So, what is that whole story about the “sons of God” having relations with the “daughters of men” in Genesis 6:1-4? This rather weird passage which has puzzled many readers for centuries actually holds a clue which unlocks the meaning of a number of New Testament passages which also confuse readers today. After a brief mention of Enoch who “walked with God” in Genesis 5:21-24, the next chapter begins like this (ESV translation):
When man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive. And they took as their wives any they chose. Then the Lord said, “My Spirit shall not abide in man forever, for he is flesh: his days shall be 120 years.” The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came into the daughters of man and they bore children to them. These were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.
In short, Genesis 6:-14 is about the “sin of the Watchers.” After Enoch was taken away (Genesis 5:24), the “sons of God” were divine beings which came down to procreate the Nephilim with the “daughters of men.” This act wreaked havoc upon God’s created world, prompting the Flood of Noah. In addition to what Christians know about the sin of Adam and Eve, it was this divine rebellion in Genesis 6 that informed Jews of the Second Temple period as to the source of sin and evil in the world, as most clearly described in the Book of Enoch, a popular Jewish text written between the Old and New Testament eras.
So argues Michael Heiser in Reversing Hermon: Enoch, the Watchers, and the Forgotten Mission of Jesus Christ. Readers of the late Dr. Michael Heiser’s landmark work, The Unseen Realm, will appreciate Reversing Hermon as a follow-up to The Unseen Realm, which lays out the scholarly case for the theology of the Divine Council, a theme which has been known by scholars but which rarely gets communicated to the average Christian on a Sunday morning.
When I first heard of Michael Heiser and his ideas, I was quite skeptical. It took me awhile to warm up to him, and still to this day, there are a few things he taught of which I am not convinced, including a few ideas presented in Reversing Hermon. But after reading through Reversing Hermon now, I am convinced that Dr. Heiser has left the church a valuable contribution to help normal, everyday believers better understand the Bible. The worst part about the book is probably the subtitle “the Forgotten Mission of Jesus Christ,” which comes across as click-bait and sensationalist. But a careful read of Reversing Hermon is anything but that!
It has been a year since the death of Dr. Michael Heiser (February 20, 2023), a highly-skilled and respected Old Testament BIble scholar, who had a keen ability to take difficult concepts and put them on the “bottom shelf” for serious students of the Bible, who want more depth in their understanding of Scripture. Many people view the Bible as being incomprehensible and confusing, but the late Michael Heiser was committed to “making the Bible weird again,” in an effort to show that the Bible has some unique things to say to 21st century sophisticated Westerners. However, much of the unfamiliarity concerning the Divine Council and the rest of Dr. Michael Heiser’s teaching has not been without controversy. Continue reading
The story of Canada’s oldest Christmas song, the “Huron Carol,” is fascinating.
Jean de Brébeuf was a French Jesuit missionary who came to Canada in 1625, in order to share the Gospel with the Huron Native American tribe. For nearly several decades, Brébeuf labored as a missionary among the Huron, making slow yet determined progress to bring a Roman Catholic understanding of Christianity to a people who were suspicious of European missionaries. In 1649, Brébeuf was captured by the Iroquois when they destroyed a Huron mission village. Brébeuf was subsequently tortured and martyred. Brébeuf was beatified as a saint in 1930.
Anecdotally, it is said that the name “lacrosse” was first given by Brébeuf to the Native American sport, since the sticks in the game resembled a bishop’s cross.
The bulk of Brébeuf’s work was in learning how to master the language of the Hurons. He wrote the “Huron Carol” originally in the Wyandot language, probably in 1642. The song goes under different names, such as “Twas in the Moon of Wintertime,” and “Jesus Ahatonia.” Jesse Edgar Middleton translated the most well known version of the song to English in 1926. You can sense how Brébeuf tried to use concepts familiar to the Huron in an effort to present the story of the birth of Jesus to them:
‘Twas in the moon of winter-time When all the birds had fled, That mighty Gitchi Manitou Sent angel choirs instead; Before their light the stars grew dim, And wandering hunters heard the hymn: “Jesus your King is born, Jesus is born, In excelsis gloria.”
