Eternity

From this morning's Grace Gems Puritan devotional:

"It is this eternality and perpetuity, which completes the happiness of the inhabitants of heaven; the least suspicion of an end--would intermingle itself with all their enjoyments, and embitter them; for the greater the happiness, the greater the anxiety at the expectation of losing it. But oh, how transporting for the saints on high, to look forward through the succession of eternal ages, with an assurance that they shall be happy through them all, and that they shall feel no change--but from glory unto glory!

"On the other hand, this is the bitterest ingredient in the 'cup of divine displeasure' in the future state--that the misery is eternal! Oh, with what horror does that despairing cry, "Forever! Forever! Forever!" echo through the vaults of hell!

"And now, need I offer anything further to convince you of the superior importance of invisible and eternal things--to visible and temporary things? Can you need any arguments to convince you that an eternity of the most perfect happiness--is rather to be chosen than a few years of sordid, unsatisfying sinful pleasures?"
- Samuel Davies

Come Thou Fount

We don't often hear the entire hymn, and it is powerful:

Come, Thou Fount of every blessing,
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace;
Streams of mercy, never ceasing,
Call for songs of loudest praise.
Teach me some melodious sonnet,
Sung by flaming tongues above.
Praise the mount! I’m fixed upon it,
Mount of Thy redeeming love.

Sorrowing I shall be in spirit,
Till released from flesh and sin,
Yet from what I do inherit,
Here Thy praises I’ll begin;
Here I raise my Ebenezer;
Here by Thy great help I’ve come;
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,
Safely to arrive at home.

Jesus sought me when a stranger,
Wandering from the fold of God;
He, to rescue me from danger,
Interposed His precious blood;
How His kindness yet pursues me
Mortal tongue can never tell,
Clothed in flesh, till death shall loose me
I cannot proclaim it well.

O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be!
Let Thy goodness, like a fetter,
Bind my wandering heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it,
Seal it for Thy courts above.

O that day when freed from sinning,
I shall see Thy lovely face;
Clothed then in blood washed linen
How I’ll sing Thy sovereign grace;
Come, my Lord, no longer tarry,
Take my ransomed soul away;
Send thine angels now to carry
Me to realms of endless day.

Practice Your Division

A father recently visited his daughter's second-grade class at school, and saw something that troubled him deeply. The teacher was quizzing the students on their addition facts. When the teacher asked the class, "What is two plus two?" Some of the students responded "four," others "three," and still others had no idea.

The father was incensed! But . . .

He wasn't angry that many in the class didn't know the correct answer. He was angry - furious - that the teacher would present material that divided the class. How dare that teacher create a divisive spirit among those innocent children!

He spoke to the school administrators, addressed the PTA, started petitions and awareness campaigns, and finally gained the attention of the DOE, where he found an attentive audience. Through his hard work and passion, the father succeeded in having math class banned from schools.

Now . . . remove the word "math" from my clumsy little parable, and substitute "doctrine".

People are incensed at the presentation of doctrine. Pastors are shamed into silence or at best ambiguity. Why? Because doctrine divides.

Yes, doctrine divides. But . . . it is supposed to (e.g., Titus 1:9). It is supposed to divide the true from the false. And that is not a Pauline novelty -- that is a core of Jesus' teaching in the Gospels. In fact, the ultimate division is coming (think: wheat from tares, sheep from goats).

While we need to take great pains that our delivery is not off-putting, insofar as we can, we must nevertheless pursue the highest possible standards of quality, veracity, and effectiveness in our preaching of doctrine. We must "speak the truth in love," but we must never forget that we must speak the truth.

Science bids farewell to Fred Flintstone

Just read this transcript from Today's Creation Moment. One of the most pernicious evolutionary infiltrates in the church would have to be the notion of "prehistoric people". When we read the Old Testament we tend to picture primeval caravans of near-savages (Christopher Hitchens certainly clings to this sort of prejudice!) But science tells a far different story:

"Cavemen. The very word conjures images of bear skin clothing, wooden clubs and perhaps some simple stone tools. We think of the cavemen themselves as part ape and certainly less than modern humans. All of these images help make human evolution look more plausible.

