Not Just Another Programming Language

You might be familiar with PASCAL as a computer programming language, but did you know about the Christian man from which this language was named?

Blaise Pascal was a French mathematician, physicist, and theological philosopher from the 17th century. Under the direct tutelage of his father, Pascal thrived intellectually and showed a penchant for theoretical and practical science. He is attributed with the invention of 0ne of the first mechanical calculators and with the laws of hydraulics.

Following a near-death experience in late 1654, where Pascal and several friends escaped plunging over a bridge in a coach, he had a vision from God. He left mathematics and physics and devoted himself to studying scripture and writing apologetics. What is apologetics?

"Apologetics attempts to render the Christian faith persuasive to the contemporary individual.

• For unbelievers: it is belief forming. It helps to establish Christianity as credible by giving intellectual support to the explanatory value of a biblical world view.



• For believers: it is belief sustaining. It nurtures Christian faith by calling believers to love the Lord with their minds (Matt 22:37)."[1]

His two most famous works date from this period: the Lettres Provinciales (The Provincial Letters) and the Pensées.[2] The Provincial Letters was a critique of religious and political leadership of his time. The Pensées is actually a collection of notes Pascal made for a book he planned to title "The Defense of the Christian Religion," but was not completed due to his untimely death in 1662.

Pascal’s primary concern was focused on the church and combating the ignorance of those who professed to be a Christian without displaying Christian virtues. J.G. Stackhouse says, “Blaise Pascal and Soren Kierkegaard are only the most famous of a long line of apologists who tried to wake up a sleepwalking culture that comfortably thought itself Christian.”[3] Though a Catholic, Pascal criticized the Catholic church for being “too Calvinistic.”[4]

Pascal’s greatness in apologetics was not to deify his personal interests of mathematics and science, like so many of his contemporaries. Rather, he chose to honestly dismiss limited human reason and accepted both the obvious ambiguity of knowledge of God and the Scriptural view of man’s fallen state. He states:

But for those in whom this light is extinguished … find only obscurity and darkness; to tell them that they have only to look at the smallest things which surround them, and they will see God openly, to give them, as a complete proof of this great and important matter, the course of the moon and planets, and to claim to have concluded the proof with such an argument, is to give them ground for believing that the proofs of our religion are very weak. And I see by reason and experience that nothing is more calculated to arouse their contempt. It is not after this manner that Scripture speaks, which has a better knowledge of the things that are of God.[5]

Though dead, his ideas fit in with modern teleological arguments. It appears that Pascal’s war against the identity crisis and apathy of Christians has continued into the 21st Century, where there seems to be little if no difference in the lifestyles between those who profess “Jesus is Lord!” and those who profess their allegiance to secular humanism. In addition, many of our modern churches that are "too Calvinistic" seem to be less concerned with working with other "less Calvinistic" churches. What does Christ have to say to this? "By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another"(Jn 13:35). Love, therfore, is our primary apologetic. If this is so, then can the inverse be also true? Can you demonstrate that you are not Jesus' disciple by hate and indifference? John was called the apostle of love, but his words are quite direct and stern on the matter. He says, "Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness" (1 Jn 2:9).

A programming language is a set of instructions for the computer. A computer that has no capacity to translate those instructions and do what is expected no longer serves the purpose of its human master. People, however, are not computers - and we are far more valuable to our heavenly master. He has given us instructions by giving us the Bible which lines up with our primary mission to glorify Him. Christ said, "Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven" (Matt 5:16). Does the way you think and act line up with the commands of Christ? Churches: are you communicating and collaborating in such a way that the unbelievers in your community want to join your fellowship? Are you celebrating your similarities in Christ or are you accentuating your differences? Is the Christian faith you profess persuasive to the world?

AL

1 Walter Elwell, Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, 2nd Ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2001), 82.
2 "Blaise Pascal." Wikipedia. Wikipedia, 2005. Answers.com 21 Oct. 2006. http://www.answers.com/topic/blaise-pascal (accessed October 21, 2006).
3 J.G. Stackhouse, Humble Apologetics: Defending the Faith Today (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), 44.
4 Ibid., 167.
5 Wikisource contributors, "Pensées/IV-242," Wikisource, The Free Library, http://en.wikisource.org/w/index.php?title=Pens%C3%A9es/IV&oldid=212972 (accessed October 21, 2006).

6 Image. Augustin Pajou (1730-1809). Blaise Pascal (1785, Paris, Musйe du Louvre)
http://nibiryukov.narod.ru/nb_pinacoteca/nbe_pinacoteca_artists_p.htm

Seeker-Sensitive to Sinner-Sensitive

Both Warren and Schwarz address being a seeker sensitive church in their respective books, The Purpose-Driven Church (1995) and Natural Church Development (1996). Is it important to be seeker-sensitive? Yes!

I have heard and read opinions from those who think it is a bad thing because it tends to compromise the order and respectability of what they think a church service should be. Their attitude is that visitors need to come in a behave themselves. If they behave, they must be Christians. If they don’t behave, they are going to hell and they do not belong in church. This is the seeker insensitive model, which is grounded in centuries of tradition. The Pharisees and scribes did church this way two thousand years ago.

Then came Jesus, who drew quite a crowd. The Jewish leaders growled, "He takes in sinners and eats meals with them, treating them like old friends" (Lk 15:1, MSG). Perhaps they complained that Jesus is too “sinner-sensitive.” According to Warren, it is important to be seeker-sensitive like Jesus. He said:

At Saddleback Church we do not expect unbelievers to act like believers until they are. We do not expect visitors in the crowd to act like members of the congregation. We expect very little from the seeker who is investigating the claims of Christ. We simply say, as Jesus did in his first encounter with the disciples, "Come and see!” (Warren, 54)

The seeker-service is perceived by the visitor that, not only is this church a safe place to attend without feeling judged or being hassled by pushy, zealous members, it is a place that they can come to find out more about God. After all, if fellowship was the only criteria of the visitor, the local sports bar or Starbucks, might do as well.

Though Schwarz posits that being seeker sensitive is not a church growth principle, he does find that there is indeed “a strong correlation between an inspiring worship experience and a church's quality and quantity” (Schwarz, 31). He further states, "it can be demonstrated that there is a significant connection between laughter in the church and that church's qualitative and numerical growth" (Schwarz, 36). In other words, being seeker sensitive impacts the environment that is attractive to the visitor. And Warren states, “No one becomes a church member without first being a visitor” (Warren, 253).

Can we be seeker-sensitive and not quench the operation of the Spirit? Again, there may be a preconception that for the Spirit to transform, the environment has to be quiet and somber. This is truly a misconception. God works when our hearts are open and receptive to his word, as the good soil was in the parable of the sower (Matt 13:3-8; Mk 4:3-20; Luke 8:5-8). A seeker sensitive service provides that environment. Is there possibility for church growth? Look at the result of the good soil. Jesus said, “Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown” (Matt 13:8).

--Al