Worldly Grief

The seventh chapter of 2 Corinthians is one of the most important passages when it comes to counseling ourselves and others. For in it we are introduced to the distinction between worldly grief and godly grief.
I’m convinced all of us feel grief. Even the most brazen, self-confident hypocrite usually feels bad about something they’ve done.  But not all grief is the same.
Some grief is worldly. Most of us assume that feeling sorry for something is morally neutral.  There isn’t a right and wrong way to feel bad, you just feel it.  In fact, if anything, we consider grief over some action we’ve taken to be an automatic good.  “I may have screwed up and made a mistake, but now I feel really rotten about the whole thing.  At least I have my grief over the situation to show for myself.”
But according to the Bible, it is possible to feel sorry in a worldly way. Worldly grief is an expression of regret over opportunities lost, painful present circumstances, or personal embarrassment. We regret getting drunk on the weekend and blowing the test on Monday. We are sorry for having gambled away $10,000 at the casino. We feel terrible that our unflattering email get forwarded to the wrong person. Though we feel bad in all three situations, the regret may not have any spiritual dimension to it. We may just regret getting caught, hurting ourselves, or looking bad.
Worldly grief is owing to one of two causes: losing something dear to us (money, opportunity, recognition) or the negative opinion of others. Worldly grief has to do with pride, ego, and humiliation. It cares about man’s opinion instead of God’s.  We feel terrible because people around us think we are silly or stupid.  We feel sorry for the past because people no longer think highly of us like they once did.  We feel deep distress because we love the praise of man, not because we have the fear of God.
Worldly grief is not good grief. It leads to death.  Because worldly grief does not allow us to see our offensiveness to God, we don’t deal with our sin in a vertical direction. And therefore, we don’t get forgiveness from God, the lack of which leads to spiritual death. Worldly grief deals with symptoms not with the disease. Worldly grief produces despair, bitterness, and depression because it focuses on regret for the past (which can’t be changed) or the present consequences (which can’t fully avoid) instead of personal sinfulness (which can always be forgiven).
Ironically, if we say “I can’t forgive myself” it’s probably a sign of worldly grief–either unbelief in God’s promises and the sufficiency of Christ’s work on the cross, or regret that is merely focused on my loss and what other people think of me and not on my sin before a holy God.
We hate to look at our sin, but when we refuse to deal with our sin, we are only hurting ourselves.   Sorrow over loss of money does not bring it back.  Sorrow over personal failure does not make it all better.  Sorrow over negative reactions from others does not make them like us again.  But sorrow over sin can lead to repentance and repentance leads to mercy and mercy means a fresh start.
So, yes, God wants us to feel guilty when we are guilty. But he doesn’t want us to feel guilty when we are not. And when we are, he doesn’t want us to wallow in our sin. He wants us to run to the cross, confess it, be cleansed, and enjoy a clean conscience.
Kevin DeYoung

The Lost Understanding of Sin

Joe Carter has a typically thoughtful review of Lost and the Christ-figure of Jack:

In case that is too subtle, the producers also gave him a name with a Biblical allusion (the Good Shepherd), a father whose name screams God-figure (Christian Shephard), have him drink from a cup in the garden after submitting his own will to the higher purpose, give him holy wounds in his side in a fight with the Devil, and then have him sacrifice his life for both his friends and enemies. No doubt the producers would have called the character “Jesus Christ” had their lawyers not warned that the name might already be trademarked.

But Joe doesn’t think it ultimately works:

Although the show’s creators recognize the value in having a Christ-figure, they fail to understand the significance and purpose of the actual figure of Christ. They’ve seen the archetype used in movies (e.g., Neo in The Matrix) and literature (e.g., Simon in the Lord of the Flies) and assumed that merely having a Christ-figure in the story was enough to tap into a Jungian collective unconscious. But because they fail to appreciate how the death of Christ affects the metanarrative of history, they do not realize how their Christ-figure is supposed to affect the narrative of their own plot.

More:

Lost replicates many of these tropes (God the Father—Christian Shephard; the created but fallen world—the Island; death of Christ—the sacrifice of Jack; Kingdom of God—the afterlife in the church) but is unable to connect them because of an inadequate concept of sin. . . . The result is that the two primary deus ex machinas of Lost are rendered irrelevant: Where there is no sin there is no need for either Christ or purgatory.

You can read the whole thing here.
Justin Taylor

Experiencing God . . . Or Not

Ed Welch

Everyone who believes that God exists would like “a personal encounter with God.” We want that back-and-forth, knowing-and-being-known, emotional liveliness that is the fruit of a growing relationship. No one who follows Jesus harbors dreams of emotional and experiential dryness. Instead, bring on that promised abundant life (John 10:10).
Moses led the way. He wanted to feel God. He wanted the promises of God bolstered by a display of God’s glory (Ex.33:18). Times were tough. Doubt was in the air. A little experiential boost in which God confirmed his promises to Israel would go a long way. And God accommodated Moses’ request. His glory would go whooshing by and Moses would get to see God’s back, which we assumed happened but Moses doesn’t record the event.
The desire to experience God is a good thing, a very good thing. Scripture leads us in our aspirations for full-bodied praise, love and unity.
But there is a problem. What about those who feel God’s absence but desperately want to know his presence? What about those who sense that God hides himself, and he seems to do it at the times we need him most? What about those who’s emotional experience is so dominated by depression or fear that the experience of God just cannot break through?
Questions like these bring us back to Scripture – back to the Lord – with internal tensions that acknowledge both “I will never leave you or forsake you” and “My God why have you forsaken me.”
What we find in Scripture are the deeper ways of God with his people. “Sometimes God puts his children to bed in the dark” is one way to put it. Another way is this: in this era, our God has chosen to make walking by faith more fundamental, and more blessed, than walking by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7). This means that there will be many times when we can see the goodness of the Lord with our very eyes. But there will be other times when our experience says “God is far away” and he counters “I am with you.” In those cases, his words win.
Just expand the word “sight” in “walking by sight” to include all things sensory, such as our emotions. Then we are back on track: God is speaking right to us. He is not far away. This teaching gets to the heart of Scripture. Scripture exists because we need revelation. We can’t see reality clearly with the naked eye. Scripture is God’s technology that allows us to see everything we need to see.
You don’t feel his presence? Here are God’s words to you.