However, in China there are some 20 million people living in caves. The caves there are easily carved in the silty soil of the Western regions of the Yellow River. The caves are generally 10 to 13 feet wide and can extend as far as 25 feet back into the hillside. Sometimes the caves are connected to one another, creating a larger place to live. Many of the people who live in these caves would not think of moving out of them. Caves are warm in the winter, cool in the summer, and they are fireproof. These caves include flues for venting the exhaust from cooking fires. But these caves are not primitive dwellings by any stretch of the imagination. They feature plumbing, electrical wiring and even cable television! Except for windows, some of these cave homes are as modern as anything you’ll see in the rest of the developing world.

Throughout the ages, people have taken shelter in caves and even set up housekeeping in them. The fact that they lived in caves does not make them primitive at all."

Abstinence Ed Works

In a recent issue of TIME (Feb 15, 2010, p. 15) , #9 of the "10 Essential Stories" reports:

"According to a study published in the Archives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine, abstinence-only sex-education programs proved more effective in encouraging teens to delay having sex than more comprehensive school programs that include information about safe sex and contraceptive options."

Well, duh.

God is Always Good.

One year ago our daughter was dying. We didn't know it. For weeks she grew more and more lethargic, while other symptoms which we recognize only in hindsight began to present themselves. We took her to the doctor for testing, and he called us a few hours later: her blood sugar was well over 600 (normal is around 100). We needed to get her to the emergency room at Children's Medical in Salt Lake City immediately.

Twenty-four hours later she had been hooked up to IVs, pumped full of medications, and finally she was stabilized and on the road to recovery. And she was a Type I diabetic. Our little 2-year-old would be getting 5-6 injections of insulin, or more, every day for the rest of her life.

And here is where theology kicks in. As I reflect on that time, I recognize that God was not standing by, helplessly wringing His hands as He watched her pancreas shut down. God's Providence was clear through the entire process. God's Providence was clear in the way my wife's heart was unsettled, and perceived danger in ambiguous symptoms. It was clear in the speedy, decisive test results and diagnosis. His watch-care was glorious, dazzling, in the way our daughter's body responded to treatment. His grace has been so clear in watching our 2 (now 3)-year-old enduring the constant needles.

AND . . . this is so very important . . . His Providence, His glorious will, was active and real and decisive when that little malfunction in Alison's body triggered the reaction that put her in the hospital. God gave her a perceptive mother. God gave her a caring, experienced doctor. AND God gave her diabetes (Isaiah 46:9-10, Psalm 33:8-11). That is not an accusation. It is worship.

God is sovereign. Period. Whether Alison's medical condition stems from God's permission or His intervention, this is part of the Potter's grand design for her life and ours. And He is no less loving, no less merciful, and no less good, after the diagnosis than He was before. He is God. He is glorious. And the difficult and distressing times are no less His tools because we finite human beings struggle to understand them.

"But now, O Lord, You are our Father.

We are the clay, and you our Potter;

And all of us are the work of your hand."

Isaiah 64:8

Thank you, Lord, for Alison. And thank you, Lord, for Alison's diabetes.

Back in the Saddle

Some time ago I felt it best to shut down the blog. Today I HAD to pry open the door, pull the dustcloths off the furniture, and let the sun in . . . at least for a little while. I'll be back in a minute to do some splaining.

The Emperor Goes Soul-Winning

or, "Why in the world is this guy bragging about THAT?"

Here is a quote from a prominent church's website, touting their pastor's career stats as his bona fides:

"Before becoming the pastor of the [church name], [pastor] served as the youth pastor. Under his leadership, the [church] teenagers have been used by the Lord to see over 260,000 people won to Christ, with over 30,000 of those following the Lord in baptism."

In other words, just over 1 in 10 of these supposed converts actually demonstrated obedience to God. Why in the world is this guy touting this statistic? All it proves is that either (a) God is really bad at follow-up, or (b) this pastor has no CLUE about the Gospel.

Hilarious

Check out the funniest guys since Victor Borge:

Why "Wronger" Should Be a Word

Reading Charles Ryrie's Basic Theology in preparation for a Sunday school lesson, and came across a phrase that was so wrong that it begs a new, more intensive word: there's wrong, but then there is wronger. Now, I'm not knocking Ryrie or his book, as a whole. But this particular claim was pretty far off the beam:


"Historically, this consideration has been labeled the ordo salutis, or way of salvation, and it attempts to arrange in logical order (not temporal order) these activities involved in applying salvation to the individual. But like the question of the order of the decrees in lapsarianism, the ordo salutis in reality contributes little of substance."
- Charles Caldwell Ryrie, Basic Theology : A Popular Systemic Guide to Understanding Biblical Truth (Chicago, Ill.: Moody Press, 1999), 374.

