Thursday, December 10, 2009
Thursday, November 19, 2009
I recently purchased WILLIAM COWPER: Selected Poetry and Prose, editted by David Lyle Jeffrey. One of the poems in the book is titled "Truth". It is an interesting and challenging work of 591 lines, with much to explore in it, but I was particularly taken by these lines near the beginning:
Grace leads the right way: if you choose the wrong,
Take it, and perish; but restrain your tongue.
Charge not, with light sufficient, and left free,
Your wilful suicide on God's decree.
Grace leads the right way: if you choose the wrong,
Take it, and perish; but restrain your tongue.
Charge not, with light sufficient, and left free,
Your wilful suicide on God's decree.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
The Good News (2)
Today I was meditating on the gospel. You know, the good news that Jesus came to earth as a man; that He was crucified, died, and was buried; that He rose again on the third day, so that our sins might be forgiven. (1 Cor. 15:1-4) I was thinking in my meditations that people today—especially modern Americans—don't really have a good analogy to understand just what this meant in the ancient world. In the ancient world the good news was the announcement that was made when a new king or emperor was crowned, or the announcement of a messenger that a great battle had been fought and their side had been victorious. (Think of Phidippides' announcement to Athens after the Greeks were victorious at the battle on the plain of Marathon.) But in our day of instant communication such good news of this sort often gets swallowed up in the cacophony going on around us. There are some examples that might work from our time though.
Every four years this country has a nationwide election for our president. Each network wants to be the first to make the announcement of who won the election. This caused some problems when they tried to make the announcement even before all of the polls were closed. but each side eagerly awaits the "official" announcement of who our next president will be. Now not everyone receives the announcement as good news. The side that loses often resorts to "wailing and gnashing of teeth." The left did this in 2000 and 2004, and the right did it in 2008.
The point of this is that the event is momentous and we are concerned about the outcome. In the ancient world kings and emperors were crowned many times. And today we elect a new president every four years. But the good news of Jesus Christ is that came, died, and rose once. He was victorious once, and that is enough. He doesn't need to do it again. This is the most momentous event ever; this is truly the Good News!
. . . [Jesus Christ] has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgement, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him. (Hebrews 9:26–28, ESV)
Every four years this country has a nationwide election for our president. Each network wants to be the first to make the announcement of who won the election. This caused some problems when they tried to make the announcement even before all of the polls were closed. but each side eagerly awaits the "official" announcement of who our next president will be. Now not everyone receives the announcement as good news. The side that loses often resorts to "wailing and gnashing of teeth." The left did this in 2000 and 2004, and the right did it in 2008.
The point of this is that the event is momentous and we are concerned about the outcome. In the ancient world kings and emperors were crowned many times. And today we elect a new president every four years. But the good news of Jesus Christ is that came, died, and rose once. He was victorious once, and that is enough. He doesn't need to do it again. This is the most momentous event ever; this is truly the Good News!
. . . [Jesus Christ] has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgement, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him. (Hebrews 9:26–28, ESV)
Saturday, October 10, 2009
Revelation: science & Scripture
Dr. James Anderson (proginosko) has some excellent thoughts on hwo to deal with [supposed] contradictions between Scripture and science at his blog Analogical Thoughts.
Friday, October 9, 2009
Milestones
Last weekend was the fortieth reunion of my high school graduating class—Bear Creek H.S. class of 1969. I didn't go.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
The folly of fools
A desire fulfilled is sweet to the soul,
but to turn away from evil is an abomination to fools.
Proverbs 13:19 (ESV)
Dan Phillips has a great post up at Pyromaniacs today on this subject.
In particular, this quote hit home for me: "The sinner does what he does
because he is convinved that it will bring him happiness, delight, joy.
He doesn't care where it ends." We all have our failings; many of us have
many failings. So what does Mr. Phillips recommend as the answer?
"Pray, watch, stay humble and rebukable."
I think that my biggest failure, my greatest folly is my lack of,
indeed my seeming inability to pray.
but to turn away from evil is an abomination to fools.
Proverbs 13:19 (ESV)
Dan Phillips has a great post up at Pyromaniacs today on this subject.
