In yesterday’s post we were attempting to understand the massive collectivist “winds” that are blowing across the modern world right now. The purpose was to help Christians see that these are nothing new, nothing unexpected, and nothing untypical of mankind. The language changes, maybe, but the forces at work are always the same.
“God is interested in our willing participation in his plan for our lives, not in micro-managing helpless automatons.” — Tom
- Home
- What We’re Doing Here
- F A Q
- Anonymous Asks
- Apocrypha-lypso
- Book Reviews
- The Commentariat Speaks
- DAMWWTIM
- Flyover Country
- How Not to Crash and Burn
- Inbox
- The Language of the Debate
- Letters from the Best Man
- Mining the Minors
- On the Mount
- Quote of the Day
- Recommend-a-blog
- Semi-Random Musings
- That Wacky Old Testament
- Time and Chance
- What Does Your Proof Text Prove?
Thursday, June 25, 2020
Wednesday, June 24, 2020
Let’s Get Together and …
The most recent version of this post is available here.
Labels:
Babel
/
Collectivism
Tuesday, June 23, 2020
What Does Your Proof Text Prove? (12)
“If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching,
do not receive him into your house or give him any greeting, for whoever
greets him takes part in his wicked works.”
Growing up in an evangelical community, it was understood
that Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses were not
our fellow believers. These groups were commonly referred to as cults, and considered spiritually dangerous. Pairs of these odd-looking “missionaries”
would occasionally make their way through our neighborhood from house to house
ringing doorbells and soliciting opportunities to talk to people about the tenets of their belief system. On
more than one occasion I heard this verse from 2 John applied as a
warning about them: “Do not receive them into your house or give them any
greeting.”
As a result, when I was home alone and saw through the
peephole of our front door two pasty white guys in matching snappy haircuts, bleached
shirts, neatly pressed dress slacks and sensible shoes, I promptly made
myself scarce for fear of violating John’s instruction. Hey, the word “Hello” might
accidentally slip from my lips and cause me to “take part in their wicked works”.
Is that really the sort of thing John had in mind?
Labels:
2 John
/
Separation
/
Testimony
/
What Does Your Proof Text Prove?
Monday, June 22, 2020
Anonymous Asks (98)
“Are Christians supposed to be perfect?”
We all know Christians sin. This is the reality we live
with. I was just making another pass through the apostle John’s first letter, where
we find these familiar words: “If we say we have no sin, we
deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” Whatever might be the
expectation of us, and whoever might be expecting it, the fact is that we fail,
and fail with some regularity. The longer we walk with Christ and the better we
know his word and his character, the more clearly we will see our own spiritual inadequacy.
So any Christian who claims sinlessness is lying, not just to the world, but
more importantly to himself.
That is what is actually happening in our lives, but what is supposed to be happening?
Labels:
Anonymous Asks
/
Perfection
Sunday, June 21, 2020
A Little Monday Morning Quarterback
Have you ever been in a disagreement that got out of
control? I have.
People are different. Some respond to criticism by trying to
placate the other side, even groveling if necessary. They are willing to cede
any intellectual or moral position in hopes of ending the argument, even when they believe they are in the right. They take the proverbial knee ... or occasionally the literal knee.
Others fume and fuss and become emotional when the logic of
a critique disturbs their received worldview. They take correction personally,
as a negative commentary on their character rather than a learning opportunity.
Easily baited into debating hypotheticals, they can even find themselves arguing
positions they don’t really believe because they are so caught up in trying to “win”.
Labels:
Disagreement
/
Job
/
Wisdom
Saturday, June 20, 2020
Time and Chance (41)
Bible readers whose systematic
theology requires them to downplay or overlook the distinctions scripture makes
between the Old and New Covenants are faced with more than the occasional
conundrum in interpreting Ecclesiastes. And yet any number of older
commentators read and exposit the book as if its primary value is as
directly-applicable advice to modern Christians.
It most surely is not.
Labels:
Ecclesiastes
/
Life
/
Pleasure
/
Time and Chance
Friday, June 19, 2020
Too Hot to Handle: Empty-Somethings
In which our regular writers toss around
subjects a little more volatile than usual.
