Backwoods Belief

Signs indicate God is supernaturally frustrating alliances - among the good guys. That (somewhat chilling) reality is the subject of this episode of Backwoods Belief - the guys will show you how to see this pattern and why this seems to be God's providence for us. Also: what should we do when this is what God is doing? Press play and find out!

Gavin Ortlund, a quintessential Made to Order Man, discusses the importance of the themes in C.S. Lewis' That Hideous Strength. Topics include controversial book releases, critiques of Gavin Ortlund's views on the church, the concept of natural law, and the conversion experiences of Jane and Mark.

On this episode the guys are trying something different: Reviewing a review, specifically Gavin Ortlund's (a quintessential Made to Order Man) review of C.S. Lewis' That Hideous Strength. And the reason? Ortlund serves as a test case, demonstrating how important the themes of the book are for believers in this hour. --- Ortlund's full review can be seen here.

Don’t be naive. There are difficult times ahead. As the end approaches, people are going to be self-absorbed, money-hungry, self-promoting, stuck-up, profane, contemptuous of parents, crude, coarse, dog-eat-dog, unbending, slanderers, impulsively wild, savage, cynical, treacherous, ruthless, bloated windbags, addicted to lust, and allergic to God. They’ll make a show of religion, but behind the scenes they’re animals. Stay clear of these people. These are the kind of people who smooth-talk themselves into the homes of unstable and needy women and take advantage of them; women who, depressed by their sinfulness, take up with every new religious fad that calls itself “truth.” They get exploited every time and never really learn. These men are like those old Egyptian frauds Jannes and Jambres, who challenged Moses. They were rejects from the faith, twisted in their thinking, defying truth itself. But nothing will come of these latest impostors. Everyone will see through them, just as people saw through that Egyptian hoax. Eugene Peterson's paraphrase of 2 Timothy 3:1-9 is pretty great. On this episode we're talking about how Paul's caution to Timothy explains our cultural moment as we look at the feminine version of The Made to Order Man failure. ------------ Mentioned in the Episode (and must-read, despite Roberts' later compromises): A Crisis of Discourse - Part 2: A Problem of Gender by Alastair Roberts

Welcome to Late Stage Attractional Evangelicalism! Here's your fresh new leader, The Made to Order Man - he's just what the world has been waiting for. Good news: he's already in mass production so get your copy today! Mentioned: Steven Wedgeworth - What is Effeminacy? Can Anyone Say Ben is Wrong?

The institutions and leaders we thought would serve as guiding lights have spent the last three years failing at every opportunity. Christians who believe what the church has always believed on critical issues like sexuality and human nature are derided by the same institutional set with every fashionable derogatory term. What is a sincere Christian of conviction to do? Welcome to Backwoods Belief. Get comfortable on the margins, on the frontier - that's where the future of Christianity will be found.