The Tradition of Life Wednesday, Oct 28 2009

An elderly Rabbi was once on an airplane to Israel sitting next to a self-professed atheist. They were amicably chatting the whole trip.

Every now and then, the Rabbi’s grandchild, sitting in another row, would come over to him, bringing him a drink, or asking if he could get anything to make him more comfortable. After this happened several times, the atheist sighed, “I wish my grandchildren would treat me with such respect. They hardly even say hello to me. What’s your secret?”

The Rabbi replied:

“Think about it. To my grandchildren, I am two generations closer to Adam and Eve, the two individuals made by the hand of G‑d. So they look up to me. But according to the philosophy which you teach your grandchildren, you are two generations closer to being an ape. So why should they look up to you?”

Beliefs have consequences. If children today lack respect and are unable to honor their elders, if tradition looked down upon and the values of the past all but forgotten, is it not a natural consequence of modern education? If we teach our children that they are merely advanced animals, then they will act that way. And they will treat their parents and teachers like the obsolete versions of humanity that they are.

We have to be aware of the effects of our beliefs. If we believe that humans came about by accident, then life has no meaning. There can be no meaning to something that happens by chance. A random explosion or mutation cannot give us purpose. My life, your life and all human history has no real significance whatsoever. Whether I live a good life or one full of evil makes no difference. It is all a big accident anyway.

We only have purpose if we were created on purpose. Our lives only have meaning if we were created by a meaningful being. If we teach our children that they were created on purpose with a purpose, then they will know that more is expected from them than from an animal. The Adam and Eve story needs to be taught, not just because it is true, but because it is the basis of morality.

Both creationism and Darwinism require faith. To accept that G‑d created man and woman requires faith. To accept that a single-celled organism spontaneously mutated billions of times to form the human being also requires faith. But only one of these beliefs demands that we live a moral life. That’s the one I want my children to be taught.

From Chabad.org

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Be Ye Rememberers of God Friday, Oct 23 2009

The struggle to attain to the impossibly lofty heights of the One and Only is a struggle shared by peoples of all faiths or none, willingly or not. The Jewish Orthodox Rabbi, Pinchas Lapide, in speaking of the human propensity to divide the indivisible says this:

“…our tiny human brain cannot comprehend this All-Unity and therefore it divides it into two or three. That is not only Christian; it is also true for certain circles within Judaism, which go as far as ten. The Cabalists have a ten-level theology. That strikes normal Jews such as myself as illogical, and precisely therefore, perhaps, it also belongs in the faith world of Israel.”

The Christian concept of “The Word” as equal to and indivisibly God is rooted in the tradition handed down to Abraham by the three angels, near the great trees at Mamre.

While Mamre is a defining place in monotheism it is not a titular Name of God. Indeed it is “mis”-spelt in “Memra” (“M-m-r”) there being no vowels in Aramaic. Nonetheless this serves as a reminder that formidable linguistic barriers stand between man and even the concept of a most high and holy God.

The Christian understanding of “The Shekinah” too, is equally and indivisibly the God of Hebrew Tradition. Thus when John the Apostle speaks of a Light that shone in the darkness and the Word that was with God from the beginning, he was addressing both Hebrew and Aramaic traditions.

The Book of John does not speak of some nebulous light of a eureka moment. It’s author was intimately attuned to the testimony of the living, indivisible and Thrice Holy God who confronts mankind in the silence of the year zero and whose glory fills the whole universe, as much as the Temple in Jerusalem:

“In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of His robe filled the Temple. Above him were Seraphim, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. And they were calling to one another:

‘Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is full of His glory’

And at the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the Temple was filled with smoke”.

Isaiah 6:1-4

You see why confusion reigns. Here is a world that is willing to believe in a tooth fairy and a Santa, but not in justice and righteousness.

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The two olive branches Wednesday, Oct 21 2009

The Roman Catholic Church has come under fire again, in the UK’s The Times.

Dr Williams was notified formally only last weekend by the Vatican and looked uncomfortable at a joint press conference with the Archbishop of Westminster, the Most Rev Vincent Nichols, to announce the plan. Anglicans privately accused Rome of poaching and attacked Dr Williams for capitulating to the Vatican. Some called for his resignation. Although there was little he could have done to forestall the move, many were dismayed at his joint statement with the Archbishop of Westminster in which they spoke of Anglicans “willing to declare that they share a common Catholic faith and accept the Petrine ministry as willed by Christ for his Church”.

