What is Christian Ethics?

Sovereign Grace Family Church

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August 7, 2023

00:00: Well good evening everyone.
00:02: It's good to be back and our first term for our first class for the new term and the title of this particular term is an introduction to Christian ethics.
00:19: I have a handout that I want to make sure everyone has because we're going to be going over it.
00:25: Does everyone have a copy of the syllabus already printed out? Marina would you hand anyone who doesn't have one a copy because I know I see at least one person that does it.
00:52: As Marina is handing out the syllabus I want us to consider a couple of thoughts as we begin.
01:02: As I said the title of this course is an introduction to Christian ethics and so we want to consider two thoughts as we begin.
01:13: The first thing is that in fact this is an ethics course and we have probably at some time in our life heard the word ethics.
01:31: You probably have an idea of what ethics is because you signed up for the class.
01:37: You probably had an idea of what you were signing up for.
01:44: However too often people confuse the idea of ethics.
01:51: Here you go David.
01:52: There's a copy of the syllabus for you.
01:53: People confuse the idea of ethics and morals and so for a moment I just want to talk about the difference in these two ideas and why we call this a study of Christian ethics and not a study of morals.
02:18: When we deal with the subject of ethics we are dealing with the concept of ought and if you understand what I mean by ought I mean that which should be or that which is demanded to be.
02:37: Morals deal more with the question of is.
02:43: Ethics comes from the Greek word ethos and the Greek word ethos comes from the idea of a word for a stall like a horse stall and it references a place of stability or permanence and therefore ethics or ethos refers to the foundation of something or a permanent thing.
03:12: Whereas, morals comes from the word mores or mores and it is the idea of something that is and it is ever changing.
03:26: I'll read to you a quote by James Eckman.
03:31: He says, In modern culture, the terms ethics and morals are virtually synonymous.
03:38: Quite frankly, the confusion over the interchangeableness of these two terms is understandable, but it is wrong.
03:46: From history, we learn that the two words have different meanings.
03:50: Ethics comes from the Greek word ethos, meaning a stall for horses, a place of stability and permanence.
03:55: The word morality comes from mores or mores, which describes the shifting behavior patterns of society.
04:04: Ethics is what is normative and absolute.
04:08: It refers to a set of standards around which we organize our lives and from which we define our duties and obligations.
04:16: It results in a set of imperatives that establish acceptable behavioral patterns.
04:22: It is what people ought to do.
04:24: By contrast, morality is more concerned with what people do.
04:30: It describes what people are already doing, often regardless of any absolute set of standards.
04:38: Dr.
04:39: R.C.
04:39: Sproul points out that in simple terms, he says ethics deal with ought, as I already said, morals deal with is.
04:49: Ethics are imperative.
04:51: Morals are descriptive.
04:53: So, for instance, trying to give you an example, if we talk about what is moral today on television, Marina, would you pass that down? When I was a child, things that were allowed on television were different than the things that are allowed on television today.
05:35: In fact, before I was a child, before I was born, there were standards that were even more strict.
05:43: The morals were much different.
05:45: Ricky and Lucy were actually married in real life.
05:51: Ricky, what was his name, and Lucille Ball were married, but they could not be seen sharing a bed.
06:03: Therefore, the idea of people having two separate beds in the bedroom became very popular on television.
06:10: I don't know that anyone has ever done that.
06:12: I don't know that any couple has ever had two single beds.
06:15: I think most couples have shared a bed, but on TV, that's been a thing.
06:20: Back in the day, there was always two beds because a couple could not be shown sharing a bed on television.
06:27: And now, couples are seen on network television doing all sorts of bed sharing, if you will.
06:37: So we understand the morals shift.
06:41: As we were just saying, the difference between ethics and morals is ethics deal with fixed absolutes.
06:47: They deal with standards, and morals deal with descriptions of a society.
06:53: And so that's why we call this Christian ethics, because we are dealing with the standards.
06:59: We're dealing with what ought to be.
07:02: And this leads us to the second point of the introduction of this course.
07:06: Not only is this an ethics course, but this is a Christian ethics course.
07:23: We are beginning this course with certain overarching presuppositions.
07:32: This course is not intended to argue whether or not the Bible is true.
07:38: By being a Christian ethics course, it assumes the Bible is true.
07:43: If you want to argue for the truth of Scripture, you can do that in apologetics class.
07:49: That's not what this class is for.
07:51: Therefore, when we seek our ethical absolutes, when we seek to answer the question of ethical dilemmas, we have a standard.
08:02: And so the Bible, the Christian has a standard, which is the Bible.
08:08: Cornelius Van Til, a very important name in historical Christian teaching, Cornelius Van Til said this.
08:21: He said, Christian ethics does not differ from other ethics in that it seeks to answer any different questions than other ethical theories do, but it differs from other ethical theories in that it answers these questions differently.
08:39: We have also found that Christian ethics does not differ from other ethical theories in that it is more limited than they.
08:46: On the contrary, it is as comprehensive in its sweep as any ethical theory could be.
08:52: The difference is therefore basically one of approach.
08:55: We wish therefore to consider first the presuppositions of Christian ethics.
09:01: And what is the primary Christian presupposition? What's the primary Christian presupposition, Corey, would you say? Yes, but no.
09:16: The primary Christian presupposition is that we believe God is perfect in his character and therefore he is the fountainhead of all virtue.
09:28: He is the fountainhead of all good.
09:32: We believe the Bible is revelation from God and therefore it is authoritative in the subject of virtue.
09:42: So that would be the primary in regarding ethics.
09:46: And I think what you said is right, Corey, if we consider the idea of loving thy neighbor, that certainly is an ethic, it is a Christian ethic and maybe could be considered a primary Christian ethic.
09:57: But the presupposition that that is based on is that God is perfect, the fountainhead of all virtue, and the Bible is revelation that is authoritative in regard to virtue.
10:14: Van Til said this, he said, for Christian ethics the revelation of the self-contained God, the ontological trinity as found in the scripture, is the ultimate reference point in all ethical as well as all other questions.
10:30: For non-Christian ethics, the autonomous moral consciousness of man is the ultimate reference point in all ethical as well as all other questions.
10:39: So here's what Van Til is saying, he's saying the Christian doesn't deal with different ethical dilemmas.
10:46: We all are facing the same problems.
10:51: Abortion good, abortion bad, that's an ethical dilemma, we're all facing that question.
10:54: Whether or not euthanasia good, euthanasia bad, we're all facing that same question.
10:59: War, is it right, is it wrong, is it always right, is it always wrong, those are questions.
11:03: We're all facing the same ethical dilemmas, but we're coming with a different playbook.
11:09: We have a different standard than the world, and as we're going to see as we examine some other ethical schools of thought, we will see that a lot of different positions come from different angles, and as Van Til said, they will all, in one way or another, boil down to it's either God's standard or it's us as the standard.
11:37: There's a very common phrase that comes up a lot in debate, especially in the last five, six, seven years.
11:49: I see this come up a lot in online conversations.
11:53: Someone will ask the question, by what standard? By what standard? Someone will say, well that's wrong.
12:06: Next question, by what standard is that wrong? Or that's right, or that's good, or that's bad.
