This section of Scripture focuses on the delegation of judgment to the second person of the trinity, as well as the two different kinds of resurrection (spiritual and physical).

5:24 Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.

• Who is it that hears His word?  Does everyone hear?  Certainly many hear it outwardly.  But who has eternal life?  Those who believe the word.  Those who the Holy Spirit inwardly calls and gives faith to.
• James Boice says this, “The first point of these verses, then, is that the possession of divine life begins with God’s action rather than man’s.  In other words, life is not a reward for believing. It is the other was around. Life comes first; a person believes afterward. He believe because God has first placed His life within him.”
• We hear something similar from Jesus in His high priestly prayer.  Kate and I were reading this before bed the other night because it is so comforting to hear the Son of God praying for us, His sheep.  Here’s what He says, “…I have given them the words that you gave me, and they have received them and have come to know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me” (John 17:8).
• This is the good news – this is the gospel.  There is an opportunity for life and it is found in Christ’s actions toward us.  “We love Him because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19).
• What a relief it is that as Christians we aren’t responsible to the quickening of other men’s souls.  We are simply called to preach the word (the gospel) and let the Holy Spirit do the amazing work of spiritual regeneration.  This frees our minds and hearts to share the gospel with everyone, from every tribe and tongue and nation, and let the increase of this work be in God’s hands to His glory – this is what He wants.  He doesn’t allow us to have control of the regenerating process.  He doesn’t allow us to know the secrets of the mystery of salvation because He knows that if it were up to us alone to save mankind, that we would certainly boast (Eph. 2:9).

5:25 “Truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live.

• In this passage Jesus makes the differentiation between spiritual death and physical death, and here He touches on spiritual resurrection and physical resurrection. We know He is talking specifically about spiritual resurrection here because He says the hour of this “is now here.”  This is part of the tension of Christian eschatology as Carson points out, and is a really good point to remember.
• Last Thursday night, I hit on the fact that David and Saul are Old Testament pictures of New Testament eschatology.  David’s anointing as king didn’t change the fact that Saul continued to reign.  He was promised and anointed, but the full consummation had not yet arrived.  In the negative, Saul had been “stripped” of the kingdom, but yet he had not fully lost the kingdom outwardly.  Likewise, here we see Christ talk about a spiritual resurrection (that’s the “already”) and a physical resurrection (the “not yet”).  Christ came to inaugurate the new age and usher in the Kingdom of God; though that kingdom has not yet been fully consummated and will not be so until Jesus Christ returns (vs. 28-29).
• So how does Jesus say that He will raise people from spiritual death?  By what means?  By His voice – He says the dead will hear the “voice of the Son of God.”  As a side note, its worth thinking about how many times the voice of God is used in giving life (think Gen.1).  So this voice of the Son of God is what dead men’s souls respond to.  Now in theology we call this the “call” of God (Romans. 8:28-30).
• But is Jesus calling merely outwardly for our ears to hear?  Or is this an inward call of the Holy Spirit to our souls?  It is both.  The preaching of the Gospel is what we call the “outward call” and the quickening of the Holy Spirit is what we term the “inward call.”  Christ’s voice rings out to the dead soul’s men in the power of the Holy Spirit and brings them alive from the dead (Eph. 2:1).
• My favorite Old Testament example of this is in Ezekiel 37:1-6 when the Lord tells Ezekiel to preach to the dead dry bones of Israel.  The preaching brings them alive by the power of the Lord.
• We ought to also note, as Carson does, that “the one who belongs to God hears what God says (John 8:47).  Hearing Jesus’ word is identical to hearing God’s word, since the Son speaks only what the Father given him to say. Hearing in this context, as often elsewhere, includes belief and obedience.”
• Carson is citing John 8:47, which says, “Whoever is of God hears the words of God. The reason why you do not hear them is that you are not of God.”

5:26 For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself.

• (See verse 21) As Ryle says, “Dead bodies and dead souls are both alike under His dominion. He has the keys of death and hell.  In Him is life. He is the life. (John 1:4; Rev. 1:18).   Having the keys of death and hell means having the keys of both physical death, and spiritual death (hell).
• I also like what John says in his first epistle, “and this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life. I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life” (1 John 5:11-13).

