Training Children: The Way They Should Go

“Remember children are born with a decided bias towards evil, and therefore if you let them choose for themselves, they are certain to choose wrong (J.C. Ryle, The Duties of Parents, p. 11).”

Training Children: Patience

“The whetstone does its work slowly, but frequent rubbing will bring the scythe to a fine edge. Truly there is need of patience in training a child, but without it nothing can be done (J.C. Ryle, The Duties of Parents, p. 10).”

1 Cor. iv. 20: Power

John Calvin believed that preaching is dead when Ministers of the Word rely solely on ornate preaching. A Minister of the Word that is filled with the Holy Spirit ought to preach in accordance with the Spirit: namely, in Power.

Calvin commenting on 1 Corinthians iv.20 (For the kingdom of God is not in word, but in power.) -- As the Lord governs the Church by his word, as with a sceptre, the administration of the gospel is often called the kingdom of God. Here, then, we are to understand by the kingdom of God whatever tends in this direction, and is appointed for this purpose—that God may reign among us. He says that this kingdom does not consist in word, for how small an affair is it for any one to have skill to prate eloquently, while he has nothing but empty tinkling [sound of tinkling in the air]. Let us know, then, a mere outward gracefulness and dexterity in teaching is like a body that is elegant and of a beautiful colour, while the power of which Paul here speaks is like the soul. We have already seen that the preaching of the gospel is of such a nature, that it is inwardly replete with a kind of solid majesty. This majesty shows itself, when a minster strives by means of power rather than of speech—that is, when he does not place confidence in his own intellect, or eloquence, but, furnished with spiritual armour, consisting of zeal for maintaining the Lord’s honour—eagerness for raising up of an invincible constancy—purity of conscience, and other necessary endowments, he applies himself diligently to the Lord’s work. Without this, preaching is dead, and has no strength, with whatever beauty it may be adorned. Hence in his second epistle, he says, that in Christ nothing avails but a new creature (2 Cor. v. 17)—a statement which is to the same purpose. For he would have us not rest in outward masks, but depend solely on the internal power of the Holy Spirit.

CREC: History of the CREC

My wife and I have attended Trinity Evangelical Church, located in Larwill, Indiana, for two years. Look us up on the web: http://www.trinity-evangelical.org/. Trinity is currently a candidate church in the CREC (Confederation of Reformed Evangelical Churches). Look them up on the web: http://www.crechurches.org/.

In 2004, at the eighth Presbytery of the CREC, a report on the history of the CREC was presented; the concluding paragraphs stated: We in the CREC are recovering from 20th century fundamentalism and pietism. As pietists, we tried to be relevant to culture and to make a difference, but we learned that the more relevant we tried to become, the more shallow and fragmented, and at last, the less relevant, we became. As fundamentalists, we wanted to hold up the Bible as our standard of truth, but we came to learn that without owning the church as the “pillar and ground of the truth,” a high Bible is no longer a precious Covenant document, but Gnostic emptiness. God protected us from ourselves. He protected us through all our silly political lobbying, our taste for Contemporary Christian music, and our media-frenzied vision for ministry, even as we neglected the church. He has been kind to show us our folly, and to restore us to our mother. We in the CREC are in love with our creeds and confessions and liturgies and our church government. For our merciful God has rescued us out of the 20th century.

I relate to that history, especially the parts about being rescued from ourselves by a merciful God.

The Gentle Imperative

"Can a mortal ask questions which God finds unanswerable? Quite easily, I should think. All nonsense questions are unanswerable. How many hours are there in a mile? Is yellow square or round? Probably half the questions we ask -- half our great theological and metaphysical problems -- are like that."- C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

Myself included, this quote would have saved some of my buddies in college a great deal of heartache. We all could have used the gentle imperative, "Easy, Trigger!"

Lord of Patterns, Again

In an essay on “How to Chant the Psalms,” James B. Jordan says, “Just how important is this shape of the text? Well, our answer will depend on how we view the Word of God. Is the Word merely information, or does it shape our thinking and our lives in other ways as well? Does the shape of the text shape us? Does it change how we think, in subtle ways, enabling us to live in God’s world more perfectly? I submit that to ask such questions is virtually to answer them. Certainly the shape of God’s Word is an aspect of the Word, and should be brought across as much as possible in translation and reading.”

