Custardy

Managing God's Money - Randy Alcorn

2012-01-24T11:46:00.001Z

This is the best book I have ever read on how Christians should relate to money.

As you'd expect, there's plenty on giving, and it avoids the dangers of legalism and ignoring tithing - I love his picture of tithing as being how God trains people to give. But there's also plenty on when saving is good (and when it isn't), the dangers of legacies, training children to have a good attitude to money, dealing with debt, and so on. But practice is always rooted in good theology.

If I were going to come up with one criticism, it's that his section entitled "Is it right for Christians to have material possessions and enjoy them?" gives the right answer but underplays it. There is a real danger in some cases of people feeling guilty for enjoying anything when they feel they should give more. Admittedly, the danger for far more people is that they assume that they should be comfortable and only give God what is left over.

Oh, and it doesn't mention Fairtrade stuff either.

Great book. Highly recommended. If you know of better money-related books, I'd love to know!

Jesus and Canaanite Genocide - Part 4

2012-01-23T09:57:00.002Z

4. How can the God of Joshua be the God of Jesus?

And so we get back to the key question – how can the God of Joshua also be the God of Jesus? A few thoughts.

Jesus is the one who takes the punishment that we deserve so that we don't suffer the same fate as the Canaanites. He is the solution to the problem of how there can be any hope for those who commit treason against the rightful and righteous rule of God. And he solves it by being God and bearing God's own righteous anger against our sin.
Some people say that God could not order the destruction of the Canaanites. But if that is so, why did Jesus need to die? If the punishment that we all deserve for our sin was any less than death, God need not have paid that price for us. But he did.
What happened with the Canaanites shows us where the natural trajectory of our lives leads. Jesus offers us transformation that leads away from cosmic treason and judgement and into following the Prince of Peace.
Jesus is the one who will ultimately judge the world. He will return in glory to judge the living and dead, as the Creed says. Longman points out that those who have a problem with the Canaanite genocide are likely to have far more of a problem with the Last Judgement. But as the last judgement is something carried out by Jesus, the problem is not in reconciling the God of Joshua with the God of Jesus, but reconciling Christ as Saviour and Christ as Judge.
Christ can be Judge precisely because he is also Saviour. He has offered us salvation; he has paid the immense price for that salvation. And so if we reject that salvation, we have offended him. The God most of the Canaanites rejected is the same God who died to redeem the few who turned to him, and is the same God who judged them for their rejection of his offer of salvation.

[intro | Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4]

Jesus and Canaanite Genocide - Part 3

2012-01-22T15:18:00.003Z

3. How do we know we aren't going to be called to something like that today?

The key point in answering this question is made in the book by Gard. He points out that the God's people today – the church – are a theological entity, not a political one. There isn't a country now that is “God's country” more than another, so wars like the one in Joshua can't happen today.

This means, among other things, that fighting for God isn't physical fighting any more. Longman points to Ephesians 6.

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people. Pray also for me, that whenever I speak, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should.
(Ephesians 6:10-20, NIV)

Christian warfare is fought by praying, with weapons like truth, faith, righteousness and God's Word. It isn't about physical political battles any more, because God's people are a spiritual unity rather than a political one and our enemies are spiritual rather than physical.

And though there are battles in the book of Revelation, God's people don't fight them. When they win, they do so by speaking about Jesus, and not running away from death (Rev 12:11). The description of the great final battle is of a huge army coming against God's people to fight against them, “but fire came down from heaven and devoured them.” (Rev 20:9). God's people don't have to fight.

There's a different debate here about whether it's appropriate for Christians to serve in the armed forces. That's not the question here – the point is that “holy war” is no longer fought with the weapons of this world, because God's kingdom is not of this world.

[intro | Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4]

Jesus and Canaanite Genocide - Part 2

2012-01-21T09:56:00.002Z

2. Why Isn't It Really Genocide?

The so-called “Canannite Genocide” mostly takes place in the book of Joshua. I'd like to look at three short stories from the book of Joshua to show that not everything is as we might expect.

a) The Story of Rahab

Rahab is a Canaanite prostitute, who starts out living in Jericho. Right at the start of the conquest, before anyone dies, Joshua sends some spies out to investigate the land. They comes to Jericho, and meet Rahab, but are spotted. In one of the most remarkable turnarounds in the Bible, Rahab then lies to her own people to protect the Israelite spies, then says this:

“I know that the LORD has given you the land, and that the fear of you has fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants of the land melt away before you. For we have heard how the LORD dried up the water of the Red Sea before you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to the two kings of the Amorites who were beyond the Jordan, to Sihon and Og, whom you devoted to destruction. And as soon as we heard it, our hearts melted, and there was no spirit left in any man because of you, for the LORD your God, he is God in the heavens above and on the earth beneath. Now then, please swear to me by the LORD that, as I have dealt kindly with you, you also will deal kindly with my father's house, and give me a sure sign that you will save alive my father and mother, my brothers and sisters, and all who belong to them, and deliver our lives from death.” (Joshua 2:9-13, ESV)

The spies escape; Jericho is destroyed; Rahab and her family are saved.

There are several remarkable things about this as we consider the Canaanite genocide.

Rahab was a Canaanite, but she decided to side with the Israelites.
She is spared. No-one even questions whether it was wrong to make an agreement with her or whether they should go back on it (both arguments are used later with the Gibeonites).
God approves of her being spared. As we will see in the second story, God punishes all of Israel because Achan kept some of the plunder from Jericho, but he does not mention Rahab and her family being spared as a problem at all.
Rahab is not subsequently treated as a Canaanite. According to Matthew 1:5, she is the mother of Boaz and hence an ancestor of both David and Jesus. None of the laws against intermarriage apply to her (e.g. Deut 7:3); none of the laws against her descendants being allowed into the temple apply to her. The same is true of her Moabite daughter-in-law Ruth. Why not? I suggest it is because her profession of faith in the God of the Israelites means that she is no longer treated as a foreigner but as one of God's people.

What can we therefore learn about the “Canaanite Genocide”? Simply this – it's about punishment and idolatry. If people repent and decide to worship the true God, they can be spared. It might mean treason against their own people – it does for Rahab - but it means loyalty to the higher and more legitimate authority of God.

b) The Story of Achan

Achan stands in stark contrast to Rahab. She was the Canaanite who became part of God's people; he was the Israelite who was excluded from God's people and suffered the same fate as the Canaanites. We read about him in Joshua 7.

When Jericho was destroyed, the Israelites were not allowed to take any of the plunder for themselves – it was all to be destroyed or put into God's treasury. But Achan stole some and hid it under his tent. As a result, God was angry with Israel and they lost their next battle. Achan's actions come to light, and he is treated the same way as Jericho was (Josh 7:15 c.f. Josh 6:24).

What do we learn from this?

The division between those whom God destroys and those whom God spares is not ethnic. It is to do with whether or not they serve him. So rebellious Israelites are put outside, and obedient Canaanites are included. Echoes of Romans 11...

c) The Story of the Gibeonites

After the next battle, at Ai, Joshua has some more visitors. These visitors have a confession of faith that sounds like Rahab's, and they claim not to be Canaanites.

From a very distant country your servants have come, because of the name of the LORD your God. For we have heard a report of him, and all that he did in Egypt, and all that he did to the two kings of the Amorites who were beyond the Jordan, to Sihon the king of Heshbon, and to Og king of Bashan, who lived in Ashtaroth. (Joshua 9:9-10, ESV)

Joshua doesn't check it out with God, but makes peace with them. Of course, it turns out that they are actually from a nearby city. Squabbling ensues, but the Gibeonites join the list of Canaanites who are safe.

On the rare occasions when this passage is preached, it is usually applied by pointing out Joshua's foolishness in not asking God before signing the treaty. And that is there, but what is more striking to me is the Gibeonites' cunning in wanting to be part of God's people. It's a great illustration of Matthew 11:12. This is thrown into even clearer focus a couple of chapters later when the prophetic author of Joshua comments on the other Canaanites.

There was not a city that made peace with the people of Israel except the Hivites, the inhabitants of Gibeon. They took them all in battle. For it was the LORD's doing to harden their hearts that they should come against Israel in battle, in order that they should be devoted to destruction and should receive no mercy but be destroyed, just as the LORD commanded Moses. (Joshua 11:19-20, ESV)

In the Bible, when God hardens people's hearts, it always describes the same process as them hardening their own hearts against him. The Canaanites harden their own hearts, but God is sovereign over it and uses their hard-hearted rejection of him to bring them to destruction.

But the crucial implication of that passage is that God approved of the Gibeonites trying to avoid destruction. It was the right thing for them to do, and stemmed from hearts that hadn't been hardened. Despite their lies, it seems that they really believed what they said about God. When Joshua confronts them with their lies, they reply:

“Because it was told to your servants for a certainty that the LORD your God had commanded his servant Moses to give you all the land and to destroy all the inhabitants of the land from before you--so we feared greatly for our lives because of you and did this thing. And now, behold, we are in your hand. Whatever seems good and right in your sight to do to us, do it.”

So he did this to them and delivered them out of the hand of the people of Israel, and they did not kill them. But Joshua made them that day cutters of wood and drawers of water for the congregation and for the altar of the LORD, to this day, in the place that he should choose.

(Joshua 9:24-27, ESV)

What can we learn from the Gibeonites?

Where the Canaanites were not hard-hearted towards God, it was quite possible for them to remain in the land and escape destruction. All that they needed to do was strive for it and be willing to serve God rather than their idols.

Three short stories set during the conquest of Canaan, and each of them radically changes our perspective on what happened.

[intro | Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4]

Jesus and Canaanite Genocide - Part 1

2012-01-20T13:33:00.003Z

Continuing a series which I started yesterday...

1. How Can God's Instructions About the Canaanites Possibly Be Justified?

God commanded Israel:

But in the cities of these peoples that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance, you shall save alive nothing that breathes, but you shall devote them to complete destruction, the Hittites and the Amorites, the Canaanites and the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, as the LORD your God has commanded. (Deut 20:16-17, ESV)

The Bible itself gives several justifications for this command:

The picture the Bible paints of God is of an all-powerful sovereign. He owns the whole world, including the land of Canaan, and chose to give the land to Israel. He is therefore perfectly within his rights to expel squatters. Strikingly, that's almost exactly the language used in Joshua 3:10 – God is “driving out” the Canaanites from the land. Only the ones who stay and fight get killed.
God originally promised the land to Abram, 400 years earlier. But he does not give the land to Abram immediately. Instead he says “[your descendants] shall come back here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.” (Gen 15:16). In other words, there is a strong element of punishment in what happened to the Canaanites. God is removing them from the land in punishment for their sin.
One aspect of the Canaanites' sin which was particularly heinous was their idolatry, which God wanted eradicated. “The carved images of their gods you shall burn with fire. You shall not covet the silver or the gold that is on them or take it for yourselves, lest you be ensnared by it, for it is an abomination to the LORD your God.” (Deut 7:25) There are strong indications elsewhere in the Bible that Canaanite idolatry included child sacrifice.
Linked to this is the idea that the Israelites needed to be protected from idolatry. After the verses quoted above, Deuteronomy 20 continues “... that they may not teach you to do according to all their abominable practices that they have done for their gods, and so you sin against the LORD your God.” God wanted his people to be free from any of the evil influences of Canaanite religion, therefore he required that it be completely eradicated, which meant eradicating all of its adherents. Of course, what eventually happens is that the Israelites don't wipe the Canaanites out, they do end up copying the Canaanite religion, and so they do end up rejecting God. So God's concern at this stage turns out to be completely justified.
This is all a part of the big picture of God's mission. The overarching storyline in this part of the Bible is that God has promised that he will bless all nations, and do so through establishing Israel as a nation which serves and honours him, and then shines as a light to the world. That requires them to be a nation, in a land, and living faithfully to him. All of which requires the removal of the Canaanites.

It's easy to kick against the idea that sin deserves death. We live in a culture which so often refuses to face up to reality in this area.

Most countries seem to agree that the most serious crime is treason. It was certainly one of the last crimes to carry the death penalty in the UK (abolished 1998). Treason is essentially an act of war against one's own country, particularly plotting to kill the rightful ruler. And it seems fairly clear that the better the ruler is, the worse the treason is. So Claus von Stauffenberg plotted to kill Hitler but is widely regarded as a hero, whereas William Joyce (aka Lord Haw-Haw) collaborated with the Germans during WW2 and is viewed as a villain, though both were convicted of treason. The better the ruler, the worse the crime.

What we seem to miss is that we are all guilty of treason against the best, the wisest and the most rightly sovereign ruler of all – God. We take all the good things that he has given us and try to declare our unilateral independence from him. And even while he continues to sustain us and bless us, we use our abilities to sing the praise of other gods, who are no gods at all. The Canaanites sacrificed their children, whom God had given them, to his rivals who were nothing more than statues.

They were all traitors, and all therefore rightly deserved death. Longman writes:

In conclusion, we must point out that the Bible does not understand the destruction of the men, women and children of these cities as a slaughter of innocents. Not even the children are considered innocent. They are all part of an inherently wicked culture that, if allowed to live, would morally and theologically pollute the people of Israel. (p.201)

But so are we, and that should be the real surprise of the Canaanite genocide. It was only the Canaanites who got destroyed, and not us too. We all deserve it – but they were the only ones to get what they deserved.

The important question is not so much why certain nations were destroyed but rather why all nations, including Israel, were not. By YHWH's standards of holiness, not even the most righteous of humanity could remain alive. (Gard, p.103)

Longman cites Meredith Kline's helpful idea of intrusion ethics – that what we see at the Canaanite genocide is God's final judgement on the Canaanites, but brought forwards from the end of time to the time of Joshua. What happened to the Canaanites is what should and will happen to all of us by rights. So it's just as well there's a way out...

[intro | Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4]

Jesus and Canaanite Genocide - Introduction

2012-01-19T15:54:00.002Z

I recently finished reading Show Them No Mercy – Four Views on God and Canaanite Genocide in the excellent Counterpoints series (Zondervan, 2003). For anyone not familiar with the series, they find a controversial topic – in this case the Canaanite genocide partially carried out in the book of Joshua – and ask 4±1 scholars to write an essay on it. The scholars are selected because of the fact they hold differing views on the topic, and they get a chance to write responses to each others' essays as well. The result is a book that does a good job of presenting the different points of view on a difficult topic, which can be very useful as a starting point either for understanding the debate or for formulating one's own views.

Show Them No Mercy is a slightly unusual volume in the series because three of the four scholars end up in substantial agreement with each other, with only C.S. Cowles dissenting. Cowles kicks off the book with an essay where he argues that “love as it is revealed by God in Christ [should be] our criterion for interpreting Scripture”1. The difficult question is then this “Given that God has revealed himself supremely in the person of Jesus Christ, what does it mean for Scripture to record him commanding genocide in the case of the Canaanites?” Having raised the issue well, Cowles doesn't answer it anywhere near as convincingly. He tries a fusion of Origenistic allegorical interpretation and arguing that the Biblical authors' understanding of the nature of God develops with time, essentially saying “God didn't command it; God wouldn't command it; but Moses, Joshua and so on thought that he did because they didn't know God as well as we do now.”

Cowles' problem is that his understanding of Scripture doesn't hold together. He keeps appealing to Jesus, but ignores Jesus' understanding of the Old Testament passages as literal, and especially his claim that they are fundamentally about him (e.g. Luke 24:27). He ends up ignoring large swathes of the Bible (including Revelation and most of the OT) because they don't fit with his picture of what God is like. The three other authors rightly take him to task for this, and go on to make some very good and important points about how God could permit and even command the Canaanite genocide. And Cowles keeps coming back, saying “What about Jesus? Isn't Christianity meant to be centred on the cross?” He never really gets to grips with his own understanding of Scripture but I don't think the others ever really get to grips with his main point either. How can the God of Joshua be the God of Jesus?

Over the next few days, I'm going to try to post some of my thoughts about God and the Canaanite genocide. They lean massively on the authors of Show Them No Mercy, especially Tremper Longman III, but I'm adding some bits of my own thought too. I'm aiming to answer the following questions:

How can God's instructions about the Canaanites possibly be justified?
Why isn't it really genocide?
How do we know we aren't going to be called to something like that today?
How can the God of Joshua be the God of Jesus?

[intro | Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4]

William Law - Holiness and Thankfulness

2011-12-31T16:24:00.000Z

Here's a brilliant quote I came across today from William Law:

Would you know him who is the greatest saint in the world? It is not he who prays most or fasts most; it is not he who gives most alms; but it is he who is always thankful to God, who receives everything as an instance of God's goodness and has a heart always ready to praise God for it.

If anyone would tell you the shortest, surest way to all happiness and perfection, he must tell you to make a rule to thank and praise God for everything that happens to you. Whatever seeming calamity happens to you, if you thank and praise God for it, it turns into a blessing. Could you therefore work miracles, you would not do more for yourself than by this thankful spirit; it turns all that it touches into happiness.

Quoted by Robert Atwell in Celebrating the Saints, page ii.

Book Search

2011-12-30T17:28:00.000Z

I buy quite a few Christian books. One chore I thought needed automating was searching the half-a-dozen British Christian book websites to see which have the book and which is cheapest. I couldn't find an easy work around, so I scripted one. My JS skills aren't what they should be, but this seems to work.

<html>
<head>
<script type="text/javascript">
function dosearch() {
var sites=new Array();
sites[1]="http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=";
sites[2]="http://www.eden.co.uk/shop/search.php?category_id=&keyword=";
sites[3]="http://www.wesleyowen.com/search/product/productPowerSearch.jhtml?keywords=";
sites[4]="http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/search?searchTerm=";
sites[5]="http://www.10ofthose.com/search/?query=";
var n=1;
for (n=1;n<=5;n++)
{
var fulladd = sites[n]+ escape(document.searchform.searchterms.value);
window.open(fulladd);
}
}
</script>
<style type="text/css">
p {
font: 12pt Arial;
margin-left: 2cm;
margin-top: 1cm;
}
form {
margin-left: 3cm;
width: 10cm;
padding: 1cm;
}
</style>
<title>John's Christian Book Search</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>Please enter the name of the book you want to find in the box below, and then press "Search".</p>
<form name="searchform" onSubmit="return dosearch();">
<input type="text" name="searchterms">
<input type="submit" name="SearchSubmit" value="Search">
</form>
</body>
</html>

To use: copy and paste that into a text editor. Save it as "books.htm", and it should work. Any title you type into the box should result in you getting five windows/tabs, one for each of the online bookshops I use most often. Feel free to modify the code, redistribute and so on - it can be easily modified to work for any other searching. Just don't charge for it! If you want a copy of the html file, feel free to e-mail me and I'll send you one.

