The Recorder Rap

A guy that occasionally used to come to my Tuesday Morning men's group made this video, which is pretty silly, but impressive.  You know a rap song that says "I've got more skills than Napoleon Dynamite" can't be all bad:

Be not conformed to this world

This quote is from A Visit to Vanity Fair, by Alan Jacobs.  In fact, it is the very first sentence from the very first essay:  

"In a famous passage from Science and the Modern World, Alfred North Whitehead gives this counsel to scholars in the various historical disciplines:

"Do not chiefly direct your attention to those intellectual positions which controversialists feel it necessary explicitly to defend.  More important and more telling for the deep understanding of a culture are the fundamental assumptions which adherents of all the variant systems within the epoch unconsciously presuppose.  Such assumptions appear so obvious that people do not know what they are assuming.  Indeed, they do not know that they are assuming anything, because no other way of putting things has ever occurred to them."

This quote made me want to laugh and cry.  It is this very act of seeking to understand the assumptions that I have in common with all others in this age of the world that has been my quest for the last several years.  It is of particular importance to me as a Christian because Paul tells us in Romans 12.2

"And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God."

It is interesting to note that the Greek word "world" in that verse is "αἰών" or aion...meaning "age" of the world.  Insert the idea of "this world", to which we are not to be conformed, into Alfred North Whitehead's quote, where he uses the word "epoch" and you will see what I am driving at, maybe.


Citation:
Jacobs, Alan. A Visit To Vanity Fair: Moral Essays on the Present Age. Brazos Press, 2001.

The Old Way of Communication

We used to have to learn patience!  Now what are we learning?

Axe Head How To

Here is a bit of information from my Dad's "Miscellaneous File" that might come in useful for you sometime, especially if you happen to own an axe with a loose head:

"Keeping A Tight Head on an Axe

To prevent an axe head from loosening, drill a ¼" hole about two inches deep into the butt of the handle.  When you store the ax, place it on its head and pour the hole full of boiled linseed oil.  This will soak down the length of the handle and help prevent shrinkage.  Whenever you notice that the oil level has dropped, replenish the oil.  The oil won't spill out.  After a while, it will harder, just like beeswax.)"

Alan Jacobs thoughts on centralization

This is a repost of an Alan Jacobs blog post where he is currently reviewing a book, The Whale and the Reactor, which he is reading:

The Whale and the Reactor (7) by Alan Jacobs 

The idea that Reagan Ruined Everything seems to dominate, silently, the next chapter, “Decentralization Clarified.” I take this passage from its last paragraph to be its central idea: 

'In Kropotkin’s of G. D. H. Cole’s time it was still possible to imagine an entire modern social order based upon small-scale, directly democratic, widely dispersed centers of authority. Industrial society had not yet achieved its mature form; it was thinkable that decentralist alternatives might be feasible alternatives on a broad scale. Today, however, ideas of decentralization usually play a much different role, an expression of the faint hope one may still create institutions here and there that allow ordinary folks some small measure of autonomy.'

A melancholy statement, and one that is truer now than when Winner wrote it. After all, it was about halfway between the writing of this book and out own moment when Scott McNealy told us, “You have zero privacy anyway. Get over it.” 

Which in alternate moments makes me want to give up and makes me want to renew my determination to escape from Google. Ah, my early and innocent determination, how beautiful it was — and how distant it now seems. . . ."

Citation
Jacobs, Alan. "Text Patterns." Online Posting. 26 January 2011.
<http://text-patterns.thenewatlantis.com/2011/01/whale-and-reactor-7.html>. Accessed 26 January, 2011.

The Marriage Box

Ann Voskamp writes my favorite blog.  In a recent post, she "re-posted" a letter to Ann Landers which she then commented on.

I think the suggestion in the letter is a great idea, though...not exactly risqué...it is...well...you'll see...read on:

“Dear Ann Landers: Last weekend, we celebrated my parents’ 50th wedding anniversary. This morning, they left on a long-awaited trip to Hawaii. They were as excited as if it were their honeymoon.

When my parents married, they had only enough money for a three-day trip 50 miles from home.They made a pact that each time they made love, they would put a dollar in a special metal box and save it for a honeymoon in Hawaii for their 50th anniversary.

Dad was a policeman, and Mom was a schoolteacher. They lived in a modest house and did all their own repairs. Raising five children was a challenge, and sometimes, money was short, but no matter what emergency came up, Dad would not let Mom take any money out of the “Hawaii account.” As the account grew, they put it in a savings account and then bought CDs.

