was created from dirt and Eve from his side? 23:18 Does the fact (?) that God is neither male nor female have any contribution to make in the egalitarian/complementarian conversation? 26:15 Luke 2:25 says the Spirit was on Simeon. How is this different from post Pentecost Holy Spirit. 29:35 Should I watch violent movies like LOTR if I’m convinced of nonviolence? 33:17 Could it be that Genesis 1's 7 days are not days of creation but correspond to the 7 days Moses was on Sinai (Exod 24:15-18)? 35:36 Is there any substance to the idea that heaven/the new earth will exist "outside of time"? 38:43 What are your thoughts on pop-psychology as opposed to the biblical soul care model within the church? Can both exist together? 44:02 Thoughts on Church of Christ? I grew up COC. Sometimes you and Francis Chan seem headed in that direction :blush:e.g. communion, no paid church staff, NV, etc. 46:31 Why do we limit the upside-down, first-are-last Kingdom ethics to Jesus? 50:18 If you started another micro church today, what would you differently than last time? 53:21 Was "the great commission" intended to be a command for all believers? Or was it a specific exhortation to those disciples at the time? 55:54 What do you think about 4th point in https://christiansforsocialaction.org/resource/im-going-crazy? 58:25 How to answer my daughter who’s afraid she won't remain in God because she has seen close relatives turn their backs on God after living vibrant spiritual lives 1:01:11 My sibs are now Progressive Christians and it's one of the biggest disappointments of my life. I struggle with mere conversation, much more, raising my kids around them. Advice? 1:04:28 What would be the one thing you find most attractive and most objectionable about some of the major Christian denominations/traditions you haven't been part of? 1:07:22 I'd love to hear your take on if the Bible claims inerrancy or not. Pete Enns and Jarad Bias have some solid arguments for the "Error of Inerrancy" - thoughts? 1:11:25 Was Jesus tempted with same-sex attraction? HEB 4:15 1:13:36 You said in the 2022 review you would likely welcome guests with “heretical” views. Would it be fair to say a guest’s earnestness is a larger factor for you? 1:15:24 What do you find to be the most compelling/winsome Biblical and extra-Biblical arguments for Christian nationalism? 1:19:42 What does covenentalism (New Perspective on Paul) say about once saved always saved? Are there any examples of a member of God's covenant people (OT Jew) leaving/being kicked out? 1:21:38 Resources you recommend for someone wanting to grow in their understanding of church doctrines, spiritual formation, basic Christian beliefs & church history? 1:23:06 Why would God create a clitoris—the only organ who only serves one purpose: pleasure? Especially if it’s rarely stimulated with intercourse? 1:25:37 In what ways do the biblical passages on gendered marital roles apply to roles in the church? I.e. could you be complementarian in one but egalitarian in the other? If you would like to support Theology in the Raw, please visit patreon.com/theologyintheraw for more information!

Hey friends, welcome back to another episode of Theology in the Raw. This is sort of a bonus episode. What I'm going to do is go through all of the questions sent in by my Patreon supporters. You're going to get a little sneak preview of the first several questions that I'm going to address, and then the rest of the questions will be on the Patreon-only podcast, which you can get full access to if you go to patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw. Here is a sampling of some of the questions I'm going to address. What's your take on the historical Adam?

What is your view on covenant friendships or celibate partnerships? Was Paul's thorn in the flesh same-sex attraction? The most compelling biblical or extra biblical argument for Christian nationalism. What is meant by the power assigned to the devil and or Satan over the earth? Why would God create a clitoris? The only organ that serves one purpose, pleasure. Is that the case? How did Adam leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife?

And Adam was created from the dirt, Eve from his side. Does the fact that God is neither male nor female have any contribution to the egalitarian complementarian conversation? Was Jesus tempted with same-sex attraction? What is the Spirit's role pre and post Pentecost? And I'm going to show more here. Let's see. Any substance to the idea that in the new heavens and new earth, we will be outside of time? Is it okay to watch movies like Lord of the Rings where there's lots of violence? If I started another microchurch today, would it look any differently? How would I do it differently if I started it today? And what is my take on the biblical doctrine of inerrancy? Is it indeed biblical? And there's several other questions I'm going to address. So let's go ahead and jump in. All right. What is my take on the historical Adam? Is the creation story only an