12:11: For instance, drag queen story hour, is it right or wrong? Well, by what standard? That's where this comes from.
12:23: I would certainly agree, but that's the issue.
12:27: For you to say that it's wrong, or for you to say that it's right, there must be a standard.
12:37: So the question is, by what standard? And so ultimately, when we think of the idea of Christian ethics, we're really talking about what God says in regard to standards of right and wrong, virtue and vice.
12:55: And in this course, we are going to examine an entire host of subjects where the answers will not always be easy.
13:05: In fact, I've taught this class before, and of all of the eight core classes that we have here at Sovereign Grace Academy, this one tends to erupt in the most conversation.
13:18: Because as we begin to elicit your responses to certain ethical dilemmas, we often find that our understanding of the standard may differ at times.
13:33: And so we have to address that as well.
13:36: How are we interpreting the standard? So, with all that, that's the introduction to our class, and we're going to in a moment look at the syllabus, but before we do, let's pray.
13:52: Father, we thank you for the opportunity to be a part of this class and to study, ultimately, Lord, your commands, and that which is virtuous, and that which is wrong from your perspective, Lord, and your perspective is the only one that matters when it comes to this particular subject.
14:16: And Lord, it is easy for men to seek to qualify evil with their own arguments, but yet your word tells us right from wrong, and so we pray, O Lord, to have a better understanding of what is right and what is wrong based upon your word.
14:37: And Lord, where we have discussion and debate, and we seek to approach different dilemmas with godly attitudes, I pray that our patience with one another would be virtuous, that it would be long-suffering, and Lord, that we would be gracious in our conversations and seek to glorify you in all that we say and do.
15:04: We pray this in Jesus' name and for his sake.
15:08: Amen.
15:10: So I want to invite you to take out your syllabus now, and walk through that for just a moment.
15:28: Begin with the course overview.
15:30: It says this course will investigate the subject of ethics based on a Christian worldview.
15:38: It will expose students to a litany of ethical dilemmas and cover methods for determining the biblical answer to solving those dilemmas.
15:49: Our goals and objectives are, one, to encourage students toward a more consistent Christian worldview, and really, honestly, that's what this is all about, is conforming our worldview to the scripture worldview.
16:05: Two, to investigate the relationship between Christians and biblical law.
16:10: Next week, particularly, we're going to talk about the subject of biblical law, particularly the Old Covenant law and how we are to understand its application to today, a very important part of this course in understanding ethics.
16:24: And three, we are going to learn methods for discovering the Bible's teaching regarding ethical dilemmas.
16:33: Your required texts for this class are, one, the Holy Bible.
16:38: You have to have a copy of the Bible.
16:41: If you don't, we have some here.
16:44: If you don't have a Bible at all, I'd love to give you one.
16:47: I don't want anyone to not have a Bible.
16:50: But you can have any translation that you like.
16:52: But if you bring the passion translation, I may have to expel you.
17:00: So, there are some bad ones.
17:05: The next thing you need is a copy of Introducing Christian Ethics by Scott Ray.
17:11: Now, there were some questions about this.
17:14: I have my copy as digital.
17:16: The book itself is, I don't know if I can pull up the cover.
17:23: Yeah, maybe I can.
17:24: There.
17:25: Should look like that on the cover if you have a copy.
17:28: He wrote this short book and he wrote a longer book called Making Moral Choices.
17:37: Making Moral Choices is the textbook that is used in the college university course.
17:43: I chose this book because it is more digestible in an eight-week course than is Making Moral Choices.
17:51: However, I've used both in my preparation of my notes.
17:54: Just so you know, I do have both books.
17:57: And if you want to get Making Moral Choices, you're more than welcome to.
18:00: But this book will cover everything we're going to cover in this course.
18:03: So, you're welcome to do whatever you would like with that.
18:07: And as you can see, there are two other books that are suggested.
18:12: The second book, or the first book under suggested texts is Forty Questions About Christians and Biblical Law by Tom Schreiner.
18:21: Tom Schreiner is a professor at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky.
18:27: Forty Questions About Biblical Law will be primarily what I talk about next week.
18:32: As I said, next week's class is going to be all about Old Testament and New Testament law.
18:37: So, you don't have to have it.
18:39: But if next week leads you down a path of exploration that you want to dive deeper into, then I would recommend Forty Questions About Biblical Law by Tom Schreiner.
18:50: There are some real nuggets of gold to be found in that book.
18:56: So, keep that in mind.
18:57: And then, I just quoted from Dr.
19:00: R.C.
19:01: Sproul.
19:01: He has a book called How Should I Live in This World? Again, it's a primer, a primer rather, for Christian ethics.
19:09: Very small book.
19:10: And you're welcome to look at that as well.
19:13: But again, the only book you have to have to fulfill the requirements for this course are Introducing Christian Ethics by Scott Ray.
19:21: Now, I want to ask you to write something on your syllabus.
19:26: Because this is not on there, but I'm going to add something right here next to the required text.
19:33: So, you can just make a little line off to the side and write this.
19:37: Write The Briefing by Albert Moeller.
19:43: The Briefing by Albert Moeller.
19:48: That is a podcast which is put out by Albert Moeller, who is the president of Southern Seminary.
19:57: And it was on break.
19:59: I think he's back now to the daily briefing.
20:03: And this is a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview.
20:07: At least one time during this course, I am going to ask you to choose one of the briefing episodes, listen to it, and write a small paragraph about the ethical dilemma that he poses in the briefing.
20:23: And I'm going to let you choose.
20:24: I'll just say, I want you to choose an episode, go on to the website.
20:31: You all know, Sovereign Grace Academy.
20:33: Or you can do it in your notes if you can't access the website.
20:37: I'd rather this be done on the website where you type it up and put it there.
20:41: But if that's too difficult, I know some of you have technological issues.
20:45: If that's too difficult, you can type it out and email it to me.
20:49: But either way, I want you to type out a short synopsis of an ethical dilemma that's put out in the briefing.
20:56: It's an exercise we did in the last class.
20:58: I thought it would be helpful this time as well.
21:00: And it also, that particular program, if you're not familiar with it, that program does keep its ear to the ground on modern issues that is being faced in the world, a lot of things going on in the Supreme Court, a lot of things going on in the government, and things like that.
21:15: Thank you, Mark.
21:17: The briefing is just a great show for you to keep up with modern issues that are facing Christians, a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview.
21:27: So at least once in this course, I'm going to ask you to do that, to go and listen to an episode of the briefing and listen for at least one issue and write about it.
21:39: Just a paragraph, something simple.
21:41: So keep that in your notes.
21:44: All right.
21:44: Course requirements, you registered hopefully already for the class at sovereigngraceacademy.org.
21:49: If you have not done that, please do it.
21:52: Your attendance in this class is in person or online.
21:56: You can do either.
21:58: When you are doing your work, you are expected to have good academic character.
22:03: That means no cheating, particularly when it comes to test time.
22:07: You will be getting at least two pop quizzes on the TESMOS quiz that I send out.
22:14: You'll be getting at least two pop quizzes this term as well as your final exam.
22:21: And your reading assignment is 25 percent, your notebook assignment, which I take at the last class, is 25 percent.
