It is the duty of nations as well as of men to owe their dependence upon the overruling power of God; to confess their sins and transgressions in humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon; and to recognize the sublime truth, announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history, that those nations are blessed whose God is the Lord.
We know that by his divine law, nations, like individuals, are subject to punishments and chastisements in this world. May we not justly fear that the awful calamity of civil war which now desolates the land may be a punishment inflicted upon us for our presumptuous sins; to the needful end of our national reformation as a whole people?
We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of heaven; we have been preserved these many years in peace and prosperity; we have grown in numbers, wealth and power as no other nation has grown.
But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us, and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own.
Intoxicated with unbroken success we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us.
It has seemed to me fit and proper that God should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged, as with one heart and one voice, by the whole of the American people. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November as a day of Thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.
Christianity Today Bible Study: The Problem with the Prosperity Gospel
Christianity Today Bible studies are available for download at ChristianBibleStudies.com. This one, "The Gospel Defined," is based on an article by Ghanaian seminary professor J. Kwabena Asamoah-Gyadu.
Christianity Today has graciously allowed me to post the studies I have written to this site, usually one or two a month. If you would like to use them for anything other than your own spiritual growth, I ask you to download them at the CT Bible study site mentioned above.
The exuberant worship and prosperity theology of the New Pentecostal Churches have attracted Africa’s urban, upwardly mobile youth. According to Ghanaian seminary professor J. Kwabena Asamoah-Gyadu, in the NPCs, “health, success, and ever-soaring profits in business are coveted, cherished, and publicly flaunted as signs of God’s favor. In this new type of Christianity, success and wealth are the only genuine marks of faith.” This prosperity gospel resonates with a traditional African religious outlook that seeks to acquire spiritual power for personal gain, although it has left the poor and disenfranchised behind.
Here is a link to the study for your personal, individual use. Your feedback is always welcome.
Here's a podcast of Dinesh D'Souza on "Point of View" speaking about his new book, Life After Death: The Evidence. (I helped Dinesh on the project with editing and consulting services.)
Life After Death is a unique book. In it you attempt to make the case for an afterlife using biology, philosophy, physics, morality—just about every realm of knowledge except divine revelation. You attempt to answer the atheists on their own terms, believing they will not listen to appeals to the Bible. In that you are almost certainly right, but what makes you think they will listen to your appeals to reason?
My main goal is not to convert the atheists. I’d love to, of course, and I fantasize about a debate with Christopher Hitchens in which he finally concedes that he’s wrong, falls down on his knees, and accepts Christ. Well, that’s not entirely crazy. I debated Hitchens in 1989 at Georgetown on socialism. Many years later, Hitchens told my wife that after that debate he stopped calling himself a socialist. So maybe there is hope that he will also give up his atheism as he once relinquished his socialism.
But in general atheists come to my debates not to listen with an open mind but to show me up. My goal is to counter them, to flummox them, and in some cases to expose them as fools. This is necessary to temper atheist arrogance. As long as these guys think they are the “party of reason” and we are the “party of blind faith,” they don’t see any need to take us seriously. But their attitude changes when we use the techniques of reason to lay them flat on their back.
Now there is a group that I am trying to convince, and that’s the group of seekers who may have rejected the institutional church, but who are wrestling with questions and are open to finding out the answers. I also think that secular apologetics is very invigorating and empowering for Christians, because it shows them that there is a good, logical case to be made for Christian beliefs. We are not affirming propositions by faith that run against the evidence; we are affirming propositions that are completely in line with the evidence. Faith itself is something reasonable: it is a reasonable way to discover and affirm truths that lie outside the realm of rational inquiry.
Where do you think the new atheism is headed?
Ultimately it’s headed for hell, same destination as the old atheism. But in today’s secular culture, the new atheists are rock stars. They are admired by the media, and influentially ensconced in education. Part of the reason is they are a suave bunch, not like the grumpy old atheists. They are also sophisticated in surfing on the wave of current events. Just a few days after 9/11, Richard Dawkins published an article saying, in effect: Look what religion makes people do. Another new atheist called 9/11 a “faith-based initiative.”
See how cunning these guys are. We Christians are have to be better prepared for this. The new atheism is going mainstream and is being echoed by comedians, showing up in sitcoms, omnipresent on the Internet, and finding its way into the textbooks.
Some would say you are making a strategic mistake by not using the Bible more, because Christians believe God uses his divine revelation to convince people of the truth of Christ and of the reality of their own need for Him. Plus, you concede that the historical evidence for the resurrection of Christ, which is based in large part on the witness of Scripture, is very strong. What do you think? Is there a risk that excluding Scripture as a source of knowledge about the afterlife will simply reinforce people’s anti-religious prejudice? How close to the kingdom do you think your form of argumentation can get people to faith?