Two Awesome Adverts

2011-11-23T11:20:00.000Z

Here's one about being welcoming (or otherwise): (hat tip)

And here's probably the best advert of the year. Acts 20:35.

The Word on the Wind - Alison Morgan

2011-11-23T11:16:00.000Z

This is the best book I've read to give to members of “sleepy churches that are being woken up”. It starts off at a very general middle-of-the-road Anglicanism, even to the extent of having an introduction by Rowan Williams, and it ends up fairly close to charismatic evangelicalism.

Alison Morgan is a good and clear writer, who has obviously got lots of experience of helping people know God better and seeing him working, both in England and Africa. The only bits that got on my nerves were the bits about science and religion, where Morgan sometimes gets out of her depth. For example, in chapter 2, Morgan says that the scientific revolution was largely due to a recovery of the Greek way of thinking as compared to the Hebrew. That may well be the way things often function today, but it's just plain wrong when thinking about the history of science (for a better view, see e.g. Peter Harrison, The Fall and the Foundations of Natural Science).

But that's being picky. It's not Morgan's main point and in general this is a great book – the kind of book that made me go out and look for other stuff she's written – the kind of book I'd like to work through with folks in a church that needed waking up. She even has a poem with the reflection questions at the end of each chapter, which really isn't my style but I recognise will work well for others.

Heaven - Randy Alcorn

2011-10-25T11:27:00.002+01:00

I would never normally have picked this book up, and that would have been my loss. It's by a chap called Randy, and has a smiling cheesy photo of him on the back. The top paragraph of the blurb is “We all have questions about what Heaven will be like, and after twenty-five years of extensive research, Dr. Randy Alcorn provides the answers.” How cheesy and yet subtly threatening! What sort of research has he done – tracking down nice people and killing then reviving them?

But actually, despite appearances, and despite one or two minor quibbles (of which more later) this is just about the best book I have ever read on the topic. The “extensive research” turns out to be detailed study of all the relevant Bible passages and reading and engaging with just about every book ever published on the topic of heaven.

What I particularly liked about it was the valuable stress on the physicality of heaven and the importance of the Old Earth at its best as at least a vague picture of the New Earth. Alcorn's picture of the afterlife is God-centred, but it has a lot of enjoying God by enjoying his (new) creation, which is something I rarely see in books which try to give a Biblical perspective.

Another thing I liked was the sheer depth of his background reading.

I shall rise from the dead... I shall see the Son of God, the Sun of Glory, and shine myself as that sun shines. I shall be united to the Ancient of Days, to God Himself, who had no morning, never began... No man ever saw God and lived. And yet, I shall not live till I see God; and when I have seen him, I shall never die.
John Donne

I've got a few small quibbles though. Alcorn talks about the Millennium far too much for something that only gets one Bible verse on it (and that contested and in a highly symbolic passage). Maybe that's because he knows loads of people who think it is really important. I don't, but then I don't do loads of stuff with Christians in America. I don't dramatically disagree with him, I just don't see the point of him mentioning it so much, but maybe that's because he's in a different context from me.

About 40% of the book (>200/550) is a section entitled “Question and Answers About Heaven”, which is sometimes weak and gets a bit repetitive. For example:

In heaven, will we be able to do time travel and go back and watch exciting events from the past?
Yeah, that would be pretty cool. I don't see any good reason why not. Hey – if you did that we could go back and watch the Sermon on the Mount or the parting of the Red Sea. That would be great!
And will we able to live in fairytale castles with knights and dragons like in medieval times?
Ooh wow – some people would really like that. I don't know – let's say “yes”, but I'm not going to say where all the peasants would come from.
(not a real quote, but you get the idea.)

Alcorn also sometimes errs a little on the side of literalism for my taste, but at least he admits it. For example, he suggests that the streets in the New Jerusalem will literally be made of gold (p.478). But those are only minor quibbles and actually it is a really good book. The Q&A section does work if it's being used as a reference book, and some of the questions (e.g. on animals in heaven) are handled really well.

He reports one conversation between a young bibliophile and an older wiser Christian. The young man asks “Will we have books in heaven?”, and the older Christian replies “Yes, but only the ones you've lent out or given away.” This is a really good book, and I suspect I will indeed be lending it out! One final quote:

What if the resurrection of the dead is an actual, bodily resurrection? What if the New Earth will be real? What if Heaven will be a tangible, earthly place inhabited by people with bodies, intellect, creativity, and culture-building relational skills? What if a physical Heaven is God's plan and has been all along? What terminology would God have to use to convince us of this? How would it be different to what he has actually used in Scripture? (p.479)

Wi-Fi and Individualism

2011-08-17T12:49:00.000+01:00

From where I am sitting at the moment, my computer can pick up 13 home wireless internet connections. There are so many that they block each other's signals, and each home will be paying roughly £15 per month for theirs, which they don't use all the time.

The solution should be obvious - neighbourhood wi-fi. A group of 6 or so nearby houses pays for a really good uncapped internet connection, with 2 or 3 transmitters. They get less signal interference, it costs the householders less, and the first company to offer a deal like that makes pots of cash. But it isn't happening because we're too individualistic, don't know our neighbours and so on. Oh, and this way the ISPs make more money in total.

Dealing with Discrimination

2011-08-02T15:38:00.000+01:00

Now in these days when the disciples were increasing in number, a complaint by the Hellenists arose against the Hebrews because their widows were being neglected in the daily distribution.
Acts 6:1, ESV

How does the early church deal with discrimination? And what can that teach us today?

1. Discrimination is Inevitable

At this stage in Acts, the early church hasn't done much wrong. They are sharing everything they have with each other; they are growing rapidly; they are taking care of the poor. And yet the perception of discrimination arises. Maybe it's because the Hellenists (Greek-speaking Jews, probably from outside Israel) didn't speak the language as well as Hebrews (Hebrew-speaking Jews from inside Israel). Maybe it's because the Hebrews knew people better or were pushier because they were in their home town and the Hellenists were visitors. But whatever the reason, the Hellenists felt that they were being discriminated against. No human system is ever good enough to completely remove the perception of discrimination against someone.

2. The Perception of Discrimination is Itself a Problem

According to various bodies, if someone thinks they are being discriminated against, then they are. I used to think that was stupid, but as time has gone on, I've seen the wisdom of it. It is importance not only that justice is done but that justice is seen to be done.

3. Avoiding Discrimination Really Matters

The apostles convene a full meeting of the whole church to discuss the issue (Acts 6:2).

4. Discrimination Shouldn't Stop Preaching

The apostles recognise that the problem of discrimination has the potential to stop the central work of preaching and prayer, so they choose 7 other people to deal with it. That's not to say that discrimination doesn't matter – of course it does. It can even be a central issue – God includes all sorts of people in his kingdom, and the Jerusalem Council was convened to deal with the question of Jews and Gentiles in the Church. But other things matter too, and we should take care that dealing with discrimination doesn't stop us from doing those things.

5. The Victims of Discrimination Should Be Put In Charge of Righting It

The Seven are an interesting group. The dispute, remember, was between Greek-speaking Jews and Hebrew-speaking Jews. And the group appointed to sort it out were: Stephen (Greek name), Philip (could be Hebrew or Greek), and Prochorus (Greek), and Nicanor (Greek), and Timon (Greek), and Parmenas (Greek), and Nicolaus (Greek – and he wasn't even ethnically Jewish). 6 of them were from the group that felt that they were being wronged. And that's important, because putting them in charge removes the perception of discrimination as well. The Greek-speaking Jews can't complain that they're being discriminated against because they are now the ones in charge of food allocation.

6. The Non-Victims Should Be Protected

Of course, in trying to right any discrimination, there's the possibility of overreaction. And so it's important that the apostles protect against this as well. The Seven are described as “seven men of good repute, full of the Spirit and of wisdom”. They weren't going to mistreat the Hebrew widows to try to get revenge or anything like that.

Application

So which groups in the church feel discriminated against? Women in ministry can feel discriminated against. And those who oppose women in ministry certainly do feel discriminated against.

The Biblical solution then is to put those who feel discriminated against in charge of the protection against discrimination. Legislation for women bishops should therefore be drafted and agreed on by two groups – godly, committed women in ministry and godly, committed people who oppose them.

What's With Paul and Women? by John Zens

2011-07-22T09:28:00.000+01:00

When we debate with others, we need to make sure we understand their point of view too. Otherwise we run the risk of being deluded into believing our own bluster.

One area where this is particularly true is the debate about women in leadership in the church. For one side, the issue is one of fairness, of not arbitrarily saying that 50% of the church should not be allowed to teach or lead. For the other side, the issue is one of striving to be faithful to the Bible (or to tradition), especially when it doesn't fit with our cultural preconceptions.

What is needed in the debate, therefore, is for people who bridge the gap – who either seek to show how restricting the ministry of women is fair, reasonable and just or to show how allowing women to teach, preach and lead is compatible with the Bible. This book is an attempt to do the latter.

Zens takes the key passage of 1 Timothy 2:8-15, and tries to show that it addresses a specific situation in the church in first-century Ephesus rather than being a general injunction for all time. And he makes some good points. For example, by arguing that Paul's instructions to women all match up with specific features of the Ephesians Artemis-cult, he provides the first decent explanation I've seen of how v15 follows on from v8-14.

Some bits of the argument could be unpacked better. For example, I don't remember him making the specific link between the women wearing fancy hair styles to worship Artemis, or their leadership, and them seeking protection in childbirth. It is implicit in what Zens writes, but if he'd spelt it out a bit more, and then unpacked that Paul is showing them that there is a better way...

But the book's big weakness is how it treats people who disagree. The foreword is full of invective against people who restrict women's ministry. And regardless of whether it is true or not, that is not the way to win an argument with people who are honestly seeking to follow what they think God is saying. Ditto with Zens' argument in v12. He translates the verse “I do not now permit...”, and then makes his main point from the word “now”. However, it isn't in the verse in Greek. If Paul had wanted to put a “now” in, he could have done and he didn't. Zens is right of course that the verse could be describing Paul's practice at that time and in that situation, but grammatically it could also be describing his settled and permanent policy. That question can't be settled on grammar alone, so in implicitly saying that it can, Zens makes the serious mistake of over-arguing. I don't like people using bad arguments in debates because 1) it makes it look as if they don't have any good arguments 2) it makes it look as if they've already decided what the “truth” is before considering the arguments.

Other things about the book grated as well. When Zens wants to make a point I think is controversial, the sources he refers to to establish it are mostly non-peer-reviewed ones – he seems disturbingly fond of putting blogs in his references. Now I quite like reading people's blogs, but I don't always assume they're true. If I'm reading the blog of a noted Biblical scholar, I expect them to be right on the Biblical stuff and to have done their research. But Zens sometimes comes across as having the attitude “It says it on the internet, therefore it must be true.”

All in all, a thought-provoking read, and he makes some good points, but it could have been so much better if this book actually looked like an attempt to understand the verses rather than an attempt to have a go at people who disagree.

"Healing" Homosexuality?

2011-07-19T11:40:00.000+01:00

There is quite a bit of controversy at the moment about the possibility of therapy that is said might lead to gay people becoming straight. Albert Mohler, for example, has written an article about it which misses the point.

People argue about whether it is ok to condemn homosexuality. But that is surely neither here nor there in the argument! Consider this:

It is acceptable to be either male or female.
However, there are some people who are biologically male who wish to be female, or vice versa.
In modern culture, that too is acceptable.
We as a culture do not have a problem with men who wish to become women undergoing therapy to help them make that change.
Biological gender is clearly "hardwired" in a deeper sense than sexual "orientation".
Hence if we allow someone who wishes to change their biological gender to undergo therapy to do so, then we should also allow someone who wishes to change their sexual orientation to undergo therapy to do so (whether straight -> gay or gay -> straight)
Therefore, even in an areligious secular liberal state, we should allow therapy for people to change their sexual orientation.

Note that this argument does not assume that homosexuality is right, wrong, neutral or disordered. It does not assume anything about the authority of Scripture. It is therefore much more likely to be accepted as an argument by people who don't agree with those points. I don't understand why it isn't used more.

Three Books That Should Be on Ministry Reading Lists

2011-07-17T22:21:00.002+01:00

Here are three books I wish had been on at least one of my reading lists. (And one that I'm glad wasn't!)

Instruments in the Redeemer's Hands by Paul Tripp

This is the best book I have ever read on pastoral care. It is the best book I have ever read on pastoral counselling. It is one of the best books I have ever read on psychology from a Christian point of view. It is one of the few books I have read that seems to understand the depths of idolatry in the human heart, and that seeks to bring people to proper worship of God. Brilliant.

Deliverance by Michael Perry

This a book version of the official guidelines from the Church of England working group on Deliverance ministry. Given that fact, it's surprisingly good. They don't seem to have any anti-supernatural bias or anything, and have done their research into the nature of the phenomena and best practice very well. Well worth a read for anyone in ministry who comes across situations where deliverance is requested or an option. Recommended by my Training Incumbent.

Rid of My Disgrace by Justin & Lindsey Holcombe

This is a great book for those who have suffered from sexual abuse and those working with them. I wish I'd known about it earlier. In my somewhat limited experience, those who have suffered from such abuse often need someone who really understands what they are going through. The Holcombes really seem to, and speak grace into that situation really well.

Conduct Gospel-Centred Funerals by Newton and Croft

This book, on the other hand was a big disappointment. If you've never really thought about how to conduct a funeral, and don't know anyone who does them regularly whom you can ask for help, this is probably a useful guide. Except even then, so much of it is tied up in US culture and so on. Maybe worth reading as a discussion starter for people who have never led a funeral or if your theological college missed that bit out completely. But for those of us who were trained in how to do funerals and aren't ministering in the US, pretty much useless.

Having said that, I do read and recommend other stuff written by the authors.

Retirement

2011-06-07T11:33:00.001+01:00

There is one Biblical reference to retirement on any grounds other than ill health. And it's in Luke 12.

Then Jesus said to them, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.” And he told them this parable: “The ground of a certain rich man yielded an abundant harvest. He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’
“Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store my surplus grain. And I’ll say to myself, “You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.”’
“But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’
“This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God.”
Luke 12:15-21, NIV

And it's great to see that John Piper's on the same page...

HT to What's Best Next? for the video.

Were Adam and Eve Historical?

2011-06-04T16:00:00.000+01:00

This article is a good summary of the current state of a very interesting debate. Lots of the points made in the debate are very good ones, and some of them see difficult to reconcile with other very good points.

For what it's worth, I'm not compleltely sure exactly what I think, but I want to affirm the following two points:

Adam and Eve really existed.
The scientific evidence is not deceptive.

It isn't obvious how to reconcile those points - here are a few ideas.

Were Adam and Eve the only people alive at the time? That probably depends on what you mean by "people". I think Biblically it is clear that they are the first real humans, because they are the first ones to be given the divine image, which was subsequently spoilt, and being human is fundamentally about the capacity for relationship with God. Were there other members of the genus homo alive at the time? Maybe, but if so Adam was their representative head and so after the Fall they share in his image, which is fallen from the image of God.

Although the scientific evidence is not deceptive, the study on that evidence may have been done badly for various reason. It may be there are factors of which they are unaware. They might have been using faulty models.

Mission as Participation in the Divine Nature

2011-05-31T09:52:00.001+01:00

The mission of God's people, then, is not some external structure built by the church itself - a program or strategy devised by an institution. Sending is mission is a participation in the life of God. The mission of God's people, in this dimension of sending and being sent, is to be caught up within the dynamic sending and being sent that God the Holy Trinity has done and continues to do for the salvation of the world and the revelation of his truth.
Christopher Wright, The Mission of God's People, p.211

Not Going Where God Wants?

2011-05-20T07:42:00.000+01:00

Roger Carswell has written a really challenging piece here about how most evangelicals seem to want to go to where there are already plenty of Christians rather than where there are few. I know lots of people in that category, but I know a fair few who would rather go where Christ is not known, and they are a real encouragement to me.

HT Tim Chester.

The Death of Osama bin Laden

2011-05-14T18:32:00.000+01:00

‘As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign LORD, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live. Turn! Turn from your evil ways! Why will you die, people of Israel?’
Ezekiel 33:11, NIV

I've been meaning to write this post ever since I heard about bin Laden's death, but it's been a very busy couple of weeks. It raises all kind of questions, but I'm going to think about three of them. Was what happened just? Was it right? And should Americans have rejoiced the way they did?

First, was it just?

Osama bin Laden had personally declared war on the US. He claimed responsibility for and delighted in the events of 9/11, and clearly intended to continue to do such acts whenever he was able to do so. Had the USA captured him and put him on trial in any court in the world (except possibly those operating under Sharia Law), he would have been found guilty, and in any court that allowed the death penalty, he would have been sentenced to death. There was no possibility of reasonable doubt about his guilt, or about the seriousness of his actions. The killing of Osama bin Laden was, without a doubt, just.

But was it right?

That is a harder question. Was it right for the US to send a team of heavily armed Navy Seals into Pakistan without permission and to assassinate an unarmed man? Again, perspective helps here. The US is at war in Afghanistan, a war which had as one of its major aims to kill or capture Osama bin Laden. The war spills over the border into Pakistan, and Pakistan is officially on America's side in that war.

For the US, acting without Pakistan's permission was a necessary part of the operation. If they had asked for permission, they would have put the Pakistani government in a difficult position. Either they grant permission, in which case they get even more protests from their own population, or they refuse it and lose all US support. Far better for the Pakistani government not to have to make the choice at all. Furthermore, had the US told Pakistan of its intentions, the Pakistani authorities are sufficiently compromised by links to Al Qua'eda that it is highly likely that bin Laden would have been notified and enabled to escape. In addition, if any country (except Russia or China) had been knowingly harbouring bin Laden, it is likely that the US would have if necessary declared war on them to get at him. Much better for them, and much better for the host country, not to have to bother.

Was it right to kill bin Laden given that he was unarmed? I have already pointed out that he would have been sentenced to death anyway, so the only issue is the manner of his death. If one is in battle, and a sniper has the opportunity to shoot the enemy commander, they do not worry too much whether or not he is armed at the time. Even if it was not in battle, if in WW2 a German tank column was moving through Europe, and a British sniper caught sight of the German General Rommel and shot him, even if he was not even carriyng a gun at the time, that would be regarded as perfectly legitimate. And bin Laden clearly thought he was at war with the US. I don't see what the moral difference is.