The Telegraph reports an Italian court has ordered a divorced father to pay child support for his 28-year-old son, who has already
meandered through one degree in literature and has now enrolled in a
post-graduate course in experimental cinema.
Tom: I bring this up, Immanuel Can, because this is not an isolated case.
Most parents have not been nailed for child support, but many all over the
world have their adult sons and daughters living in their homes well into their
thirties and beyond.
The phenomenon has a
name in Italy. They call it bamboccioni, which essentially means
“chubby children”. You had what I thought was a better idea, IC. How about “empty-somethings”?
Labels:
Adulthood
/
Education
/
Recycling
/
Too Hot to Handle
Thursday, June 18, 2020
Even More Offensive
The most recent version of this post is available here.
Labels:
Christ
/
Offences
/
Soren Kierkegaard
Wednesday, June 17, 2020
Of Meth Heads and Christ Figures
People are complicated, Christians included. They are not
all one thing, either good or bad.
Friends of whom I once thought very highly have later shown
the world sides of themselves I never knew existed, betraying and
deceiving loved ones, harboring unimagined secrets and bad habits, or getting
involved in situations that seem incomprehensible to those who thought they
knew them. Equally, people who lived quite openly and despicably in sin have on
occasion shown evidence of tenderness, affection or intelligence I never
thought possible for them.
People are complicated, and they will surprise you.
Labels:
Christianity Today
/
Media
/
Racism
Tuesday, June 16, 2020
Call and Answer
As I have probably mentioned from time to time, it is my
habit every morning to try to read one chapter of the Old Testament and one
chapter of the New. Other Christians I know do much the same thing. More
than once we have found ourselves sharing with one another how remarkably one
passage seems to dovetail with another.
Coincidence? Perhaps. But the unity of scripture is a real
phenomenon, and it should not surprise us when that inherent thematic oneness expresses itself in remarkable ways. This morning it is in the form of a call
and answer.
Labels:
Job
/
John
/
Reconciliation
/
Resurrection
Monday, June 15, 2020
Anonymous Asks (97)
“Does God make mistakes?”
The Song of Moses says this about God: “The Rock, his work is perfect, for all his ways are justice.” David wrote, “This God — his way is perfect; the word of the Lord proves true.” Another psalm says the Lord’s understanding is
“beyond measure”. The prophet Isaiah said, “O Lord, you have done wonderful things, plans formed of old,
faithful and sure.” Even the pagan prophet Balaam was forced to concede that “God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?”
Does this sound like Someone who makes mistakes? The writers
of scripture claim our God is morally impeccable, utterly reliable, and acts in
absolute harmony with reality. If we accept their testimony then, no, God does
not make mistakes.
Labels:
Anonymous Asks
/
Character of God
/
Choices
/
Error
Sunday, June 14, 2020
More Than Accurate
“My anger burns against you and against your two friends, for
you have not spoken of me what is right.”
In his first letter to the churches in Corinth, as he so
often does, Paul appeals to the authority of the Old Testament in making his
argument. He says, “For
it is written.” Apparently that settles the matter.
Incidentally, Paul is quoting from the book of Job. The
text at the top of this post comes from Job as well.
Labels:
Correction
/
God
/
Job
Saturday, June 13, 2020
Time and Chance (40)
The writer to the Hebrews
notes that one of the Lord’s objectives in his incarnation was to “deliver all those
who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery”.
That slave metaphor is not particularly flattering. And yet we can see a slave’s mentality at work in
Ecclesiastes. Solomon, the Preacher, has lived his life making decisions for
everyone else around him. He has been the greatest king of his generation;
autonomous, powerful, captain of his own destiny. As he considers his own
looming demise, he cannot stop obsessing about the various ways in which his
own agency is being gradually stripped from him as he ages. This, he says, is “vanity”
and “a great evil”. Death is the great leveler of humanity, and the Preacher
does not look forward to being leveled.
That preoccupation is a form of slavery, one from which only Christ can free us.
Labels:
Death
/
Ecclesiastes
/
Time and Chance
Friday, June 12, 2020
Too Hot to Handle: Evolving Christianity
In which our regular writers toss around subjects a
little more volatile than usual.
