Sermon Video: The Messiah: David's son and Lord, Mark 12:35-37

While in the Temple courts, Jesus takes the opportunity to set forth a riddle concerning the Messiah, one that his own Virgin Birth is the answer to. In Psalm 110, David calls his son "Lord". Jesus asks how a son can be the superior of a father (or ancestor), a mystery culturally in the Ancient World. We know the answer. Jesus is David's son genealogically, but also his superior because he is the Son of God in addition to being the Son of Man. While David was a hero (flawed yes, but still a hero), Jesus is far more: a sinless savior.

Josh McDowell's folly in addition to racism: Claiming that the Bible only talks about individuals

In a recent speech author and apologist Josh McDowell caused a significant commotion by proclaiming the the primary cause of inequality for Black families in America is that Black households don't prioritize education and hard work.  That he was doing so in the midst of a speech lambasting Critical Race Theory as unbiblical because it sees oppression in systems and not just individuals made his statement ironic in addition to its casual racist stereotypes given that Josh McDowell is blaming the systems of Black families and culture rather than the individual young people he claims are growing up to not value education and hard work.  Here is the quote:

"I do not believe Blacks, African Americans, and many other minorities have equal opportunity. Why? Most of them grew up in families where there is not a big emphasis on education, security — you can do anything you want. You can change the world. If you work hard, you will make it. So many African Americans don't have those privileges like I was brought up with,"

After the uproar McDowell attempted to backtrack claiming that his statement didn't reflect his own beliefs, but much damage has already been done to his reputation.

Josh McDowell apologises for race comments, by Jennifer Lee of Christian Today

Josh McDowell steps back from ministry after controversial remarks on black families By Michael Gryboski, Christian Post Reporter

That racism is indeed a structural problem, and not just the actions of individuals is not a difficult proposition to establish, although it is anathema to a significant portion of Evangelicals in America today to say so.  I've already written against such rampant Individualism:

When the shameful past of Racism hits close to home {An analysis of The Color of Law, an incredible book}

The Prophet Amos: What provokes God's wrath? - Injustice and False Worship {Amos had no trouble seeing Israel's problems as being more than individual choices}

Especially this: Taking the name of the LORD in vain: PragerU's "Social Justice Isn't Justice"

And this: "What does the Bible say about systemic racism?" by WWUTT.com - an error filled and shameful tragedy that only makes things worse

Mitigating racism can't wait: Why Pastor Robert Jeffress is wrong

Systemic Racism: The casual racism of the phrase "Black on Black crime" {Also contains links to Phil Vischer's videos from the Holy Post, very helpful}

So yeah, I've written a lot in the last couple of years against the notion that systematic racism doesn't exist and against the over-dependence of Evangelicals today on Individualism.  It turns out that a false individualism is at the heart of Josh McDowell's theological error as well.  Also from that same speech is this fiasco that is being overshadowed by the racist stereotype that went with it:

During his talk, McDowell also criticized critical race theory (CRT) which he claimed "negates all the biblical teaching" on racism because it blames systems instead of individual sin.  "There's no comparison to what is known today as social justice with what the Bible speaks as justice," he said. "With CRT they speak structurally. The Bible speaks individually. Make sure you get that. That's a big difference." {quoted from the Christian Today article}

Wait, what??  The Bible speaks individually ONLY and NOT structurally?  The prophets don't excoriate Israelite society, its government and rulers because of their unjust laws and practices?  Jesus doesn't flip tables in the temple, upbraid the power structures in Jerusalem time and time again?  How Josh McDowell came to a place in his worldview that he would believe and teach this nonsense is itself a hard question, but there is no doubt that he is in deep error here, and that he is not alone.

My rebuttal (link above) of the PragerU video goes into much detail against this false individualistic version of the Gospel, this is a political gospel, one rooted in Ayn Rand style individualism, but antithetical to the traditional Judeo-Christian worldview.

"My body, my choice" is Individualism that spits in the face of God our Creator, Redeemer, and Lord - abortion and vaccine refusal

When is governmental action morally justified? The morality of COVID-19 responses to protect less than 1%.

