The “love bug” bites Answers in Genesis... on the arse.
Answers in Genesis (AiG) is a popular apologetics ministry that is considered by many Lutherans, as well as other Christians, to be a reliable source of information related to defending the content of the book of Genesis – the most attacked book of the Bible. It is also a popular and well-respected resource among Christian home educators, who are generally concerned with the quality of educational materials that they choose to use, and specifically concerned with the doctrinal integrity of those materials. As a result, AiG founder and CEO, Ken Ham, along with many other well-credentialed AiG lecturers, routinely speak before large audiences, and are highly sought-after by homeschool convention planners due to the interest AiG generates among prospective attendees. Most of these conventions are planned and operated by smaller, independent non-profit organizations. But not all of them are non-profit. One such for-profit organization, Great Homeschool Conventions, Inc., has unwittingly struck the sparks of what has swiftly grown into a raging controversy among home educators, one which includes all the salacious elements of a public scandal: money, influence, truth, censorship, falsehood, and “love.”
The principle characters in this controversy, other than Ken Ham of AiG, may not be known at all outside of the home education movement. Within that movement, however, the characters are mostly iconic figures: Dr. Jay Wile, who has been well-known as a young-earth Creationist and defender of the literal six-day Creation account, is founder and former president of Apologia Educational Ministries and respected author of many of their science textbooks, he sold Apologia in 2008, was retained as author for a short time, but made the decision to leave in 2009 for what appears to be doctrinal reasons; Dr. Susan Wise-Bauer, a leading proponent of Classical Education, co-author of The Well-Trained Mind (widely considered to be the guide to Classical Education for home educators), author of The Story of the World (a very popular read-aloud, grammar-stage world history curriculum) and The History of the World (a new, rhetoric-stage world history), and owner of Peace Hill Press; and Dr. Peter Enns, author of the book, Inspiration and Incarnation: Evangelicals and the Problem of the Old Testament, and the now controversial religion curriculum, Telling God’s Story, published by Olive Branch Press – the “religious instruction imprint” of Bauer’s Peace Hill Press. There are other individuals involved, of course, but in the interest of keeping things simple so that we can focus on the core issue, these names will suffice.
False doctrine, influence and ministry
Ken Ham had a contract to speak at the 2011 Great Homeschool Conventions, Inc. conventions – which are located mostly in the South and East. He delivered his presentation in Memphis as scheduled in early March, but prior to his speaking engagement in Greenville, SC, he was made aware of Dr. Enns, his association with the Biologos Foundation – a group which is aggressively promoting an old-earth “incarnational” interpretation of the book of Genesis – and of Dr. Enns’ contract to speak at the Memphis convention. Understanding that such a view impacts more than just the story of the creation of man and the universe, but also the Image of God in man, man’s fall into sin and loss of that Image, and God’s promise of reconciliation and restoration through the work of the Messiah, Ken Ham resolved to include in his Greenville presentation published statements of Dr. Enns and the Biologos Foundation, along with statements of others, in a regular portion of his presentation in which he provides examples of statements from prominent people and organizations who compromise and reject the Genesis account. Anyone who is familiar with Ken Ham and Answers in Genesis knows that this is what they do. Prior to the Greenville convention, Ken Ham published the blog entry, Another Compromiser—Speaking at Homeschool Conventions pointing out the position of Biologos Foundation, using their published words, as follows:
- In my last post I suggested that the Adam story could be viewed symbolically as a story of Israel’s beginnings, not as the story of humanity from ground zero. But some might ask, “Why go through all this trouble? Why not just take it literally? The Bible says Adam was the first man. That’s the end of it.”
It’s not that simple, and if it were, people wouldn’t be talking it about it so much. First of all, reading the Adam story symbolically rather than as a literal description of history is not a whim, and it is certainly not driven by a desire to undermine the Bible. Rather, as we have seen, the Bible itself invites a symbolic reading by using cosmic battle imagery and by drawing parallels between Adam and Israel (to name two factors).
There is also considerable external evidence that works against the “just read it literally” mentality.
The biblical depiction of human origins, if taken literally, presents Adam as the very first human being ever created. He was not the product of an evolutionary process, but a special creation of God a few thousand years before Jesus — roughly speaking, about 6000 years ago. Every single human being that has ever lived can trace his/her genetic history to that one person.
