Does Sin Render Truth Indiscernible?

Just a few hurried thoughts:

Certainly, all are guilty of such things, but to suggest that there is no difference in the values popular people hold is to close our eyes to a simple reality: values are always incarnate in specific people, and if given a public platform, those values are trumpeted, and folks are influenced, and no all values are created equal. After all, Al Capone had his values, too.

To suggest that we're all alike in our sin is true enough, sort of, but akin to suggesting that Hitler and Churchill were both men of strong opinion, and leave it at that. Or both sinners, which they were.

But it's the content of their opinion that counts. Surely, Paul was a sinner, too, and he makes that clear, but we still listen to him; though Paul's a sinner, we don't discount what he said.

Those who use immigrants and the poor to further their own agenda are failing the American People. Having listened to Rush and Glenn for a long time, I grow increasingly convinced that these men pose a serious threat to our nation's soul. 

It took a long time for Germans to see who Hitler really was, but folks like Barth and Bonhoeffer, early on, saw it, and they saw it because they were infused with the gospel of the Kingdom of God (see the Barmen Declaration).

This morning, in Barth's biography, one of the most chilling photos I've ever seen: the lead pastor of the German Reich (Yup, they had all kinds of pastors lining up) at the head of a procession to dedicate and install Nazi flags in a German Church.

I ask you: what are Rush Limbaugh's values, or Glenn Beck? Can we actually name them?

And compare them to the Apostle Paul, or Jeremiah. Is there no difference? Does sincerity alone guarantee truth? Doesn't truth have a content?

Why would any of us choose to listen to a Billy Graham and not a Joe McCarthy or Father Coughlin? What's the difference. They're all sincere; they all believe fervently. They're all sinners, too boot. So, what's the difference? Is there no means to measure anything? Then, indeed, the inmates of the asylum have taken it over!

FB 7.28.10