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Friday, July 01, 2005

"Be Fruitful" Introduction

Visit me at my new website - anniecrawford.com
Since having children, I can no longer stay awake of focused on reading for more than 10 minutes. That is, unless I am on my handy-dandy elliptical trainer with the book held open by a 'chip-clip'! Ever since discovering this secret, my fitness has never been better! I can work away 45 min. in the blink of an eye, having read several chapters and receiving my best thoughts, ideas and epiphanies for the day. I keep a pad of paper and pencil on a stand next to me so that I can pause and jot down my ideas. I highly recommend this habit, it is the one thing in my day besides cooking dinner, cleaning, changing diapers, play time . . . Ok, so I have a lot of constants, but this is the only constant for my mind and physique!

Thanks to my handy-dandy elliptical, I have finished Nancy Campbell's Be Fruitful and Multiply, and have walked away from the book refreshed, inspired and more clear on my own Biblical convictions. I do not agree with everything in the book, including some of her premises, assumptions, strongest points and part of her over-all world view. I do, however, heartily agree with the 'spirit' of the book and Nancy's heart which is to battle the present cultures disdain for children. I will address what I found to be "the good, the bad and the ugly" in the following posts, to be written as I am able.

Nancy best captures the spirit of her book and ministry when she describes God's heart, "God's kingdom is a kingdom of life. He is the author of life. He is the one who breathes life into every human being. He loves life. Because He is the author of life, it is precious to Him. Do we value life the same way that God does? . . . God calls life good. He calls it a blessing. And we [as Christians] had better not contradict God. In Isaiah 5:20, He says, 'Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; who put darkness for light, and light for darkness; who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter." (162,167) Our world today does not value life as the Lord does and the church does indeed find itself entrenched in a battle between insipid lies and truth. Be Fruitful contains much encouraging, faith building, truthful material that make it worth reading.

Throughout the book, I found a few bits of sloppy logic concerning conclusions more rooted in her cultural and generational biases, as well as what I consider a few hermeneutical errors, rooted in her theological biases. However, these minor errors I do not find too troubling.

Two significant and specific emphasis of Campbell's general viewpoint prove to be the most problematic aspects of her book. Firstly, Campbell attempts to prove that the Genesis mandate to Adam and Eve, "Be fruitful and multiply" (1:27), is a command to the church today as well. Not a principle or example, but a command, a law. Secondly, in her new covenant Kingdom view, she substitutes and emphasizes physical children and motherhood over spiritual children and God's Fatherhood, resulting in the diminution of Christ and his work. At the end of her book, Campbell finally addresses evangelism in a manner illustrative of this problem; "We do not see a harvest of souls coming into the kingdom. Oh yes, here and there - but not a great harvest. Once again, I feel that this hinges on our resistance to children from our loins. I believe that when we, as the church of God, repent for stopping the godly seed from coming into the world and begin to embrace life, " (198, emphasis mine) Any theology or teaching that begins to make faith a matter concerning childbirth instead of Christ has gone astray. Indeed, her choice of the phrase "church of God" instead of "church of Christ" is indicative of the problems I will address under "the ugly".

I hope you will stick through this review with me and comment. These issues are very central to our view of motherhood, Christianity relationship to our modern culture, and even our view of the Bible and how we read it.

For the next post on "Be Fruitful - The Good," click here.
posted by texashimalaya @ 7/01/2005 03:47:00 PM  

5 Comments:

  • At 7/02/2005 2:04 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Looking forward to it.

     
  • At 7/03/2005 5:04 PM, Blogger texashimalaya said…

    T. Smith and Dani - Thank you for your comments!

    Dani - I see your point about success and obediance, and definately the major issue here to discover is whether or not we are still commanded to "be fruitful and multiply". Obviously the spread of the Gospel and growth of the church comes through our preaching the Word, loving and serving others; commands which Christ gave us directly.

     
  • At 7/06/2005 6:59 PM, Blogger Jana said…

    Great review...I'm looking forward to more of your thoughts as well! This is a topic of much interest to me these days.

     
  • At 7/06/2005 10:00 PM, Blogger Elena LaVictoire said…

    Just a thought on success and obedience - in Europe where the population is in decline, but immigration is on the rise, Christianity is not growing. In fact those countries, like France are becoming more Muslim. SO if it is Christ's command to spread the Gospel - in this one way we are failing miserably.

     
  • At 7/17/2005 7:25 PM, Blogger texashimalaya said…

    Dani - I was looking at your comment again, and you asked about the "church of God" vs. the "church of Christ". All kinds of religions speak about God. Jews even speak about and say they obey YHWH, the God of Abraham. Yet Christ has come to reveal God. People who have legalist and fundamentalist tendancies seem to talk about "God" more than "Christ" which to me seems to indicate a focus on moralism more than grace and gospel. It is just a personal observation really, not a theological point. It hard to read the NT and not feel that our focus now ought to be heavily on Christ as the One who has finally revealed the Father.

     

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