Teacher: "Learning to read the Bible daily is like learning to ride a bicycle."
Pupil: "You mean, once you learn how, you never forget?"
Teacher: "No. I mean when you fall off, you need to get back on and try again."
Thursday, February 15, 2007
The Danger of Multi-Level Marketing
Imagine receiving a phone call from a friend who begins raving about a new business plan he is starting, and he wants you to come to a meeting and hear his presentation. Upon arrival, you realize that he has invited a hundred or so of his closest friends and relatives to hear and contemplate his plan. He begins by raving how, if you are persistent in this business, with a little work over a relatively short period of time, you can earn a large and permanent income. The notion of literally thousands of dollars per month is placed before you and, money conscious as we all are, you want to learn more.
"The plan is simple", he says. "To start with, all you have to do is sign up and agree to send me one hundred dollars each month."
At this point, you obviously sense that things are not quite as they should be. "How can us sending you a hundred a month help us? If we all did it, that would be ten thousand dollars per month out of our hands, and into yours."
"Of course," he replies. "But, by joining up, you receive the right to do the same thing. You can try to recruit your friends and family and convince them to send you one hundred dollars per month as well. If you get a hundred of them, then you will receive ten thousand dollars per month, at the cost of only one hundred per month. Don't you see the beauty of this?"
The above would be an overly simple example of what is known as a pyramid scheme. Not surprisingly, as it is presented above, it is illegal. However, though filtered through an intricate array of products and services, when stripped down to their actual operating procedures, many, if not most, of the multi-level marketing plans which are out there are doing essentially the same thing. Not only that, they are doing it legally, and often they are created by supposedly Christian people, and put forth with an air of morality, helping others, and the "American Way."
However, they are not moral, they are not Christian, they are not ethical, they do not help others, and, if the American Way has to do with hard work and an honest livelihood, they certainly do not represent that, either.
Let me give you a little history. Some years ago I was approached by a friend, who had a sister, who had a boyfriend, who was involved in some sort of multi level scheme. This plan, as I remember it, involved a shopping service where one could buy apparently anything he wanted, and at an attractive price. In order to have access to that service, one would have to pay a moderate monthly fee into the system. He then would go out and convince others to come in below him and do the same thing. As an individual built his or her "pyramid", he would "earn" a certain percentage of the monthly fee from certain of the levels below them. I do not remember the exact numbers on how this system worked. However, what I do remember was that, based on recruiting (or is it conning?) two people to come in below you, and both of them convincing two people to do the same, and this trend continuing until you had nine levels in the pyramid below you (the ninth level would contain 512 people) your monthly "income" would be almost five thousand dollars. By adding more than two people directly below you, and continuing the pyramid indefinitely, you could conceivably build an enormous income.
At the time that plan was presented to me, I was just young enough and just stupid enough to have been impressed. However, by the Grace of God, somehow, I resisted. Even though it seemed to me to be a good way to make some extra cash, I realized even then that this whole idea had some problems – problems which I was not altogether ready to deal with.
First among these was that the "shopping network" you were buying into seemed to me to be entirely secondary. The primary concern was having people below you send in their monthly fee, so that you could get your share of the cash. All this served to do was create a transfer of wealth from the lower levels to the higher levels. No wealth or anything of value was created, it was only transferred.
The second thing that concerned me was that I did not see how I could have any control over what was happening more than one or two levels removed from me. If I signed up two people, presumably I could stay in touch with them to try to ensure they sent their monthly fee in and recruited others. However, at that ninth level, containing five hundred twelve people, I would have absolutely no control. I would not know any of those people or anything about them. I would only know how relatively full my "pyramid" was based on the size of my check each month.
Given this, if someone several levels below me started "stalling" the progress, this eventually could work its way back up to me, where even those one or two levels below me were no longer propagating the system. This is always a problem with pyramid schemes. Once the progress slows to a certain point, the people at the bottom start backing out. Those immediately above them would then be at the bottom and they would have to go out and recruit all over again, or get out themselves. This could eventually reach all the way back to the top of the pyramid, thereby collapsing it.
However, those who had been at or near the top of the pyramid, most likely would obtain some substantial sums of money, while those at the bottom worked at trying to recruit people and likely got little or nothing in return. The whole system really served as a vehicle for those at the top to siphon money off of those at the bottom.
Fortunately, I did not sign on to that first exposure to multi-level marketing. However, a couple of years later, I was approached by a well known company which markets household supplies through a multi level marketing business plan. I will refrain from naming the company specifically, but, suffice it to say, they bill themselves as working in a manner consistent with "the American Way." This exposure came when a former classmate of mine called informing me that she and her husband were trying to build a business, and she wondered if I would be interested in hearing about it. Always looking for a way to achieve greater financial security, I agreed.
"The first thing I will do," she continued, "is send you a tape outlining the business idea. After hearing it, call me and if you are interested, I will come to your house, fill you in on the details, and sign you up if you desire."
Within a few days, I received a cassette tape in the mail. At the first opportunity, I listened to the tape, not knowing what to expect. As it turns out, this tape told me absolutely nothing about what the business was, what product or service it involved, how it operated, what would be expected out of me, or any other pertinent information I had been led to believe it would contain. Instead, the tape was made up solely of one speaker after another, recorded at some sort of rally, going on endlessly about how much money they had made in "this business."
"I was the leading neurosurgeon in a large city," one man began. "I made over four hundred fifty thousand dollars per year. But, I never had anything until I got involved in this business." (Of course, I could only think what a horrid money manager this guy must be!) "Since being in this business, I have started making real money (as if $450K isn't real money!) and now have a huge house, drive a different car everyday of the week, etc. etc. blah blah blah."
The only hint in any of this about who or what this business was came from a passing comment one of the speakers made about making all these gobs of money "selling soap." That gave me a clue as to what company this was, but I still did not know for sure.
Within a few days, the former classmate came into my home to present the program to me. "Do you have any questions after listening to the tape?" she asked.
"Only one," I responded. "Tell me, specifically, what this business is, how it works, and how I go about making money in it." I was still young and naïve, but, fortunately, I am an overly cautious person by nature, and thus far was unimpressed with all these tales of the huge sums of money to be made in this business.
"Ok, let me explain it to you." She then went on to confirm my suspicion about which company this was. But to me, that company was a name only, and I really didn't know that much about it. As she presented the "business plan", to use the term loosely, all I remember was some scribbling on a piece of paper which included a bunch of circles, representing all those people I would help recruit, and big dollars which I would most assuredly make if I signed on. I'll never forget her asking, "Now, can you think of any possible reason why you couldn't just 'wear this business out'?"
I was dumbfounded. I did not know what to say. I could think of lots of reasons, not the least of which was, I still had not a clue how the business worked. So, I asked her again the same question I started with. "Exactly how does this work and what is the mechanism by which I can make money?"
"Well, I'll tell you what", she responded. "Let me leave you a couple more tapes to listen to. I'll come back in a week or so after you listen to these tapes, and we can talk further. These tapes will answer any questions you may have." (It seemed we were going in circles to me.) But, I reluctantly agreed to listen to the tapes, eagerly hoping to find out more specifically how this system worked.
Well, I listened, and guess what? More of the same! Speech after speech lauding what huge sums of money the participants in this business make. At least with these tapes, (which I guess were "Round 2" for those who were not sold during "Round 1") they freely and openly mentioned the name and nature of the business. But, there were no specifics, other than the required work of recruiting everyone you could. The closest thing to an honest description, one which did not try to pass it off as a foolproof get rich quick scheme, was when one of the speakers indicated that to make money in this business, you (and likely your spouse) had to be willing to work six nights per week, for at least two years.
I really did not need to hear much more than that. Given the fact that I already had a full time job, was still not all that far removed from being a newlywed, had a young son, and a brand new daughter, we had no burning desire to spend six nights a week for two years on anything, regardless of the financial outcome. Some things, at least to us, were more important than money.
At any rate, within a week or so, she returned to my house and asked, once again, if I had any question. "Just the same one", I replied. "Exactly how does this work?"
After much more trivial conversation, she finally indicated that a regional meeting was upcoming, and perhaps I should attend. There, they would discuss in-depth how the business actually operates. "If you will just come to the meeting, you will learn what you need. Then, I am sure you will want to join." This whole ordeal started sounding like a broken record to me.
So, my wife and I went to the meeting. The crowd there reminded me of a cross between a high school pep rally and a Pentecostal Church. There was much shouting and clapping and hooting and hollering. Since my wife an I are basically quiet, private people who rarely, if ever, make a public showing of emotion, this caught us entirely off guard. The first thing they did was ask us to all stand up and cheer. At the urging of our host (my old schoolmate) we were seated on the front row. I did not fill entirely comfortable standing and cheering, but also felt weird just sitting there while everyone around me were carrying on like nobody's business.
They had brought in one a young couple who were like the people on the tapes who had gotten rich from this business. Just for starters, I found it interesting that of the hundreds of people there from our area, and probably hundreds more in our area who were not present, they had to bring someone in from outside who had gotten rich enough to lead the pep rally.
During the course of the event, an interesting thing occurred. They split the women and men apart. The women went to one room while the men remained in another. The male member of the rich couple led the all-male meeting, while the female led the ladies. I have to wonder if this was some sort of divide and conquer technique. That is, the thought seemed to be if they could use a method on the females which might appeal to them, and another method on the males which might appeal to them, then perhaps they stood a better chance of convincing at least one of them to join the group if they hadn't already, or to remain in the group if they were already in but having doubts. By convincing one, perhaps they both would join or continue,
Well, this thing drug on for what seemed like hours. I kept waiting and waiting for that promised part where the business plan would be explained in detail to me. However, yet again, it was not to be. Instead, most of the meeting focused on how to get people to sign up without actually filling in the details. "Just keep showing them the circles and the dollar signs. When they ask for more information, give them more of the tapes", etc. In short, my friend was simply doing what she had been trained to do. Mislead, confuse, or whatever, but just keep waiving the money in front of the people and sooner or later they will sign up.
Well, this meeting was my last exposure for that round. It was not over until nearly midnight, far later than we had told our babysitter. My "friend" could tell I was visibly angered by the whole thing, and she never contacted me about it again, except in a panic trying to get me to send her the tapes back. I kept them for "payment."
That would have been the last of my exposure to these businesses except that later, some family members became involved in a computer version of the same business plan. Skeptical, but always willing to listen, I went to their house for a presentation. As I listened, the plan sounded vaguely familiar to me. Pressing the point, I was able to find out that this was simply the updated, computerized version of that same plan based loosely on "the American Way."
As he presented this foolproof method of making money, he, like my classmate before him, laid out a series of circles, representing the recruits I would go out and get below me, and a series of seemingly baseless numbers indicating the riches I would receive for so doing. Upon completing his presentation, I told him I could save him a lot of trouble if he would just simply tell me how the system actually worked. He said he would, but, somehow I felt that I still left empty of the knowledge I was seeking.
As I lie awake that night pondering these things, I began to put myself mentally into the position of facing my family and friends and presenting this plan to them. If I were to get involved, I would absolutely have to do some fairly serious recruiting. Of course, I felt that to do it correctly, and to do it in the only way I would feel comfortable doing it, I would not just indiscriminately propose it to all who would listen. I would choose only those who I thought would take it seriously, and pursue it diligently. Naturally, those same people would also be the ones who would be skeptical about any plan claiming to provide an almost endless source of riches. On top of that, these people, whom I was now making a mental list of, would be only those honest and above board types who would not become involved in anything remotely underhanded. This is how it should be, of course.
But, thinking along those lines reinforced in my mind my need to totally understand how the system worked. I could not present it to them not understanding it myself. If they posed the difficult questions to me, I better well be able to provide honest and adequate answers. Better still, I should be able to present the plan in its entirety in such a way to begin with that leaves little left to the questioning of the potential recruits. If this plan is really an honest, ethical way of earning an income, I should be able to demonstrate that to them through my presentation. This, of course, would mean that I would have to present it in a way different from the way the company itself apparently trains its recruiters to do. That alone gave me pause for concern.