In particular, this quote hit home for me: "The sinner does what he does
because he is convinved that it will bring him happiness, delight, joy.
He doesn't care where it ends." We all have our failings; many of us have
many failings. So what does Mr. Phillips recommend as the answer?
"Pray, watch, stay humble and rebukable."
I think that my biggest failure, my greatest folly is my lack of,
indeed my seeming inability to pray.
Monday, August 24, 2009
Proactive
Proactive: acting in anticipation of future problems, needs, or changes.
We love because He first loved us. 1 John 4:19
But God shops His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5:8
He saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit. Titus 3:5
We cannot be procative with God. He has been proactive with us, and all that we can do is react, respond to Him.
We love because He first loved us. 1 John 4:19
But God shops His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5:8
He saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit. Titus 3:5
We cannot be procative with God. He has been proactive with us, and all that we can do is react, respond to Him.
Friday, August 21, 2009
Reform?
We are now weeks (months, years?) into the "discussion" of healthcare reform. Not being an expert on any of the questions involved, I have been mostly listening. I admit my biases. I have been reading Basic Economics, by Thomas Sowell, and that has formed some of my background thinking. But after listening to the rhetoric for a while now, I think I can plainly state my position: Our healthcare doesn't need reforming. In the United States of America we have the best healthcare in the world. It is not perfect, but it is better than that found anywhere else on a comparable scale. What does need reforming is how we go about paying for it. And none of the proposals coming from the President, or from the Democratic leadership in the House and the Senate will do any good. At best they will cause stagnation in out current system, and at worst they will lead to the deteriorization of our current care levels. I have heard some interesting ideas coming out of conservative sources. I don't know if they would work or not, but they are not even being allowed into the discussion occurring at the levels of power in our nation's capital. It seems that those currently in power are most concerned with keeping and increasing their power, not actually bringing reform that might do the populace some good.
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Memories
Saturday I drove over Trail Ridge Road, forty-eight years to the day since I was first driven over it.
Saturday, July 18, 2009
John 12:26
"If anyone serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also."
John 12:26(ESV)
John 12:26(ESV)
Saturday, July 11, 2009
Luke 6:46
"Why do you call me, 'Lord, Lord,' and do not do what I say?" Luke 6:46 (ESV)
In the latter part of Luke 6 Jesus is teaching about the law. He is not preaching gospel here, but law. But if we depend on the law to save us we must keep it in its entirety, with no exceptions. However, if we believe the gospel we will be saved, and we will want to obey the law, yet without relying on our obedience to it for our salvation.
In the latter part of Luke 6 Jesus is teaching about the law. He is not preaching gospel here, but law. But if we depend on the law to save us we must keep it in its entirety, with no exceptions. However, if we believe the gospel we will be saved, and we will want to obey the law, yet without relying on our obedience to it for our salvation.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Another book came in the mail today...
My copy of The Siege Of Budapest, by Krisztian Ungvary (translated by Ladislaus Lob), came in the mail today. A very fascinating book so far.
Friday, May 29, 2009
The Good News
How beautiful upon the mountains
are the feet of him
who brings good news,
who publishes peace,
who brings good news of happiness,
who publishes salvation,
who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.”
Isaiah 52:7 (ESV)
are the feet of him
who brings good news,
who publishes peace,
who brings good news of happiness,
who publishes salvation,
who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.”
Isaiah 52:7 (ESV)
Friday, May 1, 2009
Monday, April 27, 2009
The more things change, the more they stay the same ...
"You mortals do not walk a single way
in your philosophies, but let the thought
of being acclaimed as wise lead you astray.
Yet Heaven bears even this with less offense
than it must feel when it sees Holy Writ
neglected, or perverted of all sense.
They do not count what blood and agony
planted ot in the world, nor Heaven's pleasure
in those who search it in humility.
Each man, to show off, strains at some absurd
invented truth; and it is these the preachers
make sermons of; and the Gospel is not heard.
One says the Moon reversed its course to throw
a shadow on the Sun during Christ's passion
so that it's light might not shine down below;
others say that the Sun itself withdrew
and, therefore, that the Indian and the Spaniard
shared the eclipse in common with the Jew.
