The argument against iconography breaks down because those who reject icons do not understand what idolatrous images were actually used for. They were not merely religious art. They are a kind of religious technology designed to trap and control a god.
When the gospel began to be preached, forgiveness from God was a revelation, something new that was outside of anyone’s expectation of how a god should operate.
Sexual immorality is a kind of evil that introduces corruption into a person and his community in a way that is deep and damaging like almost nothing else is.
If we read the parable of the Publican and Pharisee merely as a morality tale about being humble rather than prideful, we miss how it is placed in the larger narrative of the Scripture and all the revelation of God.
As co-heirs with Christ, today we are offered in His holy temple along with Him. Today we share in His place as the first-born, both receiving and distributing the inheritance of God to all our siblings. And today we do so as a royal priesthood, both priests and kings, bringing God’s presence even to the nations.
If we are to believe the moral revisionists, it’s possible that what brings you death today might instead bring you life tomorrow. This is nonsense, and this is anti-Christian nonsense.
The claim that dogma is absolute but morality can be revised is a repackaging of a sixteenth-century Protestant dilemma, conditioned by a seventeenth-century German Protestant movement.
When you see people claiming that dogma is non-negotiable but morality can be revised, you can remind them that the original dogma was about morality and also about idolatry. And since those two things are always linked in Scripture, you can also use your discernment to figure out what they’re worshiping instead of the one true God.