{"id":1013,"date":"2010-03-12T17:12:06","date_gmt":"2010-03-12T17:12:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/2010\/03\/not-at-your-beck-and-call--a-reply-to-glenn-beck.html"},"modified":"2010-03-12T17:12:06","modified_gmt":"2010-03-12T17:12:06","slug":"not-at-your-beck-and-call-a-reply-to-glenn-beck","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/03\/not-at-your-beck-and-call-a-reply-to-glenn-beck.html","title":{"rendered":"Not at your Beck and Call– a Reply to Glenn Beck"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"12justice_CA0-popup.jpg\"<\/a><\/span> <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Dear Glenn Beck:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

            <\/span>I must
\nadmit that your recent attack (http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2010\/03\/12\/us\/12justice.html?scp=3&sq=glenn%20beck&st=cse) on the issue of whether the church should be
\ninvolved in social justice matters or not took me by surprise especially when
\nyou inanely went on to associate it with socialism, communism, or even Nazism. This
\nword just in— none of those -isms existed in Biblical times, but there are
\nplenty of exhortations in the Bible, to do justice, love kindness, and walk
\nhumbly with your God.  <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Indeed, there is in fact about as
\nmuch in the Bible about doing justice as there is about love, and furthermore
\nthere is more in the Bible about helping the poor than there is about salvation
\nitself!  <\/span>Imagine that.  <\/span>The Bible is not just about ‘spiritual’
\nmatters. You seem to have the mistaken notion that ‘social justice’ is somehow
\na liberal commie agenda foisted on the Christian Church or on the Mormon Church
\nby left-leaning liberals.  <\/span>Actually, the
\ntruth is it was set out as an obligation by God first for Israel and then
\nfor the Church.  <\/span>God, it is safe to say,
\nis neither a left wing Democrat nor a right wing Republican, or even an
\nIndependent. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In my own denomination, the United Methodist
\nChurch, our founder, John
\nWesley (a strong supporter of the British monarchy before the Revolutionary war
\nand about as far from a communist, socialist, or Nazi as one could imagine)
\nonce said ‘there is no spiritual Gospel without the social Gospel’ (and vice
\nversa).  <\/span>He was of course right. Even if
\nyou just read the Sermon on the Mount in Mt. 5-7 you would discover than
\nconcern for the poor and for social justice were an essential part of Jesus’
\nmessage. You may remember that Jesus warned that ‘inasmuch as you have not fed,
\nclothed, and sheltered ‘the least of these’, you have not done it unto to Me.’ I’m wondering if
\nyou have been listening to Jesus lately. 
\n<\/span>Might I suggest that before you go pontificating on matters about which
\nyou are ill informed, that you do a little research first?  <\/span>I suggest you start by reading carefully my
\nrecent book Jesus and Money. <\/u> <\/span>You
\nwill discover that Jesus is peeved with some of the things you have been
\nfulminating about and have unbiblical opinions on. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I cannot speak for all Christians,
\nbut I can say that there are plenty of orthodox ones, both Protestants,
\nCatholics, and of the various Orthodox denominations who while conservative
\nChristians are very involved with matters of social justice, and frankly were
\nvery offended by your off the cuff, inappropriate remarks.  <\/span>Have you ever heard of the Salvation
\nArmy?  <\/span>If they listened to your advice
\nthey would have to shut down 90 percent of their ministry!  <\/span>You should apologize to them and the rest of
\nus in this category. Many of them are in fact  <\/span>dedicated Republicans.  <\/span>You will not be increasing market share of
\nyour TV or radio audience if you keep attacking many of those who are your
\nbase.  <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

You may think that your ranting and
\nraving, first on CNN and then on Fox and on the radio is promoting valuable
\ndiscussion of important issues, but in fact all your doing is adding to the
\ncoarsening of discourse in our culture and the closing of the American
\nmind.  <\/span>I suggest you go back to school
\nfor a while and not open your mouth again until you have something
\nwell-informed, carefully researched, peer-reviewed, and of general value to the
\npublic to say.  <\/span>Until then— silence is
\ngolden.  Recite this mantra to yourself before breakfast tomorrow—- ‘bombast won’t last, but God’s concern for justice for the poor and oppressed will’. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Respectfully yours,<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Dr. Ben Witherington, III<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dear Glenn Beck:               I must admit that your recent attack (http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2010\/03\/12\/us\/12justice.html?scp=3&sq=glenn%20beck&st=cse) on the issue of whether the church should be involved in social justice matters or not took me by surprise especially when you inanely went on to associate it with socialism, communism, or even Nazism. This word just in— none of those…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":199,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1013","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nNot at your Beck and Call- a Reply to Glenn Beck - The Bible and Culture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/03\/not-at-your-beck-and-call-a-reply-to-glenn-beck.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Not at your Beck and Call- a Reply to Glenn Beck - The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Dear Glenn Beck:               I must admit that your recent attack (http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2010\/03\/12\/us\/12justice.html?scp=3&sq=glenn%20beck&st=cse) on the issue of whether the church should be involved in social justice matters or not took me by surprise especially when you inanely went on to associate it with socialism, communism, or even Nazism. 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A graduate of UNC, Chapel Hill, he went on to receive the M.Div. degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. from the University of Durham in England. He is now considered one of the top evangelical scholars in the world, and is an elected member of the prestigious SNTS, a society dedicated to New Testament studies. Witherington has also taught at Ashland Theological Seminary, Vanderbilt University, Duke Divinity School and Gordon-Conwell. A popular lecturer, Witherington has presented seminars for churches, colleges and biblical meetings not only in the United States but also in England, Estonia, Russia, Europe, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Australia. He has also led tours to Italy, Greece, Turkey, Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. Witherington has written over thirty books, including The Jesus Quest and The Paul Quest, both of which were selected as top biblical studies works by Christianity Today. He also writes for many church and scholarly publications, and is a frequent contributor to the Beliefnet website. Along with many interviews on radio networks across the country, Witherington has been seen on the History Channel, NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, The Discovery Channel, A&E, and the PAX Network.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/author\/bwitherington"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1013","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/199"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1013"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1013\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}