I Doubt It

Lately I have been dwelling on Thomas' doubt of the risen Lord. Hardly a Christmas story, I know. But since I can't get it out of my head, I must make the obvious observations. Many times this story has been used to explain our doubts about God. How much faith is still faith when we also harbor doubts? How can our doubt strengthen us? One can hardly go through church life without encountering these interesting discussion questions in a bible study.

But is that really what this story is about?

The Gospel According To Me

Michael Horton pens "The Gospel and the Sufficiency of Scripture", a feature this month in Modern Reformation magazine. In it he quotes the best-selling Habits of the Heart, where Robert Bellah and fellow sociologists surveyed religion in the United States. They concluded that it is best described as "Sheilaism," named after one person they interviewed who said that she follows her own little voice. Bellah proposes that every American is the founder of his or her own religion, following the dictates of his or her own heart.

Horton's (very meaty) article wants to focus on the integral connection between the sufficiency of Scripture and the sufficiency of the gospel, but must begin with the reality that the American church is basically millions of different ideas of what scripture and the gospel mean. To the average Christian, Christianity is just the relative way they see Christianity.

Where I Have Been