What Happens When You Don’t Have a Category for Wisdom or Nature (Part 1)

by on August 15, 2025

Losing Our Religion

When Andy Kaufman wrestled women in the late 70s and early 80s it was a gag; it was outrageous because, until he did it, it was unthinkable. Why? Because there is such a thing as nature (i.e., the way things are) and Kaufman was being provocative by doing something contrary to the nature of things. The spirit of the age denies that there is such a thing as nature. American evangelicals, to the degree that they are a subset of the broader culture, also lack a sense that God created things a certain way. They also lack another category: wisdom. And they lack both of these for the same reason: eschatology. The omission of these two categories of analysis is on full display in an article on the Christianity Today blog for women, her•meneutics.1

Wrestling is to Iowa what football is to Nebraska. Just as Nebraska boys grow up hoping one day to run out of the tunnel at Memorial Stadium before 85,0000 fans, so little boys in Iowa grow up hoping to wrestle for the Hawkeyes (University of Iowa) or the Cyclones (Iowa State). Recently, little girls have begun to have the same dreams in Iowa, and one of them, Cassy Herkleman, was marching toward the state wrestling tournament by wrestling and defeating boys. One of those boys, however, refused to wrestle her. He forfeited the match and struck a match at the same time. Commenting on this controversy, Caryn Rivadeneira argues,

When Joel refused to wrestle Cassy, he took an opportunity away from her. An opportunity for her to shine using her own God-given strength and ability. An opportunity to win or lose, fair and square.2

She argues that, had Joel followed Jesus’ (egalitarian) example, Joel would have wrestled Cassy. There are two great problems with this analysis: it fails to account for nature and wisdom. These are categories with which American evangelicals are not terribly familiar, so it is not surprising that she should have ignored them. She acknowledges that there are potential problems with boys wrestling girls, but she fails to acknowledge that the problems are not merely potential, they are actual. There have been episodes where boys have wrestled girls, in a match, and boys have become sexually aroused. As unthinkable as that might be to our increasingly androgynous culture, boys are still boys and girls are still girls. Most of us are still heterosexual. It does not take a rocket scientist to see the potential problems with boys wrestling girls.

One of the reasons Americans as a lot have a difficult time making such distinctions is that, since the early nineteenth century, we have been on a radically democratizing trajectory. This nation is being transformed from a representative republic to a democracy. There are still elements of the republican system (e.g., the electoral college) in place, but the pressure to eliminate them is very strong and they will likely be eroded in time. As egalitarians, Americans resist distinctions of any kind. In the twentieth century, that impulse moved beyond economic and class distinctions to the distinction between the sexes.

It is true that, in earlier generations, the differences between the sexes were overstated and fueled by male chauvinism as much as anything else. Females were regarded as inherently inferior. That was the product of Victorian assumptions more than science. Females are just as intelligent and capable and are willing to perform tasks that were once considered beyond them. The differences between males and females are not grounded in male superiority. The feminist reaction to male chauvinism has tended, however, to obliterate the differences altogether.

Anabaptist Domination

There is a second, religious, reason for this impulse. Since the early nineteenth century, the trajectory of American religion, and particularly American evangelicalism, has been toward the Anabaptist radicals of the early sixteenth century.3 One of the great impulses of the Anabaptists was, as it were, to bring down heaven to earth. They had what the theologians call an “over-realized eschatology.” They were constantly proclaiming the end of the world or that they were bringing about millennial glory. This is why the Second Helvetic Confession (1561/66) denounced them for seeking a “Jewish golden age” on the earth. Of course, more than a few Reformed folk in our time are seeking their own version of a “Jewish golden age” through the re-institution of the Mosaic law, and not infrequently by teaching the Federal Vision doctrine of baptismal benefits.4 As a consequence of this over-realized eschatology, the early Anabaptists (and many American evangelicals like them) see nature as something to be overcome rather than renewed. This impulse is basically gnostic. It is suspicious of nature as such. The biblical and catholic Christian view is that creation is good (See Gen 1) and that corruption was introduced by the fall. And our Reformed writers said that, in redemption, grace renews nature; it does not obliterate it.

