A good object lesson

Object lesson: A concrete illustration of a moral or principle.

Here is a good object lesson of why you need to fear God and not man, and why the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom and not the fear/reverence of man.

We all know Dave Armstrong. We know this book he wrote is the same shabby, hyper-juvenile, pseudo-intellectual, mendacious RC apologist drivel he produces on his weblog on an hourly basis. So we know this reviewer who is taking Dave and his material seriously is an unconscious buffoon. And hence we know that the publication he is writing for is living in the dark to the degree that it can't even know when it has a buffoon reviewing a clown, and all in the service of the devil and his kingdom of darkness. We all know this when we see this review in question. Yet it's not so obvious when you see other productions by man in other publications, taken seriously by other men, etc., etc., is it? Just as a Dave Armstrong can slip into the worldly limelight (such as he has, but don't think there aren't similar Dave Armstrongs, just as comically lame, who have risen higher, writing bestsellers and influencing large numbers of fools in various media and from places of position and prestige and authority they have attained in the world, this is all obvious, but it becomes so obvious we can become numb to the reality of it), so can any man from any camp whose worth may be marginally higher than Dave and his material, yet still is merely a man with a man's wisdom &c.

Fear God. Go to His Word. Be instructed by God's wisdom, not man's.

The main point here is this: am I saying a John Piper type writer or any number of popular Christian writers are at the same level of a Dave Armstrong? Of course not, but the object lesson here is how easily the most obvious fool can be given, by the world, a voice to influence. Often the most shamelessly mendacious and foolish are rewarded by the world in this manner. The hard thing is to see it in the not-so-obvious cases.

Just basically fear God and not man. Learn from on-the-mark teachers, yes, but don't fear them, and don't give them your reverence. Fear only God. Be instructed by God and His Word and not man. The man you choose to be instructed by - with intentionally no caveats here, folks - is to God what Dave Armstrong is to all of us who have read his blog: a fool. And you're a fool if you fear and reverence that man.

Fear God, it is the beginning of wisdom.