I don’t exclude Scripture, but I recognize that it is not going to convince someone who rejects the authority of Scripture to adjudicate the matter. If I say the resurrection happened because Scripture says so, the non-Christian and the agnostic and the atheist are not going to be persuaded by that. For them, a verse of Scripture would be as convincing as if a Muslim said, “I can prove that Muhammad took his night journey into heaven on a chariot. See, it says so here in the Qur’an.”
These are in-house kinds of arguments and they are successful only when those who already accept the premises. We have to recognize that we no longer live in a society where Christian assumptions are taken for granted. This is the true meaning of secularism. In Life After Death I make an argument for the resurrection by saying: Let’s look at the historical facts that are in the Bible and that even mainstream historians accept. Christ was crucified, the disciples found the tomb empty, they claim to have seen the risen Christ, and they started a movement of Christian conversion that brought much of Europe, and eventually much of the world, to Christianity. Now how do we make sense of this?
I am trying to show that even considered historically, the resurrection is the best explanation for the data. It would be as though an archeologist, digging in the Middle East, were to turn up new evidence for Christ’s miracles or resurrection. The Christian world would find this exhilarating. Why? In one sense you could say: No big deal, we already know that from Scripture. But it is a big deal, because now we have something we didn’t have before, which is independent corroboration of the claims of Scripture. Even people who reject Scripture would have to take this seriously. And this may lead them to change their minds about Scripture and take it more seriously.
Having said all this, apologetics is not a substitute for faith. It is the task of removing the intellectual obstacles so that people are open to the experience of faith.
Outside of Scripture, what do you think is the single most compelling evidence for life after death?
The best empirical evidence comes from Near Death Experiences, although these do no more than to show that some form of consciousness survives death. In Life After Death, I offer three independent arguments for the afterlife.
The first is the argument from brain science, the second is the argument from philosophy, and the third is the argument from morality. The argument from brain science examines the question of whether the mind and the brain are simply the same thing. If the mind is simply a name for the operations of the brain, then it’s hard to envision life after death. The brain dies, and the mind dies along with it.
But if the mind cannot be reduced to the brain, and if minds are immaterial and brains are material, then we are talking about two different things. Of course they are interdependent—here in life the mind manifests itself through the manifold of the brain. But this is like saying that music manifests itself through the manifold of my CD player. Smash the player and the music stops. But the player isn’t the cause of the music; it is merely the mechanism for the sound waves to be expressed. If my CD player dies I can still listen to the music on another player or in an open-air concert. In the same way, brains can perish but consciousness can live on.
I am only giving you a hint of how these arguments ago. It’s really exciting to follow them, because you learn a lot even while getting thrilling confirmation of your Christian beliefs.
Any one of my three arguments is decisive, but taken together they make a formidable case. Of course it is in the nature of the subject that we cannot be absolutely sure. We can be sure on the basis of faith, but we cannot be sure on the basis of reason alone.
For this reason I say that I can prove life after death by a preponderance of the evidence, but I cannot prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. Consequently, I also include in the book practical arguments: does it make sense to believe in life after death, would belief make my life better, has belief been good for society and so on.
What’s it like always being the smartest person in the room? How do you keep your bearings?
I don’t care about being the smartest person in the room. I do try to outsmart my atheist opponents in debate. It’s important for them and for the audience to see that the Christian position can answer not only the weak points of the other side but also its strong points. The atheists act as if they are defending the “round earth” position, and we are defending the “flat earth” position. If this is so, then they should win every debate.
So if we can challenge them on their own terms, fight them with their own weapons, and force them to tap out, that’s a very good thing. It isn’t just a defeat for the atheist, it’s a defeat for the whole paradigm that says that Christianity is based on illusion, Christianity is based on wish fulfillment, Christianity is against science and reason, and so on. When we avoid these issues we concede valuable intellectual and cultural real estate to our enemies, who are using it to take over our children and our culture. I, for one, want to do my part to prevent this.
Stan Guthrie is freelance writer, editor, speaker, and teacher, and a Christianity Today editor at large. He and his wife, Christine, and their three children live near Chicago.
RELEASED! Maryam and Marzieh set free after 259 days in prison
Praise the Lord! Maryam Rustampoor and Marzieh Amirizadeh were released from Evin prison in Iran today, Wednesday November 18, 2009 at 3:30pm, without bail. However, they may yet have to face a court hearing and still need our prayers.
“Words are not enough to express our gratitude to the Lord and to His people who have prayed and worked for our release,” they said.
Maryam and Marzieh were arrested because of their Christian faith on March 5, 2009. Though their health has suffered greatly while in prison, they are doing as well as could be expected, and are rejoicing in the Lord’s faithfulness to them.