22:26: And then your final examination is 50 percent of your grade.
22:29: And that is generally how I grade everything.
22:34: I did have a couple of you last semester who had at least one question on the test that you debated your answer.
22:42: And I went back and looked at it and was willing to give credit.
22:46: I can do that.
22:47: I can go into the software.
22:50: I can look at where you are and I can fix it.
22:55: So if you do have a question on the test that you feel like you should have received credit for or maybe wasn't substantially clear enough, you can email me and I can fix it.
23:05: How are you guys liking that software, by the way? Huh? How are you liking the testing software? Last semester was our first time.
23:16: Yeah, yeah, you don't love it.
23:18: Would you rather write a paper? Huh? No, no, no.
23:26: I wasn't being sarcastic.
23:28: I was saying would you prefer to write a paper? Oh.
23:32: Because I find that more people are participating with the tests.
23:37: That's one thing that's helping me.
23:39: When I ask people to write a five, six, seven, eight-page paper, very few people wanted to do that.
23:44: And I understand that not everybody is ready to sit down and write a research paper.
23:49: But taking the test seems to have gotten more people involved in that part.
23:53: So I think it's last time I think I did, I think we had 20-something certificates go out, 20-something people.
24:00: And it was all really good high grades people.
24:03: And it was a 50-question test.
24:05: So it was a pretty good final, I thought, as far as the length and everything and the breadth of it all.
24:12: So hopefully this will be just as good.
24:16: All right, so on the back of that page it's got the course schedule.
24:20: Tonight is our introduction to the class.
24:22: And as we do every week, we go over the syllabus together.
24:26: And we're fixing to look at three things.
24:28: We're going to look at why study ethics, what is goodness, and subjective versus objective.
24:33: That's going to be our outline tonight.
24:36: Lecture two next week is Christians and biblical law, perspectives on biblical law, grace as an excuse for sin, and subjectivism in Romans 14.
24:44: So we're going to talk about that next week.
24:47: Lecture three, we're going to dive into life ethics, which is abortion, reproduction, and genetics.
24:55: And each of these will have corresponding chapters in your book.
24:58: You'll notice those off to the right.
25:00: It'll tell you what you are to read for that week.
25:04: Lecture four, we have a guest lecturer, Dr.
25:08: Bert Jordan.
25:09: He's here with us tonight.
25:10: He's been with us for a while.
25:11: You guys know Bert.
25:12: Well, Bert is a seminary professor and pastor.
25:16: And he is going to be taking us this semester through the death ethics course, which will cover suicide, euthanasia, and capital punishment.
25:29: I really enjoy talking about capital punishment.
25:32: So when he told me he wanted that one, I was like, okay.
25:36: That sounded weird.
25:37: I don't enjoy talking about capital punishment.
25:39: I think that's a very important subject.
25:42: So I look forward to Bert's thoughts on that and hearing his lecture.
25:45: But that will be lecture four on that evening.
25:49: Lecture five, we're going to deal with war ethics, which deals with pacifism, just war, personal protection, and defense.
25:56: Lecture six is sexual ethics, marriage and divorce, fornication, and alternative lifestyles.
26:01: We're going to look at money ethics in lecture seven.
26:04: And then finally, and this is the fun part of this class, in lecture eight, it's you who choose the topic.
26:11: Notice it says we're going to summarize and then respond to class submissions.
26:16: Somewhere around class five, I'm going to give you a handout to take home.
26:22: And you are going to get to pose ethical dilemmas that we will discuss in the final class, seeking the biblical answer to the dilemmas that you propose.
26:34: So class eight is an opportunity for real engagement.
26:39: Hopefully we'll engage through all the classes, but class eight will be a lot of fun.
26:45: So be thinking in the weeks ahead as you're listening to these things and different issues, be thinking about what you might want to propose for the class to discuss.
26:56: Sound good? All right.
26:59: So move back now to our outline.
27:09: So as I said, tonight's lecture outline is as follows.
27:13: We're going to look at the question of why study ethics.
27:15: We're going to look at what is goodness, and you'll understand why that question in just a moment.
27:20: And then we're going to look at subjective versus objective and what does that mean.
27:27: And then we'll take our break.
27:29: After the break, we have a handout that we're going to go over tonight.
27:32: This is a model for ethical decision-making, and it comes from your book.
27:37: This comes directly out of the textbook that you're reading.
27:39: So that is the handout we'll look at after our break.
27:43: So let's look first at why study ethics.
27:47: Each of you has a reason why you chose to take this course.
27:51: Perhaps you are anxious to dive into an ethical dilemma.
27:55: Perhaps you are looking forward to asking questions, mixing it up during discussion time.
28:03: But it's likely you have a more profound sense of purpose.
28:06: It's likely that you have ethical questions yourself, which you're unsure how to answer.
28:12: And I know this.
28:14: As a pastor, I am faced with tremendously difficult questions and circumstances wherein the only option seems to be the choice of the lesser of two evils.
28:26: And I am familiar, so no one has to quote it to me, I am familiar with Spurgeon's quote.
28:32: He said, I never choose the lesser of two evils.
28:37: That's what he said.
28:38: He said, when given the option to choose the lesser of two evils, I choose neither.
28:44: That's very virtuous sounding.
28:49: And I'm not questioning his integrity as a minister.
28:53: But I will say that often it seems as if that's the only options we have.
28:59: I vote too.
29:02: It's supposed to be a joke, but I guess it's not that funny.
29:04: And we all are faced at times where it seems like there's no good answer.
29:11: There's no right answer.
29:12: And what do we do? As a human being, made in the image of God, we all have an inherent sense of ought.
29:22: Open your Bibles to Romans 2.
29:31: Go to verse 14.
29:38: And again, when I say the word ought, this is the word I'm referring to here.
29:47: Romans 2, verse 14 says this.
29:53: It says, For when Gentiles who do not have the law by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law.
30:07: They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Jesus Christ, or by Christ Jesus.
30:28: So what is Paul saying in that passage? He is saying that even people who do not have the written law of God do have a natural understanding of right and wrong.
30:46: This is sometimes referred to as natural law.
30:54: Natural law is a hugely debated subject, particularly post-Reformation this was a hugely debated subject because natural law, particularly in Roman Catholic teaching, was understood to be something that all men possessed and all men were able to reconcile and understand right from wrong.
31:18: But the Reformers understood men's nature as being corrupt and so there was debate about how far and wide in the expanse of natural law.
31:27: But we can all agree, whether we are Protestant or Catholic, we can all agree that Romans 2, 14-16 shows us that there is something that all men have that express a right from wrong ethic that is built within them.
31:54: And we see that.
31:54: If we look out just in the world, there are very few cultures, if any, that are completely without any standard of rule.
32:08: Even if we go into the farthest reaches of jungles where we find people still living very rudimentary lives out in the jungle, they still live by certain standards, certain codes and certain laws and certain rules.
32:24: One of the most basic rules is the rule of lying.
32:31: Lying is considered to be wrong.
32:33: People are expected to tell the truth.
32:36: People are expected not to steal and respect private property.
32:40: People are expected not to commit murder.
32:44: How can you have a society if people just go around killing each other? Obviously, societies are based upon certain ethical norms and certain sense of oughtness.