Is the pattern of God’s creation week an aspect of the creation? Does the Lord only want to fill our heads with ideas, or does he want to make our bodies and spirits fat with holy patterns, shapes, rites, and real, physical objects (water, bread, wine, etc)? We serve, me thinks, the Lord of pattern and shape, and I believe that we ought to pay attention to Biblical patterns and shapes, for it will cause us to mature in a manner that is cruciform.

The Lord of Patterns

Quote taken from the fifth chapter of The Answers Book : “The fourth commandment in Ex 20:9 tells us that we are to work six days and rest for one. The justification for this is given in Ex 20:11, "For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it". This is a direct reference to God's creation week in Ge 1:1-31. To be consistent (and we must be), whatever is used as the meaning of the word day in Ge 1:1-31 must also be used here. If you are going to say the word day means a long period of time in Genesis, then it has been already shown that the only way this can be is in the sense that the day is an indefinite or indeterminate period of time--not a definite period of time. Thus, the sense of Ex 20:9-11 would have to be "six indefinite periods shall thou labour, and rest a seventh indefinite period"! This, however, makes no sense at all. By accepting the days as ordinary days, we understand that God is telling us that He worked for six ordinary days and rested for one ordinary day to set a pattern for man--the pattern of our seven-day week, which we still have today! In other words, here in Ex 20:1-26 we learn the reason why God took as long as six days to make everything--He was setting a pattern for us to follow, a pattern we still follow today.”

The Lord created the world in six literal days. He created real, physical things. When He was finished, He rested. In the Book of Exodus the Lord commands Israel to model their week after the original creation week – resting one day and performing dominion work for six days. As noted above, we still follow this pattern today!

Dominion Work: We are caretakers of the real, physical world the Lord created. We work for six days. We sweat and we bleed to make this world beautiful and protect it from satanic powers. The Lord expects us to transform this world from glory to glory, in the same manner that a father expects his son-in-law to protect and increase the beauty of his daughter, which he graciously gave to the young man at the altar of marriage. A bride-to-be is beautiful and full of glory, but a wife who has been protected and cared for by her husband, she is even more beautiful, even more glorious. When a wife is made beautiful by her husband and has brought forth children who call her blessed, she is transformed from glory to glory. So too creation, which the Lord instructed Adam to tend and protect, will be transformed from glory to glory by her husbandman.

Day of Rest: Churches need to be encouraged in both dominion work and rest. Lord’s Day worship ought to provide rest from and prepare Churches for dominion work. It is good for man to rest and feast; it is good for man to work and execute dominion. When men harvest diamonds from the earth and carve them, setting them in rings so they might woo and adorn women (one way to transform women from glory to glory), that is godly, dominion work. When men build rockets, cram inside of them like canned sardines and start to count down, in order that they may explore the outreaches of space, they are performing godly, dominion work. When man gathers every Lord’s Day to sing holy songs and partake of Christ’s flesh and blood, they rest and feast in a manner that is godly.
Sing praise to the Lord of patterns, who has graciously provided a pattern for dominion and rest!

Evangelicalism

Whatever I tell you in the dark, speak in the light; and what you hear in the ear, preach on the housetops. And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. Are not two sparrows sold for a copper coin? And not one of them falls to the ground apart from your Father's will. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows. Therefore whoever confesses Me before men, him I will also confess before My Father who is in heaven. But whoever denies Me before men, him I will also deny before My Father who is in heaven. Matthew 10:27-33

But he (Stephen), being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up stedfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God, and said, Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God. Acts 7:55-56

Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many witnesses. 1 Timothy 6:12

An Optimistic Eschatology

"And the work of righteousness shall be peace; and the effect of righteousness quietness and assurance for ever." Isaiah 32:17

Samuel 21:15-22: Those Who Kill Giants

In 2 Samuel 21:15-22 several Philistine giants are killed by warriors of the Lord (Abishai killed Ishbibenob, 21:17; Sibbechai killed Saph, 21:18; Elhanan killed the brother of Goliath the Gittite , 21:19; and Jonathan killed a man with six fingers per hand and six toes per foot, 21:21). (All of this occurs under the leadership of King David.)