Remember how the LORD your God led you all the way in the desert these forty years, to humble you and to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands. He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your fathers had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD. (Deuteronomy 8:2-3)

There it is. Our senses say that we are destitute; God reveals that we have spiritual food that is profoundly satisfying. Our goal is to hear the word of the Lord in such a way that it drowns out our less-informed emotions.
CCEF

How to Disarm an Angry Person

Ed Welch talks here about how to respond when someone is sinfully angry at you. He ends with these practical-theological suggestions:

1. Don’t minimize the destruction of anger. You are getting shot at! Of course it hurts.
2. You are setting out to learn a disarming strategy that takes humility and love, and this is way over your head. As such, “Lord have mercy on me” is the order of the day.
3. Remember that angry people are blind to their own anger. They are the last to know that they are killing people. Instead, all they see is that they are right and others are wrong. Assume that they are spiritual lunatics.
4. Divest yourself of all the things you desire and cherish for yourself. Do you want love? Toss it and keep only the necessities, such as the desire to love. Do you need respect and understanding? It will only be an encumbrance. Get rid of it.
5. Move toward the angry person in love and humility. Fear runs away, anger attacks. Humility and love move toward. In a surprise attack they blindside angry people with weakness. Your timing will be important. Sometimes you can say something while the gun is aimed. Other times you will wait and speak later.
6. The person’s anger could have many reasons – you being one. But murderous anger is always wrong. At some point, from your place of love and humility, you will hold up the mirror and help angry people see themselves (Matthew 7:5).  

CCEF

Contentment by Tim Keller

It’s remarkable to read David, the Warrior-King of Israel, writing these words from Psalm 131.
My heart is not proud, O LORD, my eyes are not haughty; I do not concern myself with great matters or things too wonderful for me. But I have stilled and quieted my soul; like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me.
The metaphor for spiritual maturity here is a “weaned child.” On the one hand, we are a child at the mother’s breast, an image of complete helplessness. We are completely dependent on God. Without him we can do nothing. On the other hand, we are aweaned child, an image of contentment. Unweaned children cry in mother’s arms until they get something from mother — her milk. Only then are they quiet. But a weaned child is satisfied just with mother herself, with her very presence.
Here we see depicted, vividly and compactly, what Job was taught through all his trials. We must love God for himself alone, not just for what he gives us. This is the essence of what, for Jonathan Edwards, distinguished “true grace” from “the experience of devils,” who hold sound doctrine and tremble before God (James 2:19.) Real grace on the heart leads us to see the “beauty and comeliness of divine things, as they are in themselves” (from the sermon by the same name in volume 25 of the Yale edition of Edwards’ works). We become satisfied with God himself. Even his transcendent holiness is enjoyed as a beautiful and magnificent thing, which fills the heart to contemplate, though we certainly get nothing out of it!
If grace has really changed our hearts, we don’t ultimately care if life goes the way we want it, as long as we have him. The joys of acclaim, wealth, and power are nothing compared to the eternal acclaim, wealth, and power we have in him. A “weaned child” is not just someone who knows this in principle, but who has worked gospel truths into his or her soul as spiritually sensed realities. Internally, this quiets the soul into profound contentment and poise. Externally, it means humility, a willingness to learn from others and also to trust God. The believer realizes that the reason God’s actions are often opaque is not because we are wise and he is foolish, but because he is too “great” and “wonderful” for us.
A Christian should never have the attitude toward God, “what have you done for me lately?” Spurgeon said about Psalm 131 that it was “one of the shortest psalms to read, but one of the longest to learn.”
The Gospel Coalition

Jesus Didn't Tap (give up) by Michael Mckinley

The New York TImes seems to be on a mission to make Christians look stupid, and we keep giving them the stick with which to beat us about the head and neck.  To wit, a recent article looks at the rise of "Mixed Martial Arts" churches.  The article explains:
The outreach is part of a larger and more longstanding effort on the part of some ministers who fear that their churches have become too feminized, promoting kindness and compassion at the expense of strength and responsibility.
Now, look.  Except for Menikoff, I am the biggest fan of tattoos on this blog (btw Aaron, I told you so about that ink on the inside of your lip... bad news, brother!).  And I like contact sports a lot.  In fact, I can't even watch MMA because I don't like who I become when I'm watching it.
But I hate this "macho" resurgence in Christianity.  I'd be inclined to ignore it, but it seems to be growing and being pushed from high profile platforms.  
Here are my concerns:

1. It's derivative and unoriginal.  It was lame when Billy Sunday was doing it 100 years ago.
2. It makes the gospel man-centered.  Coming to Jesus isn't a way for you to deal with your daddy issues.  I get it, your dad didn't hug you when you were little and you want to be a different kind of man.  How about you go hug your kid then?  Jesus didn't come to help you get in touch with your inner MMA fighter.      
3. Like it or not, the gospel is at least in part about weakness.  It's about the almighty becoming weak to save us.  It's about us being helpless and unable in our sins.  There's no way to Christ that doesn't start with brokenness and an admission of impotence.  Yes, Jesus is the strong man who binds the adversary, but he bound him by suffering, humiliation, and weakness.
4. It discourages and mocks godly men who aren't macho.  There is an undercurrent of disdain in all of this.  Proponents of this testosterone Christianity can't help but take shots at guys who wear pastels and drink cappuccino.  You might not like guys with manicures, but there's absolutely nothing morally wrong with it.  A reserved, quiet, well-groomed man can be a good Christian.  Believe it or not.  

You can find other thoughts about this article here and here.
9 Marks Blog

Tebow's Super Bowl ad isn't intolerant; its critics are

By Sally Jenkins

Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, February 2, 2010 I'll spit this out quick, before the armies of feminism try to gag me and strap electrodes to my forehead: Tim Tebow is one of the better things to happen to young women in some time. I realize this stance won't endear me to the "Dwindling Organizations of Ladies in Lockstep," otherwise known as DOLL, but I'll try to pick up the shards of my shattered feminist credentials and go on.