origin myth for the Israelites or is it scientifically accurate as well? I guess let me begin by saying this is not a primary area of my expertise. I've read maybe, I would say maybe three to four books related to this topic, which there's a lot more out there than that. I have little to no scientific background. Okay. And even the books that I read, I just sort of read them. It's like I took extensive notes or wrote any like response to them or wrote a paper on it. So I'm, a lot of you listening are further ahead than I am on this. I can offer you some thoughts, but I just, I would, I would encourage you to seek out a more authoritative source, somebody that does have a really good science background, also a thorough knowledge of the

ancient Near East context of Genesis 1 and 2 or Genesis 1 to 11. Some of my favorite scholars in that area are C. John Collins, Tremper Longman, John Walton, and there's several others. I like Chris Wright as an Old Testament scholar. I'm not sure if he's done a lot of work on this specific issue. And yeah, and there's others you can check out so i and all the scholars i listed there even are going to have uh maybe slightly you know different yet maybe overlapping views as well um i i don't want to in the question i don't want to assume that it's an either or here something could technically have an origin myth that it is trying to relay or at least drawing on some sort of, you know, kind of ancient mythical elements. And it could be scientifically, or maybe a better phrase would

be historically accurate. So it's not necessarily an either or, it could be a both and. My main question I always ask with these types of really tough questions is, what was the intention of the original author? If someone says, is Genesis 1 and 2 historical or not? I'm going to say it's what the author intended it to be. Was Job a historical story? Was the story of Jonah a historical story? Well, it depends on how the author wanted us to understand that story. And so that takes us into, you know, questions around genre and language and ancient Near East parallels and so on. So I don't want to just take for granted just because it's like in the Bible, it's intended to be an extended parable that might have some historical roots, but isn't a kind of word for word summary of the historical life of Job. And I don't want to get into the reasons for that. One of them is, again, there are clues in the language of the book of Job and the genre

of the book of Job and the extensive poetry that it's written in that would suggest that the author of Job, whoever he is, it wasn't Job as a historical person. The book was written way, way later than when Job would have lived. If indeed, again, there was a historical person called Job. But there's clues in the very language, the presentation of the story that would suggest that the author didn't intend the story to be a kind of word for word, you know, account of a historical record. There's so many poetic and even some mythical elements at the end of the story that would suggest that it is more, that there's a lot of parabolic aspects to the retelling of

Job. So is Genesis 1 and 2 or Genesis 1 to 3 or Genesis 1 to 11? It's really Genesis 1 to 11. It's kind of, this question about the historicity of Adam applies to a lot of stuff being told in Genesis 1 through 11 with the flood and the story of the Tower of Babel and so on and so forth. So I do think that clearly there is a good deal of figurative language in Genesis 2. that clearly there is a good deal of figurative language in Genesis 2. Clearly, there are a lot of poetic and rhythmic elements in Genesis 1. These are clues that would suggest that we don't necessarily need to take everything in this kind of woodenly historical or word-for-word literal sense. Again, I'm not saying it shouldn't be taken that way or can't be taken that way. I'm just saying there are some signals being sent by the author that there could

be some more poetic or non-historical elements being portrayed in this section of scripture. So I think the main reason why people say that there wasn't a historical Adam and Eve, I think it's largely because they would say it conflicts with the scientific consensus, right? And that's where, again, I'm going to leave it at that. I can't speak firsthand to the scientific consensus from the little I've dabbled, from the stuff I've read. It seems like there is a decent consensus from scientists that humanity did not come from a single human pair. Again, I can't verify whether that's true or not. That's just my perception of people summarizing the so-called consensus. But even then, I've seen some really,

really smart people in tune with the science say, no, it's way more complicated than that. The science is not, quote unquote, settled. I would say the best argument for taking Adam and Eve to be a literal human pair has to do with how they are referred to in the New Testament in particular, the way that the singular literal person of Adam is intertwined with the finished work of Christ, specifically in Romans 5. And there are other passages here that for Christ to be the last Adam, it makes better sense that there would be an actual first Adam. And again, I've seen cases where people get around that. I'm not particularly compelled by those cases, but it's not like I'm raising a question that people are not aware of, people that don't take Adam and Eve in the most literal manner. So I would say, again, this is where I'm tentatively at. I think based on the most,

sometimes this phrase gets me in trouble, the plain reading. I almost said, and I don't know if I want to say it like this, but for lack of better terms, you know, based on kind of a plain reading of Genesis 1 and 2, and based especially on the New Testament use of Adam, I guess my hesitation with that though, is science is always changing and refining and developing. And what was the scientific consensus on any issue 20 years ago is typically somewhat different today. Like, so I, you know, I just, I want to be really, I want to be, you know, look at science with a broad angled lens to know like, yes, science is, it's an approach. It's how we evaluate things, right?