When Israel was under the leadership of Saul, there was no man found within the armies of Israel, except for David the shepherd boy, who would go out to face a Philistine giant (Goliath).
However, under the righteous leadership of King David, Israel has become a nation of Davids, slaying giants. Under the leadership of King David, Israel kills the enemies of Yahweh.

Prayer for Bread

Blessed art thou, Lord our God, king of the universe, who brings forth bread from the earth. We thank you for this Table Fellowship, its unity and intimacy; it is because of this feast that man is able to come from the east and west, the north and the south, and sit down in the kingdom of God. Lord, we will celebrate the death of your Son and his resurrection until he returns again. Come, Lord Jesus. Amen.

The Hoosier Alleyway

gray sky and muddy snow and scuffed shoes
Yellow Balloon still caught in the branches
of the neighbors tree

going to work really is not
that bad, praise the Lord,
after all

Barth and Altizer

Couple quotes (empasis added):

"The individual in the Church certainly cannot and ought not to accept it (Holy Scripture) as Holy Scripture just because the Church does. He can and should himself be obedient only to Holy Scripture as it reveals itself to him and in that way forces itself upon him, as it compels him to accept it. But he still has to remember that Scripture is the Word of God for and to the Church, and that there it is only in the Church that he can meaningfully and legitimately take up an attitude to Scripture. Whatever his private judgment may be, even his private judgment of faith, however much it may diverge, he must always listen to the Church. . . . As such, so long as the Church does not revise it, i.e., restrict or widen it, we have to respect it. As such, it has the character of a direction which no one can simply ignore (Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics)."

“A truly contemporary theology can only begin its task today by first seeking a ground outside of the given and established form of the Church. . . . Yet theology need not necessarily be bound to the life of the Church, not even to the vanguard of the Church, for theology must seek the presence of Christ in the world. The first duty of the Christian theologian is loyalty to Christ, and he must strive to open his thinking to the universal presence of Christ, to the presence of Christ in the totality of human experience. Above all, a contemporary form of theology is in quest of a contemporary form of Christ. In our situation this must mean that theology is now called to listen fully to the world, even if such a listening demands a turning away fro the church’s witness to Christ. At a time when Christian theology is called upon to pass through the most radical revolution in its history, the theologian must not be thwarted from his goal by a false loyalty to the authority of the Church (T.J.J. Altizer, The Gospel of Christian Atheism, pp.9-10).”

Prayer for Wine

Heavenly Father, we thank you for this Cup and the blood of grapes symbolizing the blood of the True Vine, Jesus Christ, our Lord and Saviour. Thank you, gracious Lord, for reconciliation and new life by the power and presence of the Holy Spirit as we participate in Jesus’ transfigured humanity. May we proclaim the Lord’s death until He returns, for you have chosen to strengthen and renew us at this most blessed table. Come, Lord Jesus. Amen.

Peter Pan

Portrait of a Modern Man

Wishing I were Peter Pan
That I did not know any stories
Which would be a marvelous excuse
For being the Meathead and Ass
That I am

But unlike Peter Pan
My friend does not call me an Ass
Or at least not to my face
Only prolonging my misery and
Wretched state

East of Harmon Street

The Hoosier Alleyway

I like to watch the Cars on the road intersecting the alleyway
Which I walk along as I shortcut across the town to work
The Cars come and go and I watch them
My head looking left to right and back again

One would think I was at the All England Lawn Tennis Club
And that the Cars were tennis balls being volleyed between the giants
But no -- they are still Automobiles and I am still in the alleyway
Pretending that their exhaust is either large cotton-balls or
The ghosts of dogs nipping at their heals