I'm pro-choice, and Tebow clearly is not. But based on what I've heard in the past week, I'll take his side against the group-think, elitism and condescension of the "National Organization of Fewer and Fewer Women All The Time." For one thing, Tebow seems smarter than they do.
Tebow's 30-second ad hasn't even run yet, but it already has provoked "The National Organization for Women Who Only Think Like Us" to reveal something important about themselves: They aren't actually "pro-choice" so much as they are pro-abortion. Pam Tebow has a genuine pro-choice story to tell. She got pregnant in 1987, post-Roe v. Wade, and while on a Christian mission in the Philippines, she contracted a tropical ailment. Doctors advised her the pregnancy could be dangerous, but she exercised her freedom of choice and now, 20-some years later, the outcome of that choice is her beauteous Heisman Trophy winner son, a chaste, proselytizing evangelical.
Pam Tebow and her son feel good enough about that choice to want to tell people about it. Only, NOW says they shouldn't be allowed to. Apparently NOW feels this commercial is an inappropriate message for America to see for 30 seconds, but women in bikinis selling beer is the right one. I would like to meet the genius at NOW who made that decision. On second thought, no, I wouldn't.
Trouble is, you can't focus on the game without focusing on the individuals who play it -- and that is the genius of Tebow's ad. The Super Bowl is not some reality-free escape zone. Tebow himself is an inescapable fact: Abortion doesn't just involve serious issues of life, but of potential lives, Heisman trophy winners, scientists, doctors, artists, inventors, Little Leaguers -- who would never come to be if their birth mothers had not wrestled with the stakes and chosen to carry those lives to term. And their stories are every bit as real and valid as the stories preferred by NOW.
Tebow's ad, by the way, never mentions abortion; like the player himself, it's apparently soft-spoken. It simply has the theme "Celebrate Family, Celebrate Life." This is what NOW has labeled "extraordinarily offensive and demeaning." But if there is any demeaning here, it's coming from NOW, via the suggestion that these aren't real questions, and that we as a Super Bowl audience are too stupid or too disinterested to handle them on game day.
Read the rest at The Washington Post

Trusting God Through Unemployment

by Greg Gilbert

Like many congregations around the country, we have had many of our people this year struggling through unemployment.  Included among those is one of our elders, who has been unemployed for nearly a year now.  Over the past twelve months, I’ve seen this brother hurt, I’ve seen him get excited about potential jobs and then have his hopes dashed when the job didn’t come through.  I’ve seen him cry when the struggle got simply exhausting.  But I have also watched this brother continue to trust in God, and through it all walk alongside others who are navigating that same hard road.  Even as he is shouldering his own load, he is helping others to shoulder theirs, too.  That has been and continues to be a deep and beneficial ministry.

A few weeks ago, this dear friend and brother shared with the congregation ten things he had learned from his unemployment.  Here’s what he said:

#1: Own your unemployment
#2: Preach to yourself
#3: Prepare for the Storm
#4: Depend on the LORD
#5: Be surprised at his Kindness
#6: Encourage the unemployed
#7: Beware of Idol Worship
#8: Cry out to the LORD
#9: Invest the Extra time well
#10: Take Advantage of Unique Opportunities for Evangelism
Read the article here The 9Marks Blog  Part 1     Part 2

The Real Scandal of the Evangelical Mind By Carl Trueman

The day is coming when the cultural intellectual elites of evangelicalism—the institutions and the individuals—will face a tough decision. I see the crisis coming on two separate but intimately connected fronts. The day is coming, and perhaps has already come, when, first, to believe that the Bible is the Word of God, inspired, authoritative, and utterly truthful, will be seen as a sign at best of intellectual suicide, at worst of mental illness; and, second, to articulate any form of opposition to homosexual practice will be seen as the moral equivalent of advocating white supremacy or child abuse. In such times, the choice will be clear, those who hold the Christian line will be obvious, and those who have spent their lives trying to serve both orthodoxy and the academy will find that no amount of intellectual contortionism will save them. Being associated with B. B. Warfield will be the least of their worries.
To read the entire article 9 Marks

Brit Hume's Tiger Woods remarks shine light on true intolerance

After urging Tiger Woods to accept the "forgiveness and redemption that is offered by the Christian faith" -- and comparing Buddhism unfavorably to that hope -- journalist Brit Hume insisted he was not proselytizing. In this, he is wrong. His words exemplify proselytization.
For this, Hume has been savaged. Post media critic Tom Shales put him in the category of a "sanctimonious busybody" engaged in "telling people what religious beliefs they ought to have." Blogger Andrew Sullivan criticized Hume's "pure sectarianism," which helps abolish "the distinction between secular and religious discourse." MSNBC's David Shuster called Hume's religious advice "truly embarrassing."
Hume's critics hold a strange view of pluralism. For religion to be tolerated, it must be privatized -- not, apparently, just in governmental settings but also on television networks. We must have not only a secular state but also a secular public discourse. And so tolerance, conveniently, is defined as shutting up people with whom secularists disagree. Many commentators have been offering Woods advice in his travails. But religious advice, apparently and uniquely, should be forbidden. In a discussion of sex, morality and betrayed vows, wouldn't religious issues naturally arise? How is our public discourse improved by narrowing it -- removing references to the most essential element in countless lives?
True tolerance consists in engaging deep disagreements respectfully -- through persuasion -- not in banning certain categories of argument and belief from public debate.
In this controversy, we are presented with two models of discourse. Hume, in an angry sea of loss and tragedy -- his son's death in 1998 -- found a life preserver in faith. He offered that life preserver to another drowning man. Whatever your view of Hume's beliefs, he could have no motive other than concern for Woods himself.
The other model has come from critics such as Shales, in a spittle-flinging rage at the mention of religion in public, comparing Hume to "Mary Poppins on the joys of a tidy room, or Ron Popeil on the glories of some amazing potato peeler." Shales, of course, is engaged in proselytism of his own -- for a secular fundamentalism that trivializes and banishes all other faiths. He distributes the sacrament of the sneer.
Who in this picture is more intolerant?
By Michael Gerson The Washington Post

How Do You Take Criticism Of Your Views by Tim Keller

Recently several people have asked me 'how do you deal with harsh criticism?' In each case, the inquirer had felt stung by what they felt were unfair attacks on him or her. In this internet age, anyone can have their views censured unfairly by people they don't know. So what do you do when that happens? Here's is the gist of the counsel I give people when they ask me about this. For years I've been guided by a letter by John Newton that is usually entitled "On Controversy."