“Maryam and Marzieh have greatly inspired us all. Their love for the Lord Jesus and their faithfulness to God has been an amazing testimony,” says Sam Yeghnazar, Director of Elam Ministries in London, England. Sam is an Iranian Assemblies of God minister and has worked for years in partnership with Assemblies of God World Missions.
We hope to share more details soon.
In the meantime, please pray:
For their health to be fully restored.
For their continued safety.
For their full acquittal.
Thank you again for all your support and prayers.
Mark and Amy Renfroe
The information above was provided by Elam Ministries; London, England.
This interview is also posted at BreakPoint.org and is used here with permission. Part 2 will appear next week.
By Stan Guthrie|Published Date: November 12, 2009
Dinesh D’Souza has been no stranger to controversy, whether editing the Dartmouth Review as a student or taking on the American left.
D’Souza has worked for the Reagan Administration, the Heritage Foundation, and the American Enterprise Institute. A native of India and now a U.S. citizen living in California, he has written several notable volumes, including Illiberal Education. D’Souza sparked outrage with his 2007 book, The Enemy at Home, in which he argued that the American cultural left bears responsibility for provoking militant Muslims into the September 11 terrorist attacks. Facing a firestorm of criticism from the left and the right, D’Souza refused to back down.
Since then he has begun writing works on Christian apologetics and debating atheists such as Christopher Hitchens and Peter Singer. In 2007 he authored What’s So Great about Christianity for Regnery. And recently, Regnery released D’Souza’s latest, Life After Death: The Evidence, in which he attempts to make the case for an afterlife without resorting to religion, “because I am making a secular argument in a secular culture.”
I served as an editor and consultant for D’Souza on Life After Death and interviewed D’Souza about his life as a Christian apologist.
You’ve worked for a president, Ronald Reagan. You’ve debated some of the world’s greatest minds. Now you’ve made the move into Christian apologetics. First you write What’s So Great about Christianity and now Life After Death. What has brought you from there to here?
My faith has deepened over the past several years, since we moved to California in 2000. But my work remained secular. When I saw the new atheism, and saw how it was being lionized in the media, I suddenly recognized I had an opportunity to bring my Christian faith and my intellectual work closer together. So I am delighted to be focusing now on Christian apologetics, although I still have one foot in secular culture. I don’t see this as a problem because I’d like to take the apologetic argument mainstream, to have it aired out not merely in the Christian media but also on CNN, USA Today, and so on.
What brought you to Christ?
I was raised Catholic in Bombay, India. The Portuguese missionaries came to India starting in the 16th century. Somewhere along the line, they seem to have located one of my ancestors and brought him to Christianity, possibly by whopping him over the head. It was the age of the Portuguese Inquisition. Hey, I’m glad it happened, although I’m not sure my hapless ancestor would agree. Even so I sometimes say I was raised with “crayon Christianity.”
This is a simplified Christianity, and too many of us learn this from our parents and never outgrow it. We never develop a mature Christianity that can withstand the assaults of secular culture. I married an evangelical Christian in 1992, and after our daughter was born in 1995, we started attending a nondenominational church in the Washington D.C. area. But my faith remained lukewarm, wounded, you might say, by the influences of secular culture. Only when we moved to California did we start attending a Calvary Chapel church, and I found people who took their Christianity very seriously and whose faith shaped their whole life. This also began to happen with me. Basically I went from being a crayon Christian and a lukewarm Christian to being a mature and passionate Christian.
Was your decision to go into Christian apologetics influenced by all the controversy you faced as a conservative pundit, particularly the response you provoked with The Enemy at Home? Did you get tired of all the opposition? And is there anything you would do differently?
No. The controversy over The Enemy at Home was nothing new; in fact, it paled before the controversy around Illiberal Education and The End of Racism. Besides, The Enemy at Home sold well, and its thesis has held up well. Today the whole right wing “clash of civilizations” thesis doesn't look so good. Basically my offense for some conservatives was that I departed from this model.
Anyway, I started What's so Great About Christianity intending to write an historical book, but I got drawn into the larger issues of the origin of the universe, the uniqueness of Christianity, and so on. Soon I realized that this full-scale apologetics is pretty far afield from the free market principles of the Hoover Institution and the conservative cause. So I decided to shift my focus. I still have one foot in the secular political world, but my primary emphasis these days is Christian apologetics.
How is being an apologist contending for the faith different from being a commentator contending for, say, supply-side economics?
Well, the supply-side advocate is arguing for a means to an end. It’s an important issue, but it’s subordinate to the truly fundamental and ultimate questions of life. I enjoyed my involvement in political debate, and still do, but now I feel that I am taking on the truly big questions. It gives my life an enhanced sense of purpose. Ultimately, who really cares whether the top marginal tax rate is 36 percent or 33 percent? Well, that 3 percent difference is not irrelevant to our nation’s prosperity. But still, it’s a lot less important and a lot less interesting than, say, the question of whether we have life after death.
