Joel Beeke on Personal Reading Restrictions
While attempting to clean my office this week, I came across some old papers I printed out from a Yahoo email list I participated in in 2003. The list was dedicated to exploring issues related to ‘Christian Hedonism’, which is a teaching of John Piper. I wasn’t very familiar with Piper at the time, and I didn’t really like the idea of ‘Christianizing’ worldly terms, but I tried to participate anyway.
I was shocked to find this post in my pile of papers. I couldn’t remember writing this, or even reading and thinking about the post I was responding to. What I have to say here may sound harsh, and maybe I did come across too strong, but the statement I responded to seemed to strongly lean toward Pentecostal mysticism, and that is the concern I was expressing. I have posted the whole email below, but I was only responding to one paragraph from it. What is posted here is from a ‘DesiringGod’ participant who went by his email address: ‘Hedonese@yahoo.com.’
This week’s Expositors Quote is from Joel Beeke:
“Read as an act of worship. Read to be elevated into the great truths of God so that you may worship the Trinity in Spirit and in truth. Be selective about what you read, however. Measure all your reading against the touchstone of the Scripture. So much of today’s literature is froth. Time is too precious to waste on nonsense. Read more for eternity than time, more for spiritual growth than professional advancement. Think of John Trapp’s warning, “As water tastes of the soil it runs through, so does the soul taste of the authors that a man reads.”
Before picking up a book, ask yourself: Would Christ approve of this book? Will it increase my love for the Word of God, help me conquer sin, offer abiding wisdom, prepare me for the life to come? Or could I better spend time reading another book?
Speak to others about the good books that you read. Conversation about experiential reading promotes experiential living.
Joel Beeke, “The Lasting Power of Experiential Preaching,” in Feed My Sheep: A Passionate Plea for Preaching, edited by Don Kistler (Soil Deo Gloria, 2002), p. 120.
[May we all regularly read books that will improve the taste of our souls! – Coty]
Coty Pinckney, Pastor
Desiring God Community Church
Charlotte, NC
________________________________________
Now my response:
Is Beeke Right? 5/28/2003
In a message dated 5/28/2003, Hedonese@yahoo.com writes:
Before picking up a book, ask yourself: Would Christ approve of this book?
Will it increase my love for the Word of God, help me conquer sin, offer
abiding wisdom, prepare me for the life to come? Or could I better spend
time reading another book?
Does this mean I should not read “Varieties of Religious Experience” by William James? Or a book by John Dewey? Is it unwise for me to read Nietzsche?
With this type of thinking no one could learn the truth of God’s Word. God teaches us through contrast. Paul spoke much of false teaching. We have an obligation to know those things that are false, and to know what the Word says on that issue. We ought not shelter ourselves from error for fear of deception. If we know God’s Word, we will be safe from deception whatever we read. The Holy Spirit resides in our minds, and will speak His thoughts to us regarding what we read.
In reality, Beeke’s thought makes life unlivable. Nobody can go through life completely sheltered from error. We confront error everyday. God’s Word has equipped us with “…all things that pertain to life and godliness.” A man who attempts to shelter himself from falsehood is a fool. When we read falsehood, while embracing the Word of God, we exercise our minds in His Word for the challenges that life (I mean God) presents us. If a man were to succeed in sheltering himself to some degree, he would be a useless Christian, ill equipped for God’s work. He would be weak in his faith, liable to fall from the simplest of lies. He would not be useful in ministry because many of God’s people are deceived, and in need of teaching from a knowledgeable man of God. You can’t minister to a deceived Christian if you know nothing about the ideas which have deceived him. You may think that all you need to know are whole passages of Scripture, but when you are faced with error, you will show yourself to be unskilled in the Word of Truth. You will not know how to give an answer. You will not know how to apply God’s Word to error. Just like in any practical exercise, you must practice. You ought to read error, and you ought to know how, according to God’s Word, it is wrong. Gordon Clark did this his whole life, and he did it well. My goal is to follow in his footsteps. I read his books, and I read error. I am amazed at how many errors have been embraced by the same Christians who advocate this type of intellectual restriction. These very same Christians are often thoroughgoing pragmatists and empiricists. Or they are convinced that knowledge is impossible. They are often statists, and are convinced that the Bible places no restrictions on the activity of civil governments.
When you don’t read philosophy, and the many errors that lurk therein, you have no way of knowing if you have been deceived. You must learn error before you can recognize the errors you already believe. You must learn pragmatism before you can recognize that you are a pragmatist (hopefully, then you will repent of it).
People who agree with Beeke believe that the Bible, or the Holy Spirit, possess some kind of magical power to preserve us from deception in spite of our ignorance and intellectual laziness. We don’t have to learn about anything false; God will just keep us safe. I’m sorry. God doesn’t work that way. The Bible doesn’t teach it. As Paul said “IN UNDERSTANDING, BE MEN.”
So read James, and read Dewey; and read your Bible. May God prepare you for His work in the lives of men. As the Boy Scouts say “Always be prepared.” Amen.
Cheers,
Cameron Fast
Forged Reason 
One pleasure I’ve never had is to sit around a room with three or four brothers discussing things like this for a couple of hours. I’m 42 and time is passing. I think I’ll be eighty before I have friends like that. T4G is such a dream. Nice to visit and watch for a few days, but it’s not real.
It seems I’ll never experience it.
I’d like to add one thing about my note; no one has said this to me, so I’m going to beat them to it. My statement about being unskilled because of having a sheltered mindset might cause some to wonder about 2 Timothy 3:16 and 17. If I came across as implying that Scripture is not sufficient in our lives, especially for correcting or apologetics, I apologize. I did not mean to say that. Of course Scripture is sufficient for just the purposes I referenced in my note. But I think such a rebuttal betrays a lack of careful thought.
Let me explain: the mentality I argue against in that note is one of willful blindness, or ignorance. It is a mentality of walking with one’s eyes closed while saying “The Lord will guide me. He won’t let me trip over a curb.” This is the thinking of a man who attempts to refute a philosophy without reading a few pages about that philosophy, or consulting a man in the church who knows about it. Who would attempt to fix a lawnmower with his eyes closed? I have attempted to fix my lawnmower while knowing very little about lawnmowers, or small engines in general. I didn’t get very far, and I usually end up lugging the stupid thing to a repairman and paying him $50 to tell me it’s starving for oil (maybe I shouldn’t confess such things LOL).
Because we know about pragmatism in the same way that a grease monkey knows about lawnmowers, does that mean we are relying on worldly wisdom to solve problems that God says His Word has the answers for? Of course not. We affirm that God’s Word is wholly sufficient to correct a brother who has been deceived by vain philosophy, or to answer a Mormon. But being knowledgeable about worldly wisdom, or any philosophy taught in any book at your city’s largest library, is not at all an indicator that one is relying on the world instead of Scripture for wisdom. It is merely ‘knowing about lawnmowers.’
I think what causes many Christians to stumble over intellectual pursuits is their abstract nature.
Ultimately, what I am arguing for is a robust faith. I have never seen such faith outside of Reformed circles. Generally, if you look for books that display or teach a robust faith, those authors are Reformed. That is what I’ve found anyway.