Here is a verse from an old hymn. Meditate on it when you feel overwhelmed by failure or criticism:
What though th' accuser roar
Of ills that I have done!
I know them well, and thousands more:
Jehovah findeth none.
Praise God that in Christ Psalm 103:11-12 are fulfilled:
For as high as the heavens are above the earth
so great is his steadfast love to those who fear him;
as far as the east is from the west,
so far does he remove our transgression from us.
Monday, May 4, 2009
Found in a Strange Place
Sometimes books and articles that critique faith in science, rationalism, etc. appear in unusual places. Here is a book review from Stanley Fish, on a book that debunks the present-day aggressive atheism of Hitchens and Dawkins. If you are even somehat following our cultural moment on this one, it is well worth reading--and you may be a little surpised. (Even Stanley Fish--who is not, to my knowledge, anywhere close to being a Christian--regards Hitchens and Dawkins as "school-yard atheists.")
Saturday, April 11, 2009
A reflection on Christ (from Valley of Vision):
Herein is wonder of wonders;
he came below to raise me above,
was born like me that I might become like him.
Herein is love;
when I cannot rise to him he draws near on wings of grace,
to raise me to himself.
Herein is power;
when Deity and humanity were infinitely apart
he united them in indissoluble unity, the uncreated and the created.
Herein is wisdom;
when I was undone, with no will to return to him,
and no intellect to devise recovery,
he came, God-incarnate, to save me to the uttermost,
a man to die my death,
to shed satisfying blood on my behalf,
to work out a perfect righteousness for me.
Herein is wonder of wonders;
he came below to raise me above,
was born like me that I might become like him.
Herein is love;
when I cannot rise to him he draws near on wings of grace,
to raise me to himself.
Herein is power;
when Deity and humanity were infinitely apart
he united them in indissoluble unity, the uncreated and the created.
Herein is wisdom;
when I was undone, with no will to return to him,
and no intellect to devise recovery,
he came, God-incarnate, to save me to the uttermost,
a man to die my death,
to shed satisfying blood on my behalf,
to work out a perfect righteousness for me.
Friday, April 10, 2009
Missionary Challenges
This is from a recent newsletter from the Tricaricos, missionaries in Uganda:
"Many of you already heard about the fire in Kopetatum.... It spread quickly and completely destroyed two mantayas (fenced clusters of residential huts)....
"The disaster has presented many opportunities for us and significant challenges to us. We love our neighbors. We want to show our love, but the best ways to do so are not always clear to us. Our suffering neighbors have asked us for money and food. They know we have the resources to make things much different for them in a very short period of time. But would that be the best way to love a people enslaved by the sins of idleness, drunkenness, and deceit? I must admit that Matthew 5:42 is a hard saying for me. Does Jesus mean that on every occasion, we disciples must :give to the one who asks of you, and do not refuse the one who would borrow from you?" I do not think he does. Surely, in some capacity, he does want us to say "yes" to those who ask. In the case of our mission here, we often deny requests that come. Or, to put it differently, we try to reshape the requests so that some long-term good might come from short-term relief.
"Some years ago our mission helped the people of Kopetatum start a stone-selling business. Many of the residents have spent time hammering and pounding the rocks in their village and forming mounds of them to display for sale. In fact, we have been pleased to buy their stones for our own construction needs. So,. we told our friends that we want to store up some rocks for future projects, and would like to buy from them right away. This, we thought, would provide a genuine flow of cash that could be used for food and materials for rebuilding.
"The response from most of the people was outrage. Our buying things that require them to work is not assistance, you see. They only acknowledge material gifts as bona fide expressions of love, and told us as much. Dave and I met with some of the men to talk about our plan, but we were not heard. they were not interested. We repeated our offer, even though there did not seem to be any takers. This has been hard. We pity our friends so much. They need Christ. they need to see themselves as divine image-bearers who are able, with the strength that God provides. to solve their problems in ways other than by begging for money. Do pray that they would see these things. Holy Spirit come!
"I am happy to report that a man came to us the next day, having worked hard cracking stones. His name is Loduk Albino, a member of the church, and crippled. He can't use his legs, but his arms are strong. In one day, he had pummeled and piled enough stones to bring in money to feed his family for more than a week. We bought them. On another day, some women arrived, proudly announcing their stones were ready. We are buying theirs too. We are prepared to buy from any who come, all the while offering them freely what cannot be bought--the gospel of our lord and peace with God through his blood (Isaiah 55:1-2)."
"Many of you already heard about the fire in Kopetatum.... It spread quickly and completely destroyed two mantayas (fenced clusters of residential huts)....
