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On January 12, 2015 By In Scribblings

H.R. Rookmaaker: The Reformational Fundamentalist

HR ROOK

Hans Rookmaaker, looking back on his “dogmatic struggle,” describes the necessity of accepting the Bible as God’s word:

“I do not think it is possible that someone can come to know God and his Son through the Bible and then end up as a liberal. If one is confronted with the biblical truth, as I was in those days, then it is a question of accepting or rejecting it. The Bible is either true or not true: there is no alternative. Of course, nobody who is going to read the Bible in this way, even if he or she does not accept it, will deny that there are beautiful words in it, wisdom and insight, but such a person will also see in the end that this is not the issue. The Bible comes to us, and came to me, with the demand to accept the gospel as a joyful message, God as Father and hence also his Son as Savior. That is not to say that a person, such as I was at that time, pondering everything the Bible was telling me and trying to understand the biblical world picture…did not see any problems. On the contrary, I still find it rather striking that at that time I personally experienced a dogmatic struggle, similar to the struggle of the early church, and finally came to an insight that turned out to be called ‘orthodox biblical Protestant.'”[i]

 

[i] Gasque, Laurel. Art and the Christian Mind: The Life and Work of H.R. Rookmaaker (Wheaton, Ill: Crossway Books, 2005), 56.

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I Belong to God: A Catechism for Covenant Children by Rich Lusk

On January 9, 2015 By In Scribblings

New Book from Rich Lusk: “I Belong to God: A Catechism for Covenant Children”

Our friends at Athanasius Press have announced the publication of an exciting new catechism for our covenant children. Athanasius Press describes the new book as:

“The real heart of catechesis is to form in our children a covenantal identity, a sense of belonging to God and to the church. Our children need to be taught who they are in Christ so they can live faithfully in the church, family, and world. We must train our children in such a way that their whole lives will be a grand Amen to their baptisms.”

While many children’s catechismal tools exist, Lusk’s work is certainly of a wider, more “catholic” breadth, while remaining digestible for our youngest children. Notably, Pastor Lusk emphasizes a clear presuppositional message: “God has saved you; now be loyal to him.”

Pastor Lusk adds, “When we tell our children that God is their Father and that Jesus died for their sins, we are telling them something true and helping them internalize their covenant identity.”

Rich Lusk is the father of four and the Pastor of Trinity Presbyterian Church in Birmingham, Alabama.  He is the author of Paedofaith: A Primer on the Mystery of Infant Salvation and a Handbook for Covenant Parents, as well as a contributing author to The Church Friendly Family, The Federal Vision, and The Case for Covenant Communion.

Buy the book from Athanasius Press for just $5 – Click here.

I Belong to God: A Catechism for Covenant Children by Rich Lusk

I Belong to God: A Catechism for Covenant Children
by Rich Lusk

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On January 8, 2015 By In Scribblings

Mark’s Gospel and the Victory of God

Watch Robert Barron (apologist extraordinaire) beautifully expound the first verse of Mark’s Gospel.<> разместить рекламу в гугле

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On January 6, 2015 By In Books, Politics, Scribblings

Theology as Language

Even when I quibble with points here and there, I never read Vinoth Ramachandra’s work without being moved and changed; Subverting Global Myths: Theology and the Public Issues Shaping Our World is no exception. Here’s a worthwhile nugget:

“Christian theology is more than a set of doctrinal beliefs or systematic arguments. It is a way of seeing, of so dwelling in a particular language and doing new things with that language that its revelatory and transformative power is manifest in the world. That language arose out of specific historical events that both constitute us as the ekklesia of Christ and call forth characteristic social practices such as thanksgiving, forgiving, exposing evil, truth-telling, welcoming the broken and the hopeless, and bearing testimony to grace. Such a theology seeks comprehensiveness, because it seeks to bear prophetic witness to One whose speech-acts heal, renew and transform the world in its entirety, but its own speech is always broken, sharing in the not-yet-redeemed character of the world.”<>mobi onlineреклама в гугл

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On December 16, 2014 By In Scribblings

General Thoughts on Douglas Wilson’s Against the Church

In this book, Doug Wilson does what he does best. He offers a return to ol’ time religion, but without altar calls and endless refrains of Just As I Am.  The book is divided into four sections. The first, the most controversial, is entitled Against the Church (also the title of the book). In it, he attacks liturgy, sacraments, infant anything, tradition, systematics and doctrine in favor of the new birth. Wilson’s central premise is that “it is only possible to be for the church in this effectual way if you begin mastering the case against ita. We, in liturgical traditions, value holy things and holy means. Doug writes that “God does not show sufficient respect for our holy things.” He means that our liturgical services are less than appetizing to God if God is not directing the holy.

