Postmode

In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial,
Who, squatting upon the ground,
Held his heart in his hands,
And ate of it.
I said, “Is it good, friend?”
“It is bitter—bitter,” he answered,
“But I like it
Because it is bitter,
And because it is my heart.”
- Stephen Crane (HT: Abraham Piper on the DG Blog)

I should have known my weaknesses by then. The times had passed and the evenings had grown dim, but the blood in my veins burned hot for that which I treasured, and as I burned hot, my heart quickly found its way to what I told it to love. She came to me in those fall days. Lady Lust was in my heart and on my mind, and as I drew further from home I still heard the calls of my fair lady, calling to me in the streets, calling to me to return. I heeded not her calls, being consumed in the desires I had enslaved myself to. I was a wretch.

Self-hatred consumes me still. Four and eighty years I have tread the earth, six and fifty of those in ignorance and blasphemy. My horrible deeds weigh upon me now, and even the thoughts of this dying atheist cry out against him, protesting his stupidity. And it is for this reason: Love has a way of getting ahold of you. When guilt and shame are gone, few will find that they know Love either, but Love has a way of chastening a person, or of making them feel the greatest regret, sorrow, and pain - even if they will not turn from the things that keep them from Love… If only Love were but unnecessary. If only I had never known Love before, so that I might at least have enjoyed my filth for but a little while longer.

The armored guard, my keeper, is here now. Rays of sunlight burst in upon me. My skin crackles in the sun; it has become so accustomed to darkness that to have any light upon it is a misery, a torture. He wears metal armor, and as he moves towards me, the sound of the clinking of armor, the grating of metal upon metal, is too much for me to bear; for the sound of anything is an offense against my will, with which I have made myself deaf. The smell… Oh the smell! I smell myself now. The armored man smells of rosewater and lilac, but I am truly a wretch indeed. I am but a fool. And the taste… My foul breath beats upon my tongue, tasting of worms and maggots. How can I still refuse to turn from my wretched, pitiful way, even now when it will kill me this very day?

I am lifted, my frail arms straining under the weight of my own body. I am broken, and dead. How can this guard allow himself to touch me? The saint and the sinner, the servant of righteousness and the slave to sin. I have known my own misery; isn’t it enough to let me wallow in it? The arrogant saint! He is entitled to judgment, and I can’t help but detest the absence of misery from his visage.

Next I wake I’m at the gallows. The crier justly condemns me for all my evils past and present (for as they say, sin never leaves your side, but ever follows you to the end, like a hound hunting you down.) “Lust! Pride! A lying tongue and a wicked heart that hates its gracious Maker! Constant sorrow is not enough for this man, but only death!” My accuser stands beside me, calling the blackness of my heart out into the light. I resent him. His claims are just, and the whole thing is driven by the hatred for myself that consumes me, and thus I cannot separate myself from the pride of knowing that those who should be bowing and worshiping me will now hang me.

And then my neck is in the noose, and I am standing above the door that will drop me in so short a time. Next to me another hangs. Yet he has no crier. No one has accused him. His face, bloated and blue; his eyes picked at by birds. What a horrible fate; what a pitiful man. Two days dead and having thought he was a savior. If only God would cede his position, share it with me. But this man will not share. He will not share in the act of being murdered unjustly. That is for the perfect only, and I know I cannot escape my chains. Before I am hung, I am given my chance at last to speak once before I am resigned to Hell. It is no word that leaves my mouth, but spit for the man’s face, and in that very moment the rope is pulled and my soul set free, to suffer eternally.

Ron Paul did. There are parts in this where the guy interviewing (forget his name) tries to corner Paul, interrupt him, ignore what he’s trying to say… If only people wouldn’t be so stupid and would actually listen. They’ve given him the time on the media, and now they still refuse to actually listen to what he has to say about his own motives and purposes. He consistently amazes me with the amount of thought and profundity that goes into his arguments.

Ron Paul on Meet the Press, 12/23/2007:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4

My main concern here is with the question: What qualifiications for office should Christians be looking for when they choose a presidential candidate? (I believe that this question also is worthy of consideration by those outside of the church as well, since I believe these principles have a certain utility regardless of the individual’s religious convictions - so keep reading!)

Primarily I am interested in how this relates to Mike Huckabee. As he is a former pastor, it concerns me that he’s running for president, especially bearing and wearing the name of Christ and acting like he is a Christian statesman. I don’t believe he meets the high qualifications that we should expect a future president to meet. And moreover, if what I am going to say below is true, he doesn’t even meet the qualifications for being a pastor and elder.

I am of the conviction that with the exception of the requirements that he be a good teacher and not a recent convert (because I think there can be men who meet the other qualifications without being Christian by any stretch of the word), the standards that Paul provides for elders in 1 Timothy 3 and elsewhere in Titus 1 are also a good way to evaluate the likelihood of a statesman remaining a faithful servant of the public good. Paul says that the following things are required of a man who desires to be an elder:

• Above reproach (v. 2)
• A one-woman man (v. 2)
• Sober-minded (v. 2)
• Self-controlled (v. 2)
• Respectable (v. 2)
• Hospitable (v. 2)
• Able to teach (v. 2)
• Not a drunkard (v. 3)
• Not violent but gentle (v. 3)
• Not quarrelsome (v. 3)
• Not a lover of money (v. 3)
• He must manage his own household well, in all dignity keeping his children submissive (v. 4)
• Not a recent convert (v. 6)
• Well thought of by outsiders (v. 7)

This is a pretty strict set of requirements. But all of these tend to weed out the bad things that would ruin our government, as they have so often, especially in the recent decades of the late great Big Brother.