The biggest danger of receiving criticism is not to your reputation, but to your heart. You feel the injustice of it and feel sorry for yourself, and it tempts you to despise not only the critic, but the entire group of people from which they come. "Those people..." you mutter under your breath. All this can make you prouder over time. Newton writes: "Whatever...makes us trust in ourselves that we are comparatively wise or good, so as to treat those with contempt who do not subscribe to our doctrines, or follow our party, is a proof and fruit of a self-righteous spirit." He argues that whenever contempt and superiority accompany our thoughts, it is a sign that "the doctrines of grace" are operating in our life "as mere notions and speculations" with "no salutary influence upon [our] conduct."

So how can you avoid this temptation? First, you should look to see if there is a kernel of truth in even the most exaggerated and unfair broadsides. There is usually such a kernel when the criticism comes from friends, and there is often such truth when the disapproval comes from people who actually know you. So even if the censure is partly or even largely mistaken, look for what you may indeed have done wrong. Perhaps you simply acted or spoke in a way that was not circumspect. Maybe the critic is partly right for the wrong reasons. Nevertheless, identify your own short-comings, repent in your own heart before the Lord for what you can, and let that humble you. It will then be possible to learn from the criticism and stay gracious to the critic even if you have to disagree with what he or she has said.

If the criticism comes from someone who doesn't know you at all (and often this is the case on the internet) it is possible that the criticism is completely unwarranted and profoundly mistaken. I am often pilloried not only for views I do have, but also even more often for views (and motives) that I do not hold at all. When that happens it is even easier to fall into a smugness and perhaps be tempted to laugh at how mistaken your critics are. "Pathetic..." you may be tempted to say. Don't do it. Even if there is not the slightest kernel of truth in what the critic says, you should not mock them in your thoughts. First, remind yourself of examples of your own mistakes, foolishness, and cluelessness in the past, times in which you really got something wrong. Second, pray for the critic, that he or she grows in grace. Newton talks about it like this:

"If you account [your opponent] a believer, though greatly mistaken in the subject of debate between you, the words of David to Joab concerning Absalom are very applicable: 'Deal gently with him for my sake.'  The Lord loves him and bears with him; therefore you must not despise him, or treat him harshly.  The Lord bears with you likewise, and expects that you should show tenderness to others, from a sense of the much forgiveness you need yourself.  In a little while you will meet in heaven; he will then be dearer to you than the nearest friend you have upon earth is to you now.  Anticipate that period in your thoughts; and though you may find it necessary to oppose his errors, view him personally as a kindred soul, with whom you are to be happy in Christ forever."

So whatever you do, do anything you can to avoid feeling smug and superior to the critic. Even if you say to yourself that you are just 'shrugging it off' and that you are not going to respond to the criticism, you can nonetheless conduct a full defense and refutation in the courtroom of your mind, in which you triumphantly prove how awful and despicable your opponents are. But that is a spiritual trap. Newton's remarks about this are very convicting:

"A man may have the heart of a Pharisee, while his head is stored with orthodox notions of the unworthiness of the creature, and the riches of free grace.  Yea, I would add, the best of men are not wholly free from this leaven; and therefore are too apt to be pleased with such representations as hold up our adversaries to ridicule, and by consequence flatter our own superior judgments.  Controversies, for the most part, are so managed as to indulge rather than to repress his wrong disposition; and therefore, generally speaking, they are productive of little good.  They provoke those whom they should convince, and puff up those whom they should edify.  I hope your performance will savor of a spirit of true humility, and be a means of promoting it in others."
rcpc blog

Caring for Orphans While Soaked With the Sense of Exile

Yesterday, I was deeply moved by something that I read in a letter that J.R.R. Tolkien wrote to his son Christopher. As I reflected upon his words, it occurred to me that he touches on something that is profoundly relevant to the global orphan crisis. Tolkien writes:

We all long for [Eden], and we are constantly glimpsing it: our whole nature at its best and least corrupted, its gentlest and most humane, is still soaked with the sense of ‘exile’. If you come to think of it, your (very just) horror at the stupid murder of the hawk, and your obstinate memory of this ‘home’ of yours in an idyllic hour (when often there is an illusion of the stay of time and decay and a sense of gentle peace) are derived from Eden (The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, 110).

One of the challenges for Christians in the Western world is that we are often guilty of trying to dry up our profound “sense of exile” with the non-absorbent paper towels of the incomplete joys of this world. That’s not to say that it is wrong for Christians to enjoy themselves in the here-and-now. God gives His children many good gifts that we are to enjoy now with gratitude in our hearts. But our here-and-now enjoyment was never meant to be the way we deal with the deep ache of exile. When we deal with our “sense of exile” by using God’s good gifts to self-medicate, we will find ourselves moving away from the world’s most needy rather than to them. Self-medicating people are not easily mobilized for self-sacrificial service.
The reality is that we are in exile. Eden has been lost. We are exiles in the here-and-now (1 Peter 1:1). The period of time in which we live as exiles is deeply marked by suffering and unrest (Romans 8:18). The presence of 143,000,000 vulnerable and orphaned children in the world is irrefutable evidence of that fact.
Although we find ourselves in exile – still soaked with a deep sense of Eden-lost — God has not left us to wander aimlessly within it. He has not left us alone to cope with our deep sense of exile through self-medicating behavior. No, Jesus entered into our exile, became a man of sorrows, was forsaken by the Father at the cross in order that he might lead us out of our exile into eternal belonging. Jesus endured the very worst of our exile in order that he might bring us home!
What Jesus did through his life, death, and resurrection has provided us with “a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul” (Hebrews 6:19-20) in the midst of our exile. As a result, we can enjoy the incomplete joys of this world without using them  to deal with our deep sense of exile. Only when we rest in what Jesus has already done to one day bring us back home (Romans 8:19-23) are we able to move toward our world’s most needy.
The gospel takes those who are marked with a deep sense of exile, frees them from the “need” to self-medicate, and moves them out to serve the orphan, the widow, and the marginalized. Only by the power of the gospel can we do the self-sacrificial work of caring for orphans while soaked with the sense of exile.
Dan Cruver