Within a lodge of broken bark The tender Babe was found, A ragged robe of rabbit skin Enwrapp’d His beauty round; But as the hunter braves drew nigh, The angel song rang loud and high… “Jesus your King is born, Jesus is born, In excelsis gloria.”
The earliest moon of wintertime Is not so round and fair As was the ring of glory On the helpless infant there. The chiefs from far before him knelt With gifts of fox and beaver pelt. “Jesus your King is born, Jesus is born, In excelsis gloria.”
O children of the forest free, O sons of Manitou, The Holy Child of earth and heaven Is born today for you. Come kneel before the radiant Boy Who brings you beauty, peace and joy. “Jesus your King is born, Jesus is born, In excelsis gloria.”
Loreena McKennitt’s version of the Huron Carol is a soothing celebration of Christ’s birth, amid the hustle and bustle of this season. In a world where darkness clouds our vision, the birth of the Savior brings light in the midst of despair.
As we end off the summer of 2023, I wanted to first write something more personal. It was a great summer. The highlight for me was a trip to Colorado, where my longtime friend, Mike Scott, and I hiked South Arapaho Peak, a near 13,400 foot mountain about an hour west of Boulder, right on top of the Continental Divide. God’s Creation is pretty awesome. Standing at near 13,400 feet and looking across the Rockies is amazing!
I had not done a hike like this in seven years, yet we had a total blast! As I am getting older, I am not sure if I have any more “14’ners” left in me, but I sure hope I still do! Behind us is North Arapaho Peak:
…………..
Cambridge House at the College of William and Mary
This Labor Day weekend inaugurates the THIRD year for the Cambridge House at the College of William and Mary, a ministry that I am fully excited about, which continues to grow. As a staff member at the College, it is great to have a place where followers of Jesus, from a wide cross-section of Christian traditions, can come together as students, faculty, staff, and friends in the community, to share in stimulating conversation about the beauty of historical orthodox Christian faith.
Cambridge House has brought on a full-time intern to help staff the study center this year, and has a “Fellows” program, where about a dozen students participate in growing deeper both spiritually and intellectually in their journey with Christ. This is our director, Jon Thompson’s, second year and I could not be more thrilled to see how God is moving on the campus. Small beginnings, for sure, but very encouraging for me to be a part of this on a secular college campus.
The Cambridge House, at the Crossroads, at 930 Jamestown Road, in Williamsburg, Virginia. With close proximity to the campus of the College of William and Mary, the Cambridge House is one of the newest Christian study centers.
…………………
Some Fun History…..
I also have something fun in mind that has to do with history. After all, my interests here on the Veracity blog are mainly Christian apologetics, and Christian history. But this little bit of history is broader in scope, as it has to do with Colonial Williamsburg.
Years ago, I worked as an usher for showing The Story of a Patriot, the famous Colonial Williamsburg 1957 Paramount film production recalling the events of Williamsburg’s roll in the American Revolution of 1776. Here is the film, starring a young Jack Lord, of the old TV series, Hawaii Five-O. Then after that is a “Quest Capsule” video comparing the filming locations of the movie in 2023, a “Then & Now” trip through history:
….
The Death of Pat Robertson
One of the events this summer that has had an impact on the Christian world was the death of television evangelist, Pat Robertson.
Pat Roberston was definitely a controversial figure in evangelical Christianity, and the culture at large. In the New York Times story remembering his life, I got a strong whiff of negative comments about him. Here is just a sample:
“I will not mourn his passing. He was a mean-spirited man whose objective was the fouling of democracy. He is one of many high-profile preachers who give Christianity a bad name.”
“Pat Robertson was truly one of the most destructive and divisive religious leaders this country has ever known and there have been many. When one passes another crops up with the same message of personal intolerance packaged for sale as the word of God. Like most pestilence, there is no getting rid of them.”
“Robertson was on the leading edge of the Christian alt-right political machine which has wreaked so much damage on the nation over the last thirty years.”