My parents were always very much in love. I can remember Dad coming home and telling Mom, “I have a dollar in my pocket,” and she would smile at him and reply, “I know how to spend it.”

When each of us children married, Mom and Dad gave us a small metal box and told us their secret, which we found enchanting. All five of us are now saving for our dream honeymoons. Mom and Dad never told us how much money they had managed to save, but it must have been considerable because when they cashed in those CDs, they had enough for airfare to Hawaii plus hotel accommodations for 10 days and plenty of spending money.

As they told us good-bye before leaving, Dad winked and said, “Tonight, we are starting an account for Cancun. That should only take 25 years.”

– Loving Daughter in Abilene, Texas“

What a great idea. I need to go find a metal box. For some reason, I think my Grandpa Joe would have loved this idea.

Citation:
Ann Voskamp. "How to Make a Marriage Bed." Online posting. 26 January 2011. A Holy Experience blog post, citing a letter to Ann Landers of unknown origin or date.
<http://www.aholyexperience.com/2011/01/how-to-make-a-marriage-bed/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+HolyExperience+(Holy+Experience)>. Accessed 26 January 2011.

Who Knew?

On a shelf in our bathroom, there is a Bathroom Reading Book (an important feature in any home) titled "Who Knew?" It is filled with odd and mostly interesting tidbits of information about things that we know well.  Here are a few hand picked trivia-morsels:

• "The Hershey's Kiss got its name from the puckering sound made by the manufacturing equipment as chocolate was dropped onto the conveyor belt during the production process."
• "The Maxwell House was a luxury hotel in Nashville, Tennessee, known for it's coffee."
• "In 1903, a shipload of coffee consigned to European businessman Ludwig Roselius accidentally got drenched during a storm at sea.   Since the beans were no longer fit for commercial sale, Roselius used the cargo for research purposes, eventually discovering that soaking coffee beans in water was the key to decaffeination.  When further experimenting proved that he could remove practically all the caffeine, but not the flavor and aroma, he decided to market his invention.  He called the product Sanka, a derivation of the French phrase sans caffeine."
• "Three of the first five U.S. Presidents - John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and James Monroe - died on July 4th."
• "Director Wes Craven named Freddy Krueger after a kid who bullied him in school."
• "Oscar winner Tommy Lee Jones was the college roommate (Harvard, class of 1969) of Vice President Al Gore."
• "No word in the English language rhymes with month, orange, silver, or purple."

And now for the grande finale:

• "Barbie's last name is Roberts."

Hoffman, David.  Who Knew: Things You Didn't Know About Things You Know Well.  New York, NY:  MJF Books, 2000.

Peter Kreeft on Beauty

Peter Kreeft, in a speech on "Beauty", espoused a thought that I think David and Paul would have both agreed with*

(Since this came from a talk he gave, I did a little editing to smooth out some of his stream-of-consciousness style)

“A saint is a little Christ.  The connection between the beauty of the saints and the beauty of Christ is the connection between the original and the image. 

And one of the most powerful ways to become a saint is simply to see the beauty of God.

In heaven, we’ll all be saints.

People often ask the question, “Will we be able to sin in heaven?”

And the answer is obviously, “No”

And then their next question is, “Oh, well then God must take away our free will.”

“No.”

“Well if we have free will, we’ll be able to sin, because free will is always a choice”

And the answer is “Yes.”

“Well then, why won’t we?”

And the answer is “The Beauty of God.”

In the Beatific Vision, we will see the beauty of God so clearly, so overwhelmingly that it will be impossible to sin.

Why does anybody sin?  Why does the thief steal money? Because he sees that money can buy attractive things.  The dirty pieces of paper aren't attractive.  The dirty pieces of paper can buy things that satisfy his desires and are attractive to him.

He wouldn't steal cockroaches. He’d steal gold. 

But in heaven, we’ll see that sin is like the cockroach, because we’ll see that God is the real gold. So the vision of the beauty of God makes it impossible to sin.

The more we can get that (vision) here, the more close to sanctity we are. 

Religious art isn't just kicks. It’s not just aesthetics.

It’s a powerful aid to attaining the ultimate meaning of human life: to be a saint.

I love that line of Leon Bloy, 19^th century French Catholic writer, 'In the end, there is only one tragedy, not to have been a saint.' And beauty is a very powerful aid to that.”

Peter Kreeft. Talk on "Beauty". Sacred Arts Foundation. 9/12/09. <http://www.peterkreeft.com/audio/38_beauty.htm>.