32:55: And Paul is saying in this text, he says, when the Gentiles who don't have the written law do what the law requires, they show that the ergos namos, that's the word here in the Greek, the ergos namos is the work of the law, is written on their heart.
33:15: It's actually ergos namos, I think, because it's the genitive, but it's the work of the law.
33:20: There is something in the heart of every man, and we would say it's been placed there by God to know right from wrong.
33:30: However, because of the fall, our sense of right and wrong, and this is where the reformers would step in and point out, that because of the fall, our sense of ought has been corrupted.
33:43: You're in Romans 2, turn back to Romans 1.
33:51: Notice what Romans 1, verse 18 says.
33:57: It says, for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness do what? Suppress the truth.
34:11: They suppress the truth.
34:14: I want you to write a word in your notes, and it is the word noetic.
34:29: Noetic comes from the Greek word nous, which means the mind, not nous like something that you tie in a knot on a rope, but nous in Greek would be n-o-u-s.
34:46: That's the word for the mind.
34:48: Nous is the word for the mind.
34:52: And the noetic effect, we call the noetic effect of the fall, is the effect that the fall had on the mind of man.
35:09: 1 Corinthians 2, verse 14, you don't have to turn there, I'll just read it to you.
35:13: 1 Corinthians 2, verse 14 says, The natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.
35:34: What does that tell us about the mind of natural man? Perverted, corrupted, in other words, essentially the same meaning.
35:48: The mind of man has an understanding that there is right from wrong.
35:54: We read that in Romans 2.
35:56: But the mind of man has a desire to suppress the truth in unrighteousness.
36:04: We see that in Romans 1.
36:07: Therefore, while men have an understanding of what is right and what is wrong, we also have, and I say we as all mankind has, a problem of suppression.
36:21: Suppressing that which is right and that which is wrong.
36:27: What does Jeremiah 17, 9 say? Anyone know that one right off the top of your head? That's right.
36:37: Yeah, that's right.
36:38: It says the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately sick.
36:42: Who can know it? And what is the heart? It's not our blood pumping muscle.
36:49: The heart is the inner man.
36:51: The heart is, in that sense, the idea of our understanding.
36:56: Our understanding is deceitful.
36:59: Our understanding is wicked.
37:02: Therefore, when we study the subject of ethics, we're studying the idea of helping us to conform our corruption to the virtue of God.
37:18: Helping us to abandon that which is wrong in our thinking about good and virtue and evil and vice.
37:30: And trying to conform us to the standard of God.
37:39: This particular subject may seem somewhat, it's like, well, maybe I'm oversimplifying it or overcomplicating it.
37:51: I don't know maybe how you feel about it, but the point is when we engage in the subject of ethics, we really are engaging in the subject of learning the mind of God on these issues.
38:06: Seeking to think God's thoughts after him is what one theologian said in regard to what theology is, thinking God's thoughts after him.
38:13: And so we are doing that in the same way in regard to ethics.
38:17: Romans chapter 12 tells us that we are to be, not to be conformed to this world, but to be transformed by the renewing of what? Our mind.
38:26: And that tells us that's an ongoing thing.
38:30: None of us, when we became a Christian, were automatically perfectly right in our thinking.
38:37: Sometimes I go back to sermons that I preached 15 years ago.
38:41: I look at my notes because I still have notes from that long ago.
38:44: Bert, you still got notes from 15 years ago? Or further back? You ever look at those notes and say, boy, either how shallow I was or maybe how wrong I was? Yeah.
38:56: And I'll say that.
38:59: I'll look at them and I'll say, wow, I'm thankful that God is conforming me and teaching me, but at the same time, I'm somewhat aghast at where my thinking was then.
39:15: And so, again, ethics is about growing in our understanding of right and wrong, but also growing in our understanding of God.
39:22: So when we talk about why studying ethics, it's for that very reason, that we would conform our understanding to the standard of God, to God's perfect standard.
39:35: It's a lifelong pursuit in that regard.
39:40: It's part of sanctification.
39:45: Now, the second thing I wanted to mention tonight is the question of what is goodness, because we have said several times that we're talking about the subject of virtue or the subject of goodness, and when we discuss the subject of ethics, we are, in fact, talking about the subject of goodness, and that may seem, again, like an oversimplification, but here's something to consider.
40:14: When you think about the term ethical, if I said this man is an ethical man, that would be in regard...
40:24: You would think of that man as...
40:26: I'm saying that's a good thing.
40:28: I'm saying this is a good man.
40:30: I'm saying I can trust this man because he's an ethical man, therefore he is a good man.
40:36: But if I were to say someone was unethical, what would I be saying? Bad? Yeah.
40:45: Not good.
40:46: I'd be saying I can't trust him.
40:47: He's unethical.
40:48: I can't put my wallet in his hand and trust that I'm going to get everything back.
40:54: I can't let him spend time with my family or spend time with my church family or anything like that because he's unethical.
41:03: And so when we talk about ethics, we're really, to boil it down to a very simple place, we're talking about goodness.
41:11: But this raises the immediate question of what makes something good or bad, and there are different theories on this, and this is in your book, but I want to address this, the theory of different types of understanding of ethics or goodness.
41:31: We're going to look at four.
41:34: The first one is called deontological ethics.
41:47: Think of the word deon, and it's deontological ethics.
41:53: The next one is called teleological ethics, and we'll talk about the word telos, which is where that comes from.
42:08: The third is ethical egoism.
42:15: Probably you're familiar with the word ego.
42:18: We'll address how that works in a moment.
42:21: And finally is the word relativism.
42:27: As I said, if you are reading your textbook, if you've already started, how many of you have done any reading already? Okay, have you seen these already that he's addressed? Okay, all right.
42:36: So these are there for you to dive deeper into, but for the moment for this evening in regarding the subject of goodness, I want to just address them to make sure you kind of have an idea of what we're talking about so when you do your reading, you'll hit the ground running.
42:53: Deontological ethics comes from the Greek word deon, which means an obligation or a duty.
42:58: This is the belief that things are right or wrong based on intrinsic values and principles regardless of the context or consequence.
43:09: So here's an example of deontological ethics.
43:12: It is always wrong to steal because stealing is intrinsically wrong.
43:20: That's an example of deontological ethics.
43:22: It would be in the idea of a duty or an obligation.
43:27: We have the duty not to steal or more specifically, stealing recognizes the idea of personal property.
43:37: So I have to recognize personal property.
43:41: If I steal, I am violating the principle of personal property and therefore I am violating something that is intrinsically good by doing something that's intrinsically bad.
43:54: Deontological ethics deals with that.
43:57: Good and bad are good and bad by nature.
44:02: Teleological comes from the Greek word telos, which means goal or purpose.
44:09: This is the belief that the outcome determines whether something is right or wrong.
44:16: The action which produces the greatest good and the least harm is right.
44:21: Right is determined by the greatest benefit for the greatest number or simply put, the ends justify the means.
44:31: Everyone has heard that, right? How many of you have ever heard a politician say, we want to do that which does the greatest good for the greatest number of people? What provides the greatest good for the greatest number of people? That is not deontological ethics.