Realizing that I obviously wasn't going to get a straight answer from any of the people presenting the plan to me, I began simply to logically think through the plan as it was presented. The main points reiterated over and over by my presenter was that for this to work I would have to follow a threefold plan. First, I would have to do as much of my shopping as possible through the Internet site involved. Specifically, he mentioned household goods such as soaps, dish and clothes detergents, toilet paper, cereal, and a whole litany of other items. The service was not limited to these types of items, however. Apparently, nearly everything you would care to buy is available. But, it was interesting to me, and perhaps significant, that these items in particular were pushed.
While speaking of buying through this service, the recruiter was honest enough to indicate that the prices of these items was not always the cheapest. Pushing the point, it seemed to me that the truth of the matter was that these items were often actually overpriced. On top of that, there was the concern over shipping costs, as well as sales tax which was added, which oftentimes is not added to Internet commerce. Rest easy, we were told, your total shopping cost will likely still go down because you can avoid the temptation to "impulse buy" unnecessary items. Also, there is no cost associated with shopping around such as gas, wear and tear on your vehicle, and the use of your valuable time.
Well, that was little comfort to me, for impulse buying has never been a major problem. I will squeeze a penny until Lincoln grimaces. As for the costs associated with traveling to the store, I will be going to the grocery store anyway. I am sure that not all of my grocery needs would be met over the Internet. I don't know if items such as meats, eggs, cheese, milk, produce, or other things were available. However, even if they were, I don't like to buy these items sight unseen. So, there would be no savings associated with no longer traveling to the store.
As for the timesaving, I am sure it is a time consuming proposition to sort through the Internet sight and find all the various items one would need. The total amount of time spent shopping may go up or down slightly, but I don't know that the overall difference would be noticeable. Also, as far as other, non-household items, such as clothes, stereos, etc, I likewise would not buy those sight unseen. Therefore, I would have to still spend time shopping, then, leave the mall, come home, order them over the Internet (if I could find the same exact item I wanted), then purchase it at a total price which may be less, but very well may be more than I found it in a retail outlet. I was struggling seeing the advantage of this.
In the end, it seemed that locking myself down to shopping on this network would not always, or even usually, work to my favor as far as actual money spent. But, "changing the way you shop" to simply mindlessly using this service was the first, and strongest point which was reiterated over and over during the course of the presentation.
The second point of the plan which was stressed was to go out and tell others about the plan and convince them to do the same. Seeing as how I am struggling fiercely with the validity of step one, step two would be a near impossibility. How, or why, would I convince others to do what I was not convinced myself was a good thing? Would it be ethical? Could I do it while clearly telling them the parameters of what they were doing?
Step three was simply a further, more detailed application of step two. In step three, you would note those below you who seemed particularly successful at steps one and two, and work harder with them to teach them and counsel them to do even more. Step three, like step two, seems useless unless and until I can convince myself that step one, (narrowing all my shopping down to one source regardless of the price), would be beneficial. I could not find anything beneficial in that idea.
At this point, however, the obvious question arises: How do I actually make money doing this? The answer to that is not altogether simple, but will be covered here in two parts. First, remember that the goods purchased are at least sometimes of a higher price than those same items could be available for elsewhere. This fact was admitted to by all parties involved, and, the fact that sometimes this price was even significantly higher was admitted to as well. Again this is especially true when the added tax and shipping, where applicable, was added. Also, likely this is where the household item list comes in. Those household items are the things you would buy month in and month out. They are the items which the original company (the one promoting the "Amercian Way") produces and sells. These items are likely among the most overpriced items available through the system.
Now, I as an "owner" of this business which included all those who fell below me on my "pyramid" (yes, pyramids again!), would receive a cut of the money spent by those below me. The amount of this cut is unknown because it is not specifically dictated by the amount of money actually spent. The value depends on a complicated system of "point value" and "business volume." That is, someone buys an item costing a certain amount of money. That item has a point value assigned to it which is not directly tied to its cost. According to my recruiter, that point value is usually between two and three to one. That is, to receive one hundred points, someone would have to spend between two and three hundred dollars. For a given amount of "points" gathered during a month, a certain percentage of the "business volume" would be awarded.
That "business volume", like the point system, seemed to be a mysterious entity. It was not necessarily determined by the price of the item. Simply put, the combination of "point value" and "business volume" seemed to be related, as it must assuredly be, to the amount of profit margin in the given product. That is to say, the more overpriced the item was, (such as the household items offered) the more lucrative the combination of points and volume would become. In short, I receive money based on how much overpriced volume was purchased by me and those below me. In other words, money traveled "up the pyramid" from those who spent too much on items they could get for less elsewhere. It is indeed a "pyramid" where nothing of value is created, but, money is transferred from those below to those above. Just like my imaginary pyramid where I convince people to hand over their money to me, in this pyramid I do the same, only filtered through the sale of items which the consumer may be purchasing anyway, and could likely purchase at a lower price elsewhere.
This, however, raised another interesting problem in my mind. While this seemed incredibly "sneaky", it also seemed economically impossible. If someone twelve "generations" below me received a cut of what they purchased, and every "generation" above them including me and those fifteen or twenty generations above me, also received a percentage cut, it wouldn't take long to eat up all the profits from the sale of that item and then some. There is not an endless stream of money to be generated. There can not be, say, ten dollars of profit in an item, and thousands of dollars to be dispersed from this profit.
Well, further probing yielded the answer to this problem. You see, I get my cut of all those below me in my pyramid. If I have a large pyramid with a great volume, I may get a cut of thousands of dollars for that month. My percentage is based on the total point value and business volume of those below me. I, in turn, have to pay those below me their percentage cut as well.
As an example, let's say that I have a percentage level of twenty five percent, and my business volume is ten thousand dollars. I would then receive a "bonus check" for twenty five hundred dollars. But, then assume that my volume comes from four people who each have a volume of twenty-five hundred dollars and a cut of fifteen percent. I would then have to pay out fifteen percent to each of them, or a total of fifteen hundred dollars. Therefore, my net, would only be one thousand dollars. This fact is conveniently left out, or at least hidden very well, in the recruitment presentation. Whereas I may see my check as being for twenty five hundred dollars, my net business would only be one thousand dollars.
Of course, an added net income of one thousand dollars in a month is still good, right? But, how hard would I have to work, how many hours would I have to put in, convincing people to pay a higher price for goods against their better judgement, to get that type of return? In reality, it would be difficult to get ten people providing that kind of volume. Likely, for a long time, I would have few, if any, people with that kind of volume of sales. Therefore, my percentage would be much closer to the percentage I would have to pay out, and my net, would be much much smaller. Only after years of hard work could I possibly have enough people below me in my pyramid, spending more for the same goods, to receive any worthwhile income. And, as with all pyramids, at some point it will start stalling and collapsing as stated before. This does away with the notion, also presented in the recruitment information, that at some point I could stop working and simply continue to receive residual income at the same, or even ever increasing rates. The price of eternal income is eternal vigilance. I would have to continue to recruit, and ensure that those below me did the same to keep whatever income I did develop.
The end result of all this is as follows: For any given transaction, at most, twenty five percent of the "business volume" (whatever that might be) is generated to be dispersed amongst all the levels of a given pyramid. If the pyramid is one hundred generations big, those few dollars generated by the twenty five percent of the business volume is dispersed amongst those one hundred "companies." Depending on how that pyramid has progressed, there may even be those levels where the participant actually receives no net income for that purchase. At other levels, a fairly large percentage of this cut may be obtained. In general, however, it is at the upper levels that the most money is made. The net result is that for every purchase, a small amount of money built into the profit of the product is generated and transferred upward in the pyramid. If, in a given month, one hundred million dollars of "business volume" is sold, and twenty five percent is dispersed (and it will never be more), this will yield twenty five million dollars to be dispersed amongst the various levels of the pyramid. However, if the pyramid consists, in total, of one hundred thousand people (or "companies"), then, on average, each one would receive two hundred fifty dollars for that month. In reality, some few would receive substantially more, meaning the overwhelming majority would receive a mere pittance. The odds of becoming one of the small minority who do get filthy rich in this scheme are small, and require endless hours of hard work to convince others to purchase overpriced goods against their better judgment. Thanks, but no thanks.
Multi level marketing is a sneaky, un-American way to transfer wealth.
In the end, these multi-level marketing schemes are actually more heinous than the imaginary (and illegal) pyramid I started out talking about. At least in my imaginary system, the people would know up front exactly what they were getting into. They would know all the risks, and all the potentially unethical practices involved in this transfer of wealth from the lower levels to the higher. In this "business plan", all the dangers, pitfalls, and unethical practices are kept neatly hidden in a labyrinth of details, transfers, and the supposed legitimacy of pushing an actual, concrete product line. In reality, my imaginary system is far less unethical, and should come much closer to being legal, than the real life scams pushed by those claiming to be of "the American Way."
"The plan is simple", he says. "To start with, all you have to do is sign up and agree to send me one hundred dollars each month."
At this point, you obviously sense that things are not quite as they should be. "How can us sending you a hundred a month help us? If we all did it, that would be ten thousand dollars per month out of our hands, and into yours."
"Of course," he replies. "But, by joining up, you receive the right to do the same thing. You can try to recruit your friends and family and convince them to send you one hundred dollars per month as well. If you get a hundred of them, then you will receive ten thousand dollars per month, at the cost of only one hundred per month. Don't you see the beauty of this?"
The above would be an overly simple example of what is known as a pyramid scheme. Not surprisingly, as it is presented above, it is illegal. However, though filtered through an intricate array of products and services, when stripped down to their actual operating procedures, many, if not most, of the multi-level marketing plans which are out there are doing essentially the same thing. Not only that, they are doing it legally, and often they are created by supposedly Christian people, and put forth with an air of morality, helping others, and the "American Way."
However, they are not moral, they are not Christian, they are not ethical, they do not help others, and, if the American Way has to do with hard work and an honest livelihood, they certainly do not represent that, either.
Let me give you a little history. Some years ago I was approached by a friend, who had a sister, who had a boyfriend, who was involved in some sort of multi level scheme. This plan, as I remember it, involved a shopping service where one could buy apparently anything he wanted, and at an attractive price. In order to have access to that service, one would have to pay a moderate monthly fee into the system. He then would go out and convince others to come in below him and do the same thing. As an individual built his or her "pyramid", he would "earn" a certain percentage of the monthly fee from certain of the levels below them. I do not remember the exact numbers on how this system worked. However, what I do remember was that, based on recruiting (or is it conning?) two people to come in below you, and both of them convincing two people to do the same, and this trend continuing until you had nine levels in the pyramid below you (the ninth level would contain 512 people) your monthly "income" would be almost five thousand dollars. By adding more than two people directly below you, and continuing the pyramid indefinitely, you could conceivably build an enormous income.
At the time that plan was presented to me, I was just young enough and just stupid enough to have been impressed. However, by the Grace of God, somehow, I resisted. Even though it seemed to me to be a good way to make some extra cash, I realized even then that this whole idea had some problems – problems which I was not altogether ready to deal with.
First among these was that the "shopping network" you were buying into seemed to me to be entirely secondary. The primary concern was having people below you send in their monthly fee, so that you could get your share of the cash. All this served to do was create a transfer of wealth from the lower levels to the higher levels. No wealth or anything of value was created, it was only transferred.
The second thing that concerned me was that I did not see how I could have any control over what was happening more than one or two levels removed from me. If I signed up two people, presumably I could stay in touch with them to try to ensure they sent their monthly fee in and recruited others. However, at that ninth level, containing five hundred twelve people, I would have absolutely no control. I would not know any of those people or anything about them. I would only know how relatively full my "pyramid" was based on the size of my check each month.
Given this, if someone several levels below me started "stalling" the progress, this eventually could work its way back up to me, where even those one or two levels below me were no longer propagating the system. This is always a problem with pyramid schemes. Once the progress slows to a certain point, the people at the bottom start backing out. Those immediately above them would then be at the bottom and they would have to go out and recruit all over again, or get out themselves. This could eventually reach all the way back to the top of the pyramid, thereby collapsing it.
