Wayne Grudem Stewards His Gifts By Having His Students Answer His Mail

On December 30, 2019, Phoenix Seminary professor Wayne Grudem wrote a rebuttal to Christianity Today‘s call for the impeachment of Donald Trump. In that editorial, Grudem made several fact claims that were unsupported with very few sources. One of the key claims in Grudem’s piece was about the Ukraine scandal.

Here is what Grudem wrote:

The background to that comment is that a Ukrainian prosecutor named Viktor Shokin had been investigating Burisma Holdings, a Ukrainian gas company, and that company had been paying Hunter Biden, Joe Biden’s son, around $600,000 per year to serve as a member of its board. But Joe Biden boasted that, when he was vice president and on a visit to Ukraine, he withheld $1 billion in loan guarantees in order to force the Ukrainian government to fire that prosecutor.

In fact, Joe Biden can be seen on a YouTube video from January 23, 2018 (which was subsequently reported on by The Wall Street Journal), saying this: “I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.’ Well, son of a b___. He got fired. And they put in place someone who was solid at the time.”

When I understand that background, it seems to me reasonable for officials of the U.S. government to investigate whether there was any corrupt dealing connected to Hunter Biden receiving more than half a million dollars a year, the Ukrainian prosecutor investigating the company that was paying him, and Joe Biden withholding $1 billion in loan guarantees until that prosecutor was fired. I do not know if there was any corruption involved or not. My point is only that the situation raises enough suspicion to warrant an investigation.

Based on several sources (here, here and here), I believe this is a misleading narrative based on a misunderstanding or deliberately false telling of several events. In fact, Shokin was not investigating corruption at Burisma at the time he was fired and had held up investigations by foreign governments of the company. Shokin was under pressure from not only Biden but the United States government, and European Union because he was not investigating corruption. Shokin was fired because he was not investigating corruption, not because he was. Grudem presents a narrative which is contradicted by the timeline and reporting at the time. In addition to that, the more that Ukraine players such as Lev Parnas reveal, the more the actual events appear to be at odds with Grudem’s presentation.

At the least, a Christian scholar should present citations and source material and give readers and his students all sides of the issue. This is a slanted narrative. While it is true that Shokin has made contradictory claims about his activities, others in Ukraine and in the U.S. besides Biden have corroborated the observation that Shokin was not investigating corruption. At the least, Grudem should have indicated that there is a plausible case to be made for presidential misconduct and that the narrative Grudem presented has been advanced principally by Shokin and the president’s defenders.

Given the seriousness of presenting errors to a public audience, I wrote to Grudem and expected that he would reply with his source material or some explanation why he believed Shokin was investigating when independent sources said he wasn’t. Also, I had hoped for a correction of the record about Biden’s actions in demanding Shokin’s ouster. Biden was not acting on his own; he based his actions on U.S. policy and was acting consistent with the policy of our allies. These are critical facts that Grudem omitted. As a scholar, he should correct the record.

However, the following response is what I got. He had a student assistant answer.

My name is J. B. I am Dr. Grudem’s assistant as well as a student here at Phoenix Seminary. One of my jobs is to facilitate correspondence on Dr. Grudem‘s behalf.

Dr. Grudem appreciates your correspondence. In an effort to best steward his gifts, Dr. Grudem has decided for the present season to prioritize research and writing. For this reason, he regrets that he is unable to respond to your comments.  Please accept Dr. Grudem’s humble apologies.

I can assure you that Dr Grudem continues to pray for our country and all our leaders, regardless of their party line, as the Bible tell us we should. (1 Timothy 2:1-4)

Unable? No, he is unwilling. He is unwilling to take responsibility for what he wrote. I urge readers to consult the sources I linked to above. As always, I am willing to read any sources readers provide in the comments.

Dale Partridge Liked Other People’s Work So Much He Used it as His Own

I don’t have much to say about this story but I want to link to it.

Dale Partridge, Christian ‘influencer’ and church planter, haunted by plagiarism claims

Dale Partridge is a hip social media influencer, pastor type who has been lifting other people’s words and using them to make himself look good. Cue Bob Smietana:

Discouragement, he said in a now deleted Instagram post, is a temptation that needs toughness and tenderness to overcome.

“But in any case, discouragement is not to be tolerated or wallowed in,” his post read. “It’s to be fought.”

This spiritual advice, typical of Partridge, can stand with the words of the best religious thinkers.

Perhaps because, it turns out, his advice came from two top religious thinkers.

The above sentiment about discouragement was borrowed nearly word-for-word from DesiringGod.org, a website founded by the widely read evangelical author and preacher John Piper. The “not guilty” line comes from the late author and theologian A.W. Tozer. (A post on the Relearn Church website was later updated to include the correct attribution and link to Piper’s site.)

