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February 26 Italy Trip and Update--Please Read!!!This year has been a challenging but exciting ride. Hillary and I have moved. We are currently living in a loft in south Dallas. It’s an artsy community with tons of stuff to do. I have a longer commute to school, but it’s a better situation overall. And our pet rabbit Petunia has adjusted nicely. Meanwhile I finished my Master of Theology degree and am in my second semester of PhD work in Philosophy of Religion. Hillary is busy with photography. Between artistry and studies, we’ve had to work hard to get by. But God is good. As for ministry, we’ve had some great opportunities these last few months. * South Africa Teaching Trip—last summer John traveled with a group from Southern Evangelical Seminary. The group is called T.E.A.M (Tactical Evangelism and Apologetics Mission). We went into Johannesburg, Pretoria and Potchefstrum, South Africa and taught in universities and churches on apologetics topics like the New Atheistm, occultism, defending the faith, worldview thinking, and ethics. * Love Comes to Town: A Falling Whistles Event—on February 7th Hillary did the photography at a Falling Whistles event in our loft complex to raise money for orphaned children in the Congo. About 1500 people attended and $35,000 was raised. She’s still responding to the interest raised through her pictures (www.hillarymorgan.com). * The God-Dialogues—this spring John is coordinating a round-table discussion between atheists and theists hosted by three universities: University of Texas Dallas, University of Texas Arlington, and Texas A&M. Michael Craven of the Center for Christ and Culture will join John for two sessions with Dr. Robert Sloan Lee, a college professor in the Dallas area, filling in at the A&M venue. They will be dialoguing with two representatives from the North Texas Church of Free Thought, area atheists, Dr. Zachary Moore and Derek Sansone. The Dialogues are slated for March 23rd 7-9pm (UTD), April 9th 7-9pm (UTA), and April 23rd 7-9pm (A&M). This summer, May 13-27, we have the opportunity to go on another teaching trip to Italy. We will be returning to Naples and Rome. But we’ll also venture into Milan this time. When we went in the winter of ’07 we found ministry moments everywhere—small groups inviting us to teach, guest speaking at multiple churches every night, university training, church conferences, all in the span of about 10 days. This year we have more venues opening and more time to invest. The evangelical church in Italy is hungry for truth that can stand up to objections. They are desperate to see the Gospel in action within a skeptical world. These trips are important, but as for Hill and I, they are tough on the marriage since we haven’t been able to pool enough money in the past for both of us to go. The biggest blessing of all would be to raise enough for both of us to go. The team always needs a photographer, so she’d be a vital asset. Plus, she’s a sharp apologist herself. The cost for both of us to go is around $4000. Please pray for us that God would make a way, pave the way, prepare the people, and shine through all of it. And please consider contributing to this trip. Please make all gifts in the following manner. To: Southern Evangelical Seminary T.E.A.M. For: John or Hillary Ferrer Mail to: Southern Evangelical Seminary 3000 Tilley Morris Road, Matthews NC, 28105
Sincerely, John Ferrer February 21 10 Songs That Changed My Life1. Eric Clapton "Tears in Heaven" 2. Led Zeppelin "Going to California" 3. White Stripe "Icky Thump" 4. Jeff Buckley (version) "Hallelujah" (the original might be better but I forget the artist) 5. Led Zeppelin "Over the Hills and Far Away" 6. The Guess Who "American Woman" 7. Queen "Bohemian Rhapsody" 8. Cake "Going the Distance" 9. Doby Gray "Drift Away" 10. Keller Williams "Kidney in a Cooler" The Gift of Grace is Wrapped in Discarded Paper (aka: The Un-Sermon)[I haven't written many sermons lately, and rarely any more do my sermons speak outside of apologetics purposes anymore. So when I found myself jotting these sermon notes down this sunday, I surprised even myself. This is a little Christmas message about grace] "The Un- Sermon" There is perhaps no subject matter more fundamental to life and reality than the doctrine of God. And the link between God and man is grace alone. So that makes grace the single most important lifeline that man can hold onto. Or, if you think about it another way, God's grace is the ocean where we are all afloat. Were God's sustaining grace not present, then we would sink into non-existence. I'm not merely talking about whether we go to heaven, I'm talking about whether our electrons will still revolve around their nuclei within our every atom; whether or leptons and quarks will continue to exist at a subatomic level; whether our bodily organs will continue to function and cooperate, and whether our solar system will continue its stubborn survival. I'm talking about the very sustaining of our existence so that we don't dissolve into total nothingness. I literally mean the God "in whom we live and move and have our being" (Acts 17:28). I never tire of gazing into the infinite ocean of God's grace. No subject fascinates me more. And since our present life and future hope rest squarely on His grace, we have good reason to wonder at the nature of His grace. Yet, strangely enough, grand-scale realities are sometimes so big that we can't help but miss them. I think it was C.S. Lewis who said, "If you want to understand the wetness of water, don't ask a fish." A fish knows nothing of the wetness of water. Or, to illustrate further, it is like, looking very closely at some writing. An inch away from the page you may still be able to see what it reads. But a micrometer from the page, viewed under the microscope, you might be able to see parts of it, but you can no longer see what it reads. You are literally too close, too submerged in it, to be able to see what it reads. For the fish, this over-obvious reality is water, for us, this over-obvious reality might be the experience of time, or space, or our own existence, or grace. Divine grace is for us like water is to a fish, it is the sustaining environment whereby we "live and move," but the analogy breaks down because for fish and men alike, God's grace is how we all "have our being." It is God's sustaining and gracious activity in our cosmos that gives both fish and men both life and existence. The grace of God is everywhere visible, little seen, ever-present but unnoticed, so obvious it is beyond us. God operates in gracious ways that are just crazy enough to be true. God's grace appears in grand order when a few hundred Israelites in Gideon's army defeat scores of thousands of Midianites (Judges 7). God's grace operates in subtler ways, in gentle healing (Matt 14:14). And God's grace is downright confusing when he engineers pain and suffering in redeeming ways that only a divine Daddy can do. For example, God first gave man the "gift" of death so that we would not have to live forever in our fallen state (Gen 3:22-24). And God tells Paul amidst his "thorn in the flesh," that "My grace is sufficient for you" (2 Cor 12:9). God's grace is clearly not the safe and easy doctrine that it often seems. God's grace is grand and glorious, odd and awkward, profound and mysterious. And whatever it is, it is not cheap. I hardly need note Dietrich Bonhoeffer's "Cost of Discipleship" where the author contrasts "cheap grace" with "costly grace." Grace may be free but never for a moment should we think it cheap. And so we come to the point at issue: the Baby Jesus typifies God's grace. Our response to Him is our response to God's grace. Let us dwell first on how the Christ child means grace. The baby Jesus was an infinite treasure to purchase the souls of men from slavery, yet this treasure, we find, is wrapped in burial shrouds, carried by a poor unwed teenager, lain across hay and spittle, away from home, late at night, outside a stranger's hotel, in a barn, in a feeding troth for barn animals. This child is the most important person in existence, and yet His entry into this world is the practical equivalent of being born in the parking lot of a pawn shop and first wrapped in newspaper. The infinite eternal God has here pierced time and space, donned a human nature, and taken on mortality for the express purpose of dying another man's death. And this Christ child has hidden himself in poverty among commoners so that merely mortal men could meet God. This is God's grace at work. Confused yet? Amazed? I say yes on both accounts. Let us look deeper into the story of His birth and see then how God's grace comes to us. 1) Undeservedly--first we can see from Mary and Joseph that they were not especially deserving. Adequate for God's purposes, yes. But Scripture makes no hint that they were sinless nor that they deserved to play the role they did in the redemption of mankind. Circumstantially, they were barely fit for the task. They could not afford to give baby Jesus the best educational opportunities, nor the best food and shelter, nor the most elite social network to get His message out to the world. They had little to give to baby Jesus, but what they had they gave it all. Mary and Joseph both took some miraculous convincing before they would believe that Mary was supernaturally impregnated (Matt 2:19-24; Luke 1:26-38). Yet God endured their doubt and used them anyone. 