However, those who had been at or near the top of the pyramid, most likely would obtain some substantial sums of money, while those at the bottom worked at trying to recruit people and likely got little or nothing in return. The whole system really served as a vehicle for those at the top to siphon money off of those at the bottom.
Fortunately, I did not sign on to that first exposure to multi-level marketing. However, a couple of years later, I was approached by a well known company which markets household supplies through a multi level marketing business plan. I will refrain from naming the company specifically, but, suffice it to say, they bill themselves as working in a manner consistent with "the American Way." This exposure came when a former classmate of mine called informing me that she and her husband were trying to build a business, and she wondered if I would be interested in hearing about it. Always looking for a way to achieve greater financial security, I agreed.
"The first thing I will do," she continued, "is send you a tape outlining the business idea. After hearing it, call me and if you are interested, I will come to your house, fill you in on the details, and sign you up if you desire."
Within a few days, I received a cassette tape in the mail. At the first opportunity, I listened to the tape, not knowing what to expect. As it turns out, this tape told me absolutely nothing about what the business was, what product or service it involved, how it operated, what would be expected out of me, or any other pertinent information I had been led to believe it would contain. Instead, the tape was made up solely of one speaker after another, recorded at some sort of rally, going on endlessly about how much money they had made in "this business."
"I was the leading neurosurgeon in a large city," one man began. "I made over four hundred fifty thousand dollars per year. But, I never had anything until I got involved in this business." (Of course, I could only think what a horrid money manager this guy must be!) "Since being in this business, I have started making real money (as if $450K isn't real money!) and now have a huge house, drive a different car everyday of the week, etc. etc. blah blah blah."
The only hint in any of this about who or what this business was came from a passing comment one of the speakers made about making all these gobs of money "selling soap." That gave me a clue as to what company this was, but I still did not know for sure.
Within a few days, the former classmate came into my home to present the program to me. "Do you have any questions after listening to the tape?" she asked.
"Only one," I responded. "Tell me, specifically, what this business is, how it works, and how I go about making money in it." I was still young and naïve, but, fortunately, I am an overly cautious person by nature, and thus far was unimpressed with all these tales of the huge sums of money to be made in this business.
"Ok, let me explain it to you." She then went on to confirm my suspicion about which company this was. But to me, that company was a name only, and I really didn't know that much about it. As she presented the "business plan", to use the term loosely, all I remember was some scribbling on a piece of paper which included a bunch of circles, representing all those people I would help recruit, and big dollars which I would most assuredly make if I signed on. I'll never forget her asking, "Now, can you think of any possible reason why you couldn't just 'wear this business out'?"
I was dumbfounded. I did not know what to say. I could think of lots of reasons, not the least of which was, I still had not a clue how the business worked. So, I asked her again the same question I started with. "Exactly how does this work and what is the mechanism by which I can make money?"
"Well, I'll tell you what", she responded. "Let me leave you a couple more tapes to listen to. I'll come back in a week or so after you listen to these tapes, and we can talk further. These tapes will answer any questions you may have." (It seemed we were going in circles to me.) But, I reluctantly agreed to listen to the tapes, eagerly hoping to find out more specifically how this system worked.
Well, I listened, and guess what? More of the same! Speech after speech lauding what huge sums of money the participants in this business make. At least with these tapes, (which I guess were "Round 2" for those who were not sold during "Round 1") they freely and openly mentioned the name and nature of the business. But, there were no specifics, other than the required work of recruiting everyone you could. The closest thing to an honest description, one which did not try to pass it off as a foolproof get rich quick scheme, was when one of the speakers indicated that to make money in this business, you (and likely your spouse) had to be willing to work six nights per week, for at least two years.
I really did not need to hear much more than that. Given the fact that I already had a full time job, was still not all that far removed from being a newlywed, had a young son, and a brand new daughter, we had no burning desire to spend six nights a week for two years on anything, regardless of the financial outcome. Some things, at least to us, were more important than money.
At any rate, within a week or so, she returned to my house and asked, once again, if I had any question. "Just the same one", I replied. "Exactly how does this work?"
After much more trivial conversation, she finally indicated that a regional meeting was upcoming, and perhaps I should attend. There, they would discuss in-depth how the business actually operates. "If you will just come to the meeting, you will learn what you need. Then, I am sure you will want to join." This whole ordeal started sounding like a broken record to me.
So, my wife and I went to the meeting. The crowd there reminded me of a cross between a high school pep rally and a Pentecostal Church. There was much shouting and clapping and hooting and hollering. Since my wife an I are basically quiet, private people who rarely, if ever, make a public showing of emotion, this caught us entirely off guard. The first thing they did was ask us to all stand up and cheer. At the urging of our host (my old schoolmate) we were seated on the front row. I did not fill entirely comfortable standing and cheering, but also felt weird just sitting there while everyone around me were carrying on like nobody's business.
They had brought in one a young couple who were like the people on the tapes who had gotten rich from this business. Just for starters, I found it interesting that of the hundreds of people there from our area, and probably hundreds more in our area who were not present, they had to bring someone in from outside who had gotten rich enough to lead the pep rally.
During the course of the event, an interesting thing occurred. They split the women and men apart. The women went to one room while the men remained in another. The male member of the rich couple led the all-male meeting, while the female led the ladies. I have to wonder if this was some sort of divide and conquer technique. That is, the thought seemed to be if they could use a method on the females which might appeal to them, and another method on the males which might appeal to them, then perhaps they stood a better chance of convincing at least one of them to join the group if they hadn't already, or to remain in the group if they were already in but having doubts. By convincing one, perhaps they both would join or continue,
Well, this thing drug on for what seemed like hours. I kept waiting and waiting for that promised part where the business plan would be explained in detail to me. However, yet again, it was not to be. Instead, most of the meeting focused on how to get people to sign up without actually filling in the details. "Just keep showing them the circles and the dollar signs. When they ask for more information, give them more of the tapes", etc. In short, my friend was simply doing what she had been trained to do. Mislead, confuse, or whatever, but just keep waiving the money in front of the people and sooner or later they will sign up.
Well, this meeting was my last exposure for that round. It was not over until nearly midnight, far later than we had told our babysitter. My "friend" could tell I was visibly angered by the whole thing, and she never contacted me about it again, except in a panic trying to get me to send her the tapes back. I kept them for "payment."
That would have been the last of my exposure to these businesses except that later, some family members became involved in a computer version of the same business plan. Skeptical, but always willing to listen, I went to their house for a presentation. As I listened, the plan sounded vaguely familiar to me. Pressing the point, I was able to find out that this was simply the updated, computerized version of that same plan based loosely on "the American Way."
As he presented this foolproof method of making money, he, like my classmate before him, laid out a series of circles, representing the recruits I would go out and get below me, and a series of seemingly baseless numbers indicating the riches I would receive for so doing. Upon completing his presentation, I told him I could save him a lot of trouble if he would just simply tell me how the system actually worked. He said he would, but, somehow I felt that I still left empty of the knowledge I was seeking.
As I lie awake that night pondering these things, I began to put myself mentally into the position of facing my family and friends and presenting this plan to them. If I were to get involved, I would absolutely have to do some fairly serious recruiting. Of course, I felt that to do it correctly, and to do it in the only way I would feel comfortable doing it, I would not just indiscriminately propose it to all who would listen. I would choose only those who I thought would take it seriously, and pursue it diligently. Naturally, those same people would also be the ones who would be skeptical about any plan claiming to provide an almost endless source of riches. On top of that, these people, whom I was now making a mental list of, would be only those honest and above board types who would not become involved in anything remotely underhanded. This is how it should be, of course.
But, thinking along those lines reinforced in my mind my need to totally understand how the system worked. I could not present it to them not understanding it myself. If they posed the difficult questions to me, I better well be able to provide honest and adequate answers. Better still, I should be able to present the plan in its entirety in such a way to begin with that leaves little left to the questioning of the potential recruits. If this plan is really an honest, ethical way of earning an income, I should be able to demonstrate that to them through my presentation. This, of course, would mean that I would have to present it in a way different from the way the company itself apparently trains its recruiters to do. That alone gave me pause for concern.
Realizing that I obviously wasn't going to get a straight answer from any of the people presenting the plan to me, I began simply to logically think through the plan as it was presented. The main points reiterated over and over by my presenter was that for this to work I would have to follow a threefold plan. First, I would have to do as much of my shopping as possible through the Internet site involved. Specifically, he mentioned household goods such as soaps, dish and clothes detergents, toilet paper, cereal, and a whole litany of other items. The service was not limited to these types of items, however. Apparently, nearly everything you would care to buy is available. But, it was interesting to me, and perhaps significant, that these items in particular were pushed.
While speaking of buying through this service, the recruiter was honest enough to indicate that the prices of these items was not always the cheapest. Pushing the point, it seemed to me that the truth of the matter was that these items were often actually overpriced. On top of that, there was the concern over shipping costs, as well as sales tax which was added, which oftentimes is not added to Internet commerce. Rest easy, we were told, your total shopping cost will likely still go down because you can avoid the temptation to "impulse buy" unnecessary items. Also, there is no cost associated with shopping around such as gas, wear and tear on your vehicle, and the use of your valuable time.
Well, that was little comfort to me, for impulse buying has never been a major problem. I will squeeze a penny until Lincoln grimaces. As for the costs associated with traveling to the store, I will be going to the grocery store anyway. I am sure that not all of my grocery needs would be met over the Internet. I don't know if items such as meats, eggs, cheese, milk, produce, or other things were available. However, even if they were, I don't like to buy these items sight unseen. So, there would be no savings associated with no longer traveling to the store.
As for the timesaving, I am sure it is a time consuming proposition to sort through the Internet sight and find all the various items one would need. The total amount of time spent shopping may go up or down slightly, but I don't know that the overall difference would be noticeable. Also, as far as other, non-household items, such as clothes, stereos, etc, I likewise would not buy those sight unseen. Therefore, I would have to still spend time shopping, then, leave the mall, come home, order them over the Internet (if I could find the same exact item I wanted), then purchase it at a total price which may be less, but very well may be more than I found it in a retail outlet. I was struggling seeing the advantage of this.
In the end, it seemed that locking myself down to shopping on this network would not always, or even usually, work to my favor as far as actual money spent. But, "changing the way you shop" to simply mindlessly using this service was the first, and strongest point which was reiterated over and over during the course of the presentation.
The second point of the plan which was stressed was to go out and tell others about the plan and convince them to do the same. Seeing as how I am struggling fiercely with the validity of step one, step two would be a near impossibility. How, or why, would I convince others to do what I was not convinced myself was a good thing? Would it be ethical? Could I do it while clearly telling them the parameters of what they were doing?
Step three was simply a further, more detailed application of step two. In step three, you would note those below you who seemed particularly successful at steps one and two, and work harder with them to teach them and counsel them to do even more. Step three, like step two, seems useless unless and until I can convince myself that step one, (narrowing all my shopping down to one source regardless of the price), would be beneficial. I could not find anything beneficial in that idea.
At this point, however, the obvious question arises: How do I actually make money doing this? The answer to that is not altogether simple, but will be covered here in two parts. First, remember that the goods purchased are at least sometimes of a higher price than those same items could be available for elsewhere. This fact was admitted to by all parties involved, and, the fact that sometimes this price was even significantly higher was admitted to as well. Again this is especially true when the added tax and shipping, where applicable, was added. Also, likely this is where the household item list comes in. Those household items are the things you would buy month in and month out. They are the items which the original company (the one promoting the "Amercian Way") produces and sells. These items are likely among the most overpriced items available through the system.
Now, I as an "owner" of this business which included all those who fell below me on my "pyramid" (yes, pyramids again!), would receive a cut of the money spent by those below me. The amount of this cut is unknown because it is not specifically dictated by the amount of money actually spent. The value depends on a complicated system of "point value" and "business volume." That is, someone buys an item costing a certain amount of money. That item has a point value assigned to it which is not directly tied to its cost. According to my recruiter, that point value is usually between two and three to one. That is, to receive one hundred points, someone would have to spend between two and three hundred dollars. For a given amount of "points" gathered during a month, a certain percentage of the "business volume" would be awarded.