*Psa 27:4  One thing have I desired of the LORD, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the LORD, and to enquire in his temple.(KJV)

*2Co 3:18  But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.(KJV)

Just in case I thought this was of any value at all...

For more discouragement, go to the Demotivators website. Warning: I laughed until I nearly stopped breathing.

Wisdom in cultural context

Eph 5.15-17 says "See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise,  Redeeming the time, because the days are evil.  Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is" (KJV)

I believe that a part of wisdom is being able to accurately assess to what extent culture has already influenced my thinking, so that I can then ask for wisdom in order to know how I should deal with my conformity to the world, as I seek to be transformed by the renewing of my mind. (See Romans 12.2)

Or something like that.

Anyway.  Ken Myers has been deeply influential in helping me to see the nature of cultures influence through his writings and audio compilations and interviews at the Mars Hill Audio.

Ken influentially (to me) says in his book:

            “Culture is an abstraction.  We cannot isolate for observation three pounds or fourteen centimeters of culture.  These abstract questions of definition are extremely important, just as some amount of abstract thinking about who God is and what man is are necessary if we want to be obedient to God.  But responsible evaluation of culture must always deal with concrete human experience of what has been labeled “culture.” We don’t, after all, encounter culture.  We hear a particular song or see a specific film or read a novel that we have chosen from among all the others available.

            “Not only does cultural analysis require that we look at real cultural experiences, it requires that we look at them in their natural habitat, and that we understand something of their history.  In assessing rock’n’ roll, for example, it’s not enough to read the lyrics and find out on what beat of each measure the accent falls.  We also need to consider what relationship rock has with other aspects of pop culture, what social role it plays for its fans, and how it compares with other musical options available to listeners.  We need to look at the culture of rock, not just the words and the music.

            “Such consideration of the context of a particular cultural expression is important not for the sake of some sort of academic purity, but for the sake of Christian wisdom.  (emphasis mine)  Many of the decisions we make about our involvement in popular culture are not really questions about good and evil.  When I decide not to read a certain book, I am not necessarily saying that to read it would be a sin.  It is much more likely that I believe it to be imprudent to take the time to read that book at this time in my life.  To paraphrase Paul’s argument in 1 Corinthians 10 (which is, as we shall see, a very significant passage for our thinking about culture), something may be permissible, but it may not be very beneficial or constructive.

            “Each of us arises every morning with, in the providence of God, a number of duties, dilemmas, opportunities, and confusions that stem from living in a particular culture at a particular time.  Our decisions about what sort of involvement with popular culture is prudent does not occur in isolation.  Just as a critic cannot understand a song or a novel or a movie outside of its cultural context, so we cannot anticipate or evaluate the effect popular culture has on our lives without looking at that context.  Do I want to read that book because everyone else is reading it, or because of some intrinsic merit it has? Am I turning on the television because there is something I want to watch, or because I am addicted to distracting titillation?” 

Myers, Ken. All God's Children and Blue Suede Shoes: Christians and Popular Culture.Westchester, Illinois: Crossway Books, 1989. 30-31.

A place for tradition?

Is there any place for the historical nature of the church in the lives of evangelicals? 

"For evangelicals to ignore or to be in ignorance of the great tradition of the church is to have lost their foundational heritage. With its passing, the faithful will have less and less of a place to stand when challenged by pseudo-Christian spiritualities and the confused perambulations of contemporary theology.  An absence of the churches theological past will produce believers who are not sure how to interpret their bibles apart from relative or fashionable opinion or who are not able to position their interpretations within the wider framework of competing claims of new theologies. Despite the information boom affecting biblical study over the last twenty years it is apparent that mere knowledge of the bible does not assist in the critical task of understanding and integration.  Scripture, without the tradition to guide its interpretation can too easily devolve into an insipid spiritualism. Even worse, believers become highly susceptible to repeating old heresies and unknowingly undermining the Christian identity and mission.

The tradition as found in the ancient confessions, the Rule of Faith and the doctrinal theology of the fathers provides truth about God, in fact, primal truth about God.  These sources point us beyond ourselves and ask us to peer out of the confines of the Protestant ghettos we have created into the main street of catholic Christianity. " 

(Emphasis mine.  From Retrieving the Tradition and Renewing Evangelicalism: A Primer for Suspicious Protestants by D.H.Williams)

Touché

What would you have said if you were debating this Catholic theologian?  I would appreciate anyone's comments, if you have one.