5:27 And he has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man.

• (See verse 22) Note that in verse 22 Jesus is referring to His title of “Son” as in the Son of the Father (God).  Here He uses the title “Son of Man” to mean the equivalent.  That means that Jesus is giving a logical equation for us – namely, that the ‘Son of God’ and the ‘Son of Man’ are one in the same person (Jesus).
• For many commentators there is a definite connection between Jesus’ being delegated judgment, and His humiliation on earth (see Philippians).  Here it seems to strengthen that argument by using the word “because” as a connector between His role as God in flesh, and His being given all judgment.

5:28 Do not marvel at this, for an hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice [29] and come out, those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment.

• This is a physical resurrection – compared to a spiritual resurrection mentioned earlier in verse 25.  I love the Daniel reference that the ESV gives as well.  In Daniel 12:2 it says, “And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.”
• Paul says this in 1 Corinthians 15:20-28:   [20] But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. [21] For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. [22] For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. [23] But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. [24] Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. [25] For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. [26] The last enemy to be destroyed is death. [27] For “God has put all things in subjection under his feet.” But when it says, “all things are put in subjection,” it is plain that he is excepted who put all things in subjection under him. [28] When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all.

 

This is a humorous posting from Westminster Seminary.  Thought you all would enjoy!

1) Find an attractive prisoner of war, bring her home, shave her head, trim her nails, and give her new clothes. Then she’s yours. (Deut. 21:11-13)

2) “Lay hold on” a virgin who is not betrothed to another man, and “know” her, but afterwards pay her father a sum of money. Then she’s yours. (Deut. 22:28-29)

3) Find a prostitute and marry her. (Hosea 1:1-3)

4) Find a man with seven daughters, and impress him by watering his flock.–Moses (Ex. 2:16-21)

5) Purchase a piece of property, and get a woman as part of the deal.–Boaz (Ruth 4:5-10)

6) Go to a party and hide. When the women come out to dance, grab one and carry her off to be your wife.–Benjaminites (Judges 21:19-25)

7) Have God create a wife for you while you sleep. Note: this will cost you a rib.–Adam (Gen. 2:19-24)

8) Agree to work seven years in exchange for a woman’s hand in marriage. Get tricked into marrying the wrong woman. Then work another seven years for the woman you wanted to marry in the first place. That’s right. Fourteen years of toil for a wife.–Jacob (Gen. 29:15-30)

9) Cut 200 foreskins off of your future father-in-law’s enemies and get his daughter for a wife.–David (1 Sam. 18:27)

10) Even if no one is out there, just wander around a bit and you’ll definitely find someone.–Cain (Gen. 4:16-17)

11) Become the emperor of a huge nation and hold a beauty contest.–Xerxes or Ahasuerus (Esther 2:3-4)

12) When you see someone you like, go home and tell your parents, “I have seen a woman; now get her for me.” If your parents question your decision, simply say, “Get her for me. She’s the one for me.”–Samson (Judges 14:1-3)

13) Kill any husband and take HIS wife. (Prepare to lose four sons though.)–David (2 Sam. 11)

14) Wait for your brother to die. Take his widow. (It’s not just a good idea, it’s the law!)–Onan and Boaz (Deut. or Lev., example in Ruth)

15) Don’t be so picky. Make up for quality with quantity.–Solomon (1 Kings 11:1-3)

16) A wife?–Paul (1st Corinthians, chapter 7

Obviously, this list was written with humor in mind, and some of these “ways,” are not prescriptive but descriptive of the sinful ways that God’s people have conducted themselves in the past–they are in no way exemplary. But this does demonstrate an important point–people often want the Bible to say certain things, such as how to find a spouse and marry, but they ignore portions of Scripture that don’t fit their paradigm. The Bible has more to say about arranged marriages, for example, than it does “courtship” or dating. So then, how do we proceed?