2020 has taken the measure of the Church, and found us wanting

"You do you, I'll do me" - Quintessentially American, but incompatible with the Judeo-Christian worldview

Another example of rampant Individualism: A Moral Hierarchy: A refutation of William Barr's, "Other than slavery, which was a different kind of restraint, this is the greatest intrusion on civil liberties in American history."

The response of many Christians to the COVID-19 pandemic has put into plain view the paucity of Individualism, the utter failure of an ethic based on the needs/wants of the individual and neglecting community responsibility.  McDowell's dismissal of systematic racism (as part of his political assault on CRT) is equally foolish, and equally unbiblical.

Sermon Video: The Greatest Commandments - Mark 12:28-34

We love top ten lists. Enjoy debating the merits of which team, movie, song, etc. is better than another. The rabbis had identified 613 laws in the Law of Moses, so it was natural to wonder which rose to the top, which were the most important.

In addressing the issue, Jesus gives a non-controversial answer, citing the Shema (Deuteronomy 6:4-5) that loving God with everything is the most important commandment. And then he ADDS a 2nd commandment as part of his answer, linking it to the first, 'Love your neighbor as yourself." Why? Because we can't claim to love God in the abstract if we don't love the human beings in our lives. Devotion to God means loving those also created in his image. Thus the two great themes of God's Word sit together, loving God, and loving each other.

The deplorable shame of using Potiphar's Wife to discount sex abuse victims: A refutation of Pastor Doug Wilson

Given the recent insanity of the "Empathy is Sin" movement {The folly of the "Sin of Empathy" - A self-inflicted wound to Christian Fundamentalism}, I've looked back a bit into recent history to try to understand the pieces of the pattern that led Pastor John Piper, who is well respected even by those who disagree with him, to put his weight behind the likes of Doug Wilson, Joe Rigney, and James White in this endeavor to pulverize empathy toward abuse victims.  Which is where I came across a trend that I was previously unaware of: the use of Potiphar's Wife from Joseph's story in Genesis to insinuate that some (if not most) women (and others) who claim to have been sexually abused, secretly really wanted the sexual activity that was forced upon them.

It turns out this trend is fairly widespread.  In a public letter to then SBC President J.D. Greer, Russel Moore, the President of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC, an SBC entity) wrote, "You and I both heard, in closed door meetings, sexual abuse survivors spoken of in terms of 'Potiphar’s wife' and other spurious biblical analogies. The conversations in these closed door meetings were far worse than anything Southern Baptists knew—or the outside world could report."  In some circles, evidently, it is routine behind closed doors to treat the entire MeToo movement, and even the larger Clergy Sex Abuse scandal, as a nefarious plot.  It should be little wonder then, if this is how those entrusted to lead portions of the Church are acting privately, that Rachael Denhollander was treated shamefully in public by many of these same people.

The SBC dis-fellowships a church which continues to employ a child-sex offender as their pastor: a step in the right direction, but not enough.

"By What Standard?" - A shameful trailer made by Founders Ministries utilizing the worst political ad tactics

The use of Potiphar's Wife to defend those in power accused of sexual misconduct is both despicable, in that someone would use the Word of God for such an immoral purpose, and exegetically a very poor interpretation of the text itself.  The balance of power in Joseph's story is the exact opposite of that when adult, males, in positions of power/authority, abuse others.  Joseph has no power, he's a slave.  The story of Joseph and Potiphar's wife is a cautionary tale on behalf of the powerless in society, not a defense of abusers.  This analysis further examines the text: The Real Sin of Potiphar’s Wife:

The story of Potiphar’s wife and Joseph isn’t the story of an ordinary woman falsely accusing a man of assault and not suffering the consequences; it’s the story of a powerful person using her power to exploit someone weaker, and then bearing false witness against them to cause them to suffer even further in the midst of their vulnerability.  

But most importantly, it’s the story of the good news that there is no human power so great that it can ultimately thwart the purposes of an all-powerful and all-loving God.

Another capable explanation of what the story of Potiphar's wife is actually teaching: STOP USING POTIPHAR'S WIFE TO DISCREDIT SURVIVORS BY JUSTIN COBER-LAKE 

To be clear, it is true that Potiphar's wife made a false allegation. No one denies that false accusations happen but using this story to somehow discredit all women coming forward devalues holy text, turning it into a political bludgeon rather than a liberating truth. Doing so is a political error leading to dangerous eisegesis; the text isn't about the reliability of women, victims, or witnesses. Making that issue central misses the larger point of Joseph's story and the redeeming work of God.

