Am I alone here?

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We are all public figures. Well I am. I mean I post a blog with a international readership. This month alone four people from Australia, Canada, the US, and the Bronx have read my works. Surprisingly my haiku attempts have very little critical acclaim, yet. This is my seven point suggestion of how to become famous (in our own little world).

In case we need further justification to writing open letters, it is currently in vogue to do so! Need I say more? Well, I will anyway. The person the open letter is addressed to really doesn’t matter. You, faithful reader, are the only one that matters. Why? Let’s face it you are reading this and whichever celebrity, politician, theologian, or person we don’t actually want to bother with doing the hard work of really writing to and waiting for the possibility of a response from probably will not ever know we exists.

Anyway, I am purposing a new set of guidelines in our open letter writing community.

Firstly, (I know it is not a real word but it should be), instead of writing to people that will likely ever read our works I suggest that we name drop so that other people who don’t really care about us but do the famous name will read our works. They will read our works and dive deep in to our wisdom. No wadding will be allowed except in the shallow places.

Secondarily, (a word that sounds so much better than secondly) instead of using living people lets pick universally famous dead people. We should steer clear of at least the heads of major religions. Not for religious sensitivity so much but so that we don’t want death threats, or worse, from someone that is of a religion of peace (or is that piece?). Buddha should be okay because besides that guy from Pretty Woman most Buddhists are rather pacifist. Lets face it though if our writing doesn’t fly in Dania (that’s where the Danish are from right?) then we should steer clear. I suggest we write letters to Plato, Socrates, Descartes, and other great thinkers. They are all dead so their feelings don’t matter. Unless Zombies are real and then we will have a whole other set of problems to deal with. Perhaps if we really feel led to we may write to real living “celebrities.” They are okay to engage with as long as we engage them as media folk, kind of like carny folk, and not “real people” that deserve respect and love. They won’t read our stuff or be hurt by our words or write back so we should be covered. Political celebrities always count because let’s face it, who thinks they are real people?

Thirdly, we should make sure we take our position as so right that it makes us a bit less charitable to the person that disagrees. We should leave things like love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control out of our writing for the most part. A smidgen should be used just to defend our position as superior to theirs.

Fourthly, I think we should write as many open letters as we can as long as it doesn’t deal with our issues first. Seriously, who would want to read what is effecting our day to day lives. Not nearly as fun.

Fifthly, I think we should have points that end with ly following the correct numbers. I am not sure why but it feels right. As you know if it feels right then it probably is.

Sixthly, I write these suggestions because I want to be taken as a serious blogger. As we all know bloggers will inherit the Earth. Well at least the virtual one except Farmville which is really just a evil waste of time.

Seventhly, (yes it is a made up word but look at point fifthly) if we generate enough controversy maybe we can land a book deal or video blog. I’ve always wanted to be on Oprah. Well not really but she doesn’t have to know that. Who knows maybe this could change the world!

Sincerely yours,
the occasionally open letter writer,
currently a son of a Grand Poobah,
recovering jerk,
& hopefully someone who makes a few salient points, occasionally.

Honeychild,

Thanks for the followup and sharing your thoughts. Here are my responses to your thoughts on my article on Ben Harper’s faith and your original comments. I am going to quote your recent objections to what I said and I’m going to write a response to each one. Feel free to comment and ask questions on any of them. Feel free to offer objections. Loving the dialog.

You clearly stated that Ben does not know Jesus. That was a conclusion based on his music, actions, statements, etc?

From the totality of what I have seen of Ben’s statements he does not understand who Jesus is. Ben does not profess Jesus as his Lord or as his God (John 20:28). The very definition of the biblical Christian faith is those that profess Jesus as their Christ and Lord (Acts 11:19-26).

Who are we to conclude such a thing…

We are told in Scripture to use judgment by Jesus, Paul, and James. Jesus says we must do it with introspection (Matthew 7). Paul tells us that the saints should wisely judge among themselves in temporal issues for they will one day judge even the angels in heavenly issues (1 Corinthians 6). James warns us that we must judge lawfully in the law of liberty (James 4 in context of James 2 circa vs 19-27).

The prohibitions of judgment are against the wrong types of judgment.
Jesus warns against hypocritical judgment. Paul warns against worldly judgment and ignorant judgment. James warns against unlawful judgment.

Jesus commands us to judge and to do so with right judgment. “Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment” (See John 7:24). The context of the James passage was unlawful judgment by more class conscious well to do Jewish converts that were looking down on poorer converts to Christianity. They were treating them in a unworthy manner. James charge of not unlawfully judging was his point in writing the letter we call James.