"Several years ago, I was engaged in a public debate with a Protestant minister.  The event was held at a Protestant church before a mixed audience of Catholics and Protestants.  At one point in the debate, during the cross-examination section, my Protestant opponent posed this question to me:

"Can you give me one example of a tradition that's outside the Bible and is necessary for Christians?" He sat back with a smile, confident that I would not be able to answer his question.

"Yes, I can," I said.  "It's right here." At that I dropped my Bible on the table in front of him with a thump.

No one in the audience moved.

My opponent blinked, apparently unsure what to say in response.

I explained: "The Canon of the New Testament is a tradition, a Catholic tradition, that you as a Protestant follow." I continued, "the books that belong in the Bible, and in particular the New Testament are part of Tradition.  And you accept that Tradition and follow it, otherwise you would have no bible - you simply would have no way of knowing what the Bible is unless you accepted the Tradition of the canon."

This quote was found in a book I picked up at McKay's: Why Is That in Tradition? by Patrick Madrid.  It has been interesting reading.

Os Guinness on vocation

Os Guinness, who incidentally is related to the makers of the Irish Stout,  is a speaker and author that has been influential to my thinking.  In a lecture that I listened to (but cannot remember where, though I suspect it was on a White Horse Inn podcast) Os Guinness spoke at length about the Christian sense of vocation, or calling.  He was asked, in light of all that he had said, how he recommends parents help their children discover their vocation.

He said,

“I would give them a strong sense of calling, a powerful sense of history, and good analysis of where we are now, and tell them to pray and seek God to know what their part in all of this is.”

Okay.

1. Calling
2. History
3. Analysis of current status of the cosmos
4. Pray
5. Seek God
6. Get started

Got it.

Ann Voskamp

This is a "trailer" to a book that just came out from our favorite blogger: Ann Voskamp.  Her book came out two days ago, and it is currently number 11 on the amazon.com bestselling books list. 

Warning: If you don't like poetry, there is a good chance you won't like her writing.  You've been warned.

A glimpse of the goodness of God

I am so grateful for every glimpse of the Gospel that I receive.  Here is one glimmering thought that sheds light for us. 

"...the God who saves us and the God who judges us is one God.  We are not, even, condemned by his severity and redeemed by his compassion; what judges us is what redeems us, the love of God.  What is it that will break our hearts on judgement day?  Is it not the vision, suddenly unrolled, of how he has loved the friends we have neglected, of how he has loved us, and we have not loved him in return; how when we came before his alter, he gave us himself, and we gave him half-penitence's, or resolutions too weak to commit our wills?  But while love thus judges us by being what it is, the same love redeems us by effecting what it does.  Love shares flesh and blood with us in this present world, that the eyes which look us through at last may find in us a better substance than our vanity..."

-From Love Came Down - Anglican Readings for Advent and Christmas

That thought reminds me of one of my favorite poems.  Scott Cairns, whose poem I found here, wrote this

Possible Answers to Prayer

"Your petitions—though they continue to bear   

just the one signature—have been duly recorded.   

Your anxieties—despite their constant,

relatively narrow scope and inadvertent   

entertainment value—nonetheless serve   

to bring your person vividly to mind.

Your repentance—all but obscured beneath   

a burgeoning, yellow fog of frankly more   

conspicuous resentment—is sufficient.

Your intermittent concern for the sick,   

the suffering, the needy poor is sometimes   

recognizable to me, if not to them.

Your angers, your zeal, your lipsmackingly   

righteous indignation toward the many   

whose habits and sympathies offend you—         

these must burn away before you’ll apprehend   

how near I am, with what fervor I adore

precisely these, the several who rouse your passions."

New "wood" working materials found

For those of you who don't have woodworking tools - don't let that stop you!

Thoughts on the family in relationship to the church

What is the relationship between the family and the local and universal church?  That question has been one of my constant companions as our family has grown and I have realized that I have a biblical mandate as a husband and father.

While browsing this rather wonderful Anglican family blog, I discovered The Domestic Church website.  Here are some interesting excerpts with thoughts on what it means to be a family within the context of the church:

"The Early Church described the family as the “domestic church.” This meant that it was not just a sociological unit. Rather, the family was created to play a specific role in God’s plan of salvation.

"Thus, the family is deeply associated with the Church in both its nature and structure. In the Old Testament, the family was so central that without it, there simply was no covenant. In the New Testament, the family reached its proper fulfillment in Christ. The family became the place where the Holy Spirit works out the salvation of each member and provided stability and structure for life’s journey.

"The baptized family is the first place where the essential teachings in catechesis, prayer, and morality are carried out to help in the conversion and development of growing Christians.