Huckabee fails on at least several charges here.

• Not above reproach. I include this here as its own sort of pseudo-standard. It can be taken as referring to all the things that follow, but sometimes there are concerns which do not fall inside of the standards that Paul gives following this. With Mike Huckabee, there are a whole host of concerns that fall outside of the standards he does not meet (listed below). For example, is it really a good thing that he, without any discretion whatsoever, released and pardoned the rapist Dumond? What does it say about Huckabee and the church that he just let this guy off the hook because the guy said he had become a Christian? This is a complete abandonment of biblical justice, even though it falls outside of the realm of things listed in Paul’s requirements. So I think it is useful to evaluate a potential president on this ground independently of the list that follows.
• Respectable. As with the case of the rapist above and with all of the things below, Huckabee has garnered a healthy distrust on the part of those who hear about these things. He isn’t above reproach, and is proportionately lacking in respectableness.
• Not a lover of money. This is one of the big things that concerns me. Reports are surfacing everywhere that Huckabee has accepted numerous gifts while he was governor of Arkansas. In fact, that little tidbit was even sent to an ethics committee to determine whether he had done anything wrong. Huckabee has been reported as accepting numerous gifts, for which he then rewarded individuals with political positions; allowing certain things to be done for which he then received generous contributions (in one case he allowed a race track to have [correct me if I’m wrong] electronic video poker machines installed, which are generally banned at race tracks, and received $10,000 soon after from the race track owner); and he has attempted to and actually used many of his state’s resources for actual financial gain on his part. This is egregious behavior that commands little respect and shows that Huckabee is far too interested in both the money he can receive and the things that money can buy.
• He must manage his own household well, in all dignity keeping his children submissive. And if he cannot manage his own household well, how will he care for an entire nation? It concerns me that Huckabee didn’t exhibit a Christian response to the things that his son has done. As a 17-year-old, his son stoned, hanged, and slit the throat of a dog. Now, this might not be enough to cause us to dismiss Huckabee. Understandably, sometimes teenagers have problems that weren’t preceded by some collectively causal action of the parents. There are good men whose kids are just crazy. But what really concerns me is that Huckabee tried to cover it up. Why the cover-up? Why the dishonesty? Why the refusal to acknowledge his son’s acts and execute justice? This is unacceptable.

For all these reasons I think it is incredibly unwise to vote for Huckabee, primaries or otherwise. The man doesn’t meet the high qualifications that God sets for elders, and he consequentially is unfit for the office of the president.

So numerous indeed and so powerful are the causes which serve to give a false bias to the judgment, that we, upon many occasions, see wise and good men on the wrong as well as on the right side of questions of the first magnitude to society. This circumstance, if duly attended to, would furnish a lesson of moderation to those who are ever so much persuaded of their being in the right in any controversy. And a further reason for caution, in this respect, might be drawn from the reflection that we are not always sure that those who advocate the truth are influenced by purer principles than their antagonists. Ambition, avarice, personal animosity, party opposition, and many other motives not more laudable than these, are apt to operate as well upon those who support as those who oppose the right side of a question. Were there not even these inducements to moderation, nothing could be more ill-judged than that intolerant spirit which has, at all times, characterized political parties. For in politics, as in religion, it is equally absurd to aim at making proselytes by fire and sword. Heresies in either can rarely be cured by persecution.

- Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist Papers No. 1

Note: This post is about 1) Doug Wilson’s post Dead Rat Behind The Fridge, and 2) Jeff Hutchinson’s response at Green Baggins, I Am Doug Wilson’s Dead Rat Behind The Fridge. Please note also that while I may sound acerbic here, my main focus is on keeping the facts straight. I’m not trying to attack anyone. And in the fashion of Jeff’s post “And So It Begins”, I am not making this post at the request or with the permission of Doug Wilson. As Jeff said of Bob Mattes, if Doug Wilson would prefer that this not be up I’d be more than happy to take it down.

A few things to mention, along with various interleaved questions.