God is the ultimate iconoclast. The Church has become a place of idolatry masqueraded by the holy. Part of the thesis is that we have arranged our holy furniture after our own desires, and thus, used them for our own purposes and as a result have left God out of the equation. Our house is being left desolate and we kinda like it as long as “our” sacred means are left untouched.

Wilson’s goal is to stress that outwardly we have beauty, but inwardly our churches are dying a thousand deaths because of the stench of death that has permeated our furniture. Central to this analysis is the necessity of the new birth. According to Pastor Wilson, we have failed to stress the new birth and also failed to make distinctions that the Bible makes concerning who is in and who is playing like he is in. In other words, true baptism changes the stuff inside and without that you only have a “wet member of the visible covenant” (18).

Wilson is not contra institution, he is after an institution with an evangelical heart (35). We cannot affirm a religion where the outward controls the inward, but the opposite is desired. What flows from the heart produces the type of church/liturgy that is pleasing in God’s eyes.

Engaging Doug Wilson and Some Other Notes

I love Doug Wilson. In order to let the reader know what my samba dance looks like, I should say upfront, this man has changed the direction of my life. He is my presiding minister in the denomination I serve. I have spent much time with him in meals, private conversations, phone calls, etc. My admiration for this man is truly heartfelt. God bless him. To make it even better, may the whole Trinity bless him. He’s a man for such a time as this.

So, here it comes…

Actually, nothing comes. I learned long ago from John Frame that throwing mud at friends is a losing strategy. And if I were to throw mud it would be very little. In fact, it would be the type of mud that my little kids may accidentally eat on a rainy day causing no tummy pain. I would simply say, “Well, look at that honey: little Zeke had a little mud for lunch, but I think it will help him make better distinctions between good food and food that may look good, but is not.” Then, we would laugh for a bit and move on.

I rarely finish a book these days. In fact, I can honestly say this is only the third book I have read from cover to cover this year, and in this case, the cover and its title gave me a quick heartache. I spend most of my time reading essays, various portions of books, commentaries, and writing a fair bit, but finishing a book is rare. Maybe because of the nature of my relationship with Doug and our denomination, I was able to work my way through the 212 pages of this book. I confess: this is not my favorite of Wilson’s books, and many of his books have I consumed in this last decade. But still, it was a needed book to consume, if only to perform a type of pastoral introspection that is needed from time to time.

Wilson sees things most of us can’t. Maybe it’s his view from Moscow that helps…you know, he’s near Russia and stuff. But from my vantage point–and I kid you not I am staring at the prettiest Florida waves ever a I write–the world down here is not in need of liturgical iconoclasts, but of any liturgy worth a darn. The south is replete with happy-happy-joy-joy Christianity. And sometimes my desire as a zealous disciple of Calvin (God rest his soul) is to use my clerical garb (which is magical, I hear) and walk right to a certain campus in my hometown that rhymes with Pee-See-See and start going all Book of Common Prayer on them. But alas, I actually did that and the looks I got….my, oh my!

Seriously, Doug’s points are valid. I know the liturgical dangers of loving something so much that we end up forgetting the point of the means; and the point is to show us how terribly idiotic we are if we forget the Point of the point.

So, kudos to Doug for pointing us to Jesus more fully; for making us more aware that bad people hide behind bread and wine and peace be with you. Also, thanks to Doug for directing us to the regeneration…whatever that means, it means new life, new world, and new order. And I want me some of that everyday and hope that the people I minister to want some as well. Great thanks also for calling us to lively worship; the kind that makes the kingdom of darkness tremble and God’s people rejoice.

Finally, my thanks to Doug for getting me in such great trouble in the last 12 years. It’s been real. As a result, I’ve seen happy babies, communing babies, spitting up babies, screaming babies, halleluiah babies, and my own babies. But I’ve seen them all, as a friend of ours would say, through new eyes. And to me, that matters a whole lot. In fact it matters so much that I am up for a good beer right now; the kind that is dark and foamy. Cheers for iconoclasts and to hell with the church choir if Jesus ain’t leading it.<>стоимость продвижения акреативная раскрутка в топ гугл

  1. Introduction  (back)

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On December 2, 2014 By In Scribblings

Thoughts on Ferguson and Race

Here I stand: a Latin American analyzing the Ferguson scene. What follows is a less-than-eloquent analysis, but an analysis nevertheless.

