Quote of the Day: Francis Schaeffer
A few years ago when I started to work out a Christian epistemology and a Christian concept of culture, many people considered what I was doing suspect. They felt that because I was interested in intellectual answers I must not be biblical. But this attitude represents a real poverty. It fails to understand that if Christianity is really true, then it involves the whole man, including his intellect and creativeness. Christianity is not just “dogmatically” true or “doctrinally” true. Rather, it is true to what is there, true in the whole area of the whole man in all of life.
The ancients were afraid that if they went to the end of the earth they would fall off and be consumed by dragons. But once we understand that Christianity is true to what is there, true to the ultimate environment — the infinite, personal God who is really there — then our minds are freed. We can pursue any question and can be sure that we will not fall off the end of the earth. Such an attitude will give our Christianity a strength that it often does not seem to have at the present time.
Francis Schaeffer, Art and the Bible
A very short book that has done more to help me get perspective on faith, art and life in general than almost anything else in recent memory.
Has the Church — or more specifically, evangelical Christian culture — perpetuated the idea that challenging norms and asking “dangerous” questions is a bad thing? To me that’s what it feels like, but I could be wrong.
[...] So, if nothing else, imagine what a spectrum of belief might be like, rather than all black and white that can be known. And take it all with a grain of salt. I’m just a normal guy that knows no more about the Bible than the average Christian. I’m no expert in theology; I’ve just had this “what if” idea bouncing around in my head for a long time and felt the need to output so that I might get some input. In fact, I’d rather avoid suggesting something I don’t necessarily believe myself, for fear that I come to believe it, but this is something I haven’t been able to shake for years, so forgive my pursuit to the edge of the world. [...]
Pingback by Josh Mock » The Spectrum of Belief — January 13, 2009 @ 10:07 am[...] A while back I read Francis Schaeffer’s book Art and the Bible. As I have let his words sink in, the significance of his ideas have become clearer to me. Obviously, based on the amount of attention I give the two subjects here, art and faith are two things I believe must be reconciled, and the way the modern church often approaches art is not healthy for either camp. [...]
Pingback by Art and the Bible, take two | Josh Mock — April 4, 2009 @ 3:48 pm[...] Well, that just makes me sad. And pushes me to identify with Bazan all the more. So many in such great denial. Don’t they know that we have warrant to explore the scariest questions of life? [...]
Pingback by David Bazan | Josh Mock — July 31, 2009 @ 3:20 pm[...] of it that this was an encouraging and growth-inducing read. I firmly believe that we should have no fear of any question, and Kierkegaard challenges those ideas of where the ends of the earth lie. I respect his [...]
Pingback by Provocations: Spiritual Writings of Kierkegaard | Josh Mock — December 13, 2009 @ 9:12 pm