That "business volume", like the point system, seemed to be a mysterious entity. It was not necessarily determined by the price of the item. Simply put, the combination of "point value" and "business volume" seemed to be related, as it must assuredly be, to the amount of profit margin in the given product. That is to say, the more overpriced the item was, (such as the household items offered) the more lucrative the combination of points and volume would become. In short, I receive money based on how much overpriced volume was purchased by me and those below me. In other words, money traveled "up the pyramid" from those who spent too much on items they could get for less elsewhere. It is indeed a "pyramid" where nothing of value is created, but, money is transferred from those below to those above. Just like my imaginary pyramid where I convince people to hand over their money to me, in this pyramid I do the same, only filtered through the sale of items which the consumer may be purchasing anyway, and could likely purchase at a lower price elsewhere.
This, however, raised another interesting problem in my mind. While this seemed incredibly "sneaky", it also seemed economically impossible. If someone twelve "generations" below me received a cut of what they purchased, and every "generation" above them including me and those fifteen or twenty generations above me, also received a percentage cut, it wouldn't take long to eat up all the profits from the sale of that item and then some. There is not an endless stream of money to be generated. There can not be, say, ten dollars of profit in an item, and thousands of dollars to be dispersed from this profit.
Well, further probing yielded the answer to this problem. You see, I get my cut of all those below me in my pyramid. If I have a large pyramid with a great volume, I may get a cut of thousands of dollars for that month. My percentage is based on the total point value and business volume of those below me. I, in turn, have to pay those below me their percentage cut as well.
As an example, let's say that I have a percentage level of twenty five percent, and my business volume is ten thousand dollars. I would then receive a "bonus check" for twenty five hundred dollars. But, then assume that my volume comes from four people who each have a volume of twenty-five hundred dollars and a cut of fifteen percent. I would then have to pay out fifteen percent to each of them, or a total of fifteen hundred dollars. Therefore, my net, would only be one thousand dollars. This fact is conveniently left out, or at least hidden very well, in the recruitment presentation. Whereas I may see my check as being for twenty five hundred dollars, my net business would only be one thousand dollars.
Of course, an added net income of one thousand dollars in a month is still good, right? But, how hard would I have to work, how many hours would I have to put in, convincing people to pay a higher price for goods against their better judgement, to get that type of return? In reality, it would be difficult to get ten people providing that kind of volume. Likely, for a long time, I would have few, if any, people with that kind of volume of sales. Therefore, my percentage would be much closer to the percentage I would have to pay out, and my net, would be much much smaller. Only after years of hard work could I possibly have enough people below me in my pyramid, spending more for the same goods, to receive any worthwhile income. And, as with all pyramids, at some point it will start stalling and collapsing as stated before. This does away with the notion, also presented in the recruitment information, that at some point I could stop working and simply continue to receive residual income at the same, or even ever increasing rates. The price of eternal income is eternal vigilance. I would have to continue to recruit, and ensure that those below me did the same to keep whatever income I did develop.
The end result of all this is as follows: For any given transaction, at most, twenty five percent of the "business volume" (whatever that might be) is generated to be dispersed amongst all the levels of a given pyramid. If the pyramid is one hundred generations big, those few dollars generated by the twenty five percent of the business volume is dispersed amongst those one hundred "companies." Depending on how that pyramid has progressed, there may even be those levels where the participant actually receives no net income for that purchase. At other levels, a fairly large percentage of this cut may be obtained. In general, however, it is at the upper levels that the most money is made. The net result is that for every purchase, a small amount of money built into the profit of the product is generated and transferred upward in the pyramid. If, in a given month, one hundred million dollars of "business volume" is sold, and twenty five percent is dispersed (and it will never be more), this will yield twenty five million dollars to be dispersed amongst the various levels of the pyramid. However, if the pyramid consists, in total, of one hundred thousand people (or "companies"), then, on average, each one would receive two hundred fifty dollars for that month. In reality, some few would receive substantially more, meaning the overwhelming majority would receive a mere pittance. The odds of becoming one of the small minority who do get filthy rich in this scheme are small, and require endless hours of hard work to convince others to purchase overpriced goods against their better judgment. Thanks, but no thanks.
Multi level marketing is a sneaky, un-American way to transfer wealth.
In the end, these multi-level marketing schemes are actually more heinous than the imaginary (and illegal) pyramid I started out talking about. At least in my imaginary system, the people would know up front exactly what they were getting into. They would know all the risks, and all the potentially unethical practices involved in this transfer of wealth from the lower levels to the higher. In this "business plan", all the dangers, pitfalls, and unethical practices are kept neatly hidden in a labyrinth of details, transfers, and the supposed legitimacy of pushing an actual, concrete product line. In reality, my imaginary system is far less unethical, and should come much closer to being legal, than the real life scams pushed by those claiming to be of "the American Way."
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
Okay, two quick questions
If anyone is out there....How do I...
...show only the first couple of lines of my post with a 'read more' tag on it? I tried to look this up on "Help" but the only thing I found was too complicated for a computer dummy like me.
...add a musical background to my page?
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
J
...show only the first couple of lines of my post with a 'read more' tag on it? I tried to look this up on "Help" but the only thing I found was too complicated for a computer dummy like me.
...add a musical background to my page?
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
J
Just a Note
I am just starting this blog today, but I am posting stuff I have written over the past several years. So, if some of this below or above seems dated, this would be why!
The Church and Politics
In This Election Season, the Church Would Do Well to Recall Its Mandate.
These questions can and should be asked: How are we, the Church, to address the very real social evils of the day? What part does the political process play in this and what part does the Church play in the political process? Should we, the Church, openly and vocally get behind the major party candidate who comes closest to the biblical ideals concerning the place of government in his stated positions?[i] Should we recognize and accept that more often than not (particularly on the state and national levels) the major party candidates (even the ones who are professed Christians) do not hold to Biblical ideals about government? If we reach that conclusion, should we then vote for a little known third party or independent candidate who does hold to a Biblical view of Government?[ii]
Should we, the Church, choose particularly Biblical issues such as abortion, homosexual marriage, and/or some other such moral issue, then use these as litmus tests for choosing candidates? That is, should we say, “Candidate ‘A’ is far from perfect, but at least he has stated a strong pro-life position. Therefore, I’ll vote for him even though his positions on other, not so obviously moral, government related issues may not be Biblical?” Or, should we consider a candidate who may not be quite as vocal as we would like on these moral issues, but who lines up with what we perceive to be the overall biblical concept of civil government – whatever that may be? Should we vote for the person who professes most convincingly to be a believer, or for the candidate whose platform is closer to our concept of the Biblical ideal of government, regardless of whether or not that particular candidate is a believer?
In short, what is the Church’s responsibility concerning the election of the civil magistrate and the passage or repeal of civil laws?
These are tough questions. Without at all being politically partisan, I can give several examples of how these questions can cause distress amongst well meaning Christians. For instance, some Christians may (rightly or wrongly) believe that the Bible presents a picture of a righteous government as being one that is first and foremost limited in its scope. This person would be for the scaling back, or the complete removal, of countless government programs and regulations, and the requisite scaling back and simplification of the collection of taxes. It is highly doubtful that this person would vote for a candidate from the Democratic Party. However, this person may also strongly believe that the Republican Party, for all its limited government rhetoric, does not live up to these ideals much, if any, better than the Democratic Party. A third party, such as the Libertarian Party may most closely line up with this concept, i.e. small, limited, and heavily guarded government and much lower taxes along with a much simpler tax collection system. However, more often than not, the Libertarian candidate is not a Christian, or if he is, he does not make any public issue of this fact at all. On top of that, Libertarian Candidates often are very much bent toward a secular idea of “individual liberty” such that in the name of individual “liberty”, they will overtly support such individual “rights” as abortion, and homosexual union. Therefore, what is this Christian to do?
Still other Christians may (rightly or wrongly) believe that the Biblical precepts, repeated in both the Old and New Testaments, regarding the poor and oppressed necessarily mean that the government should take an active role in providing for the poor, and freeing the oppressed, and that limited government is therefore not doing its Biblical duty.[iii] The Biblical duty of government would include not only social programs such as Welfare, Medicare, and Social Security, but also increased funding for public schools, foreign aid, and government works projects may be seen as a vitally important and Biblical function of government. This person is very unlikely to vote for a Republican candidate, and most surely would not cast a vote for the Libertarian candidate. But, when he looks to the Democratic candidate, he will again face the likelihood of voting for a candidate who is a vocal supporter of such things as abortion “rights” or homosexual “union.” Again, what is this Christian to do?
Aside from these issues, what is the Biblical view of such issues as gun control? Throw that issue into the mix, along with the mixed views individual Christians, congregations, and denominations have concerning this and the other issues listed above, and how can the church ever reach a consensus on what it should be doing in the political process?
Even aside from voting, what are Christians, individually and corporately to do? Should they devote time to the Pro-Life movement to help protect the unborn? Should they fight to keep the institution of marriage sacred? Should they be involved in charity work, helping their neighbors and others throughout the nation and world? Should they be actively involved, apart from simply voting, in the creation of more Biblical governmental structures, whatever they may feel they are? How do they handle their differences with fellow Christians?[iv]
I submit that all these questions are in fact important, and at some level, the Church should certainly be involved in addressing them. However, I would also submit emphatically that these are second order questions. That is, while vitally important, and sinful to neglect, these are not the primary issues facing the Church today, or any day. The Church’s primary duty is to be the Church. As Dr. Peter Leithart[v] has pointed out in numerous places before, the Church should be involved politically, but the most politically effective thing the Church can do is to be the Church.
But, what does it mean for the Church to be the Church? We can answer this in one word. However, in “unpacking” that one word, we will discover a whole set of positive outcomes. That one word is “Worship.” The first and the last order of business for the Church, the Alpha and Omega if you will, is to Worship in spirit and in truth the Triune God who is the Creator and Sustainer of all that ever has been or ever will be. In thinking through what this means, we can isolate several specific issues that the Church must address in its corporate worship.
First of all, all worship of a Holy, Righteous, and Just God by sinful men must start with confession of sin and repentance. How can the Church expect to make a difference in the fallen world around them, when it is itself spotted from head to toe with the stain of sin? The first order of business in the worshipping Church is to come humbly before the Throne of God, confessing and forsaking its sins, and to seek the forgiveness that can only come from leaning wholly on the finished work of Christ. If there is no repentance, there can be no progress anywhere else. If the Church chooses to “confess” to some generic god, absent the workings of each member of the Trinity, then there is no true repentance. If the Church relies on anything save the Blood of Christ for forgiveness, then nothing at all is really accomplished. Individual repentance on a daily basis is absolutely necessary. Corporate repentance on a weekly basis is just as necessary. As in all of these issues, as we will see, faith is key. When we faithfully repent, seeking grace solely through the Blood of Christ, God is faithful and just to forgive us. True repentance and confession necessarily brings true forgiveness and peace with God. A confessing Church is a forgiven, cleansed Church. A forgiven, cleansed Church, is a vital, living, and effective Church. A vital, living, and effective Church is a Church that is capable of bringing the nations to it, and making the kingdoms of this world become the Kingdoms of Our God and His Christ. Already we see that the most politically effective thing the Church can do is to be the Church!
Second, the Church, as an institution, must proclaim the whole Word of God. And the Church, as the body of all believers, must listen and obey. The Word of God brings encouragement, love, forgiveness, blessings, and eternal life. It also brings discipline, fear, threats, curses, and eternal punishment. Emphasizing one at the expense of the other brings dangerous results. The Church then also must be willing to proclaim the whole counsel of God to the world around it. Again, this will bring either salvation and blessing, or it will add to the guilt of the sinful world, bringing condemnation. A Church that does not proclaim the whole Word of God, both inside and outside of its four walls, is itself in danger of falling away.
