Thursday, November 12, 2009

A Tiny Note On A Narrow Mind


Note: This is a note on this post by Watchman Chew.

My friend Ivar has written an excellent post here regarding religious hypocrites. Ivar makes the excellent points that:

1. Hypocrites want to be honored by men. (Matthew 6:2).

2. Hypocrites love to pray standing in the Synagogues (and I guess Churches), and street corners. (Matthew 6:5)

3. Hypocrites want to boast of their religious duties, and tell others they are fasting (Matthew 6:16)

4. Hypocrites do not admit their own faults, but look for faults in others. (Matthew 7:5)

5. Hypocrites give a tenth, but neglect justice, mercy and faithfulness. (Matthew 23:23)

6. Hypocrites build tombs for the righteous, but denies that they themselves would have taken part in shedding the blood of the prophets. (Matthew 23:29)

7. Hypocrites honor Jesus with their lips, but their hearts are far from Him. (Mark 7:6)

In like manner, we can discern religious hypocrites from the blogosphere by the following characteristics:

(1) Religious hypocrites are desperate for recognition and want honor from Man. For example, they would appoint themselves with many offices (like author, apologist and watchman), and are desperate to be a teacher of others when they should be students of the Word;

(2) They love to pray (and blog) in full view of their followers. For example, they would pray to God for the anathematization of fellow Christians, pray to God to strike them dead and/or to send them to burn in hell forever. They would then be praised for their “discernment” and encouraged to fight the good fight of faith by fellow watch-bloggers;

(3) They love to boast about their religious duties and/or skills (e.g. watching and exposing errors, leading discipleship classes, attending violin lessons, spouting Greek words/grammar for which they have little knowledge of, etc);

(4) They do not admit their own faults, but constantly seek out the faults and errors of others (hence the office of Watchman). They abhor “watcher of watchmen” watching and exposing them, but they love to watch others. They detest advice from others suggesting that they are self-righteous and/or self-deluded;

(5) They might give a tenth of their income as tithe or a tenth of their precious time for blogging, or even a tenth of their time to publish a book so as to make a name for themselves, but neglect justice, mercy and faithfulness. We would neither hear of them visiting the orphans and widows in their afflictions, nor see them giving their lives to the mission fields in third world countries. We might read about them traveling to nice spots for holidays in the name of “mission” though;

(6) They honor Jesus with the lips (and blogs), but their hearts are far away from Him. These hypocrites are self-righteous, ostentatious, and love pre-eminence amongst Man. They are not after God’s heart, but are really craving for men’s admiration.

IMO, Ivar's post has successfully navigated between two extremes in this regard.

On one extreme is the self-righteous, self-deluded, self-perceived infallibility and parochialism of self-appointed “watchmen” and their blogs (e.g. Daniel Chew Huicong) "which litter the Internet like so many sewer pipes choked full with libel, all initially started mainly to defend some false teaching(s) or teacher(s) but which degenerates into the stinks they now are." (quote taken from Daniel Chew's post)

On the other extreme is the broadmindedness of religious syncretism and the likes of it. We hereby thank Daniel Chew for his thoughtful comments, which are perhaps better suited to describe his Watchman blog site. Typical of self-righteous, self-deluded "watchman" sites, the false teacher and watchman Daniel Chew failed to realize that he had likewise castigated all "watcher of watchmen ministries" with his recent post (cf. Daniel's comment on the Christian blogger, Tim Challies). Thanks Ivar for your excellent article.

15 comments:

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Monica C. said...

Whoa! Heretic, this is HERESY! How dare you criticize the venerable Watchman-Pope-Apostle Chew the infallible?

Heresy, heresy!

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Anonymous said...

You're right, he's a hypocrite. In fact, he's the biggest one there is - a religious hypocrite!

MC said...

In writing this post, did you guys read what Mike Ratliff said?

What do you guys think of he said?

Anonymous said...

@Munchy,

"What do you guys think of he said?"

Let me see ... bad grammar? What do we think of "he said?" You need to add the word "what" to your sentence :)

A reader said...

Munchy,

Mike's post, like the majority of Daniel's posts are sensationalised - short of being a conspiracy-type material.

There is also the whole buddy-buddy, I-am-of-Daniel-Chew, I-am-not-of-Tim-Challis mentality that irritates me!

MC said...

Sensationalized? not sure what you mean here, do you mean like making a mountain out of a molehill? - it seems alright to me, he doesnt slander anyone in his post

Also, he doesnt associate or disassociate himself with Daniel or Tim in his post what

Your Father said...

Munchy,

You seem unable to comprehend the breath and depth of such mysteries. And with your current reasoning ability, it is easier for Obi Wan to eat Big Mac than to defeat me.

D Vader

MC said...

hur hur...

Your Father said...

Even Father makes mistakes ... it's "breadth", not "breath." Gotcha!

But of course, my children remember me by my "breath", bad breath, that is.

It's a long story, the helmet, the attire, the suit ... don't even ask.

D Vader

Teck Huat said...

Quoting Darth Vader, "He will join us or die, my master."

I'm surprise Darth Vader said that; I could have sworn it was Daniel Chew.

A reader said...

Dear Munchy,

I cannot speak for everyone here, but this is a response....

"Sensationalized? not sure what you mean here, do you mean like making a mountain out of a molehill? - it seems alright to me, he doesnt slander anyone in his post."

Like I said earlier - Mike's current post may be good and right, but that seems to characterise his 'ministry' - i.e. discernment, what-is-wrong-with-this-and-that, heresy-busting, and so on.

"Also, he doesnt associate or disassociate himself with Daniel or Tim in his post what"

Mike, like Daniel, only associate themselves with fellow ODMers.

Anonymous said...

Excellent post! Hypocrites like Daniel are sectarian also, but in case of Watchman he has an on going medical problem. That alone coupled with his radical views of Reformed christianity makes him dangers one the blogosphere and to the average church population.

On a connected note, it makes me wonder if Daniel is even interested in women. He's a strange one!

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