Moving Toward the Goal of History

by R.C. Sproul

"What goes around, comes around." This American idiom suggests a view of history that has more in common with ancient Greek philosophy than with the Judeo-Christian understanding of history. The grand difference between the ancient view of history and that found in Scripture is the difference between what is called "cyclical" and "linear-progressive." A cyclical view indicates that there was no beginning to the universe and no goal for it; rather, history creates itself and eventually repeats itself -- forever. It was this ancient perspective that generated the skepticism that inspired Friedrich Nietzsche's view of "the myth of eternal recurrence."
Over against this view stands the biblical view of linear-progressive history. This understanding does not say that history moves in a steady incline, moving toward some evolutionary climax; rather, it indicates a movement of history that looks more like a corporate chart displaying troughs and peaks while in the long term moving in an upward direction. The most important part of this linear-progressive view of history is that, as the Bible says, the world had a beginning, and that at the beginning an action began, a movement guided by divine providence to an ultimate telos -- a culmination of purpose, aim, or goal. This purpose or telos of history is both personal and cosmic. Every individual moves from birth to death, from a beginning to an end that continues beyond the grave into the ages. In like manner, the world itself looks forward to a future that has been ordained by its Creator.
The term eschatology in our theological vocabulary refers to the study of the eschaton, or the end times. It is a mistake to think of the end times as being something that remains exclusively in the future. The New Testament makes it clear that the end times have already begun. The coming of Christ in His first advent, in which He inaugurated His kingdom, displays that the goal of creation is not totally future but has a present reality initiated by the coming of Jesus and emphasized by His resurrection from the dead and by His ascension to the right hand of God where He reigns now as King of kings and Lord of lords.
It is also important for us to understand that in terms of biblical eschatology, the end of the world does not indicate an annihilation of the world but a renovation and redemption of it. The New Testament makes it evident that the final renovation of creation is cosmic in scope, that the whole universe groans together in travail waiting for the redemption of the sons of men (Rom 8: 18-23). Questions of our future, personal and cosmic, are all subject to the inquiries associated with eschatology. The question of life after death -- the issues of heaven, hell, and resurrection -- are all integral to our study of eschatology. An understanding of the last judgment also falls under the scope of this consideration.
As people who live in the present, who have a past that we are aware of and a future that is not altogether clearly known, we nevertheless have the future promises set forth by God in His Word as an anchor for our souls. The Bible speaks of our confidence in the future in terms of the idea of "hope." In biblical categories, hope does not indicate an unfulfilled wish that we have a desire to see come to pass. Instead, our hope is that which rests upon a certain conclusion in the future that God has promised for His people. Here hope is described by the metaphor of the anchor -- the anchor of the soul (Heb. 6:13-20). An anchor is not something that is tenuous or ephemeral. It has weight, it has solidity, and it is that which gives security to a ship that is moored in open water. In like manner, we live our lives in the midst of the waves that crash against us, but we are not tossed to and fro with no anchor. Our anchor is the promise of God for the future that He has laid up for His people.
It is easy to become so preoccupied with the future that we forget the past and almost ignore the marvelous reality that God has already accomplished for His people in history. History is the domain of Christ's incarnation, atonement, resurrection, and ascension, and we can't understand our hope for the future without understanding those things that God has already brought to pass in His plan of redemption. At the same time, we must not be so occupied with the past and with the present that we forget the hope that God has set before us in the future. So, how we live today is in large measure determined by how we understand the past as well as how we understand the future. It is because God is a God of history, a God of purpose, a God of telos that the present has eternal significance. It's because God is the Lord of history that right now counts forever.
Ligonier Blog

How do Atheists observe Thanksgiving?

Thanksgiving is a deeply theological act, rightly understood. As a matter of fact, thankfulness is a theology in microcosm — a key to understanding what we really believe about God, ourselves, and the world we experience.
A haunting question is this: How do atheists observe Thanksgiving? I can easily understand that an atheist or agnostic would think of fellow human beings and feel led to express thankfulness and gratitude to all those who, both directly and indirectly, have contributed to their lives. But what about the blessings that cannot be ascribed to human agency? Those are both more numerous and more significant, ranging from the universe we experience to the gift of life itself.
Can one really be thankful without being thankful to someone? It makes no sense to express thankfulness to a purely naturalistic system. Daniel Dennett, one of the foremost figures among the “New Atheists,” describes human life as “an ultimately transient twig on the copiously arborescent tree of life.” Dennett is a clear-headed evolutionist who takes the theory of evolution to its ultimate conclusion — human life is merely an accident, though a very happy accident for us. Within that worldview, how does thankfulness work?
The Apostle Paul points to a central insight about thankfulness when he instructs the Christians in Rome about the reality and consequences of unbelief. After making clear that God has revealed himself to all humanity through the created order, Paul asserts that we are all without excuse when it comes to our responsibility to know and worship the Creator.
He wrote:

For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools. . .  [Romans 1:20-22].