You quote Isaiah 33:22 which is Isaiah pleading for the people to come in to God’s Zion. The reference to judgment in that verse is that only God can ultimately judge the merit of a nations and by proxy individuals soul for redemption. It is not a proof text for us not to judge anything or anyone on this Earth. The entire focus on that verse is God saving his covenant people. His covenant people according to Isaiah had left the covenant because of their willful life of sin. In Isaiah 59:20-21 God affirms that those who come to the Redeemer in Zion (who will be revealed as Jesus, see Mark 1:14-15) and turn from their sins (anything they have put before God, see Rom 1) then they will be saved (Romans 10:9).

I suppose that someone who praises God and makes Godly statements all the time knows Jesus in your eyes?

If they are worshiping God in spirit and truth then yes (John 4:23). If they are giving mere religious lip service then no (Matthew 23:15, 27). Even the greatest of saints on Earth is still a sinner much in need of a savior (Romans 7) but they should be being conformed in to the image of Christ (Romans 12:1-2). I’ve met my far share of religious hypocrites, some who are saved and some who are not. I ask God daily to keep me from being one and to save me when I am being one.

You say that you were only judging his actions but you cleary (sic.) stated that Ben does not know Jesus. You don’t know that and you don’t have the right to judge where his heart is.

As stated earlier Jesus in Luke 7 commands us to judge rightly. Jesus as recorded in Matthew 7 tells us how to rightly judge by telling us how not to judge wrongly. We are to judge but we are to do so by his standards and it must be done carefully. We are not to do it hypocritically (see vs 5), carelessly (vs 6), or in our own wisdom (vs 7-11). We should judge in a way we would wish to be judged (12-14). We are to judge the fruit which is a persons actions, words, statements, and values (15-20). Many good people including irreligious and religious ones, at least by our standards, will not be making it in to the kingdom of heaven because they want meet God’s standards (21-23). We mere mortals can only know if someone is saved if they have built their life on Jesus (24-27). It will in some way be evidenced in their lives (see the end of James 2).

It is our hearts that are judged by God and He is the one who knows our hearts. You don’t know Ben’s heart by his music…

Jesus say “What comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person.” The whole context is Matthew 15:10-20. Jesus made it clear to the apostles and us that we can know a person by what is on their heart. What we talk about, our passion, etc this is what reflects our heart. We sing about what is on our heart. Ben sings because he wants to share his heart with the world. It is awesome music, it is often spiritually powerful music, yet it isn’t Christian music.

We cannot conclude someone’s salvation by their actions or music, statements etc..

This sounds good but doesn’t to conform to biblical standards or observable reality. I think we both can agree if someone kills in the name of God then they likely are not of God, no matter how much they insist otherwise. This logic applies not only to a extreme example such as killing in God’s name but anything done in God’s name. We can observe a person to know what’s on their hearts. Jesus in Matthew 15 states it is the heart that we must inspect starting with our own but moving outwardly to our world by looking at their hearts. The goal of the Christian should be to win the hearts of those that don’t yet know Christ so that they might be saved (James 5:19-20). We must get to the heart of a culture including its music and performers to do this.

As a matter of fact, I imagine that a large majority or church goers will not be in God’s Kingdom.

On this you are probably right. It doesn’t mean that those outside the Church are automatically ushered in to the Kingdom. It means that they too have not come to Christ.

When I say it’s our hearts, I mean that if our heart is with God, He will know it and by His grace we are saved.

I love the grace of God. I celebrate it daily and rejoice that it has been granted for me to experience even a little bit of it. The only way we experience the grace of God is through Christ (John 1:14). To quote Paul to Titus “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.”

Perhaps the most troubling line of Ben Harper’s is “At first I wanted to become a priest or pastor, something like that, but then I realized that even if I had this immense love of God in me, it wasn’t enough to start a life of abnegation and semi-frustrations.” Harper knows that whatever knows of God it isn’t enough to follow God. Harper’s God is his worship of Creation. He is a naturalist “everything that comes from the earth” and theist “Great All” but he is not a Christian. He doesn’t conform to God’s biblical definition of a Christian as one who recognizes Christ as Lord with their mouth (Romans 10:9) and their deeds (James 2:14-26). I sincerely hope and pray one day he sings about the Jesus found in Scripture as his Lord and his God.

Just for the record. It wasn’t a perfect date but it was a good date. We were a bit rushed which isn’t conducive for a super relaxing good time. It was a good date because I got to just be with my wife. Staring in to her sheer beauty was a plus. We also played put put. Now some of you call it putt putt but you don’t play like I do. Either its a hole in one or a hole in eight. I swear one hole was rigged.

This post was posted at 1 minute after midnight, July 15, 2010.

Did you know Andy Warhol was a Christian?