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On November 18, 2021 By In Discipleship, Theology, Wisdom

Ant Wisdom

The wisdom that Solomon desires for his son is the wisdom that works. Wisdom worked from the beginning creating and ordering the world (Pr 3.19-20; 8.22-31). As the image of Wisdom, man is a worker, creating, ordering, and bringing productivity within the creation over which God set him to rule. We are world-makers, beginning with ordering the plot of creation that is uniquely ours–our own persons–and extending that dominion to wherever God grants us responsibility and authority.

God has created and commanded us to work. As Solomon’s son is moving into his maturity, the kingly stage of his life, Solomon is concerned that he understands his responsibilities as a worker and the tempting threats he will face as he fights the post-fall creation. Sin not only made the creation outside of man resistant to his dominion activity, but sin has also twisted man as a worker. We fight the curse of sin without and within.

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On November 4, 2021 By In Culture, Discipleship, Theology, Wisdom

The Salvation of Works

In all toil there is profit….

Proverbs 14.23

“Help Wanted” signs are up all over the country. Businesses are struggling, not only to find competent workers, but warm bodies who will show up. Jobs are available, but many people don’t want to work. On his November 2, 2021 show, Matt Walsh reported that three out of four unemployed able-bodied men of working age simply don’t want to work. Some of the biggest industries hit are the leisure and hospitality sectors. Vox, drawing data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, reports that there are 1.7 million job openings in the industries, ten percent of the entire industry, with another one million quitting. Theories concerning the loss of drive to work, especially among able-bodied men, are many. Some attribute it to low pay (although some places are paying higher wages than they ever have). Others attribute it to the government’s quantitative easing through printing money, extending and expanding unemployment benefits, and sending out stimulus checks, disincentivizing workers who make more staying home than they would at work. Walsh attributes the problem to despair and purposelessness.

A perfect storm is brewing that has been created between the factors mentioned and many more that has already and will leave devastation in its wake. But all of this gives us the opportunity to ask ourselves, “Why do we work?” If work is only about getting a paycheck and the government provides that, why shouldn’t I get on the dole like everyone else and ride this gravy train until the last stop? The sheer mechanics of God’s world tell us that this is unstainable. You have to engage in some level of work to continue to survive. Remove producers from society and soon we will be covered with a fruitless, unkempt world that will be our death.

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On October 21, 2021 By In Culture, Theology

The “Religion” Conspiracy

I’m not a “tin foil” hat kind of guy (though I’m beginning to sympathize with Alex Jones more and more these days). I don’t believe that there are conscious, concerted, deliberate government conspiracies behind everything that goes on in our society. However, the Western church has been the victim of a well-orchestrated conspiracy from at least the sixteenth century. The philosophical and cultural seeds that began to be sown almost five hundred years ago are bearing fruit in abundance today. This conspiracy was, no doubt, orchestrated by unseen forces; not merely the kind that meet in smoke-filled backrooms, but the demonic kind that empower those principalities and powers that pull the levers in government structures. All of these powers worked together to tame the church. A church that believes that the kingdom of Christ extends over every area of human existence–individuals as well as institutions–must be subdued.

Many have tried to subdue it through persecution. We have experienced this from our earliest days as the church. The principalities and powers believed that they could stamp out our passions by exterminating the church. Some still try to do this in Muslim and communist-dominated countries. What they find is that the more that they persecute us, the more we grow. Putting Christians to death is like planting seeds: we die and then spring up thirty, sixty, and one hundred-fold.

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On October 7, 2021 By In Theology, Wisdom

Wisdom’s Weapons

Whenever we think of safety or security, we may tend to think of being protected from anything that would disturb our comfort physically or emotionally. A generation has arisen in our society that certainly believes this. Authors Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt examine this obsession with what they call “safetyism” in their book The Coddling of the American Mind. Numerous examples are given from various parts of our society in which people seek the elimination of all threats, real or perceived, to what they consider their physical or emotional well-being. This is particularly true on college campuses, where historically a person goes to be challenged in order to sharpen his mind and skills. Now, we have “safe spaces” on campus. Professors who refuse to use preferred pronouns, question the legitimacy of gender fluidity, or dare confront the absurdities of Critical Theories have their careers ruined by people who are “traumatized.”

The security that God promises through Solomon in Proverbs has no resemblance to this sort of safetyism in our culture. The promise of wisdom’s security is not the promise of safety that a mother provides for an infant child, but the safety a shield and sword provide in war. Wisdom doesn’t shield you from discomfort and difficult decisions. Wisdom doesn’t protect you from challenges that will test your mettle. Wisdom is not a “safe space.” Wisdom is a weapon that protects you while you engage the world.

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On October 7, 2021 By In History, Theology

Why I am Happy Postmillennialist

Somewhere in the year 2000, I came into contact with a dangerous cargo filled with contrarian literature. I ate it all so quickly that the only questions I had afterward were some variation of “What’s for dinner?” and “May I have more, please?” I still keep eating contrarian literature, and I really hope that the end result is not that I become a curmudgeon, but that I find creative ways to inculcate those blessings into my community.

So, while we are at it, let me undo speculations among some two-kingdom scholars. They consistently claim that while Jesus has authority over all things, his authority does not provide or is intended to provide a tangible change in the cultural milieu. I, as a lovable contrarian, assert the exact opposite: that the kingdom of Jesus is comprehensive, and whatever it touches, it changes.