"Because the Christian family is the Church in miniature, it also shares the nature of Christ. It has a priestly, prophetic, and kingly dimension to it. The family offers Christ and intercedes for its own members and those around it (priestly); the family is a sign of Christ’s love and faithfulness to a world that is enmeshed in the culture of death (prophetic); and the family serves its own members and those around it sacrificially (kingly).

"By participating in the saving and redemptive nature of the Church, the family is profoundly rooted in the Church’s mission. The family has truly become a little church, or as it is better known, a domestic church."

Planning for Valentines Day?

I thought I would give everyone almost a months lead time.  Get started on your Valentine's planning. Here are some great ideas from Tripp and Tyler, of "Things you can't do when you're not in the pool" fame.

Some unsolicited advice

“I don’t know what to say.”

“Well, say something.  Send an e-mail.  Send a card.  Pick up the phone.  Morse Code, whatever.”

“Do you think so? I’m afraid of hurting them more.”

“Well, if you want to make sure that you hurt them more, simply say nothing.  That way, they will feel all alone in their pain.”

Gracie and I have lost four children.  Belita (“Little Beautiful One”) miscarried 12 weeks after she was conceived early in our marriage.  Katie Esperanza (“Pure Hope) died at birth at 23 weeks.  She was born on December 23, 2000.  That was a hard Christmas.  Confianza (“Trust”) was born way too early, with no possibility of living.  And then there was Andrew.  He did live.  Nine glorious weeks.  All in the NICU.  Almost all of them desperately sick.  And they were probably the nine most glorious weeks of my life up to that point.  Then he too died.  Too many things wrong with his tiny preemie body.  The doctors couldn’t do anything more.  We prayed.  God brought him home.

So, all that to say, I am familiar with grief and I have this piece of advice for you.

When someone is grieving, make that gesture; say that word; give that small gift; say you wish you could do more and you “know that this small gift won’t stop the pain”. 

And you are right.  It won’t stop the pain.  It ought not.  And, if it were me, I wouldn’t really want it too, because at the moments of the loss of my children, and even six years later, as it is now, the tears and sadness are good companions, the most relevant way of saying, “I love you, my child.”  And I wouldn’t give that up for all happy thoughts in the world.

A gesture of condolence does not remove the grief, but rather join in the grief with the grieving one.  And that is a deep comfort that helps convert the sadness from hopelessness to a form of experiencing beauty.  The beauty and majesty of small acts of true friendship are treasure in the vault of my heart, bearing long term reward. 

More on this later, I expect, because it is coming up on the season of remembrance.  Andrew was born on January 30, and died April 4, six years ago.  And each year we remember, and we delight in the garden of friendship that was cultivated by the small gestures of those that chose to grieve with us, and could only say, but helpfully, “I’m sorry for your loss.”

One pithy quote deserves another

“He who marries the spirit of the age soon becomes a widower.” 

William Ralph Inge, Dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral

Quote was found here.

"As the tradition is grounded in scripture, so also the determination of what is scripture and the requirement that the tradition be grounded in scripture are themselves grounded in tradition."

Richard John Newhaus

Quote found in Retrieving the Tradition and Renewing Evangelicalism: A Primer for Suspicious Protestants  - By Daniel H. Williams

History you don't know may hurt you

David McCullough is my favorite author of books on history.  I have been deeply engrossed by his accounts of the digging of the Panama Canal in The Path Between the Seas and his presidential biographies of Truman and John Adams (on which the John Adams mini-series was based).  His retelling of the personal, financial, social and engineering obstacles that had to be overcome in order to build the The Great Bridge to Brooklyn was intensely interesting to me.

In a speech publicized by Public Radio on the program Word for Word, which can be found here, Mr. McCollough made the following two motivating statements:

"Trying to plan for the future without having a knowledge of the past is like trying to plant cut flowers."

"The only new thing in the world is the history you don't know."

Anyone want to form a History Lover's Club?

A way to cultivate obedience

A quote from C.S. Lewis in A Preface to Paradise Lost:

"The very fact that pompous is now used only in a bad sense measures the degree to which we have lost the old idea of 'solemnity'. 

"To recover it you must think of a court ball, or a coronation, or a victory march, as these things appear to people who enjoy them; in an age when every one puts on his oldest clothes to be happy in, you must re-awake the simpler state of mind in which people put on gold and scarlet to be happy in.  