2) Unnaturally--the Baby Jesus came in a strange way. Not only was this baby born by supernatural implantation, but the baby Jesus was born away from home, amidst hostile governance, to what may have been an unwed couple. The more natural means of child-birth within the Biblical Judeo-Christian tradition is to have one man and one wife birthing the child within the stability of a loving and fruitful marriage. And the more natural and healthy manner is to settle in, and have the child in a stable and settled home--not in transit, with the first few years of His life being lived on the run from hostile governing authorities (Matt 2:13-23). But since this birth was in fact miraculous, it is unusual and almost unbelievable. It is altogether unnatural. 3) Unwelcomed--now Mary and Joseph did, eventually, embrace the the role conferred to them through the angel Gabriel. But, let us remember, that they did not ask for this prestigious position, nor was it an entirely pleasant or comfortable position to be in. Meanwhile most of the world made no effort to welcome baby Jesus. Beyond the supernaturally informed insight of Mary and Jesus, a few shepherds, and perhaps some accidentally faithful Magi, the rest of the world did not recognize or welcome Jesus into the world. As Jesus grew from a child to a man, and as he began His earthly ministry, he would become a revolutionary of the most radical sort. He would so change society and threaten convention that He faced inhospitable and intolerant opposition throughout His earthly ministry. God's grace is largely unwelcomed. Summing up, we see a picture of God's grace. It's the same picture today. God's grace comes unnaturally, undeservedly, and without welcome. Yet we would not even exist to reject His gracious advances were we not already swimming in His grace. Like the ignorant fish we are immersed in God's grace so much that we take it for granted. Reader and listener, let yourself see the grandeur of God's grace and welcome it for all its supernatural and undeserved glory. You are no mother Mary or Joseph, but God wants to show you grace by using you in a bigger plan then you could ever fashion by your own hands. He first wants to save you from yourself and the death you deserve. He then wants to salvage your life and make a miracle worker out of you, a carrier of grace to other thankless wretches like you once were. He even wants to make out of you a masterpiece of praise, an artwork of worship whose very life is an act of adoration towards God. There is no such meaningfulness to be found by our own artifice. We could never manufacture such meaning in our lives. We are made for worship, and no other meaning in life matters so much. Only by God's grace are we allowed and able to worship Him and so discover again for the first time the very reason we were made. God is here extending a gracious hand to you today. Whereever you are in your journey with Him--off the trail, far along it, not even on it--please receive God's grace for the transforming and heart-warming gift that it is. God's grace is but another name for His love. Do not reject the only perfect and infinite love in life. Do not ignore the Christ child and so reject the man Jesus, his crucifixion, his resurrection, and your own only future hope. He has come in love, he has come by grace. Welcome into your life this miracle of love and grace. Eugenics and AbortionEugenics or "good genes" refers to selective breeding techniques designed to "improve the race." Usually this meant aborting babies and sterilizing people so they can't pass on their problems to children. But on the lighter side it also included birth control--however, this was birth control for the sake of social evolution (which we'll get to later). Today, eugenics is a dirty word. And rightfully so. It paints over so much inhumanity, racism, genocide, with a thin excuse of "bettering the world." Eugenics conjures images of Nazi Germany sterilizing the handicapped, of Gattaca where "inferiors" are not allowed to live, and of sterilized imbeciles in insane asylums. But little do Americans know that it was U.S. social policies which Hitler claimed as inspiration for his eugenics legislation in WWII. How could such an aweful practice sprout on American turf?
The seedbed of ideas is not hard to find. The eugenics policies that were passed in America were in the 1920's and 30's and they were not repealled until "eugenics" became passe after Hitler's exploits gave it a bad name. In the 1860's the bookshelfs bowed under the heavy social weight of the newly release Origin of the Species, by Charles Darwin. But to be more technical, the title is: On the Origin of Species By Means of Natural Selection: The Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life. Here Darwin put forward the idea of competing animals vying for limited resources and ultimate survival in a world that is "red in tooth and claw." This natural selection idea was not all that new, but it was clearly presented and abundantly illustrated in Darwin's book. But built into Darwin's argument was a population scare forecasted by Thomas Malthus in his famous (but seriously flawed) Principle of Population. Written a few decades earlier, Malthus argued that human populations grow by multiplication while the food resources grow additively and so, he predicted, we would all run out of food within a few generations. By this logic, Human survival is a zero-sum game where we will have to restrict our growing population or "return to nature" killing each other to keep ourselves alive. Humans are just more animals subject to the cold logic of natural selection.
Meanwhile, religious conversative influence in the universities was starting to wane around the start of the 20th century as well, as historically Christian schools like Brown, Yale, Harvard and Princeton were caving in to German rationalism (with its brutal skepticism), higher criticism (which questioned the historicity and truth of the Bible), and theological liberalism (which dismissed much of orthodoxy and historic Christian ethics). Ideas like the sacredness of life and the "imago dei" were being reinterpreted naturalistically or abandoned altogether. The university then had little power to fight the tide of evolutionary appeal. Naturally, with such ideas leading the way, social darwinism rode into town in royal cavalcade. By the turn of the century social evolution was swirling aboutin educated circles and into popular conversation. By the 1920's and 30's court cases and legislation were appearing which pushed for sterilization of imbeciles, poor people, minorities and all sorts of "defectives" as they were called. In less than 20 years, estimates indicate about 600,000 people were sterilized, many of whom thought they were getting some kind of flu shot. Of course, when Hitler took the eugenics experiment into the public limelight and coldly applied its brutal logic the term became passe and most overtly eugenics-oriented legislation was repealed.
However, America has not recovered from its eugenics experiment of the 1920-30's. We have just transferred the emphasis to abortion and translated the lingo into the language of "women's rights" (though the early women's lib movement carried the 'right to life' cause alongside the suffrage issue), and "choice" (though dead babies have no choice, and the vast majority of pregnancies already involved the choice of consensual sex).
True to form, abortion on demand has preyed overwhelmingly on minority and impoverished populations--serving the same purposes for which eugenics and social evolution were drawn. Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood, herself saw the Aryan race as the most advanced race and in her "Negro Project" she targeted black ministers as cultural support in her cause saying, "The most successful educational approach to the Negro is through a religious appeal. We do not want the word to get out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it occurs to any of their more rebellious members" (quoted in, Michael K. Flaterly, "White Lie" The American Spectator Aug. 1992). At the time she had both sterilization and birth control in mind because abortion was not yet legal. Now all three are legal, and all that has been lost is the popular acceptance of terms like "eugenics" and "social evolution." Sanger's cause was hardly slowed even when social evolution was scandalized by the cold logic of the Holocaust and and Hitler's "Final Solution." We cannot estimate how many people were preempted by the 600,000 (estimated) sterilizations in American eugenics legislation in the 1920's and 30's. But we do know that since Roe versus Wade legalized abortion in 1973 in America, in just 35 years America has seen 49,000,000 legal abortions.