Billions of blue, blistering barnacles ... |
Erik Jones asks the
question “Was Christianity Designed to Evolve?”
Tom: Now, Jones is Church of God, the Sabbath-keeping sect out of Texas that originated with
Herbert Armstrong, so we’re certainly not going to find ourselves in agreement
with their particular emphasis on law-keeping and Jewish holy days, a hint of
which bleeds into Jones’ article.
We will also be unsurprised to find Jones’ answer to his own question
is a resounding ‘No’.
Labels:
Church
/
Evolution
/
Recycling
/
Too Hot to Handle
Thursday, June 11, 2020
Offensive Christianity
The most recent version of this post is available here.
Labels:
Doubt
/
Soren Kierkegaard
Wednesday, June 10, 2020
Who Does the Washing?
“If I do not wash you, you
have no share with me.”
A very simple thought this morning, but perhaps an important
one.
It is helpful to recognize what is being symbolized in our Lord’s
marvelous display of love and humility at the very beginning of John 13. When
Jesus washes the feet of his disciples, the spiritual issue being addressed is not their eternal salvation. Judas had
his feet washed right along with the rest of the disciples, and subsequently
went to “his own place”. So the “share” at stake in allowing the Lord to wash
our feet is not our “heavenly portion”. Salvation is settled separately, as
Jesus told Peter: “The one who has bathed does not need to wash, except
for his feet, but is completely clean. And you are clean, but not
every one of you.”
One man had his feet washed who had never consented to take
a bath: Judas. His footwashing did not help him in any way, shape or form. He
went right out and betrayed the Lord only moments later. If anything, the
footwashing he had received testified against him.
Labels:
Defilement
/
John
/
Washing
Tuesday, June 09, 2020
Unhelpful Friends and Uneasy Times
When Job’s three friends came to show him sympathy in his
time of distress, they wept, tore their robes and sat with him on the ground
seven days and seven nights, and no
one spoke a word to him because they saw that his suffering was very great.
The week of silence was a genuine gesture of solidarity and
goodwill, but everything Job’s friends did from that point on was a bit of a
bust. Why? Because they opened their mouths and started talking — and
arguing at great length — about something they weren’t going through and
clearly didn’t understand.
We Christians may be at risk of doing much the same thing
with respect to the current racial tensions in the U.S.
Monday, June 08, 2020
Anonymous Asks (96)
“How can I avoid the appearance of evil?”
Let me take a wild guess here: you read from the King James
Version of the Bible.
Actually, it’s not really that wild a guess. If we use the
very convenient BibleHub website to take a
look at a broad
spectrum of English translations of 1 Thessalonians 5:22 (which
is where the phrase “the appearance of evil” originates), we find only six of the
28 versions listed there translate it that way, and three of those are King
James variants. Of those six, the KJV is by far the most widely read, so this
rendering of the verse is still very common today despite being more than a
little misleading to modern readers.
Labels:
Anonymous Asks
/
Appearances
/
Bible Translations
Sunday, June 07, 2020
Christ-Plus®
In the upper room, Jesus sets out God’s program for his
disciples. The Son of Man is to be glorified, and God glorified in him. This necessitates
him going away, first to the cross, and then to the Father, where he intends to
make his preparations to receive his disciples, and then return for them. Only
three things are really required of the disciples in all this: believe,
love
one another, and wait
patiently for his promised return.
This is God’s program in a nutshell. Unsurprisingly, three
of the Lord’s disciples voice objections to it, and offer subtle improvements
to make it more palatable to them.
Saturday, June 06, 2020
Time and Chance (39)
If you’re counting, the words “dead” and “die”
occur six times apiece, “dust” and “death” three times, “one place” (guess
where?) twice, and “Sheol”, “burial” and “stillborn” once each.
To top it all off, the infamous chapter 12 contains such an impressive stack of poetic aging-and-death
metaphors that the first thing most Christians do upon finishing the book is
scramble to the New Testament post-haste in search of something to wash the
taste out of their mouths. I find the
last
nine verses of Romans 8 usually do nicely.