These fables pour from pulpits in such torrents,
spewing to right and left, that in a year
they outnumber the Lapi and Bindi in all Florence.
Therefore the ignorant sheep turn home at night
from having fed on wind. Nor does the fact
that the pastor sees no harm done set things right.
Christ did not say to His first congregation:
'Go and preach twaddle to the waiting world.'
He gave them, rather, holy truth's foundation.
That, and that only, was the truth revealed
by those who fought and died to plant the faith.
They made the Gospel both their and shield.
Now preachers make the congregations roar
with quips and quirks, and so it laugh enough,
their [heads] swell, and they ask for nothing more."
________________________________________
The Divine Comedy: The Paradiso, Canto XXIX, 85-117
by Dante Alighieri (translated by John Ciardi)
in your philosophies, but let the thought
of being acclaimed as wise lead you astray.
Yet Heaven bears even this with less offense
than it must feel when it sees Holy Writ
neglected, or perverted of all sense.
They do not count what blood and agony
planted ot in the world, nor Heaven's pleasure
in those who search it in humility.
Each man, to show off, strains at some absurd
invented truth; and it is these the preachers
make sermons of; and the Gospel is not heard.
One says the Moon reversed its course to throw
a shadow on the Sun during Christ's passion
so that it's light might not shine down below;
others say that the Sun itself withdrew
and, therefore, that the Indian and the Spaniard
shared the eclipse in common with the Jew.
These fables pour from pulpits in such torrents,
spewing to right and left, that in a year
they outnumber the Lapi and Bindi in all Florence.
Therefore the ignorant sheep turn home at night
from having fed on wind. Nor does the fact
that the pastor sees no harm done set things right.
Christ did not say to His first congregation:
'Go and preach twaddle to the waiting world.'
He gave them, rather, holy truth's foundation.
That, and that only, was the truth revealed
by those who fought and died to plant the faith.
They made the Gospel both their and shield.
Now preachers make the congregations roar
with quips and quirks, and so it laugh enough,
their [heads] swell, and they ask for nothing more."
________________________________________
The Divine Comedy: The Paradiso, Canto XXIX, 85-117
by Dante Alighieri (translated by John Ciardi)
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Friday, February 13, 2009
God's providence
By the grace and providence of God I have some extra time on my hands.
Some of it will be used to try and whittle down my reading list.
Updated
Currently reading:
- Calvin's Doctrine of the Word and Sacrament, by Ronald S. Wallace
- The Isaiah Vision, by Raymond Fong
- Till We Have Faces, by C. S. Lewis
To be read:
- The Divine Comedy, by Dante Alighieri
- The Courage to Be Protestant, by David F. Wells
Some of it will be used to try and whittle down my reading list.
Updated
Currently reading:
- Calvin's Doctrine of the Word and Sacrament, by Ronald S. Wallace
- The Isaiah Vision, by Raymond Fong
- Till We Have Faces, by C. S. Lewis
To be read:
- The Divine Comedy, by Dante Alighieri
- The Courage to Be Protestant, by David F. Wells
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Worth reading...
Dan Phillips has a good post over at Teampyro about what is important.
R. Scott Clark has a post on the Great Commission, and the Theology of the Cross.
R. Scott Clark has a post on the Great Commission, and the Theology of the Cross.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
The theology of the cross...
On Jan. 2nd, Gene Edward Veith posted a link to an article by Carl Trueman on Luther's theology of the cross. I am still digesting what he had to say about it. The folks on The White Horse Inn often talk about the theology of the cross vs. the theology of glory. I think people have widely differing views about just what these term mean, but Carl Trueman seems to get to the heart of what Luther meant by the term. Some key statements:
The "theologians of glory," therefore, are those who build their theology in the light of what they expect God to be like-and, surprise, surprise, they make God to look something like themselves. The "theologians of the cross," however, are those who build their theology in the light of God's own revelation of himself in Christ hanging on the cross.
...
