All Comments for: When to Be Naïve | Christianity Today | A Magazine of Evangelical Conviction

Free Newsletters:

RSS Feeds |

Audio |

Twitter

Home > 2009 > June

Christianity Today, June, 2009 |

When to Be Naïve

It's not a virtue just for children.

Edith M. Humphrey | posted 6/12/2009 09:48AM

Were evangelical supporters of President Obama naïve to think that he would seriously try to limit abortions? Or were they displaying Christian charity by giving him the benefit of the doubt?

When ...

[Reader Reviews]

Average User Rating:

Rate and Comment on this article

Displaying 1 - 25 of 32 comments.

Page: 1 2

Show All

Daniel Kerr

Posted: June 17, 2009 5:54 PM

Only within the last year or two of college have I become conscious of my naivety and its benefits. I felt that my naivety was a grace from God when it seemed to keep me from being influenced by the consistently crass&worldly speech of my high school cross country team. If nativity is the ability to be impervious to vice-ignoring the pull of this world that is not my home-then even ancient pagan philosophers would agree that naivety is a virtue. Lord, let me know enough of You to be naively ignore the ignoble. Discernment is not naivety, but wisdom. The Body has the truth so long as it is connected with the Head, but truth is not the blind faith of naivety. Paul was not naive in his systematic philosophic argumentation. Michael Green says that the early church succeeded because of its abilities to engage in persuasive apologetic; perhaps we can do likewise. Faith is not naivety, but is reacting appropriately to the truth;the world thinks our faith naive folly as it has not truth.

Jim	Posted: June 17, 2009 3:50 PM

Hey cleanstake, 1) There are different degrees of sin. 2) An unjust war is a matter of perspective, abortion is murder. 3) True, the invasion of Iraq was based on false data but still it was not a good idea. But since we are aready there, "get ur done and get out." 4) No body thinks they are doing God's will by being in Iraq. They are surviving and trying to win a war. If God was on our side he would have stopped the war. But do you think the Christian God is for the enemy? 5) Obama is a narcisstic, lying, two faced muslim and does not have our best interest at heart; and a possible predisessor to the antichrist. Time will tell. Get your head out of your @#^& .

Kathy

Posted: June 17, 2009 8:43 AM

I am a Christian who voted for President Obama. I know in whom I have believed and I have no Savior or King but Jesus. Did I vote for him because he's black. Well, he's only half black and part of me probably wanted him as my candidate because he's black. But, not only because he's black. What gets me is the fact that white Americans (even "Christians") can not admit that they didn't vote for him for the reason they attribute to black Americans who did vote for him--because he's black. I would think that true believers in Jesus Christ would really look at the bandaid that came off the old prejudice wound during and after the presidential election. After all the most segregated hours in this nation are still Sunday morning between 9 am & noon. Not every black person in this country is on welfare or desires to be on welfare. We are not all lazy, shiftless and looking for handouts.

Ade	Posted: June 17, 2009 12:37 AM


Obama is not a Muslim and it Will be naive to think he is.I have no objection to his policies so far and you can compare him to Bushes unjust war that has killed hundreds of thousands.

cleanstake

Posted: June 16, 2009 9:37 PM

I do not think Christians who voted for Obama were naive. He was seen as being more aware of issues facing the US and world than was MCCain who kept boasting that he was tested and tried. Abortion though wrong is no more a sin than is an unjust war or a war of choice. The invasion of Iraq was immoral and illegal .Iraq had not attacked America. Are the military men and women who killed and are killing Iraqis christian? If they believe they are doing God's will they are more than naive.

Steve

Posted: June 16, 2009 8:45 PM


Naive? Obama made it clear! He was and is for abortion rights and to expand those rights! Anyone who thought differently is not naive, but plainly ignoble!

Yvonne

Posted: June 16, 2009 12:41 PM


No, not a sin. Just that the whole common good of people are naive when they voted for this man.