Labels:
Death
/
Ecclesiastes
/
Time and Chance
Friday, June 05, 2020
Too Hot to Handle: Rules of Combat
In which our regular writers toss around subjects a little more volatile
than usual.
I was having a discussion with a Christian
academic over Calvinism. He leans toward it, though in a rather unorthodox way,
and I … don’t. Here’s his perspective on the fact that doctrinal
disagreements exist:
“I’ve
been blessed by teaching and worshiping in schools and churches which take no
stand on the [controversial] divide, all my life. I have become convinced that
agreement on this will never be reached. As a Calvinist, I posit that this is
the way God wants it. It is apparently best for the church and the world that
there be both [sides], but that we find ways to love one another and to work
together, without suppressing our different biblical understandings.”
Immanuel
Can: Is it like that, Tom? Is an
I’m-okay-you’re-okay attitude the way to deal with major doctrinal
controversies in the local church?
Labels:
Controversy
/
Debate
/
Recycling
/
Too Hot to Handle
Thursday, June 04, 2020
The Heights of Accommodation and the Depths of Evil
The most recent version of this post is available here.
Labels:
Deuteronomy
/
Truth
/
Witnessing
Wednesday, June 03, 2020
Congregations in Boxes
If you are anything like me, you have probably watched no
end of amateur Christian video uploaded to YouTube in the last two months.
The medium definitely has its limitations.
Still, there is a certain amount of courage required to record your
thoughts to be replayed in a public forum. The whole thing is pretty stark: it’s
basically a person in a box. You are seriously exposed.
Labels:
Church
/
Participation
/
YouTube
Tuesday, June 02, 2020
Not Done in a Corner
From the scientific
perspective, peer review is the litmus test of reliability.
The idea is this: that in order for a newly published academic theory to have any credibility with either the
scientific community or the general public, it is necessary for
independent parties to test it: to carefully read through the documentation
that supports it; to re-calculate the mathematical formulas that lie behind it;
to examine the steps by which the theory was constructed and certify that its
conclusions were arrived at in accordance with normal scientific procedures; in
some cases even to re-perform whatever experiments are alleged to prove it and
examine their results for consistency.
You cannot do science off
in some dark corner and then refuse to allow anybody to see what you have been
up to. If you do, nobody will believe you at all.
Monday, June 01, 2020
Anonymous Asks (95)
Entering into a relationship with God is
not like signing up to play for a ball team, getting initiated into a college fraternity
or joining MENSA. There are no tests to pass, no dotted lines to sign on, no secret
handshakes and no code words like “Open, Sesame” which must be spoken to allow
access to God.
Labels:
Anonymous Asks
/
Creeds
/
Salvation
Sunday, May 31, 2020
Divine Multi-Tasking
A teacher once told me about a student who couldn’t walk and
chew gum at the same time. He didn’t mean it literally, of course; it was a
comment on the student’s intelligence. We assume the smarter a person is, the more things they are capable of doing at the same time.
A juggler keeps multiple balls in the air simultaneously.
It can be impressive to watch a skilled multi-tasker at work. But human beings
have upper limits on our juggling ability. The maximum number of items ever
juggled is either 13 or 14, depending on who you believe. The case has been
made that the laws of physics make juggling 15 items impossible. At least, nobody
alive can do it.
Labels:
Christ
/
God
/
Omniscience
/
Purpose
Saturday, May 30, 2020
Time and Chance (38)
Revelation is a glorious thing.
The phrase “through a glass darkly” is
often used to describe our current condition: we do not know everything we wish
we knew about God’s purposes for us. We would like to know more; of course we
would.
But when we apply that biblical phrase to ourselves, I believe we are erroneously putting
ourselves back twenty centuries in time and assuming ourselves to be in the same
condition as the Christians to whom Paul wrote in the mid-first century AD with
respect to the knowledge of God and his purposes.
And yet we are not in their situation. Not at all. We are much, much better off than they were.
Labels:
Ecclesiastes
/
Revelation
/
Time and Chance
Friday, May 29, 2020
Too Hot to Handle: To Debate or Not to Debate
In which our regular writers toss around subjects a little more volatile than usual.
