Matt’s Marvelous Mailbag seeks to provide marginally adequate answers to much better questions about politics, economics, social life, theology, or any potpourri you see fit to have answered. Send questions to mailbag.bereans@gmail.com.  

We have a strangely apolitical and short mailbag this week, but seeing as it’s summer and everyone’s on vacation anyway, I think we’ll manage. Plus, there is a whole lot of politics coming up in a week or two, so if you live and die based on the political cycle, just hang tight. For now, let’s see what we got here.

Q: Edward, “The Black Prince,” Duke of Cornwall and Prince of Wales and Aquitaine asks: “Thoughts on the NBA Finals? I was cheering for the Raptors after their beautiful Game 4 performance – did you have a favorite? Also, Kawhi and KD both have two rings and two Finals MVP’s now, any idea who is considered the better player in the long run?”

A: Well, for starters, I think we should all celebrate the return of our reanimated historical questioners to the mailbag. Black death and smallpox all around, everybody! But yes, the NBA Finals — readers with a steel trap for a memory will remember that my prediction was Bucks in 6. Well…I sort of was on the right track. I had the Warriors losing to somebody in 6, so I’ll give myself half credit. Now, as a Cavs fan, I do have mixed feelings about Toronto winning. On the one hand, I’m never one to belittle a team that knocks off the Warriors. As Cleveland has most mercilessly had to find out, that is no small or easy feat. To that extent, kudos to you, Toronto!

However, there was a certain pride in knowing that Cleveland had been the only team during GSW’s dominant run to beat them in the Finals, and that’s sort of gone now. Yes, I know GSW was plagued with injuries, but they were still a loaded team even without Durant or Thompson. All that being said, I did cheer for Toronto. This year has largely been one of very interesting championships – Virginia charts its redemption story through March Madness, the Blues raise their first Stanley Cup, Canada gets a basketball trophy — the Raptors’s victory fits thematically.

On Kawhi and KD, I have two things to say:

1. If you take a stride on over to Basketball Reference and look at KD’s stats vs. Kawhi’s stats, it’s not really a comparison. KD is far and away the better player. He became a star at a younger age than Kawhi, his averages are better, his win shares are better (yes, he’s older, but his averages still dwarf Kawhi), and, even this season, he still posted better numbers than Kawhi. So, at this point in history, KD is the clearly better player. We’ll have to see how Kawhi and KD age though. If Kawhi ends up with a loaded Clippers team, I wouldn’t be shocked to see him start to close that gap, especially if KD’s injury dampens his future performance.
2. This point isn’t really related to the KD/Kawhi debate, but I do want to point out the cruel, cruel mistress that is sports fate. Go back just a few weeks ago, and Golden State is a dynasty that shows no signs of slowing down. Check in today, and I’m not sure they’re serious contenders for next year. KD and Klay Thompson are probably out for most of the season (with both possibly leaving as well), Shaun Livingston wants to retire, and handful of other Warriors are up for new contracts as well (Cousins, most notably). All of a sudden, you’re left with Curry, Green, and Iguodala as your heavy hitters, which isn’t a bad lineup of course, but I’m not sure it’s title worthy at this stage as other franchises are looking to supersize their rosters.

Q: Eddie also asks: “Are you excited for the Democratic debates? Any chance Booker or Klobuchar have a strong night at Warren and Beto’s expense? Will there be a Scott Walker (doing well but drops out quickly) repeat?”

A: Oh, Eddie my boy, I am straight up giddy about the debates. This will be delightful. I think it’s certainly possible that someone decides the rat race isn’t worth it a la Scott Walker style, but what I’m more interested in looking for is a Ted Cruz moment. You’ll recall during the CNBC debate when Cruz had his “this is not a cage match” moment and immediately saw a surge in the polls which actually made him a viable contender to Trump for a good while. If we get one of those, I’ll be very interested to see who does it. My gut tells me Sanders has the capacity to pull off something like that, but we’ll see. Beyond that, I’m just showing up for the entertainment value. Maybe we’ll even see a new satire piece come out of these.