This is a problem because it is at odds with everything else we know about the past from the natural sciences and cultural remains. (http://biologos.org/blog/pauls-adam-part-i/)
Finally, knowing that they were going to warn conference attendees of false teaching promoted by the Biologos Foundation, and that a representative of Biologos (Dr. Enns) was going to be present at the Greenville convention, Mark Looy of AiG personally spoke to the president of Great Homeschool Conventions, Inc., informing him that Ken Ham and AiG would be doing so, to which the president responded: “We would expect nothing less from Answers in Genesis” (listen to the YouTube interview with Ken Ham, below, for this quote and other details). And this is exactly what Ken Ham did at the Greenville convention.
What do you suppose happened?
Dr. Wile, Dr. Enns, and the twin coordinate powers of Church statesmanship
And now for the “love.” Aware of Ken Ham’s blog post warning of the teaching of Biologos and Dr. Enns, Dr. Wile, formerly of Apologia, issued a response to Ken Ham’s warning, entitled, An Opportunity for Critical Thinking!, in which he asserts that there is room for disagreement in the interpretation of the first three chapters of Genesis and that there are multiple equally valid positions on the “inspiration of Scripture,” and then decries Ken Ham for offering public assessment of Dr. Enns’ published materials and public statements, claiming that such is unloving and unChristlike. Then, two days later during the Greenville convention itself, Dr. Wile published a glowing review of Dr. Enns, following Enns’ lecture, The Dark Side of the Old Testament and What We Must Learn from it. This review focused mostly on ‘how Christian Dr. Enns is’ and early in the commentary section of this post, Dr. Wile defends his public approval of Dr. Enns on the basis of his identification with the man as his “Christian brother,” even though he personally disagrees with Enns’ (apparently) perfectly valid theology.
But this is nothing new for Dr. Wile (formerly of Apologia). Beginning at least since his departure from Apologia, Dr. Wile has been guilty of propping up error alongside the truth, naming the Biologos Foundation and extolling their version of theistic evolution not only as compatible with biblical Christianity, but as equally valid with his own views. For example, in 2009, he writes:
- Since the early church was not unanimous in taking the days of Genesis as 24-hour days, I fail to see why the modern church should be. Indeed, given the fact that many in the early church viewed the days of Genesis to be something other than 24-hour days, I think the modern church is free to believe that as well. Thus, if some Christians want to postulate that the days were something else (not an attempt at order, but instead, long ages of time), I can’t see how you can suddenly say they don’t believe the Bible. (Clement of Alexandria on the Days of Genesis)
- I strongly disagree with the idea that Old Earth Creationists aren't Biblical. Are you really willing to say that people like Norman Geisler, Gleason Archer, and J.P. Moreland aren't Biblical?
The young-earth view of creation is one orthodox interpretation of Scripture, but there are others. Even many in the early church, such as Origen, Clement of Alexandria, Athanasius of Alexandria , Basil of Caesarea, Augustine, and Hilary of Poitiers, didn't think the Genesis days were 24-hour days. Why do modern young-earthers believe that they MUST be 24-hour days.
For the record, I am a young-earth creationist. I prefer that term, however, because I think old-earth creationists, as well as some theistic evolutionists, are also Biblical. (Young Earth Creationists or Biblical Creationists?)
- ...I would agree with you that the philosophical underpinnings of evolution are religious in nature. They end up relying on assumptions that can’t be tested. Thus, that makes them religious. However, I don’t think they are necessarily opposed to the Christian worldview. PZ Myers is clearly opposed to the Christian worldview, and he is VERY religious in that opposition. However, I don’t think his opposition comes from the philosophical underpinnings of evolution. Instead, it comes from his application of evolution. He uses evolution as an explanation for a universe without a Creator. That is clearly opposed to the Christian worldview, but that is just his application of evolution. Others, such as the folks at Biologos, apply evolution differently, and as a result, they do not oppose a Christian worldview.