This remarkable passage has at its center an indictment of thanklessness. They did not honor Him as God or give thanks. Paul wants us to understand that the refusal to honor God and give thanks is a raw form of the primal sin. Theologians have long debated the foundational sin — and answers have ranged from lust to pride. Nevertheless, it would seem thank being unthankful, refusing to recognize God as the source of all good things, is very close to the essence of the primal sin. What explains the rebellion of Adam and Eve in the Garden? A lack of proper thankfulness was at the core of their sin. God has given them unspeakable riches and abundance, but forbade them the fruit of one tree. A proper thankfulness would have led our first parents to avoid that fruit at all costs, and to obey the Lord’s command. Taken further, this first sin was also a lack of thankfulness in that the decision to eat the forbidden fruit indicated a lack of thankfulness that took the form of an assertion that we creatures — not the Creator — know what is best for us and intend the best for us.
They did not honor Him as God or give thanks. Clearly, honoring God as God leads us naturally into thankfulness. To honor Him as God is to honor His limitless love, His benevolence and care, His provision and uncountable gifts. To fail in thankfulness is to fail to honor God — and this is the biblical description of fallen and sinful humanity. We are a thankless lot.
Sinners saved by the grace and mercy of God know a thankfulness that exceeds any merely human thankfulness. How do we express thankfulness for the provision the Father has made for us in Christ, the riches that are made ours in Him, the unspeakable gift of the surpassing grace of God? As Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift” [2 Corinthians 9:15].
So, observe a wonderful Thanksgiving — but realize that a proper Christian Thanksgiving is a deeply theological act that requires an active mind as well as a thankful heart. We need to think deeply, widely, carefully, and faithfully about the countless reasons for our thankfulness to God.
It is humbling to see that Paul so explicitly links a lack of thankfulness to sin, foolishness, and idolatry. A lack of proper thankfulness to God is a clear sign of a basic godlessness. Millions of Americans will celebrate Thanksgiving with little consciousness of this truth. Their impulse to express gratitude is a sign of their spiritual need that can be met only in Christ.
So have a very Happy Thanksgiving — and remember that giving thanks is one of the most explicitly theological acts any human can contemplate. O give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; for His lovingkindness is everlasting [1 Chronicles 16:34]. Give thanks.
Al Mohler

Art and the Precious Limits of Reality

Here is Chesterton on the essence of art.

Art is limitation; the essence of every picture is the frame. If you draw a giraffe you must draw him with a long neck. If in your bold creative way you hold yourself free to draw a giraffe with a short neck you will really find that you are not free to draw a giraffe. (Orthodoxy, 71)

When I read this I remembered the thoughts I had in writing the advent poem called The Innkeeper.

So quickly do we pass over the Christmas words, “Herod...slew all the male children…two years old and under.” But the poet lingers, weeping, raging, looking at the dark spot, in hope that any prick of light might become a portal for the sun. And what he sees he strains with words to show—pressing us against the perforation in the wall of pain.
Why this struggle? Why does the poet bind his heart with such a severe discipline of form? Why strain to give shape to suffering? Because Reality has contours. God is who he is, not what we wish or try to make him be. His Son, Jesus Christ, is the great granite Fact. His hard sacrifice makes it evident that our spontaneity needs Calvary-like discipline.
Perhaps the innkeeper paid dearly for housing the Son of God. Should it not be costly to penetrate and portray this pain? The Innkeeper seeks to reveal the Light that shines behind this brutal moment in history and our own path of suffering. Come and see! (3)

I pray that this advent season every part of the Great Story will have a fresh luster because it is a Granite Fact.
By John Piper - Desiring God

Small Wonders

Do you matter to God? | Vern S. Poythress

Consider. The largest object visible to the naked eye is a small patch of light in the night sky, known as the Andromeda nebula. It is actually a galaxy, quite close by as galaxies go: about 10 quintillion miles away (1 followed by 19 zeros), and something like 600 quadrillion miles across. You get the idea.
No you don't, and neither do I, because these sizes are just too large for our minds to grasp. Fortunately, courtesy of the internet, you can today enjoy photographs of such astronomical wonders.
God made it all. He made it beautiful, breathtakingly so. And He made it big. He threw out galaxies like sand, as far out as the Hubble telescope can see. Today we can contemplate the immensity of God's power in a way that people of previous centuries could not have imagined.
Does it make you feel small? You should feel small. You are smaller within the Milky Way Galaxy than a single mote of dust is in comparison to you. If there were no God, you would be lost in the cosmos.
But God is there, as the beauty and immensity of this universe testify. So now you may think, not only are you totally unimportant, but God must be ignoring you in order to take care of Andromeda.
Jesus said, "Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows" (Matthew 10:29-31). God does not reckon importance by size. He is infinitely great, and so He is not impressed merely by physical dimensions. In His greatness He has time and energy for what is small. He has time for you. He even has time for each of the hairs on your head.
Do you want to know about God's care for your hair? Hair is made of a protein called keratin. Wikipedia explains: "Keratins have large amounts of the sulfur-containing amino acid cysteine, required for the disulfide bridges that confer additional strength and rigidity by permanent, thermally-stable crosslinking." So God has thoughtfully engineered your hair for toughness—down to the molecular level.
The most remarkable instance of God's concern for apparently small people has been around even before the dawn of modern science. God Himself came to Earth, and became man. "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth" (John 1:14). Jesus Christ came and even died because God cared. And Jesus is God. That is the most awesome of all wonders, dwarfing the Andromeda Galaxy in its splendor. God came to this galaxy, to this planet Earth, and became man. And for whom did He care? Not only the proud and mighty but lepers, lame people, infants, the blind, and a demon-possessed man so tormented that he lived naked among the tombs. After healing him, Jesus said, "Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you" (Luke 8:39).
Does God care for you? Listen to His commitment to those who come to Him through Christ:
"If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" (Romans 8:31-35).
So, when you look at the night sky, remember that the God who displays His majesty there has committed Himself to you.
World Magazine