Apparently, the Archbishop of Canterbury was unaware of the RCC “scheme” to incorporate what Catholics see as errant Anglicans, into the (Catholic) faith.

While unity is good, it is crucial that we understand that it can only take place through the working of God’s Holy Spirit. The incessant babbling of spirits that roam the earth  here, here, here and even here; are nothing but distractions that serve to confuse.

It is advisable therefore, that Anglicans inform themselves fully on the practical consequences of theological union with Rome and of course, on the spiritual foundations of the “Petrine ministry” so perfectly encapsulated in the eschatological dynamic of Ezekiel 37- the basis of the ministry of Jesus and the Apostles.

“Lo my people, I am going to open your graves and bring you up from them; I will bring you back to the land of Israel. Then you, my people, will know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves and bring you up from them”.

Ezekiel 37:11-14

How clear is that?

‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I am going to take the stick of Joseph—which is in Ephraim’s hand—and of the Israelite tribes associated with him, and join it to Judah’s stick, making them a single stick of wood, and they will become one in my hand.’

Ezekiel 37:19

Unity is fleshed out in the “how” of the hand of God; and in the “who” that is Joseph and Judah. This is real and lasting communion. To think and act otherwise is to be unwise and to invoke God’s jealous anger.

Patience and wisdom is called for.

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Hunting Children in Sudan Tuesday, Oct 20 2009

Ed Robbins’ TIME reportage on the so-called Lord’s Resistance Army in Western Equatoria  state in Christian South Sudan.

This is a perfect example of how God’s command word in the Decalogue can be misheard and turned on it’s head.

“God did not just overcome evil at the cross. He made evil serve the overcoming of evil. He made evil commit suicide in doing its worst evil”.

John Piper

As we have seen, Africa needs more than a regional treaty to end civicide (and indeed genocide). I only need look at what is happening to citizens (or potential citizens) in the West to know this.

more about “Hunting Children in Sudan“, posted with vodpod

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Amazon recommends Friday, Oct 9 2009

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Politics and hope at the horn of Africa Monday, Oct 5 2009

In December 2007, the government of Eritrea issued an ultimatum to the Orthodox church in Eritrea, demanding that all offerings and tithes be deposited directly into a government account from where salaries of priests would be paid. The government also placed limits on the number of priests that would be allowed to serve in each parish throughout the country.

The Pentecostal church in Eritrea meanwhile, has refused to allow herself to be placed under such control and remains an illegal entity as far as the government is concerned. Pentecostal Christians are forced to either renounce their faith (by signing recantation papers) or risk imprisonment, torture and conscription where they are forced to fight in the border war with Ethiopia.

Compass Direct estimate that more than 2,800 Christians remain imprisoned for their faith in Eritrea.

While there is more religious freedom in Ethiopia, repression has taken on more subtle forms as evidenced by a recent Ethiopian court ruling.

“There is an open conspiracy between judges, police and prison officers,” (one) church leader said. “Police speeded up the investigation and brought it to the district prosecutor’s attention within a day. Witnesses were organized to falsely testify at court. The judges passed the sentence refusing the right to defense.”

The full report from Compass Direct is available here.

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Idols of deaf, blind and dumb Saturday, Oct 3 2009

Does Michelin man have soul?

A band of self proclaimed atheists, having refused to countenance the idea that God exists (less still admit that He is the only preexistent, exalted Being) have at last turned their attention to the  human soul.

We are they say, little more than a machine, or at best an animal with limited capacity to think and feel.

Well, which is it? The spectacle can be witnessed on Atheist Central, a blog run by New Zealand born Christian minister Ray Comfort, who also runs an outreach ministry through his website Living Waters.

Back in 1977, Ray published More than Comfort where he put forward the idea that spiritual healing should take precedence over physical healing an idea that I agreed with in a previous post.

In a recent post, Lurker puts forward the idea that the human soul should not exist; or if it does it is more or less equivalent to a disembodied emoticon:

If you believe in an afterlife, you need to demonstrate that it is possible for emotions to exists outside the body (or even inside a dead body would suffice).

There’s nothing new in elevating scientism to the level of the theological, this after all is what anti-Semitism is all about – but in Lurker’s world which soul is allowed to live?

I decided that the only way to get through to an atheist is to understand the god they serve and make no mistake, atheists and agnostics serve one god or the other. Unsurprisingly, many ordinary atheists have a very healthy respect for the medical profession and for science in general.

It’s fair to say that the medical profession has enjoyed considerable success following Pasteur’s accidental discovery that antibodies from cows infected with smallpox could be used to develop a human vaccine. However, it is also true to say that said profession has also facilitated human destruction on an unprecedented scale in more recent years.