The actual techniques of advocacy are quite similar in politics and apologetics. In a sense, I have steered a whole set of skills in writing and debate that I developed in the secular world into the area of defending Christian principles. Oddly enough, a secular background is a very good preparation for apologetics. The typical church-bred apologists think in biblical terms, and then they have to translate into secular terms. By contrast, I think in secular terms. This helps me when I debate on the college campus or in other secular venues.
Have you modeled your apologetics writing and debating on anyone in particular, and, if so, who?
C.S. Lewis. He was the most successful Christian apologist of the 20th century. Lewis was trained in medieval literature. He brought those secular scholarly credentials to bear on his Christian writings, and that gave him a credibility and authority that was unique in his time. Also Lewis had magnificent range. He could write for adults and he could write for children. He wrote fiction and nonfiction. He was an effective speaker and radio commentator as well as a good writer.
On the other hand, Lewis didn’t do debates. The times were different, and of course the issues he confronted were sometimes different. The big question after World War II was why a just God might allow something so terrible as a Holocaust. Today, however, we are confronted with different questions: Does evolution discredit Christianity? Does 9/11 and the behavior of the Islamic radicals show the evil social impact of religion? Has new research in brain science invalidated the possibility of life after death? We need a new apologetics for the 21st century, but Lewis remains our inspiration and guide.
You seem to me to be much like Chesterton in that you’re willing to name names and be very direct in skewering an opponent’s position. Plus, you’re very quotable. What do you think?
Skewering is something that I enjoy, and maybe this is why people say I do it well. I have no hesitation in naming names; in fact, I think that one of my most powerful weapons against the atheists is to quote them. Some of the things they say, especially when they navigate outside their fields of expertise, are quite hilarious.
As Christians we shouldn’t shrink from satirizing our opponents; ridicule is a powerful weapon, and there are good biblical precedents for using it. I like to make scholarly arguments, but I also want to reach large numbers of people. So I have to find a way to make things clear, and also to make things timely and even entertaining. It’s easier to remember a single telling phrase than to remember a 12-part argument. One of my chapters in Life After Death is on the impact of transcendental beliefs on the core institutions and values of our culture. I say that paradoxically it is the world beyond the world that has made the greatest difference in our world. That sums it up in a way that people remember.
I’ve noticed that you’re willing to take positions that many apologists don’t. For example, you concede, if not embrace, evolution as fact and use it as one of the arrows in your pedagogical quiver. While the new atheists are a constant foil for you, you don’t hesitate to challenge young-earth creationists. Aren’t you afraid you’ll lose your audience?
I am not a biologist, but I realize that the vast majority of biologists in the world accept evolution. Since this is true of biologists in China and India, for example, I find it hard to believe that they are succumbing to political correctness or are part of some kind of atheist plot. Clearly there is a good deal of evidence for evolution.
Even so, I cannot go along with Richard Dawkins when he says that evolution is as obvious as mixing hydrogen and oxygen and getting water. That’s because we can do this in the laboratory, but we cannot show evolution take place in the laboratory. I think that Christians rightly object to evolution when it is used as a battering ram to attack the Bible. The best way to fight this is to show the atheistic assumptions that are often smuggled into evolution, and not to oppose the science itself.
Some of the implications of evolution are very friendly to Christianity, and I don’t hesitate to point this out. For example, evolution is based on the low, selfish view of nature that is very close to the Christian view, and very different from the liberal view of human nature as good and wonderful. In Life After Death I also show that evolution shows a very interesting transition from simple matter to complex mind. This by itself is a clue, because nature is saying that there is a built-in progression from material things to immaterial things. Now material things like bodies perish, but immaterial things like thoughts don’t. Isn’t it reasonable to believe that we, who are part of nature, might make a transition, as nature does, from the perishable to the imperishable? For me it’s fun to take the things that atheists cherish, like evolution, and turn the argument to Christian ends.
What are the greatest strengths and weaknesses of the evangelical subculture in the U.S.?
Its great strength is its integration of faith into all aspects of life. This is very different from the once-a-week, Easter Sunday Christianity that I saw in India. Evangelicals take seriously the idea that if Christianity is true, it should affect all aspects of your life and it should make you a different kind of person. I love this kind of passionate commitment.
On the other hand, the evangelical weakness is a tendency to shun the mind, to run away from intellectual arguments, to affirm truth simply on the basis that “the Bible says it, I believe it, and that settles it.” Not a bad bumper sticker, but not an adequate philosophy for life. Today we all have one foot—and sometimes both feet—in secular culture and we cannot articulate our Christian beliefs in a language that only Christians understand. Even our children have questions and want answers that take seriously the modern knowledge that comes from history, from science, and so on.