We have to realize that the Bible does not speak to every issue we will face in life. Just ask Solomon, who had to use wisdom when the two prostitutes came to him claiming to both be the mother of one child. We must follow those things that God has given us. In all of our relationships we have the obligation to exercise the fruit of the Spirit and not mistreat anyone, that is especially true for a prospective spouse. We also have the clear biblical command that a Christian is free to marry whomever he or she chooses, so long as the prospective mate is “in the Lord” (1 Cor. 7.39). But in the end, choosing a spouse calls for wisdom.

The Bible does not give us a specific means by which we can find spouses. Some might be introduced by family or friends. Some might cultivate a letter-writing relationship (or as we might more commonly find it, e-mail, or some form of social media). In some cultures the thought of dating or courting is out of the question. I once walked in on one of my office mates in grad school–he was a Christian training for the ministry in Japan. He was intently reading a file; it looked like a personnel file. Out of curiousity I asked him what he was reading. He told me it was a file on a young woman that his father had sent him. His family, sight unseen (except for a few photos in the file) was arranging his marriage. I was stunned, but nevetheless made aware that godly Christians don’t all do things the same way. I.e., just because it’s American and Christians do it doesn’t mean its biblical or the only way.

The greater doctrinal point here is that in the pursuit of finding a spouse, we must be mindful two things: (1) that we are mindful of God’s revealed will in the moral law–we should not violate it in word, thought, or deed; and (2) Christian liberty–where God has spoken, we are bound, but where he has not spoken we are free. We are not bound by the commandments of men. This means that godly Christians may differ in how they live their lives, but it doesn’t mean that one is holier than another because she dates and doesn’t court.

We should also note that in its collective history, the church has never addressed the issue in its creeds or confessions about how to find a spouse. Perhaps this should tell us that it is a matter of Christian liberty and that in the end, we should rely on God’s grace, wisdom, prayer, and godly counsel rather than make claims that the Bible has never made.

 

NOTE: I haven’t bulleted these points.  These are my raw notes for the lesson just FYI.  I apologize if they are a little longer than usual for that reason.

 

5:16-17 And this was why the Jews were persecuting Jesus, because he was doing these things on the Sabbath. But Jesus answered them, “My Father is working until now, and I am working.”

This fifth chapter shows us a little glimpse into the waves Christ was making (or beginning to make) in and amongst the religious establishment.  The story highlights one of their biggest frustrations with Jesus – His work of healing on the Sabbath.

Obviously there are no words recorded from the Pharisees that Jesus is “answering” here, but we must suppose that He is replying to their beef that He “worked” on the Sabbath.

Carson notes that four of the leading Rabbis (including Gamaliel II) had concluded that God always works, indeed He never rests from His upholding the universe.  “Whether he breaks the Sabbath or not, God works continuously: all were agreed on that point. Assuming it, Jesus applies it to himself.”  He goes on to say that Jesus didn’t argue here that the Jews were misinterpreting the nature of the command not to work on the Sabbath, but instead “Jesus insists that whatever factors justify God’s continuous work from creation on also justify his (making himself equal with God).”

This also shows us the second reason why the Pharisees would have hated and persecuted Jesus – namely that He made Himself out to be equal with God.

Calvin expands on this thought and explains how (given that Jesus was equal with God) the Sabbath work would not have constituted work in the way we think of it – or at least how we think we ought to “keep” the Sabbath.  He says:

“…keeping of the Sabbath is so far from interrupting or hindering the works of God, that, on the contrary, it gives way to them alone. For why does the Law enjoin men to abstain from their own works, but in order to keep all their senses free and occupied for considering the works of God? Consequently, he who does not, on the Sabbath, allow a free course and reign to the works of God, is not only a false expounder of the Law, but wickedly overturns it.

