Daniel Paul your post there has alienated me.

"Evangelical writers nearly always alienate non-evangelicals in their works, noted long-time Christian writer and editor Tim McLaughlin"

Yeah so did Jesus. Who would want to be like HIM. /sarc

>>“I think that we are also unrealistic, evangelicals, in how we view let’s say marriage,” <<

In other words, she's telling religious people to give up keeping values in their writing to connect with others. That's ridiculous. Ask anyone who works at Pixar, that's not how to connect with others, and that's not how to make a good story. Boo, hiss.

It is critical that authors are clear on what they intend to accomplish in their writings. A good writer understands his or her audience and arranges an array of words that holds the audiences attention. Some writing is done to educate, some to entertain and some to inspire. Christian sometimes use words that only have impact on or are understand by other Christians. I would not even try to explain "Grace" to person who has not been saved. Even if there were words to describe the phenomena, there is no possible way of describing the emotional impact. The song, "Amazing Grace", probably describes "Grace" far better than any philosophical dissertation. Those of you who have been saved know what I am talking about, others do not. If I were writing a sermon, I would use the word "Grace" and expect it to be understood. If speaking to a secular audience I would use the word sparingly, because it might not be understood. Rather than being concerned about "Alienating the Unchurched" any good writer should focus on reaching his or her target audience.

Non-believers have difficulty reading the Bible because God talks to men through the Bible via the Holy Spirit. That conversation is to our hearts as well as our heads and the conversation often takes us out of the written word into a personal dialog. Though the writings of men, are not the same as the writings of the Bible, I believe some works are divinely inspired and they would not speak to us the way they do if they were watered down to appeal to non-believers.

I also think it some non-believers are intrigued by Christian words, and eventually figure out there really is something exciting in Christianity they do not understand. Maybe the "Alienation" actually turns people to God and saves souls.

We tend to use the word "Biblcial" quite a bit in our society. Jesus said "do you not know the scripture". The Bible contains examples of what will happen if you don't do things Jesus' way. One of the issues the author is pointing to is the first rule of radio I learned. "Never say what you want to say. Say what you want your audience to hear." Journalists write to convey. It accomplishes nothing if it isn't written in a way they can hear.

Another thing about Jerry2 for all of you who don't know him very well: He changes his name often.

The author seems to be saying that if God's people in the Bible either think, say, or act a certain way that becomes a biblical model and therefore since they messed up that gives the rest of us permission to imitate them. But God's spoken word always takes precedence over every thing else. In the case of marriage God's spoken word in both the Old and New Testaments tells us what God's design for marriage is regardless of the example set by some of His people in either the Old or New Testament.

Chris333

Re:So does anybody want to deal with the assertion in this post that there is virtually no biblical model for marriage? Especially not in the Old Testament.


The only ones who don't want to deal with it are the ones who want to justify their sexual immorality.

So does anybody want to deal with the assertion in this post that there is virtually no biblical model for marriage? Especially not in the Old Testament.

Well that answered my question about Jerry ^_^ thanks Star ;D

But I wish he was here to answer, and I guess Don got flagged cause he was portraying Evangelicals like Communists. I really wanted to talk to him about that. D:

Star 2, thanks for the info on Jerry2 and I will keep that mind as I read his responses.

believer

Jerry2 is a 58 yr old man who lives in Fla. He is an atheist and an evolutionist. He has some religious background for he was raised in a Catholic home.

He thinks Christians are uneducated, dumb, gullible, childish, dishonest because they reject evolution for creationism and believing in God.

Jerry2 oftens refers to God as the sky fairy, and other similar names.

Jerry2 is a very knowledgable man in his field of interest, evolution. Many times he will express his views in a very intelligable way without name calling. After time, though, he becomes frustrated with the Christians perhaps because they do not see it his way or maybe because he can't control our thinking and then starts to put Christians down by calling them uneducated, stupid, dishonest,and other unflattering names.

Jerry2 is a real colorful guy. He can be a bit annoying at times but after awhile his ramps can be quite comical.

He does come across as an angry man at times and some Christians that post on CP have been praying for him that God will heal his heart and some have prayed for his salvation.

Jerry 2, Is this your personal view or your opinion of what many nonbelievers think of when they hear someone referred to as an evangelical if it is the latter than as unfortunate as it may be I agree with you. I live in Appalachia and we have a lot of churches come to our area for mission trips many of whom send a survey team or person out before the actual trip and in a majority of cases I hear things like you've got Wal-Mart or McDonald's or wealthy people, and so on, why because they been fed a line of garbage by the media and agencies who recruit them that everybody here is poor, dumb, toothless and shoeless. Yes, we do have our share of poverty, but we have many who have done their best to and have successfully broken free of the "Hillbilly" stereotype. The same is true of evangelicals, the media has painted the world a picture that is indeed true of a small percentage of evangelicals, but is totally untrue of the much larger majority. And like many of our mission teams once they really get to know folks from Appalachia and see what they have accompished and see their strong work ethic they leave with a much different opinion of them and I believe once a true evangelical develops a realtionship with someone who is not a believer the same thing happens and even better the nonbeliever becomes a believer themself. That is why it is so vitally important that those of us who call ourselves evangelicals are truly living evangelical lives not just for the sake of our image, but more importantly for the sake of seeing those we call nonbelievers become not only believers but believers who have joined God in reaching their world of nonbelievers for Christ.

Jerry2,

If you did replace it with the word "homosexual", you would lose your job because of the liberal-minded homosexual agenda - by those forcing us to accept homosexuality as normal. You have your facts backwards.

Jerry2:

Do you realize that if I were to take out the word "evangelical" in your rant and replace it with the word "homosexual" I would lose my job, probably be subjected to death threats from so-called "tolerant" people and, if in Canada or other countries possibly arrested, serve jail time and have to pay a fine for "offending" someone. Now please tell me again, who is a fan of censorship?????

Jerry,
You are painting a broad stereotype that is filled with hate and one that is often painted by the biased liberal media. I am a devout Baptist and a Chemical Engineer. The degree in science I obtained only strengthened my faith. Real believers aren't following blindly like you are trying to portray.

Dongard,

America is not under Communist rule, so I'm a little confused about the connection here. Could you explain to me how evangelical christians are, in sense, tattletales to those they don't like? Sorry, I may be asking a stupid question o_o

Flagged as inappropriate.

You're a nonbeliever, Jerry?

Flagged as inappropriate.