Third, in worshipping the Lord, the Church must keep His memorial. That is, a frequent and hardy celebration of the Lord’s Supper is not some optional, add-on, empty, ritual, but is in fact the very partaking of the Body and the Blood of Christ Himself by the Power of the Holy Spirit. In the Supper, not only do we remember what Christ has done for us (although we certainly do so), but in our partaking of the Supper, God remembers His Covenant with His People in Christ. Just as when God sees the rainbow, He remembers His covenant with all mankind, in the Supper, he remembers that the death of His Son was to purchase a people, a Church. God has vindicated and justified His Son through His resurrection and ascension. He will also vindicate and justify those who are united to Christ. And who are those who are united to Christ? They are precisely those who are worthy partakers of His Body and Blood. In this meal, God feeds and nourishes us, refreshes us, strengthens us, cheers us, and renews us to go back out into the world as his Ambassadors. In this meal, we, His Church, are lifted up into the heavenlies to be fed the true Bread of Heaven. The Church neglects this gift of God to its own demise. Why would we neglect such wonderful blessings? The Church, when it seeks to change the world through its “knowledge of good and evil” (e.g. the political process) without first communing with God and being fed from the Tree of Life, commits the sin of Adam over and over again. And we wonder why we are not more effective than we are!
As with the Word, however, we must also remember that the Cup of Blessing can be a Cup of Condemnation. Word and Sacrament should combine to make clear that only those who truly have faith are worthy partakers of this gift of God. Teaching the whole counsel of God means putting faith – a living, breathing, working, fruit-bearing, persevering faith – at the forefront. The Church should make clear that partaking in this wonderful event is not some magical blessing unto itself. It is a blessing, a wonderful blessing, to those united to Christ in Faith. Partaking of the Supper outside of Faith never saved anyone. In fact, it brings damnation. However, no one who has true faith should ever willfully neglect this celebration.
As celebration of this offering of Christ to us is a Thanksgiving meal (Eucharist), we should bring our offerings of thanksgiving to God. So a fourth item of worship is our offering. We bring our firstfruits to show our thankfulness and our utter dependence on the Creator and Ruler of the universe. We would not have anything that we have, unless God gave it to us. When we do not recognize this, we do not bring any fruit of our labor to Him – or we bring them reluctantly, absent of true faith and thanksgiving.. When we do recognize this, we gladly bring a portion of our fruit, showing our thankfulness and our reliance on the God who provides. Offerings are a vital part of worship. Again, faith is at issue here. Those who bring an offering outside of faith, are bringing only filthy rags and are of no use. Those who teach that bringing monetary gifts to God necessarily yields greater monetary gifts to the giver are totally missing the point. We already have untold riches in Christ. We have the infinite gift of eternal life in Christ. Our offering is simply our acknowledgement of this fact.
Worship as a whole renews us. Confession, repentance, and the reception of forgiveness from God renews us. Hearing commands, promises, and threats of sanction from God renews us. Celebrating the Supper of the Lord renews us. Recognizing our gifts from God and our dependence on God by bringing our offering renews us. After such renewal, we are fit to go back into the world and be ambassadors of the Most High King. Therefore, a sending out with blessings is also an important part of worship. The Church gathers corporately to commune with and worship God, and is therefore renewed to perform the work of dominion that God has given us as individuals, families, and societies. Here we see again the connection to politics. It is only a renewed people who can renew the form and structure of our civil government and to bring it, along with every other area of life, into captivity to the Word of God. When the Church tries to make changes in the world, while neglecting its first priority, only catastrophe can occur. The sad state of worship in the modern American Church along with the sad state of our current political affairs is really all the proof any Christian should need.
Peripherally, there are other aspects of the Church being the Church that should come out of our renewed interest in worship. First of all, as we are renewed every step of the way through our worship (confession/forgiveness, instruction, feasting/offering, sending out) we should more and more see our utter hopelessness without God. Conversely, we find that we are more than conquerors with Him and in Him. This should set our whole mindset into the mode of praising and worshiping God, as well as to bringing our petitions to Him. Therefore, this worship, as outlined above, should be frequently dotted with the hearty singing of psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, as well as with our laying our prayers of thanksgiving and petition before the Throne of the Almighty. No amount of praise we could ever bring God could ever be too much. No amount of thanksgiving that we ever give to God could be too much. And no problem, no matter how trivial or serious, can ever surpass the love and provision that God gives to those who worship Him and bring their needs to Him. Prayer and song, along with and beside, before during and after our confession, instruction, feasting, etc. should be a vital part of every worship service in every Church.
A final fallout from the Church worshipping in spirit and in truth would be that as individual congregations begin to follow something like the pattern discussed above, they will begin to see that, despite the serious and fundamental differences they may have amongst themselves, they are all part of one Body. They all share one loaf, and one cup. They were all baptized by one baptism into this one Body. All who are joined to Christ, by baptism, by confession, by the Word, by the Supper, and of course primary to all of this by faith, are all also joined together in one Body. Unity in the Church is of utmost importance. Unity will not come until the Church, the whole Church, becomes unified around the concept of actually being the Church.[vi] This concept, as stated above, means first and foremost that the Church is to be made up of many individuals forming one body in the worship of the One True and Living God – The Triune God of the Bible. Making worship primary, instead of secondary or worse, will have a tremendous unifying effect on the Church. A unified Church is a strong Church. A unified Church can make a difference in the classroom, the boardroom, the bedroom, and the family room, as well as in the halls of Congress, the White House, or the State house.
To sum up, making worship a priority will strengthen the Church. It will unify the Church. Like the familiar concept of a snowball growing once it gets started rolling downhill, a strong unified Church can then become ever increasingly stronger and more unified. A strong, unified Church will be an evangelical Church – lifting Christ up so he can draw all men to him. A strong, unified Church means strong, faithful individual Christians who can reach their neighbors, co-workers, spouses, children, and others for the cause of Christ – thus increasing the strength and unity of the Church. But, just as Adam’s continued growth and maturity depended upon his placing the worship of God as the top priority, the Church will fall, like Adam, if She places worldly dominion ahead of Godly submission.
As the Church grows in strength and unity centered around worship, then those questions that we began with can begin to be answered. Simply by doing this, many of them will begin to answer themselves. A strengthened, unified, renewed Church will by its very nature produce stronger, more Christ centered leaders in the society as a whole. Why should we worry about the latest political problems, when we know that the very gates of Hell shall not prevail against us?
[i] Of course, this begs the questions, “What are the Biblical ideals concerning the place of government?” and “How is the church to reach a unified position on this question?”
[ii] If so, in doing so, we must also recognize and accept that the minor candidate has exactly zero chance of being elected in today’s political climate.
[iii] These individual examples, of course, re-iterate the question posed in note (i) above.
[iv] For instance, how should the two Christians described above approach one another and the issues of the day?
[v] See for instance Dr. Leithart’s book, The Kingdom and the Power, 1993, P&R Publishing.
[vi] I am not here suggesting that what I am very briefly outlining is the final absolute correct process of worship. But certainly in principle every Church everywhere should embrace the fact that worship itslef is primary to everything else the Church can ever do. I do, however, hold that no matter the particular worship style or setting, these things – confession, instruction, the Table, offerings, and benediction should be the primary elements of our worship. Also, a truly worshipping people would necessarily be a singing and praying people.
These questions can and should be asked: How are we, the Church, to address the very real social evils of the day? What part does the political process play in this and what part does the Church play in the political process? Should we, the Church, openly and vocally get behind the major party candidate who comes closest to the biblical ideals concerning the place of government in his stated positions?[i] Should we recognize and accept that more often than not (particularly on the state and national levels) the major party candidates (even the ones who are professed Christians) do not hold to Biblical ideals about government? If we reach that conclusion, should we then vote for a little known third party or independent candidate who does hold to a Biblical view of Government?[ii]
Should we, the Church, choose particularly Biblical issues such as abortion, homosexual marriage, and/or some other such moral issue, then use these as litmus tests for choosing candidates? That is, should we say, “Candidate ‘A’ is far from perfect, but at least he has stated a strong pro-life position. Therefore, I’ll vote for him even though his positions on other, not so obviously moral, government related issues may not be Biblical?” Or, should we consider a candidate who may not be quite as vocal as we would like on these moral issues, but who lines up with what we perceive to be the overall biblical concept of civil government – whatever that may be? Should we vote for the person who professes most convincingly to be a believer, or for the candidate whose platform is closer to our concept of the Biblical ideal of government, regardless of whether or not that particular candidate is a believer?
In short, what is the Church’s responsibility concerning the election of the civil magistrate and the passage or repeal of civil laws?
These are tough questions. Without at all being politically partisan, I can give several examples of how these questions can cause distress amongst well meaning Christians. For instance, some Christians may (rightly or wrongly) believe that the Bible presents a picture of a righteous government as being one that is first and foremost limited in its scope. This person would be for the scaling back, or the complete removal, of countless government programs and regulations, and the requisite scaling back and simplification of the collection of taxes. It is highly doubtful that this person would vote for a candidate from the Democratic Party. However, this person may also strongly believe that the Republican Party, for all its limited government rhetoric, does not live up to these ideals much, if any, better than the Democratic Party. A third party, such as the Libertarian Party may most closely line up with this concept, i.e. small, limited, and heavily guarded government and much lower taxes along with a much simpler tax collection system. However, more often than not, the Libertarian candidate is not a Christian, or if he is, he does not make any public issue of this fact at all. On top of that, Libertarian Candidates often are very much bent toward a secular idea of “individual liberty” such that in the name of individual “liberty”, they will overtly support such individual “rights” as abortion, and homosexual union. Therefore, what is this Christian to do?
Still other Christians may (rightly or wrongly) believe that the Biblical precepts, repeated in both the Old and New Testaments, regarding the poor and oppressed necessarily mean that the government should take an active role in providing for the poor, and freeing the oppressed, and that limited government is therefore not doing its Biblical duty.[iii] The Biblical duty of government would include not only social programs such as Welfare, Medicare, and Social Security, but also increased funding for public schools, foreign aid, and government works projects may be seen as a vitally important and Biblical function of government. This person is very unlikely to vote for a Republican candidate, and most surely would not cast a vote for the Libertarian candidate. But, when he looks to the Democratic candidate, he will again face the likelihood of voting for a candidate who is a vocal supporter of such things as abortion “rights” or homosexual “union.” Again, what is this Christian to do?
Aside from these issues, what is the Biblical view of such issues as gun control? Throw that issue into the mix, along with the mixed views individual Christians, congregations, and denominations have concerning this and the other issues listed above, and how can the church ever reach a consensus on what it should be doing in the political process?
Even aside from voting, what are Christians, individually and corporately to do? Should they devote time to the Pro-Life movement to help protect the unborn? Should they fight to keep the institution of marriage sacred? Should they be involved in charity work, helping their neighbors and others throughout the nation and world? Should they be actively involved, apart from simply voting, in the creation of more Biblical governmental structures, whatever they may feel they are? How do they handle their differences with fellow Christians?[iv]
I submit that all these questions are in fact important, and at some level, the Church should certainly be involved in addressing them. However, I would also submit emphatically that these are second order questions. That is, while vitally important, and sinful to neglect, these are not the primary issues facing the Church today, or any day. The Church’s primary duty is to be the Church. As Dr. Peter Leithart[v] has pointed out in numerous places before, the Church should be involved politically, but the most politically effective thing the Church can do is to be the Church.
But, what does it mean for the Church to be the Church? We can answer this in one word. However, in “unpacking” that one word, we will discover a whole set of positive outcomes. That one word is “Worship.” The first and the last order of business for the Church, the Alpha and Omega if you will, is to Worship in spirit and in truth the Triune God who is the Creator and Sustainer of all that ever has been or ever will be. In thinking through what this means, we can isolate several specific issues that the Church must address in its corporate worship.