I see apologetics not as a substitute for evangelical emphasis on Scripture but rather as something complementary. Both are ways to equip yourself to have a deeper understanding, and to be equipped to communicate that understanding to others. It is the combination that makes you a truly dangerous Christian—dangerous, that is, to the secularists and atheists in our society.
The second half of this interview will appear next week on BreakPoint.
Stan Guthrie is freelance writer, editor, speaker, and teacher, and a Christianity Today editor at large. He and his wife, Christine, and their three children live near Chicago.
Christianity Today Bible Study: The Gospel Defined
Christianity Today Bible studies are available for download at ChristianBibleStudies.com. This one, "The Gospel Defined," is based on an interview with author and theologian Michael Horton.
Christianity Today has graciously allowed me to post the studies I have written to this site, usually one or two a month. If you would like to use them for anything other than your own spiritual growth, I ask you to download them at the CT Bible study site mentioned above.
The gospel of moralistic therapeutic deism is running rampant in the church. In an interview with Mark Galli,theologian Michael Horton says we are tempted to live a Christless Christianity because we are humancentered rather than God-centered. Conservative-leaning believers say, “These are God’s commandments. The culture is slipping away from us. We have to recover it, and you play a role.”
Meanwhile, others say, “You can be happier if you follow God’s principles.” But as good as following these imperatives might be, the gospel is not a matter of doing the right things or trying harder. Horton says, “The gospel isn’t ‘Follow Jesus’ example’ or ‘Transform your life’ or ‘How to raise good children.’ The gospel is: Jesus Christ came to save sinners—even bad parents, even lousy followers of Jesus, which we all are on our best days.”
Here is a link to the study for your personal, individual use. Your feedback is always welcome.
FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT: Ty Mays @ (770) 256-8710 tmays@inchristcommunications.com
CHARLOTTE, NC -- InChrist Communications (ICC) (www.inchristcommunications.com), a national, full-service communications firm serving faith-based ministries, churches and businesses, has added to its team prominent Christian journalists Deann Alford and Stan Guthrie as managing editor and editor-at-large, respectively.
As managing editor, Alford will oversee all writing by ICC staff and writers for ICC clients, as well as authoring press releases and articles and providing strategic communications counsel. A senior writer for “Christianity Today” magazine, she is a 19-year veteran journalist who has worked as a beat reporter and news editor in daily and weekly newspapers. She has served as a freelance journalist for publications and news services, including Compass Direct News, Religion News Service and “Pentecostal Evangel,” and as guest editor for “World Pulse,” the missions letter of the Evangelism and Missions Information Service of Wheaton College. Alford lives with her family in Austin, Texas.
Guthrie, ICC’s editor-at-large and senior consultant, has a range of duties that includes writing, editing and strategic counsel. An accomplished author and co-author of three books, Guthrie served as an editor for “Christianity Today” for more than eight years and remains an editor-at-large at the publication. He has extensive experience in daily newspapers and as an editor, teacher, podcast host, radio commentator and author of news, columns, editorials and feature articles. At Wheaton’s Evangelism and Missions Information Service, he served as “World Pulse” editor and managing editor of “Evangelical Missions Quarterly.” Guthrie and his family make their home in Wheaton, Ill.
Holt welcomed the newest staff as vital additions to a growing company that provides public relations/publicity, marketing, advertising, creative services and special projects:
“Deann and Stan bring years of journalistic and ministry knowledge and wisdom to ICC and its clients – especially in the area of missions,” said Holt. “We are blessed to have them become important parts of our dedicated team.”
Alford is enthusiastic about joining the accomplished staff at ICC. “I am so pleased to work with a firm as committed to integrity and excellence as InChrist Communications,” she said.
Guthrie feels honored to serve the faith-based community through ICC. "InChrist Communications and Palmer Holt have high professional and moral standards and represent some of the world's best ministries,” Guthrie said. “It's an honor to be associated with them, and with Deann Alford, a colleague of many years."
InChrist Communications clients include MAF (Mission Aviation Fellowship), ECFA (Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability), Open Doors USA, HCJB Global, Outreach Inc., The Mission Society and Douglas Shaw & Associates.
Help! I'm trying to upload a PDF to a blog post. The Blogger software asks me to browse to choose the file, which is no problem. But it also asks me to name the upload path and adds, "This path must exist on the FTP server." I don't know how to do this. Would you please help? Thank you so much!
Twenty years to the day after the fall of the Berlin Wall, it is worth remembering Ronald Reagan's "Tear Down This Wall" speech on June 12, 1987, at the Brandenburg Gate. While a world has changed dramatically and the challenges we face are different (in no small measure due to Reagan himself), vision, leadership, statesmanship and patriotism are never out of style.
Chancellor Kohl, Governing Mayor Diepgen, ladies and gentlemen: Twenty four years ago, President John F. Kennedy visited Berlin, and speaking to the people of this city and the world at the city hall. Well since then two other presidents have come, each in his turn to Berlin. And today, I, myself, make my second visit to your city.