44:54: That is teleological ethics.
44:57: What if the greatest good for the greatest number of people was to eliminate a third of the people? Because by eliminating a third of the people, you would increase the amount of resources that would be available to the other two-thirds.
45:18: Recently, our Vice President Kamala Harris was discussing the idea of the need for electric vehicles and the need for cleaner energy.
45:31: Well, in the midst of her conversation, she also said, and decreasing the population.
45:43: But you understand, and I made a little video about it on my church soup show that I do.
45:49: I said one of these things is not like the other.
45:52: Because electric vehicles is fine and clean energy is fine, but decreasing population means somebody has got to go.
46:00: But again, that is a teleological ethic.
46:03: The idea that, well, if for two-thirds of the people, eliminating one-third would be good.
46:08: And this is a drastic example, you understand.
46:09: I am just trying to give you the idea of the ends justifying the means.
46:13: I will tell you, this is something I hear a lot.
46:16: Christians will often say, well, Pastor, I need to do this because this is what will occur.
46:21: Even if this is wrong, I have got this greater virtuous thing down the line.
46:25: So the ends justify the means.
46:31: But then we think of something like, and again, I am not arguing this point, I am just throwing this out there for consideration.
46:37: We think of something like Nazi Germany.
46:41: When Corrie Ten Boom chose to hide Jews in her home and she chose to lie, which deontological ethics would say, lying is always wrong.
46:53: Because it is standard, lying is wrong.
46:57: But she had the purpose of saving life by saying, ain't no Jews here.
47:04: You get what I am saying? So the question then is, does the end, saving life, justify the means of lying? I am not asking you to answer.
47:16: I am telling you these are the dilemmas, these are the things that are posed in an ethical class.
47:21: You have to ask the question.
47:23: And you see now where it begins to become more of just a simple, hmm? Somebody say something? Okay.
47:32: It becomes more than just a simple set of standards.
47:37: We have to consider certain realities.
47:40: The third is ethical egoism.
47:43: Now what does the word ego mean? Person, self, I, ego is the self.
47:53: And this is the belief that whatever is in a person's own interest is what determines right or wrong.
48:01: And here is one that you have heard.
48:03: I know you have heard this, but I am going to say it anyway.
48:08: Well, not just that, but listen to this.
48:10: This is a very specific example.
48:14: This child will be an undue financial and emotional burden on a person, therefore that person should be allowed to have an abortion.
48:26: You understand the ethical egotism argument.
48:32: This child will harm this person, therefore this child should be taken out of the equation, therefore no harm will come to that person.
48:41: We focus on that person's either emotional, financial, whatever situation, and that becomes the standard for the ethic, the individual.
48:55: Finally, relativism.
48:57: This is the belief that right and wrong are determined by the culture and therefore are not absolute.
49:05: And it can also extend to the individual level, and this goes to what you were saying, David.
49:10: What's right for me is right for me, and what's wrong for me might not be wrong for you, and that's okay.
49:15: And you've heard people say that.
49:16: That's a little bit different than ethical egotism because ethical egotism is dealing specifically with the need of the individual in the moment.
49:24: This deals more with the understanding of right and wrong on a personal level or on a societal level.
49:30: I'll give you an example.
49:35: During the great debate, and you've all heard me talk about this debate before, if you've been in this class, I've mentioned it in other classes, the debate between Gordon Stein and Greg Bonson that happened back in the 80s, and if you've never heard it, go listen to it.
49:49: It's really a great debate.
49:50: Gordon Stein represented the atheist position.
49:53: Greg Bonson represented the Christian position, and when they got to challenge one another on questions, Bonson asked Stein, he said, why is what Hitler did wrong? Hitler killed millions of Jewish people as well as many other people that he found inferior.
50:14: Why was that wrong? Stein, who represented the atheist position, said the reason why it was wrong was because the cultural morals of the day had determined that killing innocent people is wrong, and therefore, what Hitler did was wrong because it went against the, remember what I said about the difference between ethics and morals? Morals are changing, right? Ethics are staying.
50:45: He didn't say it was unethical.
50:47: He said it was immoral because they had determined this was the moral standard, and Bonson responded and said, well, what if they didn't? What if the culture said it wasn't wrong? What if Hitler's culture won, and what if his morals became the standard? Would it then have been right to kill millions of Jews? Again, going back to this question, by what standard? Because if your standard is only the society, because I'll argue, I'll say, morals are very relative in our day, as I said, even just on TV.
51:23: We see the morals changing, and very relative, and therein lies the problem.
51:31: But here's the thing that I want to say about all four of these, and this may surprise you, so hold on to your seats, and don't let your head blow up when I say this.
51:42: The Bible actually addresses all of these, and it uses all of these at times to make points.
51:51: For instance, the Bible certainly says that there are things that are intrinsically virtuous and intrinsically evil, but at the same time, by the way, the word teleological can also be utilitarian.
52:07: I should have said that.
52:08: A term that you'll hear sometimes is utilitarian.
52:11: Again, the ends justifying the means.
52:13: That's just another term.
52:15: It's utilitarian ethics.
52:16: We will see that sometimes in Scripture where the ends, again, with the issue of Rahab and the question of whether or not what she did was virtuous or wrong, and there's debate about that, about her hiding the spies.
52:36: Should she have just trusted God and told the truth? Right? That's a question, and that's a debate that comes up, and people ask that question, or did the ends justify the means? More specifically, maybe Rahab not being the best example, go back one book to the book of Genesis when the midwives were being told to kill the children that were being born to the Israelite women, and they told the Pharaoh, the women are, what do they say? Lie? Lie, yeah, that they give birth so quickly we can't do anything about it.
53:10: I don't know how that story jived, but they made it work, but they used that as their reasoning for not fulfilling the king's command to kill the babies, right? So we talk about utilitarian ethics or teleological ethics.
53:30: Ethical egoism.
53:31: There are times when self-interest does play a part.
53:40: This one might kind of surprise you, but think about when we are given certain commands in scripture, Jesus appeals at times to self-interest.
53:52: Example, he said, if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off, because it's better to enter into heaven maimed than it is to go to hell.
54:05: So you have self-interest in doing the right thing here.
54:11: There is self-interest in doing what's right, because the punishment for evil is eternal hell.
54:20: How many of us have wrestled with Jesus' words there? I mean, none of us think he's really telling us to cut our hand off, but at the same time, he's calling us to consider ourselves in this, to consider our own self-interest.
54:33: If you continue going down this path, it's going to have a dangerous position for you as an individual.
54:41: Finally, relativism.
54:43: We're going to talk about this next week a little bit more, but think about Romans chapter 14, which does tell us that there are times where there are things that would be wrong for me that wouldn't necessarily be wrong for you, such as the eating of meat or not eating of meat.
54:58: Paul says, let each one be convinced in his own mind and don't judge the other person if he sees it differently than you.
55:09: Let each one stand before his master.
55:11: Each one has to stand or fall before his own master.
55:14: Now, that's not pure relativism, but that does say, he says for the one who can't do it in faith, what does he call it? Sin.
55:21: That which is not of faith is sin.