First of all, all worship of a Holy, Righteous, and Just God by sinful men must start with confession of sin and repentance. How can the Church expect to make a difference in the fallen world around them, when it is itself spotted from head to toe with the stain of sin? The first order of business in the worshipping Church is to come humbly before the Throne of God, confessing and forsaking its sins, and to seek the forgiveness that can only come from leaning wholly on the finished work of Christ. If there is no repentance, there can be no progress anywhere else. If the Church chooses to “confess” to some generic god, absent the workings of each member of the Trinity, then there is no true repentance. If the Church relies on anything save the Blood of Christ for forgiveness, then nothing at all is really accomplished. Individual repentance on a daily basis is absolutely necessary. Corporate repentance on a weekly basis is just as necessary. As in all of these issues, as we will see, faith is key. When we faithfully repent, seeking grace solely through the Blood of Christ, God is faithful and just to forgive us. True repentance and confession necessarily brings true forgiveness and peace with God. A confessing Church is a forgiven, cleansed Church. A forgiven, cleansed Church, is a vital, living, and effective Church. A vital, living, and effective Church is a Church that is capable of bringing the nations to it, and making the kingdoms of this world become the Kingdoms of Our God and His Christ. Already we see that the most politically effective thing the Church can do is to be the Church!
Second, the Church, as an institution, must proclaim the whole Word of God. And the Church, as the body of all believers, must listen and obey. The Word of God brings encouragement, love, forgiveness, blessings, and eternal life. It also brings discipline, fear, threats, curses, and eternal punishment. Emphasizing one at the expense of the other brings dangerous results. The Church then also must be willing to proclaim the whole counsel of God to the world around it. Again, this will bring either salvation and blessing, or it will add to the guilt of the sinful world, bringing condemnation. A Church that does not proclaim the whole Word of God, both inside and outside of its four walls, is itself in danger of falling away.
Third, in worshipping the Lord, the Church must keep His memorial. That is, a frequent and hardy celebration of the Lord’s Supper is not some optional, add-on, empty, ritual, but is in fact the very partaking of the Body and the Blood of Christ Himself by the Power of the Holy Spirit. In the Supper, not only do we remember what Christ has done for us (although we certainly do so), but in our partaking of the Supper, God remembers His Covenant with His People in Christ. Just as when God sees the rainbow, He remembers His covenant with all mankind, in the Supper, he remembers that the death of His Son was to purchase a people, a Church. God has vindicated and justified His Son through His resurrection and ascension. He will also vindicate and justify those who are united to Christ. And who are those who are united to Christ? They are precisely those who are worthy partakers of His Body and Blood. In this meal, God feeds and nourishes us, refreshes us, strengthens us, cheers us, and renews us to go back out into the world as his Ambassadors. In this meal, we, His Church, are lifted up into the heavenlies to be fed the true Bread of Heaven. The Church neglects this gift of God to its own demise. Why would we neglect such wonderful blessings? The Church, when it seeks to change the world through its “knowledge of good and evil” (e.g. the political process) without first communing with God and being fed from the Tree of Life, commits the sin of Adam over and over again. And we wonder why we are not more effective than we are!
As with the Word, however, we must also remember that the Cup of Blessing can be a Cup of Condemnation. Word and Sacrament should combine to make clear that only those who truly have faith are worthy partakers of this gift of God. Teaching the whole counsel of God means putting faith – a living, breathing, working, fruit-bearing, persevering faith – at the forefront. The Church should make clear that partaking in this wonderful event is not some magical blessing unto itself. It is a blessing, a wonderful blessing, to those united to Christ in Faith. Partaking of the Supper outside of Faith never saved anyone. In fact, it brings damnation. However, no one who has true faith should ever willfully neglect this celebration.
As celebration of this offering of Christ to us is a Thanksgiving meal (Eucharist), we should bring our offerings of thanksgiving to God. So a fourth item of worship is our offering. We bring our firstfruits to show our thankfulness and our utter dependence on the Creator and Ruler of the universe. We would not have anything that we have, unless God gave it to us. When we do not recognize this, we do not bring any fruit of our labor to Him – or we bring them reluctantly, absent of true faith and thanksgiving.. When we do recognize this, we gladly bring a portion of our fruit, showing our thankfulness and our reliance on the God who provides. Offerings are a vital part of worship. Again, faith is at issue here. Those who bring an offering outside of faith, are bringing only filthy rags and are of no use. Those who teach that bringing monetary gifts to God necessarily yields greater monetary gifts to the giver are totally missing the point. We already have untold riches in Christ. We have the infinite gift of eternal life in Christ. Our offering is simply our acknowledgement of this fact.
Worship as a whole renews us. Confession, repentance, and the reception of forgiveness from God renews us. Hearing commands, promises, and threats of sanction from God renews us. Celebrating the Supper of the Lord renews us. Recognizing our gifts from God and our dependence on God by bringing our offering renews us. After such renewal, we are fit to go back into the world and be ambassadors of the Most High King. Therefore, a sending out with blessings is also an important part of worship. The Church gathers corporately to commune with and worship God, and is therefore renewed to perform the work of dominion that God has given us as individuals, families, and societies. Here we see again the connection to politics. It is only a renewed people who can renew the form and structure of our civil government and to bring it, along with every other area of life, into captivity to the Word of God. When the Church tries to make changes in the world, while neglecting its first priority, only catastrophe can occur. The sad state of worship in the modern American Church along with the sad state of our current political affairs is really all the proof any Christian should need.
Peripherally, there are other aspects of the Church being the Church that should come out of our renewed interest in worship. First of all, as we are renewed every step of the way through our worship (confession/forgiveness, instruction, feasting/offering, sending out) we should more and more see our utter hopelessness without God. Conversely, we find that we are more than conquerors with Him and in Him. This should set our whole mindset into the mode of praising and worshiping God, as well as to bringing our petitions to Him. Therefore, this worship, as outlined above, should be frequently dotted with the hearty singing of psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, as well as with our laying our prayers of thanksgiving and petition before the Throne of the Almighty. No amount of praise we could ever bring God could ever be too much. No amount of thanksgiving that we ever give to God could be too much. And no problem, no matter how trivial or serious, can ever surpass the love and provision that God gives to those who worship Him and bring their needs to Him. Prayer and song, along with and beside, before during and after our confession, instruction, feasting, etc. should be a vital part of every worship service in every Church.
A final fallout from the Church worshipping in spirit and in truth would be that as individual congregations begin to follow something like the pattern discussed above, they will begin to see that, despite the serious and fundamental differences they may have amongst themselves, they are all part of one Body. They all share one loaf, and one cup. They were all baptized by one baptism into this one Body. All who are joined to Christ, by baptism, by confession, by the Word, by the Supper, and of course primary to all of this by faith, are all also joined together in one Body. Unity in the Church is of utmost importance. Unity will not come until the Church, the whole Church, becomes unified around the concept of actually being the Church.[vi] This concept, as stated above, means first and foremost that the Church is to be made up of many individuals forming one body in the worship of the One True and Living God – The Triune God of the Bible. Making worship primary, instead of secondary or worse, will have a tremendous unifying effect on the Church. A unified Church is a strong Church. A unified Church can make a difference in the classroom, the boardroom, the bedroom, and the family room, as well as in the halls of Congress, the White House, or the State house.
To sum up, making worship a priority will strengthen the Church. It will unify the Church. Like the familiar concept of a snowball growing once it gets started rolling downhill, a strong unified Church can then become ever increasingly stronger and more unified. A strong, unified Church will be an evangelical Church – lifting Christ up so he can draw all men to him. A strong, unified Church means strong, faithful individual Christians who can reach their neighbors, co-workers, spouses, children, and others for the cause of Christ – thus increasing the strength and unity of the Church. But, just as Adam’s continued growth and maturity depended upon his placing the worship of God as the top priority, the Church will fall, like Adam, if She places worldly dominion ahead of Godly submission.
As the Church grows in strength and unity centered around worship, then those questions that we began with can begin to be answered. Simply by doing this, many of them will begin to answer themselves. A strengthened, unified, renewed Church will by its very nature produce stronger, more Christ centered leaders in the society as a whole. Why should we worry about the latest political problems, when we know that the very gates of Hell shall not prevail against us?
[i] Of course, this begs the questions, “What are the Biblical ideals concerning the place of government?” and “How is the church to reach a unified position on this question?”
[ii] If so, in doing so, we must also recognize and accept that the minor candidate has exactly zero chance of being elected in today’s political climate.
[iii] These individual examples, of course, re-iterate the question posed in note (i) above.
[iv] For instance, how should the two Christians described above approach one another and the issues of the day?
[v] See for instance Dr. Leithart’s book, The Kingdom and the Power, 1993, P&R Publishing.
[vi] I am not here suggesting that what I am very briefly outlining is the final absolute correct process of worship. But certainly in principle every Church everywhere should embrace the fact that worship itslef is primary to everything else the Church can ever do. I do, however, hold that no matter the particular worship style or setting, these things – confession, instruction, the Table, offerings, and benediction should be the primary elements of our worship. Also, a truly worshipping people would necessarily be a singing and praying people.
Rationalism and Revivalism
In his essay entitled “Paedo Baptism and Baptismal Efficacy: Historic Trends and Current Controversies,” Rich Lusk defends his thesis that the diminishing occurrence of paedobaptism of the last two hundred plus years is a result of a concurrent diminishing of views toward sacramental efficacy in general. This lower view of sacramental efficacy in turn is due in large part to two trends in American Christianity, namely enlightenment rationalism and revivalism.
At first blush, these two trends, rationalism - which would seem to elevate the human mind above scripture itself, and revivalism - which would seem to elevate the human emotion, would appear to be in conflict. It is difficult to see how these two apparently contradictory movements could ‘conspire’ to affect a single purpose. However, as I attempt to demonstrate, these two streams do coalesce at a certain point. The result of that coalescence is that the experience of conversion becomes the defining trait of a true Christianity. A view that an experiential Christianity is definitive then forces such ‘supernatural’ phenomena as sacramental efficacy to become superfluous. If the sacraments are then stripped of their power, and the experience of rebirth is put in its place, then the sacraments cease to be sacramental, and become symbols only. Symbols are at best ‘extras’, and at worst, useless.
But how, when, where, and why do the elevation of the intellect and the elevation of the emotion come together to carry off such a conspiracy? We shall here examine rationalism to its end, and emotionalism from its beginning. Here, we shall see that the end of one forms the beginning of the other.
Enlightenment Rationalism
Without repeating the detailed study of Reverend Lusk and others here, it is safe to simply say that the historic humanistic trend of the enlightenment was to place the power of the human mind, its ordering, systematizing, and reasoning capabilities, to the forefront. The enlightenment itself was an attempt to return to the philosophizing of the ancients, with modernism thrown in as well. Man’s investigating, studying, sorting and so forth of natural phenomena was to be the basis for all beliefs and practices. At its core, enlightenment rationalism was devoid of any place for the living and true God. It could possibly posit a deistic god, or gods, to account for original conditions. From there, however, once conditions exist, the human mind can study them and possibly understand all things.
Around the same time that this trend was occurring among those outside or on the fringes of the church, another separate movement was taking place, namely the reformation. Unlike rationalism, the reformation exalted God and His Word above all. Any reasoning capability man had came from God, and unless grounded firmly in Him and His word, this reasoning ability could not truly understand anything. Humanistic rationalism elevates the mind of man such that he can achieve true knowledge of his own accord, while reformational thought elevates the Word of God as man’s only true source of knowledge.
However, these two seemingly contradictory trends did have a few commonalties. Both questioned the outright authority claimed by the church of the day. The medieval church claimed an infallible ability to interpret the Word of God. The common man, it was believed, could not fathom such without the church’s instruction. Perhaps it is safe to say that reformational thought denied the infallibility of the church, and rationalism denied any authority or power in the church. However, these two tends danced dangerously close together at times. The resulting ‘tango’ was that rationalism affected reformational thought patterns. At times, in fact, rationalism appeared to be ‘leading’ the dance, and reformational thought, proper lady that she was, followed.