In addition, there are problems associated with keeping bin Laden in prison. It would provide an incredibly high-profile target for protests and suicide bombings, and it could be argued it was far better tactically to kill him and bury him at sea. Having said all that, I think if it would have been possible to capture and put bin Laden on trial, that may have been even better.

I don't mean better from the point of view of justice at all - I mean from the point of view of what bin Laden seemed to understand so little about - mercy. Of course he didn't deserve it - if he had deserved it, it wouldn't have been mercy. To allow him the possibility of repentance would have been a very merciful thing. Of course, to allow him the possibility to give a memorable speech inciting the Muslim world to unity and hatred of the West would have been a very dangerous thing, so it would have had to be handled carefully.

And so we come onto the question about whether it was right to rejoice. I think relatives of those killed in 9/11 could have rejoiced. But ultimately God does not rejoice in the death of sinners, but rather that they turn from their wickedness and live. If bin Laden had turned around and become a force for peace in the world, even a living demonstration of the power of God to change sinners, that would have been cause for rejoicing. As it is, it seems that he is just one more unrepentant sinner going to Hell. That isn't something to rejoice in, especially when we recognise that it is what we deserve too - it is where we would be but for the grace and mercy that God has shown us.

History of Homosexual Theology

2011-05-14T17:05:00.000+01:00

Concerning homosexuality there has been absolute unanimity in church history; sexual intimacy between persons of the same gender has never been recognized as legitimate behavior for a Christian. One finds no examples of orthodox teachers who suggested that homosexual activity could be acceptable in God's sight under any circumstances. Revisionist biblical interpretations that purport to support homosexual practice are typically rooted in novel hermeneutical principles applied to Scripture, which produce bizarre interpretations of the Bible held nowhere, never, by no one.

from here.

Royal Wedding

2011-04-29T08:52:00.000+01:00

What a day! What a celebration! It's great to know that we can still all get behind celebrating something as wonderful as a Royal Wedding!

Of course, it also reminds us of the glorious reality behind marriage. My wife predicted a whole spate of Christian posts on it, but I've not seen that many. The best however, has to be this one from Barry Cooper (who is famous for not being Rico Tice). Quotes below.

But we can focus too much on sin. Today is a day where a Royal Prince, who will (God-willing) one day be King, marries a commoner, and she therefore becomes Royal. What a great picture in itself of what God has done for us!

In a shocking revelation, the palace has confirmed that the Prince has married a prostitute.

The woman has not yet been publicly named. But sources close to the palace have revealed that as well as being a serial adulterer, she is also known to be a notorious drunk, an inveterate liar, and a grievous hypocrite.

When asked why he would set his love on such an undeserving bride, the future King replied, “I have always loved her. I loved her from the very beginning, before she even knew me. And I will continue to love her, regardless of who she is. Nothing can separate us, not even death.”

Some have complained that, given her profession, such a woman could never become Queen. But the Prince was unrepentant: “If I am King, and I choose to marry her, then she becomes Queen. Whatever she may be, her status changed forever when I joined myself to her. Whatever she may do, she has been irrevocably welcomed into my family. Everything I have is now hers. And everything she has, I have taken upon myself.”

Derren Brown - Miracles for Sale - Review and Critique

2011-04-26T09:16:00.002+01:00

These people always cause trouble. Their minds are corrupt, and they have turned their backs on the truth. To them, a show of godliness is just a way to become wealthy.
1 Tim 6:5 (NLT)

Last night, Derren Brown did a TV expose of American faith healers. There's a link to the website here. I thought a lot of it was good and well done, but it could have been significantly better.

Brown started with a crowd of volunteers, and then picked and trained one to become a fake faith healer, using some of the techniques he was sure that many of the "real" fake healers were using. His target was specifically the faith healers linked to the so-called Prosperity Gospel who teach that in order for God to bless you the most, you need to give the most money to them.

I don't doubt that there are plenty of such people. The Bible warns about them (see above). I've written against the "prosperity gospel" before. I thought it was especially good how Brown at al worked alongside Christians and Christian organisations in trying to expose the con artists.

One of the problems they had was getting enough publicity in the US. Most churches were surprisingly well-guarded about letting Brown's fake faith-healer preach or publicising his event - encouragingly so. It was also encouraging that Brown decided not to use a US Christian publicist, for fear of destroying his business when it became clear that they were fakes.

Critique

Brown is of course dead right that a lot of "faith healers" are manipulative charlatans. But there are others too. I'm sure that some are well-meaning and wanting to see God at work, and get easily tricked into faking stuff without realising they're doing it, and then misled into running after money. I'm sure too that others are genuine. I have a friend whose leg was miraculously healed, and who has a letter from his NHS consultant to that effect.

One of the key ways of telling the difference is their attitude to money, sex and power. If they are getting rich from their status and their ministry, then I would suggest they aren't genuine. Maybe some of the healings might be, but their hearts are clearly in the wrong place. Jesus did lots of miraculous healings; the apostles did miraculous healings, but they didn't get rich from them - they got killed.

The well-known Christian leaders I have the most respect for are the ones who are either on fixed salaries / stipends (as in most of the C of E), or who have set up trusts so that they personally don't get book royalties, donations, etc (as Rick Warren, John Piper, etc) and are instead paid by the church they work for. They also make sure they don't profit in other ways - strict rules about accountability and so on. Billy Graham famously didn't allow himself to be unsupervised with any woman except for his wife - he'd even refuse to go along in a taxi if the driver was female.

Healing on the Streets is an informal British movement which got briefly referenced. When that sort of thing is done as publicity for big rallies with financial appeals, as with Derren Brown's examples, it may well be faked and wrongly motivated.

I'm pretty sure that most of the British stuff is in a different category. Let me explain. I've been to a big conference where we were encouraged to go out and pray for people on the streets. Not to fake stuff, but to go out and do it. I've also seen the leg lengthening thing done in that context, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't done like Derren Brown did it with the loosening of shoes. I think it was to do with posture and the angle the person was sitting at on a cheap plastic chair - if you slip slightly to the left because someone is pulling your left leg, it appears to become longer. I'm not sure if the person showing us that knew that he was faking it, but I know that "miracle" is easy to fake, even if you don't realise you're doing it. I know people who do Healing on the Streets, and they're genuine about it - they're doing it because they want to see God blessing people rather than to get money, sex or power, and they're not trying to do fake healings like on the film. I also know that God does sometimes heal people genuinely.

I know too that God does sometimes give people words of knowledge about others. It was interesting to see how they faked it on the programme, but the existence of a fake does not imply that real ones don't exist.

Lessons for us

I help to run a bi-monthly Service of Prayer for Healing and Wholeness. And it's really important for us to be clear that we're not in it for financial gain. So we don't, and we shouldn't take collections at services where we pray specifically for healing.

We should be clear it isn't about personalities - I read somewhere that best practice is only ever to pray for healing in pairs or groups, so that you never know which person's prayers led to any healings that happen and so detract from any possible personality cult. The Biblical model is that it should be done by the elders (plural) of the church, with anointing with oil, and that seems right. There is one person who heals, and it's Jesus, not me.

We should be clear in our attitudes that it's about us serving and laying ourselves down for others, just as Christ has done for us. If attention ever starts to drift onto us or onto the healings, push it back onto Christ, because that's where it belongs.

We should also be clear to distance ourselves from those who think that godliness is a means to financial gain. And that's partly why I welcome Derren Brown's programme.

Sexual Revolution: Defend It, If You Can

2011-04-19T12:40:00.003+01:00

This is a brilliant article, which argues from good old-fashioned ethics that the sexual revolution has been and continues to be a Bad Thing. Here's his conclusion - I'd love to see an attempt at a response from someone who disagrees...

In other words, let the sexual revolution be justified on grounds of the common good. I believe it fails that test miserably, with evidence that is weighty, obvious, manifold, logically and anthropologically deducible, and clearly predictable by wisdom both pagan and Christian. Let them make their case, rather than asserting a principle that, in reality, would destroy the very idea of the common good. For if we cannot appeal to the common good in a matter so fundamental, I do not see how we can appeal to it in any other.

It's worth adding that I know we are now living after the sexual revolution, and there's no point trying to pretend otherwise.

Alternative Vote Referrendum

2011-04-18T15:01:00.000+01:00

In the UK, we're about to have a referrendum on whether to change the voting system. Here's a video that explains some of the issues. And I know it ends up pro-AV. I'm not sure which way I'd vote - at the moment it's more likely I'd go for Alternative Vote than First Past the Post. If someone can point me to a sensible argument for FPTP, I'd be happy to consider posting that too.

Evangelism and Nominal Christians

2011-04-17T12:38:00.000+01:00

I was reading a short article the other day by Dan Clark, author of "I'm a Christian, aren't I?", and it got me thinking.

90%+ of the training I've had in evangelism has been assuming that the people I'm speaking to don't already think they are Christians. 90% of those I meet who don't attend church regularly already think they are Christians but don't show much sign of it in their lives - they're nominal.

Of course, it's not for me to question the reality or otherwise of their faith. But at the same time, it is clear that just claiming to be a Christian isn't enough, and I as a minister should be helping them know, love and serve Jesus better.

So...

Anyone read Dan Clark's book?
Anyone know other good resources for specifically helping nominal Christians know God better?

Did God Have a Wife?

2011-03-23T18:34:00.000Z

“Did God have a wife?” was the title of a programme on BBC2 yesterday. I didn't bother watching it, because that series isn't about presenting new evidence; it's about recycling old arguments that have been refuted but still hang around like a bad smell in the atheistic corners of the theology faculties of the world. And it depresses me to see the stupid things that people get paid to say on TV and other people accept is true.

Here's their basic argument:
YHWH is the Hebrew personal name for the God of the Old Testament. Someone found an inscription in the area of Israel from the Old Testament period saying “YHWH and his Asherah”. Asherah was a female goddess. Therefore, so the argument goes, the ancient Israelites said that God had a wife, called Asherah. And what you see described in the Old Testament are the attempts to stamp it out.

Here's some background you probably need in order to understand the situation: The main gods in the (“pagan”) Canaanite pantheon around 800BC were called El, Asherah and Ba'al. El and Asherah were married, Ba'al was their son. But Ba'al and Asherah were comparative newcomers – they don't appear on the scene much before 1500BC. So at the time the books of Kings are set, it's El, Asherah and Ba'al; at the time of Abraham, it's just El and some worship of the Sun and Moon.

Now, when Abraham was around, God revealed himself to him as “El”, or variants of “El” like “El Shaddai”, “El Elyon” and so on. I've written more about that here. The traditional argument is that “El” was how they remembered the true God, and Ba'al and Asherah were later additions. The Hebrew conception of El is similar to the Arabic Al, which was later picked up by Mohammed as Allah... It's also similar to the Latin “Deus” and the English “God”, which are used both as a title for the one God but also as labels for the many gods in a polytheistic pantheon.

But at the time of Moses, God revealed himself by the name YHWH as well as El – YHWH is used as a name that's associated with God's promises and with the fact that they come out of Egypt. Interestingly, God first uses the name when Moses basically asks him which God he is, because Moses grew up in polytheistic Egypt. When there is only really one God worshipped at the time of Abraham, God is fine going as just “God”, but when there are lots of gods around, he adds the name YHWH.

So by the time you get to the books of Kings, the followers of Moses' religion use El and YHWH for the same God. Elijah, who is one of the big figures in that religion in about 800BC even had a name that meant “El is YHWH”. The followers of Canaanite paganism had three main gods – El, Asherah and Ba'al. And so the question is whether the two religions were actually merged.

Right, so now to the argument.

The way that ancient history works is that there is often some kind of text that describes what happens. If you're lucky, it's from roughly the same time as the events it describes. If you're very lucky, there are two or more texts. And there may be some archaeology as well, which usually won't be enough to put a complete picture together. Ancient history tends to treat the text as basically reliable, unless there is some contradictory evidence from archaeology or unless the events described are impossible. We shouldn't discard the narrative account unless it clashes with archaeology – that's bad history.

That means that we need to think about what situation the Bible actually describes from about 900BC to 500BC. And what we see is that the people of Israel consistently sliding back into worshipping other gods, starting off with the gods of the Canaanites like Ba'al and Asherah under kings like Ahab and Ahaziah, and moving onto worshipping the gods of the nations around them like Chemosh and Molech. So according to the Old Testament, what you get is people trying to merge Judaism with Canaanite paganism. You get people building Asherah poles in the temple, for example. And the prophets (the ones the OT calls “true prophets” anyway) are consistently criticising them for doing so.

My point is this:
If the Old Testament account is right, then you'd expect that many of the Israelites were worshipping YWHW alongside Asherah and trying to merge Judaism with Canaanite paganism. So you'd expect them to be making statues saying things like YHWH and his Asherah. You'd also expect the OT prophets like Elijah to be condemning them for it.

Does it mean that God had a wife? No.

So what's new?

David Starkey on why the new intolerance of Christians is bad...

2011-03-09T10:41:00.001Z

Gay historian David Starkey warns about a state imposed liberal morality.

My comment - I think that to an extent we brought this on ourselves by focusing on law when we should have focused on grace.

Hat tip to Cranmer.

Rob Bell, Universalism and Hell

2011-03-02T07:36:00.002Z

There's been quite a lot of controversy lately about Rob Bell's new book, which is probably a very well-done marketing campaign to make sure it sells lots of copies, which it will.

Rob Bell's past work (e.g. Nooma) is generally really really good at connecting with modern culture, especially the end of it that likes computers with fruit logos on. But he often leaves himself open to the accusation that he is so connected to modern culture that he has at some points lost connection with the Bible.

His new book is called "Love Wins", and sounds like it will be about the non-existence of Hell. Some condemn it outright on the grounds that it looks like it's teaching universalism - that everyone will be saved in the end. And others condemn those people on the grounds that it's a bad idea to attack someone on the basis of a book that isn't even out yet.

Anyway, I thought that Richaard Taylor got the balance about right on his blog. He explains why universalism doesn't work as an idea, then leaves it up to the reader to decide whether or not Rob Bell is teaching it.

Here are a few quick reasons why I don't think universalism works.

1. It downplays the seriousness of sin

In modern western culture, we tend to forget how much of a big deal sin is. Sin is us rejecting the God who made us. Sin is saying that we think we are better off away from the source of all life and love. Sin is ultimately attempted deicide - us trying to kill God - and part of the shock of the cross is that we managed it. Except that death couldn't hold him.

We tend to think that God treats sin like a benevolent old grandfather would, welcoming us in and gently ticking us off for occasional bits of naughtiness while actually indulging us. But sin is far more serious than that. Sin is trying to kill the rightful and loving ruler of the universe and put ourselves in his place. Sin is cosmic treason. God cannot and should not just shrug it off and say that it is all ok.

2. It downplays the dignity of human responsibility

Some people clearly reject God. They clearly say that they do not want God to be Lord of their lives - they want to run the show themselves. And in some cases, over time, those people come to change their minds. But what if they don't? What if they hard-heartedly persist in their rejection of God? Is he going to over-ride them completely, and drag them kicking and screaming somewhere where they do not want to go? Or is he going to let them choose to reject him?

3. It misunderstands the nature of heaven

Jesus said to God "this is eternal life - to know you, the one true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent." (John 17:3). The essence of eternal life is to know God, and to be in relationship with him. Heaven is not some beautiful existence with God as an incidental feature - it is seeing God face to face and knowing him fully in perfect communion with him. Everything else is secondary.

So what would it mean for those who persistently rejected God to be in heaven? Some people argue that heaven and hell are actually the same, and are experienced differently by different people only because of their attitude to God. And I'm not persuaded by that argument, but there's certainly something in it.

Imagine that you'd been bullying a kid in the playground, and then his dad becomes headmaster or Prime Minister. You'd feel pretty stupid, and scared. Now imagine that the God you had been persistently trying to dethrone as king of the universe, surpress, ignore and even kill - suppose that that God turns out to be the ultimate reality of the universe. How is that meant to be good news for you?

Everything you know (about preaching) is wrong...

2011-02-28T15:21:00.004Z

Looking back, I should have realised the first time I heard Charlie speak. Charlie is the minister of a large charismatic church near where I used to live. I've heard him preach half a dozen or so times. Charlie isn't the best preacher in the world. I mean, he's not a bad preacher but he doesn't do most of the things that I learned to do in preaching training. His structure is often unclear; it's sometimes hard to tell what his main point is, and so on. On a technical level, I know lots of people who are "better" preachers than Charlie, many of them not in full-time Christian work.

But when Charlie speaks, God really moves in the hearts and minds of the people who are listening. And I'll bet it's because Charlie prays, and prays a lot. On the level that actually matters, rather than the level we're taught to preach and evaluate sermons on, he's one of the best preachers I know.

I've been through theological college. I've been on conferences about how to preach. I've read quite a few books on the topic, and yet prayer is hardly mentioned. Just about the most recent book on preaching I've read which spent anywhere near enough time on prayer is Spurgeon's Lectures to My Students. Perhaps that is why we now see God moving so little through preaching.

It matters far more that we spend much time in prayer than that we spend much time in preparation, or in alliteration, sharpening or making our points memorable. As Andrew Murray wrote, there is no record of Jesus teaching his apostles to preach, but he did teach them to pray. Preaching is ultimately about God's work in the hearts of the hearers rather than our work in the mind of the preacher, so prayer must be the key.

This is Baxter's advice to preachers:

Above all, be much in secret prayer and meditation. Thence you must fetch the heavenly fire that must kindle your sacrifices... Therefore [before preaching] go then specially to God for life: read some rousing, awakening book, or meditate on the weight of the subject of which you are to speak, and on the great necessity of your people's souls, that you may go in the zeal of the Lord into his house... that every one who comes cold into the assembly may have some warmth imparted to him before he depart.
Richard Baxter, The Reformed Pastor, p.62-63

and Spurgeon's

Prayer is the best studying.
C.H. Spurgeon, Lectures to My Students, p.90

And here's R.C. Sproul Jr on what we can tell about how to preach from Scripture:

The Bible is clear that there is power to change us in the preaching of the Word. We know we are to preach the Word, and not our own wisdom. We know we are to preach Christ, and Him crucified. That, however, doesn’t tell us everything. I confess that I could preach for days on how to preach a proper sermon, but I would run out of proof-texts the first hour.
from here

Why, oh why do we so often try to make preaching a human work? I am not doing down the importance of preparation and much skilful preparation, or of God's work through our work in preparation. But I suspect that we treat it far more as our work than God's, and should pray accordingly.

Limited Atonement?

2011-01-15T12:29:00.004Z

Did Jesus only die for the sins of those who believe in him, or for the sins of everyone?