And what of the idea of a God who comes down and loves the unlovely and the unrighteous before the objects of his love have any inclination to love him or do good? Such is incomprehensible to the theologians of glory, who assume that God is like them, like other human beings, and thus only responds to those who are intrinsically attractive or good, or who first earn his favor in some way. But the cross shows that God is not like that: against every assumption that human beings might make about who God is and how he acts, he requires no prior loveliness in the objects of his love; rather, his prior love creates that loveliness without laying down preconditions. Such a God is revealed with amazing and unexpected tenderness and beauty in the ugly and violent drama of the cross.
...
To the eyes opened by faith, however, the cross is seen as it really is. God is revealed in the hiddenness of the external form. And faith is understood to be a gift of God, not a power inherent in the human mind itself.
...
...if the death of Christ is mysteriously a blessing, then any evil that the believer experiences can be a blessing too. Yes, the curse is reversed; yes, blessings will flow; but who declared that these blessings have to be in accordance with the aspirations and expectations of affluent America? The lesson of the cross for Luther is that the most blessed person upon earth, Jesus Christ himself, was revealed as blessed precisely in his suffering and death. And if that is the way that God deals with his beloved son, have those who are united to him by faith any right to expect anything different?
This casts the problem of evil in a somewhat different light for Luther than, say, for Harold Kushner, the rabbi who wrote When Bad Things Happen to Good People. They happen, Luther would say, because that is how God blesses them. God accomplishes his work in the believer by doing his alien work (the opposite of what we expect); he really blesses by apparently cursing.
...
The answer to the problem of evil does not lie in trying to establish its point of origin, for that is simply not revealed to us. Rather, in the moment of the cross, it becomes clear that evil is utterly subverted for good. Romans 8:28 is true because of the cross of Christ: if God can take the greatest of evils and turn it to the greatest of goods, then how much more can he take the lesser evils which litter human history, from individual tragedies to international disasters, and turn them to his good purpose as well.
Professor Trueman has provided us with some excellent teaching on this important topic, and I praise God for it.
The "theologians of glory," therefore, are those who build their theology in the light of what they expect God to be like-and, surprise, surprise, they make God to look something like themselves. The "theologians of the cross," however, are those who build their theology in the light of God's own revelation of himself in Christ hanging on the cross.
...
And what of the idea of a God who comes down and loves the unlovely and the unrighteous before the objects of his love have any inclination to love him or do good? Such is incomprehensible to the theologians of glory, who assume that God is like them, like other human beings, and thus only responds to those who are intrinsically attractive or good, or who first earn his favor in some way. But the cross shows that God is not like that: against every assumption that human beings might make about who God is and how he acts, he requires no prior loveliness in the objects of his love; rather, his prior love creates that loveliness without laying down preconditions. Such a God is revealed with amazing and unexpected tenderness and beauty in the ugly and violent drama of the cross.
...
To the eyes opened by faith, however, the cross is seen as it really is. God is revealed in the hiddenness of the external form. And faith is understood to be a gift of God, not a power inherent in the human mind itself.
...
...if the death of Christ is mysteriously a blessing, then any evil that the believer experiences can be a blessing too. Yes, the curse is reversed; yes, blessings will flow; but who declared that these blessings have to be in accordance with the aspirations and expectations of affluent America? The lesson of the cross for Luther is that the most blessed person upon earth, Jesus Christ himself, was revealed as blessed precisely in his suffering and death. And if that is the way that God deals with his beloved son, have those who are united to him by faith any right to expect anything different?
This casts the problem of evil in a somewhat different light for Luther than, say, for Harold Kushner, the rabbi who wrote When Bad Things Happen to Good People. They happen, Luther would say, because that is how God blesses them. God accomplishes his work in the believer by doing his alien work (the opposite of what we expect); he really blesses by apparently cursing.
...
The answer to the problem of evil does not lie in trying to establish its point of origin, for that is simply not revealed to us. Rather, in the moment of the cross, it becomes clear that evil is utterly subverted for good. Romans 8:28 is true because of the cross of Christ: if God can take the greatest of evils and turn it to the greatest of goods, then how much more can he take the lesser evils which litter human history, from individual tragedies to international disasters, and turn them to his good purpose as well.
Professor Trueman has provided us with some excellent teaching on this important topic, and I praise God for it.
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