That's not to say we can't apply the story to current events. What we primarily see is a person in power using that position to try to gain sexual access to a subordinate.

The Bible repeatedly speaks to this sort of abuse of power. The structural forces that landed Joseph in prison are largely the same forces that prevent modern assault victims from having a voice. Power oppresses individuals in multiple ways, and one of the most immediate is through enforcing silence. We have no knowledge of Joseph's response because he was likely allowed none.

I am reminded of the classic trope from The Princess Bride, revolving around the word Inconceivable. So it is here with the misuse of the story of Potiphar's wife, it doesn't mean what they think it means.

It isn't surprising that those who would attack victims to defend abusers would also twist the Word of God to that unholy purpose, but it is dangerous.  In an attempt at satire, Pastor Doug Wilson in 2017 reimagined Potiphar's wife as a modern-day feminist, eager to destroy men: Potiphar’s Wife, Survivor

Then that fateful afternoon came when he tried to rape me. Yes, I am no longer afraid to use the word rape. If he been a little more patient, if he had groomed me for just another month, I might not have cried out. I had been almost completely absorbed into the rape culture that Joseph truly embodied. I was truly in a vulnerable place, which my therapist has really helped me to finally grasp. I still am in a vulnerable place, in so many ways. My therapist is so kind and gentle . . . not at all like Potiphar. He truly listens to me. He actually believes me when I dare to share my innermost thoughts. I am almost to the point where I can tell him what would really satisfy me.

What is the point of this sexually suggestive nonsense?  Pastor Wilson uses the Word of God to suggest that (1) mental health professionals are part of the problem, (2) downplay real dangers from sexual abusers like grooming their victims, and (3) hint without much subtlety at the end that 'women really do want it'.  This is, very much, a dark place, and one that fits fairly seamlessly with the more recent call to abandon empathy lest we identify with those claim to have been abused.

Dig further, and you find that Pastor Wilson views marital sex in terms of rape, in fact he believes that this is the God-ordained dynamic, as he wrote the following: 

A final aspect of rape that should be briefly mentioned is perhaps closer to home. Because we have forgotten the biblical concepts of true authority and submission, or more accurately, have rebelled against them, we have created a climate in which caricatures of authority and submission intrude upon our lives with violence. When we quarrel with the way the world is, we find that the world has ways of getting back at us.

In other words, however we try, the sexual act cannot be made into an egalitarian pleasuring party. A man penetrates, conquers, colonizes, plants. A woman receives, surrenders, accepts. This is of course offensive to all egalitarians, and so our culture has rebelled against the concept of authority and submission in marriage. This means that we have sought to suppress the concepts of authority and submission as they relate to the marriage bed. -Douglas Wilson, Fidelity: What it Means to be a One-Woman Man (Moscow, Idaho: Canon Press, 1999), 86-87. - emphasis mine.

I don't have the proper words for how disgusting this attitude is, and how unbiblical.  This is not two halves united as a whole, not a man treating his wife's body as his own for her betterment.  Here is a similar response to the above quote from Rachel Held Evans: The Gospel Coalition, sex, and subordination

There is so much about this passage that I, as a woman, find inaccurate, degrading, and harmful that it’s hard to know where to begin.  That Wilson blames egaliatarianism for the presence of rape and sexual violence in the world is ludicrous and unsubstantiated.  His characterization of sex as an act of conquering and colonization is disturbing, and his notion that women are little more than the passive recipients of this colonization, who simply “accept” penetration, is as ignorant as it is degrading. 

In addition, the Apostle Paul flat-out condemns marital sex that is one-sided in a passage full of mutual submission: 

1 Corinthians 7:3-5   New International Version

3 The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife, and likewise the wife to her husband. 4 The wife does not have authority over her own body but yields it to her husband. In the same way, the husband does not have authority over his own body but yields it to his wife. 5 Do not deprive each other except perhaps by mutual consent and for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer. Then come together again so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.