Yikes! Pat Robertson’s reputation did not fair very well in the national media. Robertson’s campaign for President amplified the vitriol levied against him. These attitudes towards him should give Christians pause whenever we try to mix the Gospel with an overtly political message. As Christians, we are called to pray for our political leaders, act as good citizens, and participate in the political process for the common good of our neighbors. But if our involvement in political matters overshadows our efforts to share the Gospel with a lost and hurting world, we might end up alienating the very people around us who so desperately need to hear a word of hope and comfort that the Good News of Jesus Christ came to bring.
As an aside…. I have known of misguided fans of Pat Robertson who would do well to heed this warning: There is a lot of talk about “Christian Nationalism” these days, placing the importance of certain political alignments ahead of Jesus’ call to evangelize and make disciples of all of the nations.
As YouTuber Inspiring Philosophy argues, many of the most active adherents to so-called “Christian Nationalism” are people who profess a form of Christian belief, but who are ironically little involved in the life of healthy Christian communities. Such advocates of “Christian Nationalism” are pursuing something other than a genuine devotion to Christ, a growing knowledge of Scripture, and a sense of accountability within a local church…. assuming that such people even participate in a local Christian church at all!
You might be thinking that I am targeting certain people on the political “right,” and to a certain extent, that would be true. But there is just about as much mischief, if not more-so, on the political “left.” For everyone I know who is enamored by Q-Anon-type conspiracies on the right, there are plenty of supposedly Christian people who repeat worn-out tropes of the “woke” movement, and supposed champions of “social justice,” which is just as bad, and just as self-righteous, in my view.
I am looking forward to the 2024 political season just as much as I am looking forward to having a tooth-ache….
Now, back to Pat Robertson….. I do recall a news story back in 1985 when Hurricane Gloria was approaching Virginia Beach, and Pat Robertson publicly prayed that God would steer that hurricane away from Virginia. When that hurricane did veer off from Virginia, to slam into New England instead, many Americans were annoyed by that kind of prayer. Furthermore, Pat Robertson’s association with extreme elements of the Charismatic Movement, some radical political figures in other parts of the world, and certain other shady television evangelists did him no favors among more mainstream evangelical Christians.
However, there was another side to Pat Robertson that has been overlooked by all of that negative publicity. Robertson grew up in Lexington, Virginia and went to college at Washington and Lee University, where I obtained my undergraduate degree decades later. As the son of a well-known Democratic United States congressman and senator, Absalom Willis Robertson, and coming from a family of Baptist preachers, young Pat was known to be a renegade and a “black sheep” within his family.
There is a well-worn anecdote about Pat Robertson in college. Who knows how much truth there is to the story, but it sure fits. One night, his fraternity at Washington and Lee University was getting ready to have a big party, and bring in a lot of girls from the surrounding women’s colleges. Suddenly, a fire broke out in the fraternity house. Several of Robertson’s fellow frat brothers escaped the burning building, including Roger Mudd, who later on became a well-respected television journalist, and John Warner, who later became a multi-term Virginia senator and husband to the famed movie star, Elizabeth Taylor.
But after the fire was put out by the local fire squad, and thankfully sparing much of the building, Pat Robertson was nowhere to be found!! Had he perished inside the frat house during the fire?
Frantic fraternity brothers looked for him high and low. There was no sign of him. A sense of despair rippled through the despondent party goers.
Then just a few minutes later, a fancy convertible with its top down drove up in front of the house. Pat Robertson hopped out of the car safe and sound. He had gone off to get another beer keg for the party and missed the fire altogether!!
That story chimes in well with what we know of Robertson after college. Though he had joined the Marines, he avoided combat in the Korean War, rumored to have been because of the influence of his senator father. He married his wife in 1954, but years later, when Robertson ran for President, it was discovered that the birth certificate for his first son was dated just 10 weeks after the wedding.
It was after those early years of being a young father and married that Pat Robertson’s life changed dramatically, when depression settled in and he considered suicide. He met a Christian evangelist and soon gave his life to Christ.
