The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers?

Posted on | November 4, 2013 | 35 Comments

The headline at Hot Air caught my eye:

Kirsten Powers: My journey
from atheist to Christian

Whoa! Who saw this coming? Feminist Democrat gets Jesus?

It’s like picking up the paper and reading that Kim Jong Un has decided that free markets and democratic elections are the way to go.

Anyway, in her article in Christianity Today, Kirsten Powers credits a pastor, Tim Keller of Redeemer Presbyterian Church on the Upper East Side of New York. What’s very interesting to me is the extent to which she confirms what I’ve long suspected about a certain type of atheist: It’s an intellectual thing, about self-image.

Christianity is profoundly unfashionable among college-educated young people. If there is no one in their lives who will speak up for the Gospel truth, peer pressure and popular culture will be the predominant influence. The supposedly radical individual, as atheists often like to think of themselves, is usually just following the herd. Here, let’s let Kirsten give her testimony:

I was so clueless about Christianity that I didn’t know that some Presbyterians were evangelicals. So when we arrived at the Upper East Side service of Redeemer Presbyterian Church, I was shocked and repelled by what I saw. I was used to the high-church liturgy of my youth. We were meeting in an auditorium with a band playing what I later learned was “praise music.” I thought, How am I going to tell him I can never come back?
But then the pastor preached. I was fascinated. I had never heard a pastor talk about the things he did. Tim Keller’s sermon was intellectually rigorous, weaving in art and history and philosophy. I decided to come back to hear him again. Soon, hearing Keller speak on Sunday became the highlight of my week. I thought of it as just an interesting lecture—not really church. I just tolerated the rest of it in order to hear him. Any person who is familiar with Keller’s preaching knows that he usually brings Jesus in at the end of the sermon to tie his points together. For the first few months, I left feeling frustrated: Why did he have to ruin a perfectly good talk with this Jesus nonsense?
Each week, Keller made the case for Christianity. He also made the case against atheism and agnosticism. He expertly exposed the intellectual weaknesses of a purely secular worldview. I came to realize that even if Christianity wasn’t the real thing, neither was atheism.
I began to read the Bible. . . .

You can read the whole thing. That Kirsten Powers is willing to frankly admit her ignorant prejudice — she was “clueless,” and shocked to discover that a Presbyterian minister could be “intellectually rigorous” — might just be a miracle, praise God.

 

 


Category: Religion

Comments

35 Responses to “Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers?”

  1. MrEvilMatt
    November 4th, 2013 @ 8:50 am

    Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers?: The headline at Hot Air caught my eye: Kirsten Powers: My journey from atheist … http://t.co/RPhJCSQKNp

  2. CHideout
    November 4th, 2013 @ 8:50 am

    Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers?: The headline at Hot Air caught my eye: Kirsten Powers: My journey from atheist … http://t.co/GD9W2722FE

  3. Lockestep1776
    November 4th, 2013 @ 8:50 am

    Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers?: The headline at Hot Air caught my eye: Kirsten Powers: My journey from atheist … http://t.co/72uOnccir2

  4. Resista38176897
    November 4th, 2013 @ 8:50 am

    Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers?: The headline at Hot Air caught my eye: Kirsten Powers: My journey from atheist … http://t.co/i8zHdQSdh0

  5. Citzcom
    November 4th, 2013 @ 8:50 am

    Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers?: The headline at Hot Air caught my eye: Kirsten Powers: My journey from atheist … http://t.co/OaP7Y9AzKT

  6. jwbrown1969
    November 4th, 2013 @ 8:50 am

    Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers?: The headline at Hot Air caught my eye: Kirsten Powers: My journey from atheist … http://t.co/axeSZ4nTRa

  7. Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers? : The Other McCain | Dead Citizen's Rights Society
    November 4th, 2013 @ 9:18 am

    […] Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers? […]

  8. rmnixondeceased
    November 4th, 2013 @ 9:21 am

    Enlightenment can come at the least expected time and place, the miracle of the Truth of God’s Word.

  9. ZION'S TRUMPET » Well Known Liberal Commentator (and Atheist) Kirsten Powers Experiences the Reality of Jesus Christ
    November 4th, 2013 @ 9:33 am

    […] Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers? […]

  10. rsmccain
    November 4th, 2013 @ 9:38 am

    Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers? http://t.co/2a4EffcWun | @kirstenpowers10 @timkellernyc

  11. ForMotionCreatv
    November 4th, 2013 @ 9:42 am

    RT @rsmccain: Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers? http://t.co/2a4EffcWun | @kirstenpowers10 @timkellernyc

  12. BigDave74Tex
    November 4th, 2013 @ 9:44 am

    RT @rsmccain: Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers? http://t.co/2a4EffcWun | @kirstenpowers10 @timkellernyc

  13. DBT816
    November 4th, 2013 @ 9:44 am

    RT @rsmccain: Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers? http://t.co/2a4EffcWun | @kirstenpowers10 @timkellernyc

  14. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    November 4th, 2013 @ 9:48 am

    Kirsten Powers Rule 5!