Helen Thomas

Posted: June 16, 2009 12:37 PM

Something that we as Christians have failed to do is distinguish between being childish and childlike. Childlike means that we trust our FATHER in heaven while taking responsibility for our actions; childish is not taking responsibility for our own actions within the context of GOD's Standard of Holiness. Too many of us still think that there is something 'magickal' about being born again (GOD detests magick). We all need to 'mature in our faith' while remaining childlike.

soulifam

Posted: June 15, 2009 12:42 PM

I think the Christian support for Obama is a good indicator of where many believers live. They want the "easy" out and all the goodies in life without paying the price. Many would rather find a sugar-daddy savior to make the consequences go away than to really explore the causes of the problems. The bailout mentality is nothing more than the world’s system that promises everything without full disclosure of the real cost (sounds like Eve in the garden, huh?). I don’t think believers were naïve in voting for Obama. I think they were simply vulnerable to the panacea message because of their own desire to escape the hard realities of life; to have their proverbial cake and eat it too (2Tim 4:3). That said, I also believe that all authority is given from God (Rom 13:1). Hence, I suggest that God, in His mercy, is using the growing disenchantment with this president among believers to awaken the church to the urgency of the times (Eph 5:13-17). The church must stop looking to man or to man

Lewis

Posted: June 14, 2009 11:32 AM

To begin and end this article with a not too subtle political reference seems either deliberate or naive. I hope it is the latter since preaching to the choir is the bane of many of the articles published in CT. Also, the reference to Adam "knowing" Eve refers to (heaven forbid) Adam having sex with Eve. I once was present when a novice Hebrew speaker asked, in Hebrew, if the two young Israelis, male and female knew (yodea) each other. The Israelis were a little embarrassed before they realized it was a language nuance problem.

Daniel Muth

Posted: June 13, 2009 7:32 PM

Edith - thanks for a thoughtful, well-written article. As is so often the case, I think Dostoevsky probes this question with striking depth. While Prince Myshkin and Alyosha Karamazov are the most obvious examples of characters exemplifying "holy naivete'", if there truly is such a thing, I am particularly struck by the character of Sonia in Crime and Punishment. On the one hand, her simple-minded belief that God would never let the impending death of her consumptive stepmother cause the loss of her young half-siblings is hopelessly immature, on the other it is precisely this simple trust that attracts the confused searcher Raskolnikov and eventually provides the family with respite, gives Raskolnikov hope of salvation, and rescues Sonia from a life of self-sacrificing harlotry. It seems to these eyes that the modifier to that last term (along with the virtue of hope) is key to the novel's positive denuement. For Dostoevsky, it seems that God indeed loves "Holy Fools".

LAH	Posted: June 13, 2009 9:23 AM

Romans 16:19 tells us to be excellent at what is good & simple concerning evil. This does not mean to be naive. It means to not be well practiced in it. We tend to think if we do not participate in the evil itself we are safe. But Romans one tells us that if we approve of others doing it we are as guilty as they are. It is not about a political party, but what are we a party to? We are a Romans 1 nation. Our nation has voted for its god. The god is self.

karen

Posted: June 13, 2009 3:37 AM

As a non American, I can learn a lesson from and relate to this article. Personally in my relationship, and politically. Sometimes I am confused of how to respond and react to certain situation when everything or everyone else seems to go on the opposite direction. I am not afraid to be called naive anymore. Jesus says the pure in heart will see God. On Politics - since my country and Iran are in the process of electing new President- I want to say that many Americans are being naive in the wrong way to believe everything Politicans (Obama is one ) said and promised, which often times are just that, empty words and promises. In my country, we learned the hard way from tens of years of believing in one President, so now I think we are less naive than many Americans.

Paola2

Posted: June 13, 2009 3:19 AM

How much I wish we had an African-American presidential candidate supporting the ideals that we Christians deem crucial as platform for a fair and productive society. But things were not that way. However, that doesn’t preclude me to pursue what is right, walk away from naïveté, grow in understanding, be color blinded about it and make my choices in life accordingly. And that is why I didn’t condone our current president’s campaign, even though this is what God finally allowed. Therefore, I pray that the fact that we have a black president now, would get rid of the any remaining idea of “the establishment repressing anybody to reach its full potential”. I pray that all Christian Americans from any minority group, starting for those in government, raise up and impact society in such a way that this crippling entitlement covering be removed and we be heard not because the color of our skin but because we have something to say as we stand for God’s truth.