If you had to weigh this in balances, the wholesale slaughter of the innocent unborn (for instance) alone would outweigh by far, the potential good derived from medical discoveries.

It does seem to be the case that new types of cancers are discovered faster than cures can be developed, and that viruses and bacteria mutate faster than medical science can engineer their removal.

A recent New York Times report suggests that cancer mortality rates over the past 40 years have remained unchanged.

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How well do we know God? (Revisited) Wednesday, Sep 30 2009

Back in January, Jay Dyer expressed his profound disappointment with the founder of HeartCry Missionary Society, Brother Paul Washer.

I was, for several years, a huge fan and follower/disciple of Paul Washer. I thought he was a godly leader; a real missionary, and a true reformer. I had several of his sermons on tape and, in fact, made copies of his tapes and distributed them to my fellow college students who needed to hear the “true Gospel of God’s grace.” I met him and spoke with him on theology several times. However, I was on a Path that Paul Washer was not on.

I disagree with Jay. Placing an inordinate amount of trust in anyone other than God is never a good thing. Paul Washer has, on numerous occasions warned about the heart’s susceptibility to deception (see here).

Here’s the word on the street:

“Fear of man will prove to be a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord God is kept safe.”

Proverbs 29:25

Jay, wake up.

You ask what happened to the Church for 1,500 years. Well, effectively she traded the precious pearl of the gospel of Jesus Christ for a slice of Nicolatian pie (or, the council of Nicaea and the political patronage of the Byzantium Empire). The Arabic speaking peoples soon realized that had been duped as sought a break with the established order (they were fiercely discriminated against) borrowing heavily from sacred Jewish and Christian texts.  The rest you might say, is history.

By the time Jerusalem fell into the hands of the caliphs in the seventh century, the Church was already in theological hot water. In 1054 the eastern and western Churches parted ways and between 1095 – 1291 the western Church was wholly devoted to taking back the holy land, by means contrary to the revealed will of God.

“Not by military force and not by physical strength, but by My spirit,’ says the Lord of Hosts.”

Zechariah 4:6

That’s one argument in support of Sola Scriptura and it explains why Catholics of my grandparents generation were far more conversant with their missals than their bibles.

I do hope Jay realizes that these are the first signs of a denial of the sufficiency of Scripture. Historically, this has often been the first step down the very slippery slope of denying it’s inerrancy.

The Isaiah Wall, off First Avenue in New York City

Back in January, Jay Dyer expressed his disappointment with the founder of HeartCry Missionary Society, Paul Washer.

I was, for several years, a huge fan and follower/disciple of Paul Washer.  I thought he was a godly leader; a real missionary, and a true reformer. I had several of his sermons on tape and, in fact, made copies of his tapes and distributed them to my fellow college students who needed to hear the “true Gospel of God’s grace.” I met him and spoke with him on theology several times. However, I was on a Path that Paul Washer was not on.

Like Tim Conway and countless others, I have to disagree with Jay on this one. For starters, what’s a good man like Jay doing, placing an inordinate amount of trust in anyone other than God? Paul Washer has on many occasions warned about the heart’s susceptibility to deception, and this has always unforeseen consequences.

“So says the Lord: Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his arm, and whose heart turns away from the Lord. He shall be like a lone tree in the plain, and will not see when good comes.”

Jeremiah 17:5-6

Jay, wake up!

I’ll tell you what happened to the Church for 1,500 years, Jay. Jerusalem fell into the hands of the caliphs in 638 and for an odd couple of hundred years or so, between 1095 – 1291, she was fully committed to taking the holy land by military force. Well, the western church anyway. We know now (because we read our Bibles) that God did not instruct the prophets to advance the kingdom in violence and yet the battle cry was Deus vult!

“This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel, saying: ‘Not by military force and not by physical strength, but by My spirit,’ says the Lord of Hosts.”

Zechariah 4:6

That’s one argument in support of sola scriptura. Anyhow, this monumental act of rebellion was the cause of much trial and tribulation, which is still very much in evidence to this day. It was not that the “Holy Spirit forgot the Church” Jay, rather, it was the Church who forgot her rightful place in the kingdom.

Enter Martin Luther, and his 95 theses.

I do hope Jay recants on what appears to be the denial of the sufficiency of Scripture. This is always the first step down the slippery path to denying it’s inerrancy

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How well do you know God? Tuesday, Sep 29 2009

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Well worth watching Saturday, Sep 26 2009

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