A review of Partridge’s writings shows that the plagiarism in these posts is not a one-time mistake. According to critics who have tracked his tweets and Instagram posts, Partridge has commonly passed off quotes from celebrities, musicians, fellow entrepreneurs, authors and public figures including Ricky MartinJohn WoodenRon Finley and Martin Luther King Jr. as his own. Partridge’s habit of plagiarizing quotes even inspired a “Fake Dale Partridge” Twitter account, which reposted Partridge’s tweets from October 2014, along with the correct attribution.

Go read the rest if you want to learn more about how hip influencing is done. I just can’t see how this stuff appeals to people but since I warn folks about this kind of thing, I thought I should post it.

Eric Metaxas’ Christian Case Against the Constitution

David Barton (left); Eric Metaxas (right)

Yesterday in the Wall Street Journal, Eric Metaxas was allowed to opine on what he called “The Christian Case for Trump.” In essence, he argued that Trump’s failings don’t matter as long as Trump opposes abortion and supports religious liberty for Christians. I argue in response that there is no distinctly Christian reason to favor one president over another when it comes to applying the law.  Assuming for a minute that we can determine what Christian public policy is, a president who holds those policies still must abide by the law or face the consequences.

Metaxas begins by faulting the editorial of Christianity Today’s Mark Galli which called for impeachment of removal of Trump from office. Galli called the president “profoundly immoral” and stipulated to his guilt in the Ukraine affair. Metaxas objected that Galli misapplied Christian doctrine:

But these subjective pronouncements promote a perversion of Christian doctrine, which holds that all are depraved and equally in need of God’s grace. For Christianity Today to advance this misunderstanding is shocking. It isn’t what one does that makes one a Christian, but faith in what Jesus has done.

I believe it is Metaxas who confuses the matter. Galli does not make a judgment about Trump’s salvation, but rather Trump’s fitness for office. Trump may or may not be a Christian but that isn’t at issue when it comes to conviction on the articles of impeachment. If we take Metaxas seriously, then no law breaking office holder could be held accountable — after all we are all sinners so who should throw stones?

Metaxas dismisses Galli’s proper comparison of Trump to Clinton. In Galli’s editorial, he noted that Clinton’s sins led many evangelicals to call for his ouster. However, many evangelicals now look the other way with Trump and excuse his actions. Metaxas’ justification for this is political:

In the 1990s some Democrats were antiabortion. Neither party could exclusively claim the high ground on this deepest of moral issues. Mr. Clinton spoke of making abortion “safe, legal, and rare.” No longer. Despite ultrasounds and 4-D imaging, Democrats endorse abortion with near unanimity, often beyond viability and until birth. If slavery was rightly considered wicked—and both a moral and political issue—how can this macabre practice be anything else? How can Christians pretend this isn’t the principal moral issue of our time, as slavery was in 1860? Can’t these issues of historic significance outweigh whatever the president’s moral failings might be?

The last question is really the heart of Metaxas’ argument. For good measure, he paints the Democrats as favoring open borders, socialist and Christian hating. So for Metaxas, Trump’s problems are better than the only alternative he considers which is a Democratic-socialist takeover.

Metaxas’ analysis is misleading on a key point

There are several fact based problems with Metaxas analysis. I will take just his key point. Abortion was just as divisive in the early 1990s as it is now. I am old enough to remember the absolute Republican hatred of the Clintons and the belief by pro-life advocates that Hillary was evil. I was much more involved in pro-life and Republican circles in the 1990s and I can tell you the divide is the same.

In his short op-ed, Metaxas drops fact challenged hints (refers to “socialists,” the FBI’s “J.Edgar Hoovers”) that the Democratic deep state alternative universe would be so bad that Trump is a far better alternative no matter what impeachable offense he has committed. In short, Metaxas plays the role of a demagogue, mongering fear to move people away from their critical sense.

Walk by Sight Not by Faith

Another serious problem with this kind of reasoning is that fear mongering causes people to walk by sight and not by faith. Metaxas tells Christians that they need Trump. Their world will fall apart if Trump isn’t president. Abortion will be worse, you won’t be able to pray in public, the worst will happen, the sky is falling. God will not be on His Throne.

In fact, if Trump is convicted, Mike Pence will become president. This is right now the choice. Then Christians of that persuasion can vote for Pence next November. The fear based choice offered by Metaxas is a false one. Metaxas and the president’s court evangelicals aren’t acting from faith or principle, they are reciting talking points.

The only real issue for the Christian or any citizen right now is Trump’s guilt on the articles of impeachment. Christians don’t have a political team. The Christian position on impeachment and conviction is for senators now to do impartial justice as the Senate oath specifies. To argue otherwise is to make a case against the Constitution and rule of law.

 

Crown Him with Many Crowns – Trump Upon His Throne

This speaks for itself.

Keep in mind that this is a political rally in a church. These evangelicals have political goals which are more important than their religious ones.

For more, see these posts by John Fea and Andy Rowell.