Handling God’s Holy Word
Phil Johnson, one of my favorite bloggers, has once again posted something that hit me like a ton of bricks [Pyromaniacs: Some Certainties for These Uncertain Times]. This time it was one of his weekly snippets from C.H. Spurgeon and this quote dealt with the tremendous gravity of handling God’s holy and inspired Word. We are not called to present our viewpoints or our formulas or our programs; we are called to present Jesus Christ and him crucified—the very essence of scripture, without additions or subtractions.
Here’s a quote to whet your appetite. Then go over to Pyromaniacs: Some Certainties for These Uncertain Times for the whole thing.
“Those are my views, but other people’s views may be correct.” We ought to preach the gospel, not as our views at all, but as the mind of God—the testimony of Jehovah concerning his own Son, and in reference to salvation for lost men. If we had been entrusted with the making of the gospel, we might have altered it to suit the taste of this modest century, but never having been employed to originate the good news, but merely to repeat it, we dare not stir beyond the record. What we have been taught of God we teach. If we do not do this, we are not fit for our position.
If I have a servant in my house, and I send a message by her to the door, and she amends it, on her own authority, she may take away the very soul of the message by so doing, and she will be responsible for what she has done. She will not long remain in my employ, for I need a servant who will repeat what I say, as nearly as possible, word for word; and if she does so, I am responsible for the message, she is not. If any one should be angry with her on account of what she said, they would be very unjust; their quarrel lies with me, and not with the person whom I employ to act as mouth for me. He that hath God’s Word, let him speak it faithfully, and he will have no need to answer gainsayers, except with a “Thus saith the Lord.”
Literary escapism
From the beginning of the human race stories have been used—by priests, by bards, by medicine men—as magic instruments of healing, of teaching, as a means of helping people come to terms with the fact that they continually have to face insoluble problems and unbearable realities.
Joan Aiken
Blog Header – March 30, 2008
This week’s header photo is of my son watching the small training aircraft activity at Lynchburg Regional Airport. This one could actually be included in my Why-I-Love-Lynchburg series. In any large city, you can’t get anywhere near the airplanes. And if you look suspicious in any way, you’re likely to get a quick trip to the security center for investigation and questioning.
But the Lynchburg airport allows you to stand on the grass outside the border fence, just feet away from one of the runways. And quite a few families are there on pleasant days, having picnics and watching the planes take off and land.
My son has always loved all forms of travel. He became particularly interested in flight a little more than a year ago and he knows quite a bit about aircraft now. His interest in this caught the attention of the folks who work at the airport and they now let him go right out onto the field in front of the hangar. He is able to set on a bench, just about 25 yards from the landing strip. He can hear the chatter between the tower and the pilots as they prepare to land. He gets to talk to some of the pilots once they have landed and parked their planes. One of the men took David into the lobby of the airport and showed him a cutaway of an airplane engine, explaining to him how each part of the engine worked. David ate it all up.
We love Lynchburg!
A man’s grill
Ok – I see that the “Mommy” blogs get to post recipes and decorating tips and stuff like that. So if I’m writing a “Daddy” blog, do I get to do something similar? Maybe I could showcase my favorite wheel cleaning supplies or do a review of an XBox 360 game. But I want to deal with food-related things too. After all, I like to eat. So here it is—I’m going to tell you about my backyard grill.
I told my wife that I needed a new outdoor grill. I told her that I didn’t want a gas grill—I wanted a manly grill, so that would have to involve real flames. So my wife headed out to the store and returned with the Big Daddy of all grills. It’s a real wood, open flame grill. That’s real wood, not charcoal—wood, like the kind you would put in your fireplace. It’s awesome.
My son and I get to go pyro and stack up big chunks of wood, stuff leaves under the pieces of wood, and set fire to the pile. It makes a tremendous amount of smoke and fire and the flames last for a good long time, so you could cook a couple of meals on it if you happened to need to do two or more courses on the outdoor grill.
It also handles the special wood chips like mesquite better than any other grill I have ever used. Because of the serious amount of smoke this grill can produce, you can do a fantastic job smoking burgers and steaks and introducing flavors that just aren’t possible on a gas grill, and aren’t very easy to produce from charcoal grills. But on this grill its simple.
It may be a bit of overkill for the typical outdoor grilling adventure. But it sure is fun. And it also cooks a great steak! Really. It cooks better than any grill I’ve ever head. We cooked red snapper on it today—and that was incredible too.
