This is an interesting article about 'courtship'.  By 'interesting', I'm not saying I agree with it, nor that I disagree with it... it is simply 'interesting' for now...

http://www.thomasumstattd.com/2014/08/courtship-fundamentally-flawed/

here's a fascinating paper on the christian roots of abolitionism.

See also two source documents...

"America the Beautiful"?   Or  "America the Dying"?

I realize that both might be true.   But which do you think is most accurate?

2 Chronicles 25:5-9...

Moreover, Amaziah assembled Judah and appointed them according to their fathers' households under commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds throughout Judah and Benjamin; and he took a census of those from twenty years old and upward and found them to be 300,000 choice men, able to go to war and handle spear and shield.

He hired also 100,000 valiant warriors out of Israel for one hundred talents of silver.

But a man of God came to him saying, "O king, do not let the army of Israel go with you, for the LORD is not with Israel nor with any of the sons of Ephraim. But if you do go, do it, be strong for the battle; yet God will bring you down before the enemy, for God has power to help and to bring down."

Amaziah said to the man of God, "But what shall we do for the hundred talents which I have given to the troops of Israel?"

A legitimate question, in my opinion.   Here's a king who's faced with a choice.  He's just become king, and he's about to go out to war.  He's paid the equivalent of hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars to hire mercenary soldiers.  But then a prophet of God comes and tells him that he should send them all home, because God will not support him if he sends this particular group to fight his battles.  But what about all the money I would lose? asks Amaziah.  It was a nonrefundable deposit!

How profound is the answer in return:

And the man of God answered, "The LORD has much more to give you than this."

I came across this very interesting thought in my readings today, from this article.

Now I want to relate a story. Some years ago I viewed the 1993 Academy Award movie of the year, Schindler's List, the Steven Spielberg story of Oskar Schindler, the Nazi war profiteer, who shortly after the German invasion of Poland in 1939 began to use the Jews of the Krakow ghetto as workers in his pots and pans factory. At first he saw them only as chattel to be used to line his own pockets, which he did quite successfully, becoming exceedingly rich. But as the war dragged on, and as he increasingly witnessed Nazi atrocities being inflicted against the Jews of Poland, increasingly did he begin to use his own wealth to bribe Nazi officials and army officers to give him more and more Jews for his factory that the Nazis had turned toward the end of the war into a munitions factory and that, by Schindler's personal instructions, became a model of non-productivity in the Nazi war effort. Though it virtually bankrupted him personally, he saved over twelve hundred Jews from certain death in the gas chambers of Auschwitz.

I recount this story line only to say that I was struck by some statements put in his mouth toward the end of the movie. The war has just ended, and having worked for the Third Reich, both he and his Jewish factory workers realize that the Allied authorities might search for him. As he bids farewell to them, they present him with a letter signed by each of them that they hope will help him before the Allied authorities.

At this moment Schindler suddenly becomes very sober and quietly says: "I could have done more. I could have done more!" He begins to sob. "I could have done more. I didn't do enough. This car-why did I keep the car? Ten people right there. Ten people. Ten more people." Pulling off his lapel pin, he exclaims, "The pin. Two people. This is gold. Two more people! One more. I could have bought more people! But I didn't." His knees crumble and he sobs heavily.

As his words - "I could have done more! Why did I keep the car? Ten people right there. The pin. This is gold. Two more people. One more. I could have bought more people. But I didn't." - seared themselves into my mind as I sat in the darkness of that theater, I suddenly became convicted that many Christians-I among them-are going to be asking similar questions at the Great White Throne Judgment: "Why did I not do more to reach the lost for Christ? Why did I think I had to have that more expensive house, that more expensive car, that snowmobile, that ten-speed bicycle that hangs most of the time in my garage? Why did I not use more of my resources for the cause of Christ?" More poignantly, "Why was I not more committed to Christ's cause? Why did I esteem my own self-preservation so highly? Why was I not willing to go myself?" In that Great Day I fear that many of us will have no answers to salve our smitten consciences.

May God raise up in our day, while divine patience still grants us time, a multitude of men and women who will boldly dare to go into this lost and dying world where no man has ever gone before with the liberating law-free gospel of God!