Second Coming

It's a reality that should not be ignored | Vern S. Poythress
Are you eager for the Second Coming of Christ?
Too often people go to extremes. Some people end up overexcited about the Second Coming, others forget about it.
You know something about the overexcited ones, because they draw attention to themselves. A group gets worked up by its leader, who claims he can predict when Christ is coming. They sell their property, dress in white robes, and go out to a mountain on the appointed day.
It is not always so extreme. But William Miller, the founder of the Adventist movement, predicted the Second Coming of Christ in 1843-44, and gained many followers. He narrowed down the time to a cut-off date of March 21, 1844. When that passed, it was reset to April 18, 1844. One of his followers reset it again to Oct. 22, 1844.
Charles T. Russell, who is the original figure behind Jehovah's Witnesses, predicted that the Second Coming would occur in April 1878. The Jehovah's Witnesses later had 1914 as a key date.
One book gave 88 reasons why Jesus Christ would come in 1988. When that failed, the author reset it to 1989.
The Bible gives us a simple answer for all these speculations. "It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by His own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses" (Acts 1:7-8). In other words, do your job as a Christian, and do not try to find out what God has not told us.
Among Christians today the prevailing mood threatens to go to the opposite extreme. We forget about the Second Coming and then become immersed in worldliness. In practice we have the attitude that this world is all there is, and that it is never coming to an end. That is little better than what skeptics have repeatedly said: "Scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing. . . . They will say, 'Where is the promise of His coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation" (2 Peter 3:3-4).
But God Himself has promised, and Christ has promised, that Christ will return and that this present world will be dissolved (2 Peter 3:10-12). "According to His promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells" (2 Peter 3:13). A solemn exhortation comes with God's promise: "Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness" (2 Peter 3:11).
Jesus tells us to be alert in expecting His Coming. "But watch yourselves, lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly like a trap" (Luke 21:34). Be fervent in serving the Lord. Know that your time is limited. Make "the best use of the time" (Ephesians 5:16).
However long you live on earth, it is only a short span in comparison with eternity (Psalm 90:1-4). If you invest the time in yourself, you have nothing. If you invest in fellowship with God, through Christ, then already in this life you will have eternal life in Christ. "Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears My word and believes Him who sent Me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life" (John 5:24). And your sufferings in this life will be outweighed by "an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison" (2 Corinthians 4:17). Wait patiently but actively for His coming.
World Mag.com

A Word of Optimism from the State of Perpetual Bad News

Apparently I live in one of the worst states in the union.  From foreclosures (top five) to adult obesity (top ten) to unemployment (the highest in the country at 15.3%), Michigan is not exactly a happening place these days.  Our tax breaks backfire.  Our incentives don’t motivate.  And our plan to be the Hollywood of the Midwest never turned a profit.  It’s gotten so bad we are lobbying to get the Gitmo detainees.
And then there’s Detroit which has become, alternatively, a laughing stock or a pity party.  Two-thirds of the Big Three are owned by the government.  The Lions are unremittingly awful.  The Wolverines are falling apart.  The weather is cold and snowy.  The roads have craters for potholes.  Even the movie version of Cloudy With a Chance for Meatballs modeled their loser town after one in Michigan (the main character is Flint Lockwood who at one point ruins Sardine Land, a poke at the failed AutoWorld from the 1980s).
Can things get any worse?  According to my local paper (Michigan’s Woes Likely to Drag On), they’re not going to get better anytime soon.  And when my state does make some positive news, like it did in the latest issue of World, it’s for a man from Lansing setting the record for Madagascar hissing cockroaches in the mouth.  You’ve made all us proud, son.
We even have our own tear-jerking commercials that try to make us feel better about the six months of winter coming.

Whenever I hear these Pure Michigan commercials I’m not sure if I’m supposed to smile or cry or just not move out of the state.
But Michigan really isn’t quite as dismal as you might think. Most people who want one still have a job (including virtually everyone in my church, so this is not a “woe for us” piece). Billions of dollars are still forked over for our cars. Our indoor plumbing still works. And the sun shines every once in awhile.
Better yet, the gospel is still true. Jesus still reigns. He has all the money we could ever need, and he knows how to get his work accomplished without money too.  Jesus still saves.  The most important news is always good news everyday.
At times, I admit I wonder what it could be like in Michigan in 5-10 years. What if Lansing goes the way of Chewandswallow? What if the state can’t support its colleges and MSU has to make drastic cuts? What if our best people are forced to move away to find work? What if this whole global warming thing never pans out and we get buried in snow year after year?
But then I think, what if people see their need for God in the midst of economic turmoil? What if the church can show the love of Jesus to the poor and frightened? What if we can demonstrate the joy of Christ in the midst of struggle? What if hardship makes us holier? What if God chooses to bring life out of death? That seems to be his way, does it not?
So listen all you God-fearing Michiganders (yes, we are called Michiganders): hold your heads up high. Politics and policies may fail, but the word of God is not bound. Famine, nakedness, peril, sword, and the auto industry cannot separate you from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.  God sent his Son for Saginaw and Alpena and Escanaba and Benton Harbor and Jackson just as much as for Boston, Austin, and New York City. God cares about the rust-belt cities too.
And as a special bonus for those of us in Michigan, God knows our city like we know the palms of our right hands.
Kevin DeYoung

