This chapter offers a rambling discourse on not being popular with the
world or acting like the world, and not pursuing worldly fame and the church
admiring the wrong people (sports heroes, pop-stars, etc.) and using church
service as nothing but a pep rally and then being a Christian in name only the
rest of the week. As such we find little at fault with it in this part, other
than that like all of Dean's discourses it is about 95% longer than it needs to
be. It is rather excessive in the paranoia department against i.e., dramatic
performances in church, which is waved off as having the goal in mind that “God is pleased with an uproar”. It is
less off the mark where it concerns issues such as not ensuring that church
speaking guests are doctrinally correct.
Ironically enough Dean also notes that “personal testimony” has become too much of a meat market. This is
ironic because this book is all about Dean (his feelings, his anecdotes, his
frustrations, his experiences, his guessing, etc.) while the apostles in their
preaching appealed to facts about Christ, not personal testimonies.
Dean does however stick its head in the sand with an extended screed
against “PAPER CREDENTIALS” noting that, “Never
in the Bible does any one of God's spokesmen ever certify his divine authority
by producing or referring to some piece of paper”. The sad news for Dean is
as follows:
- While it is not useful to use a “piece of paper” to “certify divine authority”, it certainly does have use in terms of who has better ability to render a qualified exegesis — which understandably would not be in Dean's interest!
- Paul and Matthew were
both educated rabbinic students and Luke was an educated physician.
Between these three we have almost all of our New Testament.
It will not do for Dean to spray hayseed around and claim that “all a diploma means is that one has
memorized enough answers to pass a test and had enough money to go to school”,
or that it is just a means to “SING THE
PARTY LINE in order to make a 'career' from it”. It is not a matter of “Who, or what, gives a man permission and
authority to speak for God?” but who or what gives someone authority (in
the knowledge sense) to competently expound on Scripture.
Dean does not think anyone can just open a Bible and start preaching accurately.
He is not oblivious to the point that everyone mentioned in the Bible, even the
Apostles, even Apollos, had to be taught by someone else, whether Christ
or another. How much more so today when our culture is miles away from theirs?
What he wants us to understand, is that he is a Bible teacher and prophet certified by “divine authority”, and that we should pay close attention to only his words, or else!