This year America is slated to pass the 50,000,000 mark for legal abortions.
-That is almost as much as the populations of California and New York combined. Or about 2x the population of Texas.
-That is more than the populations of either South Africa or South Korea.
-That is about 6 million more than Stalin killed during his communist regime in Russia.
-That is about 4.5 x's as many as Hitler ever killed in Nazi Germany
-That is more than 100 x's as many as Mussolini killed in Fascist Italy.
-That is 50 x's more than the total number of American's who have died in combat throughout U.S. History.
-That is 12 million more than all the deaths in combat in all the wars in all the world during the entire 20th century.
Abortion is an arm of eugenics, and, if you listen closely to the arguments used today to support it you can hear the same logic of social evolution. I pray that God has mercy on our country and intervenes to stop this genocide. We dare not cannibalize our kids for mere comfort any longer and presume to ask God's favor or blessing on our country. Lord save us from ourselves. Let the terror stop.
If you are considering or know someone who is considering an abortion, please do not be another statistic in that 50 million. That is a record you don't want to be a part of. There are other options. Thoughts on doubtDoubt can be a scary place. In a turning and transient world, when time flies too fast for our memory to follow, and our business is busyness, change seems to be the only constant. We cope by finding bits of solid ground to stand on. We survive by forging little nooks of security, places where we feel safe, where boring is good, and dependability is golden. We need bastions of protection just to get by. Sure we don't mind the swirling dervish of life sometimes, but we need breaks between the rides. We all need solid ground to stand on. Doubt can be like that whirling ride, or it can be a diminished spot of ground beneath us. If doubt overtakes us, we either cannot get off the ride anymore, or we step off it into emptiness.
But lets be honest. Everyone doubts. Doubt is like taxes, its obligatory. Sure, we wouldn't want to doubt ourselves into an asylum somewhere, but we also wouldn't want to be a naive gullible, a comparative bunny rabbit in this predatory world. How then can we harness our doubts and force them into submission to truth? Well, we first should consider what we're dealing with.
Three kinds of doubt stand out to me (this is borrowed from Dr. Gary Habermas who first clarified these categories for me).
1) Intellectual Doubt--this is the reasoned and thoughtful kind of doubt where questions are raised about some proposed belief and unless answers come we suspend belief. Scientific, philosophical, theological or what have you--intellectual doubt is the "thinking mans" mode of doubt.
2) Emotional Doubt--this is the emotionally based doubt where, regardless of intellectual objections, the locus of doubt is some hurt, anger, fear, or otherwise emotional distrust. In my estimation, the vast majority of skeptics, free-thinkers and disbelievers have emotional doubt lurking beneath their intellectual questions.
3) Volitional Doubt--this is the willful and deliberate doubt, which may have originally sprung from emotional hurt or intellectual objections, but has since cooled and calcified into simple choice. This kind of doubt is the scariest because it cannot be assuaged or reasoned with. As such, it is emotionally and intellectually oblivious.
Intellectual doubt is my forte. It's relatively easy to address since the questioner is simply looking for answers to the question. Intellectual answers. Logical, scientific, theological, and philosophical problems can often find strong answers, if not conclusive answers so that intellectual doubt is resolved.
Emotional doubt is a bit trickier. The questions that arise are are often attempts to vent an emotional hurt, rather than seek an intellectual answer (for example, "There can't be a good God if he lets little babies die every day, right?"). The questions and doubts that are expressed sometimes don't even do that. Sometimes they just obscure and deflect us from seeing the emotional wound where the doubt really lurks. Here the intellectual questions can be answered without resolving much or any of the doubt. The intellectual questions are more of a smoke screen than a barrier. The real barrier is usually some kind of hurt. to address emotional doubt we have to address the hurt. A warm hug can sometimes do the trick. Usually though it takes some long-term loving friendship, earned trust, a patient ear, and gentle counsel. These needs are met existentially, not "rationally," so to speak.
Volitional doubt is even trickier. This kind of doubt might be exposed by first addressing the intellectual and emotional needs. When the person has no significant hurt or rational objection, he or she may still prefer to doubt and stay comfortable in their old lifestyle, their secret sin, their independence, their addiction, or what have you.
Somewhere between the last two kinds of doubt lurk the three main reasons for disbelief (that I can see at least).
Pride, fear and comfort.
Untold millions of people would rather reject faith in God than have to admit they were wrong, than cede to his authority, than step into the unknown, than leave their comfort zone. Rarely do I meet a person whose sole, or even main, reason for disbelief is a genuinely intellectual reason. Usually what happens with an "intellectual doubter" is after searching out his or her questions about God (or "the faith," or "the resurrection," or "the Bible") to the furthest end and seeing that strong reasons remain for believing God, they still don't want to believe or are still emotionally unable to believe. Resolving the intellectual doubts merely cleared away the smokescreen so that the real reasons for disbelief can be addressed.
so what is the moral of the story then? I suppose the simplest starting point is to admit that we don't always know ourselves as well as we think we do. Once admitting that we need courage enough to follow the truth wherever it leads. This is a willful commitment, a scary one at that. And following the truth is rarely a straight and narrow path. Then, lastly, we humbly pursue the truth.
to put this is brutally painful terms, consider the lonely maiden wanting a husband. There are millions of eligible women, good girls and would-be domestic goddesses/career women (take your pick) with a great work ethic, a gentle spirit, and undying faithfullness ready to be unleashed on a husband. The only problem is they have no good husband material available. For there millions of those women, there are about 12 good guys to choose from. So what do they do? They do what anyone desperate enough does, they settle. I'm not talking about realistic settling, I'm talking about pessimistic settling. I'm not saying they should hold out for prince charming, I'm saying they shouldn't marry the dragon. The truth is, and they know this, they should wait for a good respectable God-fearing and responsible man. However emotional doubt can be very strong ("Being an old maid is the worst thing ever!; No man will ever love me") and it can be well hidden by intellectual doubts ("All the good guys seem to be gay or taken; I really don't have a 'right' or 'deserve' anything better than this?; Hardly anyone 'holds' out for their Mr. Right anymore."). Reasoning with such women does little good. The locus of doubt is emotional, but if not treated it hardens into intellectual and volitional doubt.
I know I already "concluded" but perhaps some clarification would help to apply this insight.
1) Treat the doubt according to its kind--intellectual for the intellectual, emotional for the emotional, and persistent prayer for the volitional doubt.
2) Use your doubt--don't run from it, explain it away, or pretend its not real. It need not master you. Rather let it be the insightful question that helps your further along to better answers.
3) Known what you know, and doubt your doubts--if you find that doubt is getting the best of you, remember what you do know. And don't let anyone talk you into unreasonable, baseless, and illicit doubts. In the mean time, question your very questions. Some questions are uncalled for, and you don't have to let them trouble you. Why question whether truth exists? Do you really believe that you can't trust your senses AT ALL? Why question your own existence? If you have no real intellectual reason to doubt your wife's faithfulness, then why worry about it?
4) Emotions are a better follower than leader--when you find that your doubts are more emotional than anything else, treat it with the caution and care you should use with any emotion. Don't let emotion take you on a roller coaster ride. You have great authority over your emotions so don't believe the lie that you have to "follow your heart," or "if I feel it, it must be true." If you can let your emotions inform you but not guide you then you'll find that emotions are a great and helpful support as you pursue truth.
