Friday 29 February 2008 at 1:42 pm
I often hear conservative Christians with great earnestness declaring “this is the very word of God!!!!” Why the earnestness? Usually because someone is doing something they believe is wrong or someone else is asserting something they believe is wrong.
It’s not a bad thing to be upset about wrong-doing and wrong-thinking. What is interesting to me are the assumptions of the earnest advocate:
1. that revelation somehow will act on the other person.
2. that the other person’s basic want is a lack of information and that information itself will somehow solve the wrong-doing or wrong-thinking.
3. that the acknowledgment that a piece of information is “revelation” will somehow cause the other person to start behaving differently, to stop their wrong-doing and their wrong-thinking.
4. that earnestness in feeling and vehemence in communication will somehow convince the other person that body of knowledge “X” IS “God’s very word” thus resolving whatever it is making this person behave wrongly or think wrongly.
Not too much reflection will of course reveal that these assumptions themselves are generally wrong and people generally acknowledge this too, YET the revelation of the fallacy of these assumptions does not stop the behavior.
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Wednesday 27 February 2008 at 3:35 pm
I posted a few stories I thought were good on Iraq for CRC Voices: The Myth of the Surge, Partisan Retreat, After Iraq
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Thursday 21 February 2008 at 4:56 pm
Since the end of WWII church stuff has changed radically. (I'm assuming a North American context here.) "Discipleship" for those in a European tradition church (CRC in this case), if the word was used at all was something that was assumed through the normal life of a Christian church in the context of a Christian community and a Christian home. Churches held services, gave catechetical classis, had societies, devotions where done as families and prayers and Bible reading as well as religious book reading as individuals. The question of "what is a disciple" was something that was generally understood and if treated done so in a formal way.
The 60s revolution along with the Christian religious elements of it challenged traditional assumed understandings of just about everything and included discipleship. There were Jesus people who sought a counter-cultural stance toward discipleship. Now of course throughout church history there have been many such revolutions spearheaded by great saints whose visions started societies, orders and such and would radically impact the church. These revolutions are both diverse, touching different areas of the church, but also repetitive, repeating similar practices and methods involving scripture, small groups, spiritual disciplines, etc. The 60s revolutions were no different. One of the legacies that the various forms of this revolution has brought is a practice of intentionality. Since the 60s we have never stopped working on discipleship and pondering what exactly a disciple ought to look like, be or do.
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Tuesday 19 February 2008 at 7:42 pm
The Coming Religious Peace
Tuesday 19 February 2008 at 6:40 pm
Again, more from Voices. I referenced a piece on this blog on hell and Neal Punt posting a version of it with permission. Also a piece I wrote on wrath.
I've continued to do more thinking on Jesus and Hell. It struck me one day that the ending of Luke 15 (Lost Sons) was another Jesus hell allusion very much fitting with many of his other ones. The consummation of kingdom of God especially in Luke is so often depicted as a banquet, celebration, party. The older son refuses to go into the party because he doesn't believe his father is just and ultimately he doesn't believe his father should be so lavish with his love. This is exactly the complaint of Jonah. The son excludes himself based on his own moral principles. That is a sobering thought for all of us moral people.
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Tuesday 19 February 2008 at 6:00 pm
This was a response to a Voices posting. I have to attribute my attitude on this to Keller. He treats it in many sermons, particularly his sermon on the prodigal sons.
There are lots of complexities in the language here that can be pretty easily teased out.
Experientially we do in fact love (feel attached to, feel benevolent towards) our parents because they have shown us love (action: cared for us, caressed us, etc. )
A child shouldn't love (action: obey, respect, etc.) merely IN ORDER THAT or SO THAT (loving action as instrument or perhaps even manipulative) they receive good things from their parent. If my child keeps their room clean because they love me (expression of respect and gratitude) I'm pleased and accept the gesture as something healthy and welcome to the relationship. If, however, my child cleans their room BECAUSE they are insecure in my love, are afraid I will throw them out of the house if their room is dirty, or is trying (in a significant way, this tit-for-tat happens at a minor, more playful level) to get me to buy them a car or do something for them that isn't within the bounds of the relationship I would likely feel grieved and concerned about the relationship. If they do so out of insecurity I would try to reassure them that they are my child and that relationship is not based on anything they've done, it's simply based on the relationship I began by bringing them into existence. If they are trying to manipulate me or extort me, then they also have wounded the relationship because they have received my love to them and not reciprocated.
Monday 11 February 2008 at 2:01 pm
From "The Weight of Glory" Chapter 1, Paragraph 1:
If there lurks in most modern minds the notion that to desire our own good and earnestly to hope for the enjoyment of it is a bad thing, I submit that this notion has crept in from Kant and the Stoics and is no part of the Christian faith. Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about
with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.
Saturday 09 February 2008 at 09:38 am
I posted a link of the e
xcerpt from Keller's upcoming book found on his sons' blog to Calvin-in-Common on Fanaticism and Nominalism. Then I wrote this follow-up piece on the subject.
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Saturday 09 February 2008 at 09:09 am
This is a great illustration from Keller's Vision sermon "Christ our life" (free download) that skepticism is itself a belief system that has to be learned. Its from Mark Lilla in the NY Times magazine.
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Thursday 07 February 2008 at 10:39 am
From the sermon "Miserable Comforters" around minute 18 in the recording
Eliphaz sees the Bible as a record of people who by living well get God's reward and blessing.
"The Bible is not a record of people living right and getting the blessing, it's a record of people who are so broken and so corrupt that they never would have been able to rise above their own brokenness and corruption except the grace of God broke into their life usually in the form of disappointment, discouragement and disaster."
Thursday 07 February 2008 at 09:25 am
In Keller's opening sermon to his 08 Job Series "Questions of Suffering" he draws the connection between suffering, Satan's cynicism and love. He echoes CS Lewis in the Screwtape letters basically saying that the demons deny the existence of love which is at the heart of Satan's challenge in the book of Job. "Humanity can't love. They are incapable of it. They are only capable of being self-serving and self-seeking".
Keller notes (around minute 28 in the recording) that in the Garden of Eden Satan comes to us and says "God doesn't really love you" and we believe Satan. When Satan said bad things to God about us, even though there was some truth in them, God didn't accept it. When Satan said bad things about God to us, even though there was no truth in it, we believed it. The lie of Satan is that if you give yourself to God he'll crush you. He can't be trusted. God doesn't really love you, he's just using you. Our main problem in life is that we don't believe God loves us and we don't trust him.
Wednesday 06 February 2008 at 10:23 pm
This is from Keller's Christmas sermon "God of Wonders".
Three things the human race desperately needs and worldly wisdom can't give or even claim to be able to give it. Three things you need in order to be able to handle life as it really is.
1. To face death with assurance, confidence, even joy
2. To live with your own past, to get absolute peace of conscience. Deep self acceptance no matter what you've done even if you've murdered people. We've got to be able to forgive ourselves 100%.
3. You've got to be able to forgive your enemies even if they've raped or murdered your family. From the heart 100%
Wednesday 06 February 2008 at 10:10 pm
In Keller's fifth sermon in his Jan/Feb 08 Job series
"Where Can Wisdom Be Found" he sites a NYTimes Magazine review of David Rieff's book on his mother Susan Sontag's death. The NY Times has an
except, and a
review which is what Keller sites.