Is there such a thing as too much discussion? |
“Do these squabbles speak love? Does the loud and passionate protestation about same-sex marriage draw others to Christ?”
Tom: Good questions, Immanuel Can. Is there any easy answer? Or is this
a debate where both sides may have legitimate concerns?
Labels:
Gay Marriage
/
Recycling
/
Tolerance
/
Too Hot to Handle
/
World Vision
Thursday, May 28, 2020
Stuck in the Middle with You
The most recent version of this post is available here.
Labels:
Church
/
Conservatism
/
Liberalism
/
Unity
Wednesday, May 27, 2020
Anatomy of a Genocide
Serious efforts to exterminate Jews have happened more than
once, and the word of God assures us they will happen again. The book of Esther
is the story of a relatively early attempt.
The Medo-Persian empire was not Nazi Germany, and it is not
Armageddon, but there are still a few interesting things to be observed about
genocides, how such things can even come about at all, and what a persecuted (or
soon-to-be-persecuted) minority can learn from them about how best to conduct
itself in the face of overwhelming numerical opposition.
Labels:
Esther
/
Government
/
Persecution
Tuesday, May 26, 2020
Sound and Unsound
It is difficult to miss the adjective “sound” in the first
couple chapters of Titus. In fact, it occurs more times in Titus than
anywhere else in the New Testament. In instructing his younger associate, the
apostle Paul refers repeatedly to both “sound doctrine” and being “sound in the
faith”, the latter being the result of the former. Soundness was the apostle’s
desire for the Christians in Crete, and indeed for all believers everywhere.
In Greek, the word “sound” is hygiainō, which means “healthy”. It has the sense of fitness and
functionality. In Luke it is contrasted with both sickness
and injury.
Monday, May 25, 2020
Anonymous Asks (94)
“Is it possible to go a whole day without sinning?”
No.
Shortest Anonymous Asks ever.
Okay, I suppose I could elaborate a little. It is only possible to imagine you have
gone a whole day without “sinning” if your definition of sin is grossly deficient,
if you are stupifyingly un-self-aware, or maybe if you happen to be in
a coma.
Labels:
Anonymous Asks
/
Nehemiah
/
Sinlessness
Sunday, May 24, 2020
Good Applications and Bad Ones
Billy Graham noted that the character of our loved ones, friends, and acquaintances may change. Jesus does not.
TL Osborn says that because Jesus Christ does not change, you
can count on being healed from sickness, just as he healed the sick in the
first century.
A commenter at Christian Forums says the fact that Jesus Christ never changes means
dispensationalism is false teaching.
We all agree that “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and
forever.” However, it is evident we do not all agree about
precisely what that means.
Labels:
Application
/
Christ
/
Hebrews
/
Immutability
Saturday, May 23, 2020
Time and Chance (37)
Last week we encountered
the term “vanity” for the umpteenth time in the book of Ecclesiastes, and
considered another entry in the Preacher’s list of realities he found
frustrating, and which he could not hope to understand without direct
revelation from God. In this case, he had observed that there is a species of
wicked people who move freely in polite society and who, far from being punished
for their crimes, are more often politely indulged ... and sometimes even
celebrated.
He continues this thought in the next couple of verses, in the process adding yet another “vain thing” to
his list of conundra.
Labels:
Ecclesiastes
/
Joy
/
Time and Chance
Friday, May 22, 2020
Too Hot to Handle: Getting Relevant
In which our regular writers toss around
subjects a little more volatile than usual.
I heard that most young people drop out of church today, either for a short or
indefinite time, around age 18-19. I was concerned: after all, if we lose
the next generation, what’s going to happen to the church? But then I found
this glossy new resource, and it’s really helping me to understand what today’s young adults are going to
find relevant by way of spiritual stuff. I’m sharing it with you, Tom, because
I know you’ve got young-adult children of your own.
Just in time, eh?
Tom: Uh, thanks, IC, I think. Why is it that some Christians seem to think that being “relevant” actually
means “pandering” or “condescending”?
Labels:
Church
/
Discipleship
/
Recycling
/
Too Hot to Handle
/
Youth Work
Thursday, May 21, 2020
Contradictions and Contradistinctions
The most recent version of this post is available here.