I've recently finished reading "Life by His Death", which is a simplified version of John Owen's classic The Death of Death in the Death of Christ. I didn't feel the need to read a simplified version - but Amazon were out of DoDitDoC and they didn't say this version was simplified... Poor excuse, and if anyone who has read DoDitDoC says it deals with some of the criticisms of it here, I'm happy to make the effort to find a copy.

The book itself is a strong defence of the doctrine of Limited Atonement - that Christ died only for those who trust in him rather than for everyone without exception. It's a controversial doctrine, so I thought it worth writing a few thoughts about it.

Much of what Owen writes is brilliant - he argues strongly from God's sovereignty and from the fact that we require the work of the Holy Spirit to bring us to life and open our eyes before we believe that we cannot trust God unless he draws us to do so, and if he draws us to do so, we cannot resist.

It really got me thinking what it would be like to preach evangelistically trusting properly in God's sovereignty, and seeking to encourage God's work in people and preaching to those whom God is working in rather than those in whom he is not yet working...

Thus we appeal to men as if they all had the ability to receive Christ at any time; we speak of His redeeeming work as if He had done no more by dying than make it possible for us to save ourselves by believing; we speak of God's love as if it were no more than a general willingness to receive any who will turn and trust; and we depict the Father and the Son, not as sovereignly active in drawing sinners to themselves, but as waiting in quiet impotence 'at the door of our hearts' for us to let them in. It is undeniable that this is how we preach; perhaps this is what we really believe. But it needs to be said with some emphasis that this set of twisted half-truths is something other than the biblical gospel.
J.I. Packer, Introduction

The weaknesses in Owen's arugments are twofold. Firstly, he comes to a theological position based on some texts, and then interprets others in the light of his theology. One of his most common arguments is "this text does not mean A, because we already know ~A". Hence many of his arguments would only work on those who already hold to the authority and consistency of Scripture. At the same time, his arguments could be (and have been) reversed. People could argue from the verses that seem to teach ~A that it is true, and then use exactly the same tactics on the verses that seem to teach A. I think they'd come unstuck though, because their conception of God would not really be sovereign, but that doesn't change the problem with using it as an arguing technique.

The second problem is that Owen almost always looks at things from a God's-eye view. And actually, I agree with Owen. From God's point of view, when Jesus died, God knew and had chosen those who were going to trust in him, and Jesus died only for their sins. From God's point of view, Jesus did not die for those who would not trust in him.

But from our point of view, things are very different. There's only one point in the book where Owen's view changes to ours.

Preachers can never know who, in their congregations, are God's elect. They must therefore call on all to believe, and promise that as many as do will be saved, for there is enough in the death of Christ to save all who believe.
Life by His Death, p.52

Most people don't function with a God's eye view. Most people find conceptual arguments difficult to follow, and Owen employs little else. I'm heavily conceptual, and I found it difficult that when he kept mentioning the many people who hadn't heard of Jesus, he never once used it as a motivation to tell them!

I think that at the end of the day, Owen is right about Jesus' death. I don't know if in 1647 there were people who believed in the full authority and consistency of Scripture, were comfortable with highly conceptual arguments and believed that Jesus died to actually forgive the sins of all rather than just those who believe. If there were, maybe this book is the reason there are so few such people now. But that's clearly who the book is aimed at.

But it is critically important that we hold that belief in tension with human responsibility and the fact that the gospel is held out to all, because Jesus died for anyone who will put their trust in him.

Books I've Read Recently 3 - Now, Discover Your Strengths

2011-01-15T11:59:00.004Z

As far as I know, this isn't a Christian book. It's a book by two people who have done a lot of research (with Gallup) into people's working patterns. But we can learn from them, and it's always nice to see secular researchers getting back to where the Bible said they should be, which they kind-of do...

The basic thesis of the book is that we work best by focusing on our strengths rather than our weaknesses. I think that's a good point, and they justify it well.

The book is based around the question "At work, do you have the opportunity to do what you do best very day?" They asked that to a lot of employees, managers, and so on, and found that the people who said "yes" were more productive, enjoyed work more, were healthier and happier, and so on. They found that companies that enabled employees to do that worked better as a whole.

The authors then go on to identify 34 different "strengths", which is enough for there to be 34C5 = 278,256 different combinations of top 5 strengths, even if you ignore the order. Including ordering too, that's over 33 million permutations. And they offer an online test to determine what your top 5 are. There are then a good number of suggestions of how to use your strengths to deal with weaknesses, how to encourage others to use their strengths and so on. A lot of it is common sense, but common sense isn't always very common, as evidenced by some in the Church of England who think that all clergy should be able to do any clergy job.

Weaknesses in the book - they don't explain exactly where the 34 strengths come from. I very much doubt that they are all independent. For example, I would expect people who score highly on "intellection" also to score highly on "deliberative". Nor do they explain why 5 is the magic number - I would expect that some people are more focused than others - one person might have 80% of their abilities on one skill, another might have 20% distributed across each of 5 skills. And some people might just have more innate ability than others anyway. Some of their suggestions are just plain silly too - replacing interviews with just competency measures, for example - often basic conversational skills and personality are important, and you miss that through just doing tests.

There are some good insights as well - for example the way that performance reviews often don't measure performance in the ways that matter. All in all, I found it a thought-provoking read. I don't agree with everything in it, and some bits were overly long and tedious, and the good research doesn't justify all the conclusions they hang on it in terms of the 34 types. But in terms of thinking about what it means for us to be given different gifts, and for us to be different parts of the body, and to be supporting one another as different parts of the body, it was well worth a read.

Books I've Read Recently 2 - Calvin, by Bruce Gordon

2011-01-15T11:48:00.003Z

2009 was the 500th anniversary of Calvin's birth, and this was one of the biographies released to celebrate. From reviews I've read, it's meant to be just about the best biography of Calvin written thus far. And it is very good. I don't think it's the definitive biography - you don't feel like you know Calvin after reading it - but you feel like you know someone who knows him well.

It's an interesting read particularly because I get the impression that Bruce Gordon's natural reaction is not to like Calvin much at all, and there are a few bits where that comes through. But he ends up with at least a strong grudging admiration for him. There's one sentence in the preface which kind of captures that. "[Calvin] never felt that he had encountered an intellectual equal, and he was probably correct." I'm not sure that's true from Calvin's life as Gordon tells it either - Calvin certainly attached himself to various people (e.g. Martin Bucer) as mentors and so on.

But Gordon does do a very good job of showing us how Calvin fits into the times, how he was influenced by different people at different times, and changed his mind on some issues, and so on. It's very much a warts-and-all biography, but Calvin wouldn't have wanted it any other way! He really gets into Calvin's thoughts and priorities as well - I hadn't realised, for example, how closely some of the issues addressed in the Commentaries tie into events in France and the world at that stage.

What he doesn't get into really is Calvin's passion for God and his personal relationship with God, which there is such a strong sense of in his writing. But with Calvin, that is so tied up with his theology that to understand it probably needs a historian who is at least strongly sympathetic to Calvin's understanding of God's sovereignty. This is quite possibly as good a biography of Calvin as could be written by someone who doesn't share his theology.

A really good read, and a very good biography of one of the key figures in European History, and one of the biggest figures in Church History. It might be the best one yet written, but it isn't the best possible one.

Books I've Read Recently 1 - The Way of the Righteous in the Muck of Life

2011-01-15T10:57:00.004Z

I've long been an admirer of Dale Ralph Davis. His books of sermons on Joshua - 2 Kings are models of what Christian preaching on the historical OT books can be. This book contains 12 of his sermons on the Psalms - specifically Psalms 1-12.

As you'd expect from DRD, each contains his own translation of the Psalm and a discussion of some of the textual and contextual issues, but only where they are relevant to the points he is making. The translations alone were worth the cost of the book, but I found the sermons moving, helpful, and they really pointed me to Christ.

Well worth reading devotionally, as I did. Well worth having if you are going to preach on any of the Psalms in the near future. Well worth studying to get ideas for how to preach poetry. Brilliant book.

Walking Well - Ephesians 4:17-5:17

2011-01-04T12:14:00.003Z

I've recently been reading Ephesians 4 and 5, and have been really struck by the number of reasons Paul gives for avoiding sin. I found it a real encouragement to avoid sin better in my own life, and I'm not sure I've ever seen a list of them worked through properly, so here goes...

Walking badly is what the Gentiles do (4v17). One of Paul's big themes in the letters is Christian identity. Those Christians (like me) who were Gentiles ethnically are no longer Gentiles because of what God has done for them in bringing them near in Christ. So we shouldn't walk as the Gentiles do.
Walking as the Gentiles do stems from having minds that are futile (4v17) – the word is the same one translated “meaningless” in Ecclesiastes. The way they think and the things they think about are passing away. So don't live like they do.
Not only do their actions stem from ways of thinking that are passing away, they also stem from ignorance (4v18). Sinning is an ignorant way to act.
Sin stems from hard-heartedness (4v19)
Sin is giving yourself away to licentiousness (4v19)
Sin leads to the pursuit of every uncleanness in excess (4v19)
It's not how we were taught and discipled as Christians (4v20)
It's not according to the truth in Jesus (4v21-22)
Sin belongs to the old person, which is being destroyed (4v22)
We should put off the old person and put on the new person (4v23)
Our new selves were created according to God in righteousness and devoutness of truth (4v24)
We are members of each other, so should be speaking truth to one another rather than falsehood (4v25)
Sinning can give the devil a foothold in our lives (4v27)
Our actions should be motivated by the needs of others (4v28-29).
Doing good means that we can give to the needy (4v28)
Our speech should be motivated by building up the needy (4v29)
Sin grieves the Spirit of God (4v30)
We have been sealed by the Spirit aiming for the day of redemption. We should therefore remember that we are heading for redemption and live accordingly (4v30)
We should show grace to each other rather than evil because God has showed grace to us rather than evil (4v31-32)
We should imitate God (5v1)
Because we are God's children (5v1)
Christ loved us and gave himself up for us – we should follow his example (5v2)
We are “holy ones” and therefore should live in a fitting way (5v3-4)
Sin is a form of idolatry, because we are acting as if God is really just our imagined version of God rather than the real one. (5v5)
Idolaters (and therefore sinners) don't get an inheritance in God's kingdom (5v5)
Saying that sinners won't be punished is just empty words (5v6)
God's wrath really is coming on those whose identity is tied up with sin (5v6)
We shouldn't partner with those who are heading towards God's wrath. (5v7)
We were darkness, but now we are light. Therefore we should live like it. (5v8)
God's light at work in us should produce goodness, righteousness and truth (5v9)
We should test out what pleases God (5v10)
The works of darkness are futile – they don't lead anywhere good. (5v11)
It is shameful even to talk about deeds of darkness (5v12)
God's transforming power is available to change the dark things in our pasts into light and use them for his glory (5v13-14)
Walking well is wise; walking badly is foolish (5v15)
The days are evil, therefore we need to make an effort to live wisely (5v16)
It's important to understand what God wants us to do rather than be foolish (5v17)

Mark's Gospel - Wordle

2011-01-04T11:00:00.000Z

We're starting a series on Mark at church this term. Here's a Wordle image for the book (ESV, because they're better with making the text available).

Tech Humor for the Tech Challenged

2010-12-30T09:36:00.001Z

I caught a bit of The One Ronnie over Christmas. If I'd seen this bit, I might have kept watching...

HT Thabiti Anyabwile.

Voyage of the Dawn Treader - Review

2010-12-18T08:44:00.001Z

Not mine, I'm afraid, but this one is well thought through...

HT to Christianity Today.

Incest and Homosexuality

2010-12-15T11:05:00.002Z

In an interesting article, Albert Mohler argues that the normal justifications for homosexual relationships apply equally to incest. (Of course, being Albert Mohler, he also shows that the commonly used societal arguments against incest apply equally to homosexuality...)

Classical Music and the Conductor

2010-12-15T08:25:00.003Z

Well worth a watch... Some good thoughts on leadership as well.

HT: Thabiti Anyabwile

Wanting to Feel Important

2010-12-11T10:25:00.002Z

T.S. Eliot wrote, "Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don't mean to do harm, but the harm does not interest them … or they do not see it, or they justify it … because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves."

Although our mission in Christ is to do good in this world, we will actually do harm if our deeper mission is to feel important and "think well of ourselves." Eliot's words forced me to ask, How much harm do I do to my family, my friends, the people I am supposed to lead, all because I want to think well of myself?

from Pastoral Narcissism by JR Kerr

The Student Riots

2010-12-10T12:06:00.004Z

The big news story of the last few days has been the student riots in London, specifically the way they attacked national institutions, including the Cenotaph and the Prince of Wales. Whether the destruction of the Glastonbury Thorn was part of the same thing is an interesting question.

Newspapers, the BBC, and so on condemn the violence, and rightly so. But they miss the point. I think this is the start of something much bigger. This looks to me like the beginning of the end of an era in Britain.

After World War 2, the British people voted for the setting up of a comprehensive welfare state - education, healthcare and so on all free at the point of delivery. It achieved unprecendented social mobility - both my parents were the first in their family to go to university, and there were thousands like them. A generation or so - those born between 1940 and 1970 - got rich on the prosperity this afforded. And now, having built a bridge from poverty to wealth, and crossed over themselves, they are destroying the bridge behind them.

Of course, there is a certain inevitability about all of this. After the ill-judged massive expansion of university education under Labour, especially without maintaining the same standards of attainment or level of work required, it was inevitable that we would be unable to continue to have largely state-funded places at universities. To restrict funding to just those universities and courses where graduates either benefitted society as a whole and/or had to work so hard during their degrees that they did not have time to spend vast amounts of time and money drinking or working would seem elitist. Furthermore, it is clear that graduates earn far more than non-graduates.

But of course the problem is that the proposed changes do not target graduates - it does not target the people who have benefitted from the years of government subsidy. They target those who will do so in the future, and are written by those who have already done so in the past.

I rather suspect that this is the first of the rebellions against the baby boomers - the "richest generation ever". Their parents made the world a place where they could prosper. They prospered, and now they are stopping their children from doing so rather than taking the consequences of their own actions.

Of course, there are plenty of people in that generation who care for and look after their children well - I am blessed to have them as both parents and parents-in-law. And I don't especially blame the current government - Labour would have delayed the conflict for a few years, but the clash would have been even worse when it came. I rather suspect it is that generation as a whole acting in their own corporate interests rather than in the interests of future generations.

And now their children - especially those born after 1990 or so - are angry. They aren't able to buy houses without their parents helping them. They can't afford the insurance on cars. And now they're meant to be starting their adult life £40k in debt because their parents' generation would rather make them pay than stick 1% on the top rate of income tax for those who have already graduated. I really don't think we've heard the last of it.

Edited to add this:

Why is it when we bring children up to value their own rights rather than society that we are surprised when they attack symbols of that society?
Why is it that we anounce a change in pension age, and take a decade to bring it in, but we anounce a change in student tuition fees and bring it in almost immediately?
Why are we surprised when education has been about how important it is to get good grades and get into university, we then add thousands of pounds to the cost of doing so, and students are annoyed?

I'm not saying for one moment that the student riots were right, only that they were understandable and forseeable consequenes of government action since at least 1997.

Yes Minister on Bishops and the C of E...

2010-12-06T14:02:00.000Z

NIV 2011

2010-12-01T10:25:00.003Z

The NIV has changed. The version that seems to be in most healthy churches is no longer supported. They tried doing it a while ago with the TNIV, which made some minor improvements where the NIV was a weak translation, and switched to gender-neutral language where appropriate. It came under a lot of flack for that, though after listening to women who felt excluded by older language, I concluded it was best to use the TNIV for churches if buying a new set of Bibles.

Now the NIV 2010/2011 has come out, and seems to be replacing both the NIV 1984 (the familiar version) and the TNIV. It's already the default search on Bible Gateway... So I thought it would be worth making some general comments and then looking at how it fares with regards to some of my personal favourite difficult passages for translators...

Here's a helpful summary graph from John Dyer who has logged all the changes.

As you can see, 60% of the verses in the Bible are identical NIV 1984 / TNIV / NIV 2011, and Dyer reckons about 91% of the words are identical - the changes affect a very small proportion of the words, and even of the verses that have been changed, most were only a word here or there.

The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood don't like it, but it's interesting how all their objections are to do with how it fits with their theology which is based on existing translations rather than on the Greek / Hebrew. The simple fact is that Greek allowed for gender-neutral language and modern English uses gender-neutral language, but the old NIV (along with the KJV, ESV, RSV, etc) did not.

1 Timothy 2:11-15

A woman [or wife] should learn in quietness and full submission. 12 I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; [or over her husband] she must be quiet. 13 For Adam was formed first, then Eve. 14 And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. 15 But women [she] will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.
NIV 2011 (square brackets for footnotes)

11 A woman [or wife] should learn in quietness and full submission. 12 I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; [teach a man in a domineering way; or teach or to exercise (or have) authority over a man] [or over her husband] she must be quiet. 13 For Adam was formed first, then Eve. 14 And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. 15 But women [she] will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.
TNIV

A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. 12 I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. 13 For Adam was formed first, then Eve. 14 And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. 15 But women [she] will be saved [or restored] through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.
NIV 1984

A genuinely controversial passage this one, with so much about church life hanging on whether the words mean "woman" or "wife" (same in Greek) and "have authority", "domineer" or "assume authority" (very rare word - we're not sure exactly what it means). CBMW think it should stay as the trad reading. I'm pretty sure they're wrong - it is genuinely controversial how to translate the passage, and I think the translation should show that, as both TNIV and NIV 2011 do.

I should probably say though, I prefer the TNIV on this one because it keeps the ambiguity over what the "assume authority" word means. Unless there's been new work on that that I'm unaware of.

Romans 8:5-9

5 Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. 6 The mind of sinful man [or the mind of the flesh] is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace; 7 the sinful mind [or the mind set on the flesh] is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. 8 Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God. 9 You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ.
NIV 1984

5 Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. 6 The mind controlled by the sinful nature [or mind set on the flesh] is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace. 7 The sinful mind [or mind set on the flesh] is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. 8 Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God. 9 You, however, are not controlled by the sinful nature but are in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ.
TNIV

5 Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. 6 The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. 7 The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. 8 Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God. 9 You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ.
NIV 2011

5 For those who are according to the flesh think things of the flesh, but those according to the Spirit [think] the things of the Spirit. 6 For the thought of the flesh is death, but the thought of the Spirit is life and peace. 7 Because the thought of the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not keep the law of God, for it can't. 8 Those who are in the flesh can't please God. 9 But we are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if the Spirit of God dwells in us. If someone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not [Christ's].
John's Clunky Literal Translation

My problem with the NIV 1984 reading is described here. TNIV tackles it a bit, but the NIV 2011 wins hands down for translating it so the problem goes away, though I'm a little uncomfortable with the introduction of "realm" in v9.