5) Let your intellectual doubts correct your faith--be a life-long learner, ask sensible and responsible questions to correct your faith. When you have good reasons, and the pros outweigh the cons, then you can start extending some faith in that direction, reasonable faith. If you wait for absolute certainty you'll be waiting a while. But if you hold out for high probability, or a good defensible position, then you can start building a worldview and a life.
Doubt can be good. Truth is out there and you can know it, so let your doubts be just another avenue to it. Thoughts on doubtDoubt can be a scary place. In a turning and transient world, when time flies too fast for our memory to follow, and our business is busyness, change seems to be the only constant. We cope by finding bits of solid ground to stand on. We survive by forging little nooks of security, places where we feel safe, where boring is good, and dependability is golden. We need bastions of protection just to get by. Sure we don't mind the swirling dervish of life sometimes, but we need breaks between the rides. We all need solid ground to stand on. Doubt can be like that whirling ride, or it can be a diminished spot of ground beneath us. If doubt overtakes us, we either cannot get off the ride anymore, or we step off it into emptiness.
But lets be honest. Everyone doubts. Doubt is like taxes, its obligatory. Sure, we wouldn't want to doubt ourselves into an asylum somewhere, but we also wouldn't want to be a naive gullible, a comparative bunny rabbit in this predatory world. How then can we harness our doubts and force them into submission to truth? Well, we first should consider what we're dealing with.
Three kinds of doubt stand out to me (this is borrowed from Dr. Gary Habermas who first clarified these categories for me).
1) Intellectual Doubt--this is the reasoned and thoughtful kind of doubt where questions are raised about some proposed belief and unless answers come we suspend belief. Scientific, philosophical, theological or what have you--intellectual doubt is the "thinking mans" mode of doubt.
2) Emotional Doubt--this is the emotionally based doubt where, regardless of intellectual objections, the locus of doubt is some hurt, anger, fear, or otherwise emotional distrust. In my estimation, the vast majority of skeptics, free-thinkers and disbelievers have emotional doubt lurking beneath their intellectual questions.
3) Volitional Doubt--this is the willful and deliberate doubt, which may have originally sprung from emotional hurt or intellectual objections, but has since cooled and calcified into simple choice. This kind of doubt is the scariest because it cannot be assuaged or reasoned with. As such, it is emotionally and intellectually oblivious.
Intellectual doubt is my forte. It's relatively easy to address since the questioner is simply looking for answers to the question. Intellectual answers. Logical, scientific, theological, and philosophical problems can often find strong answers, if not conclusive answers so that intellectual doubt is resolved.
Emotional doubt is a bit trickier. The questions that arise are are often attempts to vent an emotional hurt, rather than seek an intellectual answer (for example, "There can't be a good God if he lets little babies die every day, right?"). The questions and doubts that are expressed sometimes don't even do that. Sometimes they just obscure and deflect us from seeing the emotional wound where the doubt really lurks. Here the intellectual questions can be answered without resolving much or any of the doubt. The intellectual questions are more of a smoke screen than a barrier. The real barrier is usually some kind of hurt. to address emotional doubt we have to address the hurt. A warm hug can sometimes do the trick. Usually though it takes some long-term loving friendship, earned trust, a patient ear, and gentle counsel. These needs are met existentially, not "rationally," so to speak.
Volitional doubt is even trickier. This kind of doubt might be exposed by first addressing the intellectual and emotional needs. When the person has no significant hurt or rational objection, he or she may still prefer to doubt and stay comfortable in their old lifestyle, their secret sin, their independence, their addiction, or what have you.
Somewhere between the last two kinds of doubt lurk the three main reasons for disbelief (that I can see at least).
Pride, fear and comfort.
Untold millions of people would rather reject faith in God than have to admit they were wrong, than cede to his authority, than step into the unknown, than leave their comfort zone. Rarely do I meet a person whose sole, or even main, reason for disbelief is a genuinely intellectual reason. Usually what happens with an "intellectual doubter" is after searching out his or her questions about God (or "the faith," or "the resurrection," or "the Bible") to the furthest end and seeing that strong reasons remain for believing God, they still don't want to believe or are still emotionally unable to believe. Resolving the intellectual doubts merely cleared away the smokescreen so that the real reasons for disbelief can be addressed.
so what is the moral of the story then? I suppose the simplest starting point is to admit that we don't always know ourselves as well as we think we do. Once admitting that we need courage enough to follow the truth wherever it leads. This is a willful commitment, a scary one at that. And following the truth is rarely a straight and narrow path. Then, lastly, we humbly pursue the truth.
to put this is brutally painful terms, consider the lonely maiden wanting a husband. There are millions of eligible women, good girls and would-be domestic goddesses/career women (take your pick) with a great work ethic, a gentle spirit, and undying faithfullness ready to be unleashed on a husband. The only problem is they have no good husband material available. For there millions of those women, there are about 12 good guys to choose from. So what do they do? They do what anyone desperate enough does, they settle. I'm not talking about realistic settling, I'm talking about pessimistic settling. I'm not saying they should hold out for prince charming, I'm saying they shouldn't marry the dragon. The truth is, and they know this, they should wait for a good respectable God-fearing and responsible man. However emotional doubt can be very strong ("Being an old maid is the worst thing ever!; No man will ever love me") and it can be well hidden by intellectual doubts ("All the good guys seem to be gay or taken; I really don't have a 'right' or 'deserve' anything better than this?; Hardly anyone 'holds' out for their Mr. Right anymore."). Reasoning with such women does little good. The locus of doubt is emotional, but if not treated it hardens into intellectual and volitional doubt.
I know I already "concluded" but perhaps some clarification would help to apply this insight.
1) Treat the doubt according to its kind--intellectual for the intellectual, emotional for the emotional, and persistent prayer for the volitional doubt.
2) Use your doubt--don't run from it, explain it away, or pretend its not real. It need not master you. Rather let it be the insightful question that helps your further along to better answers.
3) Known what you know, and doubt your doubts--if you find that doubt is getting the best of you, remember what you do know. And don't let anyone talk you into unreasonable, baseless, and illicit doubts. In the mean time, question your very questions. Some questions are uncalled for, and you don't have to let them trouble you. Why question whether truth exists? Do you really believe that you can't trust your senses AT ALL? Why question your own existence? If you have no real intellectual reason to doubt your wife's faithfulness, then why worry about it?
4) Emotions are a better follower than leader--when you find that your doubts are more emotional than anything else, treat it with the caution and care you should use with any emotion. Don't let emotion take you on a roller coaster ride. You have great authority over your emotions so don't believe the lie that you have to "follow your heart," or "if I feel it, it must be true." If you can let your emotions inform you but not guide you then you'll find that emotions are a great and helpful support as you pursue truth.
5) Let your intellectual doubts correct your faith--be a life-long learner, ask sensible and responsible questions to correct your faith. When you have good reasons, and the pros outweigh the cons, then you can start extending some faith in that direction, reasonable faith. If you wait for absolute certainty you'll be waiting a while. But if you hold out for high probability, or a good defensible position, then you can start building a worldview and a life.
Doubt can be good. Truth is out there and you can know it, so let your doubts be just another avenue to it. January 30 On Evolution: Critiquing the "Explosion in a Print Shop" illustrationSome Intelligent Design theorist use a certain illustration to bad effect. They suggest that the possibility of some instance of biological design (or apparent design) occurring by chance is so improbable that it is equivalent to an explosion in a print shop producing the complete works of Shakespeare, a 1000 volume encyclopedia, a library, or something comparable.