We come to Berlin, we American Presidents, because it's our duty to speak in this place of freedom. But I must confess, we’re drawn here by other things as well; by the feeling of history in this city -- more than 500 years older than our own nation; by the beauty of the Grunewald and the Tiergarten; most of all, by your courage and determination. Perhaps the composer, Paul Linke, understood something about American Presidents. You see, like so many Presidents before me, I come here today because wherever I go, whatever I do: “Ich hab noch einen Koffer in Berlin” [I still have a suitcase in Berlin.]
Our gathering today is being broadcast throughout Western Europe and North America. I understand that it is being seen and heard as well in the East. To those listening throughout Eastern Europe, I extend my warmest greetings and the good will of the American people. To those listening in East Berlin, a special word: Although I cannot be with you, I address my remarks to you just as surely as to those standing here before me. For I join you, as I join your fellow countrymen in the West, in this firm, this unalterable belief: Es gibt nur ein Berlin. [There is only one Berlin.]
Behind me stands a wall that encircles the free sectors of this city, part of a vast system of barriers that divides the entire continent of Europe. From the Baltic South, those barriers cut across Germany in a gash of barbed wire, concrete, dog runs, and guard towers. Farther south, there may be no visible, no obvious wall. But there remain armed guards and checkpoints all the same -- still a restriction on the right to travel, still an instrument to impose upon ordinary men and women the will of a totalitarian state.
Yet, it is here in Berlin where the wall emerges most clearly; here, cutting across your city, where the news photo and the television screen have imprinted this brutal division of a continent upon the mind of the world.
Standing before the Brandenburg Gate, every man is a German separated from his fellow men.
Every man is a Berliner, forced to look upon a scar.
President Von Weizsäcker has said, "The German question is open as long as the Brandenburg Gate is closed." Well today -- today I say: As long as this gate is closed, as long as this scar of a wall is permitted to stand, it is not the German question alone that remains open, but the question of freedom for all mankind.
Yet, I do not come here to lament. For I find in Berlin a message of hope, even in the shadow of this wall, a message of triumph.
In this season of spring in 1945, the people of Berlin emerged from their air-raid shelters to find devastation. Thousands of miles away, the people of the United States reached out to help. And in 1947 Secretary of State -- as you've been told -- George Marshall announced the creation of what would become known as the Marshall Plan. Speaking precisely 40 years ago this month, he said: "Our policy is directed not against any country or doctrine, but against hunger, poverty, desperation, and chaos."
In the Reichstag a few moments ago, I saw a display commemorating this 40th anniversary of the Marshall Plan. I was struck by a sign -- the sign on a burnt-out, gutted structure that was being rebuilt. I understand that Berliners of my own generation can remember seeing signs like it dotted throughout the western sectors of the city. The sign read simply: "The Marshall Plan is helping here to strengthen the free world." A strong, free world in the West -- that dream became real. Japan rose from ruin to become an economic giant. Italy, France, Belgium -- virtually every nation in Western Europe saw political and economic rebirth; the European Community was founded.
In West Germany and here in Berlin, there took place an economic miracle, the Wirtschaftswunder. Adenauer, Erhard, Reuter, and other leaders understood the practical importance of liberty -- that just as truth can flourish only when the journalist is given freedom of speech, so prosperity can come about only when the farmer and businessman enjoy economic freedom. The German leaders -- the German leaders reduced tariffs, expanded free trade, lowered taxes. From 1950 to 1960 alone, the standard of living in West Germany and Berlin doubled.
Where four decades ago there was rubble, today in West Berlin there is the greatest industrial output of any city in Germany: busy office blocks, fine homes and apartments, proud avenues, and the spreading lawns of parkland. Where a city's culture seemed to have been destroyed, today there are two great universities, orchestras and an opera, countless theaters, and museums. Where there was want, today there's abundance -- food, clothing, automobiles -- the wonderful goods of the Kudamm.¹ From devastation, from utter ruin, you Berliners have, in freedom, rebuilt a city that once again ranks as one of the greatest on earth. Now the Soviets may have had other plans. But my friends, there were a few things the Soviets didn't count on: Berliner Herz, Berliner Humor, ja, und Berliner Schnauze. [Berliner heart, Berliner humor, yes, and a Berliner Schnauze.²]
In the 1950s -- In the 1950s Khrushchev predicted: "We will bury you."
But in the West today, we see a free world that has achieved a level of prosperity and well-being unprecedented in all human history. In the Communist world, we see failure, technological backwardness, declining standards of health, even want of the most basic kind -- too little food. Even today, the Soviet Union still cannot feed itself. After these four decades, then, there stands before the entire world one great and inescapable conclusion: Freedom leads to prosperity. Freedom replaces the ancient hatreds among the nations with comity and peace. Freedom is the victor.