Labels:
Contradictions in Scripture
/
Jordan Peterson
/
Paradoxes
Wednesday, May 20, 2020
Everything Louder Than Everything Else
Ian Gillan of the seventies metal band Deep Purple reportedly
once asked the sound engineer mixing the band’s live album, “Could we have everything louder than
everything else?”
I’ve always loved that line. It just sounds like a title for the perfect rock and roll anthem.
But when you think about it for half a second, the request is
absurd. If the bass is louder than the high hat, the high hat cannot simultaneously
be louder than the bass. If you mix the snare drum louder than a guitar cranked
up to eleven, you cannot make that guitar louder in the sound mix without reducing
the volume of the snare. It’s absurd.
“Everything” cannot be louder than “everything else”. It
doesn’t work.
Labels:
Money
/
Poverty
/
Priorities
/
Recycling
Tuesday, May 19, 2020
Diagnosing the Problem
“Behold, we are slaves this day ... behold, we are slaves.”
“We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone.”
You can’t solve a problem unless you know what it is.
John 8:33 records a very strange statement, the second
one I have quoted above. It appears to have been made not specifically by the Pharisees
or Sadducees (though there may have been some of these present, of course), but more generally, by men who had just made a public confession of belief in Christ.
The statement was this: “We have never been enslaved to
anyone.”
Monday, May 18, 2020
Anonymous Asks (93)
“Is it wrong to wish for something?”
There was a time when the Lord Jesus wished for something
with all his heart. Luke says he prayed for it earnestly, in agony, to the
point where “his sweat became like great drops of blood falling to the ground”.
Here is what he wished for: “Father ... remove
this cup from me.”
Labels:
Anonymous Asks
/
Prayer
Sunday, May 17, 2020
Lost Light
How does the word of God go missing among God’s people? How
does the plain teaching of scripture get overlooked for months, years and even
centuries, only to be suddenly rediscovered? You would think it impossible if
we didn’t have both historical and biblical evidence that it happens, and
happens with sad regularity.
For example, in the days of King Josiah, the Book of the Law
was found in the house of the Lord and taken to the king and read to him. When
Josiah heard the Law read, he
tore his clothes, humbled and stricken by the degree to which the people of
God had departed from his commandments and the wrath they had incurred because
of it.
Saturday, May 16, 2020
Time and Chance (36)
As mentioned in earlier
studies in Ecclesiastes, the Preacher uses the term “vanity” repeatedly. This
is usually read as an expression of disgust, as if Solomon is saying, “Pointless,
pointless ... it’s all futile and pointless,” as if the order God has set
in place since the fall of man — and it is very much evident he believes God
is behind it all — is not worth further investigation.
And yet, on he goes investigating anyway. Can’t be all that pointless, can it?
Labels:
Ecclesiastes
/
Time and Chance
/
Vanity
/
Wickedness
Friday, May 15, 2020
Too Hot to Handle: Stinkin’ Selfish
In which our regular writers toss around
subjects a little more volatile than usual.
Megachurch pastor Andy Stanley inadvertently
opened a can of worms with comments he made in a sermon earlier this month:
“When I hear adults say, ‘Well, I don’t like a big church. I like about
two hundred’ or ‘I want to be able to know everybody’, I say,
‘You are so stinkin’ selfish. You care nothing about the next generation. All
you care about is you and your five friends. You don’t care about your
kids or anybody else’s kids.”
Now of course he quickly and abjectly
apologized the moment the predictable blowback started, but Stanley’s not backtracking on his
dislike of traditional-sized churches, just the ill-conceived and insulting way
he expressed it.
Labels:
Andy Stanley
/
Megachurches
/
Recycling
/
Too Hot to Handle
/
Youth Work
Thursday, May 14, 2020
What’s Behind Faith?
— Hebrews 11:1
“I consider rationality (in a nutshell) to be: ‘an accurate apportionment of belief in a statement concerning the objective nature of reality, with respect to the available evidence.’ I can think of no better definition of faith than the exact opposite of this: ‘A grossly inaccurate apportionment of belief in a statement concerning the objective nature of reality, with respect to the available evidence.’