55:25: So all of these have a place in our study, but if we had to choose one and say the biblical ethic is based primarily on one of these, which one would we probably lean toward? The ontological, because we have a standard.
55:44: So we can say that of the four, though these are all addressed in Scripture, we do have a standard that we can look to, and that's where we get to the question of what makes something good, and this leads us to a dilemma, because when I say what makes something good, there is something called the Euthyphro Dilemma.
56:17: Euthyphro is spelled E-U-T-H-Y-P-H-R-O, Euthyphro Dilemma, and the Euthyphro, yeah, it's hard to say, Euthyphro Dilemma is the question of, is something good because God commands it, or does God command something because it's good? I'll ask that again in case you're writing it down.
56:49: Is something good because God commands it, or does God command something because it is good? And why this is a dilemma is the question of where, let me write this up here, you and I have a standard that we look up to, and we could call that standard goodness, and we are seeking to achieve that standard of goodness.
57:24: That's what we're trying to do.
57:27: We want to be good, we want to do good, we want to be virtuous, so here's the line, that's goodness, we are trying to reach it.
57:33: Is God in that same position? Is God, is there a standard above God, because there's a standard above us, but is there a standard above God to which he must reach? And the answer is obviously no, but what then do we say is good when we're discussing the subject of God and his goodness? We say God is good, so does that mean God is the standard? We would say yes, but here's where the dilemma comes in.
58:09: We say okay, well what if God commanded something that wasn't good? Is that even possible? A few years ago, a person I'm acquainted with was in a debate, he's a pastor, he was actually a pastor, he preached here once, and he was in a debate with an atheist, a very well-known atheist named Dan Barker, and in the debate, Dan Barker asked him the question, would you kill me if God commanded it? Now my acquaintance, my fellow pastor, he didn't want to answer that question.
59:02: The reason why he didn't want to answer that question is because he knew the next response.
59:08: In fact, it ended up going there.
59:10: Dan Barker said, if God told you to kill me, would you kill me? And the pastor sort of hemmed and hawed and didn't really want to answer.
59:17: He said, well I wouldn't kill you.
59:19: I would tell God no.
59:22: I would say no, because killing is wrong, and if God commanded me to kill you, I would tell him no.
59:30: Now in my last class, I actually listened to the audio from my last class.
59:34: Cindy, you were here.
59:35: Daisy, you were here.
59:35: In my last class, somebody said, well God would never command anyone to kill anyone.
59:39: I said, for a moment, read your Old Testament, because there are times when God had a scorched earth policy.
59:52: Go into the land and kill every man, woman, child.
59:56: Blessed is he who dashes the heads of your little ones against the rock.
01:00:01: It's in the Psalms.
01:00:03: So are there times that God commands that which men would find morally repugnant? We have to be honest, right? We have to say yes.
01:00:15: Isn't this what the atheists use to argue against Scripture? And this is the very example I'm giving.
01:00:20: An atheist is using this to argue against the God of Scripture.
01:00:24: So the question is, does God command anything that is evil? No.
01:00:31: Therefore, does killing become good if God commands it? That's the issue of the euthyphro dilemma.
01:00:39: That's where this dilemma comes up.
01:00:41: My answer to this, and I certainly do not find myself as being more intelligent than other men, but I do find my answer somewhat satisfying for me, and that is to simply say that by saying God is the standard, that I have eliminated the question because somebody says, is something good because God commands it, or does God command something because it's good? I say God commands that which is in accordance with His will, and His will is good.
01:01:11: That's my answer.
01:01:12: Like I said, you may find that compelling.
01:01:14: You may not find that compelling.
01:01:15: But again, the line becomes God.
01:01:18: God does not have a standard to which He must reach.
01:01:22: God does not have Lady Justice who stands above Him with her scales and say, you must reach this scale, or some other virtuous thing that God has to reach up to.
01:01:34: God Himself is the standard.
01:01:38: God Himself is the one who determines the standard.
01:01:42: And therefore, and this is why in your notes it says subjective versus objective, the last thing we're going to talk about before we take our break, I know we're a little over time now, but when we talk about subjectivity and objectivity, we're talking about the subject of right and wrong from a perspective.
01:02:02: If we say something is objective, we say objective means it's always right, or it's always wrong.
01:02:09: But subjective means it's right or wrong from a particular perspective.
01:02:15: And here's where I hope this helps with the rest of this class.
01:02:20: When we talk about right from wrong, when we talk about good and evil, vice and virtue, we are always talking about it from God's perspective.
01:02:35: Let me give you maybe a way of thinking about that.
01:02:43: The word truth.
01:02:47: Someone define the word truth.
01:02:55: Facts.
01:02:57: Facts are those things which are true.
01:03:01: Someone else? That which is not false.
01:03:06: So we define it by the negation.
01:03:08: That's fine.
01:03:09: What else? Truth is what conforms to God's will.
01:03:19: Is this a question that's been around for a while? Anybody remember when Jesus was brought before Pilate? Jesus said, I have come to bear witness to the truth.
01:03:33: And Pilate scoffed at Jesus, and he said what? What is truth? He didn't say, what is the truth? He said, what is truth? As if to say, even 2,000 years ago in Italy, well, Jesus, I'm sorry, in Jerusalem.
01:03:53: I was thinking of Rome, but maybe they were in Jerusalem.
01:03:55: Even 2,000 years ago in Jerusalem, there was a man who was willing to say, truth doesn't exist.
01:04:06: Because he said, what is truth? Truth doesn't exist.
01:04:12: When we ask what truth is, there's something, I really like this.
01:04:17: It's called the correspondence theory of truth.
01:04:20: The correspondence theory of truth is that truth is what corresponds to what is.
01:04:27: Truth corresponds to what is.
01:04:32: And therefore, if I were to say, God exists, it's either true or it's not.
01:04:41: And what would make it true? If God is.
01:04:44: If God actually exists, it's true.
01:04:47: If God doesn't exist, it's not true.
01:04:49: And all the faith in the world wouldn't conjure God up.
01:04:52: And all the unbelief in the world wouldn't make God go away.
01:04:56: Right? So correspondence theory says truth is what corresponds to what is.
01:05:02: What is actually true.
01:05:04: What is actually there.
01:05:07: Okay? So how does this relate to ethics? Good, goodness, virtue is what corresponds to what is right from God's perspective.
01:05:29: Goodness or virtue is what corresponds to what is right from God's perspective.
01:05:37: And I did leave something out, so I'm going to ask you to go backwards for just a second.
01:05:40: In the definition of truth, truth is what corresponds to what is true from God's perspective.
01:05:46: Truth is what corresponds from God's perspective.
01:05:49: And therefore, truth is subjective in this sense.
01:05:51: It's subjective to God.
01:05:54: And virtue and ethics are subjective in correspondence to God.
01:06:05: I feel like I kind of lost myself there for a moment, so let me clarify this.
01:06:10: God determines what is right and wrong.
01:06:13: Every person is subject to themselves, but we are also subject to God.
01:06:19: And as a Christian, we would say God is the standard for determining what is right and what is wrong.
01:06:25: Therefore, we can rightly say that ethics are subjective, but they're not subjective to us.
01:06:32: They're subjective to God.