However we have to be careful how we use this illustration. It can be a helpful method of illustrating improbability, but it does not map well onto the proposed evolutionary scheme common among naturalist. To do that we would need to postulate
* millions of various level explosions (comparable to mutations)
* in various different print shops (comparable to different environments and life forms)
* with certain accidentally present brute facts of nature and reality (laws of math, logic, and nature)
* which happen to sustain some low level complexity (such as, vowels tend to magnetically attract consonants), some high level cumulative complexity (such as 5-10 letter conglomerates attract 2-3 letter conglomerates),
* and a low level of specificity (1,2,3 letter words occur relatively frequently, say, 2x's per 100,000 letter assortments).
* with a preservation tendency among certain fit (or fortunate) words (natural selection)
Given this scenario, it becomes more plausible to suggest that there might arise a five word sentence every trillion or so tries. There is some level of randomness, but there are also brute facts of nature (why we can consider them "brute" is contestable, but roll with me here) that "inform" the scheme to where slight instances of complexity and specificity can occur such as we do see in nature. The case, of course, is still strong against evolutionists even with these kinds of qualifications, however evolutionists are right to object to misrepresentation. May 25 Beyond and Below Human: An Essay on Nuclear ArmamentBeyond and Below Human Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov thinks he is above "good and evil." Such peasant ideals, he thinks, apply to a lesser class of men, to those servile subjects of natural law. Morality, social responsibility, and individual duty--these are all leftover ghosts from a deceased superstitious morality. They have long left the corpse of some dead church or government. Feodore Dostoevsky in his epic Crime and Punishment casts this grim antihero as a forerunner for some growing philosophies of his day (C&P, 3rd ed., George Gibian, Ed., New York: Norton, 1989). Raskolnikov attempts the superhuman, or shall we say inhuman, act of transcending conventional morality with a deliberate act of murder. In typical fashion, as taken from the pages of Greek tragedy, the harder he runs the less he escapes himself. Raskolnikov, in trying to be a God becomes a demon instead. And so goes the barbarism of men whose arms exceed their heart, or, if we may retranslate, whose technological ability exceeds their moral sensitivity. Philosophers may recognize bits of Friedrich Nietzsche's philosophy in the terms "superhuman," or "above good and evil." Those educated elite can revel in that privileged pleasure. What may elude even them however is that Raskolnikov is not merely a thought experiment to challenge Nietzsche, this rascal of a character is no more than the logical outworking of secular humanism. Few scholars took the idea of non-religious mortality to the grave extremes that Nietzsche did, but where else could such logical outworkings lead? As Dostoevsky shows, the deification of man as the supreme value makes devils out of mortals. This character is every society that attempts to make "might" its "right." He is every person who says that, "Morality is relative." He is each individual who realized that convention, in itself, is just a majority vote, no more "good" than any other popular evil. He is everyone who let his ability determine his morality. Technology is one of those abilities which becomes monstrous unless informed with a humble human soul. Technology can be angelic or demonic, but at base, it is at least a powerful beast. If that beast is to be humane, it must draw its breath from the same source Adam did, from God himself. Nuclear power is one big bicep on that beast of human technology. We may hope that nuclear production will recede to obscurity and that human will would incline to angelic purity. Or we may hope that nuclear powers are redirected to positive purposes such as dissolving hurricanes or destroying incoming meteorites. However such powerful beasts rarely play nicer than they have to. Technology can be no more grand than its master is good. Nuclear powered neighbors will continue to mount their arsenals and brandy about their boom sticks as long as power and fear inspire them. At the risk of oversimplying, let us say that fear and power are the main motivators for nuclear proliferation. Setting aside obviously constructive uses for nuclear energy such as nuclear power plants, fear and power are the chief impetus for man's fascination with nuclear power. Would it not follow then that people dominated instead by altruism, courage and wisdom, would stand against aggressive uses of nuclear force? Sure, we are painting here with a broad brush whereas wisdom distinguishes bristles. But we can at least admit that no matter what kind or amount of nuclear weapons there are in the world, if men were angels we would be in no danger. What then should be done to stop nuclear proliferation? People must first address the war in their own souls. Our public victories at peace and charity are but natural extensions of a longer harder victory in private. It is easy to talk about morality in the abstract and talk about war and violence in the public domain but we squirm when forced to look at our own finger prints on the gun. War rages in the world because it rages in each us. Like Raskalnikov we are deeply conflicted people because we each add evil to the world yet still we want to think of ourselves as justified and good. But if we try to make our own morality in the process, as if Gods ourselves, we may become the devils--whether we gallantly stride into evil as Raskolnikov did or we subtly slip there as unwitting relativists, the destination is the same. There we are driven more by base instincts like lust, fear, power, and greed since the higher, harder virtues are thereby less accessible. So each of us must admit our part in feeding this deadly nuclear culture with our contributions of arrogance, ethnocentrism, foolishness, racism, egoism, and isolationism. Second men must apply the peace in their own souls to their piece of the world. Again, I speak vaguely, but I mean simply that it is not enough for people to wish good things and do good things in private, there is need for a public practice of peace. The chief virtue in this task is humility. How revolutionary would it be if the G8 summit began first with a time of repentance among each of the world leaders, confessing the evils of their country and themselves? How radical a shift would we see in world politics if the united nations opened its yearly sessions with the giving of gifts--a new gift to a different randomly selected nation each year? True these examples might be little more than roses on a coffin, a dying gift for an already dead cause--but only creativity prevents us from finding other live expressions of peace that might make a difference. Third, of course, no amount of policy or institutionalism will make men good, so there is need for individual peacemakers--master diplomats--who will put their very lives in the balance between feuding people groups lobbying, pleading, traveling, giving, and sacrificing themselves to muster bits of peace between nuclear enemies. These are an elitely qualified group and they will more likely come from the pools of natural law and the fear of God than from the oceans of moral relativism. Fourth, and I say this gravely, righteous nations must earn a noble reputation on the world stage as both good and strong, retaining the strongest of nuclear weapons to defend decency itself. I see no other option in this natural world. Goodness must be enforced because it is anything but natural. It is a Platonic pipe dream to think that mankind will be good just because he has been taught the good, has observed the good, and knows everything about the good. Were man basically good and selfless then communism would be one of the crowning achievements of human invention. But, as it happens, communism has proved to be one of the most deadly miscalculations man has imagined. And so we have the great plague latent in secular humanism. If man is believed to be basically good and is likewise esteemed as the highest value then what prevents him from becoming a law to himself? What prevents him from renaming evil "good?" Once man is a law to himself, his invented "good" eventually proves his own wickedness. The book does not end in despair, and neither should our world story. Like Raskolnikov at the close of the book, we too may find redemption, but not without the humility that leads to repentance, and both of these leading to a wise and loving defense of goodness in an all-too-evil world. February 03 ItalyTripNaples Italy, the birthplace of Pizza, played host to a team of students and alumni from Southern Evangelical Seminary. This team of teachers, conveniently called T.E.A.M. exists for the purpose of Tactical Evangelism and Apologetics Mission. A brethren Church in Bacoli (a district in Naples Italy), pastored by Rod Jones played host to this motley crew of 7 apologists. May 05 Return to the LivingPhwew! It is good to be back to the living world. I have had my nose to the grindstone for a while with brief interruptions over my wedding and honeymoon. Married life is great--though it is not easy. Marriage is not for the faint of heart. Everything you had learned to overlook about yourself and graciously forgive yourself about, those are the brightest things reflected back at you in the spousal mirror. Being so close to a person means that your sharp or rough edges cut and bruise them. If you aren't willing to be hurt sometimes, or to see yourself as you really are, or to be challenged then don't get married.