However, I invite those who have faith, and profess it as a virtue, to submit their definition of faith.”
— Joseph Dorrell, Ted Talks, 2012
Okay, Joseph. Let’s play.
Labels:
Faith
/
Rationalism
/
Recycling
Wednesday, May 13, 2020
Stating the Obvious
When you make a life-long habit out of reading other people’s
mail, strange things tend to become commonplace.
I should probably unpack that a bit.
I’m enjoying the book of Hebrews once again, as I make
my way through the New Testament in my morning reading. But the problem with
having been acquainted with the scriptures since before I could read them
for myself (and it’s not the worst problem in the world to have) is that
arguments which should puzzle any modern, thinking, Gentile reader seem perfectly normal to me. My familiarity
with the passage makes it difficult for me to be surprised by it, though it should surely surprise me.
Tuesday, May 12, 2020
Crossing the Gulf
“... with patience, bearing
with one another in love.”
Easily said, isn’t it?
“Between us and you there is a great gulf fixed.” So said
Abraham to the rich man suffering the torments of hades. That chasm is not crossable. “They which would pass from
hence to you cannot.”
Speaking naturally, there is also a great gulf fixed between
you and me. Not all of you, of course, but certainly some of you. Cross it we must. Our first step is to recognize it is there.
Labels:
Communication
/
Death
/
Empathy
/
Love
Monday, May 11, 2020
Anonymous Asks (92)
“Are soul mates for real?”
When Jonathan watched David slay Goliath, he recognized a
kindred spirit.
Like David, Jonathan was a brave man who trusted in God almost
to the point of recklessness. Climbing a hill fully exposed to enemy arrows
in order to take it to an enemy whose numbers dwarf your own seems like a crazy
stunt, but if the Lord has given the enemy into your hands, it’s a cinch.
Jonathan and his armor bearer had prevailed against 10:1 odds.
It’s holy conjecture, but I suspect if his father had
allowed it, Jonathan might have taken on Goliath himself. But Jonathan knew
that would never be permitted. Why would the king of Israel risk his own crown
prince in what he believed was an unwinnable duel? It would have been a huge PR
win for the Philistines and a political disaster for Saul.
David was comparatively expendable. Saul couldn’t even put
a name to him when asked.
Labels:
Anonymous Asks
/
Relationships
/
Soul
Sunday, May 10, 2020
Semi-Random Musings (20)
Of all the books in the Bible, Esther seems to have the
least to do with 21st century Christianity. It is basically a book of
Jewish-centric history which tells how the nation of Israel (for the umpteenth time) survived
extermination at the hands of its enemies. God is not even mentioned in its
pages. The national feast inspired by the events in Esther (Purim)
is nothing like the God-ordained celebrations of Leviticus 23. Purim
commemorates the “days on which the Jews got relief from their enemies”, and is
(or at least originally was) more like today’s secularized Christmas
celebrations than any of the seven
feasts of Jehovah, all of which were rife with rich spiritual symbolism,
speaking to generations about the meaning of the death of Christ
and its consequences for mankind.
So why is Esther in our Bibles?
Labels:
Artaxerxes
/
Ezra
/
Jealousy
/
Semi-Random Musings
Saturday, May 09, 2020
Time and Chance (35)
Let’s back up and remind
ourselves where we were last week in Ecclesiastes 8, because the subject
under discussion in the first five verses continues just a little longer.
The Preacher was considering
the temptations and opportunities that face people under authority in the
performance of their duties; in this case, servants of the king. There are
really only two possibilities: either the servant is doing the will of the
king, or else he is using the king’s authority as cover to promote his personal
agenda, or to advance some ideological position.
Labels:
Decision-Making
/
Ecclesiastes
/
Government
/
Time and Chance
Friday, May 08, 2020
Too Hot to Handle: Evaluating Virtual Church [Part 2]
In which our regular writers toss around subjects a
little more volatile than usual.