Credo

“The Church, though dispersed throughout the whole world, even to the ends of the earth, has received from the apostles and their disciples this faith: [She believes] in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and the sea, and all things that are in them; and in one Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who became incarnate for our salvation; and in the Holy Spirit, who proclaimed through the prophets the dispensations of God, and the advents, and the birth form a virgin, and the passion, and the resurrection from the dead, and the ascension into heaven in the flesh of the beloved Christ Jesus, our Lord, and His [future] manifestation from heaven in the glory of the Father “to gather all things in one,” and to raise up anew all flesh of the whole human race, in order that to Christ Jesus, our Lord, and God, and Saviour, and King, according to the will of the invisible Father, “every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess” to Him, and that He should execute just judgment towards all; that He may send “spiritual wickednesses,” and the angels who transgressed and became apostates, together with the ungodly, and the unrighteous, and the wicked, and the profane among men, into everlasting fire; but may, in exercise of His grace, confer immortality on the righteous, and holy, and those who have kept His commandments, and have persevered in His love, some from the beginning [of their Christian course], and others from [the date of] their repentance, and may surround them with everlasting glory (Against Heresies, Book I.X).”

Treasure Maps

All children love treasure maps, the same way all Rabbis love the Torah. A little child will spend hours hovered around a treasure map, his or her youthful eyes carefully considering every signpost and legend. If it is true that a Rabbi hopes the Lord will write the words of the sacred text upon his heart, then it is also true that a child hopes the Lord will give them the grace to memorize the map key. If it is true that a Rabbi will carefully consider every letter for the purpose of drawing some spiritual insight from the sacred text, then it is also true that a child will carefully consider every crooked tree and collimating river. The Rabbi knows that there is a Treasure beyond all treasures in the sacred text, the same way a child knows that the rivers on the map feed into some hidden lagoon, which once hosted a Pirate’s Armada bloated with bullion. And, of course, the focal point of every treasure map is that formidable and mysteriously looming X. It is always bold and black, stylized by the nuances and curvatures of some ancient font.

All types of joy and excitement are identified and contained within that mysterious X, for it is equal to some known unknown, the same way an X is used in a basic math problem. For a child, the X represents all the joy that newfound discovery has to offer.

Today, however, children are no longer seeking after buried treasures. The youth of today have grown up too quickly. They are too much like their parents, for they no longer care to be surprised by joy and they no longer care to commit themselves to the pursuit of the known unknown.

The youth of today have replaced the symbol on the treasure map with another image, a symbol masquerading as the original symbol. This new image lies in their living room. It nearly always makes the list denoting contents of their bedrooms. If you stroll along any parkway or in any local bookstore, you will see it referred to on billboards and magazine racks. It has pervaded their every thought, even to the point that their newest gaming console has been constructed in the exact shape of their imposturous symbol. It is just as obvious as the X marked on a vile of poison, a label which declares the presence of dangerous contaminants. And it is this new X, the one displayed on billboards and in magazines, the same image which is sitting upon their living floors, which prophetically utters, in the same fashion that a vile containing poison does, “Do not take a single step closer, for the thing before you is known to kill. Mystery and game do not lay herein, for only pain and disenchantment are derived from such things. There is no mystery, only the ability to end all mystery; and there are no games, only the possibility of ending all games. And if you fail to pay attention to my advice, then you will have forfeited your ability to ever again be surprised by discovery and joy!”

These new youth, though there is nothing original about them, are counterfeit. Some people say that youth is wasted on the young, but this is not true of the youth I was formerly speaking of, but it is true of these latter youth. The youth of today have failed to fulfill their duty to participate in the games naturally created by life. They no longer choose to participate and fulfill the requirements of what it means to be a son, a brother, an extended family member, or a child. They do not look to the sky and wonder, and they refuse to look at something as static as a treasure map. They want dynamics, and because of this lust they have abdicated their responsibility as little children to run around wild as mother wit, yet all the while maintaining reverence for mother wisdom.

And the tragedy of it all is this: The youth are not to blame, for they have been misled by those who came before them. It is you and I who are responsible for their shortcomings, for we handed them snakes and rocks, and in so doing, we failed to give them wine and bread.

P & Q

The old adage “mind your own P’s and Q’s” originated in European pubs. Occasionally when the congregants of those joyful establishments gathered they became unruly, and in such cases, the bartender would then tell the patrons to “mind their own pints and quarts.”