Lastly, here is a examination of Wilson's view of marital sex from a fellow Complementarian, who also utilizes 1 Corinthians 7 to demonstrate how dangerous this viewpoint is: Does Doug Wilson endorse marital rape?

Pastor Doug Wilson is a central figure in the charge to abandon empathy (because it is helping the Libs).  Even without the theological refutations of that argument, which are many, looking further at the overall worldview of the source is damning.

 

Sermon Video: Resurrection - The God of the Living, Mark 12:18-27

What will Heaven be like? Much of our own assumptions and cultural baggage enters into our typical answer, but as Jesus revealed to the Sadducees, making those assumptions can lead to serious error. Jesus utilizes the story of God revealing to Moses his name, "I AM" to illustrate that God has always been the God of the Living, that for his people life continues beyond the grave.

What will Heaven be like? I'm not sure, but it will be beyond our imaginations, contrary to our assumptions, our words will fail us when we stand amazed in the presence of the LORD.

The folly of the "Sin of Empathy" - A self-inflicted wound to Christian Fundamentalism

Sin is a big word for Jews and Christians, it is an especially toxic word among Evangelicals and Fundamentalists.  When some attitude, thought, or behavior is put under the label of sin, people take notice.  When I was much younger than I am now, it was not uncommon for people in my sphere to talk about going to the movies or social dances as a sin.  In fact, both of those things were banned by the Christian College, Cornerstone, that I attended.  In both cases, blanket bans and talk of sin was unproductive, and unnecessarily legalistic.  What should have happened was a much more nuanced discussion about temptation and stewardship of time and resources that led to much more accurate conclusions like, "Some movies should not be viewed by Christians, and would thus because of their immoral content be sinful to attend." Or, "Some social dancing, because of its connection to both alcohol and potential to inflame lust in young people who may not be capable of saying no to that temptation, should be avoided by Christians."  Statements of that nature don't fit on a bumper sticker, don't feel tough enough by those rooting on the Culture Wars, but actually conform much more closely to both the teaching of the Apostle Paul about the confluence of Christian freedom and responsibility {1 Corinthians 10:23 New International Version “I have the right to do anything,” you say—but not everything is beneficial. “I have the right to do anything”—but not everything is constructive.} and the actual reality of how Christians deal with and overcome temptation.

That being said, the choice of Pastor Joe Rigney {with the support and agreement of Pastor John Piper, Pastor Doug Wilson, and apologist James White} to label Empathy a SIN cannot be set aside as hyperbole or click-bait {if that was the goal, to gain notoriety and ultimately sales, this discussion takes on a whole different tone; let us not assume the worst}.  Rigney, and those like minded leaders in the Church, want Empathy to be reevaluated, judged, and jettisoned from Christian discipleship, ministry, and counseling. 

The following quotes are from Pastor Joe Rigney's, The Enticing Sin of Empathy HOW SATAN CORRUPTS THROUGH COMPASSION   Unfortunately, Rigney considers himself to be somehow C.S. Lewis' literary successor and has written his indictment of Empathy in the style of the The Screwtape Letters.  It worked well for Lewis' genius, less well here.

When humans are suffering, they tend to make two demands that are impossible to fulfill simultaneously. On the one hand, they want people to notice the depth of their pain and sorrow — how deep they are in the pit, how unique and tragic their circumstances. At the same time, they don’t want to be made to feel that they really need the assistance of others. In one breath, they say, “Help me! Can’t you see I’m suffering?” and in the next they say, “How dare you act as though I needed you and your help?” The sufferer doesn’t want to be alone, and demands not to be pitied.

Rigney sets forth an example of the complex emotions of traumatized people.  He evidently considers it a tool useful to Satan that those who have are experiencing deep pain may at the same time struggle to accept help for that pain.  Traumatized people don't have straightforward emotional responses; that's not news.  He really shouldn't be surprised, is not the Bible full of examples of people who didn't feel worthy of God's redemption, Peter saying to Jesus, “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!” (Luke 5:8) being but one example.  Moreover, in ministry I've experienced this, as have countless other pastors and lay Christians.  When we reach out to someone in desperate need of help, that person either struggles with pride (not being willing to admit they need it) or with despair (not seeing that help is possible for someone like them).  The human condition, especially apart from the involvement of the Spirit, is a mess.