Mark Steyn: Shooter exposes hole in U.S. Terror Strategy

Thirteen dead and 42 wounded would be a bad day for the U.S. military in Afghanistan and a great victory for the Taliban. When it happens in Texas, in the heart of the biggest military base in the nation, at a processing center for soldiers either returning from or deploying to combat overseas, it is not merely a "tragedy" (as too many people called it) but a glimpse of a potentially fatal flaw at the heart of what we have called, since 9/11, the "war on terror." Brave soldiers trained to hunt down and kill America's enemy abroad were killed in the safety and security of home by, in essence, the same enemy – a man who believes in and supports everything the enemy does.
And he's a U.S. Army major.
And his superior officers and other authorities knew about his beliefs but seemed to think it was just a bit of harmless multicultural diversity – as if believing that "the Muslims should stand up and fight against the aggressor" (i.e., his fellow American soldiers) and writing Internet paeans to the "noble" "heroism" of suicide bombers and, indeed, objectively supporting the other side in an active war is to be regarded as just some kind of alternative lifestyle that adds to the general vibrancy of the base.
When it emerged early Thursday afternoon that the shooter was Nidal Malik Hasan, there appeared shortly thereafter on Twitter a flurry of posts with the striking formulation: "Please judge Maj. Malik Nadal [sic] by his actions and not by his name."
Concerned tweeters can relax: There was never really any danger of that – and not just in the sense that the New York Times' first report on Maj. Hasan never mentioned the words "Muslim" or "Islam," or that ABC's Martha Raddatz's only observation on his name was that "as for the suspect, Nadal Hasan, as one officer's wife told me, 'I wish his name was Smith.'"
What a strange reaction. I suppose what she means is that, if his name were Smith, we could all retreat back into the same comforting illusions that allowed the bureaucracy to advance Nidal Malik Hasan to major and into the heart of Fort Hood while ignoring everything that mattered about the essence of this man.
Since 9/11, we have, as the Twitterers, recommend, judged people by their actions – flying planes into skyscrapers, blowing themselves up in Bali nightclubs or London Tube trains, planting IEDs by the roadside in Baghdad or Tikrit. And on the whole we're effective at responding with action of our own.
But we're scrupulously nonjudgmental about the ideology that drives a man to fly into a building or self-detonate on the subway, and thus we have a hole at the heart of our strategy. We use rhetorical conveniences like "radical Islam" or, if that seems a wee bit Islamophobic, just plain old "radical extremism." But we never make any effort to delineate the line which separates "radical Islam" from nonradical Islam. Indeed, we go to great lengths to make it even fuzzier. And somewhere in that woozy blur the pathologies of a Nidal Malik Hasan incubate. An Army psychiatrist, Maj. Hasan is an American, born and raised, who graduated from Virginia Tech and then received his doctorate from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md. But he opposed America's actions in the Middle East and Afghanistan and made approving remarks about jihadists on U.S. soil. "You need to lock it up, Major," said his superior officer, Col. Terry Lee.
But he didn't really need to "lock it up" at all. He could pretty much say anything he liked, and if any "red flags" were raised they were quickly mothballed. Lots of people are "anti-war." Some of them are objectively on the other side – that's to say, they encourage and support attacks on American troops and civilians. But not many of those in that latter category are U.S. Army majors. Or so one would hope.
Yet why be surprised? Azad Ali, a man who approvingly quotes such observations as "If I saw an American or British man wearing a soldier's uniform inside Iraq I would kill him because that is my obligation" is an adviser to Britain's Crown Prosecution Service (the equivalent of U.S. attorneys). In Toronto this week, the brave ex-Muslim Nonie Darwish mentioned that, on flying from the U.S. to Canada, she was questioned at length about the purpose of her visit by an apparently Muslim border official. When she revealed that she was giving a speech about Islamic law, he rebuked her: "We are not to question Shariah."
That's the guy manning the airport security desk.
In the New York Times, Maria Newman touched on Hasan's faith only obliquely: "He was single, according to the records, and he listed no religious preference." Thank goodness for that, eh? A neighbor in Texas says the major had "Allah" and "another word" pinned up in Arabic on his door. "Akbar" maybe? On Thursday morning he is said to have passed out copies of the Quran to his neighbors. He shouted in Arabic as he fired.
But don't worry: As the FBI spokesman assured us in nothing flat, there's no terrorism angle.
That's true, in a very narrow sense: Maj. Hasan is not a card-carrying member of the Texas branch of al-Qaida reporting to a control officer in Yemen or Waziristan. If he were, things would be a lot easier. But the same pathologies that drive al-Qaida beat within Maj. Hasan, too, and in the end his Islamic impulses trumped his expensive Western education, his psychiatric training, his military discipline – his entire American identity.
What happened to those men and women at Fort Hood had a horrible symbolism: Members of the best-trained, best-equipped fighting force on the planet gunned down by a guy who said a few goofy things no one took seriously. And that's the problem: America has the best troops and fiercest firepower, but no strategy for throttling the ideology that drives the enemy – in Afghanistan and in Texas.

By MARK STEYN

Syndicated columnist

Yawning at the Word - It's really hard to listen to God when there are really interesting things to think about.

It has been said to the point of boredom that we live in a narcissistic age, where we are wont to fixate on our needs, our wants, our wishes, and our hopes—at the expense of others and certainly at the expense of God. We do not like it when a teacher uses up the whole class time presenting her material, even if it is material from the Word of God. We want to be able to ask our questions about our concerns, otherwise we feel talked down to, or we feel the class is not relevant to our lives.

It is well and good for the preacher to base his sermon on the Bible, but he better get to something relevant pretty quickly, or we start mentally to check out. Don't spend a lot of time in the Bible, we tell our preachers, but be sure to get to personal illustrations, examples from daily life, and most importantly, an application that we can use.

It's easy to see how this culture has profoundly reshaped the dynamics of preaching and teaching. All the demands have been placed on the shoulders of the preacher, so anxious are we to meet needs and stay relevant. No longer are listeners asked to listen humbly to the proclamation of God's Word, in all its mystery and glory. To be sure, we want the preacher to begin with the Word—we're Christians after all—but only as a starting point, and only as long as he moves on to things that really interest us.

We often hear people say how difficult it is to hear God anymore, and I wonder if one reason is that we've forgotten how to listen to the Word of God when it comes to us in the sanctuary or the classroom. We listen like a husband and wife listen when they are in the middle of an argument: they listen only so they can have ammunition to mount a counter attack. That's not listening. And when we listen to the sermon only to hear what seems immediately and directly relevant, neither is that listening. And yet we've raised a whole generation of Christians to listen like this.

Whenever the Bible is read, a hush should come over us. We should be inching toward the edge of our seats, leaning forward, turning our best ear toward the speaker, fearful we'll miss a single word— the deeds and words and character of Almighty and Merciful God are being revealed! In a world of suffering and pain, of doubt and despair, of questions about the meaning and purpose of existence, we are about to hear of God's glory, forgiveness, mercy and love, of his intention for the world, of his promise to make it all good in the end, of the way to join his people, of the means to abide with him forever! And there we sit, tapping our feet, mentally telling the preacher to get on with it.

But if we take the trouble to listen, really listen, to that Word, we'll discover something else marvelous: that the One being revealed is as patient with us as we are impatient with his Word, and as enamored with us as we are bored with him. Ah yes, even more enamored.

By Mark Galli - to read the rest