Paola

Posted: June 13, 2009 3:14 AM

Dear Nia, thank you very much for speaking your mind. You don’t state whether you’re Christian or not, but I certainly pray the Lord guide you on your quest for the truth, which has nothing to do with your political party choice but with whom you’re going to place your confidence on to choose your way of life. Ok, you questioned what does our current president has to do with this article and among other things that is time that the racial prejudice by so-called Christians be denounced and rejected. See, I humbly think that it has a lot to do with it. It’s because I completely reject racial prejudice that I should be color blind when judging anybody’s philosophies, in this case our current president’s (And this is a Hispanic immigrant talking, so I apologize for any grammar mistakes). Why should I believe that because this person is Black or Asian or White he is right? If righteousness were defined based on our ethnicity, then the Nazis were right..(To be cont'd)

Jan	Posted: June 12, 2009 8:04 PM


We are all answerable to God for all of God's creation including His animals. Hopefully someday, Christians will not support the billions of animals who suffer in factory farms for our stomachs, fashion, and sport - Hebrews 4:13. God looks on our hearts and will hold us accountable someday. God's Creatures Ministry

Pehtr Todorov

Posted: June 12, 2009 7:45 PM


I believe Nia stated matters honestly and cogently. I continue to marvel at how truth is not acceptable to anyone who holds a strong religious connection.

Linda

Posted: June 12, 2009 7:39 PM

Christians are supposed to be "wise as serpents and harmless as doves." That doesn't sound naive to me. I am always amused when people who "know where it's at" are called "worldly" like there is something wrong with that. God gave us discernment didn't he? Those who follow his laws written in the Bible will walk with discernment as opposed to those guided by the trends of the day. Christians who voted for Obama clearly were ignoring the wealth of information about his far leftist agenda that includes killing babies in the womb whenever they are inconvenient.

Dale Fincher

Posted: June 12, 2009 7:22 PM


Well parsed... a distinction our church is in much need of. By the way, "change and become like a child" is, in context, a reference to humility, not knowledge (Matt 18). That's often overlooked in favor the wrong view of naivete that is our zeitgeist.

MP	Posted: June 12, 2009 7:12 PM

Good thoughts. Thank you for your essay. It seems that the problem with many Christians in this regard is that they do not know that the mind matters in conversion and mature faith. We live in the aftermath of modernity's multiple division of reality into specialties and compartments. I have often seen sincere, devoted, passionate Christians act like pagans when away from church, or as they like to say, "in the real world." We are to be transformed in the renewing of our minds by the mind that was in Christ Jesus. This is a gift and task which many churches simply disregard. In other words, much of the naive thinking and behaving among Christians may be the result of intellectual laziness. Karl Barth wrote somewhere that stupidity, the refusal to use our minds, is a sin. Mark Noll said as much in "The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind." Faith and reason are not eneimes. It is not a Christian virtue to pretend we live in "la la land."

Servus Humillimus

Posted: June 12, 2009 7:08 PM


Yes, & Obama is fully answerable to God. Instead of considering the thoughts of man, take the time to read this powerful message from God, wield the Sword of the Spirit, the Word of God. A Sermon for the U.S. President--and for the People of God LINK: http://www.baylyblog.com/2009/06/a-sermon-for-the-presidentand-for-the-peop le-of-god.html

Nia	Posted: June 12, 2009 6:56 PM

What does President Obama have to do with this? God is not a Democrat or a Republican. Being a Republican will not be a criterion on Judgement Day. It's time for the thinly veiled bigotry, racial prejudice, and yes, oftimes racism, by so-called Christians to be denounced and rejected. Naive is blindly believing urban legends just because a "Christian" said so. However passing them on as gospel truth is a sin. I think evangelicals who follow, uphold and support pastors, theologians and evangelists who are engaged in the very things they rage against in others are the people who are naive. Neither Democrats nor Republicans own the sin market. Sinners come in all races, creeds, colors, religions and political affiliations. I think it's high time for the so-called Religious Right to get over themselves and start to truly live the Biblical principles in which they claim to believe. Do the mindset and behavior of many evangelicals reflect the teachings of Jesus? I don't think so.

Dave	Posted: June 12, 2009 6:37 PM


Good artical but I am sorry are you suggesting that voting for Obama was a sin? GET OVER IT!!!

EdithHumphrey

Posted: June 12, 2009 6:11 PM


Hello, there, Christianity Today. Would probably be a good idea not to be naive about the spelling of the word "shrewd" with you polling questions (-:

Loretta

Posted: June 12, 2009 5:44 PM

I was ostracized and socially punished by a church member who I had asked to verify an urban legend before passing it on. It's claims were easily proved false, but the story was "so lovely" that she passed it on without check, was angry with me when I asked her to verify it, and was flat rude when I explained, in answer to her questions, why the story was false. I was raining on her parade. It is so comfy to be naive and belive all is well. Ruin comes suddenly.

Page: 1 2

E-mail this page

Write CT

Print this article

Post a comment