01:06:39: We study the subject of ethics to help us conform our understanding about good and evil, right and wrong, vice and virtue, to the perfect standard of God.
01:06:50: All right, so we're going to take five minutes, and when we come back, we're going to look at this handout.
01:06:54: During the break, please get a copy of this handout.
01:06:57: It's up here, and when we come back, we're going to talk about this.
01:07:04: All right, we are going to finish up with our last 20 minutes or so of conversation, and we're going to talk about our model for ethical decision-making here, which is a handout.
01:07:17: Before we do the handout, though, I do want to make a mention of one other thought experiment.
01:07:27: How many of you have ever heard of the Ring of Gyges? Is that you, Ms.
01:07:35: Debra? I saw your hand go up, and I was like, okay, somebody.
01:07:42: The Ring of Gyges was from Plato in his Republic.
01:07:47: This was obviously written very long ago, and it was a story about Gyges, who was a shepherd, who had found a magical ring, and the ring allowed him to make himself invisible.
01:08:09: Yeah, yeah.
01:08:12: Well, the ring that made him invisible made it possible for him to take what he wanted, do what he wanted, go where he wanted, be whatever he wanted without any consequence.
01:08:29: And the question that this story was used to raise was the story of ethics as being something that was only because we have to.
01:08:44: Do we behave only because we are forced to by society? And if we were given the opportunity to do whatever we want, see whatever we want, hear whatever we want, without any consequence, would it change our ethics or change our behavior? It's just an interesting thought experiment.
01:09:06: If you want to look this up and read the story and maybe use it as part of your thinking, it's G-Y-G-E-S, that's the name, and it's the Ring of Gyges, and it's from Plato.
01:09:21: I'll just read the last sentence.
01:09:22: It says, imagine for a moment that you were in possession of such a ring.
01:09:26: How would you use it? If you had a perfect guarantee that you would never be caught or punished, what would you do? And that's a question regarding ethics.
01:09:40: And again, you say, well, it doesn't change me because my standard is God, and he can see me whether I'm invisible or not.
01:09:47: But in thinking of, because we're not looking at this, this is not a Christian ethic.
01:09:52: This is obviously from Plato.
01:09:53: This is regarding more of a secular view.
01:09:56: Does man and his understanding of right and wrong really only come down to the question of fear of punishment? Fear of consequence.
01:10:07: Fear of consequence, yeah.
01:10:09: So it's just an interesting thought experiment if you want to look that up and read about it.
01:10:14: All right, so model for ethical decision making.
01:10:18: This is your handout.
01:10:20: This comes from your book, as you can see at the bottom.
01:10:22: It says, taken from Introduction to Christian Ethics by Scott Ray.
01:10:27: And he gives us seven points that can be used for ethical decision making.
01:10:34: Now, when we do our final class, remember I said in our final class we're going to allow you to propose some ethical dilemmas for us to discuss? Well, in our final class, this will be our rubric.
01:10:49: This will be our model for the conversation.
01:10:52: Okay, first question is have we gathered the facts? What do we know and what do we need to know? So someone proposed tonight an ethical issue.
01:11:12: Okay, my man.
01:11:14: My man came out strong.
01:11:15: I was going to say divorce, but okay.
01:11:19: Because something I deal with a lot, obviously, in ministry is dealing with family problems, marriage, divorce, things like that.
01:11:25: That's obviously something where you have to gather a lot of facts.
01:11:29: But we'll go with A.J.
01:11:30: We'll say, okay, A.J.
01:11:32: said, what if you were forced to get a vaccine and you were unwilling to do it, but you had to have a passport for your job, right? That's the issue.
01:11:44: Is that what we're talking about, right? Am I right? Vaccine passport, okay.
01:11:47: So gathering the facts.
01:11:49: What do we know? What do we need to know? Now, we're not going to try to solve A.J.'s dilemma.
01:11:54: Some of this is just seeking out how to do it.
01:11:56: How would we go about it? And we would gather the facts, things, questions of, well, questions about the vaccine itself, questions about safety, questions about the law.
01:12:06: What does the law require? What is the law demanding? Is what the law demands going against something that God commands? Or is it in violation of God's law, right? So those are things.
01:12:17: Those are the facts.
01:12:18: When it says, you know, sort of like, what's his name, Joe Friday? Just the facts, right? We were going to gather the facts.
01:12:25: We're going to see what all is involved.
01:12:27: And what's amazing is as you begin to consider these ethical dilemmas, you begin to start seeing there are a lot of things that you hadn't considered, a lot of facts that need to be brought into the conversation.
01:12:38: So Scott and his, or Dr.
01:12:41: Ray, excuse me, not on a first-name basis, but Dr.
01:12:44: Ray in his book is saying the first thing you need to do is make sure you understand the issue.
01:12:49: Make sure you understand you've gathered the facts.
01:12:52: How many people speak ignorantly without gathering the facts? Just go on Facebook, go on Twitter, spend five minutes on TikTok, and you'll see people who speak very confidently in their ignorance because they have not gathered the facts.
01:13:10: So first things first, what do we know? What do we need to know? Number two, identify the ethical dilemma.
01:13:18: Now, the ethical dilemma is a conflict between two or more principle or virtue-driven interests.
01:13:26: Now, he talks in the book about what that means, but for a simple outline of what he means by a principle or virtue-driven interest, often ethical dilemmas come down to the issue of not necessarily right and wrong on its face, but it's coming back to our types of ethical issues.
01:13:46: You say, well, and I'm going to use divorce because that was the one I was more prepared for, even though it's not that I don't want to talk about the other, but I'm a little bit more prepared.
01:13:54: Okay, we say the Bible says that husband and wife should stay together, right? Husband, love your wife.
01:14:01: Wife, submit to your husband.
01:14:02: That should be what happens.
01:14:04: Okay, but then ethical egoism, they would say, okay, what if they're absolutely miserable, right? And you say, well, that shouldn't matter.
01:14:13: But it does.
01:14:14: I remember sitting in a conversation with two men.
01:14:17: No, I'm sorry.
01:14:19: No, no, no.
01:14:23: Totally different ethical question.
01:14:24: No, I was in a counseling situation about 15 years ago with a husband and wife, and they were absolutely miserable.
01:14:32: They were so ugly to each other, so harsh with each other, and I was trying to counsel them to love one another and to do the biblical and godly thing of staying together and loving one another and supporting one another and encouraging one another.
01:14:45: They were so harsh with one another.
01:14:47: I remember looking at one of them.
01:14:48: I said, honestly, there's no grounds for divorce here.
01:14:52: I said, but as ugly as you are to one another, I think that one of you is eventually going to leave simply by virtue of the fact that you're so ugly to each other.
01:15:03: You're so harsh and so mean to each other.
01:15:06: I said, I'm not saying it's right, and I'm not saying it's good, but I can see it happening because eventually somebody is going to say, I can't do this anymore.
01:15:16: And so that has to be considered as part not as what's right and wrong but as why people are making the decisions they're making.
01:15:22: Again, what is bringing about the virtue or the principle of their interest? What's causing the dilemma here? So identifying the dilemma.
01:15:35: Number three, what additional virtue or principles have a bearing on the case? Along with competing interests, others may be relevant.