The kingdom is not limited to one sphere, nor are things heavenly to be severely differentiated from things earthly. And again, not to repeat the obvious, but the earthly city is not Babylon, nor do we live in this perpetual sense of exile and pilgrimage simply existing seeking a city that shall come.

We affirm that the people of God are headed somewhere to take something and claim Someone as Lord over the nations (Rom. 4:13) and that the city has come. Our agenda is to get people to see the ads and RSVP ASAP.

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On September 30, 2021 By In Theology, Wisdom

The Enemy Within

Throughout the book of Proverbs, Solomon warns his son of the enemies he will face. A few of those enemies are outside of his son. There is the perverted Band of Brothers who appear in chapter 1 and are alluded to elsewhere. They lie, steal, and pillage. They will play on the son’s God-given need to join with other men in a comradery of mission to take dominion. But their commitment to a distorted dominion makes them an enemy to be avoided. Then there is Harlot Folly who plays on the need of the son for a helper. She seduces with short-term benefits without long-term commitment and will only help him in dwelling in the abode of the dead, not in his mission to build God’s house. Her seduction is to be avoided for she is an adversary.

But there is another enemy with much more influence over our lives than the perverted Band of Brothers or Harlot Folly. This enemy resides within each of us and poses the greatest threat to our well-being. This enemy is our own hearts.

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On September 23, 2021 By In Theology, Wisdom

Unafraid of Immortal Wounds

What, if anything, keeps you awake at night? Are there any anxieties or fears that roll through your mind that keep you from sleeping? This is a common question in the business world, especially for the owners or leaders that feel the stress to keep the business going knowing that not only do their livelihoods but others’ livelihoods are dependent on them. But you don’t have to be a boss or owner of a company to experience stresses that create insomnia. Any fear of loss that stems from a real or perceived lack of power to control people and situations can create stress that will rob sleep from you. You can worry about family finances, personal health, the health of family members, loss of job, loss of relationships because of tensions, and a myriad of other things.

In the end, what keeps us up at night is the lack of security. We feel threatened with some sort of loss accompanied by the powerlessness to change things. We sleep well when we feel secure.

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On September 9, 2021 By In Theology, Wisdom

Wisdom: Guardian Against Lies

Toward the end of the long sentence that is Proverbs 2, Solomon promises his son that the way of wisdom is safe, guarding and preserving him from the perverted speech of both men (2.12-15) and women (2.16-19). God calls the son to a mission of dominion, a mission that requires that he become a brother in arms with other men in fulfilling our masculine duty as well as finding a personal helper, a woman who will aid him in building a house, being fruitful and multiplying. There are fallen men and women out there who submit to the father of lies and because they bind themselves to him, they assume his nature as liars. They make false promises concerning the mission. Their lies promise you that you can defy reality–the way God made and sustains the world–and, in the end, find the same rest, peace, and security that God promises.

Both men and women use perverted speech, lies, to try to seduce the son. The men want the son to join their marauding gang (cf. Pr 1.10-19) and walk in evil paths, obtaining glory through wicked means. The woman entices him that he can have sex without consequences or commitment; no marriage, no children, only fun. Both are lies that lead to death.

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On September 2, 2021 By In Culture, Theology, Wisdom

Liberty of Conscience

“Sphere sovereignty” is one characteristic of Kuyper’s theology that is emphasized by his heirs. Sphere sovereignty, the teaching that God has delegated authority to certain spheres with limitations, is the outworking and further clarification of the Reformation’s recovery of biblical principles concerning proper authority. The spheres emphasized are usually three: family, church, and government. But there is another (among others) that needs to be remembered: the individual. We, in America, have been plagued with an individualism that has distorted this sphere and, therefore, the other spheres needed to be emphasized. But the tides are turning in Western Culture, and we need to remind ourselves just what good thing was being perverted.

Individualism is a perversion of individual sphere sovereignty, the doctrine that the individual has God-given authority over himself before God and will be held personally accountable to God in the judgment. Taken to the extreme, men begin to do what is right in their own eyes thinking that they are accountable to no other mediate authorities in the world. No one can tell them what to do. This is a distortion of biblical truth, but it is a biblical truth that is being distorted.

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On August 26, 2021 By In Discipleship, Theology, Wisdom

Growing In The Light Of Wisdom

The path of the righteous is like the light of dawn, which shines brighter and brighter until full day. The way of the wicked is like deep darkness; they do not know over what they stumble. ~Proverbs 4.18-19

Solomon incentivizes his son to accept his words and walk in the path of wisdom with the promise of ever-growing light. Light is a great blessing in everyday life, but why would ever-growing light be an incentive to walk in the path of wisdom? Solomon’s promise is rooted in deep themes of Scripture that begin with the story of light and darkness in the opening scenes of history.

There was a time when there was nothing outside of God himself. You and I can’t imagine “nothing,” for when we try to imagine “nothing” we are imagining something. Nothing means that there wasn’t even darkness. On the opening day of history, God created heaven and earth and, with it, darkness (cf. Isa 45.7). Darkness was not evil in the broad sense of affliction or trouble or in the narrow sense of being sinful. In fact, God judges all of his creation “good” at the end of the week. Darkness was a part of each day and was, therefore, good with the rest of creation.

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