Au contraire, mon ami. There is a universe of difference between a soteriology that begins with faith, and one that begins with regeneration. One is synergistic; one monergistic -- and that is two totally different gospels at the core. In fact, I would argue that the ordo salutis is one of the watershed issues of the whole debate!

True Courage

Studying for Sunday's sermon, from Ruth 1. Alexander MacLaren captures Ruth's character beautifully:

Put the sweet figure of the Moabitess beside the heroes of the Book of Judges , and we feel the contrast. But is there anything in its pages more truly heroic than her deed, as she turned her back on the blue hills of Moab, and chose the joyless lot of the widowed companion of a widow aged and poor, in a land of strangers, the enemies of her country and its gods? It is easier far to rush on the spears of the foe, amid the whirl and excitement of battle, than to choose with open eyes so dreary a lifelong path. The gentleness of a true woman covers a courage of the patient, silent sort, which, in its meek steadfastness, is nobler than the contempt of personal danger, which is vulgarly called bravery. It is harder to endure than to strike. The supreme type of heroic, as of all, virtue is Jesus Christ, whose gentleness was the velvet glove on the iron hand of an inflexible will. Of that best kind of heroes there are few brighter examples, even in the annals of the Church which numbers its virgin martyrs by the score, than this sweet figure of Ruth, as the eager vow comes from her young lips, which had already tasted sorrow, and were ready to drink its bitterest cup at the call of duty. She may well teach us to rectify our judgments, and to recognise the quiet heroism of many a modest life of uncomplaining suffering. Her example has a special message to women, and exhorts them to see to it that, in the cultivation of the so-called womanly excellence of gentleness, they do not let it run into weakness, nor, on the other hand, aim at strength, to the loss of meekness. The yielding birch-tree, the ‘lady of the woods,’ bends in all its elastic branches and tossing ringlets of foliage to the wind; but it stands upright after storms that level oaks and pines. God’s strength is gentle strength, and ours is likest His when it is meek and lowly, like that of the ‘strong Son of God.’

- Alexander Maclaren, Expositions of the Holy Scripture (DEUTERONOMY, JOSHUA, JUDGES, RUTH, 1 SAMUEL, 2 SAMUEL, 1 KINGS, AND 2 KINGS Chapters I to VII), 130.

Stealth Mysticism

There is a widely-accepted rule in hermeneutics called the Law of (or the Principle of) First Mention. I remember hearing about it in church when I was growing up, indeed hearing entire sermons based on a "truth" derived by the First-Mention Principle. I don't remember hearing it taught in the first Bible college I attended because they, somewhat tellingly, did not even OFFER hermeneutics (the last thing a hireling needs is someone being taught shepherding skills!). I was, however, taught this principle in a hermeneutics class in the second Bible college I attended.

But the more I reflected on it, this Principle of First Mention is a serious fallacy. Think about it: if the key to interpreting any person, place, thing, or idea in Scripture is to be found in its first appearance, this is the opposite of progressive revelation. The key to understanding redemption, for example, is not Genesis 3:15; it is the full exposition in Paul's writings. If the key to understanding lions is the first mention of a lion in the Bible, what exactly are we to learn from Genesis 49:9

          “Judah is a lion’s whelp;
          From the prey, my son, you have gone up.
          He couches, he lies down as a lion,
          And as a lion, who dares rouse him up?"

Are we to, upon later learning that Christ is the lion of Judah, teach that He had made sin and death His prey, and, let's see . . . He crouches, He lies down, so that refers to His resting after completing His work . . .

Oh, the sermons we could write. Oh, the ears we could tickle. The only problem is that NONE of that is in the Text! And the Principle is shown to be a quiet, stealthy infiltration, an unguarded back-door through which allegorizing and spiritualizing creeps in.

I'd be interested to learn the provenance of this First-Mention Principle. Who came up with this idea? Were they prone to spiritualizing the Text in other ways?

And are there other fallacies lurking in the methods we employ to prepare the weekly meal for His flock?