"The disaster has presented many opportunities for us and significant challenges to us. We love our neighbors. We want to show our love, but the best ways to do so are not always clear to us. Our suffering neighbors have asked us for money and food. They know we have the resources to make things much different for them in a very short period of time. But would that be the best way to love a people enslaved by the sins of idleness, drunkenness, and deceit? I must admit that Matthew 5:42 is a hard saying for me. Does Jesus mean that on every occasion, we disciples must :give to the one who asks of you, and do not refuse the one who would borrow from you?" I do not think he does. Surely, in some capacity, he does want us to say "yes" to those who ask. In the case of our mission here, we often deny requests that come. Or, to put it differently, we try to reshape the requests so that some long-term good might come from short-term relief.
"Some years ago our mission helped the people of Kopetatum start a stone-selling business. Many of the residents have spent time hammering and pounding the rocks in their village and forming mounds of them to display for sale. In fact, we have been pleased to buy their stones for our own construction needs. So,. we told our friends that we want to store up some rocks for future projects, and would like to buy from them right away. This, we thought, would provide a genuine flow of cash that could be used for food and materials for rebuilding.
"The response from most of the people was outrage. Our buying things that require them to work is not assistance, you see. They only acknowledge material gifts as bona fide expressions of love, and told us as much. Dave and I met with some of the men to talk about our plan, but we were not heard. they were not interested. We repeated our offer, even though there did not seem to be any takers. This has been hard. We pity our friends so much. They need Christ. they need to see themselves as divine image-bearers who are able, with the strength that God provides. to solve their problems in ways other than by begging for money. Do pray that they would see these things. Holy Spirit come!
"I am happy to report that a man came to us the next day, having worked hard cracking stones. His name is Loduk Albino, a member of the church, and crippled. He can't use his legs, but his arms are strong. In one day, he had pummeled and piled enough stones to bring in money to feed his family for more than a week. We bought them. On another day, some women arrived, proudly announcing their stones were ready. We are buying theirs too. We are prepared to buy from any who come, all the while offering them freely what cannot be bought--the gospel of our lord and peace with God through his blood (Isaiah 55:1-2)."
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Virtual Friendship?
Can't resist posting this from Carl Trueman. Witty and pointed about the use of cyberspace:
Well, the virtual world is new but it is here to stay; and it will no doubt continue to shape human behavior and self-understanding. We cannot ignore it but neither should we simply allow it to dictate to us who we are and how we think. Thus, we must teach people by precept and example that real life is lived primarily in real time in real places by real bodies. Pale and pimply bloggers who spend most of their spare time onanistically opining about themselves and their issues and in befriending pals made up of pixels are not living life to the full; nor are those whose lives revolve around videogames; rather they are human amoebas, subsisting in a bizarre non-world which involves no risk to themselves, no giving of themselves to others, no true vulnerability, no commitment, no self-sacrifice, no real meaning or value. To borrow a phrase from Thoreau, the tragedy of such is that, when they come to die, they may well discover that they have never actually lived.For myself, I rejoice that I grew up before the web and the videogame supplanted the real world of real friendships, real discussions, real lives. I did not spend my youth growing obese and developing Vitamin D deficiency in front of an illuminated screen, living my life through the medium of pixels. However she does it, the church should show this generation of text and web addicts where real friendship and community lie, not with some bunch of self-created avatars on Facebook but with the person next to them in the pew on Sunday, with the person next door, with the person they can see, hear, touch and, of course, to whom they can talk, and who is created not in webworld but by the mighty Creator. And never, ever allow your church to go virtual so that people think that logging on to a service or downloading a sermon is really being part of the body of Christ. Of course, I write, as I indicated last month, as a self-proclaimed miserable middle-aged git. My instinct, therefore, is that things like Facebook, along with low-rider jeans, dances that involve the `splits,’ and sentences such as `It was like you know like totally awesome and stuff,’ are probably best left to the under-25s. Use these web doohickeys if you must; just don’t mistake them for real life, or the relationships that only exist there for real friendships.
Well, the virtual world is new but it is here to stay; and it will no doubt continue to shape human behavior and self-understanding. We cannot ignore it but neither should we simply allow it to dictate to us who we are and how we think. Thus, we must teach people by precept and example that real life is lived primarily in real time in real places by real bodies. Pale and pimply bloggers who spend most of their spare time onanistically opining about themselves and their issues and in befriending pals made up of pixels are not living life to the full; nor are those whose lives revolve around videogames; rather they are human amoebas, subsisting in a bizarre non-world which involves no risk to themselves, no giving of themselves to others, no true vulnerability, no commitment, no self-sacrifice, no real meaning or value. To borrow a phrase from Thoreau, the tragedy of such is that, when they come to die, they may well discover that they have never actually lived.For myself, I rejoice that I grew up before the web and the videogame supplanted the real world of real friendships, real discussions, real lives. I did not spend my youth growing obese and developing Vitamin D deficiency in front of an illuminated screen, living my life through the medium of pixels. However she does it, the church should show this generation of text and web addicts where real friendship and community lie, not with some bunch of self-created avatars on Facebook but with the person next to them in the pew on Sunday, with the person next door, with the person they can see, hear, touch and, of course, to whom they can talk, and who is created not in webworld but by the mighty Creator. And never, ever allow your church to go virtual so that people think that logging on to a service or downloading a sermon is really being part of the body of Christ. Of course, I write, as I indicated last month, as a self-proclaimed miserable middle-aged git. My instinct, therefore, is that things like Facebook, along with low-rider jeans, dances that involve the `splits,’ and sentences such as `It was like you know like totally awesome and stuff,’ are probably best left to the under-25s. Use these web doohickeys if you must; just don’t mistake them for real life, or the relationships that only exist there for real friendships.
