Recent Posts
God? Who Needs Him?May 31, 2013
Self-sufficient humanism. Paul saw it coming – “lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.”
Imago Dei
September 12, 2012
So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.
Why Can't I Pray?
August 18, 2012
The bible gives us several reasons, but according to Jeremy Taylor, a deceitful heart is at the root of prayerlessness.
It's Not Rocket Science
July 23, 2012
To keep in step with the Spirit should be our daily quest. And if we are successful at that, all of life falls into place.
Theological Steak
April 10, 2012
These words by P. T. Forsythe on the magnificence of Christ's work are to theology what Ruth's Chris is to a good steak.
Describing the Indescribable
February 11, 2012
What we have in Christ will take all eternity to describe. But for one segment of one sermon, a great preacher made a mighty attempt.
Making Sense Of It All
January 30, 2012
Where are things headed? Is there rhyme and reason to the endless cycle of summer, fall, winter and spring? Is there a plan in place, or is randomness the explanation?
God? Who Needs Him?
May 31, 2013
Self-sufficient humanism. Paul saw it coming – “lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.”Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold. Matthew 24:12
Jesus may have had our day in mind when he spoke these words. Charles Taylor in A SECULAR AGE, writes….
“I would like to claim that the coming of modern secularity in my sense has been coterminous…”
(NOTE: Had to look this word up. Means having the same boundaries or extent in space, time, or meaning)
“….coterminous with the rise of a society in which for the first time in history a purely self-sufficient humanism came to be a widely available option. I mean by this a humanism accepting no final goals beyond human flourishing, nor any allegiance to anything else beyond this flourishing.”
“Of no previous society was this true.”
So here is the most encouraging thing I can think of to checkmate the reality of our age:
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. Hebrews 13:8
Imago Dei
September 12, 2012
So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!
The son of a Presbyterian minister and biblical scholar, Robinson Jeffers was a Northern Californian poet who died in 1962. At the height of his fame, Time Magazine featured him on their cover. He was invited to read from his works at the Library of Congress, and his image was even made into a U.S. postage stamp.
You have set your glory in the heavens. Through the praise of children and infants you have established a stronghold against your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger.
His poetry revealed a preference for the natural world over what he saw as the negative influence of civilization. He even coined the phrase “inhumanism,” holding to the thought that mankind is too self-centered and too indifferent to the "astonishing beauty of things."
When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?
The National Endowment For The Arts claims that Robinson Jeffers questioned the uniqueness of humankind.
“As extraordinary as humans might be, from his perspective they are not qualitatively superior to other beings, they are not essential to the universe, and they are not the special concern of a man-like God.”
You have made them a little lower than the angels and crowned them with glory and honor.
How did this play out in his poetry. The poem HURT HAWK includes the controversial line “I'd sooner, except the penalties, kill a man than a hawk.”
You made them rulers over the works of your hands; you put everything under their feet: all flocks and herds, and the animals of the wild, the birds in the sky, and the fish in the sea, all that swim the paths of the seas.
In his collection of poems titled A BOOK OF LUMINOUS THINGS, Czeslaw Milosz says that Jeffers felt that the human species was a “destructive plasm on the surface of the globe,” and that in time mankind would exit this planet, when everything would “once again be perfectly beautiful.
Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! Psalm 8
Making Sense Of It All
January 30, 2012
Where are things headed? Is there rhyme and reason to the endless cycle of summer, fall, winter and spring? Is there a plan in place, or is randomness the explanation?
George Herbert on Prayer Meetings
January 21, 2012
Prayer Meetings are a thing of the past. Or so it seems. What has been lost? Maybe more than we realize.
When Fear Is Good
January 7, 2012
NO FEAR, we are told. And the point is well taken. But fear can be healthy, at least when it comes to eternal matters.
A Way With Words And Then Some
December 31, 2010
I'm terrible. Ask me to describe my wife of 40 years when she's not present, and I freeze. Uh.... Malcolm Muggeridge could find just the words to put your imagination on spin cycle.
17th Century Authenticity
December 30, 2010
To say what you don't feel in your emotions is considered to be inauthentic, or phony. Samuel rutherford would beg to differ.
It Is Necessarily So!
July 24, 2010
The Bible has always had its detractors, but for the last hundred years there has been an unprecedented attack mounted against it. The death blow has failed, but not for lack of trying.
But By My Spirit
July 16, 2010
Jesus told his disciples that they would be better off when he left, because then they would benefit from the presence of the Holy Spirit. We cannot overestimate this gift.
A True Hymn
June 25, 2010
Our words count for eternity. One of the readers of what we write is the Lord Himself. And we will give an account someday.
Against The Grain
June 2, 2010
Anybody can swim with the current. It's the salmon swimming upstream that get our admiration.
Choices Have Consequences
January 1, 2010
Poets often see things as they are before the "general public" - you and me. Their insight into faith matters needs to be considered, and perhaps could serve as a wakeup call.
Chesterton and the Men Of Issachar
July 22, 2009
Being able to see through the mist and fog of these modern times is not easy. Fortunately, some men and women have that prophetic gift. G. K. Chesterton was one of those.