I don’t agree with the folks at Biologos, but I understand where they are coming from. They think God organized the physical laws of the universe so that evolution would produce everything we see today, including people. This keeps God’s hands “clean” of the “messy” business of creation. In their mind, this elevates God. Thus, their application of evolution leads to their Christian worldview. (This Isn’t Evolution – It’s Lunacy)
We encourage the reader to pause here for a moment, however, and recall our very recent post, C.P. Krauth explains how orthodox Lutheran Synods descend into heterodoxy. What were the steps that Charles Porterfield Krauth observed as the process of descending from orthodoxy into heterodoxy?
- Error begins by asking toleration...
- Indulged in for this time, Error goes on to assert equal rights...
- From this point Error soon goes on to its natural end, which is to assert supremacy.
As one can imagine, Dr. Wile’s aggressive and public pursuit of “big-tent orthodoxy,” and retreat from the young-earth positions he is well-known for defending, has sent Apologia Educational Ministries into a virtual tizzy. Inundated with letters and calls from deeply concerned home educators, they have had to issue their own reply in an effort to assuage the concerns of current and potential customers. ‘Don’t worry folks, Dr. Wile does not work here anymore!’ But just how much of what Dr. Wile (formerly of Apologia) currently reveals as his true doctrinal perspectives have seeped into the textbooks he has written over the years? We are assured by Apologia that on their face, nothing has, directly. But what about indirect influences? What would he have written differently had he not been wrestling with his own doubt regarding what he had been publicly defending – as we are now forced to presume he was? What about further patronage of those works? By purchasing the textbooks he had written for Apologia, is the concerned Christian home educator, or Christian day-school, financing his continued attempts to stand truth up next to error? These are critical questions for those looking for Christian teaching, or doctrinal reinforcement, from a science textbook, and for those selling such textbooks on this basis.
For the love of... ??? Dr. Susan Wise-Bauer just wants it to go away
Dr. Susan Wise-Bauer is considered by many to be the poster-child for the success of home education. Herself a first generation home school student, she’s been referred to as the quintessential whiz-kid, and is regarded today as a high-power intellectual among home educators. Based on the education she received in the home, Dr. Bauer and her mother, Jesse Wise, wrote The Well-Trained Mind, launching Dr. Bauer’s career, and her curriculum publishing business, Peace Hill Press. Like Dr. Wile (formerly of Apologia...), she has been a well-known figure and trusted source within the home education movement for a long time, and today is widely known and respected outside of it, particularly in academia.
Up to this point, Dr. Bauer, who is herself a professing “American Christian” and whose husband is pastor of a rural, non-denominational church near their home, has wisely stayed away from religious issues in her world history curriculum and other publications meant for consumption by home educators. As a result, her curriculum has appealed to a very broad market, and has been very popular.
The connection between Dr. Bauer and Dr. Enns in the unfolding drama briefly outlined here, is her decision to enter the religious publishing market with a new publishing imprint of Peace Hill Press – Olive Branch Press. As stated above, this is the publisher of Dr. Enns' now-controversial Bible instruction curriculum for young children. One may wonder at Dr. Bauer’s decision to publish a Bible curriculum that promotes “big-tent orthodoxy:”
- ...is this her confession? (it might be...)
- ...was this merely a business decision, to appeal to the broadest possible religious-publishing market? (maybe... with the implosion of Evangelicalism, it is no longer the profitable religious publishing demographic that it once was... Liberalism, with the aid of the Emergent movement, has replaced it as the new profitable demographic for publishers... the new reductionist, gender-neutral NIV is evidence of this demographic change...)
- ...or does it have something to do with the professional connections she has with Dr. Enns, such as the fact that he was a professor at the college from which Dr. Bauer received her M.Div, or that she has publicly supported him through other controversial publications? (seems reasonable...)
- “I have absolutely no connection with Biologos. At all.”
- “Peter Enns, who has written a book for the Olive Branch imprint of Peace Hill Press, sometimes blogs for Biologos. To my knowledge, he has a publisher-author relationship with them. He has a publisher-author relationship with Olive Branch Books.”
- “I support every parent's right NOT to use the Bible curriculum published by Olive Branch Books. However, it is absolutely untrue to say that this curriculum attacks the Bible. Please read it before making such accusations. That seems to me to be the most basic requirement for critiquing materials.”