There is no such thing as like the science. So I want to, I would be hesitant simply using the so-called scientific consensus to trump the most natural and theologically compelling way to read scripture. So that's where I'm at on that. Again, I would highly encourage you to consult somebody who has worked with these issues more extensively than I have. Next question. What is my view of covenant friendships and or celibate partnerships? Typically, this is between two people. Usually, I mean, between two people. Well, no, typically

between two people. Usually, it's two people who are same-sex attracted and they themselves are the same sex. So two men who are both attracted to the same sex, who typically for theological reasons, ethical reasons, do not believe it's okay to engage in a sexual relationship with each other, but they might enter into what's called a covenanted friendship or a celibate partnership. Now, that's the broad way to describe it. And some of you are thinking, well, what does that mean? Is this like a sexless marriage? Is this just a friendship? And there's going to be a wide array of different viewpoints on what exactly it is we're talking about. In fact, my friend, Dr. Greg Coles, wrote a recent paper on this called Understanding Celibate Partnerships and Committed Friendships. You can download it for free at centerforfaith.com under the resource tab. And he basically spends a lot of time just surveying. He interviewed over a dozen different people in

these kinds of relationships, and he wanted to get his arms around kind of what other questions they're asking, what's the kind of spectrum of relationships that people are engaging in that would be under the large umbrella of some kind of covenant friendship or celibate partnership. And it's a really important paper because he seeks to understand what it is we're even talking about from the people who are in these relationships before he offers any kind of like ethical evaluation. I think that's really important, especially for those of us who, you know, this might be super new and we're just so programmed to have a knee-jerk reaction with anything that we don't understand, something that seems maybe different or abnormal or whatever. anything that we don't understand, something that seems maybe different or abnormal or whatever. So I would highly encourage you to seek to understand before you develop some kind of strong opinion on what it is we're even talking about. Now, what does the Bible say? The Bible

says that marriage is between a man and woman and all sexual relationships outside that covenant bond are not God's intended will, are what we would call sin. And that's kind of where the Bible would draw the line. It doesn't go too much further beyond that. So if two people are not in a sexual relationship that the Bible forbids, then I think we are now moving into more of a gray area where we can, maybe there can be differences of opinion on this and we can learn from each other on it. So I think, I wouldn't even say I'm simply okay with these kinds of relationships. I think they can be an absolute beautiful picture of what biblical friendship should look like.

I come at this question with, you know, the assumption based on experience that I think a lot of people, especially men, Western men in the modern world are really terrible at friendships. I think we have a really weak view of what friendship is. So when I look at two people who are covenanting to each other to be in a committed relationship for life, to lay down their lives for each other, to live life together. I mean, I think that that actually captures beautiful visions like David and Jonathan and Naomi and Ruth in the Bible, where you see a really robust, rich, profoundly intimate relationship between two people that is a non-sexual same-sex relationship. So again, I would go beyond saying, oh, I guess I can tolerate this. I'm like, man, I think this could be a very beautiful and necessary picture of what friendship is intended to be. Now, having said that,

that doesn't mean I would simply sign off on every form of a covenanted friendship or partnership that may take place. For instance, here's, well, let me, before I even offer any critique, I just, I want to highly recommend talking to actual people in a covenanted relationship so that you really understand what it is you're even talking about. And each one might look different. Don't assume that there's a one size fits all of covenanted partnerships or covenanted friendships. There's a lot of differences within the broad umbrella of these kinds of relationships. Two maybe cautions I would have. Number one, I wouldn't want these relationships to sort of mimic marriage. I wouldn't want it to use marital language. I wouldn't want it to be kind of portrayed as a marriage. I want to keep marriage protected and distinct and unique. And marriage

can involve friendship, but marriage is a different kind of institution than non-sexual friendships. So I would want to, I really appreciate people, friends of mine who are in covenanted friendships, who are really intentional about making sure that people know this is, we're not pretending like this is a marriage. This is under the biblical category of friendship. Another hesitation I would have, maybe it's even strong hesitation, would be I don't, even here, I want to propose that it might be more complicated than you might hear at first glance, but I wouldn't want a relationship to have, to be romantic. Now that should raise a question in your mind of, well, what do you mean by romantic? Romance can be a little tricky.