I was thinking today about Thomas Kinkade and the fact that I don't seem to despise him nearly as much as many of my friends do, and about art in general, about which we've discussed some thoughts before in the past.

And I was pondering one of my favorite paintings, by Norman Rockwell:

Here is a blurb about this painting:

Some of Rockwell’s most powerful creations came out of his years with "Look." One such piece was inspired by the unjust murders of three civil rights workers near Philadelphia, Mississippi. The painting, “Southern Justice,” was done in 1965 and depicts the horror endured by three young men, two white and one black [James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwermer], who had come to Mississippi in the fight for equality. One man is seen lying dead in the foreground; the next is standing in the glow of the attacker’s torch while defending the third man, who appears near death.

Though this painting is not very "Kinkadian", the question for me is whether the sentiment it expresses is Biblical, and whether it's a skillful work, worth thinking about.   I think so, for two reasons.

First, its goal (as a work of art) is to promote racial equality (Rockwell left the Saturday Evening Post after working for them for 47 years, because they told him "never to show coloured people except as servants".  Rockwell's decision fits with the Bible's portrayal as all the world of ONE race and endowed by the Creator with unalienable human rights, contrary to the racism inherent from the theory of evolution.  And it fits with the mission of "seeking justice" and "defending the fatherless" that God has commissioned His people to engage in.  Our primary task is "making disciples" of Jesus - fishing for men in light of the extremely high stakes of eternity.  But meanwhile we are the salt of the earth, and without a doubt this influence cannot ignore our host country's political structure.

Second, I find so much beauty in the portrayal of the standing man holding up the other man.  I remember standing in front of this painting in the Norman Rockwell museum being literally stunned by the force of the standing man's gaze (he has piercing blue eyes, which are hard to see in the online pictures).  The look in his eye says, "Go ahead.  Shoot me.  But I will not run away - I will not cease from helping this black man who is my friend."  This "rugged individualism" is not really "American" in origin, although it is one of the most beautiful things that the American culture has preserved for the world.  (...though particular strengths are often tied to related excesses/sins...)   Instead, this insistence on doing what is right even when it is unpopular or "goes against what society considers right" is Biblical  (contrast with the atheist/agnostic's relativistic/cultural view of morality if you have some time).

I find myself empathizing strongly with the standing guy.  Of all ways to die, how wonderful it would be to die while helping someone else, seeking justice and the glory of God and others' salvation, in an ending which the world might consider "tragic" but which God remembers with approval.  (Indeed God Himself experienced this... He died on our behalf while saving us from our sins...  He voluntarily submitted to death at our hands, so that He could save those of us who believe in Him...)  Truly "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose."

Yet it is amazing to realize that I can glorify God even in the mundane, everyday moments of life... choosing to die to self and obey God's direction...  and amazing that God will not forget even the slightest act.  Not just the moment of our death, but literally everything is significant and will be scrutinized on that Day.

Soli Deo Gloria - To God alone be glory.   May God be exalted in my life.

"...born of a gorilla, not of a virgin."

Hmmm.

It is a "Bible for skeptics, seekers, and people of different faiths."

Lots of faiths, perhaps.  But not Christianity.

It's interesting that a book self-claiming to be postmodern and inclusive should so stridently insist that Christians and Jews have "got the story wrong" on origins (and on Jesus).

Also, "The first volume in the series – which will eventually present the Torah, Bhagavad Gita, Buddhist sutras, and Sufi mysticism – covers the Gospel of Mark."

Notice one particular "holy book" that's missing from the revisionist/parody-series?   I wonder why...

I'm sure some have you have already seen this documentary about global warming (hint: the hype may well be based on faulty science).

But if you haven't, it's worth taking two hours to listen to and think about (especially if you can do something else during that time - dishes, laundry, whatever... multitasking to 'redeem the time...' 

Here's a powerful quote from near the end:
"I think one of the most pernicious aspects of the modern envionmental movement is this romantisation of peasant life, and the idea that industrial societies are the destroyers of the world.

The envionmental movement has evolved into the strongest force there is for preventing development in the developing countries.