- “The Flood was an attempt by God to set it right, but it didn’t work.” (Page 70)
“For many parents, the Bible looks a little bit like my child’s room. It’s a mess. Names, places, events are all over the place, and you hardly know where to start cleaning up. It’s such a mess, in fact, that if someone ripped twenty pages out of Leviticus or 1 Chronicles, you might not even notice it was missing. And if your aim is to teach the Bible to your children, the mess isn’t just confusing. It’s stressful.” (page 10)
“If our expectations are modern instead of ancient, we will get ourselves into a bind. Before we can ask the hard questions — for example, 'Is Genesis 1 in harmony with scientific thought? Or does Genesis 1 trump scientific thought?' — we must ask a more foundational question: 'What do we have the right to expect from God’s word as a book written in an ancient world?'” (pages 18/19)
“The issue is that I read him a very complex and intricate biblical narrative — the story of Adam, Eve, and the serpent — as if it were a child’s story. This biblical story was meant to convey something profound, mature, and foundational to ancient Israelites. Sitting down and reading this story with my son set him up to receive it as one tall tale among others. The Garden narrative is deeply theological and symbolic. Despite the neat talking snake, it is not the type of story that we should toss casually to our young children. When, at a more mature age, children are asked to revisit this story and begin dealing with it in earnest, many can hardly refrain from snickering. ('I outgrew talking animals years ago!') Or consider another Bible story commonly taught to children: the story of the Flood. The boat, the animals, the rain, the drama — all lend themselves to videos, snappy tunes, macaroni art, flannel graphs, and furry friends. What is obscured is the simply horrific notion that God would bring down such drastic destruction on the earth, rather than finding some other solution to humanity’s rebellion. And that is a question young adults should ask.” (page 44/45)
- So how can we claim that the Old Testament — and it alone from all the texts of that pre-Christian age — is divine communication from God to man? It’s an interesting question, but it turns out to be small potatoes compared with the next problem that Enns, professor of Old Testament at Westminster Theological Seminary, sets before us: It seems as though the Old Testament was also puzzling for Matthew and Luke and Paul. In fact, from where we sit, it looks as though the apostles were lousy at exegesis...
Enns gives us a number of startling New Testament passages that use the Old Testament by wrenching the original words violently out of context and even altering them … In other words, Matthew is shamelessly proof-texting, in a way that would get any student enrolled in Practical Theology 221 (Expository Skills) sternly reproved...
Changing the words of Scripture to suit your own purposes? Paul wouldn’t get past the first week of New Testament 123 (Hermeneutics) like that. He is breaking every rule of thoughtful evangelical scholarship, which holds that the proper way to approach inerrant Scripture is with careful grammatical-historical exegesis: painstaking analysis of each word of the Scripture and its relationship to other words, the setting of the sentence in the verse, the verse in the chapter, the chapter in the book, and the book in the historical times of its composition.
Of course Paul breaks those rules, Enns says; they are our rules, not Paul’s. Inspiration and Incarnation offers us passages from such extrabiblical texts as the Wisdom of Solomon and the Book of Biblical Antiquities in order to show that, far from doing something extraordinary and super-apostolic, Paul and Matthew were doing exactly what most of their contemporaries did. Both apostles had been trained by the scholars of their day, the so-called “Second Temple” period, to come to a text looking for the “mystery” beneath the words: the deeper truth that an untrained reader might not see. Both of them came to the Old Testament already convinced that they knew what that mystery was: the incarnation, death, and resurrection of God in Jesus Christ...
- there is a definite theological resonance between Bauer and Enns,
- their theology is not to be trusted by any Christian who desires to be orthodox,
- her “reluctance” to be forthright with her customers and her apparent desire to struggle against those who would publicly critique her published materials and those of Dr. Enns is very suspicious – and has nothing whatsoever to do with a concern over “being loving”.
“Great Homeschool Conventions, Inc.” to Ken Ham: We reject your spirit!
Affirming their agreement with Ken Ham and his position, Great Homeschool Conventions, Inc. nevertheless folded under pressure – presumably from Dr. Jay Wiles, Dr. Peter Enns, Dr. Susan-Wise Bauer and other interested parties – officially terminating their contract with Ken Ham and Answers in Genesis, and permanently prohibiting him and AiG from any further involvement in any future conventions that they may host – and this after the president of Great Homeschool Conventions, Inc. was informed by Mark Looy of AiG that Ken Ham would warn conference attendees of compromises and error in Dr. Enns’ materials, and affirmed to Mark Looy his support for Ken Ham: “We would expect nothing less from Answers in Genesis”.