Hebrews 2 / Psalm 8

A bit of explanation here. The phrase translated "son of man" is used both as general way of speaking about any person, and also as a specific title for Jesus, because he is the Truly Human One. Psalm 8:4 is an example of using it to talk about people in general, but Hebrews 2 picks it up and uses it to talk about Jesus. Gender neutral translations really struggle with this (except for the NLT which translates Ps 8 differently in Psalms and Hebrews).

what is mankind that you are mindful of them,    human beings that you care for them? [or what is a human being that you are mindful of him, / a son of man that you care for him?]
Psalm 8:4, NIV 2011

It is not to angels that he has subjected the world to come, about which we are speaking. 6 But there is a place where someone has testified:
   “What is mankind that you are mindful of them,
   a son of man that you care for him?
7 You made them a little [or for a little while] lower than the angels;
   you crowned them with glory and honor
8 and put everything under their feet.”
   In putting everything under them, [or him] God left nothing that is not subject to them. [or him] Yet at present we do not see everything subject to them. [or him] 9 But we do see Jesus...
Hebrews 2:6-9, NIV 2011

Not bad. They footnoted the more literal translation in Ps 8, then quoted that in Hebrews 2. They also correctly kept the ambiguity in v8 about whether we see everything subject to man or to Jesus, though they had to use footnotes to do it. Clearly better than the TNIV, but still a bit awkward.

1 Kings 12:10

The young men who had grown up with him replied, "Tell these people who have said to you, 'Your father put a heavy yoke on us, but make our yoke lighter'-tell them, 'My little finger is thicker than my father's waist.'"
NIV 1984, NIV 2011, TNIV

My little one is thicker than my father's loins.
literal

Here's my earlier discussion of the verse. Looks like the Bible translators still don't have the balls to do a decent translation that doesn't conform to people's unhelpful stereotypes of the Church.

Other Verses and Issues

NIV 2011 still ascribes a masculine gender to the Holy Spirit, despite the fact that the pronouns used in the original are masculine, feminine and neuter, depending on the gender of the word used to describe the Spirit.

Galatians 2:17, the NIV 2011 keeps the TNIV's unhelpful addition of the word “Jews”.

NIV 2011 has undone some of the difficulties arising from pluralisation in the TNIV (see Rev 3:20). I personally think that we should just accept that “they” can be a gender-neutral singular pronoun, but my English teacher wife disagrees!

NIV 2011 has also addressed some of the problems with NIV 1984 - that it always translated the same word as "teachings" if it was in a positive sense and "traditions" if it was in a negative sense. There's now some crossover (e.g. 1 Cor 11:2), but it's still not quite fair.

Conclusion

I should say, I don't care whether the translation fits with my theology or not. I want a translation that fits with the original text in a way that makes its meaning clear to speakers of modern English.

The TNIV was already my translation of preference because it is important not to alienate people who speak more modern English unnecessarily. Pretending that “he” is still gender-neutral does that, even though most churchy people are comfortable with slightly more traditional language.

The NIV 2011 seems to be an improvement on the TNIV. It isn't perfect yet, but translations aren't. However it's a very good translation, and it would probably now be my first choice translation for use in a church where the reading age was high enough to cope.

Quirinius and the Census

2010-11-27T20:22:00.002Z

I did a talk today on "Has History Disproved Christmas?" The answer, of course, was "No!" But here are a few of my notes about the census problem.

1 In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. 2 (This was the first census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria.) 3 And everyone went to their own town to register. 4 So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. 5 He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child.
Luke 2:1-5, NIV 2010

Bock identifies five problems people cite when it comes to this passage.

There was no known empire-wide census under Augustus
No Roman census would have required Joseph to go to Bethlehem to register
Israel under Herod wasn't officially part of the Roman Empire until Herod died in 4BC
Josephus wrote that the first Roman census was under Quirinius in AD6, and that caused a revolt
Quirinius wasn't governor of Syria until 10 years after Herod died. Herod died in 4BC, Quirinius became governor of Syria in AD6.

Here are some answers to those problems, adapted from Bock...

1) The Romans liked doing censuses because they liked taxing people. We know there was ongoing census activity across the Roman Empire at the time of Herod.

3) We also know that vassal kings (like Herod) did censuses too when Rome told them to. There's even evidence that Jews under Herod were paying Roman taxes (and hence had been censused).

If there was a census for Roman taxation and at Roman command under Herod, it makes sense that...

2 & 4) If Herod did a census (before 4BC), he might have done it Jewish-style rather than Roman-style. A Jewish-style census could well involve going to ancestral towns, especially if Joseph owned land in Bethlehem as he might well do if descended from David. A Jewish-style census wouldn't have caused riots like the Roman-style one in AD6 and so is less likely to be mentioned by Josephus, who is the only non-Biblical historian describing Palestine in that period.

It's also clear that the census Luke is talking about isn't the one in AD6. For example, a census after 4BC wouldn't have required Joseph to go from Nazareth to Bethlehem - after 4BC they were in different provinces. Luke also knows about the AD6 census - he mentions it and the rebellion in Acts 5:37.

So what about Quirinius? Luke 2:2 reads "This was the first census that took place whilea Quirinius was governor of Syria." But the 2010 NIV has a footnote saying “Or this census took place before...”

The word in question is πρωτος - dictionaries define it as “first, before, greatest”. So it could be talking about the census BEFORE the one where Quirinius was governor of Syria (the one in AD6 which caused all the trouble). We've got the same issue in English with the word "prototype", which is from πρωτος. Is the prototype of a new car before that car, or the first one?

Literally, the verse reads “this was the first census of Quirinius, governor of Syria.” Qurinius may well have been asked to administer the census by Herod, even though he wasn't governor of Syria yet. In the same way, we might say "President George W Bush was a notorious drunkard as a young man", even though he wasn't president when he was a young man.

In conclusion, these verses don't seem to provide good reason to doubt the historicity of Luke's account.

The Apprentice

2010-11-03T13:26:00.004Z

I've got to admit, I do quite enjoy watching The Apprentice. It's amusing in particular how no-one ever suggests that each team should work as a team, and put their success as a team ahead of their individual success. It's a much better strategy than the one most of them adopt. But then I suspect there's more than a grain of truth in Mitchell & Webb's assessment...

Richard Baxter on Science and Religion

2010-11-02T18:36:00.002Z

Richard Baxter might seem like an unusual person to quote on science and religion. As far as I know, the Vicar of Kidderminster didn't have any real connection with science. But he was clearly part of the Puritan movement, and the scientific revolution of the 1600s largely grew out of Puritanism. Baxter wrote his classic book The Reformed Pastor just 4 years before the Royal Society was founded, so it's an interesting reflection of what sort of thing Puritans were saying about science at the time...

I hope you perceive what I aim at in all this, namely that to see God in his creatures, and to love him, and converse with him, was the employment of man in his upright state; that this is so far from ceasing to be our duty, that it is the work of Christ to bring us, by faith, back to it; and therefore the most holy men are the most excellent students of God's works, and none but the holy can rightly study them or know them 'Great are the works of the Lord, sought out of all them that have pleasure therein;' but not for themselves, but for him that made them. Your study of physics and other sciences is not worth a rush, if it be not God that you seek after in them. To see and admire, to reverence and adore, to love and delight in God, as exhibited in his works - this is the true and only philosophy.
p.83

Has Science Disproved God?

2010-10-30T19:14:00.002+01:00

Earlier today, I did a talk called "Has Science Disproved God?" at Apologetics in Manchester. It seemed to be very well received. You can find audio of the talk here, and the handout here.

Richard Baxter - The Reformed Pastor

2010-10-28T18:23:00.003+01:00

I recently finished reading the classic book The Reformed Pastor by the great Puritan Richard Baxter. It's basically a book length plea for clergy to work hard rather than slacking off, and to devote their time especially to visiting for the purposes of evangelism and discipleship, specifically by teaching the catechism (and Baxter didn't really mind which catechism...)

It's the kind of book that ought to be a must-read for clergy, and I can well see why it was so heavily recommended at college. But last time I mentioned it in a gathering of clergy, no-one there had read it. Here's a sample quote:

For my part, I study to speak as plainly and movingly as I can, (and next to my study to speak truly, these are my chief studies,) and yet I frequently meet with those who have been my hearers eight or ten years, who know not whether Christ be God or man, and wonder when I tell them the history of his birth and life and death, as if they had never heard it before... I have found by experience, that some ignorant persons, who have been so long unprofitable hearers, have got more knowledge and remorse of conscience in half an hour's close discourse than they did from ten years' public preaching.
p.196

Looking at the UK

2010-10-26T18:13:00.001+01:00

There's a really interesting report here on the UK - always interesting to see our culture from an outside point of view.

In quick summary, the UK is one of the nicest places in the world to live, but if you went by what people think of it, you'd think it was one of the worst. For example, we're ranked 101st out of 110 countries for financial confidence and 40th for feeling safe walking home alone at night (though we're actually 23rd).

Meekness

2010-10-26T10:47:00.003+01:00

Then let me go further: the man who is meek is not even sensitive about himself. He is not always watching himself and his own interests. He is not always on the defensive. We all know about this, do we not? Is it not one of the greatest curses in life as a result of the fall - this sensitivity about self? We spend the whole of our lives watching ourselves.

But when a man becomes meek he has finished with all that; he no longer worries about himself and what other people say. To be truly meek means we no longer protect ourselves, because we see there is nothing worth defending. So we are not on the defensive; all that is gone.

The man who is truly meek never pities himself, he is never sorry for himself. He never talks to himself and says, "You are having a hard time, how unkind these people are not to understand you." He never thinks "How wonderful I really am, if only other people gave me a chance." Self-pity! What hours and years we waste in this!

But the man who has become meek has finished with all that. To be meek, in other words, means that you have finished with yourself altogether, and you come to see you have no rights or deserts at all. You come to realise that nobody can harm you. John Bunyan puts it perfectly. "He that is down need fear no fall."

When a man truly sees himself, he knows nobody can say anything about him that is too bad. You need not worry about what men say or do; you know you deserve it all and more. Once again, therefore, I would define meekness like this. The man who is truly meek is the one who is amazed that God and man can think of him as well as they do and treat him as well as they do. That, it seems to me, is its essential quality.

D Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Studies in the Sermon on the Mount Vol 1, p57-58
Quoted in The Briefing, July-August 2008

I think Lloyd-Jones is spot on in some ways. He is right in terms of what meekness looks like. But I think his definition fails when it comes to look at Jesus - Jesus surely sees rightly and therefore knows that he does deserve all honour and glory.

And of course I am a sinner and deserve nothing more than God's righteous indignation against me, but if I also recognise that everyone else is a sinner as well, it should surprise me less if I do some things better than some other sinners, just as they do some things better than me.

It seems that the essence of meekness is more than just recognition of our sinfulness - it is also choosing to lay down any claims to status that we might have which are based on ourselves. And the helpful and challenging stuff that DMLJ writes then follow...

The De-Churched and God's Judgement

2010-10-18T21:11:00.004+01:00

Here's a graph I find absolutely terrifying. It shows church attendance stats for the UK (I think it's for 2005).

On the horizontal axis is a breakdown on the population by age. And on the vertical axis is the proportion of the population as a whole. The three colours on the chat represent those who are currently regular attenders at church (at least once a month), those who used to attend church but no longer do so and those who never attended church.

Roughly 60% of the population have never attended church. Roughly 30% of the population used to attend church but now no longer do so.

What terrifies me is what this means for those who have been leading the church over the past few generations. God entrusted the care of his people to them, and they presided over the decline of the church so severely that nearly 75% of those who are now 85-year-olds were once part of a church, but only 15% or so of children currently are. Roughly 80% of living Brits who have been part of a church are no longer part of the church.

42The Lord answered, "Who then is the faithful and wise manager, whom the master puts in charge of his servants to give them their food allowance at the proper time? 43It will be good for that servant whom the master finds doing so when he returns. 44I tell you the truth, he will put him in charge of all his possessions. 45But suppose the servant says to himself, 'My master is taking a long time in coming,' and he then begins to beat the menservants and maidservants and to eat and drink and get drunk. 46The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not aware of. He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the unbelievers. 47"That servant who knows his master's will and does not get ready or does not do what his master wants will be beaten with many blows. 48But the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.
Luke 12:42-48, NIV

I can hear in my head the sort of conversation God will have with people who were ministers during that time. When God tells them of the privilege it was to be made a steward over his household and family, and asks them what they did with it. When they try to make their pathetic excuses for how they did their job so poorly that 5 out of every 6 people in their churches left and the church went from being seen as the foundation of society to being a boring irrelevance in just two generations.

And the church leaders today who carry on the trend - who don't see that their job is about bringing people to know Jesus - it is about saving lives rather than making sure the few already in the lifeboat have more comfortable cushions as they watch the rest of the world drown. Is their lot going to be any better?

God's judgement and wrath against the vast majority of British church leaders over the last few generations is going to be terrible. And that scares me, because God has called me to follow after them, and I am beginning to see something of what an awesome responsibility it is...

Extraordinary Interview with Russell Brand

2010-10-13T15:49:00.005+01:00

It isn't often your opinion of someone changes totally over a very short space of time. I just watched an absolutely extraordinary conversation between Jeremy Paxman and Russell Brand. Well worth watching - here are a few snippets.

No-one cares about religion any more... because we've been fed this grey sludge of celebrity glittered up and packaged and lacquered and sent directly into our brains by the media.

If you are pursuing [celebrity] for its own end, that's absolutely ridiculous.

[Paxman]Do you ever worry you're going to burn out?
[Brand] Well, I'm going to die, so yes.

Growing up, I wanted to be famous and now I am famous, and what does it mean? Ashes in my mouth...

Hat Tip to Marcus at Digital H20.

J.S. Bach - the point of music

2010-10-11T10:47:00.003+01:00

The aim and final end of all music should be none other than the glory of God and the refreshment of the soul. If heed is not paid to this, it is not true music but a diabolical bawling and twanging.
J. S. Bach (1685-1750), Glory and Honor: the musical and artistic legacy of Johann Sebastian Bach, Gregory Wilbur & David Vaughan, Cumberland House Publishing, 2005, p. 1

What Bach says of music goes for pretty much everything else too! And yes, there can still be good in music not written by Christians, because we still retain a remnant of the image of God, but in terms of anchoring and purpose, it's totally adrift.

HT CQOD

Spurgeon - Lectures to My Students - Quotes on Preaching

2010-10-06T11:58:00.004+01:00

Here are some more excellent quotes from Spurgeon's Lectures to My Students, this time on the subject of preachers and preaching, but also including evangelism and apologetics...

Painfully do I call to mind hearing one Sabbath evening a deliverance called a sermon, of which the theme was a clever enquiry as to whether an angel did actually descend, and stir the pool at Bethesda, or whether it was an intermitting spring, concerning which Jewish superstition had invented a legend. Dying men and women were assembled to hear the way of salvation, and they were put off with such vanity as this! They came for bread, and received a stone ; the sheep looked up to the shepherd, and were not fed.
p.79

Some ministers need to be told that they are of the same species as their hearers.
p.183

But if you are drawn into controversy, use very hard arguments and very soft words.
p.188

Is religion to be tabooed the best and noblest of all themes forbidden? If this be the rule of any society, we will not comply with it. If we cannot break it down, we will leave the society to itself, as men desert a house smitten with leprosy. We cannot consent to be gagged. There is no reason why we should be. We will go to no place where we cannot take our Master with us.
p.189

It is to be hoped that we shall never, in our ordinary talk, any more than in the pulpit, be looked upon as nice sort of persons, whose business it is to make things agreeable all round, and who never by any possibility cause uneasiness to any one, however ungodly their lives may be.
p.189

Jim Collins, Good Leadership and the Gospel

2010-10-04T16:44:00.004+01:00

The gospel should make us better leaders.

The other day, I heard a talk by leadership guru Jim Collins, at the GLS. Jim Collins isn't a Christian as far as I know, but quite a bit of what he said ties in rather strongly to the Gospel.

For example, the first stage he identified in "how the mighty fall" was hubris born of success - failing to recognise that success isn't all our own doing. He even suggested that one of the best exercises for leaders of successful organisations to do was to "count their blessings" - to write out a list of good things that have happened to them or that they have that they haven't earned. It seems that understanding something of grace and having something resembling a healthy gratitude is key to being a great leader.

Another key feature that Collins identified was the importance of listening to feedback that is critical of you, especially when you are succeeding rather than having your sense of self invested in your achievements.

Or take the Stockdale Paradox. General Stockdale survived being a prisoner in the "Hanoi Hilton" POW camp because he never gave up believing that he would be let out. But at the same time, the optimists in the camp did not survive, because they kept saying things like "we'll be out by Christmas", and could not cope with the repeated disappointment. What is needed, said Collins, was both faith in the eventual outcome, but also willingness to face up to the brutal facts of the present. And isn't that exactly the Christian attitude to faith in a God whose victory will become clear in the end but often isn't in the present.

Yet another example. Collins said "the enduring greats are driven by a passion beyond money and value", and emphasised the need to be non-negotiable on core values, but very flexible when it came to aiming to achieve our objectives. Once again, it's Biblical.

And all of this got me wondering two things.

1) If the gospel implies great leadership, why is the quality of Christian leadership so often lower than great?

2) How do non-Christian great leaders manage it? My boss wisely suggested that they substitute some other aim for the gospel, effectively becoming idolaters and slaves of an ideal. But I'd much rather serve the real thing!

Stephen Hawking

2010-09-29T06:55:00.001+01:00

from the excellent xkcd:

Spurgeon - Lectures to My Students - Quotes on Prayer and Many Words

2010-09-28T15:10:00.003+01:00

I recently finished reading one of the absolute classic books on ministry - C.H. Spurgeon's Lectures to My Students. Of all the books I've read on ministry, it is one of the very best and certainly one of the funniest! It's also just about the only book I've read on sermon preparation which gives about the right amount of weight to the importance of prayer... It's so good, in fact, that I may well do a mini-series of quotes from it!

