The Upper Limits

“A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone when he is fully trained will be like his teacher.”

A couple of months ago I discovered a new word. Don’t laugh. It was “autodidact”.

It’s not a difficult concept. An autodidact is simply a person who is self-taught rather than formally schooled. Despite being a voracious reader for six decades, to the best of my recollection I had never come across “autodidact” before a friend used it in conversation, prompting me to inquire, “Er, what is that?” I was embarrassed, but only slightly. English has an awful lot of words. I have a decent vocabulary, but some of the words I know are only useful in limited, very specific contexts. Autodidact is certainly one of those.

Semi-Random Musings (50)

Partial Preterists argue that Futurists misinterpret the symbolic language of scripture. Where a Futurist understands imagery like that of Matthew 24:29 (the darkening of sun and moon, stars falling from heaven, etc.) to refer to the apocalyptic finale of our present age, Preterists exhaust the meaning of the Lord’s words in the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in AD70. For Preterists, most or all of the events prophesied in that chapter have already taken place.

The issue, Preterists say, is that Futurists fail to understand “Old Testament prophetic de-creation language”.

Anonymous Asks (413)

“How should Christians react to doomsday predictions?”

You know what’s worse than nuclear Armageddon, for me at least? The prospect of ending life in an old folks’ home while succumbing to Alzheimer’s just slowly enough that I occasionally notice my mind’s merciless and inexorable deterioration. Of the various fates that might turn me into a quivering bag of Jell-O if I allowed myself to indulge in hysterics, that’s the mother of them all. Loss of independence and autonomy are right up at the very top of my personal anti-bucket list. Any form of speedy, absolute obliteration I don’t see coming is vastly, vastly preferable.

Yeah, as I have said about a few of the questions we’ve handled here over the years, I might be the wrong guy to ask. I’m not exactly the median respondent in any survey you might conduct.

In the Path of Your Judgments

Once upon a time, I had a conversation with a former co-worker about a friend who had just passed away. The Lord gave me the opportunity to share with her how he came to faith.

For years, his family prayed for his salvation, but he was a decent fellow with morals and principles and couldn’t see what all their concern for his soul was about. Looking at the way other people lived, he estimated that if God existed and he found himself standing before him one day, he would probably make out okay. Despite attending church regularly with his family and despite seeing the changes in their lives, he felt no particular personal need of Christ or his salvation.

Then one day on his way to work, he was involved in a catastrophic car accident.

Somebody Else’s Mail (12)

Because so many psalms are prophetic, we are wise when we come to them to ask the question posed to Philip by the Ethiopian eunuch concerning the prophecy of Isaiah that he was reading at the time. He inquired, “About whom does the prophet say this, about himself or about someone else?”

It was an excellent question. We must ask it of ourselves (and of the scriptures) today.

Too Hot to Handle: Rainbow Unicorns and Cosmic Heat Death

In which our regular writers toss around subjects a little more volatile than usual.

Canada’s former Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland once noted that Russia had a chance to get on the “right side of history” and help negotiate a political end to the reign of Syrian strongman Bashar Assad. Former president Obama loved the expression, and Bill Clinton used it more than 20 times in his speeches. Writer Ben Yagoda says the phrase — whether it’s “right side” or “wrong side” — has been in use for over a century.

Tom: I can vaguely understand what a Christian might intend by the use of the expression, Immanuel Can. But what on earth does “the right side of history” mean in a post-religious, thoroughly secular context?

Valley and Peak

On September 9, 1939, The Telegraph reported that a woman from London, England named Frances Fripps was accidentally struck by a local bus. Taken to Middlesex hospital, Miss Fripps awoke to find someone bending over her bed. To her utter astonishment, she recognized her visitor as none other than the Queen of England, there for a surprise tour of the hospital.

“They told me I had been trying to knock down a bus,” gasped Miss Fripps, “and now I find you here, your Majesty. What a day!”

What a day indeed.

Mystery Babylon in the New Testament (2)

I don’t love boring post titles like this one. However, in this case the alternative was my working title, Babylon 5. You can thank me later.