Wittingly or unwittingly, some within the arena of reformation theology believed that the Word of God itself could be ordered, reduced, and sytematized into a neat, tidy package of doctrines, each fitting with the others and forming a type of jigsaw puzzle. Such doctrines as that of God, the Holy Trinity, the Scriptures, creation, fall, election, redemption, justification, sanctification, adoption, etc. became as so many pieces of the puzzle. As we know, pieces of jigsaw puzzles do not overlap. Each piece is its own separate entity, taking up its own space, and adding to the final picture.
In and of itself, this systematizing of doctrine is not altogether a bad thing. It simply must be kept in its place. It should be viewed as one helpful way to look at scripture, but not the only way. By nature, if we form such a system, then use it alone to interpret scripture, we have allowed the system to trump the scriptures. This systemization of theology as the norm, instead of as a help, has resulted in many controversies in the past, and continues to today.
One major example that has current ramifications is in the area of the relationship between justification and sanctification. It may be a healthy spiritual exercise to isolate justification from sanctification and study it in some ways as a stand-alone concept. However, when we return to our Bibles, we often see that the Bible is not always so neat and tidy as all this. To state as an inerrant fact that justification and sanctification are two completely separate pieces of the puzzle, and never the twain shall meet, pushes us into many dead ends. The rationalistic approach is to stick with the concept, at all costs, that the two are entirely separate. Rationalism as a system will not allow the meshing of the two, or any dependent relation of the two in any way. Rationalism says that justification is one thing – what happens to an individual when he reaches a point of professing faith in the Risen Savior. It is an event that happens at a particular point in time. Sanctification is another thing – the life of the individual believer after he has been justified. This clean separation is not always apparent in the Bible.
Many examples could be cited, but only a few will. Saul apparently was ‘justified’. He was filled with the spirit, had faith in God, even prophesied. However, as we follow the remainder of his life, we see that he eventually fell away. His sanctification was not complete. He died a broken, and apparently eternally lost individual. Rationalism would tell us he was never actually justified. Had he been, then his justification would have infallibly lead to sanctification. The Bible, however, seems to paint a different picture. Other similar examples might include Judas, as well as several named by the apostles who were at one time followers of Christ in good standing, but who ultimately fell away.
Christ Himself provided examples, both in His parables, and in His warnings. Some seeds (the Word of God) we are told, fall on certain types of ground (hearts of men) where they are accepted and sprout up quickly. However, because the soil itself was not good, they quickly fell away. Christ also warns us that there would be those who would say “Lord, Lord,” but who, on the last day would be sent away.
The apostles warn us not to forsake our salvation, to work out our own salvation, to make sure our election, and that those who forsook such a great salvation would be worse off than those of the Old Covenant who did the same (such as Saul, maybe?). It tells us that there would be those who were “enlightened…have tasted of the heavenly gift…were made partakers of the Holy Ghost…have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come…” but that shall “fall away.” Dare we say now that either those who had been “enlightened…have tasted of the heavenly gift…were made partakers of the Holy Ghost…have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come…” were never really justified in any sense? Or shall we say that the danger of ‘falling away’ is really a hypothetical warning that is actually impossible for those who have actually been “enlightened…”?
Again, rationalism tells us that that these two, justification and sanctification (with the ultimate end of glorification) are completely separate. The Bible is not nearly so clear.
However, when we do follow rationalistic thought patterns, and separate justification as a single entity tied to a particular moment in time, the fallout is great and it affects so many other aspects of the Christian life. If justification is a particular moment in time, is based on some type of conversion experience, and infallibly results in sanctification and glorification, then causing this particular point in time to come about for the individual becomes the most important thing in all of our activity as the church. Therefore, preaching is reduced to compelling the individual to have such an experience. He must come to terms with his being a sinner, repent, and believe.
Now, coming to terms with being a helpless sinner in the hands of an angry God, repenting, and believing on the Lord Jesus Christ and Him alone for salvation, certainly is of utmost import. The rub is this, though. Is this a one-time event in the life of every believer, which infallibly results in sanctification and final glorification, or is this a constant, ongoing process that occurs along with sanctification and glorification in the life of believers? When we separate our theology into puzzle pieces, never to allow them to overlap, then the one time experience becomes the norm.
This affects the way we view our children. As infants, we rationally posit, they can not see their utter sinfulness and their need to repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, as infants, (and young children below some supposed age of accountability) they can not be justified, in the puzzle piece sense of the word. They must, as they grow in intellectual capacity, have a moment of conversion. Before this moment, they must be viewed as unjustified sinners. The fallout from this, though not to be discussed here, is incredible and costly. Not the least of this, though, is what do we say of those dying before such an age of accountability? What do we say of those with mental weaknesses such as the retarded or brain damaged? If we suggest that they are somehow treated under a different economy, then our whole system falls apart!
The end result of all of this is that rationalism reduces Christianity (or is it rather true Christianity? or rather the church? or rather the true “invisible” church?) to only those who have had such an experience. Therefore, bringing those who have not had such an experience to the point of having such an experience becomes our top priority. Evangelism is defined by this paradigm. Since we care about a lost and dying world, our main goal is to bring men into a saving knowledge of Christ. This can only be done by bringing them to a conversion experience. This, in turn, can only be done by the preaching of the Word. The preaching of the word, therefore, is reduced to evangelistic sermons based on bringing about a conversion experience. We must always expect that there are those even within our congregational midst who have not had the proper experience. So, weekly we must preach in such a way as to bring about this experience.
Emotionalism
This then brings us to the intersection of rationalism (intellect) and revivalism (emotion). For a person may be reached by their intellect – that is by bringing them to the rational conclusion that they are sinners in need of salvation. But also, a person may be brought to such a conclusion emotionally. Usually, a persons emotion causes them to react much quicker than their intellect. So, if we must bring a person to the point of having an experience of conversion, to do so through an appeal to their emotions may well be a more efficient means.
The sum of all of this is this: Rationalistic systematizing results in emotionalistic preaching. The one ends where the other begins. Rationalism demands in every instance a conversion experience. Emotionalistic preaching brings about such an experience efficiently. The river of rationalism leads inevitably to the waterfall of emotionalism. What becomes of the flow after the waterfall is then seen as secondary. It is assumed by all that if the experience truly takes place, the river will flow aright (sanctification) afterwards. If it does not, that must mean that the experience was not a “true” one. Therefore, what is needed is still more revivalist preaching.
It is true enough that this paradigm fits well with Arminianism, but not necessarily with Calvinism. The Calvinist might argue that since all is in God’s hands, the emotionalistic ferver of the preaching is not so important. Simply a pure preaching of the Word of God will bring about true conversions. But, this is simply the last gasp of the rationalistic tendency before the revivalist waterfall. Held consistently, a single point in time conversion experience (which is required for a rationalistic single puzzle piece justification) will result in more and more pressure to reach the emotions of men. Perhaps the best among Calvinist preachers will hold out and continue to attempt to reach the intellect with the word of God. However, while they are doing so, their churches stifle. The revivalistic movements in the meantime, are enrgetic, constantly ‘winning souls for Christ.’ However, a realistic review reveals that much of this ‘soul winning’ is of the revolving door type. People have the experience, but once the newness of the emotional experience wears away, they wither and die. New people then move in to take their place. Sometimes, though, people come back and ‘re-dedicate’ their lives to Christ, only to fall away yet again.
A good example of this was revealed by a sign I once saw on a local mega-church steeped in revivalist tendencies. The sign read “New Members for April – 76.” Now, if this was anywhere near typical, and if the majority of these people stayed the course, then in short time, that church would be overflowing and possibly starting new congregations. However, that particular church has stayed within its current walls for several decades now. It has a huge sanctuary that is not filled on a regular basis. The revolving door is spinning out of control.
However, revivalists have one trick up their sleeve to keep the game going. They simply keep intensifying the emotionalism. Once a person has an emotion based conversion experience, he needs to keep feeding the beast. More and more emotionalism will keep some coming back again and again. You just keep raising the stakes. The end result if that path is chosen can be seen in the world of Pentecostalism.
Again, the best of the Calvinistic rationalists will be quick to point out here that what I am describing is not even close to describing the scene in their particular congregations. They do not appeal to the emotions above all. They do not reduce preaching to even an intellectual plea for conversion and nothing else. Several things can be said in response to this, but one will suffice here.
If their particular congregation believes consistently the rationalistic, systematic, justification as a single point in time phenomena, yet they do not preach that way, then they are simply being inconsistent with their presuppositions. Fortunately, this inconsistency may be pronounced enough in some congregations to allow for a relatively healthy congregation. If that is the case, we rejoice with them in their success. But we must insist that they examine themselves and see the inconsistencies. Hopefully, doing so will lead them to a more holistic view of Christian life and worship. However, it also runs the risk of setting them on the path outlined above.
However, one question yet remains for even these type congregations…..
Where are the sacraments in all of this?
It should be clear that once we accept the notion of justification as a one time event based on some type of experience, that any working of God through sacraments is unneeded. The sacraments become, as it were, superfluous. The sacrament of baptism may be preached simply as an institution to demonstrate the persons willingness to submit in obedience to Christ, thus providing further evidence of the legitimacy of that persons experience. The sacrament of the Lord’s Table may be occasionally used to further the intellectual or emotional reflection of the person on their experience. But, there is no real power of God active in the sacrament.
I witnessed the latter first hand once while attending a particularly rationalistic Reformed congregation. The Lord’s Supper was ‘celebrated’ at the conclusion of the worship service. However, it was a very somber, reflective experience. The major theme seemed not to be the congregation’s communion with the Lord and with each other, but instead to be several minutes of ‘naval gazing.” The power of the sacrament, apparently, was not to be found in God’s sovereign power working through the elements and activity of the celebration, but through each individual’s sovereign power and ability to look within himself and find…something. What he was to find, I am unsure. But it almost seemed taboo to look anywhere outside oneself, or, heaven forbid, to actually have on a happy face. Again, they may retort that what I am saying is a caricature of what was really going on. I respond by saying that appearance is a reflection of reality. Whether they realized it or not, this is what was happening.
Infant baptism in particular becomes a useless activity. With the construct described above, what possible motive is there in sprinkling water on an infant? It obviously does not do anything. At best, it again provides the parents an opportunity to display that their own conversion experience was real. But what does it say about or do for the child? Absolutely nothing.
Many reformed theologians would deny that this is their belief. However, it is their practice, and if they are to be consistent to their experiential presuppositions, they have to admit that this belief is consistent with that. This, I believe, is what Reverend Lusk was driving at. This is a major cause in the decline of infant baptism. When the reformed-minded pastor follows rationalism to its end, they either become revivalists, or the revivalists in our midst pick up where they leave off. Either way, the efficacy of the Sacraments is denied.
At first blush, these two trends, rationalism - which would seem to elevate the human mind above scripture itself, and revivalism - which would seem to elevate the human emotion, would appear to be in conflict. It is difficult to see how these two apparently contradictory movements could ‘conspire’ to affect a single purpose. However, as I attempt to demonstrate, these two streams do coalesce at a certain point. The result of that coalescence is that the experience of conversion becomes the defining trait of a true Christianity. A view that an experiential Christianity is definitive then forces such ‘supernatural’ phenomena as sacramental efficacy to become superfluous. If the sacraments are then stripped of their power, and the experience of rebirth is put in its place, then the sacraments cease to be sacramental, and become symbols only. Symbols are at best ‘extras’, and at worst, useless.
But how, when, where, and why do the elevation of the intellect and the elevation of the emotion come together to carry off such a conspiracy? We shall here examine rationalism to its end, and emotionalism from its beginning. Here, we shall see that the end of one forms the beginning of the other.
Enlightenment Rationalism
Without repeating the detailed study of Reverend Lusk and others here, it is safe to simply say that the historic humanistic trend of the enlightenment was to place the power of the human mind, its ordering, systematizing, and reasoning capabilities, to the forefront. The enlightenment itself was an attempt to return to the philosophizing of the ancients, with modernism thrown in as well. Man’s investigating, studying, sorting and so forth of natural phenomena was to be the basis for all beliefs and practices. At its core, enlightenment rationalism was devoid of any place for the living and true God. It could possibly posit a deistic god, or gods, to account for original conditions. From there, however, once conditions exist, the human mind can study them and possibly understand all things.