Now, sufferers have been placing such impossible demands on others from time immemorial. In response, our armies have fought for decades to twist the Enemy’s virtue of compassion into its counterfeit, empathy. Since we introduced the term a century ago, we’ve steadily taught the humans to regard empathy as an improvement upon compassion or sympathy.

Here is Rigney's premise: Empathy is a twisted mirror to Compassion, a counterfeit modern opposite.  For this to be true, one would need to search the Bible in vain for empathy on display and only find compassion.  Let's take a look, does God show compassion ONLY, or empathy too under its umbrella?

Matthew 9:36 New International Version

When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.

1 Peter 3:8  New International Version

Finally, all of you, be like-minded, be sympathetic, love one another, be compassionate and humble.

Romans 12:15  New International Version

Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn.

John 11:34-36New International Version

34 “Where have you laid him?” he asked.

“Come and see, Lord,” they replied.

35 Jesus wept.

36 Then the Jews said, “See how he loved him!”

Hebrews 4:15  New International Version

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin.

Beyond these examples from Scripture, passages where Compassion is not devoid of emotional connection, there is one simple act of Jesus that puts aside any thought that Jesus only felt Compassion and not Empathy: He touched the lepers.

Matthew 8:3  New International Version

Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” he said. “Be clean!” Immediately he was cleansed of his leprosy.

To touch a leper was forbidden, it made one unclean according to the Law of Moses, and risked infection.  Why would Jesus touch this man before he healed him?  He could just have easily healed him first, and then (after presenting himself to the priests to be declared 'clean') this man could have had all the hugs he needed.  Why?  Because Jesus felt his pain, his isolation, his loneliness.  Was Jesus thus unable to see what the man really needed?  Did he lose sight of Truth?  Of course not, his Empathy was one of the reasons why Jesus was able to transcend conventional wisdom and accepted limits, to show the mercy and love of God to someone in desperate need of both.  In all honesty, this one passage is a deal-breaker for the notion that Empathy is Sin.  Jesus felt the pain of others, it didn't hinder him from remaining true to his calling and purpose one bit.

In addition, this entire pronouncement of SIN against those who feel empathy is a semantic exercise with two words that have significant overlap in their semantic ranges, and are often used interchangeably by authors, pastors, and the public.   

According to Merriam-Webster, which actually contains a page comparing the two terms:

What is the difference between empathy and compassion?

Some of our users are interested in the difference between empathy and compassion. Compassion is the broader word: it refers to both an understanding of another’s pain and the desire to somehow mitigate that pain:

Our rationalizations for lying (or withholding the truth)—"to protect her," "he could never handle it”—come more out of cowardice than compassion.
— Eric Utne, Utne Reader, November/December 1992

Sometimes compassion is used to refer broadly to sympathetic understanding:

Nevertheless, when Robert Paxton's "Vichy France" appeared in a French translation in 1973, his stark and devastating description ... was rather badly received in France, where many critics accused this scrupulous and thoughtful young historian either of misinterpreting the Vichy leaders' motives or of lacking compassion.
— Stanley Hoffmann, The New York Times Book Review, 1 Nov. 1981

Empathy refers to the ability to relate to another person’s pain vicariously, as if one has experienced that pain themselves:

For instance, people who are highly egoistic and presumably lacking in empathy keep their own welfare paramount in making moral decisions like how or whether to help the poor.
— Daniel Goleman, The New York Times, 28 Mar. 1989

"The man thought all this talk was fine, but he was more concerned with just getting water. And, if I was going to be successful on this mission, I had to remember what his priorities were. The quality you need most in United Nations peacekeeping is empathy."
— Geordie Elms, quoted in MHQ: The Quarterly Journal of Military History, Autumn 1992

In some cases, compassion refers to both a feeling and the action that stems from that feeling:

Compassion, tenderness, patience, responsibility, kindness, and honesty are actions that elicit similar responses from others.
— Jane Smiley, Harper’s, June 2000

while empathy tends to be used just for a feeling:

She is also autistic, a disability that she argues allows her a special empathy with nonhuman creatures.
— Tim Flannery, The New York Review of Books, 29 April 2009

