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JCsites.com
Registered Member

Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 169

Posted 8/6/2002 7:16 PM (GMT -6)

I didn't know where the best place was to put this post so I picked here.

Anyhow, I recently obtained a copy of Dr. Boyd's latest book co-authored with Paul Eddy. It's called, "Across the Spectrum."

I think it's great read for someone like me who has more theological training than the average parishoner, but still can't hold a candle to a seminary student.

Anyhow, it turns out this book is causing nightmares!!!!

Here's the story, then the prayer request:

I recently moved from Minneapolis, to the Atlanta area. My wife and I have become fast friends with our neighbors. They're very outgoing and open people.

So they had us over for dinner last weekend, and the subject of theology came up. Turns out he was raised Catholic, hated church, but got back "into it" when he started dating his current wife.

She was raised Presbyterian and doesn't mind talking about Christianity and Church. But I'm not sure she's ever thought throught the doctrines she's been taught.

In the course of the conversation she announced that the Bibles says that the spiritual gift of tongues no longer exits. She said it like everyone knows that. Who could dis-agree?

So I started telling her about Across the Spectrum. I said that some believers do speak in tongues and that it's a debated issue.

Then she got on the idea of Predestination. Again, she didn't realize others believe differently. I mentioned the book again.

So she was intensley interested in this book. I was glad cause I thought it would be perfect for her. I happened to have it handy so I loaned it to her to read.

The next day she returned it. She said she had read the chapter on Scripture - the inerrancy debate. The chapter upset her and then she had nightmares about it. So she didn't want that book in her house!

Apparently she had no idea that some Christians take Predestination so far as to say that God created some people intended for eternity in Hell. That really bothered her.

When she returned the book, she spoke with my wife. I wasn't there. Somehow, my wife got her to keep the book and at least read Greg and Paul's chapter on Charasmatic gifts.

Anyhow, I'd like to ask for prayers for this woman. What a bizarre response. Nightmares! I can only guess that this is spiritual warefare. I'm guessing her neat and tidy worldview got rattled and the enemy took advantage. Her name is Jennifer and I'd like to ask that God would intervene to allow her to read the book and not be harrassed or upset. That the Lord would re-assure her unsettled heart as she reads and learns. Thanks!

How about that Doc? Your book is causing Nightmares! And this one was supposed to be non-controversial cause it give both opposing view points on issues! ;-)

JC Sites Guy

PotOnWheel
Registered Member

Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890

Posted 8/7/2002 6:09 PM (GMT -6)

JC?

Do you have a future of teaching college philosophy ahead of you. You gonna blow away those freshmen who only went to church every Sunday and never examined everything? Have mercy on the poor lady. If she is not a liberal arts college--and a good one--cultured person this could be traumatic.

Also, you are in the South now. North and South are both "onions." Onions alternate hard and soft layers. (Technically the layers have hard boundaries and wet middles...so the analogy will fit.) Minnesotians have a "Rep" in other states as being Cold. They aren't bubbly and warm sounding and acting like everyone south of Champaign, IL. Minnesotians are cool on the outside, but immediately under that friendly....if we just give you a chance. Southerners are "Y'all" on the outside; but don't take that as an invitation except for you to be bubbly right back. Minnesotians are EVENs and Southerners are ODDs. A Southerner's third layer (underneath the polite formality a Swede might take for inpersonal or cold) is the invitation they will extend for you to invade their private space in the event of real need. (Like a European inviting you to drop by and stay at their house if you get to Europe--and actually expecting to see you; while Americans say it but are shocked when Europeans actually come.) The Minnesotian who is invited IN actually thinks that they have been made a part of the family. They feel like they are being treated that way. In Minnesota, this kind of thing doesn't happen until layer four. Three is perceived to visitors tranfered to the icy berg of lake-filled cites as colder than winter! The "Minnesota Nice" (Which y'all shouldn't condesend yourselves for; cause its genuine, and spiritual!) is layer Two. You put on layer two when it actually pays to notice each other. "Work to be done.", and then you notice each other over a cup of Gavalia coffee. Three is that "coldness" that cements the visitors first shock over the lack of smiles and "Hey"s of One. Four is an evalutionary addaptation whereby you will actually adopt anyone into your families you are snowbound with. A few months of blizzard and you have to get married anyways! And if you don't go bizzerk and kill each other off ... you might as well at least become inlaws! Southerners will say "Yall come back now." They mean it. Your BODY can come back. But don't be personal.The Five of a southerner has never been discovered by any Northerner who has lived to tell about it. I think its called "Kin."