  15. Frankly Bored
    November 4th, 2013 @ 10:28 am

    Isn’t grace AMAZING?

  16. AuthorAnnBaker
    November 4th, 2013 @ 10:46 am

    Is this why Kirsten Powers is sounding more reasonable? http://t.co/frU1qNUNUX Welcome to Christendom Ms Powers! Glad to have you aboard!

  17. screwtape1a12
    November 4th, 2013 @ 10:49 am

    RT @rsmccain: Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers? http://t.co/2a4EffcWun | @kirstenpowers10 @timkellernyc

  18. McGehee
    November 4th, 2013 @ 10:57 am

    God performs miracles? Who knew?

  19. rsmccain
    November 4th, 2013 @ 11:47 am

    RT @AuthorAnnBaker: Is this why Kirsten Powers is sounding more reasonable? http://t.co/frU1qNUNUX Welcome to Christendom Ms Powers! Glad …

  20. rsmccain
    November 4th, 2013 @ 11:48 am

    RT @Resista38176897: Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers?: The headline at Hot Air caught my eye: Kirsten Powers: My journey from atheist … http…

  21. G Joubert
    November 4th, 2013 @ 12:41 pm

    As long as she has been on Fox News as a contributor –years– I’ve regarded Powers as Fox’s token liberal, and that you wouldn’t have to scratch too deeply to find the conservative within. Further confirmation.

  22. vsgrules
    November 4th, 2013 @ 12:49 pm

    Again…@KirstenPowers10 displays awesomeness….just when I think I can write her off…. http://t.co/qmL35Yv9WV

  23. Quartermaster
    November 4th, 2013 @ 2:34 pm

    According to the tail on her article, she’s still a Dimocrap commentator. Like most of us at the same point she is at, she has a long road ahead of her. Shedding the immorality and stupidity of progressivism will come if she is sincerely seeking the truth.

  24. Adjoran
    November 4th, 2013 @ 3:25 pm

    Little-known Kirsten Powers fact: years ago she dated Anthony Weiner – and he dumped HER.

    In the South, we would call that a “come-to-Jesus moment.”

  25. Funeral guy
    November 4th, 2013 @ 5:29 pm

    I’ll be curious to see how Ms. Powers squares the circle of being pro-choice with her new found Christianity.

  26. Joe Dokes
    November 4th, 2013 @ 5:30 pm

    I hope she is now right with God through Christ but her testimony was rather unclear. In fact, I do not recall her mentioning Christ nor the cross, which is the crux of the Gospel. Based on that, no one can say exactly what she now specifically believes. Not judging her at all, only going by what she said. Perhaps there’s other reports I’ve not read in which she elaborated on it. But again…I’m hopeful.

  27. WJJ Hoge
    November 4th, 2013 @ 6:38 pm

    I highly recommend Timothy Keller’s book, The Reason for God, which you can buy via Stacy’s Amazon link.

  28. Regular Right Guy
    November 4th, 2013 @ 7:55 pm

    Kirsten, darling. If the whole premise of your life was wrong until now, maybe it’s time to rethink your politics as well.

  29. thatMrGguy
    November 4th, 2013 @ 8:00 pm

    Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers? http://t.co/0XFPNZOqcu

  30. higgins1990
    November 4th, 2013 @ 8:16 pm

    ^this. Seriously, I find myself becoming more and more cynical towards liberals that I need stories like this to remind me of whom I serve and who loves us (regardless of political ideology).

  31. Jason Lee
    November 4th, 2013 @ 9:19 pm

    One of the most disgusting and condescending caricatures of Christianity I’ve ever seen was from the Edward Norton movie “Leaves of Grass.” The protestant preacher was a blithering bumpkin.

    Too many people only know the Christianity presented in Hollwood which, at best, features the intellectual depth of a Hallmark card, and on the other end of the spectrum, has all the corrupt sadistic depravity of the warden in Shawshank Redemption.

  32. sokeijarhead
    November 4th, 2013 @ 9:45 pm

    Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers? : The Other McCain http://t.co/MtZrPHoys9

  33. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    November 5th, 2013 @ 2:51 am

    I knew that. But there is nothing weird at all about a Jewish Pro Israel congressman marrying a Saudi Muslim woman tied to the powers that be there, who just happened to work for years to the Secretary of State, is rumored to have a lesbian affair with her, and who is a person who has a decent shot at being President.

    And then suddenly his political career implodes over a dick tweet…and his name is Weiner.

    It makes Homeland seem just a wee bit more plausible.

  34. Susannah72
    November 5th, 2013 @ 4:10 pm

    Jesus Saves … Kirsten Powers? http://t.co/2fTpI3xHdH (Via @rsmccain.)

  35. Why Is Obamacare Driving Up Your Premiums? Kirsten Powers Has The Answer | The Lonely Conservative
    November 15th, 2013 @ 1:30 am

    […] changing. For one, she’s always been a little more reasonable than, say, Alan Colmes. Oh, and did you hear that she found God? Now, thanks to Obamacare, she has had her insurance policy cancelled, and she summed up the reason […]