And most of us think, well, no, there's things that are romantic, things that aren't romantic. We don't even think about it. There's a clear black and white line between what's romance and what's not. I'm like, well, I, I, I don't know. Like I, I, I think it might be a little blurry as any kind of physical touch, romantic, putting your arm around somebody, hugging, um, rubbing somebody's back. I mean, this is something that friends do all the time that aren't attracted to each other. So it is all of a sudden wrong. If some of the people are same sex attracted to give each other a back rub, is it, um, what if they're same sex attracted, but they're actually not attracted to each other? I mean, just cause I'm opposite sex attracted doesn't mean every single female I come around, I'm like struggling with being

sexually attracted to them. Um, so I think even the category of romance is fuzzy, but, but, but if, if something is clearly engaging in what would be categorized as romantic, I think romance would – a romantic relationship is not limited to marriage necessarily because you have people that date and are romantic with each other, but is sort of headed toward or has some kind of marital potential baked into the romantic relationship, again, maybe from a Christian perspective. But even then, I mean, you know, a friend of mine pointed out like, well, romance is fuzzy. Like, you know, I've heard of, you know, fathers taking their daughters on a father-daughter date. I'm like, well, yeah, but that's not romance. Like, I know, but you're doing, you even call-daughter date. I'm like, well, yeah, but that's not romance. I know, but you're doing, you even call it a date. Like, is dating romance? Most people would say, well, yeah. Why did you take your daughter on a date then? That's kind of creepy. You know, well,

it's not, but it kind of, you know, it's, you're engaging in an activity that is typically seen as a romantic activity, and yet you're clearly not engaging or shouldn't be engaging in it in any kind of romantic way. So all that to say, I'm going to hold intention here saying, yeah, I don't think marriage or relationships that don't have marital potential or that aren't marriages, I want to say they shouldn't be romantic. And yet I do want to have a footnote underneath that term romantic to acknowledge that there is some complexity and some ambiguity here. Next question.

Have you heard the theory that Paul's thorn in the flesh was same-sex attraction? I have heard that. And I'm going to say it very well could have been or it may not have been. We just have no textual evidence to say one way or the other. Now, for those of you who say, well, no, Paul wrote part of the New Testament. He couldn't have been same sex attracted. I'm going to say, check your theology. Even if you say same sex attraction is part of the fall, which I think that might be the best theological explanation. Again, whenever we punt to the fall with different experiences in life, I think we have to be a little bit careful, a little bit cautious, but

even if that's true, then Paul had a fallen nature. Okay. So, um, yeah, there's, there's no reason why Paul couldn't have been same sex attracted very well could have been his thorn in the flesh, but there's no evidence, um, either for that view or against it. So it's really just a speculative viewpoint. All right, next question. Can you explain what is meant by the power assigned to the devil or Satan over the earth? It seems really pervasive, like the power over death in Hebrews 2. You got the authority that the devil possesses in Luke 4, the temptation passages. And I would even add to this, I mean, that's where the devil possesses in Luke 4, the temptation passages. And I would even add to this, I mean, that's where the question ends.

But I mean, you have 2 Corinthians 4 talks about the God of this age referring to Satan. You have Ephesians 2, the prince of the power of the air. You have the devil. Oh, yeah, this was referenced, Hebrews 2, the devil holding the power of death in Hebrews 2.14. The temptation narratives, again, yeah, you have Satan saying the kingdoms of this world, I will give to you and their splendor and all this authority, Satan talking to Jesus. Now, some people say, well, he didn't really have the power over the kingdoms of the earth. Well, go read Revelation 12 to 13, where it explicitly says that the beast from the land, no, beast from the sea, which is the Roman

Empire, according to Revelation 17, that beast is empowered by the dragon in Revelation 13. And the dragon is clearly Satan. I mean, everything I said there is not really, it's disputed. It shouldn't be disputed because it's really clearly talked about in the book of Revelation. So yeah, Satan has power over. Hey friends, I hope you enjoyed this portion of the Patreon-only Q&A podcast.

If you would like to listen to the full-length episode and receive other bonus content like monthly podcasts, opportunities to ask questions, access to first drafts of my research and monthly Zoom chats and more, then please head over to patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw to join Theology in the Raw's Patreon community. That's patreon.com forward slash Theology in the Raw. This show is part of the Converge Podcast Network.