01:15:46: Let's go back to A.J.
01:15:48: for a minute with the passports.
01:15:51: So the ethical dilemma is we don't want, I say we, I'm speaking for you, A.J., maybe I'll just say I don't want to get the vaccine, but I also don't want to lose my job.
01:16:03: That's my ethical dilemma.
01:16:05: And are there any other virtuous considerations? Well, there are those who say without the vaccine, I'm potentially going to harm other people.
01:16:13: That's something that has to be considered.
01:16:14: Even if I disagree, that's something that has to come into the conversation.
01:16:17: That's something that has to be brought in at least for consideration.
01:16:20: Even if I dismiss it after studying it, I still have to look at the facts.
01:16:24: Okay, what are the facts? If I don't get the vaccine, is that going to hurt someone else? Am I going to put somebody else into peril? Or if I do get the vaccine, am I going to end up with a heart problem or some other issue that's going to harm me and ultimately hurt my family, and it's going to make my family not have a father that's able to take care of them because I've put myself in a dangerous situation.
01:16:43: You understand? So all these facts come into play, and all these questions come into play.
01:16:49: Number four, he says to list the alternatives.
01:16:53: What choices are available to resolve the conflict, and do they really resolve it? Well, the one choice is to get a false passport.
01:17:01: That's what you're talking about, right? And, again, this is all recorded, and I'm sure the FBI will be there.
01:17:09: No one can see you.
01:17:10: They can only see me.
01:17:12: But you understand, one of the ways to resolve that ethical dilemma would be simply just get the jab, right? Get the vaccine, right? Take the shot.
01:17:29: I'll give you an example.
01:17:30: Here's a good one.
01:17:32: Oh, this would be fun.
01:17:36: Obviously not in my notes.
01:17:38: About two or three months ago, I interviewed a young man named Samuel Say.
01:17:43: He has a blog called Slow to Write.
01:17:46: Very good writer, very smart young man.
01:17:50: And he was a Canadian.
01:17:54: God bless him.
01:17:56: He was a Canadian who met a woman from the United States, and he wanted to get married to her.
01:18:05: But he could not travel without getting the vaccine.
01:18:11: Okay? I interviewed him on my show.
01:18:15: My show is Conversation with a Calvinist podcast.
01:18:17: If you want to look it up, you can look up that show.
01:18:19: I talked to him for an hour about his decision.
01:18:23: He ended up getting the vaccine.
01:18:26: Now, we could debate until the cows come home whether he was right or whether he was wrong.
01:18:30: And I had people in the comments going both ways.
01:18:32: Oh, he was a coward for getting it because he just wanted to get to America or whatever.
01:18:37: But he ended up getting the vaccine.
01:18:40: So that would solve the dilemma, right? Even though you may not agree with it, right? But that's one of the resolutions.
01:18:48: The resolution would be just get the shot, right? But that doesn't resolve your problem because your problem is I don't want the shot.
01:18:55: I'm assuming, right? But if you're interested in hearing a position, that's his position.
01:19:04: And like I said, I didn't interview him because I agreed or disagreed.
01:19:07: I interviewed him because I wanted to hear what he had to say.
01:19:09: So you'll notice on my side, I didn't necessarily – the only thing I did, I did agree with him on one thing.
01:19:15: I don't think that churches should be divided over this subject.
01:19:19: And we talked about that.
01:19:20: Should the body of Christ be divided over who's vaccinated and who's not? Obviously, I think the answer is no.
01:19:25: But that could be another conversation we could have, like in this class.
01:19:28: Should the body of Christ mandate vaccines? I would say absolutely not.
01:19:33: But what if somebody said you had to mandate the other, that you couldn't get it, right? There are churches that have disciplined people for getting the vaccine because they think it's sinful.
01:19:44: It's a lack of faith or something.
01:19:49: Oh, yeah.
01:19:50: You'd be surprised the things that happen.
01:19:54: And so these are – I'm actually glad you brought it up.
01:19:57: It's good.
01:19:57: See, now you've got to see how this fits, right? We've got to gather the facts.
01:20:01: We've got to identify what the issue is.
01:20:03: We've got to decide what are the virtues and the principles that we're dealing with here.
01:20:07: List the alternatives.
01:20:08: What are the alternatives? Number five, compare the alternatives with our virtues and our principles.
01:20:15: Look for a solution that satisfies everything.
01:20:18: Is there a solution that's going to satisfy all virtues and principles? And if that exists, it's obviously the answer, but it's very uncommon.
01:20:25: It's very uncommon that you're going to find something that satisfies everything.
01:20:31: Number six, assess the consequences.
01:20:35: Though not always the determining factor, you have to determine, all right, if I do this and I get caught, I might go to jail, right? If I falsify a document, I might get in trouble, right? Is it worth it? Is putting myself in that position worth it? And then number seven, the most important of the things on this list is you've got to make a decision.
01:21:03: Many men die straddling a fence, right? Ultimately, you've got to make a decision.
01:21:12: The apostles were told, do not preach Jesus.
01:21:18: They went out and they preached Jesus.
01:21:22: And when the government, which was the Jewish leaders at the time, said, we told you not to do that, and we told you there would be punishment, they said, we must obey God rather than men, and then they took the consequences.
01:21:41: Peter was in prison, remember? So sometimes making a decision doesn't mean that the problem's over.
01:21:50: It may be that the problem's just begun.
01:21:53: Once you make a decision, you're bringing about whatever consequences come with that decision.
01:21:58: But you can't ride the fence forever.
01:22:00: Eventually, you have to make a decision on whatever the ethical issue is.
01:22:04: Now, some of the things we talk about in this class are going to be not easy, but they're going to be easier to come to a conclusion.
01:22:16: And there are going to be things that are harder to come to conclusions about.
01:22:19: And there may be issues that we disagree on.
01:22:22: Again, A.J.
01:22:23: brought up something tonight that I know, within Christian circles, there's all kinds of thoughts on the vaccine.
01:22:31: I call it the jab, so you probably know where I stand, because that's usually a derogatory way of describing it.
01:22:36: But you understand that this is a subject that many people disagree on.
01:22:42: All that I ask of in this class is if we have a disagreement or if there's something that we disagree about from how we understand God's Word, that we be gracious to one another in our differences.
01:22:53: Because this, of all of the eight classes, as I said, I've taught them all, and Daisy's been here, Cindy's been here.
01:22:58: Of all the eight classes, this class tends to be the one where people get the most uncomfortable.
01:23:05: We talk about things like abortion and rape and sexual ethics.
01:23:09: We talk about war and euthanasia and suicide.
01:23:13: Those are difficult subjects.
01:23:15: But I encourage you to be participating in the conversation, be gracious with one another, and pray for me as I seek to lead us through this jungle of ethical dilemmas.
01:23:28: All right, any questions? Let's pray.
01:23:32: Father, I thank you for your Word.
01:23:34: Thank you for this opportunity to be here tonight.
01:23:37: I pray, Lord, that we would seek to conform our minds to you, O God, to not be conformed to this world but to be transformed by the renewal of our minds.
01:23:48: And I pray, Lord, that you would grant us wisdom as we seek to go about this.
01:23:53: In Jesus' name, amen.