Yes, this series has run longer than expected. We are done today. In yesterday’s post, we briefly examined the current frontrunners for the real-world, present-day religious and political entity toward which scripture’s “mystery Babylon” symbolism is pointing us. Eschatologists in the Reformed tradition put forward apostate Judaism as its prime candidate, while the more popular names in the Dispensationalist school have historically envisioned Roman Catholicism in the role of the great prostitute seated on many waters or, as John refers to her, “Babylon the great”.

Hey, we’re Protestants. We have to protest something. Or someone. And yes, I know more than a few saved Catholics. Let’s not go there.

Mystery Babylon in the New Testament (1)

The New Testament writers reference Babylon 11 times. The first four mentions are purely historical, denoting the ancient city and its empire. My interest today is in the final seven, which talk about a Babylon that has endured throughout history. Six of these are in Revelation.

Few attentive readers of scripture doubt that John’s usage of “Babylon” in Revelation is primarily or exclusively symbolic. It has to be. The city was a ruin then and remains one today, buried under millennia of dirt. The empire is long gone. To the extent that Babylon continues to be a factor in our world, it is primarily a spiritual and philosophical influence rather than a visible political entity. I’ve been calling her “mystery Babylon”, not least because interpreters of scripture struggle to determine exactly where and how the Babylonian spirit currently manifests and how it will manifest in the end times. That is certainly mysterious.

Of course, there are always opinions about it. One favorite speculation over the centuries has been that Roman Catholicism is mystery Babylon.

Anonymous Asks (412)

“I believe our pastor is trying to introduce teaching and practices inconsistent with our church’s statement of faith. Should I respond, and if so, how?”

It’s not at all uncommon for Christians to attend a church whose statement of faith they disagree with in small ways. I’ve yet to fellowship with any congregation that was monolithic in its faith and practice. Doctrinal differences are to be expected, and our Lord anticipated them in his letters to the seven churches in Revelation. To the church in Pergamum he twice says some among them held teachings contrary to the faith.

Quietly holding a doctrinal error is a problem, but not as big a problem as being in a position to teach it. Being in a position to teach it weekly is worst of all.

The Spirit and Destiny of Mystery Babylon

“Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, she who made all nations drink the wine of the wrath of her sexual immorality.”

It’s not enough for the chronic sinner to quietly sin in a corner. Whatever tattered shreds of conscience he retains will trouble him just enough that he must rationalize his behavior, and that requires seeking the validation of others.

To secure their approval, he needs them to be thinking the same way he does. The quickest way to pervert their intellects along the same lines as his own twisted reasoning is to introduce them to his favorite sin, so they can experience the very same sort of moral tension with which he is struggling. So the sinner in the corner becomes the cause of stumbling in the public square, and sin spreads. Maybe if everybody’s doing it, it won’t feel so bad.

Somebody Else’s Mail (11)

Last week we looked into the apostle Paul’s use of Psalm 5:9 in the book of Romans. For Christians, this is usually the bottom line: we’re interested in how the things that were written in the Old Testament apply in our own experience. That’s normal, natural, and even biblical, but it’s useful to keep in mind that whatever the NT writers may have legitimately made of them, these passages also had an original context and an original audience.

Today we’re looking at what these words meant when David wrote them something in the order of 3,040 years ago.

Too Hot to Handle: The Fat Lady Sings

In which our regular writers toss around subjects a little more volatile than usual.

David B. is a regular reader/commenter here. A few weeks back he (politely) asked Immanuel Can, “Why do you choose to fellowship in a church where you clearly disagree with how they operate?”

IC responded, “Maybe I’ll do a post on that …”

Tom: Maybe that time is now, IC, not least because I feel like it might be a useful topic for a number of our readers who have found themselves in similar positions.

As you suggested to David in your response, churches do not suddenly become heretical overnight. It’s my experience that almost anything can be smuggled into a local church provided it is done incrementally.