Now, there is a little lesson to be learned from the words of the wise bartender, who was acting as a cleric of sorts, and that lesson is this: though man and all of creation surrounding and within which man inhabits was created by God, it is oftentimes the case that man becomes unruly, for he is a fallen man.

Unfortunately the type of unruliness that plagues man most often is in regard to his treatment of leisure. It is not sinful for a man to enjoy a strong and aged drink, just as it is not sinful for mankind to enjoy the entertainment provided by that sport originally called “football.” The drink and the competitive spirits are both commendable. In and of themselves they are good, but a virtue is always mirrored by a vice, and this situation is without exception. We live well when we honor God through the participation and enjoyment of His blessings of leisure, a category in which strong drink and sport consist. The vice of such enjoyments occurs when we become unruly, and in so doing, we fail to mind our own P’s and Q’s.

Oftentimes we have witnessed a man at our favorite pub that provokes others into an intoxicated brawl. Likewise, when athletes become unruly, they perform deeds by which they display unsportsmanlike conduct. In both scenarios men have failed to mind their own P’s and Q’s. Mankind can either thank God for strong drink by not drinking too much, or he can drink too much and rob God of thanks and honor. An athlete can either thank God for sport and competition, or he can conduct himself in an unsportsmanlike fashion, much to the dismay of robbing the Sovereign Lord of praise and honor. If we have failed to mind the P’s and Q’s of leisure, then we have failed to honor God appropriately and reverently.

The advent season is a time in which Christians celebrate the human birth of the Son of God, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who was a gift to creation from the Master of the Universe (John 3:16). We ought to celebrate well during this season, but in order to do so we must ensure that we mind our own P’s and Q’s. We will accomplish this by not allowing the other gifts of God, especially the gift of entertainment and leisure, to replace the greatest gift of God, the gift of Jesus Christ!

G.K. Chesterton’s Orthodoxy: An Excerpt Per Chapter

1. I have attempted in a vague and personal way, in a set of mental pictures rather than in a series of deductions, to state the philosophy in which I have come to believe. I will not call it my philosophy; for I did not make it. God and humanity made it; and it made me.

2. Modern masters of science are much impressed with the need of beginning all inquiry with a fact. The ancient masters of religion were quite equally impressed with that necessity. They began with the fact of sin -- a fact as practical as potatoes. . . . But the cross, though it has at its heart a collision and a contradiction, can extends its four arms for ever without altering its shape. Because it has a paradox in its centre it can grow without changing. The circle returns upon itself and is bound The cross opens its arms to the four winds; it is a signpost for free travelers.

3. You cannot call up any wilder vision than a city in which men ask themselves if they have any selves.

4. I have always been more inclined to believe the ruck of hard-working people than to believe that special and troublesome literary class to which I belong. . . . As long as wit is mother wit it can be as wild as it pleases.

5. And my haunting instinct that somehow good was not merely a tool to be used, but a relic to be guarded, like the goods from Crusoe’s ship -- even that had been the wild whisper of something originally wise, for, according to Christianity, we were indeed the survivors of a wreck, the crew of a golden sip that had gone down before the beginning of the world.

6. And the more I considered Christianity, the more I found that while it had established a rule and order, the chief aim of that order was to give room for good things to run wild.

7. The only intelligible sense that progress or advance can have among men, is that we have a definite vision, and that we wish to make the whole world like that vision. If you like to put it so, the essence of the doctrine is that what we have around us is the mere method and preparation for something that we have to create. This is not a world, but rather the material for a world. God has given us not so much the colours of a picture as the colours of a palette. But he has also given us a subject, a model, a fixed vision. We must be clear about what we want to paint.

8. A miracle simply means the swift control of matter by mind. . . . A holiday, like Liberalism, only means the liberty of man. A miracle only means the liberty of God. You may conscientiously deny either of them, but you cannot call your denial a triumph of the liberal idea.

9. The man who lives in contact with what he believes to be a living Church is a man always expecting to meet Plato and Shakespeare tomorrow at breakfast. He is always expecting to see some truth that he has never seen before. . . . Joy, which was the small publicity of the pagan, is the gigantic surprise of the Christian.