Book Review/Summary - Broken (Jonathan Fisk)

This is a great book and I highly recommend it.  It brings to mind the great Luther quote: “Whatever your heart clings to and confides in, that is really your God, your functional savior.” Pastor Fisk's book is sort of an updated (and way more readable) version of Adolph Köberle's book called "The Quest for Holiness", where he discusses "three ladders" which are the three ways the modern man tries to ascend to heaven (think the tower of Babel here). The three ladders are Mysticism (Feeling), Moralism (Ethics), and Speculation (or Rationalism).  Pastor Fisk also has these three, but adds a few more.  They are as follows:

Mysticism

This is essentially worshiping of emotions or feelings.  This is trying to find God in our heart or experiences.  It includes seeking an emotion high to get close to God (modern evangelicalism anyone?) and the goal of life being the pursuit of happiness (modern America?). However, once it wears off, there is nothing left but to seek the next high.  This eventually leads to despair when you can’t keep it up. Ultimately, we are not saved because God is in our hearts (that is Osianderianism). We cannot reach God with our hearts. God reached to us through his Son.

Moralism

This is essentially worshiping your actions or ethics. This is trying to find God in your good works. It includes pietism, as well as moralistic therapeutic deism (modern evangelicalism anyone?), and the goal of life being meeting some set of goals. This manifests itself in phrases like "deeds not creeds" and WWJD? However, this eventually leads to either denial of our sinful nature and to pride, or to despair if you are honest enough with yourself to realize you can never be "good enough". Ultimately, the Bible is not a book of morals and laws of what we have to do, but the good news that Jesus did it all. We cannot reach God by what we do. He reached us by what He did.

Rationalism

This is essentially worshiping your mind or reason. This is trying to find God in your enlightenment. This worldview assumes that you can find truth found internally through reason, instead of externally through Gods revelation of the Bible. Here, the sole criteria of truth is, "Does it make sense to me?" This led to modernism and liberalism (Mainline Protestants anyone?). Ultimately the Bible is the Truth.  We cannot reach God with our mind.

by E. J. Pace, first appearing in the book Seven Questions in Dispute by William Jennings Bryan

Pragmatism

This one is essentially saying that something is "truth" simply because it works. Therefore, the ends justify the means. This is postmodernism, because it denies there is an objective truth. It is deconstructionism because an individual fits whatever they want in however they want and redefine anything and everything to make it fit with what they think. Believers get redefined as "fully devoted followers of Jesus" and unbelievers become "seekers". This leads to the seeker driven church, where you redefine church to be whatever you want if it brings in people and grows the church. It is appealing to a culture based on instant gratification. However, it is not Biblical and leads to despair when things are not working.  We cannot reach God by redefining God.

Prosperity

This one is essentially the American Dream gospel, or the "health and wealth gospel". This is all about selfishness and having your best life now. It is essentially a modern form of Hedonism and worshiping stuff. However, this leads to despair when money does not buy happiness. Ultimately, the point of Christianity is not for you to have things, but the hope in the resurrection of the dead and the life everlasting. You cannot reach God by having things.

Change

This one is essentially looking for the "silver bullet" to "fix" the church and everything else. It starts by saying,  “If we can just…” It is always moving to the next popular preacher, trend, or structure. This is jumping on the bandwagon and swarming to the fad (Schwärmerei?). This leads to changing away from traditions and liturgy to try to find God outside of the church where He promised he would be found. This leads to despair when change after change still doesn't end in perfection. You cannot reach God by just finding the right change.

Lawlessness (Freedom or Liberation)

This last one is essentially worshiping freedom or choice. Choice has become a false god, a true American idol. It manifests itself in statements like, "I do what I want, when I want it." It is the desire to be free from everything, including free from traditions of the church. This seeking to justify yourself creates a perceived need to break with historical church. When you try to remove God's law altogether, soon, nothing is a sin. This only leads to trying to be free of God. It turns into preaching you have to be free or else, which is the ironic intolerance of tolerance. You cannot reach God by being a slave to sin and you cannot find God by getting away from him.

People know something is wrong and broken. People have a need to justify our own consciences and get rid of lingering guilt and doubt. It leads to preaching to others to convince them so that they preach it back to you to convince yourself. All of this is man trying to reach God and justify ourselves, but it is never done, never complete, and you can never completely be sure you have made it. However, we just need to realize that all good things come from outside ourselves and that we can't reach God, but we don't need to because he sent his Son to reach us.