Here are some on prayer and the dangers of too many words.

slovenly, careless, lifeless talk in the guise of prayer, made to fill up a certain space in the service, is a weariness to man, and an abomination to God. Had free prayer been universally of a higher order a liturgy would never have been thought of, and to-day forms of prayer have 110 better apology than the feebleness of extemporaneous devotions.
p55

Fine prayers are generally very wicked prayers. In the presence of the Lord of hosts it ill becomes a sinner to parade the feathers and finery of tawdry speech with the view of winning applause from his fellow mortals.
p56

Never fall into a vainglorious style of impertinent address to God; he is not to be assailed as an antagonist, but entreated with as our Lord and God.
p58

Verbiage is too often the fig-leaf which does duty as a covering for theological ignorance.
p74

The art of saying commonplace things elegantly, pompously, grandiloquently, bombastically, is not lost among us, although its utter extinction were "a consummation devoutly to be wished."
p77

Praying is the best studying.
p90

My brethren, it is a hideous gift to possess, to be able to say nothing at extreme length.
p165

The Hurt Locker

2010-09-21T18:02:00.005+01:00

I missed this one when it was at the cinema, but I aim to watch all the films that won the "Best Picture" Oscar.

It starts with the quote

"The rush of battle is often a potent and lethal addiction, for war is a drug."

And the whole film is basically an illustration of that.

It follows the story of a bomb-disposal team in Iraq towards the end of their time there, with all sorts of hard-hitting encounters between them and Iraqis.

I wouldn't say it was a pleasant film, or a nice film to watch. It isn't something I'd especially like to watch on an evening in front of the TV. But it's a really good film, and a thought-provoking one.

Sex and the Pope

2010-09-20T07:13:00.004+01:00

There's a really interesting article by Peter Hitchens here about people's response to the Pope's visit. It's well worth a read - here's the section that struck me most...

The special condemnation reserved for the Romish church also suggests, absurdly, that such horrors never took place, or were covered up by, liberal secular institutions. They did, and have been. Yet this is never advanced as an argument against the secular liberal state (and it would be a bad argument, if it were).

The sex scandal is not, as it happens, the real reason for the anger directed against the Bishop of Rome. If it were, then the undoubted case against the Roman Catholic hierarchy could be made without all the puce-faced exaggerations, straightforward lies and total lack of proportion which infect it. It is overblown precisely because it is not the true issue, but a pretext.

This is what it is really about: the sons and daughters of the sexual revolution, the inheritors of 1968, are actively infuriated by anyone who dares to suggest that their behaviour in their personal lives might be, or might ever have been, selfish and absolutely wrong

Give Me Only My Daily Bread

2010-09-15T14:02:00.003+01:00

How would you feel if you got a pay rise? My guess is that you'd feel pretty happy, because pay rises are one of those things that people just like. Surely the only way that anyone could be sad at getting a pay rise is if they were expecting an even bigger rise!

But that's actually a reflection of the culture we live in – a culture that just accepts and assumes that money is good. So in the financial news, we read things like “Richard Branson is worth £3 billion”, as if the amount of money that people have in some way reflects how much they are actually worth. And even though Christians don't always go that far, we've still been far too influenced by the culture around us, and not influenced enough by the Bible. And that goes for me too.

So when we read words like Agur's prayer in Proverbs 30, it comes as a counter-cultural breath of fresh air.

Two things I ask of you, O LORD;
do not refuse me before I die:
Keep falsehood and lies far from me;
give me neither poverty nor riches,
but give me only my daily bread.
Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you
and say, 'Who is the LORD ?'
Or I may become poor and steal,
and so dishonour the name of my God.
Proverbs 30:7-9, NIV

Agur prays: “Give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread.”

There are two things we can learn from this short prayer.

Firstly, poverty and riches are both dangerous.

It's worth being clear on what we mean by poverty and riches here, because people mean different things by the word “poverty”. What Agur means is being so poor that he is tempted to steal so that he and his family have enough to eat.

That sort of poverty is dangerous, says Agur, because he'll be tempted to steal, and that would dishonour God. And generally, I think the church has understood that one. We want to help people who are that poor, and we see that it's a good thing to pray that we wouldn't be that poor.

So what about being rich? Agur uses “rich” to mean “having enough money that we don't have to consciously depend on God for what we need to survive”. Now by that definition, I guess almost all of us are rich. I know I am. I've got enough money and skills and I'm in a rich enough country that realistically I don't need to worry about where my food is coming from.

But that need to depend on God was built into the very way the Promised Land worked. Here's Moses speaking just before Israel enters the Promised Land in Deuteronomy 11.

The land you are entering to take over is not like the land of Egypt, from which you have come, where you planted your seed and irrigated it by foot as in a vegetable garden. But the land you are crossing the Jordan to take possession of is a land of mountains and valleys that drinks rain from heaven. It is a land the LORD your God cares for; the eyes of the LORD your God are continually on it from the beginning of the year to its end.
Deuteronomy 11:10-12, NIV

Egypt is a flat desert country with a big river going through it. So to grow plants, you need to dig ditches for the water to get through. To stay alive, you work and trust yourself, and if you work harder, you can get rich. But Israel wasn't like that – it was lots of hills and little streams, so you needed to trust God for the rain. Hard work didn't mean as much, and it was harder to get rich. What mattered most was trusting God. Being part of God's people was tied up with leaving Egypt, the land where you worked for your food, and living in Israel, the land where you trusted God to bring the rain.

But if you're rich, says Agur, you can start feeling like you don't need to trust God. You can even say “Who is the LORD?” which is what the King of Egypt says when he won't let Israel go. He thinks you get where you are by hard work, and he's rich so he doesn't trust God and doesn't even recognise him. That's the danger of wealth – that we stop trusting God.

Why is it that in general, the richer a country is, the less we see God moving and the less of his power we see at work in the church? Why is it that the churches in Britain where God seems to be doing the most are full of students or immigrants, neither of whom have any money? Isn't it because by and large, we are rich, so we've stopped trusting God? We don't see the danger of wealth, so we fall for the trap.

Everything else in life, we see that you can have too much as well as too little. We know that too little food is bad for you, and too much food is bad for you as well. We know that too little exercise is bad for you, and too much exercise is bad as well. Well, too little money is bad for you, and too much money is bad for you as well.

We aren't jealous of people who've had too much food, are we? And we aren't jealous of people who have had too much exercise. So why should we be jealous of people who have too much money? Shouldn't we be sorry for them because they will find it harder to trust God?

What about those who can't help being rich? Well, here's Paul writing to Timothy.

Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share. In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life.
1 Timothy 6:17-19, NIV

Those of us who are rich should remember and take care not to be arrogant, and not to trust in money, but to trust God who gives us everything we have. If we are rich in this age, says Paul, well are we rich in good deeds and generosity? And will we be rich in the age to come?

Those of us who are rich now need to be very careful that we invest in the kingdom of God – in the age to come – so that we can take hold of the life that is truly life. Because otherwise we're going to be the poor ones. We need to remember that our wealth is just something that is going to pass away, so we need to use it wisely and well now.

You know, people have done a lot of research about whether money makes you happy. And what they have found wouldn't have come as much surprise to Agur. They found that when people are very poor, the more money they have, the happier they are. But once people have enough money to survive, having more money doesn't make them any happier. Too much money is dangerous, and it doesn't make you happy.

And as Christians we know that true satisfaction doesn't come from money – it comes from knowing Jesus and being known by Jesus, from loving God and knowing that we are loved and accepted by God.

We all know that the happiest people we know aren't the richest, so why do we still so often aim for money?

But if money is dangerous, what should we aim for? This brings us on to the second point we can learn from Agur. Godliness is more precious than gold.

Look at v9. What does Agur actually want? What does he actually pray for? He prays that he won't have too little money, because then he'll dishonour God. And he prays that he won't have too much money, because then he'll forget God. What Agur really wants is to love God more, and to value God, and to trust God.

Agur wants godliness, because he knows that godliness is more valuable than gold. So we should aim for godliness too, the way that a lot of society today aims for money. We should aim for what will help us be closer to God, and what will help us love God more.

Aim to have enough money that you don't have to steal, but not so much that you'll trust your bank account rather than your God, and if too much money is a problem for you, then give the rest away.

Don't go for the job that pays the best; go for the job that will help you be the most godly. Don't go for the more comfortable house, go for the house that will enable you to use it the most for God's kingdom, because godliness is more valuable than gold.

And what does it mean for our prayer lives? What can we learn from Agur's masterclass in prayer?

Well, what do we pray for? Do we pray that our friends and family will get good jobs, or do we pray they will get jobs that help them to be godly, even if that means they'll be struggling financially?

Do we pray that we would be comfortable, or that we would be holy? When people are in pain, do we pray that they would be free from pain or that they would learn to trust God more through their pain? Don't get me wrong, it's important to pray for healing, but it's far more important to pray for godliness.

We pray for the poor, and for poor Christians, who struggle to survive. Do we pray for rich Christians who will struggle to keep on trusting God?

Are we willing to pray “Lord, please don't give me a pay rise if having more money will stop me trusting in you?”

Are we brave enough to pray, as Agur did, “Give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread.”

Folk Religion

2010-09-13T15:40:00.002+01:00

Round where I live, there's a pretty strong belief in a folk religion. The beliefs go something like this:

Everyone, well, except maybe the really bad people, goes to heaven when they die.
Heaven is probably disembodied
The main attraction of heaven is meeting up with everyone we know and love
In the meantime, those who have died are “looking down on us”.
This is “Christianity”
Celebrations in Christianity are having a christening for babies, a church wedding (optional), and a Christian funeral, as well as turning up to stuff at Christmas and occasionally Easter. After all, that's what you learn about in RE. There might be more beliefs about Jesus and stuff, but they don't really matter and all boil down to this.
Anything more is optional, and is nice for those who need it as a support or to help kids learn about stuff.

Every single one of those beliefs is, of course, wrong.

It's also peculiarly resilient as a system of belief. In large parts of England, people question it and reject it. Those are the parts I've been better trained to reach. But here, by and large, it remains unquestioned by most people. But it's resilient because people won't change their ideas unless they're explicitly contradicted and argued and shown the truth. Merely preaching about the importance of stopping to think doesn't help when they just stop to think the same wrong things over again.

But contradicting some of those facts makes only a tiny amount of difference - I mean, what good would it do them if they change their minds to think of heaven as resurrected rather than disembodied, but still hold onto their universalism and the highlight of heaven being other people?

Other facts are ones that the church often acts embarrassed about – the fact that the Bible clearly teaches that some people (and not just the really bad ones) are going to hell, for example. And that's almost certainly inappropriate for talking about at a baptism or funeral which are the only occasions these people come to church.

Which means it's back to preaching the importance of responding to God...

Burning the Qur'an?

2010-09-10T17:53:00.007+01:00

There's a big row about some American nutter who decided to burn a Qur'an and then decided not to, but lots of Muslims rioted anyway.

And there's something about the whole story that I just don't get. It's obviously big enough for world leaders to intervene...

Most of the Muslims I know and have known have been reasonably intelligent, socially moderately normal people. There were a few oddballs, but I know plenty of non-Muslim oddballs as well. Most people in poor countries I know and have known have also moderately normal.

So is there something about Muslims in Afghanistan that means they stop maturing at about the emotional maturity of a stroppy teenager?

Or is it a normal, mature and sensible human reaction to riot and kill people because some silly chap on the other side of the world bought a Qur'an with his own money and then set fire to it? And let's be honest, he didn't set fire to it, and the one he would have set fire to was probably only an "interpretation" of the Qur'an (i.e. translation), which the Muslims don't even think is holy.

I'm a committed Christian, and have a very high view of the Bible. And to be honest, if someone down the road bought a Bible and set fire to it, or used it as loo roll, I don't especially mind - they can do that if they want to. I might like to have a chat with them about why they felt that way, but they're free to do it.

I am fully aware that people blaspheme God, and say all kinds of nasty things about him, and disrespect him in all kinds of different ways. Now I disagree with them, but I figure that God is big enough to deal with that himself.

So what is going on? Is there a new thought police in town? Do Afghan Muslims have an emotional age of 13? Is the God they believe in too small to look after himself? Or is the media whipping up a storm in a teacup to sell copies?

I don't know, but there's something odd going on...

All the Old Gods

2010-09-06T09:04:00.006+01:00

All the old gods haven't gone away - they've just changed their names a bit.

There's a line which I hear quite a bit when we talk about idolatry - something like this. "In the old days, idolatry was much more obvious because you'd worship Thor or Jupiter or someone. But now it's harder because it's much more subtle."

I've been thinking about that a bit over the last few days, and I disagree.

In Roman times, for example, you'd worship Bacchus, god of wine in two ways. One was going to the temple of Bacchus, and the other was partying and eating lots of food and drinking lots of wine and getting drunk. Except often what you did when you visited the temple of Bacchus was parting and drinking.

Or you'd worship Venus, goddess of sex, in two ways. One was going to the temple of Venus. And the other was ritualised pursuit of sex for its own sake. And sure enough, at the temple of Venus there were loads of ritual prostitutes who "helped" people seek sex.

I think we do exactly the same today, except without naming the gods. We still worship Bacchus, and Venus, and others.

Plato's Academy, in many ways the prototype for the university, was built around a temple to Athena, goddess of wisdom (known to the Romans as Minerva). And in the same way, a lot of people at universities today still worship her.

We worship the old gods whenever we pursue sex, drunkenness, wisdom, knowledge, sporting prowess, fitness, anything, for its own sake or for its own enjoyment rather than for God's sake. As St. Augustine wrote:

He loves Thee too little who loves anything together with Thee, which he loves not for Thy sake.

And one of the great things about Roman religion was that it wasn't fussy or exclusivist. It was perfectly happy with people worshipping Bacchus one evening and Venus another, then taking a trip to the temple of Athena. They weren't fussy about what the gods were called, and were happy to identify them with foreign equivalents. They were fine with people worshipping whatever and whoever they wanted, as long as they let them get on with their own business and devotion to their own gods.

And where other cultures were happy to go along with that, Rome just tended to assimilate them because of its greater cultural output and power.

Where the problems came for Christians was that God claimed exclusive allegiance. Christians could not just go to the temple of Venus for a quick fix of casual sex and then go home as normal. They couldn't burn incense to the emperor when they started claiming their place in the pantheon. And they said that other people should abandon their worship of all the old gods, which was seen as far too exclusive.

Sound familiar?

God, Stephen Hawking and the BBC

2010-09-03T08:59:00.008+01:00

The currently most-read article on the BBC website has this headline "Stephen Hawking: God did not create Universe". As a Christian who has studied a fair bit of physics, I'm going to discuss that. Quick summary of my conclusions: Hawking has got it a bit wrong, but the media are over-sensationalising it as usual. And in the process, they are providing a massive amount of free advertising for Hawking's new book.

It's worth pointing out that I haven't read Hawking's article, because it's behind the Times' paywall, or Hawking's book, because it hasn't been published yet. But at this stage of his career, Hawking is far more a populariser of ideas than an original thinker, so I've got a pretty good idea where he is coming from on this...

The BBC quotes Hawking as writing:

Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing.

Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist.

It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going.

Science and Religion

It's worth explaining a few things from these quotes. Firstly, Hawking's philosophy of how God acts in the universe. Hawking seems to have a kind of "God of the gaps" idea going on here - he only sees it as "necessary to invoke God" when there is no other explanation for something.

Of course, Hawking isn't stupid enough to go down the classic God of the Gaps line. He'd probably draw a distinction between when it is "necessary to invoke God" - i.e. when there is no other explanation for something, and when it is possible to invoke God - i.e. when there is an explanation for something that includes the possibility that God is behind it. The Christian answer - that science describes the way that God chooses to run the world - would be treated as when it is possible to invoke God rather than when it is necessary to do so.

Hawking is still wrong though. Rowan Williams is better (quoted on the front of the Times Online today):

Belief in God is not about plugging a gap in explaining how one thing relates to another within the Universe. It is the belief that there is an intelligent, living agent on whose activity everything ultimately depends for its existence.

In other words, Rowan Williams (correctly IMO) asserts that God's existence and action is necessary for science to keep working at all. God and Science aren't competing explanations for the same phenomenon.

Of course, the journalists seem to have even less understanding of this, and think that because Hawking says it isn't necessary to invoke God, he's denying God was involved at all. That's partly because it sells more papers or gets more people looking at the website, and partly because they don't have sufficient understanding of the topic to report accurately on it.

Creation and Quantum Fluctuations

The other thing that is worth explaining is what it means for Hawking to write that "Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing."

In quantum physics, things do sometimes just appear out of nowhere, and then vanish again. But when they do, the total amount of energy involved multiplied by the time they last for has to be less than about 10^-34 Js. So an electron / positron pair, for example, could only last about 10^-21s - one thousand billion billionth of a second. And something bigger would last even less long. So we don't see them very often and they don't usually make much difference to the universe on a big scale.

But that is the only known way of getting something out of nothing. So if the universe wasn't created - it just happened - that's the only known way for it to happen. The problem with that of course is that the universe has lasted quite a while - roughly 14 billion years. Therefore, in order for this theory to work, it needs to have almost exactly zero total energy.

The only known way of having a sufficiently large amount of "negative energy" is through gravity. Imagine that there is a lump of rock a very long way from the Sun, and it isn't moving. Now imagine that it falls towards the Sun, and in doing so it speeds up. It has clearly gained kinetic energy because it is moving. At a year 7 level, we'd say it has converted Gravitational Potential Energy (GPE) to Kinetic Energy (KE). But at the start, its total energy was zero, and at the end its KE is positive, therefore its GPE must be negative.

It's often asserted in astrophysics circles that Black Holes have zero total energy, because all the negative GPE cancels out the positive energy from their mass. And therefore it is possible to get something out of nothing if the something is a black hole because it has zero total energy. On the other hand, I've done a masters course in astrophysics, and I've never once seen that calculation done, or even referenced. Personally, I don't believe it, and I believe it even less when it comes to saying the universe as a whole has zero total energy, but am happy to change my mind if given a good reference that doesn't just assert it.

If it was true, it should mean that you get black holes popping into existence and staying there quite often, and we don't see that happening.

But the idea here is that many cosmologists think that that is what happened with the universe - it popped into existence as a kind of unstable black hole with zero total energy that then exploded. And that's what Hawking means by saying that gravity allows the creation of something from nothing.

(Images from NASA)

Remaking a Broken World - Chris Ash

2010-08-23T12:40:00.003+01:00

One of the things that winds me up about Bible overviews is that they always seem to take the same point of view, usually based on Graeme Goldsworthy's People / Place / Presence idea. It's a good way to do a Bible overview, but it only gives one perspective and there's so much more to see! Chris Ash here chooses a different point of view - the point of view of scattering and gathering.