Yesterday’s post opened with a little chart that appeared to
indicate that the longer the COVID-19 lockdowns go on, the fewer Christians are interested in playing virtual church — at least, the way we’re
currently doing it. If YouTube views are any sort of legitimate proxy by which
we can measure the interest of believers in the preaching of the word of God by
members of their local congregations, then we’re in trouble.
Tom: So what are
we doing wrong? Well, one possibility we have been speculating about is that
with all those Christian YouTube videos up there, one can always find a more
interesting subject, a more lucid speaker, or something that tickles our
itching ears.
Labels:
Church
/
COVID-19
/
Too Hot to Handle
/
YouTube
Thursday, May 07, 2020
Too Hot to Handle: Evaluating Virtual Church [Part 1]
In which our regular writers toss around subjects a
little more volatile than usual.
If church is a big enough part of your life that you
normally go every Sunday, in all probability it will not have escaped your
notice that your congregation has started meeting online after some fashion or
other. Most churches I have ever been part of are doing it, and because a
bunch of them are posting their virtual Sunday morning services on YouTube,
it’s given me opportunity to check out the ministry of believers I have
not seen personally in years.
Tom: In the process, I noticed something interesting and perhaps worthy of discussion.
Labels:
Church
/
COVID-19
/
Too Hot to Handle
/
YouTube
Wednesday, May 06, 2020
Tuesday, May 05, 2020
Beyond the River
The book of Ezra is written in Hebrew, but one of its most
frequently-used expressions is not Hebrew but Aramaic.
The words `abar nĕhar are translated “beyond the river” or “this side of the river” in most of our
Bibles. They occur in the sections of Ezra that contain letters written by the
enemies of the returning Jewish exiles in Jerusalem to kings of the Medo-Persian
empire, and by the functionaries of these kings in response, since Aramaic
was the language in which royal edicts were issued. The expression also occurs,
probably for the sake of consistency, in the Hebrew narrative portions of Ezra
which have to do with the contents of the letters.
Basically, “beyond the river”
means the biblical land of Israel and any of the surrounding nations over which
Israel, at the height of its powers, had influence.
Monday, May 04, 2020
Anonymous Asks (91)
Well, they say third time’s the charm. Let’s test that
theory.
This is my third attempt at answering a question which is more than loaded: subtext hangs over the post like giant flapping leather bat wings blotting out the sun. It also doesn’t help that I probably misread it first time round. I took it to mean “In what ways should a Christian child honor an abusive parent?” (a relatively easy one), when the author is far more likely asking “How can anyone possibly expect me to give honor to someone who has mistreated me so egregiously?”
Different question, right? And not so quick and easy.
Labels:
Abuse
/
Anonymous Asks
/
Family
Sunday, May 03, 2020
A Nature Like Mine
James says a remarkable and encouraging thing about one of the greatest prophets of the Old Testament: a man who had conversations with God; a man who stood for God at a time when the nation of Israel had given up the worship of Jehovah for the worship of Baal and was in a state of moral decrepitude, ruled over by a king who was just about as wicked as they come; a man who ascended to heaven in a chariot rather than dying like the rest of us; and a man who would later appear and talk with the Lord Jesus on the mount of transfiguration.
What he says is this: “Elijah was a man with a nature like ours.”
Saturday, May 02, 2020
Time and Chance (34)
When we try to get some
practical help for daily living from scriptural reflections 3,000 years
old, it is obvious we are going to have to do a little bit of thinking: first,
about whether these things can be applied to our own situation at all; and secondly, assuming they can
be, what reasonable conclusions we might draw from them about our own situation.
Labels:
Ecclesiastes
/
Government
/
Time and Chance
Friday, May 01, 2020
Too Hot to Handle: Get Happy
In which our regular
writers toss around subjects a little more volatile than usual.
Shocked at the plethora of mental health issues she discovered among her students while
eating with them daily, Yale University professor Laurie Santos
developed a popular new course about the nature of happiness which Yale
now offers free online.
Tom: Santos says it’s not bigger houses or better spouses that make human beings happy. It’s
little things like “making a social connection, or taking time for gratitude,
or taking time to be in the present moment”. What do you think, IC: might she
be on to something there?
Labels:
Happiness
/
Too Hot to Handle
Subscribe to:
Posts
(
Atom
)