By 1960, Pat Robertson sensed a calling to start a Christian television station, which became the Christian Broadcasting Network, in Virginia Beach, Virginia. I remember watching Channel 27 on the television every now and then, mostly out of curiosity, as Robertson made an effort in the 1960s and 1970s to make something out of television evangelism. Most famously known as the host of the “700 Club,” Pat Robertson became not only a talented religious broadcaster, he developed into becoming a very capable businessman.
Despite a lot of the negative controversies surrounding Pat Robertson, I actually grew to appreciate a lot of the good things he had done over the years. I even took several classes at Regent University in order to obtain my seminary degree, so I can say I am a direct recipient of the notable vision that Pat Robertson had within the Christian church.
Other Notable Deaths
There have been other notable deaths from the summer of 2023. Daniel Fuller, son of radio evangelist Charles E. Fuller, died at the age of 97. Daniel Fuller taught biblical interpretation at Fuller Theological Seminary, for forty years: 1953-1993. This was where I did graduate work, but unfortunately I never had a class with him. Daniel Fuller was the most influential intellectual figure in the life of evangelical preacher John Piper.
I recently picked up a Kindle copy on sale of Thiselton’s Puzzling Passages in Paul, Forty Conundrums Calmly Considered. I thought about writing a separate blog review, but I have to confess that while the book is illuminating, it is also terribly infuriating. Thiselton goes to great lengths explaining the controversies surrounding various passages from the Apostle Paul, but he tends to be gun-shy about making conclusive judgments of his own. Unless you are a hopeless Bible geek, you would be better off with a good study Bible.
Then there was the death of popular singer/songwriter Sinéad O’Connor….. you know, the musician who ripped up a photo of pope on live television on Saturday Night Live, in 1992. Sinéad O’Connor was protesting sexual abuse within the Roman Catholic Church, but she did not articulate why she was protesting Pope John Paul II in her Saturday Night Live appearance. Therefore, many viewers simply took her unexpected action to be an anti-Catholic, if not, anti-Christian expression of speech. It is hard to believe that some 30 years later, Sinéad O’Connor’s expression of speech would pale in comparison to what people often view almost everyday on social media.
This story just fell under the wire of much of the international news media this year, but I am hoping that there might be greater attention drawn to it in the coming years.
I believe in the non-binary God whose pronouns are plural.
I believe in Jesus Christ, their child, who wore a fabulous tunic and had two dads and saw everyone as a sibling-child of God.
I believe in the rainbow Spirit, who shatters our image of one white light and refracts it into a rainbow of gorgeous diversity.
I believe in the church of everyday saints as numerous, creative, and resilient as patches on the AIDS quilt, whose feet are grounded in mud and whose eyes gaze at the stars in wonder.
I believe in the call to each of us that love is love is love, so beloved, let us love.
I believe, glorious God. Help my unbelief. Amen.
There have been numerous critiques of the “Sparkle Creed,” coming from evangelical Protestants, Eastern Orthodox, and Roman Catholic alike. I have no desire to “pile on” with additional criticism, as it should be plainly evident that this progressive Christian creed departs radically from any historically orthodox Christian creed, across the widest diversity of Christendom.
A secular creed, from sign displayed on a suburban front yard in Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina, October 3, 2020. …. But now we have the Sparkle Creed.
However, the “Sparkle Creed” does present a challenge for historically orthodox-minded Christians: We need to do a better job of articulating an imaginative, beautiful vision of God’s intention and purposes for human gender and sexuality, which is both winsome and Scripturally grounded. We need to extend compassion towards others, particularly young people, who wrestle with complex questions regarding gender and sexual identity. It is a lot easier to poke fun at something like the “Sparkle Creed,” and ridiculing those who support it, than it is think through how our churches can more effectively reach out to those with genuine questions and confusions, building relational bridges instead of blowing up those bridges and needlessly alienating those who desperately need to hear Good News.