I'd strongly recommend the book to anyone who has done a Bible overview from the Goldsworthy point of view (or read its best write-up in God's Big Picture by Vaughan Roberts) and wants something a bit different. From my point of view as a Bible teacher, the first two thirds was good but not much new except for his wonderful treatment of Babel. The last third or so of the book, where he gets on to talking about the Church, was spectacular.

The thesis of this chapter, indeed the theme of the book, is precisely this: the ordinary local church with all its imperfections, weaknesses, oddities and problems, has within in the seeds, the spiritual and relational genetic blueprint, of a broken world remade.
p.138

When I walk in Jesus' footsteps and become 'like a child' I will willingly receive 'a child' into my group. Only when my self-perception is that I am a despised nobody will I welcome other despised nobodies into my fellowship. Only when I am deeply humbled will my door be open to the lost, the struggling and the desperate.

If we do not receive nobodies, we do not receive Jesus Christ. That is why putting up barriers of pride is so serious. That is why it would be better to have a quick and early death by drowning than to do something like that. That is why it is so desperately important that a church be a church of 'children', a church in which status is zero and agreed to be zero and proclaimed to be zero.
p.150

Iron Sharpens Iron - Orlando Saer

2010-08-10T11:39:00.006+01:00

This is by far the best book I have ever read on how to lead a small group for Bible study and prayer. If I was training Bible study leaders, I'd seriously think about using it as a curriculum. When I'm next in charge of homegroups, I may well buy every leader a copy and ask them to read it.

Having been a homegroup leader for many years, and been in homegroups or Bible Study Groups in many different churches and CUs, there's nothing especially new or revolutionary in it, but it's an excellent compendium of best practice and training.

I bought it because of the number of recommendations I'd seen from people much more knowledgeable and experienced in this area than me. The recommendations were, of course, right.

The Importance of Prayer

2010-08-09T16:21:00.004+01:00

I'm being really challenged at the moment about the importance of prayer. Just this morning, I was reminded from Ephesians 2 that by nature we are dead and objects of wrath. What hope therefore can there be for us to act in our own strength? What hope can there be that people will respond to preaching or to evangelism unless the Holy Spirit of God moves them. And if he moves us, how can we resist?

It is frequently a disappointment to me that so few books on preaching speak much about prayer. A great exception, of course is Spurgeon's Lectures to my Students.

If you can dip your pens into your hearts, appealing in earnestness to the Lord, you will write well ; and if you can gather your matter on your knees at the gate of heaven, you will not fail to speak well. Prayer, as a mental exercise, will bring many subjects before the mind, and so help in the selection of a topic, while as a high spiritual engage ment it will cleanse your inner eye that you may see truth in the light of God. Texts will often refuse to reveal their treasures till you open them with the key of prayer.

...

The minister who does not earnestly pray over his work must surely be a vain and conceited man. He acts as if he thought him self sufficient of himself, and therefore needed not to appeal to God. Yet what a baseless pride to conceive that our preaching can ever be in itself so powerful that it can turn men from their sins, and bring them to God without the working of the Holy Ghost. If we are truly humble-minded we shall not venture down to the fight until the Lord of Hosts has clothed us with all power, and said to us, " Go in this thy might." The preacher who neglects to pray much must be very careless about his ministry. He cannot have comprehended his calling. He cannot have computed the value of a soul, or estimated the meaning of eternity.

...

How much of blessing we may have missed through remissness in supplication we can scarcely guess, and none of us can know how poor we are in comparison with what we might have been if we had lived habitually nearer to God in prayer.

C.H. Spurgeon, Lectures to My Students, chapter 3

Brian McLaren and the Kingdom of God

2010-08-08T16:13:00.001+01:00

When Jesus began his preaching, his message was this: “The Kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news.” (Mark 1:15). And in the last few years, at least three groups within the Church have really taken on board this idea. I'm part of two of those groups (conservative evangelicals and charismatics), and I've got friends and colleagues who are very sympathetic to the other one (Brian McLaren and the Emergent Village). I've heard both very good and very bad things about McLaren, so I thought it worth getting to grips with him and his message. Following the recommendation of a friend who likes McLaren, I've read his book “The Secret Message of Jesus” as a way in (Thomas Nelson, 2006). What follows is therefore part book review, and part essay on the significance of the phrase “Kingdom of God”.

McLaren is quite open about the fact he is reacting against those who proclaim Jesus as their personal Saviour, but where Jesus doesn't make a difference to their lives – those who see Jesus as their Saviour, but not their Lord, and also against those who use the Bible as a way to condemn others' morals and so on. Of course, the danger with reactionary theologies is that they over-react and ditch the baby with the bathwater. And such seems to be the case here.

He sees the central teaching of Jesus as the proclamation of the Kingdom of God, and the central feature of the kingdom of God being our horizontal relationships with each other as part of God's new community. And his vision of this new community (largely around the Sermon on the Mount) is at times well-explained and moving, but fundamentally lacking. For example, here he summarises the purpose of Communion:

a kind of regular recommitment where people say, by gathering around a table and sharing in bread and wine, that they are continuing Jesus' tradition of gathering in an inclusive community. (p.166)

My alarm bells started ringing in the introduction. McLaren writes: “For example, you may wish that I had said more on particular dimensions of Jesus' message or life which are of special importance to you.” (p.xvii) Then there's an endnote, which when I chased it up told me that Jesus' death was considered as one of the “dimensions that might be of special importance to some readers”!

That's not to say that McLaren ignores Jesus' death. He does however take a thoroughly Girardian take on it, though not as well worked through as Girard himself. (Girard argues that Jesus in his death takes the violence of the mob on himself and so exposes the roots of human violence and scapegoating, in doing so opening the way for a new kind of society. I think he's right, but his approach can only be one facet of the truth.) McLaren, however, is more scathing about particularly Penal Substitution.

When we think of the language of Jesus' secret message, we realise quickly that for many people these days, to mix a political term like kingdom with a religious term like God sounds... scary, even terrorizing. We can't help but think of the dangerous religious-political cocktails of crusade and jihad, colonialism and terrorism, inquisition and fatwa – manifested in oxymoronic terms like holy war and redemptive violence. (p.149)

What's “redemptive violence” doing in that paragraph? Isn't it a kind of “guilt by association? And what would someone who wrote that think of Hell?

But all of that is side issue. For me, the central weakness of McLaren's work is that he misses the main point of the Kingdom of God. The main point of the Kingdom of God is God's King. “Christ” is a royal title – it's used of God's anointed kings in the Old Testament (e.g. 1 Sam 24:6). The proclamation of the Kingdom of God is picked up by the apostles precisely because it is the proclamation of Jesus as Lord and Christ. McLaren is at his absolute weakest in chapter 9, when he discusses how the apostles carried on Jesus' teaching. He picks up on the few references to the “kingdom of God” without looking at what the apostles actually preached, which was much closer to the fact that Jesus Christ is Lord, which McLaren seems to totally ignore.

McLaren's kingdom, good though some of the descriptions are, and helpful though his exhortations to follow the ways of the kingdom are, is ultimately a kingdom without a king. This is particularly striking in chapter 16, where he argues that Jesus wouldn't have used Kingdom language at all today, and discusses what else he'd have called it. His suggestions (the dream of God, the revolution of God, the mission of God, the party of God, the network of God, the dance of God) are all notable because they aren't anywhere as hierarchical as the kingdom language that Jesus used. It is the Kingdom precisely because Jesus is the King.

For McLaren, Jesus seems reduced to being the potentially divine revealer of a better way who then disappears from the picture as all are welcomed into the inclusivistic dance - rather than the enthroned King of the Universe, who we are invited to know for ourselves. And of course that knowledge should be one that makes us into a new community and that follows him as Lord, but that is what the Church has always preached, and there's no reason to ditch it.

Spurgeon - a New Biography by Arnold Dallimore

2010-07-27T11:45:00.005+01:00

I started reading this book as part of Tim Challies' Reading Classics Together. That looks like a good idea for reading difficult stuff together, but 2 chapters a week is too slow a pace for a book I enjoy reading, as I did this one, so I finished it way ahead of schedule. Still, thanks to Tim Challies for suggesting it.

As a source on information about Spurgeon, it's pretty good. I'd heard of him, of course, but not realised quite how much God used him, and if this biography was aimed to make readers more fans of Spurgeon and wanting to read more of his work, in my case it certainly succeeded.

It was a great read, but I don't think it worked as a biography for several reasons. One was that I think by the end of the book we got to know Spurgeon as fans, but not as people who knew him did. We don't really get to know Spurgeon - he's always at arm's length. I guess that's especially true of his childhood. So when Spurgeon starts preaching at 15, or becomes pastor of a church aged 17, he seems almost a curiosity, rather than understanding where that came from or even what sense of calling he felt to it.

Dallimore comes across as a huge fan, which is ok in a biographer. But he also reads too many of today's controversies into Spurgeon's life. So, for example, chapter 19 contains this section:

This opposition to evangelical truth sprang first from the publication in 1859 of Darwin's Origin of Species. Teaching that life had originated not by divine creation but by blind chance, it directly contradicted the Scriptures and obviated the very idea of the existence of God.

Dallimore then goes on to conflate Darwin's ideas with the later German theological liberalism, and cites Spurgeon numerous times against liberalism to show that he also opposed Darwinism. Never once does he cite Spurgeon on Darwin. Now I'm not a 19th century historian, but as far as I can tell, Dallimore there is taking two different (but possibly linked) things, and saying they are the same. In doing so, he assumes lots of stuff about Biblical interpretation and theology of science, which I don't think is justified.

He's also very reticent to say that Spurgeon drank alcohol and smoked - it's almost as if he sees writing the book as a hagiography rather than a biography, and he wants Spurgeon to conform to his own culturally assumed norms of holiness. Though to be fair, he does include both, as well as mentions of Spurgeon's depression, though he always links that as a symptom of his gout.

I don't doubt that Spurgeon was a great man of God, and Dallimore gives us some great insights into how God used him, and what his priorities were. As a record of Spurgeon's life, this is good, and it's a good introduction to the man, but I wouldn't class it as a great biography.

Dallimore is more famous for his two-volume biography of George Whitefield, which I haven't read. On the basis of reading this, I'm more likely to read it, and I hope it gives us better insight into the man himself and what drove him and led him to become the man he was.

Spurgeon Quotes on Ministry

2010-07-26T14:46:00.008+01:00

I've just finished reading a biography of the great Victorian preacher CH Spurgeon, of which more to follow.

But here are a few quotes from the great man:

Whatever "call" a man may pretend to have, if he has not been called to holiness, he certainly has not been called to the ministry.
Lectures to my students, p.3

Better abolish pulpits than fill them with men who have no experimental knowledge of what they teach... He who presides over a system which aims at nothing higher than formalism, is far more a servant of the devil than a minister of God.
Lectures to my students, p.5

A man who has really within him the inspiration of the Holy Ghost calling him to preach, cannot help it - he must preach. As fire within his bones, so will that influence be, until it blazes forth...
Autobiography

Are churches in a right condition when they have only one meeting for prayer in a week, and that a mere skeleton?The Sword and the Trowel, August 1887

"Do not enter the ministry if you can help it," was the deeply sage advice of a divine to one who sought his judgment. If any student in this room could be content to be a newspaper editor, or a grocer, or a farmer, or a doctor, or a lawyer, or a senator, or a king, in the name of heaven and earth let him go his way...
Lectures to my students, p.23

True preaching is an acceptable adoration of God by the manifestation of his gracious attributes : the testimony of his gospel, which pre-eminently glorifies him, and the obedient hearing of revealed truth, are an acceptable form of worship to the Most High, and perhaps one of the most spiritual in which the human mind can be engaged.
Lectures to my students, p.54

If My Nose Was Running Money...

2010-07-24T08:00:00.000+01:00

Another funny video...

Extra-Geeky Comic

2010-07-23T10:01:00.002+01:00

Dinosaur Comics is frequently just weird, but this is magnificent...

Shrek 4

2010-07-08T17:52:00.005+01:00

Yesterday, we went to see Shrek 4 - "Shrek - Forever After" at the cinema. Not the 3D version, because that's just a silly overpriced gimmick which means you have to keep your head vertical...

Shrek 1 was a work of genius in the way it reworked fairy stories and went against the grain. Shrek 2 was a pretty good continuation of it, that heavily referenced and parodied modern culture. Shrek 3 was so easily forgettable I can't find anyone who can remember it well, though I've found several people who think they've probably seen it.

Shrek 4 doesn't parody anything really. It just uses most of the same characters, with one new major character (the evil Rumplestiltskin), who is largely as in fairy tales rather than being a clever twist on it. It's a fun film, and a decent one - probably better than 3, but nowhere near either 1 or 2 in standard. There are a couple of really clever moments, and one really romantic one, but they're the exception rather than the rule.

It's like they tried writing a decent-ish story with the same characters (albeit in a parallel universe where Shrek was never born), and it's just all a bit too pedestrian in comparison with the first two - as if the clever writers had run out of steam. Fun, but not fantastic.

A(nother) Flaw in the Rules of Football

2010-07-03T07:20:00.003+01:00

Last night, Uruguay were playing Ghana in the World Cup. In the last minute of extra time, the score was 1-1, and Ghana had a very good shot on goal. The Uruguayan striker Suarez quite clearly pushed the ball off the line using his hands. He was sent off; Ghana missed the resulting penalty; Uruguan went on to win on penalties.

The problem is this: As the rules stand, Suarez's action was sensible and was self-sacrificially doing the best thing for his team. Had he not handled the ball off the line, his team would have been knocked out. As it was, handling the ball off the line ensured that his team still had a chance of going through, a chance which they duly took. The rules therefore encourage fouls in such situations.

The most obvious modification to deal with this would be the introduction of a penalty goal, as in Rugby. The rule would run something like this:

If a player commits a foul to prevent an otherwise certain goal, they shall be sent off and the referee shall award a goal to the side and player that would have scored had the foul not been committed.

Priorities in Global Mission

2010-07-02T10:24:00.005+01:00

This is an extract from an e-mail sent to me by a friend of mine who is involved in mission in the Muslim world...

Every year, the world Christian Church gives 125 BILLION dollars to Christian missions, through more than 20,000 different agencies....

Now considering the strategic importance of Islam, what percentage do YOU think the Church allocates to North Africa and the Middle East - the heartlands of Islam?

Think of a number before you scroll down...

5%?

..

..

2%?

..

..

1%?

..

..

Actually it is 0.07% - just 84 million dollars!

I ask myself a simple question:

"Is this really the result of a Spirit led strategy in the Church?"

Or does it show that the global Church would rather put resources into more 'responsive' areas (which often already have flourishing Christian populations?)

Haddon Robinson - Expository Preaching

2010-06-30T12:11:00.004+01:00

I read this book because a good friend who is also a good preacher strongly recommended it to me. And he was right to do so.

It is just about the best book I've read on how practically to prepare a sermon on a passage of the Bible. It's aimed at an introductory level, but so that it's thought-provoking and challenging for people who are used to it as well. If I was teaching someone to preach, or helping someone to preach better (unless there was a specific issue to deal with), this is just about the number 1 book I'd want them to read. When I was at theological college, I attended several lectures on preaching, and used to wonder how they could be done in such a way that would be accessible to people with a variety of different levels of experience and skill. This is how.

It allows for a variety of styles and outcomes, and acknowledges that good preachers often do things radically differently from the method he recommends for preparation, but it's good to hear how he'd do it, and I've found his method helpful for dealing with the task of writing a sermon when I don't feel in the mood to do so.

I might do a post in the future on how he recommends a sermon should be prepared...

The one thing I thought was a huge and dangerous omission is that he talks remarkably little about the importance of prayer for the preacher. Preaching is not something that is fundamentally our work - it is God's work through us, and while it is of course important to understand the passage and explain and expound it in a way that is relevant to the hearers, it is useless unless God speaks to their hearts by his Holy Spirit. Prayer should permeate the process of sermon preparation through and through. But if you assume that from the start, this gives you a good way to prepare a sermon which will proclaim God's Word faithfully, relevantly and hopefully challengingly.

What Motivates Us?

2010-06-28T08:59:00.002+01:00

This is a very interesting film. If that's what the research shows - as well as (un-)common sense, experience and yesterday's TV - then why do people keep on pushing on the silly track?

Of course, there's a lot that can be said from that for running churches...

(HT to +Donald)

Video Preachers

2010-06-27T11:57:00.004+01:00

Krish Kandiah has started an interesting discussion about preachers at megachurches who video their sermons for use in other congregations.

It's long been something I've been uncomfortable with, but not been able to put my finger on precisely why not. Krish suggests 4 problems with the approach:

Cult of personality
Lack of feedback / communication
Lack of relationship
Consumer Church

I think I'd agree that all of those are definite dangers, but I'd push the "personality cult" point further than Krish does. Having video sermons seems to say that not only is the Main Preacher unusually gifted (which may well be true), but it makes it harder to raise up good secondary leaders, or even good primary leaders for other churches / to succeed the main leader.

Consider the following scenario:

A church has 4 main congregations on a Sunday, meeting in different venues. For the sake of unity, the church leader decides that they will all have the same passage on the same day. Main Preacher does 2 of them, and upcoming leaders do the other two. Main Preacher's job is then not only preparing the sermon, but also mentoring the two upcoming leaders in preaching. They do a significant fraction of their preparation together or in discussion with each other, but end up with finished products which are their own. This doesn't add significantly to the workload of Main Preacher, and means that the upcoming leaders get the benefit of being mentored by Main Preacher, improve quicker. After a few years, if they were already fairly gifted and worked hard, they would likely be able to preach at a similar standard to Main Preacher, and probably taking a style of their own, albeit one heavily influenced by Main Preacher, and the result is greater multiplication of the ministry.

If these upcoming leaders are (for example) people who already know how to preach and are fairly gifted in it, that looks like a much better way of doing it in the long term.

I should add that I've got a lot of respect for John Piper, Mark Driscoll et al, and I'm sure they've got good reasons for doing it. I just don't see what those reasons are, and would be interested to know...

On the other hand, I'm aware that the church I'm a minister at does use video sermons from time to time as a way to give staff a month or so off preaching. That seems like a good idea, as long as it isn't regular...

Orienting Ourselves Right

2010-06-26T15:12:00.002+01:00

We ask "Where does God fit into the story of my life?" when the real question is "Where does my little life fit into the great story of God's mission?"

We want to br driven by a purpose that is tailored just right for our own individual lives, when we should be seeing the purpose of all life , including our own, wrapped up in the great mission of God for the whole of creation.

We talk about "applying the Bible to our lives". What would it mean to apply our lives to the Bible instead, assuming the Bible to be the reality - the real story - to which we are called to conform ourselves?