So husbands, let your wives know that you need a MAN’S grill. Tell her it needs to take fireplace wood. Remind her that it’s now springtime and you need this visceral connection with the land. Okay, that might be overdoing it. Maybe you should just head down to Lowes on your own and pick up one of these grills. Even if you’re an accountant, you’re going to look manly flipping burgers on this thing.
Wisdom from a fictional source
Buckingham Palace Gardens
My wife has been devouring her new Anne Perry book (Buckingham Palace Gardens). This morning she read some quotes from the book that struck her as addressing some of the recent conversations we have had. My wife and I believe that we Christians hurt the name of Christ when we present what I call “gospel-plus.” It’s a presentation of the true Gospel of Jesus Christ; that Christ came to earth, took on human flesh, died on the cross and rose from the grave three days later in order to pay the penalty that we could not pay for our sins and to secure a place in heaven for all the believing ones.
Buckingham Palace Gardens
The plus is all the added requirements that we think make us more acceptable to God. These are such things as demanding total abstinence from aclohol when the scriptures demand moderation, demanding the use of a particular Bible version when there is nothing indicating that this should be done in scripture, demanding a particular standard of dress when these things are not presented in scripture, and demanding that Christians listen to a particular style of music when this is not addressed in scripture. Apparently, Christians think that God did a pretty good job overall, but had they been god—they would have done better. So they present the world with their list of addenda to the 10 Commandments—typically numbering in the hundreds of new commandments to follow to gain God’s approval.
The greatest problem I see when we do this is that we misrepresent Christ to the world. This gives rise to a skewed view of who and what Christ is and stands for. The vision of Christ we present to the world is that of stereotypical Fundamentalist Bible-Thumpers. This turns people off so quickly that it inhibits our attempts at evangelism. The old saying is “you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.” We Christians seem to love to walk up to people, throw a bucket full of vinegar in their face and then say, “God loves you,” and walk away.
Here’s that stereotype as presented by one of the characters in Anne Perry’s new book:
“I don’t want to see the last true passion tamed by railways and men with Bibles telling everyone to cover their bodies.”
—Anne Perry, Buckingham Palace Gardens, p. 196
The wounds of a friend
Proverbs 27:5-6
Better is open rebuke than hidden love. Faithful are the wounds of a friend; profuse are the kisses of an enemy.
Mulch man
Some days are easier than others. After four days of outstanding behavior and lots of fun together as a family, my son decided to show he was in charge. Needless to say, he lost the gambit.
In the photo here, he is showing he’s in charge by doing the mulching that my wife had planned to do for the past few weeks. We finally got the mulch today when our friend Dan was mulching the church playground and offered to take my wife to the mulch place and carry the mulch to our house in his trailer. This happened just after my son “volunteered” to do this back-breaking task.
It’s just so great when punishments get to come with the added benefit of less work for Mom or Dad.
A heritage from the Lord
We saw a friend of ours at the playground yesterday. Our son adores this family’s little girl and told her mother how cute she looked. I grabbed my camera and took a few photos.
Looking at the photos this morning brought to mind something Voddie Baucham has pointed to as an “infection” in our churches—the apparent dislike of children. And I think he’s right about this. We often hear jokes told even among Christians that belittle the concept of having a “quiver full” of children. Voddie mentions such examples as the statements that are “jokingly” made to women who enter church with three or more kids in tow. “Haven’t you figured out how that happens yet?” Ha ha ha. “You might want to try watching television instead.” Ha ha ha. Even teachers and pastors will sometimes say something like, “we thought my wife was pregnant, but she went in for a pregnancy test last Thursday and (wiping his brow), praise God, she is not pregnant.”
What a terrible way to look at God’s blessing of children. My son has severe issues caused by the in-utero drug use of his birthmother. He is severly ADD, bipolar, has sensory integration disorder, and, according to those who have evaluated and tested him ad infinitum, “a grab bag of other emotional and psychological disorders.” His medical needs alone are staggering with monthly medications presenting us with deductibles well above most people’s monthly mortgage payments. My wife has had to quit her job in order to work full time to keep him from being discharged from school. We had to move our family 200 miles away from the city where we both were raised and found our living in order to be near him when he was hospitalized at a behavioral treatment center for 18 months. And on and on.
And yet, in spite of it all (and sometimes even because of it all), we can’t imagine life without him. He’s a delightful child—full of life, bright, intelligent, talented. All-in-all, a wonderful kid. And truly, a blessing of God.