The Anabaptist and modern evangelical tendency, however, is to think that grace (redemption) obliterates nature. Many of us were taught as evangelicals that if we enjoyed something before we came to faith, then grace would remove that interest. So it has been said that if you enjoyed baseball before coming to faith, as a Christian you would no longer enjoy baseball. Such a view fundamentally misunderstands the relations between nature (creation) and grace (redemption).

Rivadeneira’s appeal to our Lord’s example regarding females is wrongheaded. He did not ignore the differences between males and females. Yes, he regarded the humanity of both males and females because, as the eternally begotten Word (Gen 1:1–3; John 1:1–3) he was present at creation and the agent of it. Joel’s refusal to wrestle Cassy was faithful to our Lord’s example. By refusing to wrestle a female, Joel was not denying Cassy’s humanity. He was affirming it. He was affirming obvious realities; he was affirming that God had made her distinctly different from him. He was honoring her and respecting God-given differences. The modern impulse, born partly of pagan Unitarianism, has been to flatten out all distinctions. Cornelius Van Til (1895–1987) taught us, among many things, that we must always account for the one (that which unifies) and the many (that which distinguishes). Males and females have a great deal in common. We are both image bearers. In Christ, there is no male and female, that is, both sexes have equal standing before God. Nevertheless, God is not only redeemer; he is also Creator. And there is not just salvation and grace; there is also nature. For all the faults of the Victorian period, at least they were able to acknowledge that these differences exist. Yes, they over-stated them with the flourish only Victorians could generate, but Vive la différence!

How Wisdom Helps

The case is that of a boy who refuses, on religious grounds, to wrestle a girl. A writer for the Christianity Today blog for women argues that the boy was wrong and disobedient to Jesus’ example. I reply: that is grossly anachronistic. Jesus was not a feminist. Yes, he subverted social expectations, but he did not assume what the Christianity Today blogger assumes about nature.

Evangelicals do not tend to invoke this category because it does not really exist for them. They tend to subscribe to the early Anabaptist view of grace and nature where grace overwhelms rather than renews nature in salvation. We are not here discussing cultural or cosmic transformation. Nature, or creation, is a thoroughly biblical category. After all, Scripture begins with “In the beginning . . . ” which starts with creation. Tragically, in evangelical and fundamentalist circles, the very word or idea of creation has become synonymous with creationism. I fear that, in their defense of creationism, many fundamentalist, evangelical, and even Reformed Christians have lost the category of creation (nature).5

There is another biblical category that will help us analyze this problem and work through it: wisdom. This is not a term one hears frequently in revivalist, transformationalist, theonomic, or fundamentalist circles. There is a reason for that. It does not fit their paradigm. Next time we will examine these reasons.

Notes

  1. Caryn Rivadeneira, “The Argument for Girl-Boy Wrestling,” her•meneutics, February 22, 2011.
  2. Rivadeneira, “The Argument for Girl-Boy Wrestling.”
  3. You can read about this in R. Scott Clark and Julius E. Kim eds., Always Reformed: Essays in Honor of W. Robert Godfrey (Escondido, CA: Westminster Seminary California, 2012).
  4. See R. Scott Clark, “For Those Just Tuning In: What Is The Federal Vision?”
  5. See the chapter on this in R. Scott Clark, Recovering the Reformed Confession (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 2008).

©R. Scott Clark. All Rights Reserved.

Editor’s Note: This article was originally published on the Heidelblog in 2011.

RESOURCES

Heidelberg Reformation Association
1637 E. Valley Parkway #391
Escondido CA 92027
USA
The HRA is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization

    Post authored by:

  • R. Scott Clark
    Author Image

    R.Scott Clark is the President of the Heidelberg Reformation Association, the author and editor of, and contributor to several books and the author of many articles. He has taught church history and historical theology since 1997 at Westminster Seminary California. He has also taught at Wheaton College, Reformed Theological Seminary, and Concordia University. He has hosted the Heidelblog since 2007.

    More by R. Scott Clark ›

Subscribe to the Heidelblog today!