I, well, CERTAINLY don't know what I'm talking about!!!!!!

But you might just have miss-interpreted the meaning of her politely returning the book. That might have been the equivalent of a Minnesotian throwing it down at your feet. Atlanta is south. The gentility of the place might be too subtle for someone raised on WCCO, or KQ92. And what means one thing in Minnesota, of convincing her to take it back ... might be taken as AN ONION OF A DIFFERENT THING in the South.

Ask around.

You are certainly not in Kansas any more.

Electra
Registered Member

Date Joined Feb 2002
Total Posts : 611

Posted 8/7/2002 6:59 PM (GMT -6)

If you ever doubt the redemptive potential of an onion—particularly the onion freshly picked from your own garden, read Brothers Karamazov. Electra

~·• kyrie eleison ·~•~· christe eleison ·~•~· kyrie eleison •·~

JCsites.com
Registered Member

Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 169

Posted 8/7/2002 7:28 PM (GMT -6)

Here's the follow-up on my neighbor. I actually got to talk to her myself, regarding "Across the Spectrum."

I had some of my facts wrong. She was raised Souther Baptist, not Presbyterian.

She was upset with the ultra calvanist notion that God creates people intending them for Hell. For even thru that, God get's glorified.

She read this viewpoint late at night, and then had a dream where she was being raped and God was watching over it saying, "I will still get glory from this when my just sentence is carried out on this man."

This dream was very upseting cause it made her feel like God wasn't concerned about evil in the world, evil that happens to her. Because he still get's the glory.

So then she was like, I don't like all Presbyterians. She said, "I know Steven Curtiss Chapman goes to a Presbyterian Church, I don't think I should listen to his music anymore."

I managed to convince her that not all Calvanists believe predistination to that extreme, with no free will at all. "They really are Christian brother's and nice people." I said.

She metioned that she had read more of the chapters in the book during the day time and was starting to get into it. She remarked that she had no idea that within Evangelicalism, there's such a wide range of diverse opinions on doctrine and theology.

She said in college she got in the habit of ignoring professors that would try to pose questions that would make her doubt her faith. Kind of like griping the steering wheel through thick and thin. Her grip has been on trying to stay true to Jesus and her faith in him.

My take is that she's accidently stunted her growth. But it seems that "Across the Spectrum" is helping her to safely investigate other ideas and decide for herself.

Doc, guess that's why you wrote the book, huh? Congrat's! Thanks to any who prayed for her. I'd ask that if you remember please pray for her again. What a horrible, and intense dream!

Lord I pray for Jennifer right now. That you would protect her and her family from attacks of Satan and his hosts. Please continue to let your Holy Spirit guide and teach her. Amen

JCsites guy

Edited by - JCsites.com on 08/08/2002 12:29:17 AM

PotOnWheel
Registered Member

Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890

Posted 8/7/2002 7:56 PM (GMT -6)

Amen!

GregBoyd
Registered Member

Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 1818

Posted 8/8/2002 3:03 AM (GMT -6)

JC: How about that Doc? Your book is causing Nightmares!

Doc: People have been telling me this for fifteen years. In some cases, I’m flattered. In this case, I'm not. But it sounds like the fear buttons needed to be pushed.

JC: She read this (deterministic) viewpoint late at night, and then had a dream where she was being raped and God was watching over it saying, "I will still get glory from this when my just sentence is carried out on this man."

Doc: Sounds like a clear, lucid thinker. Ten bucks says she eventually becomes an open theists!

Hope all is going well for you in Atlanta JC. We miss you at WHC.

Doc

"In Christ...the ONLY THING that matters is faith energized by love." Galatians 5:6

Tom
Registered Member

Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353

Posted 8/8/2002 4:02 AM (GMT -6)

quote:
I managed to convince her that not all Calvanists believe predistination to that extreme, with no free will at all. "They really are Christian brother's and nice people." I said.

JC-

You would have done better to simply point out that Steven Curtis Chapman's music is too awesome to dismiss. I've found a few lines in his lirics now and then that I don't agree with, but hey, with a drummer like his, Champman can't be all that bad! Right Doc?

Tom

"Every saint has a history and every sinner a future." Oscar Wilde

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