Around the same time that this trend was occurring among those outside or on the fringes of the church, another separate movement was taking place, namely the reformation. Unlike rationalism, the reformation exalted God and His Word above all. Any reasoning capability man had came from God, and unless grounded firmly in Him and His word, this reasoning ability could not truly understand anything. Humanistic rationalism elevates the mind of man such that he can achieve true knowledge of his own accord, while reformational thought elevates the Word of God as man’s only true source of knowledge.
However, these two seemingly contradictory trends did have a few commonalties. Both questioned the outright authority claimed by the church of the day. The medieval church claimed an infallible ability to interpret the Word of God. The common man, it was believed, could not fathom such without the church’s instruction. Perhaps it is safe to say that reformational thought denied the infallibility of the church, and rationalism denied any authority or power in the church. However, these two tends danced dangerously close together at times. The resulting ‘tango’ was that rationalism affected reformational thought patterns. At times, in fact, rationalism appeared to be ‘leading’ the dance, and reformational thought, proper lady that she was, followed.
Wittingly or unwittingly, some within the arena of reformation theology believed that the Word of God itself could be ordered, reduced, and sytematized into a neat, tidy package of doctrines, each fitting with the others and forming a type of jigsaw puzzle. Such doctrines as that of God, the Holy Trinity, the Scriptures, creation, fall, election, redemption, justification, sanctification, adoption, etc. became as so many pieces of the puzzle. As we know, pieces of jigsaw puzzles do not overlap. Each piece is its own separate entity, taking up its own space, and adding to the final picture.
In and of itself, this systematizing of doctrine is not altogether a bad thing. It simply must be kept in its place. It should be viewed as one helpful way to look at scripture, but not the only way. By nature, if we form such a system, then use it alone to interpret scripture, we have allowed the system to trump the scriptures. This systemization of theology as the norm, instead of as a help, has resulted in many controversies in the past, and continues to today.
One major example that has current ramifications is in the area of the relationship between justification and sanctification. It may be a healthy spiritual exercise to isolate justification from sanctification and study it in some ways as a stand-alone concept. However, when we return to our Bibles, we often see that the Bible is not always so neat and tidy as all this. To state as an inerrant fact that justification and sanctification are two completely separate pieces of the puzzle, and never the twain shall meet, pushes us into many dead ends. The rationalistic approach is to stick with the concept, at all costs, that the two are entirely separate. Rationalism as a system will not allow the meshing of the two, or any dependent relation of the two in any way. Rationalism says that justification is one thing – what happens to an individual when he reaches a point of professing faith in the Risen Savior. It is an event that happens at a particular point in time. Sanctification is another thing – the life of the individual believer after he has been justified. This clean separation is not always apparent in the Bible.
Many examples could be cited, but only a few will. Saul apparently was ‘justified’. He was filled with the spirit, had faith in God, even prophesied. However, as we follow the remainder of his life, we see that he eventually fell away. His sanctification was not complete. He died a broken, and apparently eternally lost individual. Rationalism would tell us he was never actually justified. Had he been, then his justification would have infallibly lead to sanctification. The Bible, however, seems to paint a different picture. Other similar examples might include Judas, as well as several named by the apostles who were at one time followers of Christ in good standing, but who ultimately fell away.
Christ Himself provided examples, both in His parables, and in His warnings. Some seeds (the Word of God) we are told, fall on certain types of ground (hearts of men) where they are accepted and sprout up quickly. However, because the soil itself was not good, they quickly fell away. Christ also warns us that there would be those who would say “Lord, Lord,” but who, on the last day would be sent away.
The apostles warn us not to forsake our salvation, to work out our own salvation, to make sure our election, and that those who forsook such a great salvation would be worse off than those of the Old Covenant who did the same (such as Saul, maybe?). It tells us that there would be those who were “enlightened…have tasted of the heavenly gift…were made partakers of the Holy Ghost…have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come…” but that shall “fall away.” Dare we say now that either those who had been “enlightened…have tasted of the heavenly gift…were made partakers of the Holy Ghost…have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come…” were never really justified in any sense? Or shall we say that the danger of ‘falling away’ is really a hypothetical warning that is actually impossible for those who have actually been “enlightened…”?
Again, rationalism tells us that that these two, justification and sanctification (with the ultimate end of glorification) are completely separate. The Bible is not nearly so clear.
However, when we do follow rationalistic thought patterns, and separate justification as a single entity tied to a particular moment in time, the fallout is great and it affects so many other aspects of the Christian life. If justification is a particular moment in time, is based on some type of conversion experience, and infallibly results in sanctification and glorification, then causing this particular point in time to come about for the individual becomes the most important thing in all of our activity as the church. Therefore, preaching is reduced to compelling the individual to have such an experience. He must come to terms with his being a sinner, repent, and believe.
Now, coming to terms with being a helpless sinner in the hands of an angry God, repenting, and believing on the Lord Jesus Christ and Him alone for salvation, certainly is of utmost import. The rub is this, though. Is this a one-time event in the life of every believer, which infallibly results in sanctification and final glorification, or is this a constant, ongoing process that occurs along with sanctification and glorification in the life of believers? When we separate our theology into puzzle pieces, never to allow them to overlap, then the one time experience becomes the norm.
This affects the way we view our children. As infants, we rationally posit, they can not see their utter sinfulness and their need to repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, as infants, (and young children below some supposed age of accountability) they can not be justified, in the puzzle piece sense of the word. They must, as they grow in intellectual capacity, have a moment of conversion. Before this moment, they must be viewed as unjustified sinners. The fallout from this, though not to be discussed here, is incredible and costly. Not the least of this, though, is what do we say of those dying before such an age of accountability? What do we say of those with mental weaknesses such as the retarded or brain damaged? If we suggest that they are somehow treated under a different economy, then our whole system falls apart!
The end result of all of this is that rationalism reduces Christianity (or is it rather true Christianity? or rather the church? or rather the true “invisible” church?) to only those who have had such an experience. Therefore, bringing those who have not had such an experience to the point of having such an experience becomes our top priority. Evangelism is defined by this paradigm. Since we care about a lost and dying world, our main goal is to bring men into a saving knowledge of Christ. This can only be done by bringing them to a conversion experience. This, in turn, can only be done by the preaching of the Word. The preaching of the word, therefore, is reduced to evangelistic sermons based on bringing about a conversion experience. We must always expect that there are those even within our congregational midst who have not had the proper experience. So, weekly we must preach in such a way as to bring about this experience.
Emotionalism
This then brings us to the intersection of rationalism (intellect) and revivalism (emotion). For a person may be reached by their intellect – that is by bringing them to the rational conclusion that they are sinners in need of salvation. But also, a person may be brought to such a conclusion emotionally. Usually, a persons emotion causes them to react much quicker than their intellect. So, if we must bring a person to the point of having an experience of conversion, to do so through an appeal to their emotions may well be a more efficient means.
The sum of all of this is this: Rationalistic systematizing results in emotionalistic preaching. The one ends where the other begins. Rationalism demands in every instance a conversion experience. Emotionalistic preaching brings about such an experience efficiently. The river of rationalism leads inevitably to the waterfall of emotionalism. What becomes of the flow after the waterfall is then seen as secondary. It is assumed by all that if the experience truly takes place, the river will flow aright (sanctification) afterwards. If it does not, that must mean that the experience was not a “true” one. Therefore, what is needed is still more revivalist preaching.
It is true enough that this paradigm fits well with Arminianism, but not necessarily with Calvinism. The Calvinist might argue that since all is in God’s hands, the emotionalistic ferver of the preaching is not so important. Simply a pure preaching of the Word of God will bring about true conversions. But, this is simply the last gasp of the rationalistic tendency before the revivalist waterfall. Held consistently, a single point in time conversion experience (which is required for a rationalistic single puzzle piece justification) will result in more and more pressure to reach the emotions of men. Perhaps the best among Calvinist preachers will hold out and continue to attempt to reach the intellect with the word of God. However, while they are doing so, their churches stifle. The revivalistic movements in the meantime, are enrgetic, constantly ‘winning souls for Christ.’ However, a realistic review reveals that much of this ‘soul winning’ is of the revolving door type. People have the experience, but once the newness of the emotional experience wears away, they wither and die. New people then move in to take their place. Sometimes, though, people come back and ‘re-dedicate’ their lives to Christ, only to fall away yet again.
A good example of this was revealed by a sign I once saw on a local mega-church steeped in revivalist tendencies. The sign read “New Members for April – 76.” Now, if this was anywhere near typical, and if the majority of these people stayed the course, then in short time, that church would be overflowing and possibly starting new congregations. However, that particular church has stayed within its current walls for several decades now. It has a huge sanctuary that is not filled on a regular basis. The revolving door is spinning out of control.
However, revivalists have one trick up their sleeve to keep the game going. They simply keep intensifying the emotionalism. Once a person has an emotion based conversion experience, he needs to keep feeding the beast. More and more emotionalism will keep some coming back again and again. You just keep raising the stakes. The end result if that path is chosen can be seen in the world of Pentecostalism.
Again, the best of the Calvinistic rationalists will be quick to point out here that what I am describing is not even close to describing the scene in their particular congregations. They do not appeal to the emotions above all. They do not reduce preaching to even an intellectual plea for conversion and nothing else. Several things can be said in response to this, but one will suffice here.
If their particular congregation believes consistently the rationalistic, systematic, justification as a single point in time phenomena, yet they do not preach that way, then they are simply being inconsistent with their presuppositions. Fortunately, this inconsistency may be pronounced enough in some congregations to allow for a relatively healthy congregation. If that is the case, we rejoice with them in their success. But we must insist that they examine themselves and see the inconsistencies. Hopefully, doing so will lead them to a more holistic view of Christian life and worship. However, it also runs the risk of setting them on the path outlined above.
However, one question yet remains for even these type congregations…..
Where are the sacraments in all of this?
It should be clear that once we accept the notion of justification as a one time event based on some type of experience, that any working of God through sacraments is unneeded. The sacraments become, as it were, superfluous. The sacrament of baptism may be preached simply as an institution to demonstrate the persons willingness to submit in obedience to Christ, thus providing further evidence of the legitimacy of that persons experience. The sacrament of the Lord’s Table may be occasionally used to further the intellectual or emotional reflection of the person on their experience. But, there is no real power of God active in the sacrament.
I witnessed the latter first hand once while attending a particularly rationalistic Reformed congregation. The Lord’s Supper was ‘celebrated’ at the conclusion of the worship service. However, it was a very somber, reflective experience. The major theme seemed not to be the congregation’s communion with the Lord and with each other, but instead to be several minutes of ‘naval gazing.” The power of the sacrament, apparently, was not to be found in God’s sovereign power working through the elements and activity of the celebration, but through each individual’s sovereign power and ability to look within himself and find…something. What he was to find, I am unsure. But it almost seemed taboo to look anywhere outside oneself, or, heaven forbid, to actually have on a happy face. Again, they may retort that what I am saying is a caricature of what was really going on. I respond by saying that appearance is a reflection of reality. Whether they realized it or not, this is what was happening.
Infant baptism in particular becomes a useless activity. With the construct described above, what possible motive is there in sprinkling water on an infant? It obviously does not do anything. At best, it again provides the parents an opportunity to display that their own conversion experience was real. But what does it say about or do for the child? Absolutely nothing.
Many reformed theologians would deny that this is their belief. However, it is their practice, and if they are to be consistent to their experiential presuppositions, they have to admit that this belief is consistent with that. This, I believe, is what Reverend Lusk was driving at. This is a major cause in the decline of infant baptism. When the reformed-minded pastor follows rationalism to its end, they either become revivalists, or the revivalists in our midst pick up where they leave off. Either way, the efficacy of the Sacraments is denied.
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