If you are looking for a very practical way to implement a kind of positive ministry focus in your church, I would suggest checking out The Center for Faith, Sexuality, & Gender. They sponsor webinars, online courses, and events, grounded in supporting a traditional sexual ethic, that helps people work through questions about gender and sexual identity, as well as parents and other friends looking for resources to help them better love their LGBTQ family members and friends. With endorsements by various Christians leaders, like Francis Chan, Matt Chandler, and Karen Swallow Prior, The Center for Faith, Sexuality, & Gender can offer a lifeline for folks who find themselves wrapped up in confusion and doubt regarding such sensitive, personal issues.
Veracity in the Fall of 2023
I read several books over the summer that I am excited to review here on Veracity, that I hope will be helpful to readers. I am almost finished reading another Bart Ehrman book, and I am planning on offering an extended critique over a series of blog posts over the fall. Bart Ehrman is one of the most prolific writers and influential New Testament scholars, who rejected Christianity several decades ago, but who continues to draw in a lot of media attention…… In the meantime, there is one more blog post in the 1 Corinthians head covering series left, to come out in September. Look for it in a few weeks.
As we head into the summer of 2023, I wanted to list out some of best video/audio that I have dabbled in so far this year. Most of these talks and videos I have only started, only wanting come back to them later. It seems like everybody has a podcast or YouTube channel theses days, but I mainly want to highlight some of the best stuff out there…. and there is some really good stuff!
These deaths fall on the heals of a few notable deaths in late 2022, including Gordon Fee and E. P. Sanders. Gordon Fee was one of the most well-regarded evangelical New Testament scholars of that last quarter century, a curious mix of a keen intellect that produced some of the most outstanding commentaries of various New Testament books that thousands of pastors weekly consult for their sermons, and controversially having a strongly charismatic, Pentecostal background, with egalitarian convictions regarding women in ministry. Here is an 8-minute interview with Dr. Fee a few years before he died:
Yet I was also struck by the death of Atlanta Baptist pastor Charles Stanley. My first encounter with Charles Stanley’s ministry some 25 years ago was unfortunately not very positive (sorry Charles Stanley fans, but that is the truth). I had never heard of Charles Stanley before, and I was taken aback when one of Charles Stanley’s fans got really annoyed in one of my church history classes that I was teaching at my church. This woman rebuked me in front of the whole class, and sent me a stack of Charles Stanley tapes the next week, hoping that by listening to them they would straighten me out. She had somehow gotten the odd impression that I believed that the study of church history was more important than studying the Bible. The teaching on the tapes was actually pretty good. But I was still so bothered as to why this woman in my class felt that I needed to listen to Stanley, that I became pretty suspicious of him. Fast forward to about ten years later, I gained a more favorable appreciation of Charles Stanley when I went to hear him preach at the First Baptist Church of Atlanta.
After his recent death, I learned more about Charles Stanley’s life story, learning that he had a very difficult childhood, growing up for time with a single mom, and then enduring abuse from a step-father. I had no idea that his early life was so difficult, and how his relationship with Christ got him through very troubling times. His life story is worth listening to:
After the death of Queen Elizabeth, we now have a new King of England. Charles III was recently coronated as King of the United Kingdom. The ever delightful, contrarian, and indeed quirky atheist historian David Starkey remarks that the UK coronation ceremony is deeply rooted in Christian ritual. Starkey has a couple of videos that tell the history about the coronation down through the centuries, if you like that kind of stuff:
Probably some of the best listens I have had so far this year come from the Rest is History podcast. Everyone has probably heard about Dan Brown’s blockbuster novel, The Da Vinci Code, which became a Ron Howard movie starring Tom Hanks in 2006. In 2023, we stand at the 20th anniversary of when The Da Vinci Code was first written and took the world by storm. Brown’s book popularized a conspiracy theory that began in certain academic circles in the late 1970s, suggesting that Jesus Christ never went to the Cross, contrary to what you hear week after week in most church services across the globe. Instead, Jesus and Mary Magdalene got married, scuttled off to the other side of the Roman Empire, and their progeny had been living in Southern France for centuries, much to the consternation of the Roman Catholic Church who wanted to supposedly suppress the “truth.” If you could possibly pinpoint a date where “fake news” really began to take off in the 21st century, this might be the best candidate.