“If it be objected, that the example of God is held out to men, that they may rest on the seventh day, the answer is easy. Men are not conformed to God in this respect, that He ceased to work, but by abstaining from the troublesome actions of this world and aspiring to the heavenly rest. The Sabbath or rest of God, 101 therefore, is not idleness, but true perfection, which brings along with it a calm state of peace. Nor is this inconsistent with what Moses says, that God put an end to his works, (Genesis 2:2;) for he means that, after having completed the formation of the world, God consecrated that day, that men might employ it in meditating on his works. Yet He did not cease to sustain by this power the world which he had made, to govern it by his wisdom, to support it by his goodness, and to regulate all things according to his pleasure, both in heaven and on earth. In six days, therefore, the creation of the world was completed, but the administration of it is still continued, and God incessantly worketh in maintaining and preserving the order of it; as Paul informs us, that in him we live, and move, and are, (Acts 17:28;) and David informs us, that all things stand so long as the Spirit of God upholds them, and that they fail as soon as he withdraws his support, (Psalm 104:29.) Nor is it only by a general Providence that the Lord maintains the world which He has created, but He arranges and regulates every part of it, and more especially, by his protection, he keeps and guards believers whom he has received under his care and guardianship.”

The Jews definitely would have been aware of what Jesus was saying.  They would have understood Him to have been claiming that God was His Father.  Kostenberger says that this probably (incorrectly) violated their sense of strict monotheism because they probably thought of what Jesus was saying here at to some kind of dualism – like both the father and son were gods, and not simply once essence.

5:18 This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.

This claim of deity enraged the Pharisees, and their reaction was fierce.  They wanted to put Jesus to death.

I heard a theologian/pastor (I think on the Case for Faith) once say that he was listening to a friend talk about why Jesus could possibly have had such a short ministry.  The reaction of this theologian was surprise, and he said, in affect, “I can’t believe He lasted 3 years!”  And this is because Jesus was claiming something that no other man had claimed among the Jews prior to Him.  Was He mad?  Was He out of His mind?  What do you say?  If He was, then there’s no use studying the words of a madman.

5:19 So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise.

This tells us something of the mystery of how the Trinity works.  We can hardly grasp what it means.  We try to scratch the surface and come up woefully short.  But we know that Christ isn’t saying that He is merely a robot just doing whatever the Father says. As Boice says, “…the mind of the Father and the mind of the Son are united. We must not think that when Jesus claimed to be able to do nothing, except what He saw the Father doing, He was saying He was something like a Robot, a zombi, who carried out the directives of the Father without thinking.  This is not at all what He was saying. Christ is a person. He has a personality, including an intellect and feelings. He faced temptations, real temptations.  There were discouragements. Nevertheless, in nothing did He ever disobey His Father. He obeyed Him, and obeyed Him willingly.”

So the Lord Jesus Christ had the same mind as the Father, they were united in their thinking.  But He was also fully human, and He bent His human will to match His divine will.  There was no sin in Him – He obeyed flawlessly and He calls us to obedience as well.  Boice continues, “This is what He wants you to do, in one sense, or rather what He enables you to do when He saves you. The trouble with us is that we are the opposite of Jesus Christ at this point. We are not interested in obeying God. We are interested in doing our own thing.  We want to run our own lives. We want to be “god” to ourselves.  Jesus was not like that, for everything He did He did out of love for God and out of obedience to Him.”

It is hard to add much to that!  But I know that this verse holds a great depth that cannot be plumed by the human mind.  How shall we ever know the mystery of the Trinity?  It is a wondrous thing to ponder that mind and work and love of Christ.

5:20 For the Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing. And greater works than these will he show him, so that you may marvel.

Marveling has to do with worship.  When we marvel, we are basically giving glory or a sort to the man who did the great deed.  Such is the result of miracles in the ministry of Christ.  But the greatest miracle of all is that which Christ describes in the next few verses – He gives us life out of death. No man can do this.  Only God the creator of the universe can do it.  So this verse is a setup for verse 21.

5:21 For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom he will.

In the first part of this verse we learn that Jesus has life giving power in Him – no other creature has this.  That’s why we say He was “begotten” because He wasn’t created.  A critical part of Christology is understanding the significance of His equality with God the Father, as well as the way in which He came into the world – He was begotten by the Holy Spirit.