And now -- now the Soviets themselves may, in a limited way, be coming to understand the importance of freedom. We hear much from Moscow about a new policy of reform and openness. Some political prisoners have been released. Certain foreign news broadcasts are no longer being jammed. Some economic enterprises have been permitted to operate with greater freedom from state control.
Are these the beginnings of profound changes in the Soviet state? Or are they token gestures intended to raise false hopes in the West, or to strengthen the Soviet system without changing it? We welcome change and openness; for we believe that freedom and security go together, that the advance of human liberty -- the advance of human liberty can only strengthen the cause of world peace.
There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace.
General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate.
Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate.
Mr. Gorbachev -- Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
I understand the fear of war and the pain of division that afflict this continent, and I pledge to you my country's efforts to help overcome these burdens. To be sure, we in the West must resist Soviet expansion. So, we must maintain defenses of unassailable strength. Yet we seek peace; so we must strive to reduce arms on both sides.
Beginning 10 years ago, the Soviets challenged the Western alliance with a grave new threat, hundreds of new and more deadly SS-20 nuclear missiles capable of striking every capital in Europe. The Western alliance responded by committing itself to a counter-deployment (unless the Soviets agreed to negotiate a better solution) -- namely, the elimination of such weapons on both sides. For many months, the Soviets refused to bargain in earnestness. As the alliance, in turn, prepared to go forward with its counter-deployment, there were difficult days, days of protests like those during my 1982 visit to this city; and the Soviets later walked away from the table.
But through it all, the alliance held firm. And I invite those who protested then -- I invite those who protest today -- to mark this fact: Because we remained strong, the Soviets came back to the table. Because we remained strong, today we have within reach the possibility, not merely of limiting the growth of arms, but of eliminating, for the first time, an entire class of nuclear weapons from the face of the earth.
As I speak, NATO ministers are meeting in Iceland to review the progress of our proposals for eliminating these weapons. At the talks in Geneva, we have also proposed deep cuts in strategic offensive weapons. And the Western allies have likewise made far-reaching proposals to reduce the danger of conventional war and to place a total ban on chemical weapons.
While we pursue these arms reductions, I pledge to you that we will maintain the capacity to deter Soviet aggression at any level at which it might occur. And in cooperation with many of our allies, the United States is pursuing the Strategic Defense Initiative -- research to base deterrence not on the threat of offensive retaliation, but on defenses that truly defend; on systems, in short, that will not target populations, but shield them. By these means we seek to increase the safety of Europe and all the world. But we must remember a crucial fact: East and West do not mistrust each other because we are armed; we are armed because we mistrust each other. And our differences are not about weapons but about liberty. When President Kennedy spoke at the City Hall those 24 years ago, freedom was encircled; Berlin was under siege. And today, despite all the pressures upon this city, Berlin stands secure in its liberty. And freedom itself is transforming the globe.
In the Philippines, in South and Central America, democracy has been given a rebirth. Throughout the Pacific, free markets are working miracle after miracle of economic growth. In the industrialized nations, a technological revolution is taking place, a revolution marked by rapid, dramatic advances in computers and telecommunications.
In Europe, only one nation and those it controls refuse to join the community of freedom. Yet in this age of redoubled economic growth, of information and innovation, the Soviet Union faces a choice: It must make fundamental changes, or it will become obsolete.
Today, thus, represents a moment of hope. We in the West stand ready to cooperate with the East to promote true openness, to break down barriers that separate people, to create a safer, freer world. And surely there is no better place than Berlin, the meeting place of East and West, to make a start.
Free people of Berlin: Today, as in the past, the United States stands for the strict observance and full implementation of all parts of the Four Power Agreement of 1971. Let us use this occasion, the 750th anniversary of this city, to usher in a new era, to seek a still fuller, richer life for the Berlin of the future. Together, let us maintain and develop the ties between the Federal Republic and the Western sectors of Berlin, which is permitted by the 1971 agreement.
And I invite Mr. Gorbachev: Let us work to bring the Eastern and Western parts of the city closer together, so that all the inhabitants of all Berlin can enjoy the benefits that come with life in one of the great cities of the world.
To open Berlin still further to all Europe, East and West, let us expand the vital air access to this city, finding ways of making commercial air service to Berlin more convenient, more comfortable, and more economical. We look to the day when West Berlin can become one of the chief aviation hubs in all central Europe.
With -- With our French -- With our French and British partners, the United States is prepared to help bring international meetings to Berlin. It would be only fitting for Berlin to serve as the site of United Nations meetings, or world conferences on human rights and arms control, or other issues that call for international cooperation.