I have little to offer, except to say that I have been racially profiled on several occasions. At one time, when my hair was longer, I was stopped consistently at the airport. I have been asked if my country of origin is Morocco, Peru, or Guatemala, among others. I am actually from Brazil. My country has not been in a war in over 100 years. Lula, our former president, famously said, “why should I go to war? have you seen our beaches?” I feel the same way.

So, here I stand: a foreigner, generally opposed to warfare, a peace-making man, yet, often receiving suspicious looks from authority figures in our culture. To make the situation even more interesting, my father-in-law is a cop, and I have family members who are involved in politics, law, and respected positions in police departments in my home country. And to conclude the matter, I have family members in the process of adopting a black child. So I am in a pretty interesting spot, being immersed in both worlds.

I look at Ferguson with paradoxical eyes. On the one hand, I see simplifications of the situation all over the media. On the other hand, I see folks overly-complicating matters and offering the same old solutions to the race-problem. Here is an affirmation: racism exists. It is not as severe as it once was in American history, but it still exists. I have learned over the years that adopting the full narrative of the right — with whom I have much in common — is a bad idea. But to refuse to listen to the narrative of the left — with whom I have far less in common — is also a bad idea. Both sides have spoken concerning Ferguson. They have spoken so forcefully that you would think that one side is either drunk or lost in the sea of ignorance for not seeing the clarity of the opposing position.

I don’t feel the need to offer such antithetical statements. I think there are narratives on the left and on the right that actually get it right. I think a harmonized position can exist. I am not sure I have the wisdom to put it together coherently, but I do see the possibility.

Senator Rand Paul is right to criticize the justice system, and to recognize that there is a disproportionate amount of blacks in prison:

Three out of four people in jail for drugs are people of color. In the African American community, folks rightly ask why are our sons disproportionately incarcerated, killed, and maimed?

This is a reality that modern Republicans need to grasp. Many do not.

At the same time, Democrats must realize that fatherlessness is a huge factor in leading some in the black community to seek drugs or theft as an escape from absence in the home. White kids from fatherless homes also seek the same, but fatherlessness is a disease in the black community in a way that is not in the white community. Some have observed that homes where fathers are present do not necessarily guarantee a safe environment. This is very true. I have invested some of my time into studying domestic abuse and realize that in some cases, the presence of the father does more damage than his absence. But I am quick to say this is not most cases. In most cases, the presence of a stable father (or father figure) in the home provides greater and healthier options for black teens to thrive in society. The same, of course, can be said for the white community.

Another element missing is that theology needs to be joined to sociology. A sociological dimension needs to be added to these conversations. The children of Israel did not walk around 20-50 years later after their slavery and oppression, thinking that since time had passed, the Egyptians would now treat them with dignity. No, they were cognizant that the abuses they suffered left a cultural impression on them that they would not soon forget. Culturally speaking, the abuses seen in the South not long ago led to much of the skepticism in the black community toward the police, and that skepticism has bled over to many outside the black community.

We must also be reminded that the fifth commandment serves as an exhortation to honor those in authority. Police officers, for better or for worse, are placed in a position of protection over us. We may choose to reject their help, or to avoid contact with them, but we cannot go out of our way to disrespect or threaten them. We ought to give them the benefit of the doubt, treat them respectfully, and be at peace with them as much as possible. And in most cases, it is possible, but our stubbornness and perhaps previous bad experiences force us to view them with contentious eyes. We need to keep in mind that not all members of the police department in town are created equal. Each one has a conscience. So we ought to treat each one as worthy of our respect. The same, of course, needs to be said of how police officers treat citizens.

A soft answer almost always turns away wrath. We need to keep that in mind. We are not responsible for what people do or say to us, but we are responsible for how we react to what is said or done.

In this entire drama, there have been various redeeming episodes. There were the black men who protected a white man’s gas station, images of reconciliation that have captivated a nation, and an NFL player who spoke publically and directed the nation to Christ as redeemer. Every conflict is an opportunity to redeem the ugly. Some redemption has taken place. But there is no redemption when we affirm only one side of the story and dismiss the concerns of the other side. We owe our brothers and sisters the courtesy to see things through their eyes.<>коэффициент конверсии продажаудит интернет а

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On December 1, 2014 By In Scribblings

Cyber Monday Deal for Christian Pipe-Smoking and The Trinitarian Father, $0.99

As a way of saying thanks for your support, I am offering The Trinitarian Father and Christian Pipe-Smoking for $.99 each. Buy Now!