"Above all, you must be rid of the hideous idea, fruit of a wide-spread inferiority complex, that pomp, on the proper occasions, has any connection with vanity or self-conceit. A celebrant approaching the altar, a princess led out by a king to dance a minuet, a general officer on a ceremonial parade, a major-domo preceding the boar's head at a Christmas feast—all these wear unusual clothes and move with calculated dignity. ; they are obeying the hoc age which presides over every solemnity.  

"The modern habit of doing ceremonial things unceremoniously is no proof of humility; rather it proves the offender's inability to forget himself in the rite, and his readiness to spoil for everyone else the proper pleasure of ritual."

This quote from C.S. Lewis had a profound effect on my moral imagination.  In particular the sentence that suggests that those that are submitting to the details of a tradition are being obedient, not vain. While I do know that a ceremony can be a cause of pride, I also know, from personal experience, that spontaneity can just as easily - perhaps more easily - be a source of pride.


Quote link found here .

January 14

 It's almost time to pull out the seed catalogs and start planning.

"Every gardener knows this temptation.  He loves his garden too much.  He wants it perfect and unblemished and all to himself.  There is absolute desire for the impossible perfection in the minds eye, and rage at the intruder who spoils it." - Vigen Guroian in Inheriting Paradise

Authority and Sub-Mission

In the most recent Touchstone magazine (Jan/Feb 2011), Peter J. Leithart writes a short essay in the Quodlibet "Department" of the magazine entitled "Under Authority".

"The humble centurion who comes to Jesus concerning his servant won't let Jesus come to his house.  He explains that he knows the power of words, and trusts Jesus to heal his servant with a creative fiat.

"The way the centurion explains his refusal is curious.  We would expect him to say, 'I am a man with authority,' but his explanation is different.  'I am a man under authority,' he says, and therefore the soldiers of his regiment obey his words.  Because his words are backed up by the might of Caesar himself, they carry weight.

"In our culture of autonomy, we think we gain authority by resisting authority, but the opposite is true.  Rebels can exercise power; they can terrorize.  But they cannot exercise authority, because true authority requires submission.  Jesus himself speaks with authority only because he is 'under authority,' because he speaks what his Father has given him to speak."

Since I think about these things a lot, I look forward to musing more about this thought in the context of being a husband and a father.  And how does this relate to authority in the church?  Hmm.

Cooperating With God

Ann (no "e") Voskamp is our favorite blog author.  There are two reasons, I suppose, that I enjoy reading her writing: she thinks about things that I think about; she loves to play with words.


She says,

"...life is not a thing to be wrestled with, subdued and conquered; life’s a beauty to be considered. God didn’t say control the landscape, but to consider long the lilies...."

Elsewhere, and likewise, we found this quote,

"For the Christian, time is not meant to be a tyrant, ruling over us. Nor is the passing of time to be experienced as an enemy, somehow stealing our youth and opportunity. Rather, time is meant to become a companion, a friend and a teacher, instructing us; offering us a series of invitations to allow the Lord to truly become our King by reigning in our daily lives. Our conscious awareness of time makes it a path along which the redemptive loving plan of a timeless God is revealed and received. In Christ, time is now given back to us as a gift. It offers us a field of choice and a path to holiness and human flourishing."

Read more by Deacon Keith Fournier: Here

Futurity, anyone?

I don't always agree with Samuel Johnson's conclusions, but I am always struck by his observations.  Here he is talking about how to prepare for the future:

"As man is a being very sparingly furnished with the power of prescience, he can provide for the future only by considering the past; and as futurity is all in which he has any real interest, he ought very diligently to use the only means by which he can be enabled to enjoy it, and frequently to revolve the experiments which he has hitherto made upon life, that he may gain wisdom from his mistakes and caution from his miscarriages." 

(Samuel Johnson, The Adventurer, No. 137, Tuesday, 26 February 1754, as found in the book: Samuel Johnson-Selected Writings, pg.200)


Is it true that "futurity is all in which he has any real interest".  At first I thought not, because I believe that the present is all I can truly apply myself to in any practicality, but then I thought that perhaps "the present" is only the moment when the immediate future into which we are rushing becomes "present to us".

There seems to be a parallel here to reading out loud. I am giving voice to a word in the "present", but my attention is given primarily to the words I am about to enunciate in the immediate future. So in a sense, I read well, only when I have given proper attention to the future, and perhaps a well lived "present" is only a ramification of our looking into the future with perspicacity.

I NEED one of these!

This way I would never have to actually decide what book to read.  Just give the wheel a spin.
Photo link here

What's in a week?

