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Straw Man God

You can’t just say there is a God because the world is beautiful. You have to account for bone cancer in children. You have to account for the fact that almost all animals in the wild live under stress with not enough to eat and will die violent and bloody deaths. There is not any way that you can just choose the nice bits and say that means there is a God and ignore the true fact of what nature is. The wonder of nature must be taken in its totality and it is a wonderful thing. It is absolutely marvelous and the idea that an atheist or a humanist…doesn’t marvel and wonder at reality, at the way things are, is nonsensical. The point is we wonder all the way. We don’t just stop and say that which I cannot understand I will call God, which is what mankind has done historically.
–Stephen Fry, The Importance of Unbelief, Big Think

Is it possible that NEITHER the skipping-through-the-daisies god of people’s invention NOR the one that fails to exist is true? That neither the stoic, aloof god of people’s imagination NOR the one who winks in approval of whatever people fascinate themselves with is true? Is it possible that He is neither a crutch for that which is unknown nor a crutch used by those who find their identity in their sensual passions and therefore suppose their mentally-constructed god gives them a thumbs-up? Is it possible that He is both love and fearsome? And is it possible that love is defined on His terms, not ours? Is He even knowable except through that which He reveals Himself? The lion has roared…who can but prophesy?

Impoverished Romance

“There is a whole wonderful realm of relational intimacy that our culture misses out on by loading all of its human-closeness eggs in the basket of specifically sexual intimacy. We tend to refer to these latter relationships as “romantic,” and yet perhaps our sense of romance here is a bit impoverished. Perhaps there is room for a kind of romance with our beloved friends: doing for one another the little deeds of affection that we often associate with a lover wooing his or her espoused, things like writing letters that affirm the beloved’s virtues and beauty, attending carefully to the things that delight their soul and spontaneously and gratuitously fulfilling them, forbearing with their irritating eccentricities while dwelling on their excellences, overcoming their occasional coldness with a deeper kindness.”

–Mac Stewart, All Souls’ Episcopal Church, Oklahoma City

Why are Wisdom and Folly Depicted as Female?

Why are wisdom and folly depicted as women in Proverbs? Something hit me a while back for you to test against the Word: traditionally a female is pursued, so is wisdom and wickedness–each require deliberate action, so we must consider carefully what we chase; you wouldn’t exactly chase a dude in that way, so any comparison to a male would seem more like a conquering of an enemy rather than a catching of a prize. In Proverbs, one prize kills you, but the other is an eternal treat.

No God Would…

We ought to have far more fear of God than we do of someone’s concept of God.

Recently, I just starting noticing (it’s been happening since…let’s see…creation?!) the number of concepts people communicate about God. On a weather site, the following comment was published:

If any GOD had any pull on weather [conditions] , We’d have beautiful days forever.

How common is this kind of statement? I’m reminded of Job’s friends who all thought they knew God. I’m reminded of the false prophets from Jeremiah’s day who were ousted by God in His revelation to Jeremiah. I’m reminded of…well…pretty much everyone, including myself, who has ever looked to an “image” of God, either molten or mental, as J. I. Packer says, thereby reducing His glory.

“I also withheld rain from you
when the harvest was still three months away.
I sent rain on one town,
but withheld it from another.
One field had rain;
another had none and dried up.
People staggered from town to town for water
but did not get enough to drink,
yet you have not returned to me,”
declares the Lord. – Amos 4

Let us take care that we do not reduce God with statements like “No God would…” or “God wouldn’t” or [ad infinitum].

We ought to have far more fear of God than we do of someone’s concept of God.

Illiteracy Will Kill You.

We will not believe more than we know, and we will not live higher than our beliefs. The many fronts of Christian compromise in this generation can be directly traced to biblical illiteracy in the pews and the absence of biblical preaching and teaching in our homes and churches.
This generation must get deadly serious about the problem of biblical illiteracy, or a frighteningly large number of Americans–Christians included–will go on thinking that Sodom and Gomorrah lived happily ever after.

–Albert Mohler

Forms of Knowledge

According to El-Arabi, there are three forms of knowledge: 1) intellectual knowledge, which is “only information and the collection of facts”; 2) the “emotionalism” that consists of getting in touch with and expressing your feelings; and 3) “real knowledge, which is called the Knowledge of Reality. In this form man can perceive what is right, what is true” (Shah 1968, p. 85). The first two forms–the false forms–of knowledge outlined by El-Arabi are the forms that dominate the current confusion surrounding issues in education. They can be seen in the talk about technological innovation and feeling good about one’s self.

–David Patterson, 36

Being As Vague as Possible

Near the end of Heinz Schirk’s film on the Wannsee Conference, Heydrich tells Eichmann to “be as clear as necessary and as vague as possible” in the execution of his duty. This statement is a formulation of the principle of the lie that breeds death and is directly opposed to education’s quest for the truth that sanctifies life. Where the affirmation of the truth of the sacred is concerned, one must be as clear as possible and only as vague as necessary.

–David Patterson, When Learned Men Murder, 24

Trappings and Pretense of Civilization

There can be no doubt that at the Wannsee Conference sophisticated, cultivated, educated men passed the children through fire in an offering to Moloch, the god of mammon and power. And the ritual was all the more ghastly because it was performed with all the trappings and pretense of civilization.

–David Patterson, When Learned Men Murder, 26

Conquer

It is a glorious phrase…that ‘he led captivity captive.’
The very triumphs of His foes, it means, he used for their defeat. He compelled their dark achievements to sub-serve his end, not theirs.
They nailed him to the tree, not knowing that by that very act they were bringing the world to his feet.
They gave him a cross, not guessing that he would make it a throne.
They flung him outside the gates to die, not knowing that in that very moment they were lifting up all the gates of the universe, to let the King of Glory come in.
They thought to root out his doctrines, not understanding that they were implanting imperishably in the hearts of men the very name they intended to destroy.
They thought they had defeated God with His back the wall, pinned and helpless and defeated: they did not know that it was God Himself who had tracked them down.
He did not conquer in spite of the dark mystery of evil. He conquered through it.

James Stewart (1896–1990) was a minister of the Church of Scotland

How to Love

How do I love?

To love, I must consider Him.
To consider, I must learn Him.
To learn, I must search for Him.
To search, I must have information about Him.
To have information, I have been reached by Him.
To be reached, I am found by Him.
To be found, I am known by Him.
To be known by Him, I am loved by Him.


We love because we were first loved by Him.