The Numbers: Foreboding or Describing Opportunity?
The Limits of Human Knowledge
Two articles I came across today are fascinating for what they say about the limitations of scientific and philosophical inquiry to really capture how intricately our Creator made us, both as individuals and as social beings (imaging inter-trinitarian relationships in personal relationships).
It's baseball season again, and here is an article about computer simulations in baseball, and the reality of baseball. Significantly, the writer indicates that while statistics can predict to an extent what will happen, they cannot take into account the stress and emotions of a real game--and are thus extremely limited.
In another article David Brooks ("Philosophy's End") grapples with the interplay between reason and emotion (what Jonathan Edwards called "affections") in ethics and morality. Many philosophers since Greek philosophy have regarded morality as a matter of reason and rational decision-making, and emotions as unpredictable and uncontrollable (by reason, that is); contemporary philosophy finds it more complicated than that, and find that emotions (affections) play a much bigger part in moral decisions.
Scripture sheds light on what these philosophers miss. Moral virtues and vices grow out of affections and reason. Love for God and neighbor are foundational--and include both reason (what glorifies God? What does good for my neighbor?) and affection (passionate affection for God's glory, and hatred for what undercuts it; passion for what is just, and therefore good for my neighbor, and hatred for what is unjust). To be sure, we struggle to attain both the knowledge and the affections that we need and ought to have and experience; these the Spirit works in us. We long to be made more holy. But no doubt we are fearfully and wonderfully made.
It's baseball season again, and here is an article about computer simulations in baseball, and the reality of baseball. Significantly, the writer indicates that while statistics can predict to an extent what will happen, they cannot take into account the stress and emotions of a real game--and are thus extremely limited.
In another article David Brooks ("Philosophy's End") grapples with the interplay between reason and emotion (what Jonathan Edwards called "affections") in ethics and morality. Many philosophers since Greek philosophy have regarded morality as a matter of reason and rational decision-making, and emotions as unpredictable and uncontrollable (by reason, that is); contemporary philosophy finds it more complicated than that, and find that emotions (affections) play a much bigger part in moral decisions.
Scripture sheds light on what these philosophers miss. Moral virtues and vices grow out of affections and reason. Love for God and neighbor are foundational--and include both reason (what glorifies God? What does good for my neighbor?) and affection (passionate affection for God's glory, and hatred for what undercuts it; passion for what is just, and therefore good for my neighbor, and hatred for what is unjust). To be sure, we struggle to attain both the knowledge and the affections that we need and ought to have and experience; these the Spirit works in us. We long to be made more holy. But no doubt we are fearfully and wonderfully made.
Friday, April 3, 2009
Known--and still loved!
For Good Friday this year my thoughts are turning to Psalm 31 ("Into your hands I commit my spirit," Ps. 31:5/Luke 23:46). Especially powerful is v. 7: "I will rejoice and be glad in your steadfast love/because you have seen my affliction;/you have known the distress of my soul."
Charles Spurgeon remarks: "God owns his saints when others are ashamed to acknowledge them; he never refuses to know his friends. He thinks not the worse of them for their rags and tatters. He does not misjudge them and cast them off when their faces are lean with sickness, or their hearts heavy with despondency. Moreover, the Lord Jesus knows us in our pangs in a peculiar sense, by having a deep sympathy toward us in them all; when no others can enter into our griefs, from [lack] of understanding them [experientially], Jesus dives into the lowest depths with us, comprehending the direst of woes, because he has felt the same."
Charles Spurgeon remarks: "God owns his saints when others are ashamed to acknowledge them; he never refuses to know his friends. He thinks not the worse of them for their rags and tatters. He does not misjudge them and cast them off when their faces are lean with sickness, or their hearts heavy with despondency. Moreover, the Lord Jesus knows us in our pangs in a peculiar sense, by having a deep sympathy toward us in them all; when no others can enter into our griefs, from [lack] of understanding them [experientially], Jesus dives into the lowest depths with us, comprehending the direst of woes, because he has felt the same."
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