I was talking with Kate last night, and one of the things that hit me in our conversation was how men of religion often leave out the work of the Spirit in the course of things.  They see a man who was a rebel or a vile sinner and then they a change when he becomes a Christian.  We ask: what can account for the change?  We should ask: WHO can account for the change.  That “who” is the Holy Spirit, and that same life giving power we find in the Spirit who quickens men was also found in Jesus Christ when He walked upon the earth.

In the second part of the verse we read that the Son gives life to “whom he will.”  The verse necessitates two things.  1. That He gives life to certain people and not others.  2. He discriminates based on His will.  This means that he necessarily doesn’t give life to some and does give life to others.  It also means that those who get life get it because He willed that you get it.  This presents us with a problem for some in the church because it seems to indicate that He chooses – and their argument is normally that “God doesn’t choose arbitrarily who will get life and who won’t.”  But that’s not what this verse seems to indicate is it.  There’s nothing arbitrary about it – the choice is based on His “will.”  His will is whatever pleases Him.

As Ryle says, “life is the highest and greatest gift that can be bestowed.  It is precisely the thing that man, with all his cleverness, can neither give to the work of his hands, nor restore when taken away.  But life, we are told, is in the lands of the Lord Jesus, to bestow and give at His discretion.”

5:22 The Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son,

Ryle says, “All power and authority over the world is committed to Christ’s hands.  He is the King and Judge of mankind.  Before Him every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess that He is Lord. He that was once despised and rejected of men, condemned and crucified as a malefactor, shall one day hold a great assize, and judge the world (Rom. 2:16).”

We often think of Christ as the great lover of our souls – and so He is.  But what we often forget is how all things are committed into His hands.  In the glory of our personal relationship with Him, let us not forget with whom we are conversing: the Lord of all mankind, of all creation, the creator of all and the judge of all.

5:23 that all may honor the Son, just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him.

In this verse Jesus says that He is not only equal if character and power with the Father, but He is equally worthy of praise and worship.  Not only because of what He has done for us (for that comes in the next verse) but because He is the divine Being.  He is God.  He has all authority.

As I mentioned in class two weeks ago, this year we’ll be holding our 4th annual men’s campout.  The preliminary details are below.  This is an amazing time of fun and fellowship that I highly recommend for any guy who enjoys shooting guns, grilling out, hiking, and playing a lot of cornhole.  Please RSVP to PJ Wenzel: pjwenzel@gmail.com

NOTE: the purpose of this event is both outreach and inreach.  So invite those who don’t come to our church as well as folks who you don’t know well but know would enjoy coming and meeting other guys.

Address: Tom Whatman’s Farm, 6650 Stoffer Rd., Bellville, OH 44813

Date: June 22nd and 23rd  – meet at Dublin Baptist Parking Lot at 1pm on the 22nd and you’ll be back in time for a late dinner with your family on the 23rd (Saturday).

What to bring: Bible, sleeping bag, tent (if you don’t have a tent I will put you in with someone else who has space), any guns you want to fire along with ammo

Cost: count on this being $25-35 per person.  I will have exact figures soon.

Lastly, look for updated to this page website.  I’m sure I’ll post updates as people ask questions and I solidify the itinerary.

PJW

Legendary for his Prison Ministry, and his conversion after being jailed for his role in the Watergate Scandal, Chuck Colson did many a great thing for the cause of Jesus during his time on earth.  But as discerning Christians we must look at the full measure of a man as we seek to memorialize and not idolize him.  Pastor Tim Challies wrote an important blog posting today that I believe we should all read. 

The Legacy of Charles Colson

I don’t mean to be a curmudgeon and I don’t mean to be insensitive, truly. Perhaps there are rules that govern these things, and I am violating them, or maybe I am just missing some vital piece of information. I don’t know. But I have been to a wide variety of Christian blogs and news sites reading the obituaries and memorials and remembrances of Charles Colson and have been surprised to note that they are have been very nearly uniformly, unabashedly positive. 