My family has been taking quite a bit of joy in "discovering" the sabbath.  We are beginning to understand what Christ meant when He said that the sabbath was made for man.  And, I must say, I am delighted.

Here is a clip from an article we ran across online that captured my imagination.

"The secret of sabbath time is to build into every seven days a rhythm that nourishes wholeness.  We are invited to live life for one week, rather than by days or epochs.  Rather than forestalling to the future this weeks acts of love, prayer, play, exercise, intimacy, rest or obedience, we ensure by sabbath time that all we need for wholeness occurs during these seven days."

The whole article can be found  here.

Thoughts on C.S. Lewis

This is from a conversation between Gilbert Meileander and Ken Myers.  Mr. Meileander is trying to explain why he thinks C.S. Lewis was and is such an effective proponent for the faith. (from "Contours of Culture" by Ken Myers in Touchstone Magazine - October 2010)

"I think he's (C.S. Lewis) not so much trying to argue anybody into thinking something as he is simply trying to understand what it would mean to believe something, through the enormous gifts he has for illustration and metaphor and story."

A Joke My Dad Told Me

The Water Closet

(In England 'water closet' means bathroom)

A newly wedded couple were looking for a house in the country near Wintnigh, England, and after finding a suitable one they started back to their home in the city.  While making their way there, the wife happened to remember that they hadn't noticed whether there was a water closet at the place and decided to write the landlord about it.  Being very modest, however, she hesitated to spell out the words 'water closet' so she referred to it as W. C.  The landlord didn't readily understand what was intended by W.C. but after due consideration decided that Wintnigh Church was intended, therefore he wrote:

Dear Madame,

I very much regret the delay in sending this letter but now take pleasure in informing you that the W.C. is located about nine miles from the house and is capable of seating 1260 people.  This is very unfortunate indeed if you are in the habit of going regular, but undoubtedly you will be interested to know that a great many people take their lunch and make a day of it, while others who can't spare the time, arrive just in time and generally are in too great of a hurry to wait if the place is crowded.  The last time my wife and I went was six years ago and we had to stand all the time we were there.  It may also interest you to know that we are planning to hold a bazaar to raise money for plush seats as that is felt long wanted.  I might mention that it pains me very much to be unable to go more frequently.  It is surely no lack of desire but as we grow older it seems to be more of an effort, particularly in cold weather.

Sincerely Yours,

The Landlord

This joke is being "reposted" from my Dad's "Miscellaneous File" where he keeps interesting and often thought-provoking quotes.  Most are "more spiritual" than this particular one, incidentally.

What a title!

I recently was at McKay's Used Bookstore in Chattanooga, and ran across this title from an author I read regularly in Touchstone Magazine, Peter Leithart:
Against Christianity.

"Against Christianity"?  What an interesting title from a PCA ordained minister and senior fellow of theology and literature at New St. Andrew's College.  So, of course, and compulsively, I bought it.

It is not written in a typical manner.  It is comprised of 5 chapters

1. Against Christianity
2. Against Theology
3. Against Sacraments
4. Against Ethics
5. For Constantine

And you know that he is being provocative with a chapter titled "For Constantine".  Those chapter titles just make me smile, because I know this is going to be interesting.  And it is.  Not only are the titles interesting, but the layout of the chapters is.  Not so much a running script, as short, choppy snippets of thoughts: sometimes a sentence, sometimes several paragraphs.

From the Preface

"This book is theological bricolage and lurches at many points toward a form of theological haiku.  I have come to think, however that this is all for the good, for the effect I hope for is the effect of haiku.  At its best, haiku glances at the familiar from an awkward angle; it presents what we normally approach straight-on from the side or underneath or inside out and helps us to see it, in a flash, as something wholly new."

And from Chapter 1

"Christianity is biblical religion disemboweled and emasculated by (voluntary) intellectualization and/or privatization.

"Christianity is not merely a haphazard embrace of the values and practices of the modern world. Worldliness in that sense has plagued the Church since Corinth and will be a temptation to the end of time.  Christianity is institutionalized worldliness, worldliness accepted in principle, worldliness not at the margins but at the center, worldliness built into the foundation.

"Christianity is worldliness that has become so much our second nature that we call it piety."

Well, he is obviously being intentionally provocative. It reminds me of the title that some of my friends have been reading lately, "Pagan Christianity", though obviously it won't follow the same lines with a chapter entitled "For Constantine".  Or maybe it will, from an oblique angle.

But!  I am not going to read this right now...I'm reading "Third Ways"!  I only picked it up to skim it!

