Real Bible Rob
I am a Presbyterian USA minister who interprets the Bible in all of its messy and varied voices. I teach and preach spiritual growth to people who want an open and affirming Christianity. My social media tagline is "People say lots of things about the Bible that aren't really there."
My full-length sermons and live stream are available on YouTube: @robchrist8999 and @edmondspresbyterian132
Contact me at: epc-pcusa.org, pastorepc@frontier.com
Real Bible Rob
War on Empathy, 2 Corinthians 1:3-7, Psalm 103:13
How can you justify cruelty as a Christian? It has a very long tradition, from the Crusades to Slavery and Jim Crow to Mass Deportations today. These were all and are still perpetuated and justified by Bible believing Christians. This justification and hypocrisy is the main critique of Christianity. How can a religion that exhorts love and kindness be so unloving and unkind? Simple, just redefine what love and kindness are, and voila, you can justify anything. This is exactly what is happening with the current discussions about "Empathy is Sin." I have spoken frequently about hyper-Calvinists like John Piper, who do this redefinition by saying that empathy is not in scripture. In this episode, I discuss the origins of the word empathy and why it is considered invalid by some people. Then I describe the reason we needed to adopt the word empathy in English. Next, I explore the Hebrew word "rachamim" and the Greek word "parakaleo," discussing how they are often used to describe something closer to empathy than just mercy or compassion.
#rachamim #parakaleo #empathy #compassion #mercy #empathyissin #edmonds #edmondspres #pcusa