In announcing their termination last week, AiG published the email they received from Great Homeschool Conventions, Inc., along with their own response, in this blog post: Kicked Out of Two Homeschool Conferences. In their letter, Great Homeschool Conventions, Inc. equated AiG’s public critique of Dr. Enns’ published materials with terms such as “slander” and “attack” – but most peculiarly, as having an “unScriptural spirit.” In the public announcement on their own web site, Great Homeschool Conventions, Inc. state as much directly: “Ken Ham was removed for his spirit, not for his message” – whatever that means.
In their commentary, Answers in Genesis quite correctly observes:
- We often find today that if we speak against someone’s theological compromise, we are accused of being “un-Christian” or “unloving.” This is a bigger topic for another time, but for the moment let us state that we need to understand what the Bible means by “love.” It does not mean one doesn’t publicly stand against error.
Being kicked out of these conventions is sad, but AiG notes this is not the major issue here. What is troubling is that more and more churches have been infiltrated by academics who compromise God’s Word, and many Christians are simply unaware of the danger.
| Todd Friel of WRETCHED Radio interviews Ken Ham Interveiw begins about 1:45 into the recording... |
Our Conclusion
The situation with Ken Ham and AiG is not unique, and it is quite illustrative of situations we all face. It is unfortunate, but more often than not these days, the phrase, “Speak the truth in love!” is levied as a threatening warning against those who, with hearts full of love and gratitude for what Christ has done for them, do the hard work of actually speaking the difficult truth. Such threats warn of impending retaliation from rivals or organizational authorities; or they warn that, ultimately, the value of truth is only proportional to the subjective standards of behaviour which accompany it.
And this is what has happened to this perfectly good phrase. Repeated ad nauseum and used as a weapon, the thrust of this phrase is no longer that Truth flows from a foundation of love, but that Truth has no objective value and that it is only as effective as the “method” employed by the truth-teller. Often, it seems, the pious theologian who gives arbitrary instructions concerning “loving discourse” is only posing as a psychologist or sociologist as he points the truth-teller to the results he desires from speaking the truth, rather than to the value of the truth itself, and insists that the truth-teller observe certain rules of discourse if he would be effective. Thus, the perfectly good phrase, “Speak the truth in love” has been ruined.
The fact is, speaking the Truth is love. That is what has made the other well-known, and much older phrase, “The truth hurts,” so poignant; and it is especially the case when the Truth exposes cherished falsehoods and demolishes the strongholds of Satan. For this reason, speaking the Truth "in love" should never have anything to do with whitewashing the Truth, or remaining silent, in order to avoid ‘hurt feelings’; all it means is that we don't offend for the sake of offending, or for the sake of sport. Furthermore, the impact of standing on the Truth and sounding warnings against error should never be an object of anticipated measure, but of trust in God’s providential working. Each person has been given unique characteristics by God. Personality, for instance, is a product of God’s genetic gift to the individual and of His gift of life experiences through which that individual’s character is developed, for His hidden purposes. Likewise, an individual’s conviction comes from God’s gift of faith to that individual, where the individual's portion of faith meets his personality and is expressed accordingly. Such expression has the impact God desires, and has already planned.
We are called to live by conscience, and this means speaking and acting according to our convictions as we have been equipped by God to do so. As a wise man, caught in a difficult situation, once said, It is never safe to go against conscience. And in giving advice for living according to conscience, this same man recommended that Christians Sin Boldly! – that is, that they do what they do because they are convinced as a matter of conscience that it is the right thing to do. Even if it turns out that in the end it isn’t the right thing to do, that’s ok, because we can deal with that – it’s called repentance and forgiveness. But a fear of possibly being wrong should never prevent us from confessing and living according to the convictions of conscience, indeed such fear robs us of conviction; and it is never safe to violate conscience at the behest of those issuing threats and demands, or to attenuate Truth and squelch warnings of error because someone declares that in merely doing so “YOU’RE NOT BEING LOVING!!!” In this sense, we at Intrepid Lutherans will continue to speak and live according to conscience, to “sin boldly,” and encourage our fellow confessional Lutherans to do the same.