The Unbearable Heaviness of Individuality

“Shallum the son of Jabesh conspired against him and struck him down at Ibleam and put him to death and reigned in his place …”

“Then Menahem the son of Gadi came up from Tirzah and came to Samaria, and he struck down Shallum the son of Jabesh in Samaria and put him to death and reigned in his place …”

“Pekah the son of Remaliah, his captain, conspired against him with fifty men of the people of Gilead, and struck him down in Samaria, in the citadel of the king's house with Argob and Arieh; he put him to death and reigned in his place …”

“Then Hoshea the son of Elah made a conspiracy against Pekah the son of Remaliah and struck him down and put him to death and reigned in his place …”

Ah, the kings of Israel. Their history is very much like that of all the idolatrous nations around them. Somebody gets the kingship, then somebody else murders him and takes over. And each one is as bad as the last.

“Meet the new boss, same as the old boss,” as Roger Daltrey famously intoned.

Mystery Babylon in the Old Testament

Looks like this is turning into at least a three-parter. I’ll post the next instalment this coming Sunday, LW. Meantime, we should have a look at three significant Old Testament passages that almost surely informed the writings of Peter and John about what we might call “mystery Babylon”, the spiritual descendant of the Chaldean-controlled city that was both the enemy of Israel and the enemy of her God.

The writers of the New Testament were comfortable with the idea of Babylon as a spirit, temperament or idea, one that promotes the glory of man rather than the glory of God.

Not Just an Excuse to Babylon

The writers of scripture use the Hebrew/ Aramaic word translated “Babylon” or “Babel” nearly 300 times between Genesis and Revelation. That’s an awful lot of references to look up. If you had asked me before I looked which book of the Bible mentions that great city the most, I would have bet on one of the OT historical books. In fact, almost half the Strong’s entries are in Jeremiah, of all places (141). 2 Kings is a distant second with 28. Revelation, which dedicates parts of three chapters to her, has only six.

At some point, the attentive Bible student says to himself, “Hmm, Babylon is actually a major theme of scripture. Maybe I should look into that.” All right then. I hope you’ll find it’s not just an excuse for me to … babble on.

Anonymous Asks (411)

“I recently came to faith in Christ and am living with an unbeliever. What should I do?”

An excellent question. A couple that attends our church’s Sunday morning service recently answered it: they got married. The man, definitely saved and growing in Christ. The partner of many years, possible. She comes out to the meeting. She looks, listens and lingers, but no definitive evidence of regeneration. Maybe she will follow her new husband’s lead. Maybe she will decide to turn back to Sodom and end up the spiritual analog to Lot’s wife. Nobody knows.

Come now, smart guys (of whom I used to be one): Why is there no easy, black and white, definitive answer for couples with one partner on each side of the line between heaven and hell?

My Invisible Friend

Sometimes you really have to read something to believe it.

This would be one of those cases. It’s what appears to be an honest expression of frustration at the writer’s inability to shake the belief of Christians he encounters. Blogger Gary asks, “How Do You Convince Someone That His Invisible Friend Does Not Exist?” Sounds like he’s tried and failed, and is thoroughly stumped.

I guess the first thing that crosses my mind is Why would anyone want to convince others Jesus does not exist?

Somebody Else’s Mail (10)

I mentioned last week that we would take a little time out from expositing Psalm 5 in context to look at Paul’s use of verse 9 in a famous passage in Romans 3 that begins by posing this question: “What then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin.”

The selection from Psalm 5 is part of a list of Old Testament quotes from various sources that Paul assembles to prove his point, and this is where his critics begin to object to his usage of Psalm 5:9 and other verses. So let’s take a look at their objections today and see if we can’t come to a better understanding of what Paul was trying to accomplish in Romans 3.

Too Hot to Handle: Worth Leaving Over

In which our regular writers toss around subjects a little more volatile than usual.

In principle, I’m not keen on leaving churches. It happens too often and too easily. But sometimes, there just isn’t any choice.

When Gretta Vosper became the pastor of a West Hill United Church in Toronto, Canada in 1997, she was not yet out of the closet about her atheism, a little bonus she didn’t disclose from the pulpit until 2001. Amazingly, quite a few congregants hung on until 2008 when Vosper did away with the Lord’s Prayer, at which point 2/3 of the flock made for the exits.

Tom: I’m not sure precisely where the line is, but I’d have difficulty faulting anyone who leaves a church with an atheist pastor, IC. From your experience, what are the ingredients that go into making for a “time to go” decision?