I think it's legitimate for me to call them anti-human.  Like, Ok, you don't have to think humans are better than whales, or better than owls, or whatever... if you don't want to, right.

But surely it is not a good idea to think of humans as being scum.  ..That it's ok to have hundreds of millions of them go blind or die or whatever.   I just can't relate to that."

Patrick Moore - cofounder of Greenpeace

Here's a recent email I wrote to a email group of creationists...   I'd be interested to hear your thoughts.

Dear -------, -------, and other friends,

I think you're both right.   We Christians can (and must) base our belief structure upon Christ and the Word of God as our sure foundation (more sure than shifting science).   Yet our faith in Christ is not subjective or based on circular reasoning, but is based on real historical facts (1 Corinthians 15:1-8) that have empirical/historical/scientific backing.

Our "presuppositional structure" can be based on the Bible (a more 'postmodern' emphasis), while our trust in the Bible itself can be based on the "evidence" for the accuracy and truth of the Bible (a more "modernist" emphasis).   Neither full postmodernism nor full modernism are correct (they are both human-centered rather than God-centered), but both philosophies of knowledge have some truth to them.

While saying "Christ should be our starting point" sounds great, problems arise whenever we ask the "What" and "Why" questions.  What/who exactly is this "Christ"?  Is He the Christ of the modern emergent church, the liberal socialistic activist-for-the-poor?  Is He the Christ of Luther? or of the Catholics?  "He's the Christ of the Bible," one might say.  But all of those groups claim Biblical basis.  It is necessary to go back to the "brute facts" of the not-completely-subjective Word of God to ascertain exactly who Christ was and is.    Furthermore, "Why" should Christ be our starting point?   Why not Muhammad or Buddha or Joseph Smith?  Why must we believe in any God whatsoever? Again we must go back to the historical "brute facts" of creation and the history surrounding Jesus of Nazareth to provide a basis for our hope (1 Peter 3:15).

Yet brute facts presented to a nonbeliever will be as ineffective as water rolling off a duck's back... unless God opens the heart and mind to believe.

The Bible itself supports both perspectives on the issue I think (they are complementary rather than contradictory) - in Acts 26:26, 17:22-32, 1 Cor. 15:1-8, etc, examples are given of pointing to Christ from empirical evidences and proofs, philosophical reasoning, and historical facts.   Yet in Col. 2:1-10, 1 Cor 1:18-2:16 and 1 Tim 6:20 we are warned against "philosophy"/"human wisdom" and in 2 Peter 1:19 we are told that the prophetic word is even more sure/reliable than direct sensory experience.

Will people come to believe in Christ without God working in their hearts to open their eyes?  No.  "Evidence" or "brute factuality" without God's regenerating power is useless.  (Acts 16:14, Rom. 1, John 6:44, 65, Eph. 2:1-10, etc).  Kuhn and Polanyi showed the stubbornness of mere scientific paradigms in the face of data... how much more the stubbornness of a human heart that hates God.
On the other hand, was Van Til right that the only way to witness to people is to first get them to adopt your presuppositional starting point (e.g. the Bible is God's Word)?   I see plenty of evidence from Scripture that there are other ways to present the gospel... including ways that start from "scientific facts" or philosophical reasoning, and end at Jesus Christ as portrayed in the Scriptures (e.g. Acts 17:22-32).

Different people are led to Christ from different starting points (1 Cor. 9:19-23).

With esteem,

In Christ, Tim

 Wow, this is really strange.   And sad.  It's interesting how it's hard to get the full/accurate perspective on war events until years afterward (cf. USA War for Independence, Civil War, WWI, WWII, Vietnam, etc).   Who knows how much more crucial information we're missing about current world conflicts...

God knows.

"...there is nothing covered up that will not be revealed, and hidden that will not be known. Accordingly, whatever you have said in the dark will be heard in the light, and what you have whispered in the inner rooms will be proclaimed upon the housetops.

I say to you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that have no more that they can do. But I will warn you whom to fear: fear the One who, after He has killed, has authority to cast into hell; yes, I tell you, fear Him!" 

- -  Jesus Christ

It is quite plausible that Jesus Christ knew what He was talking about.