Yet I strongly recommend marriage. I see how marriage can serve to mature a person. The small world of self must grow or else the marriage will suffocate. Individualism becomes communion. Me becomes we. And every petty, prideful, irrational part of yourself will be tweaked out and pressed. If you do not submit to the inquisition you will not grow from it. If you do, then your marriage may have a fighting chance, and you may be able to grow up finally.
Don't get me wrong though. It's not like singlehood is just marriage prep. Singlehood is a great stage in itself. But there is a level of humanity available only in marriage. The union of man and woman (not just male and female) is a sublime mystery, an awe inspiring, miraculously mundane interweaving of spirits.
Yet I'm just a newlywed. I'm still googly eyed over my wife. I still am surprised at how she changes clothes in front of me. I'm still excited to share a bed with her. Supposedly, all of these things and more are going to lose their luster and leaving us with only with the stench of dirty laundry and unwashed dishes in our nose and no rosey love scent to mask the smell.
I think the smell can surface without the spell fading. This is reality, not pessimism or optism. The real is more beautiful than anything imagined. March 02 Excerpt from my commentary on Matthew[Below is an bit of commentary on Matthew 21:34. It was originally written as commentary, and not as a blog, so please be gracious and don't expect it to have the feel of a popular level or rhetorically flourished literary flower. The standing question, as you will see, is where you fit in this parable about two kinds of workers: are you a slave of God or a servant of God?]. 21:34 34 And when approached the season of the harvest, he sent the slaves of him ["his slaves/servants"] to the tenant farmers to take the fruit of him ["his fruit"]. The master is intent on fruitfulness. Even while away he is intent on claiming the fruit produced by his vineyard. The responsibilities entrusted to the tenant farmers is secondary. The service of his slaves is secondary. The master intends for his field to bear fruit and he intends to claim that fruit as his own. Two kinds of workers are in view: the tenant farmers and the slaves. The tenant farmers serve their own purposes by renting the master's land so that they have income and a place to stay. They may be concerned for the bounty of the land insofar as it affects their own interests, that is, keep it fruitful or lose their job. But even if the tenant did work hard on the land and see that it produced a good crop, he still may be doing it just to keep his job and not really because he is concerned about the crop itself nor because he loves the master enough to work hard for him. Their's is a contractual relationship to the master and in it, they are allowed great personal autonomy. On the other hand, the servants have no such thing. The term used, douvlo" (doulos), is also translated "slave." If they are indeed slaves, then they own no land nor do they own themselves. Their task is more simple in its directness, but more difficult in its variety. They simply do what the master says. They do not have autonomy like the tenant farmers do. They have great responsibility but little authority. From a worldly perspective the slaves are in the least enviable position. At core, these two kinds of workers differ in ownership. As such, they differ in the person for whom they are working. The tenant farmers work for their own interests through their job over the vineyard. The slave works simply for the master. Understood with these subtle clarifications, this story takes on a new level of spiritual signifance (and preachable application). Christians are challenged to consider whether their walk with God is more like the tenant farmers or like the slaves. January 25 UpdateI'm still preparing for the wedding, March 17th. Hillaryand I are looking for a place to live for after that. She just got a job teaching inner city kids through a local church (if an hour away constitutes "local") but it pays well and has good hours. I'm still working at two gyms doing general management, cleaning, and a little bit of personal training. My personal training certification is next weekend and I have another personal training period at the end of february which is 40 hours long and rather intense. It costs a little but I get paid for that time, so that should make up for it. I'm taking three classes for a total of 8 hrs this semester: Thesis research seminar (where I write a thesis prospectus and get it approved by my advisor), Reading Seminar (I read books in philosophy of religion), and Christianity, Art, and Culture (an elective where we study pop culture, art and Christian worldview). I have my hands full, but it should be a fun semester.
Sorry to everyone who has actually come to enjoy my writing yet have found little to nothing on my blog in the last few months. I do write a little bit. And I do miss having the leisure to meditate on things through writing. It is a busy time in life and I appreciate your prayers. I did have one thought recently which is short, but worth sharing.
"The task of the scientist is to discover. The task of the artist, to create." Discuss. December 12 6 Weird Things About Me1) I've dated 2 football players.
2) I can flex my tongue so large that I have to open my mouth to accomodate it. Yeah, I know. That's either really perverted or just really gross.
3) I've never had a good hair day in my life.
4) I am a grammar nazi.
5) I absolutely hate to waste food.
6) I was born 2 months late.
* Extra: 7) I have hobbit feet; 8) Everything reminds me of a song; 9) I play banjo but hate country music; 10) I met my fiance on Myspace (but don't let her know I told you. She hates that we met online! Neither of us are desperate people. Really.)
What are your weird things? December 08 On the Meaning of lifeWhat's the meaning of life? Lets see here. . . Hedonism? Agnosticism? Nihilism/Absurdism? Relativism? Religious absolutism? I think I'll take E. "Meaning" presupposes some reality to which this life points else it is just like words without a referent. If there is no greater reality, we walking words mean nothing. We are just hollow senseless shouts in space. If we are the ultimate reality than we can only hope to point back to ourselves. Our lives reverberate no larger than we are. It would be like the word "word." We indicate only ourselves, nothing else. Hardly a transcendent answer rising to the occasion of this transcendent question. We ask "what is the meaning of life" because we are filled with a wonder about life. We still dream and imagine and hope and even worship despite the fact that cold and heartless worldviews often freeze over us as we age. We lose the simple pleasures in life as we lose our imaginations. Our faith matures to doubt and rather than returning to rejuvenate faith it just spoils into cynicism. We are told that we are just hairless apes. We are told that God and supernature are little more than santa clause and fairy tales. Yet we die, perhaps old and gray, having far less joy than the child who still believes in fairy tales. Should we believe that all the grand epics of faith are empty and then proceed to invent some meaning to life? We can certianly distract ourselves from the question that way. But after the pleasure drive has slipped out of gear and our conscience has crashed we come tumbling back to the reality that we are finite creatures who will not ultimately be satisfied with anything less than infinite. We can press into the barren tundra of nihilism determined to be the Nietzschian superman: too great, too bold to need the companionship of meaning in life. We can invent purposes. We can survive on rations of pleasure and power. But again, this option seems to push people away from each other, killing the very thing that most strongly suggests an answer. In each other's arms there might be an answer. In family, in friends, in relationship we have hints of something transcendent. Our very humanity chafes at the thought of such cold impersonal isolation as the Nietzschian superman. Nietzsche was not happy. He died crazy and alone. I do not trust his council. Perhaps we are searching for what can only be a question? Perhaps we are not words referring to something, but life is a question mark whose ultimate orientation is "to seek." Perhaps the meaning of life is a circular question where the only hope of meaning is to continue asking "what is the meaning of life?" Perhaps the meaning of life is not an answer but a question, an admission that any supernature or sub-natural reality that might answer it all is really beyond reach and can be experienced only by admitting that there is no such thing as "arrival." Religion is to seek what cannot be known. And Meaning in life is to live for what we know not what. This kind of agnosticism, as elegantly eastern as it may be reduces to the same relativism we had elsewhere. If there is no answer, then we'll invent one. Life is too urgent to beat around the bush with this kind of "Its all about the journey" talk. Meaning is in the meandering, they say. But we soon tire of searching, and we honestly will quit searching if we ever truly believe there is no arrival point. If we find there is no answer, we quit