• In response to the questions pertaining to the names of certain individuals that Doug failed to provide, here’s a list:
  • “PCA men who have misrepresented my doctrinal views in their books, articles, reports, and blogs;” - I believe this would fall under the headings of “Johnson, Gary”; “Waters, Guy”; and “Clark, Robert Scott”.
  • the “bureaucratic insiders” and “gatekeepers” in the PCA;” - Well, it starts with people who make unjust accusations on their blogs and then keep anybody from responding in a public forum to openly confront lies. It goes on from there, but in particular this foundation has been well established on the Heidelblog. This isn’t the actual place where this occurs (I think Doug was referring to the actual actions in the PCA), but this sort of thing is an indicator of what is going on.
  • the “leaders among the FV critics;” - This would again include misters Johnson, Waters, and Clark. There are also a number of men who, if I recall correctly, put out a report talking about the views of the Federal Vision in which they denounced it - without ever having once spoken to a Federal Visionist. The next two groups on the list of people who were mentioned by Doug Wilson also fall into this same category.
• In response to Jeff’s questioning of Doug’s accusation of anonymity-mongering, please consider other sources such as Robert Scott Clark’s blog. Here are some choice selections: How Does the Salvation of the Culture Look in Moscow? and Interpreting Providence? (it is absolutely shocking to me that nobody calls Clark out on his - in the words of Doug’s own post - “crap”. The elders of Christ Church have addressed that issue, and as they themselves said here, “The pastor and elders of Christ Church deeply regret that the enemies of our church have decided that additional pain to the families of the victims is worth the petty political points they think they can score with this.”). So the claim that 1) nationally recognized leaders against the Federal Vision are recognizing anonymous attack blogs and that 2) they are stooping to the level of “sneeveling around with slanderous accusations circulated by anonymous and lying cowards” and that 3) they are “producing ‘crap’” are quite well-founded. There’s simply no question about it: I just linked to one example of this above.
• “And So It Begins” may well have been a post aimed at exposing the attack, but instead, it ended up being a vicious maligning of brothers in Christ by accepting any word concerning them with absolutely no discretion, and for that Jeff is as much in need of making an apology as he believes is the case with Doug Wilson and Mike Lawyer. There is no justification for the length of time that the post was allowed to go unchecked. He is supposed to be an imitable model for all other believers. “I then allowed comments (some of which included links to articles and primary documents) to be posted on Greenbagginses, with appropriate warnings, for those who might choose to read the articles and documents, as to reading with godly discernment.” Have you forgotten Psalm 23? We’re SHEEP. Sheep are dumb, stubborn, don’t want to listen to anybody else, and routinely screw themselves over. It is the job of a pastor (shepherd) to look out for the flock, and just because they happen to live in a different city doesn’t mean pastors who live in other areas - and this is especially true with the dawn of instant, high-speed, internet communication - aren’t charged with looking out for them too. Geographical proximity puts a pastor in closer touch with certain members of the Church than it does others, but this by no means negates the responsibility of a pastor to look out for the church as whole (else why have anybody but members of Auburn Avenue or Christ Church attack the Federal Vision?)

• This is the series of events to which Doug Wilson was referring when he wrote his blog post, “Dead Rat Behind the Fridge.” This and this alone. This website and my post.

  In other words, I am Doug Wilson’s #1 dead rat behind the fridge.

  Except for Bob Mattes, who perhaps was following my lead, no one else among the large group of men that Doug Wilson charges, allowed links to be posted to the internet articles and primary documents that various commenters forwarded to us, on this blog or anywhere else that I am aware of. No one else. I and Bob were the only ones who did that. Not Lane. Not Reed. Not David. No one else. Certainly not anyone in the PCA who has written “books, articles, or reports” about the FV. And certainly not anyone on the SJC!

  There are not scores of dead rats behind the fridge. There is one dead rat, two if you count Bob (Bob, don’t let anyone ever tell you that you don’t count!).

  As I have capably demonstrated (and it only took two or three Google searches) this is patently false. Even the two most recent posts I link to above on the Heidelblog discredit this claim.

• To him, I am the dead rat behind the fridge, but the facts are not as he represents them. I did not “cite anonymous attack blogs as credible sources;” I did not “demonstrate that I believe (anonymous attack blogs) sufficiently authoritative” (nor do I believe that, whether or not I “demonstrated” it); I did not “demonstrate in public that I am prepared to accept, and have accepted, anonymous testimony” (nor have I or would I, whether or not I “demonstrated” that); I have not been “sneeveling around with slanderous accusations circulated by anonymous and lying cowards;” nor was my post ”crap.”

  Jeff had to moderate the comments being posted. I know this is true because somebody said something that seemed like it was a direct response to me, and I got a little bit hot-headed and made a response in justification of my claim that I was not one of Doug Wilson’s five clones (he keeps them lying around for all the things he can’t get to in between holding all of Moscow hostage and shooting puppies with a .23 - these things have been well documented by Mark T and dougsplotch respectively). Jeff, in turn, said that he was moderating the comments and that mine had not been posted yet when the other person made the comment. I quickly apologized.

  Now, how is it that he isn’t complicit in all of these things? He allowed them to be posted, and if I recall correctly was quite happy to continue allowing certain “slanderous”, “anonymous” comments by “lying cowards” to go straight through.

• Third–and I would be glad to be corrected about this one–neither Mike Lawyer nor Doug Wilson have apologized to Bob for their attacks upon him, though I believe they have removed the letter Mike Lawyer wrote from the internet, which is certainly a good first step.

  I do believe that something close to an apology (if not at least an explanation) of the incidents surrounding Mike Lawyer’s letter can be found here.

  • UPDATE: Mike Lawyer has posted an official apology here.

Grace and peace to everyone.