The Rest is History podcast creators, historians Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook, tell the story behind The Da Vinci Code, in Episode 301. But the tale is actually much bigger and more interesting than the narrative which filled Dan Brown’s pockets with a lot of money.
YouTube apologist Gavin Ortlund has some absolutely fantastic content that I need to listen to over again, just because it so rich. Ortlund has an interview with author Christopher Watkin, about his book Biblical Critical Theory, which is probably one of the most talked about books in the past year in evangelical circles. Watkin offers a biblical critique of the so-called “critical race theory.” I already have too many books on my “to be read” list, but this interview with Watkins sure entices my interest:
The Pints with Aquinas channel has great debate featuring Gavin Ortlund defending the Protestant doctrine of sola scriptura with Roman Catholic apologist Trent Horn criticizing sola scriptura. This is an excellent example of how charitable debates should be held with believers who strongly disagree with one another.
Baptist preacher and YouTuber Matt Whitman has an informative video interviewing Ligonier Ministries’ Dr. Stephen Nichols about “What Was the Great Schism and Why Did It Happen?,” talking about when Western and Eastern Christianity parted ways with one another about 1,000 years ago:
Along those same lines about “deconstruction,” Lutheran YouTuber Dr. Jordan B. Cooper, host of the Just and Sinner podcast, has a talk about Jacques Derrida, one of the foundational thinkers of postmodernism. Derrida popularized the terminology of “deconstruction”:
A lot of great documentaries/films are showing up on YouTube now, that once belonged behind a paywall. One of them is Fragments of Truth, where New Testament scholar Dr. Craig Evan’s talks about the discoveries of the New Testament documents we have found over the past few centuries which bolster our confidence in the historical reliability of the Christian faith. This gives Christians good answers to those who have read Bart Ehrman’s New York Times bestseller Misquoting Jesus:
A book by Collin Hansen is out now discussing the life and thought of the late Timothy Keller: His Spiritual and Intellectual Formation, interviewed by Gavin Ortlund:
…and FINALLY….. something a little fun, in honor of the late Tim Keller. How about “Carpool Karaoke with Tim Keller!”
ONE QUICK ADMINISTRATIVE NOTE: WordPress is no longer distributing blog post announcements via Twitter, so be sure to sign up via email by clicking the black “Follow” button on the right hand side of the Veracity page, if you want to receive announcements of new blog posts from Veracity, and stop using the “Follow” button for Twitter, which no longer works.
Tim Keller, former pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church, in New York City, and co-founder of the Gospel Coalition.
Tim Keller made a lot of mistakes as a young pastor, in an economically depressed town. But in those years he cultivated a love for reading which would set him on a path of being one of most influential evangelical intellectual Christian leaders in the first quarter of the 21st century. Years before, when Keller was in college at Bucknell University, he met the Lord through the ministry of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship. After leaving Hopewell, to go teach at Westminster Theological Seminary, Tim Keller and his wife Kathy eventually surprised everyone to go plant a church in the heart of urban New York City, where Redeemer Presbyterian Church eventually became one of the fastest growing churches in New York City in the 1990s and early 2000s.
Alas, being a prominent Christian leader is bound to bring out the critics, from within the church. When Keller published his 2010 book Generous Justice: How God’s Grace Makes Us Just, his critics accused him of being “woke”, a closet-Marxist in Christian clothing. Perhaps the criticism is due to the fact that Keller proposed a winsome approach to winning the culture over to Christ, whereas other Christians were becoming convinced that a more combative approach was needed in the face of more opposition to Gospel values. While I do reject the “woke” movement, I will take the more winsome approach over the combative approach any day of the week.
In my mind, Tim Keller’s voice represented perhaps the best intellectual and spiritual mind that evangelical Christianity has had to offer to our 21st century world, a heart for spiritual renewal within the church and a passion to reach a lost world with the Gospel. He will be sorely missed.
Veracity 