In Depth:  Mark Troughton

Is it possible that the age-old taboo of cannibalism is going to fall — like others we could mention — things that were once considered socially deviant because morally repugnant, but which are now ‘part of the wallpaper’?

It seems that anything is possible in these days of moral anarchy. Simplistically put, we know that when people stop going to church they cease coming under the sound of God’s Word. They eventually turn from his absolutes towards absolutes of their own making, in our case relativism and hedonism. This is neither new nor surprising. Autonomous human beings in rebellion towards their Maker have always behaved so. The Bible calls it idolatry, for when people stop worshipping the true God, they end up worshipping their own (Acts 17; Romans 1.18ff).

I’m not a scholar, nor a scholar’s son. I have only a dilettante interest in Judaism. My interest in Jewish writings has come about through my interest in the Jewish Messiah who, unbeknown to most Jews, ushered in his kingdom in ‘already and not yet’ form 2,000 years ago. There are encouraging signs that many Jews are coming to faith in Jesus today. But that’s another issue. So I’m a dilettante - Jewish Messiah- loving Christian. It’s good to be able to see things through Jewish eyes and get a feel for how Jews see things (1 Corinthians 9.20).

But I’m annoyed on two fronts. First, some voices today are claiming Reformed evangelicals are preaching a false gospel. This is owing to the fact that we have (apparently) misunderstood the Judaism of Paul’s day and swallowed the false assumptions of Luther who was himself labouring under gross misapprehensions about the ‘merit theology’ of the Jews Paul was opposing. So the Reformation got it wrong, apparently.