[Matt. 7:15-20] “This is Jesus telling us what to do. He is telling us that — without access to the decrees or the examined prophet’s heart laid out before us on a dissecting table — we have the authority to conclude that someone is inwardly a ravening wolf. This is not reading hearts, or reading the decrees. It is reading the story. The outer story reveals the inner man” (Against the Church, p. 127).
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To someone who has not read this book, the quote makes it seem like unless every person has a card in their wallet with their views on the Bible and life in general I must assume they are evil. Or if I move and go to a new church gathering for the first time I must assume they are being led by a vicious wolf.
Yes, but it is important to read the story. Some people look at the photographs of a day in a man’s life when they need to be looking at the video.
Also, some men’s sins precede them, others follow. That we have identified some wolves does not mean we have identified them all; some are better at sewing their sheep skins.
Jonathan, I’m not seeing that at all in the quote. It seems to me that it says that it is possible to draw that conclusion after “reading the story,” based on what one reads in the story, not that one assumes that before reading the story.