A Really Stupid Slogan
You see it everywhere. It
is on T-shirts. It assaults you from
television, and you hear it on the radio.
It assaults reason. It assaults
morality. It assaults godliness. It is a superb advertising slogan for an
irrational age.
"Just do it."
Don't think about it. Do not
measure the consequences. Do not listen
to anyone. "Just do it." Do what?
Whatever. Whatever comes into
your mind. Do not allow reason or
restraint, or the advice of old folks, or the collective wisdom of the race,
and certainly not the precepts of the Bible, keep you from doing it. Don't think about it. "Just do it." If you think too much, you are a
stick-in-the mud. "Don't you have
a life?" is the devastating put-down.
Live life with gusto. "Just
do it."
This is what you would expect from a culture that has assaulted
rationality. If the law of
contradiction is not valid and true contradictions can be reconciled in God; if
the Bible does not contain propositional* truth, then there is nothing to
evaluate the existentialist moment. The
existentialist believes that existence is prior to thought. Therefore, "Just do it." No proposition can be finally true, not
even God's own affirmation that He lives forever. The only thing certain is my existence, which I must affirm as
more basic than reason.
[Definition:
*proposition: a statement that
can be contradicted, and considered either true or false. Hence, it can be considered true, and other
propositions derived from it. For
instance, God cannot deny himself means that God cannot lie. It also means that faith is not a leap in
the dark, but trust in God's promises.
The things that the Bible affirms to be true are true because God cannot
deny Himself. The law of contradiction
is an expression of God's own nature, for He cannot deny Himself. Propositional truth depends upon the law of
contradiction and the integrity of God's Word, for He cannot lie.]
If the only thing certain is my existence, then experience is the
only thing that counts. Then I cannot
really believe in God unless I have experienced Him. I then define truth in terms of what I experience, or think I
experience. I do not study the
propositions of the Bible to discover the nature of God. No, God cannot be known by the use of
rational study of the Bible. I must
"feel the text," I don't want
"dry Bible study." I must
"find what it means to me,"
for the Bible is certainly not God's revelation of Himself to the whole
world, but it is a very flexible book that speaks to each one differently, and
each one is called to find out "what it means for him." Truth is totally subjectivized, and there is
no standard left. Because there is no
standard left, there is no way to hold anyone accountable for his activities,
for why should anyone submit to having other peoples' "values forced on
him." Everyone needs to "Just
do it."
Some dispense with meaning all together, throw themselves into the
world, and "just do it." If
we are really pious, we will say "Let go, and let God" as we plunge
into the bottomless pit of irrationality.
Others retain the form of the faith, drawing on the spiritual capital of
the past, but the form is as fragile as a house of cards. Or as the blind leading the blind, we rest
in the keeping of rules, some of which might even be God's commandments.
It might be also well for us to remember Jesus' thoughtful
words: "What king, going to make
war against another king, sitteth not down first, and consulteth whether he be
able with ten thousand to meet him that cometh against him with twenty
thousand?" (Luke 15:31) If it is
stupid to go to war without rationally considering the alternatives, how much
more stupid is it to go into eternity without adequate preparation. A half-hearted preparation for eternity is
stupid, and Jesus tells us plainly: "Whosoever does not bear his cross,
and come after me, cannot be my disciple." But why try to reconcile that with justification by faith, for
the Bible is full of contradictions, isn't it?
On the other hand, Jesus doesn't seem to be advocating a
philosophy of "Just do it?" now, does He? His Spirit is the spirit of love, and of power, and of a sound
mind; not hate, weakness, and silliness. (2Tim. 1:6,7)