Metanoia

So everyone and their cousin is posting this video by Ray Comfort and "The Way of the Master" ministry: "180".

If you haven't seen it yet, click here to check it out.

It's well worth watching. However, I'd like to first post my thoughts after watching it and then the thoughts of someone I respect. If you haven't seen it yet, you should check it out before reading the rest of this post. It will make a lot more sense.

My take:

1. How can you not know who Hitler is?
2. Of the 'morality' questions he asked regarding Hitler and the Jews, the only one I had to stop to think about was the one about having a sniper rifle with Hitler in your sights. But even knowing the evil that he caused, I don't believe it would be right to kill him. If you are a Christian and believe that God is sovereign, then obeying God's command not to murder applies clearly here. God allowed Hitler to live as long as he did for His own purposes. Murdering him in cold blood, whether we can rationalize it or not, would be wrong. Most of you probably didn't even have to think about it, but in case anyone else paused at that one, that's my thoughts.
3. Ray takes 2 Peter 3:9, "God is not willing that any should perish" out of context. He takes it as a universal statement and the context clearly shows that Peter is drawing a distinction in the first 9 verses between the elect and the world. While it's not an uncommon error, it is demonstrably an error and should be corrected.
4. It seemed like he talked a lot about the law. While that's not necessarily a bad thing and is often very necessary, it felt quite lengthy while I was watching it.

This morning, while at work, I was checking my Twitter feeds and noticed Tim Challies had an 'a la carte' blogpost (a post in which he links to different interesting things) this morning. I clicked to read the post and read the following:

"180 is a new documentary from Ray Comfort. Just 33 minutes long, it’s worth watching. Comfort does battle with moral relativism on the issue of abortion. (On the critique side, I sure wish he did a better job of getting to the gospel)" - Tim also linked to the movie's website.

Curious as to what his critiques were, I read down in the comments and found a number of other people with the same question I did. One commenter named Mark Spence commented,

"I love your posts and what you do. I was soooo excited to see you post about 180. I produced and edited the documentary.

You said, "I sure wish he did a better job of getting to the Gospel."

You caught me off guard with this statement. Would you please elaborate?

The Law was 3 minutes long and the Gospel presentation was 3 minutes long. Some very respected people, within your circle of influence, encouraged me to take out the Gospel altogether and leave it as simply a 'pro-life' video.

Looking forward to your thoughts. I value them greatly."

Reading further down, I found that Phil Johnson - aka John MacArthur's book editor/Head of Grace To You/Blogger at teampyro.blogspot.com/Spurgeon aficionado.

Phil is one of the smartest guys I know and as soon as I saw his name in the comments section, I was eager to hear what he had to say.

"I'm with Tim on the 180 film. It makes a very powerful rational and emotional case against abortion--and that aspect of the film is utterly superb. But I have watched the film carefully a few times, and there's MUCH more than 3 minutes given to the Ten Commandments. (The preaching of the law is scattered throughout, not just in a 3-minute bloc. It is a prominent feature throughout..) That's fine, and to be expected with any WoTM product. I appreciate and applaud their stress on the use of the law in evangelism.

But I can't find 3 minutes of gospel exposition in the film. The first mention of the historical facts of the gospel comes around 27:30, when the film is nearly over. And it's one of the interviewees who brings up the subject of Jesus dying on the cross. The film immediately goes back to the law, and then Ray makes one brief statement of gospel truth at about 28:30, followed by more law.

Nowhere in the film that I can see is there a clear explanation of the principles of substitution, propitiation, or justification by faith. Surely these things--all necessary to a proper understanding of Jesus' atoning work--warrant as much careful explanation as the law has already received.

To complicate matters, statements are made such as: "There's something you can actually DO, because of God's kindness, to have all your sins forgiven" (at 27:47)--all without a single mention anywhere of the fact that OUR works contribute nothing to salvation.

I would love to have seen the vital truths of Titus 3:5 or Ephesians 2:8-9 fully explained, and the parachute illustration just doesn't do it.

I'm sounding hyper-critical, no doubt. And I am sorry for that. I love WoTM and Ray Comfort. And I'm grateful for the countless people they have motivated to do open-air evangelism. But I do earnestly wish they stressed gospel AS MUCH AS (note: not "instead of") law.

For those who I know will ask, yes, I have communicated these concerns to Ray Comfort personally. "

It is very clear watching the film that Ray Comfort is a gifted communicator and evangelist. However it is equally clear that as a theologian he is no heavyweight. To clarify, I'm not saying he's ignorant of theology, it's just obvious he hasn't spent nearly as much time studying theology as he has evangelizing (by no means a bad thing - except when small problems emerge). Tim, incidentally came on and said essentially the same thing as Phil in a shorter post. Later, Phil, responding to someone else, wrote,

"My concerns aren't really about measuring ratios. Jesus sometimes stressed the law and sometimes stressed the gospel--with greatly varying ratios of each. And the reason for differentiating was clear. As they used to say on the Way of the Master radio broadcast: *Law to the proud; grace to the humble.* Where the stress should be placed depends to a very large degree on the spiritual state of the person being dealt with.

(That's why I cringe when someone has only one memorized script and they follow it verbatim no matter who they are dealing with. And let's face it: that's a sometimes problem with people who follow the WoTM approach to the letter.)

But specific ratios aside, the gospel is ultimately the most important part of the message. It is crucial--especially in these postmodern times when words are capable of an infinite variety of meanings--it is crucial to explain _what we mean_ when we say "Jesus died for your sins."

The principles of substitution and propitiation; the futility of our own works and the utter sufficiency of Christ's righteousness; and the meaning of faith as trust in Christ ALONE--those are truths that even many professing Christians don't understand sufficiently. And the person who never takes time to explain them in clear and simple terms just isn't doing all he needs to do as an evangelist, no matter how bold he is in bringing up the subject with people on the street.

That, from an eternal perspective, is an even more important issue than the abortion epidemic.

And that's NOT to minimize the problem of abortion. Instead, it's meant to stress how immensely HUGE the problem of a weak gospel presentation is."

I think there's a particular importance to this stress in this situation given that Ray Comfort is often used as an example for evangelism (and rightly so!). Unfortunately, too few people today can actually explain the Gospel coherently in basic terms.

But to be fair, some have noted that many involved with the film wanted it to be simply a pro-life film and to skip the Gospel at the end. RC is to be applauded for standing firm on the importance of including that part of the message. It is entirely possible that he was forced to limit his Gospel presentation because of external pressure from others involved in the production.

At the end of the day, I'm very grateful for both of these men. I'm convicted and humbled by RC's passion for the lost, yet also sensitive to PJ's loving critique of a friend and his concern for Gospel accuracy.

SDG

P.S. Metanoia (blog title) is the Greek word for repent. It essentially means to change one's mind, or, as the film's title suggests, to do a 180 degree turn in one's beliefs.