Christian Pipe-Smoking: $0.99

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On December 1, 2014 By In Scribblings

Planet Narnia: The Speechless Word

planet narnia bookI am currently reading Planet Narnia by Michael Ward. I am only halfway through, so this is not a full review, only some thoughts. I just want to catch you before you appropriate all your Christmas money; this may be a book you want under your tree with your name affixed to it.

The primary reason to read this book is that Lewis was a genius and the Narnia movies are, to put it bluntly, not. If you are watching the movies but not reading the Narniad to your children, then your children are learning lies about Lewis. Although it may be formally true that the films were “based on books written by C. S. Lewis,” it can only be true in the meanest sense. The movies are “action/adventures” for children; the books are the subtlest of fairy tales. The movies are the epitome of unliterary, while the Narniad nears the apex of literary. The Chronicles of Narnia are sublime, and Michael Ward proves it.

Michael Ward is unflinching in his thesis that Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia were shaped by medieval cosmology, which happens also to be a distinctively Christian cosmology. But instead of Lewis using Narnia as a bare metaphor, he wrote the Chronicles “along the light” of medieval astrology instead of looking directly at the light or even at the object on which the light was shining. The seven heavens are the atmosphere in which the stories live, not the focal point of the stories themselves. You are not supposed to read The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe and always be thinking of the planet Jupiter, but without the medieval understanding of Jupiter which Lewis employed as his “atmosphere’ for the tale, the tale would not exist as it does. It is distinctively Jovial, and Ward proves it.

He does the same for the other six books, neatly aligning them with the other six “planets”: Mercury, Venus, Luna, Sol, Mars, and Saturn. The book Cosmosis incredible—worthy to be read and reread.

I finished the Mercury chapter this morning. As we have just entered the Advent season, the following paragraph stood out to me:

In a sense, ‘the night was over at last’ is a pun, but a pun with a Christological significance, pointing, as it does, not just to the approaach of daylight but also to the effect of Aslan upon Shasta. For that matter, all good puns have Christological significance: first, because Christ himself was a punster; second because there was a divine wit at work (as Augustine recognized) when the Word became speechless (infans) in the infant Jesus; and third because of the essentially polemic import of the God-man. The incarnation of Christ, the enfleshment of the spiritual, is the tap-root of Lewis’s belief in meanings beyond the literal. It is the incarnation which sanctions and underwrites both his use of word-play, one of the lowest forms of wit, and his faith in the highest double meanings of all, which he calls symbols or sacraments. The highest does not stand without the lowest, and Lewis’s understanding of God is that he is both ‘unspeakably immanent’ and ‘unspeakably transcendent.’ To attempt to combine these theological perspectives without cancelling out their polarity was a bold endeavor and full of risk. The Horse and His Boy succeeds as well as it does because a river of Mercury runs through it.

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On November 26, 2014 By In Scribblings

C. S. Lewis: No Ordinary People, No Mere Mortals

lewis weight of glory“It may be possible for each to think too much of his own potential glory hereafter; it is hardly possible for him to think too often or too deep about that of his neighbor. The load, or weight, or burden of my nieghbour’s glory should be laid on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long, we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealing with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. This does not mean that we are to perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously—no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And out charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner—no mere tolerance, or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbor is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbor, he is holy in almost the same way, for in him also Christ vere latitat—the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden.” (emphasis mine)

–C. S. Lewis, “The Weight of Glory” p. 45

Order your own copy here.

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On November 13, 2014 By In Scribblings

Naming God’s World

I am currently rereading Nancy Pearcey’s Soul of Science. Here’s a juicy morsel from the conclusion of chapter 7:

“The primeval paradigm of human knowledge is the account of Adam’s naming the animals. Devising a suitable label for each animal required careful observation, analysis, and categorization, based on the way it was created. Adam couldn’t very well call a fish ‘woolly creature with four legs’ or a bird ‘scaled creature with fins.’ He had to reflect the world as God made it.

Yet Genesis tells us ‘God brought the animals to Adam to see what he would call them.’ God did not prescribe one right name, one correct way to describe an animal. He left room for Adam to be creative, both in the features he chose to focus on and in the terms he selected to describe the animal. In this simple paradigm Genesis gives the Biblical basis for all the arts and sciences. On the one hand, we root our work in the external world God has created, and, on the other hand, we freely exercise the creativity and imagination He has given us.” (page 160)<>биржи текстов отзывытоп ов работы

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