Thus if Rigney is correct, and compassion is a virtue, but empathy is a sin, the only thing that a Christian can do to have compassion, which is required, is to understand the pain of others, want to help them alleviate it, but NEVER feel that pain.  The primary distinction between the two terms is the emotional connection that empathy makes beyond that of some forms of compassion.  I've known this many times in ministry.  There are some people I have helped in their distress whose emotional state, for whatever reason, does not powerfully connect with me at that time.  I help them just the same.  And yet, there have been others, perhaps in the same circumstances, whose emotional pain hits me powerfully, even causing me to loose control over my emotions and shed tears.  In both cases I offer such help as I can give, am I to believe that the emotion-less response, Spock like, is a virtue, and the one that causes me emotional pain too, the more empathetic response, is SIN??  This conclusion I reject both categorically, and whole-heartedly.  I have my mother's heart, I always have.  When she cries, I can't hold back tears, the things that tug at her heart have always tugged at mine.  It is a gift of God born of both my nature and my nurture, and something that I am profoundly grateful to my mother for the role she played in giving it to me.  Why?  Because it has produced some of the most powerful and transformative moments in my ministry.  In addition, it has shaped my heart and mind, bringing me closer to the suffering of others, shutting down excuses and rationalizations against helping others in need, because at times I can feel what they feel (at least in part).  That Christian Fundamentalism (or Evangelicalism, the two terms, ironically, have much overlap) has degenerated to the point where a seminary president lays this down as the Rubicon that cannot be crossed, is an indicator of just how ill this patient has become.

Of note: In his discussion Rigney is defining Empathy in a way foreign to both the dictionary definition and common usage.  He is putting on empathy all manner elements that are not required, not part of what this emotion actually is.  Those who just read the headlines won't notice this, they'll assume that a minister of the Gospel has warned them not to feel the pain of others because it is sinful, and walk away even more misguided than if he/she had tried to maintain the hair-splitting definitions Rigney is favoring.

Think of it this way: the Enemy’s virtue of compassion attempts to suffer with the hurting while maintaining an allegiance to the Enemy. In fact, it suffers with the hurting precisely because of this allegiance. In doing so, the Christians are to follow the example of their pathetic and repulsive Master. Just as the Enemy joined the humans in their misery in that detestable act of incarnation, so also his followers are to join those who are hurting in their misery.

However, just as the Enemy became like them in every way but sin, so also his followers are not permitted to sin in their attempts to comfort the afflicted. Thus, his compassion always reserves the right not to blaspheme. It seeks the sufferer’s good and subordinates itself to the Enemy’s abominable standard of Truth.

Our alternative, empathy, shifts the focus from the sufferer’s good to the sufferer’s feelings, making them the measure of whether a person is truly “loved.” We teach the humans that unless they subordinate their feelings entirely to the misery, pain, sorrow, and even sin and unbelief of the afflicted, they are not loving them.

Here Rigney builds his Straw Man to dismantle.  His false dichotomy states that one can ONLY have empathy if one abandons the desire to seek the good of the other person, that while Christ did indeed suffer 'with' those who were hurting, in other words he felt their pain, this was somehow not Empathy, but only Compassion.   The last sentence above is instructive: Rigney has now redefined empathy to be feeling the pain of others WITHOUT any recognition that pain might be, at least in part, caused by sin or unbelief on the part of the person one is feeling empathy towards.  But why??  Even if there is an attempt to demand such unquestioning, truth-less, empathy on the part of a person in pain or from segments of society, why must a Christian accept it?  This is a classic example of 'throwing the baby out with the bath water'.  Joe Rigney, as a Culture Warrior, fears that 'they' are trying to use blind empathy to advance their political causes, and thus 'we' must reject empathy, in its entirety, to deny them that tool.  In other words, let us surrender this field of battle and retreat.  The answer is no.  No, I will not allow the Culture War to dictate my theology, I will not adjust my ministry focus and methods to avoid any taint of looking/acting/sounding like 'them' to satisfy the knee-jerk reaction of political partisanship.  

By elevating empathy over compassion as the superior virtue, there is now an entire culture devoted to the total immersion of empathy. Books, articles, and social media all trumpet the importance of checking one’s own beliefs, values, judgments, and reason at the door of empathy.