This quote perfectly describes my wonderful son:
The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars
—Jack Kerouac
The Value of Adversity
It is good for us to have trials and troubles at times, for they often remind us that we are on probation and ought not to hope in any worldly thing. It is good for us sometimes to suffer contradiction, to be misjudged by men even though we do well and mean well. These things help us to be humble and shield us from vainglory. When to all outward appearances men give us no credit, when they do not think well of us, then we are more inclined to seek God Who sees our hearts. Therefore, a man ought to root himself so firmly in God that he will not need the consolations of men.
When a man of good will is afflicted, tempted, and tormented by evil thoughts, he realizes clearly that his greatest need is God, without Whom he can do no good. Saddened by his miseries and sufferings, he laments and prays. He wearies of living longer and wishes for death that he might be dissolved and be with Christ. Then he understands fully that perfect security and complete peace cannot be found on earth.
—Thomas à Kempis
Persisting in error
Jeremiah 8:12Were they ashamed when they committed abomination? No, they were not at all ashamed; they did not know how to blush. Therefore they shall fall among the fallen; when I punish them, they shall be overthrown, says the Lord.
“To err is human, to persist in error is diabolical.”
I have often seen a tendency in myself and in others I have observed to develop personal favorite activities and to eventually come to a point where we hate to give those activities up. The obvious example of this is something like drinking or smoking, which may develop into addictions that require intervention to break. The smoker or the alcoholic refuses to quit, even when he is told how very bad continued indulgence in this activity will be for him. In fact, even the good of exercising may lead to addiction and become a bad thing. The Apostle Paul directly addressed the fact that we need to keep even these good things under check by saying: “For bodily exercise profits a little, but godliness is profitable for all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come” 1 Timothy 4:8.
Many other activities we get involved in may have bad consequences as well, especially if we persist in them after we have been alerted to a problem. Consider the concept of propounding or defending a particular doctrine. Let’s say we have been convinced of the truth of evolution. We are determined to convince folks that evolution and not creation is the force that brought our world into existence. We push and push and push that line of thinking.
And then one day we run into a well-educated and well-spoken Intelligent Design proponent. We present our argument to him, laying out each tile in the mosaic of our complete system, complete with our interpretation of the archaeological data backing our idea and statements from experts who agree with our position. But as we lay each tile, this Intelligent Design guru obliterates every one of our arguments with solid fact, science, and philosophy. In the end, we find that we have not been able to answer his positions in the way he has answered ours. He has won the debate, and done so clearly.
And yet, the next day, we accost the first person we see and present to them all the same things we said before because this new person probably doesn’t know the things the Intelligent Design guy did and he will likely be persuaded by our presentation.
This is called “persisting in error.” It happens when we have a “pet” doctrine that we like to proclaim, but then our arguments in support of that doctrine are shown to be wrong, say by scripture and by a demand on using proper terminology and historically accurate definitions. Nevertheless, we continue to push our defeated arguments on other unsuspecting victims.
I have recently been made aware of a group of bloggers who are promoting a non-biblical use of the word modesty. Although many people have pointed out the error in definition that is giving rise to a tremendously inaccurate interpretation of the scripture, these folks persist in their use of the inaccurate definition. No defense has been made along the line of why this inaccurate definition is being used. The simple fact is that the only reason someone who cannot defend their position will post that position again after it has been refuted is that they choose to “persist in error.”
This scenario played out over the past couple of week’s on Mrs. Stacy McDonald’s blog, Your Sacred Calling. She was made aware of the errors she had made in her application and interpretation of a scriptural passage. She made no defense of her position, and yet persists in her error.
This is the passage in question:
1 Peter 3:3-4 Do not let your adorning be external—the braiding of hair, the wearing of gold, or the putting on of clothing— but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious.
The blogs I have seen covering this passage are almost all making the same mistake—that of thinking that this verse is talking about women dressing in a way so as to entice men. That is quite clearly not what this passage is talking about. The blogs not making this mistake are discussing the passage to point out that the mistake has been made by others.
Because words may have multiple definitions, we sometimes clarify our speech with qualifying phrases using parallels, examples, antonyms and synonyms. These techniques help us to more clearly convey our thoughts and help keep people from misunderstanding what we were saying.
The inspired words of scripture here use such techniques to help keep us on track. Peter says, “Do not let your adorning be external.” He then ensures the reader’s understanding by giving some examples: “the braiding of hair, the wearing of gold, or the putting on of clothing.” He then continues the clarification with an opposite parallel: “but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit.” Quite clearly this passage is not encouraging women to be careful that they cover themselves appropriately with clothing. It is in fact saying that this should not be their primary focus. We can probably agree that proper covering will be an outworking of that gentle and quiet spirit, but it is certainly not being demanded by this scripture.