questioning. If the answer is ultimately inaccessable, we have shown ourselves to still be obsessed with an answer. We will not give up searching. Some quit trying, of course. These are the insane, the dead, and the dying. To live requires meaning. Only in death do we accept meaninglessness. John Paul Sartre converted to Christianity in his dying years. Neitzshe self-destructed. Anthony Flew, now in his nineties has just recently become a theist. Something about the end of life fleshes out things for us and exposes how unbearable our cognitive dissonance is over the issue of meaning. The meaning of life might be inferred from the most meaningful points of life. Sex might certianly be one of the most memorable moments. But maybe it is in the context of family that our meaning most clearly begins to surface. For there we have the sublime joy of knowing someone, trully knowing someone, and to have them trully know us. We also have the experience of creation. To create another life, no matter how thoroughly science may be able to explain it away, it is still a miracle. And then to have a love that only grows as we invite more people into this world, into this home, into our hearts--that is meaningful. And then to have that love culminate in the supreme physical and spiritual consumation of sex--that is meaningful. Package all of that together and we are reminded that there is more to life than our individual selves. Yet even in family we find the picture is a bit flat. Its a lovely picture, but its only two-dimensional. It lacks depth when we peel back the top layer. We fight. We abuse and are abused. We prove unfaithful. We divorce. We fail and shout and regret. This "bliss" is ephemeral. Yet, we have in it a glimpse of some relationship, some family for which we were made, some manner in which we are caught up in the lives of others, and perhaps drawn into a divine love. That is a love that never fails, a love that only grows stronger with age, a love that is genuinely perfect. Surely that is the stuff of fairy tales right? The meaning of life is to worship God by enjoying him forever. For in returning to our basic ackowledgment of Him, and in humbling ourselves enough to worship once again, we discover that we cannot love greatly unless we are remade. We cannot even receive His perfect love properly until we let Him transform us. We are therein invited into a depth of love at which this world can only hint. We are ushered into a family that is wider than any other family we've ever known. In loving Him we find that our problems were not that we desired too much but that we did not desire enough. Our problem was not that we had such a great appetite, but that we'd spoiled our appetite with fast-food pleasures and self-centered gorging. Now, in relationship with the living loving God, our tastes have evolved from animal to human. In a sense, we are back to Adam, before the fall. Now we can see that the glory of the garden of eden was not the fruit but was God Himself. Sex finds its rightful context in purity once again. Family is restored with God as its designer. Pleasure is restored by noble intentions. Faith and hope are present realities in the abiding presence of God. The meaning of the Garden of Eden was not to eat and sleep, not to avoid the cursed tree, not to name the animals, but was to enjoy God--the essence of beauty and joy Himself. And the meaning of life, then proves no more sublime than to love God and be loved by Him. We are too smart to be able to settle for invented meaning. And we are too spiritual to settle for a Nil answer. We are too conscientious to accept mere pleasure. But all of these come together in the answer of God. Man cannot create his own "meaning" because God has already made it. Man cannot accept a Nil answer because our God-given instincts of living are smarter than our reasoned nihilism. Our philosophies of nothing are not loud enough to outshout our hearts. And our moral conscience, which speaks with the unusually clear voice of God, rightfully objects when we try to exalt pleasure itself as the highest meaning for man. We suspect that man was made for infinite joy, but that is only because we were made for God who is Himself infinite joy and the giver of transcendent peace and pleasure. Apart from this God there is little hope for meaning in life. November 08 Redeeming Reason ConferenceHello one and all. I come again before you with eagerness in my heart and a predisposition for excessive abundant redundance. . . .
This weekend I will be at a conference at University of Chicago called:
REDEEMING REASON
Nov. 9-11th
I'm getting the chance to present a paper called: "Christian Freedom and Academic Calling"
Below is the abstract from that paper. If you are interested in more just message me with your email address and I can send it to you. God bless.
October 19 A Prayer: 5-27-02Father you are so gentle and quiet in your manner. So much so that I could easily forget you and run ahead of you. Like Martha I run around doing chores and activities as if you needed my labor. And I dream up so many ways for me to serve you. All the while I am really just sorta day dreaming about someone who is already mine. Father, I have the greatest love of all in you. I don’t have to work for you. I don’t have to earn you. I don’t have to run to keep up with you. This romance is mutual. You want to be discovered. You want to be enjoyed. You aren’t trying to get ahead of me. You aren’t trying to hurt me. Quite the opposite, I find myself running away and hurting you. I suppose all of human history has been the story of man’s struggle to be liberated from your love. We’ve cursed and spat in your face rejecting your warm embrace. We turned and ran away, now we wonder why we are so cold and gray. I’m learning to love. Trust can be so hard. And the type of trust you ask is the hardest. How can I trust someone with my future? How can I trust someone with my secrets? How can I trust someone with love? These must seem like silly questions to you considering all of these things have always been in your hands anyway. I don’t know what that thing is that is in man that wants to go two directions at once. For some reason I long to be independent, though I crave the security of dependence. I want to be my own person, but I want to lose myself in something much bigger than I. And depending on the day I may want to live in the past the future or the present. God, as a silly little person I can only imagine how you giggle at our ravings. Despite the confusion I may have at times, I have seen enough of your heart to know that I want to live there. And I know that even before I called to you, you saved a place for me. I have a place setting at the dinner table in your house. I have a room in your home. And I am branded on your heart. Its nice to know that I can talk to you no matter how I’m feeling or what has been happening. You are always listening, but more than that you are always leaving me love letters in a cat’s pur, in a good meal, in the sunshine, and a friends embrace. God, somehow the complicated theology and deeper learning all seems to boil down to or boil away leaving love, that love which springs into mercy and grace. That love is the reason for your epic pursuit of man. That love is the reason I can live and breath. I just pray that this hurting lonely world would come to realize that the second hand emotions we call love are but cheap knock-offs of you. I won’t find life long satisfaction in books, or TV, or music. Nor will I find a relationship in my entire life that will compare in importance to my relationship with you. Your love is difficult to overstate. And it is the most tragic oversight this world will ever regret. God let me be a testimony to your love. I want the world to know that they will never know as great a love as is found in you. I don’t want to run away any more. I want to run with you. Amen September 10 Collegiate CuisineI have returned to dorm life and am struck by the drastic change incurred upon one's diet. Perhaps there is a major difference between women in dorms and men in dorms, but for me, food choice differs about as much as apples to orange jelly slices. To help the up and coming collegiates needing to figure out what is suitable dorm food I am compiling a list. Bear in mind that this list refers to foods appropriate for a small refridgerator, preferrably without refridgeration. And this would be food suitable if you slept in on saturday and missed both breakfast, lunch, couldn't afford dinner, and have little to no available cooking equipment. 1) Peanut butter--the nector of the peanut gods. this thick pasty shelvable good is a great filler and goes good with most everything, chocolate, apple slices, peanuts, animal crackers, saltine crackers, leather, toothpaste, etc. 2) Romen Noodles (sp?)--cheap, cheap, cheap. What this food lacks in nutritional value it makes up for with its stylish, and lost cost packaging. And because of their neat boxy design, you can carry them in your bookbag and look like you are packing more books than you really are! See, that is SMART idea. And if you can't get to a stove you can cook them in the microwave. If not a microwave, then you can use your coffee maker. if not a coffee maker, then you can use extra hot faucet water to soften them a bit. If you don't get hot water, well then, you can't always try them crunchy. Unfortunately, when you find yourself picking off a slab of uncooked roman noodles then you have pretty much hit rock bottom in your life. That is pretty sad. You may want to consider a serious life adjustment at that point lest it be a precursor to depression. 