This is the what Rigney believes the Left is doing.  If taken at face value, why would the Church change in response?  One can first listen to those hurting and in pain without making judgments either way until you know what is going on.  One can simply say instead, "I do feel your pain, but my devotion to Christ shows me what the ultimate answer to that pain is."  Why must we abandon Empathy to protect Truth??  This is the dangerous false dichotomy of this position.  We are being asked to make a sacrifice by abandoning empathy, 'for the greater good', that is unnecessary.  I, as a minister of the Gospel, am fully capable of understanding the pain of someone I'm trying to help, even feeling some of it myself, without abandoning my own connection to Truth and Righteousness.  

Is it possible for a minister or a counselor to lose objectivity, to get too close to someone they are trying to help?  Of course it is,  but Rigney didn't say, "Be careful because sometimes people take empathy too far."  The "Sin of Empathy" is a much catchier title, but also foolish.  

Rightly used, empathy is a power tool in the hands of the weak and suffering. By it, we can so weaponize victims that they (and those who hide behind them) are indulged at every turn, without regard for whether such indulgence is wise or prudent or good for them.

Here is where it seems the 'quiet part' is said out loud.  The reason for this diatribe against Empathy is that victims have been 'weaponized' in the last few years.  The primary examples of this are the MeToo Movement and BLM.  Women are starting to believed when they report sexual abuse, and questions of ongoing systematic racism are starting to be taken seriously.  Rigney, and those echoing his fears, view such victims as a Trojan Horse, threatening both Complementarianism, what John Piper is best known for, and the longstanding dominance of Whites in America.  If we feel the pain of women and minorities, if we take the harm done to them by individuals and institutions who have not traditionally been held accountable seriously, will we not be seeking what is True and Righteous?  Is this not the call of the Church, to defend the powerless against those who harm them?

This reminds me of the attempt to smear Rachel Denhollander, a sexual abuse victim and advocate for those being abused, by some within the SBC. {"By What Standard?" - A shameful trailer made by Founders Ministries utilizing the worst political ad tactics}  This Christian woman was connected to 'godless ideologies' by Founders Ministries, despite the fact that her efforts were both God honoring and biblically correct.  Her crime?  Working on a 'Blue' issue that was shining the light of Truth on the sins committed in churches on the 'Red' team.

How do we know that this push against Empathy is connected to blowback against MeToo and BLM?  In other words, that it is a Culture War response of the Team Red against Team Blue, and not simply the seeking of theological Truth?  The ouster of three pastors at John Piper's church, known for their empathy and willingness to work on behalf of the oppressed, makes the connection clear.  Read the article from Christianity Today, it provides important context for this discussion. {Bethlehem Baptist Leaders Clash Over ‘Coddling’ and ‘Cancel Culture’ A debate over “untethered empathy” underscores how departing leaders, including John Piper’s successor, approached hot-button issues like race and abuse. by KATE SHELLNUTT}  

 Empathy demands, “Feel what I feel. In fact, lose yourself in my feelings.”

Why must it be thus?  Even if some demand that Empathy be this, it isn't, nor does it have to be.

When faith is abused by some, do we declare faith a sin?  When love is abused by some do we declare love a sin?  Of course not, don't be ridiculous, so why would we cast empathy out into the darkness simply because some may want to use it for unhealthy purposes?

The Culture Wars make for BAD theology.  When we look at what is happening in the Culture, and then design a theological response to bolster 'our side' against 'them', the results are not pretty.  The Church is supposed to be above such swaying to and fro, supposed to be firmly planted on the Solid Rock.  This is yet another example of how we endanger the Church, its purity and its mission, when we marry the Church to politics.  Empathy is not a sin, it never was.

For further discussion:

Holy Post Episode 472 The “Sin of Empathy” & Spotting Toxic Leaders with Jamin Goggin & Kyle Strobel  This topic is discussed from the 33:20-59:00 mark.

Empathy is Not a Sin by Warren Throckmorton

“Your Empathy Is a Sin”: A Response to Desiring God by Rebecca Davis

Empathy is a Virtue, by SCOT MCKNIGHT

The American Crisis of Selective Empathy And how it reaches into the church. By David French