There is no better way to establish hope for the future than to enlighten young minds, and we would be honored to sponsor summer youth exchanges, cultural events, and other programs for young Berliners from the East. Our French and British friends, I'm certain, will do the same. And it's my hope that an authority can be found in East Berlin to sponsor visits from young people of the Western sectors.
One final proposal, one close to my heart: Sport represents a source of enjoyment and ennoblement, and you may have noted that the Republic of Korea -- South Korea -- has offered to permit certain events of the 1988 Olympics to take place in the North. International sports competitions of all kinds could take place in both parts of this city. And what better way to demonstrate to the world the openness of this city than to offer in some future year to hold the Olympic games here in Berlin, East and West.
In these four decades, as I have said, you Berliners have built a great city. You've done so in spite of threats -- the Soviet attempts to impose the East-mark, the blockade. Today the city thrives in spite of the challenges implicit in the very presence of this wall. What keeps you here? Certainly there's a great deal to be said for your fortitude, for your defiant courage. But I believe there's something deeper, something that involves Berlin's whole look and feel and way of life -- not mere sentiment. No one could live long in Berlin without being completely disabused of illusions. Something, instead, that has seen the difficulties of life in Berlin but chose to accept them, that continues to build this good and proud city in contrast to a surrounding totalitarian presence, that refuses to release human energies or aspirations, something that speaks with a powerful voice of affirmation, that says "yes" to this city, yes to the future, yes to freedom. In a word, I would submit that what keeps you in Berlin -- is "love."
Love both profound and abiding.
Perhaps this gets to the root of the matter, to the most fundamental distinction of all between East and West. The totalitarian world produces backwardness because it does such violence to the spirit, thwarting the human impulse to create, to enjoy, to worship. The totalitarian world finds even symbols of love and of worship an affront.
Years ago, before the East Germans began rebuilding their churches, they erected a secular structure: the television tower at Alexander Platz. Virtually ever since, the authorities have been working to correct what they view as the tower's one major flaw: treating the glass sphere at the top with paints and chemicals of every kind. Yet even today when the sun strikes that sphere, that sphere that towers over all Berlin, the light makes the sign of the cross. There in Berlin, like the city itself, symbols of love, symbols of worship, cannot be suppressed.
As I looked out a moment ago from the Reichstag, that embodiment of German unity, I noticed words crudely spray-painted upon the wall, perhaps by a young Berliner (quote):
"This wall will fall. Beliefs become reality."
Yes, across Europe, this wall will fall, for it cannot withstand faith; it cannot withstand truth. The wall cannot withstand freedom.
And I would like, before I close, to say one word. I have read, and I have been questioned since I've been here about certain demonstrations against my coming. And I would like to say just one thing, and to those who demonstrate so. I wonder if they have ever asked themselves that if they should have the kind of government they apparently seek, no one would ever be able to do what they're doing again.
I've started writing Current Issues Bible Studies for Christianity Today. The studies take as their starting point an article in Christianity Today and help you to dig into what God's Word says about the issues raised. The studies are inductive and substantial (about 2,500 words), usually covering four scriptural passages each.
The first two studies are available for download at ChristianBibleStudies.com. The first, "The Gospel Defined," is based on an interview with author and theologian Michael Horton. The second, "The Problem with the Prsperity Gospel," is based on "Did Jesus Wear Designer Robes?," by J. Kwabena Asamoah-Gyadu.
Christianity Today has graciously allowed me to post these studies on this site, and I will start doing so next week, usually one or two a month. If you would like to use them for anything other than your own spiritual growth, I ask you to download them at the CT Bible study site mentioned above.
I welcome your feedback and am excited by this opportunity to assist you with God's Word.
Yesterday anxious voters took Obama, Reid, and Pelosi to the political woodshed. It was an especially bitter day for our president, who was marking one year since his election on a platform of hope and change. Apparently he has provided too little of the one and too much of the other.
Stan Guthrie is an editor at large for Christianity Today magazine. His latest book, All that Jesus Asks: How His Questions Can Teach and Transform Us, is scheduled for November release from Baker. He is author of Missions in the Third Millennium: 21 Key Trends for the 21st Century. Stan writes the monthly "Priorities" column for BreakPoint.org.
Besides authoring, writing, and editing books, Stan is a literary agent, bringing together good authors, good books, and good publishers.
Stan has appeared on National Public Radio's "Tell Me More," WGN's Milt Rosenberg program, and many Christian shows, including Moody Radio's "Prime Time Florida." He is a weekly guest on "New Day Florida."
An inspirational speaker, he hosts a weekly podcast with John Wilson of Books & Culture. He also is an author and editorial advisor for ChristianBibleStudies.com.
A former columnist for CT, Stan served as moderator for the Christian Book Expo panel discussion, "Does the God of Christianity Exist, and What Difference Does It Make?"
Stan is married to Christine, and they have three children and live in the Chicago area.
StanGuthrie.com