I am not convinced that we are doing right here. I suppose I would rather wait a little while to say this, but then the opportunity will be gone. At least to my understanding, Colson’s legacy was both more and less than people are making it out to be. I didn’t really understand the man in all his inconsistencies and complexities while he lived—the combination of good and bad baffled me—and I certainly don’t understand him now that he has died.

Don’t hear me say that Colson was a complete villain, but do hear me when I say that he leaves behind a legacy that is far more multi-faceted, far more multi-dimensional, than most people have been saying. It is a legacy that includes some dark chapters, and not only prior to his conversion.

Charles Colson leaves behind a testimony of a man who encountered grace at his darkest hour. He leaves behind a legacy of a ministry that seeks to extend grace to those who are likewise in their darkest hour. He sought to teach Christians how to think—to describe and define a biblical worldview. And then he sought to lead in the application of that biblical worldview, and this is where things become hazy, where a positive legacy collides with a woeful one, where his work for the Lord encounters his work against the Lord’s church.

The fact is that as we remember this man, we remember someone who labored to strike a significant blow against the gospel, and who time and again called on the church to do the same. And this is what is absent in so many remembrances. He labored for good and positive causes, but he also labored for outright sinful causes.

Colson was a leader, a co-founder, of Evangelicals and Catholics Together, one of the efforts that must stand as part of his defining legacy. At heart, ECT made the Reformation a mistake or an over-reaction and sought to draw Protestant and Catholic back together. It made little of the gospel, suggesting that there was no unbridgeable difference between the gospel of the Reformation and the gospel of Roman Catholicism. This had potential to do terrible damage to the church and its gospel witness. Remarkably, the obituary at The Gospel Coalition mentions ECT along with Colson’s other accomplishments as if it is substantially the same as Prison Fellowship. Most others do not mention it at all.

R.C. Sproul wrote two powerful and important rebuttals to ECT, Faith Alone and Getting the Gospel Right, books that are still well worth a read today. Time may have dulled our collective memories, but in its time ECT was a major issue and a major threat to church unity and gospel centrality. It was just the kind of threat that merited and demanded the treatises Sproul provided—ones that sounded a warning and drew attention to a danger that so many people were ignoring.

Then there was the more recent Manhattan Declaration, another effort to form a wide ecumenism. This Declaration addressed critical issues of our day: the sanctity of human life, the dignity of marriage as the conjugal union of husband and wife and the rights of conscience and religious liberty. But it did so as Evangelicals and Catholics and Orthodox together under the banner of a common gospel. John MacArthur said it well in an article detailing why he would not sign his name to it:

It assumes from the start that all signatories are fellow Christians whose only differences have to do with the fact that they represent distinct ‘communities.’ Points of disagreement are tacitly acknowledged but are described as ‘historic lines of ecclesial differences’ rather than fundamental conflicts of doctrine and conviction with regard to the gospel and the question of which teachings are essential to authentic Christianity. … [It would] relegate the very essence of gospel truth to the level of a secondary issue. That is the wrong way—perhaps the very worst way—for evangelicals to address the moral and political crises of our time.

Sproul likewise declined to put his name to the Declaration. At heart it downplayed the gospel to a lowest common denominator. It used the word gospel as if it applied in the same way to Roman Catholics and Protestants, something very consistent with what Colson held and taught throughout his years of being a leader within Evangelicalism.

In these ways and others, Colson undermined the gospel. He may not have set out to do this and he may not even have understood that he was doing this, but it remains the fact of the matter. ECT and The Manhattan Declaration stand as two prominent and public testaments to his willingness to tamper with the purity of the gospel. These things really happened and they both had the potential to be very, very destructive to the church because each one called into question the gospel, the very heart of the Christian faith.

It is not wrong of us to mention these negative aspects of his legacy along side the good. They are nothing more, nothing less, than what is true of the man. As Christians we ought to be able to deal with a mixed legacy, one of success and failure, one that is as complex and inconsistent as so many men are. Our worldview ought to be big enough to deal with such things. To portray Charles Colson as all villain is unfair to the man; to portray him as all spiritual giant is unfair to the church. Let’s not be afraid to call it as it is.