3) Bagels--these aren't particularly cost effective, nor are they ultra-long-lasting. but they do have a decent shelf life. And they are substantial, portable, and make great projectiles in the event that your roommate says something stupid meriting a bagel assault. 4) Condiments packets--whenever you stroll by the caf, or the food court, or a restaurant at the mall be sure to pick up some plastic wear, some non-dairy creamers, honey packets, peanut butter packets, half-and-half creamers, butter wedges, jellies, syrups, napkins, salt, pepper, sugar, hot sauces, crackers, toothpicks, mustards, ketchups, mayonnaise, and the occasionally offered free sample. Hey the price is right! And remember, a pb and j sandwich on crackers is still a sandwich. It's just a tiny dry and unsatisifying sandwich. 5) Pop tarts--the most handy, toastable, least nutrious breakfast on the market is not just for breakfast anymore. Try these with the peanut butter and condiments mentioned above (I'll leave you to decide which condiments--Hey, you're in college you should be able to figure this out). Yummy! 6) Dried milk and Potato Flakes--just add water, butter packets, salt packets and you have a filling little snack. You have the potatoes, now all you need is freeze dreid steak. They don't make that though. I tried adding water to Beef jerky, but it never quite plumped up enough to be a strip steak. You're better off just doing the potatos and maybe you can swipe some cheese and bacon bits from the salad bar. 7) Vitamin supplements--these are not cheap at all. You wouldn't even keep them on the food shelf. And they taste terrible. But, when you eat like a college student, you are likely to get some obscure malnourishment disease unless you get some vittamins and nutriments somehows. The good thing however is that your parents are so likely to fear for your dietary health that they are going to pay for this on your behalf. 8) [What is your pick???????????????????????????] August 31 I'm in Texas Now, so I must Take Up More Space.Well friends and family, I am almost fully situated here in Texas. You heard me right (as opposed to "correctly"). I have relocated to the state so big it thinks it's a country. And, in fact, they'll challenge any other country to a game of football (and probably win, except maybe for Australia, they're crazy over there). Just ask any Texan and they'll tell you that being from Texas is an honor. Such a claim sets men apart from boys and women apart from prissy little girls who can't get their nails dirty. Texas women are beautiful AND strong. It takes a MAN to court a Texas woman. But that's beside the point.
I am now engaged. It sounds weird to say it, but I am now in the long line of men who are currently or are waiting to be domesticated. Not that I pee on the furniture or anything like that, but there is something in us men that needs a woman's touch before we will harness our daring and our strength and use it for God-given adventureous loving. We were meant to be strong, but disciplined. Bold, but wise. Powerful, but loving. And the one who has reigned me in is named Hillary "Texifornian-Goddess" Morgan. She is a looker and a thinker. She has more energy than I know what to do with and more spontaneity than I could ever schedule into my day planner. We are very different people with the same spiritual and intellectual convictions. She stands up to me when we disagree. But she respects me and serves me. So I can't help but love and honor her. She's a queen. Oh, and did I mention she is from Texas, spent the last few years in California, and is now in Japan taking class pictures of military brats. from the United States? I may have a hard time keeping up with her.
I am also enrolled at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary also nicknamed SWBTS (pronounced, "Swubuts"). It is the local indoctrination center for the Fort Worth area. I am trying to pry a PhD from their cold calloused hands. But to do that I have to play like I'm agreeable and all that. I am currently enrolled in the almost-PhD-but-still-more-high-fallutin-program-than-an-M.A.-or-MDiv-program called the Master of Theology degree. This is a degree for those who think they are better than the Master's of Divinity persons but too scared to try for a PhD. It is not enough for us to master divinity. We want to ascend the great mount Olympus and claim Divinity itself. But we want to go even further than the top of the mountain by adding to our newly aquired divine status the attribute of omniscience. We want to Master Theology as well. And the PhD's, well we wont' go into how snooty they are. All in all, it's a pretty good school. I can't really complain. Pink Floyd would be proud.
I am also on the job hunt. This is a bit like dating. You are after a big pay-off, but it's taboo to ask about that. So you hunt around to find something attractive to you--it fits you, you could see the two of you "hitting it off," it seems fun, it makes you laugh. You linger around and talk a bit. You exchange numbers. You contact them and exchange personel info. You arrange for an interview, perhaps over coffee. The whole time you know you are looking for a big pay-off with low responsibility and low committment, but you just aren't allowed to say any of that even though both parties know that is what you are after. If you find the right one you might be able to even get a family plan with free benefits and free dental and an early retirement. Unfortunately, most times you end up with all your money spent before you earn it, the benefits package is more expensive than it's worth, you work twice the hours at half the pay, and there is no vacation. Fortunately, I am in the ministry so I don't have to worry about that whole issue of "paychecks" and "benefits." People are eager to hire you if you work for beans.
As you can see, I have been quite busy even though my blog, of late, suggests I have been non-existent over the past month or so. Yes I am alive. I am even writing. I just haven't been writing much on this blog. I love you all (I'm just saying that). Thank you. And God speed. Oh, and you are all invited so long as you call ahead and bring a big expensive wedding gift (please, no more mounted Moose Heads). August 15 Yet another Rant Against Boredom. Come On People! Quit Whining and be productive!Boredom is the mood of our generation. Some may say we are marked more by "nervous busyness" or "complaint." But it is becoming increasingly obvious that we are being teased into impotence, stimulated into numbness, and filled till our appetite is ruined. We are too often products of a glittering and teasing culture. We follow the patterns of our consumer driven, microwaveable, McDonalds packaged, own it now, You deserve it, 7 second sound byte, oversexed, sugar loaded, capitalistic, no waiting, buy on credit, have it your way culture. And we find that in the sheer loudness of our culture little is being said. In the quest to find something loud enough to truly recapture our attention we end up becoming bored with the most entertaining of things. Boredom is not conquered by having something worthwhile to do. Boredom is a problem in us, not in externals. We choose instant gratification. We choose complexity over simplicity. We choose the lies of sinful flesh over the true goodness of the spirit. We choose according to an unredeemed nature, playing like slaves, and find that we are left with the terribly mundane innane existence of having only ourselves to please. When pleasure itself becomes meaningless, our boredom shows to be an absolute nightmare. As Ravi Zacharias has said, "hopelessness comes not from tiring of pain but from tiring of pleasure." Boredom is a kind of hopelessness. It is an existential nightmare. And everything that sets us further from the only true hope in life will in some way bring us boredom on route to the hopelessness and death down the road. God has designed our appetites to be infinite. Feast on Him for the infinity that He is and you can never reach the end, never be bored. If you are ever bored with God, then either you or your idol are too feelbe for the full and fullfilling relationship of faith. Boredom in the larger sense (that is, subtracting the practical examples as mentioned above) should not happen for those who have a God-entranced worldview. It is when we fill our plate not with the living bread of God's Goodness but with the dirt of the earth that our appetite fails and become bored with the bounty before us.
July 22 Conference ResultsI just finished two presentations at the: No Other Gods Conference in Middletwon, PA. If anyone wants the lecture notes or would like to talk about these issues feel free to message me with a link to your email I can send it through to you. I presented on the following Topics:
DO ALL ROADS LEAD TO MT. CARMEL? An Evangelical Study of the Baha'i Faith.
And
Hell Yes or Hell No? A Defense of the Literal View of Hell.
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