By the way, here is a haiku I just picked up by googling "haiku" in order to understand what PL was alluding to in his preface.

the morning paper

harbinger of good and ill

--I step over it

-by Dave McCroskey

An Anglican's Response

Those that have been keeping tabs on me for a while will know that I have been considering the Anglican Church as a possible way of expressing my faith and worship. I first started considering this as an option when I discovered how many of the authors that influence my thinking are Anglican.  (C.S. Lewis, Os Guinness, Jeremy Begbie, J.B. Phillips, G.K. Chesterton-who was Catholic, nee Anglican, Alan Jacobs, and probably most importantly Ken Myers.)  


These are all men who, as authors and thinkers, I deeply admire, and whose thoughts I ponder.  As I realized that Anglicanism was a common thread, I decided to explore for myself.  


In the middle of that, I happened upon Alan Jacobs e-mail address.  His blog, which I follow, was having a comments issue, so he posted his e-mail address in order to rectify the problem.  I took that opportunity to write to him with a question, "Why are you Anglican?" (a question which I introduced a little less abruptly in the e-mail.)


A.J., the "Clyde S. Kilby Chair Professor of English" at Wheaton, was polite enough to respond, and here is a part of his e-mail, which was a copy and paste of something he wrote for his church's website:


"We are heirs of CATHOLIC tradition: we draw for our sustenance upon
teaching and practices that go back to the Apostles but flowered fully
in the Church's first several centuries. The foundation laid for us,
and for all subsequent generations of thoughtful Christians, by the
Early Church Fathers is a rich legacy. From those early times we
inherit our Creed, our sacramental worship, and our sacramental
theology; these we share with Christ's true Church wherever it may be
found. We see that kinship in powerful ways when we look upon our
brothers and sisters in the Roman Catholic Church and in the Orthodox
world. In that sense we claim, and rejoice in, catholicity.

"But we also acknowledge that that Church has not always faithfully
preserved its theological and spiritual inheritance, and that, in His
love and care, in the sixteenth century God raised up great men of
faith to REFORM the church, to call us back to the Bible as the
ever-living Word of God, the reliable testimony to his grace and favor
towards us in the life, death, and resurrection of His Son. In that
Word we see clearly that we are saved by God's boundless grace, and we
appropriate that grace through faith in Jesus Christ. It is this
message -- which we share with all the churches that trace their
lineage to the Reformation -- that we proclaim in our preaching and
enact in our worship.

"We strive to be a church that is fully catholic and fully reformed;
and this is what we think it means to be ANGLICANS."


This short essay was particularly interesting because I had recently decided to stop acting as if history didn't exist as I pursued loving God and loving others.

New Favorite Word

I'm reading through "Third Ways" by Alan Carlson, and ran across this sentence:

"He sees the state-run economy generating 'a new class stratification,' a fresh kleptocracy of rulers who would 'deprive the whole regime of its original high ideals.' "

Kleptocracy.  A word which immediately struck me as hilarious.

Shorter Oxford English Dictionary pronounces:

"...a ruling body of thieves; a nation ruled by thieves..."

But sobering, really.

John Ruskin's "Modern Painters"

How can I cultivate a life that acknowledges this fact?

"To watch the corn grow, and the blossoms set; to draw hard breath over ploughshare or spade; to read, to think, to love, to hope, to pray — these are the things that make men happy; they have always had the power of doing these, they never will have the power to do more. The world’s prosperity or adversity depends upon our knowing and teaching these few things: but upon iron, or glass, or electricity, or steam, in no wise." 

John Piper on Scripture Memorization

Scripture memorization - 8 reasons

1. Memorizing Scripture makes meditation possible at times when I can’t be reading the Bible, and meditation is the pathway of deeper understanding.
2. Memorizing Scripture strengthens my faith because faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ, and that happens when I am hearing the word in my head.
3. Memorizing Scripture shapes the way I view the world by conforming my mind to God’s viewpoint.
4. Memorizing Scripture makes God’s word more readily accessible for overcoming temptation to sin, because God’s warnings and promises are the way we conquer the deceitful promises of sin.
5. Memorizing Scripture guards my mind by making it easier to detect error—and the world is filled with error, since the god of this world is a liar.
6. Memorizing Scripture enables me to hit the devil in the face with a force he cannot resist, and so protect myself and my family from his assaults.
7. Memorizing Scripture provides the strongest and sweetest words for ministering to others in need.
8. Memorizing Scripture provides the matrix for fellowship with Jesus because he talks to me through his word, and I talk to him in prayer.

From John Piper sermon 'If My Words Abide in You'