A similarly misused scripture is found in 1 Timothy 2:9-10, which says:
Likewise also that women should adorn themselves in respectable apparel, with modesty and self-control, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly attire, but with what is proper for women who profess godliness—with good works.
Here Paul is telling Pastor Timothy that he should instruct women to be modest in their appearance. Again he uses communication techniques to qualify and focus his statements. He begins with: “Women should adorn themselves in respectable apparel.” He then focuses that “respectable apparel” with the phrase: “with modesty and self-control.” To make sure that Timothy understands what he means by “modesty and self-control” when regarding apparel, Paul then gives some negative examples: “not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly attire.” He is obviously using the more common meaning of modest here: living in a simple way rather than in an ostentatious way, as in “he is a man of modest means.” He is saying that the women should not be slaves to fashion, worrying incessantly about what they’re going to wear. This parallels exactly the requirements in the previous passage that the women dress themselves in a “gentle and quiet spirit.”
Paul then continues the clarification with a definitional phrase to make clear what he meant. He does this by way of a material example: “but [they should adorn themselves] with what is proper for women who profess godliness—with good works.” Paul is saying that the woman’s focus should not be on her manner of dress, but rather on the good works “which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” Ephesians 2:10.
I know that we are all prone to this sort of idolatry of our “favorite” doctrines—holding them in higher regard than scripture at times. But the fact that we are all prone to this does not make this right. I urge all who see the name Stacy McDonald attached to a book, a blog, an article, a group, or a conference to beware. Don’t fall for the veneer. Do some research. Find the truth. You won’t find it in their books, blogs, articles, interviews, groups, etc.
- Under Much Grace – Perception, Prevarication, and Gathering Our Scattered Words
- Under Much Grace – A Review of Reviews of Passionate Housewives
- Under Much Grace – Prevarication in Patriarchy
- ThatMom – November 24
- ThatMom – December 1, 2007
(regarding Tim Bayly) - ThatMom – December 1, 2007
(regarding women’s roles) - That Mom – December 3, 2007
(on the term “white washed feminists” - ThatMom – December 7, 2007
(on Christian Decorum) - True Womanhood – Prarie Muffin Manifesto in the New Millennium
I will add more links to this list as I become aware of more documentation of this persistence in error ADDENDUM: See the comments to this post for more links (thank you to my commenters).
Another reason to love Lynchburg
As another installment in my ever-growing, but unintentional series on the reasons I love Lynchburg so much, you have to see my wife’s Easter Sunday post Happy Easter. I think the photo there speaks for itself, as did my wife.
It’s what you believe that matters
As happens each Easter, the mainstream media has been asking the question: Do you have to believe in the literal, bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ in order to call yourself a “Christian”? You hear a similar question at Christmas: Do you have to believe in the literal virgin birth…?”
This used to provide some mild amusement as the news anchors and invited guests showed that they had little knowledge of Christianity and its beliefs. But now it is frustrating as big name Evangelicals are paraded in front of the camera with such answers as, “I don’t want to say that anyone MUST believe what I believe,” and, “It’s not up to me to decide whether or not you’re a Christian.” No one wants to actually come out and defend the Word of God.
Except for a small group of heroes, one of them being Dr. Al Mohler of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Whose column in Saturday’s Washington Post included:
The literal, historical, bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead is the vindication of Christ’s saving work on the cross. The issue is simple—no resurrection, no Christianity. For this reason, belief in the resurrection of Christ is essential in order to be a Christian.
The resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead is the central miracle of the Christian faith. As the New Testament reveals, the resurrection represents the Father’s complete satisfaction in the obedience of the Son—even unto death. Sin and death do not have the final word. Indeed, they are defeated through the saving work of Christ.
The resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead separates Christianity from all mere religion—whatever its form. Christianity without the literal, physical resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead is merely one religion among many.
Read the full text of Dr. Mohler’s excellent article here.
Blog Header – March 23, 2008
Mark 16:6 – Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He is risen!
This week’s blog header photo is from our backyard. I created these blog headers late last year except for a few that I added when we had a snow storm last month. I did not know which week Easter would fall on when I chose which header I would use for each week of the year. So as I prepared to change the blog header this week, I realized that I would likely need to create a new one for this week to address the fact that today is Resurrection Sunday.
But before I did so, I looked in my files to see what had originally been slated for this week. It was this photo, which I think perfectly suits this holiday—this celebration of Jesus Christ’s victory over sin and death. “O Death, where is your sting? O grave, where is your victory?”
Praise the Lord! He is risen! Hallelujah!
By His grace - For His glory 