Q: Eddie finally asks: “So, this past Friday was Donald Trump’s birthday, along with John Macarthur and Che Guevara. Then Saturday was President Xi Jinping’s birthday. Conspiracy, odd coincidence, or just a good chance to create a global holiday: Revolutionary Leaders Festival? (After all, it was also Yuri Andropov and Mario Cuomo’s birthday on Saturday, but they might not quite make the cut.)

A: Drat, if only we had gotten a blood moon as well, I could have cooked up some shoddy, birthday math and told you when and where Jesus was returning. The conspiracy option is tantalizing, but I fear we’ve spent all our conspiracy tokens on Russia, so we’ll have to go with the global holiday, though I do wonder how John Macarthur would react to being on a list like this…meh, he’d just calmly and expertly exegete from somewhere in Scripture, I’m sure. For what it’s worth, I share a birthday with Clint Eastwood, Colin Farrell, Joe Namath, Viktor Orban, and Waka Flocka Flame. So, if you can conjure up a holiday for that, you are obviously in deep need of sleep or sobriety.

A Final Reflection:

We’re continuing our June reflections on Christians and homosexuality, and, first, I want to recommend Rosaria Butterfield’s testimony. It’s a powerful story of Gospel witness and transformation. Now last week, I reflected on the first incorrect approach Christians take towards homosexuals, namely trying to use government to impose Christian doctrine. This week, I want to briefly reflect on a second incorrect approach: singling out homosexuality.

Hopefully, you just read that sentence and noticed a bit of irony in the fact that I’m devoting a whole month of reflections to homosexuality and Christianity. If I think we shouldn’t be singling it out, why do we spend so much time talking about it? One reason is fairly obvious — because culture. For better or worse, this is one of the prominent issues of our day, and we can’t just ignore it. But, I think there’s more underlying this, so bear with me on this analysis.

There is an article by C.S. Lewis called “We Have No Right to Happiness” which I think everybody should read, not just because it’s Lewis, but because he makes some very salient points. One such point is that we use the pursuit of sexual happiness as a cover for all kinds of deeds which we would normally consider exceptionally cruel. Consider these words:

“Clare, in fact, is doing what the whole western world seems to me to have been doing for the last forty-odd years. When I was a youngster, all the progressive people were saying, ‘Why all this prudery? Let us treat sex just as we treat all our other impulses.’ [Not much has changed, I see]. I was simple-minded enough to believe they meant what they said. I have since discovered that they meant exactly the opposite. They meant that sex was to be treated as no other impulse in our nature has ever been treated by civilized people. All the others, we admit, have to be bridled. Absolute obedience to your instinct for self-preservation is what we call cowardice; to your acquisitive impulse, avarice. Even sleep must be resisted if you’re a sentry. But every unkindness and breach of faith seems to be condoned provided that the object aimed at is ‘four bare legs in a bed.'”

What Lewis is aiming at is a call to mastery of our sexual instincts in service to God and others. I want to go one step more on his point and turn it on ourselves by positing that a chief reason some of us have singled out homosexuality in the past is as a cover for our own sinfulness, sexual or not. Many angry and genuinely hateful souls have been forgiven by the church in the name of opposing homosexuality. I’ve told this story before, but I remember talking with a man who I knew had been sleeping around, and he mentioned very piously one day how disappointed he had been with the Supreme Court’s ruling on gay marriage and how it had just ruined his summer. I’ll leave it to you to spot the inconsistency. Whatever ‘untouchables’ or ‘special class of sinner’ view we’ve built up of homosexuals, we’ve got to change it if we’re going to have an effective ministry. At the end of the day, we have got to confront a certain, fundamental reality that our sinful actions are not a cause but rather a symptom of a heart in misalignment with its Creator.