We wrestle with "making the gospel relevant to the world". But in this story, God is about transforming the world to fit the shape of the gospel.

We argue about what can legitimately be included in the mission that God expects from the church, when we should ask what kind of church God wants for the whole range of his mission.

I may wonder what kind of mission God has for me, when I should be asking what kind of me God wants for his mission.

CJH Wright, The Mission of God, quoted Total Church p.34

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Daleks

2010-06-25T10:40:00.002+01:00

It's my day off. And this is wonderful.

HT to Stephen Pereira.

Tattoos and the Body of Christ

2010-06-24T11:27:00.006+01:00

Following on from my previous post, one of the obvious markers of social class (round here at least) is tattoos.

Working class men, especially of my age, tend to have obvious tattoos. Middle class men don't. I don't live in an especially rough area, it's certainly a lot nicer than some places I've lived. But it's a fairly traditional working class housing estate, and I'm conscious that I'm about as middle class as it is possible to be, and I don't really fit in.

Q. What proportion of men aged between 25 and 60 have noticeable tattoos?
A. According to this US page, 40% of people aged between 25 and 40 have tattoos. I can't find stats for Britain. I'd guess at least 50% of men on this estate do... There are 3 or 4 guys in the congregation with noticeable tattoos, and a few women as well.

Q. What proportion of male clergy aged between 25 and 60 have noticeable tattoos?
A. I'd guess very low. I know hundreds of male clergy in that age bracket, and I can hardly think of any with noticeable tattoos. Isn't there a question there about being incarnational?

Because of the way the C of E works, I only get three years here. If I knew I was spending my life trying to reach this sort of estate, I'd seriously consider getting a tattoo, maybe like Pete Postlethwaite's in Romeo + Juliet (see above). Don't know what my wife would say though!

Theologically, tattoos were banned for Israelites in the OT Law (Lev 19:28). But we're not Israelites, and in the NT, we're told Jesus has a tattoo (Rev 19:16), which is probably symbolic rather than literal.

Class Barriers in Church

2010-06-23T10:08:00.002+01:00

A couple of days ago, I posted some initial thoughts on the book Total Church by Tim Chester and Steve Timmis. I said that it raised some interesting questions about class and evangelical Christianity.

One church leader commented to me recently: 'Social class is British evangelicalism's equivalent of racism in American evangelicalism.'... It means the leadership in conservative evangelicalism largely runs along lines of social class. Those from a lower social class who achieve positions of prominence do so by adopting the culture of the upper class.
p.74

I'm pretty sure that should read "middle class" at the end...

When we look at church throughout the world, God is choosing the weak and lowly to shame the power and wealth of the West. It seems that God's response to the imperialism of global capitalism is to raise up a mighty church in the very places this new empire marginalises and exploits. Let the Western church take note.
p.81

One of the reasons we have middle-class churches that are failing to reach working-class people is that we have middle-class leaders. And we have middle-class leaders because our expectations of what constitutes leadership and our training methods are middle-class. Indeed, working-class people only really get into leadership by effectively becoming middle-class. p.117

I think they're right, of course. In one sense it's a symptom of the old problem where attempts to improve education levels in working class areas tend to produce middle-class people who then leave the areas and so create no overall improvement. Chester & Timmis even suggest (probably rightly) that one of the keys to reaching the working classes is for converts to decide to stay rather than to leave.

Another is of course "downward mobility", Christians moving into more working-class areas intentionally instead of following the standard trend of society to try to move out of them.

But there's an awful lot to be said for the massive problem facing evangelicalism in the UK - that it's just too middle class to seem relevant to the working class. Stuff like the "reaching the unreached" conferences help, but there's a long way to go in terms of changing culture, not least in terms of mobility around the country. Generally speaking, working class families are rooted in a specific area over generations, and middle class families move around a lot and are geographically dispersed. For me to be fully part of the community I live in would require my family to have lived there since the 1950s.

There's a big challenge here...

Doing Church Differently

2010-06-21T14:11:00.005+01:00

I've read a couple of books recently on doing church differently. They're the sort of book I wish I'd read in book group this year instead of the book we did do, which is best characterised as rich in complex theological language and poor in content. In contrast, I'd strongly recommend both of these for church leaders - not because I completely agree with them, but because they really get you thinking.

The first one is a book I've seen highly recommended - The Trellis and the Vine by Colin Marshall and Tony Payne.

Marshall and Payne basically argue that churches in general and church leaders in particular often spend far too much of their time looking after the existing structures (the trellis) rather than focusing their attention on growing Christians (the vine).

It's basically a persuasive book length plea for church leaders to invest their time in training people in the congregations to serve God better.

Here's an extract:

If we pour all our time into caring for those who need help, the stable Christians will stagnate and never be trained to minister to others, the non-Christians will stay unevangelized, and a rule of thumb will quickly emerge within the congregation: if you want the pastor's time and attention, get yourself a problem. Ministry becomes all about problems and counselling, and not about the gospel and growing in godliness.
And over time, the vine withers.
p.111

What we're suggesting is that [the sick and suffering] aren't the only ones that need your time and ministry. If you really want to care for them and see real gospel growth, then the wise thing to do is to train and mobilise the godly mature Christians in the congregation to do some of that caring work.
p.183

Another book, and more controversial, is Total Church, by Tim Chester and Steve Timmis.

They argue for a total remodelling of the way we do church, to be far more community-centred, far more about living lives together. There are some very good points in here, but they often raise them in deliberately controversial ways, and don't provide a discussion of what it would look like for a traditional chuch to try to take some of this on board. It works and is convincing as a manifesto for planting radical house churches, specifically in working class areas (I'll post some of their discussion of class at a later date).

This is the sort of thing I'd really like to discuss with other people in church leadership positions.

The communities to which we introduce people must be communities in which "God-talk" is normal. This means talking about what we are reading in the Bible, praying together whenever we share need, delighting together in the gospel, sharing our spiritual struggles, not only with Christians but with unbelievers.
p.62

At present the military and economic might of Western nations is struggling to counter the threat of international terrorism. It is proving difficult to defeat an enemy made up of local 'cells' working towards a common vision with high autonomy but shared values. They are flexible, responsive, opportunistic, influential and effective. Together they seem to have an impact on our world far beyond what they would if they formed themselves into a structures, identifiable organisation. Churches can and should adopt the same model with a greater impact as we 'wage peace' on the world.
p.107

G.K. Chesterton said: "The man who lives in a small community lives in a much larger world... The reason is obvious. In a large community we can choose our companions. In a small community, our companions are chosen for us.
p.111

I don't agree with everything they say at all - for example their rejection of the importance of silence on p.139-140 seems a massive over-statement which contradicts the fact that both Jesus and Paul took long periods of such quiet, as well as the fact that I read the book while on a silent retreat. But there's a lot I do agree with, and a lot of thinking to be done...

How much do you have to hate someone to not tell them about Jesus?

2010-06-21T10:43:00.003+01:00

Here's a really interesting video from American comedian (and atheist) Penn Jillette. I apologise for the cheesy music at the end...

Here's some of what he says...

I've always said, you know, that I don't respect people who don't proselytize. I don't respect that at all. If you believe that there's a heaven and hell, and people could be going to hell, or not getting eternal life or whatever, and you think that, well, it's not really worth telling them this because it would make it socially awkward... How much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytize? How much do you have to hate somebody to believe that everlasting life is possible and not tell them that? I mean, if I believed beyond a shadow of a doubt that a truck was coming at you, and you didn't believe it, and that truck was bearing down on you, there is a certain point where I tackle you. And this is more important than that...

NB - proselytize = seek to convert someone else to your religion

All Loves Excelling - John Bunyan

2010-06-16T08:02:00.002+01:00

I've just finished reading this book on Ephesians 3:18-19. It was originally published as "The Saints' Knowledge of Christ's Love", but the folks at Banner have reprinted it under a snappier, more Wesleyan title. There are some really heart-warming bits, as well as some quite dry bits. Bunyan is so good at psychological application! Here are some highlights:

O the length of the saving arm of God! As yet thou art within reach thereof; do not thou go about to measure arms with God, as some good men are apt to do: I mean, do not thou conclude that because thou canst not reach God by thy short stump, therefore he cannot reach thee with thy long arm... It becomes thee, when thou canst not perceive that God is within reach of thy arm, then to believe that thou art within the reach of his; for it is long, and none knows how long.
p.14

Were all the saints on earth, and all the saints in heaven to contribute all that they know of this love of Christ, and to put it into one sum of knowledge, they would greatly come short of knowing the utmost of this love...
p.68

know they self, what a vile, horrible, abominable sinner thou art. For thou canst not know the love of Christ before thou knowest the badness of thy nature... He that sees most of what an abonimable wretch he is, he is like to see most of what is the love of Christ... So then, if a man would be sure and steadfast, let him labour before all things to see his own wretchedness.
p.84

Why then do not Christians devote themsevles to the meditation of this so heavenly, so goodly, so sweet, and so comfortable a thing, which yieldeth such advantage to the soul? The reason is, these things are talked of, but not believed: did men believe what they say, when they speak so largely of the love of God, and the love of Jesus Christ, they would, they could not but meditate upon it.
p.113

Oh that God would make us dangerous!

2010-06-14T13:36:00.002+01:00

We are so utterly ordinary, so commonplace, while we profess to know a Power the Twentieth Century does not reckon with. But we are "harmless," and therefore unharmed. We are spiritual pacifists, non-militants, conscientious objectors in this battle-to-the-death with principalities and powers in high places. Meekness must be had for contact with men, but brass, outspoken boldness is required to take part in the comradeship of the Cross. We are "sideliners"--coaching and criticizing the real wrestlers while content to sit by and leave the enemies of God unchallenged. The world cannot hate us, we are too much like its own. Oh that God would make us dangerous!

Jim Eliot

HT to CQOD

Sir Terry Leahy

2010-06-09T07:58:00.004+01:00

There's an article here about the retirement of one of the most successful CEOs in British history.

How the article ends is very instructive when it comes to leadership in whatever capacity as well as the problems besetting the British corporate (and public for that matter) sector...

Sir Terry frequently says that there is no secret to his success – apart from paying attention to what customers want (as head of marketing, he pioneered the loyalty card). But I suspect that what really sets him apart from peers who are also bright, energetic and driven is that he has avoided many of the traps that lie in wait for the unwary CEO.

First and foremost, he is more interested in Tesco than in himself. As one person who has worked with him told me: "It's not that he doesn't have an ego – they all have an ego – but he doesn't have the personal vanity that afflicts almost every other chief executive."

Another said: "After a while, so many of these guys think they are supergods. He doesn't." The decision not to sit on the board of any other company typifies this attitude: he thinks he should dedicate himself to Tesco and does not consider himself above dealing with the nitty-gritty of the business, as well as the big picture. He has not sought to maximise profits in the short term: Tesco's margins are low, but by investing in lower prices for customers, the business has inexorably built market share.

Sir Terry's unremitting obsession with all things Tesco may also be the reason why he is often called boring. I have met duller men, but it is true that he is neither charming nor charismatic.

Caution, obsession with detail, genuine love of the business. It is not rocket science. But it is depressingly rare.

(emphasis mine)

Kent & Barbara Hughes Liberating Ministry from the Success Syndrome

2010-06-04T09:52:00.004+01:00

This book was given to me as a Christmas present, and I've greatly enjoyed reading it over the last few weeks. It's basically about how the most important thing in ministry is staying close to God rather than growth in numbers and so on. I've found it very good for devotional reading.

The book itself is very good - some of the quotes from other writers are outstanding.

Someone once asked George MacDonald why, if God loves us so much and knows everything we need before we ask, must we pray. MacDonald's magnificent answer remains wonderfully instructive.

What if he knows prayer to be the thing we need first and most? What if the main object in God's idea of prayer be the supplying of our great, our endless need - the need of himself? What if the good of all our smaller and lower needs lies in this, that they help drive us to God? Communion with God is the one need of the soul beyond all other needs; prayer is the beginning of that communion.
(p.72)

(quoting Malcolm Muggeridge)

If it were ever possible to eliminate affliction from our earthly existence by means of some drug or other medical mumbo-jumbo, as Aldous Huxley envisaged in Brave New World, the result would not be to make life delectable but to make it too banal and trivial to be endurable.

(p.121)

GK Chesterton once described a paradox as "truth standing on its head crying for attention."
(p.138)

(quoting Bruce Thieleman)

The pulpit calls those anointed to it as the sea calls its sailors; and like the sea it batters and bruises, and does not rest... To preach, to really preach, is to die naked a little at a time, and to know each time that you must do it again.

(p.183)

School of Theology 4

2010-06-03T14:42:00.002+01:00

The audio of the fourth school of theology session, on God's promise to David, can be downloaded here.

Wedding!

2010-06-02T10:38:00.002+01:00

Leaving to form a new church?

2010-05-29T12:51:00.003+01:00

Here's an interesting quote I came across from Calvin on whether to keep going in existing non-ideal churches or start your own. It's worth pointing out that this doesn't address the issue of starting new churches for missional reasons, or congregations leaving an existing denomination because they persecute true believers.

Dreadful are those descriptions in which Isaiah, Jeremiah, Joel, Habakkuk, and others, deplore the disorders of the Church of Jerusalem. There was such general and extreme corruption in the people, in the magistrates, and in the priests, that Isaiah does not hesitate to compare Jerusalem to Sodom and Gomorrah. Religion was partly despised, partly corrupted. Their manners were generally disgraced by thefts, robberies, treacheries, murders, and similar crimes. Nevertheless, the prophets on this account neither raised themselves new churches, nor built new altars for the oblation of separate sacrifices; but whatever were the characters of the people, yet because they considered that God had deposited his word among that nation, and instituted the ceremonies in which he was there worshipped, they lifted up pure hands to him even in the congregation of the impious. If they had thought that they contracted any contagion from these services, surely they would have suffered a hundred deaths rather than have permitted themselves to be dragged to them. There was nothing therefore to prevent their departure from them, but the desire of preserving the unity of the Church. But if the holy prophets were restrained by a sense of duty from forsaking the Church on account of the numerous and enormous crimes which were practised, not by a few individuals, but almost by the whole nation,--it is extreme arrogance in us, if we presume immediately to withdraw from the communion of a Church where the conduct of all the members is not compatible either with our judgment, or even with the Christian profession.

John Calvin, Institutes 4.1.18

HT to CQOD.

"God is love" as primary?

2010-05-25T17:58:00.002+01:00

There seems to be a common assumption in an awful lot of modern theology that the primary truth about God is that he is love. "God is love" is at least Biblical as a statement (1 John 4:8, 16), and there's a lot of important stuff that can be said about the Trinity from that statement.

But of course, people often load the word "love" with a lot of baggage it wasn't meant to carry, and interpret "God is love" in a way that contradicts large chunks of the rest of the Bible.

But why should "God is love" be primary at all? Why not "God is light; in him there is no darkness at all." (1 John 1:5). After all, it's in the same book. But I don't think either "God is love" or "God is light" is the number one candidate for a three word description beginning "God is...". Nor is "Truth", "Life" or "Wisdom", though there may be something to be said for each of those.

I think there are two possibilities much stronger than either. After all, we're never told that "God is love, love, love", but we are told that he is "holy, holy, holy." Actually, we're told that as many times as we are told that God is love (Isaiah 6:3, Rev 4:8), and we're told that God is holy quite a lot more (Lev 11:44, Lev 11:45; Josh 24:19; 1 Sam 6:20; Ps 22:3; 99:9; Isaiah 5:16; 1 Pe 1:16 for starters). So I'd say "God is holy" is much closer to being his primary attribute that "God is love" on the basis of the Biblical evidence.

The other possibility of course is "God is Jesus".

Now imagine what modern theology would be like if we started with the truth that God is holy rather than the truth that he is love.

Steve Jobs, Apple, Porn and Freedom

2010-05-24T13:41:00.004+01:00

I'm not normally a great fan of Apple. I think their products are over-hyped, over-priced and too hard to tinker with. I think in some sections of society (and that includes a fair few friends of mine from theological college), they've reached the status of a pseudo-religion. I remember one of my best friends had an apple laptop. It fell off the sofa and stopped working, necessitating a long drive to the nearest Apple franchise shop then cost a lot to repair. My PC cost half as much, as the same sort of performance, is a lot harder to break and a lot easier to fix.

But then this comes along. I've deliberately linked to Albert Mohler rather than the original story because I think his analysis of this is good. I've got to say, I agree with Steve Jobs on this. Freedom from is often far more important than freedom to.

Of course, I think that freedom is actually meaningless unless we specify "freedom from something" or "freedom to something". We are never free to do whatever we want - we can't fly to the moon unaided, for example. And as a Christian, I think the freedom that really matters is freedom to follow God, a freedom which only comes through slavery to Christ. But that's a different story...

David Simpson of Macclesfield

2010-04-27T23:32:00.002+01:00

At the moment, I'm doing some reading about the great evangelical preacher David Simpson of Macclesfield. Here are some quotes:

Away then, my brethren, with all party names and uncharitable distinctions. Let the only name of which you are ambitious be that of Christian, and the only religion after which you aspire be that of the Bible. Let others talk about sects and parties. Let others dispute about principles and doctrines, but let it be our daily aim, study and endeavour to grow more and more in humility, in meekness, in knowledge, in love, in gentleness, in goodness and benevolence...

(at the controversial opening of Christ Church)

Brisk, solemn, lively tunes are best adapted to awaken holy affections... Such words, such tunes, such singing as leaves us dull, stupid and languid, answers no valuable end whatever. They are neither pleasing to God nor profitable to man.

Bits and Bobs - Drugs and Spiritual Experience, Contraceptives

2010-04-26T08:53:00.003+01:00

There's some interesting research here about the ways in which some drugs can give people emotional experiences similar to those experienced in worship.

From the point of view of experience, it seems it's impossible to tell the difference between drug-induced and "natural" mystical experiences. Both are powerful. Both enable people to enjoy a transcendent moment. Both seem capable of transforming people so that they feel a greater sense of empathy for and unity with other people—what most people would call love.

That doesn't surprise me at all, because we're made as single entities - we don't have a separate bit of us labelled "soul", so you'd expect that any feeling that can be experienced as a result of something genuine can also be created by drugs or by other forms of artificial stimulation. And though experiences are important and useful, at the end of the day, the key question is one of truth and reality. Is the God we experience real and true? That's why discernment is important.

Meanwhile, Albert Mohler poses some interesting questions about the effect of the contraceptive pill on society. Personally, I suspect things would have turned out much better if its use had been restricted to married (or just about to be married) women.

John Piper argues that the cross has a benefit for unbelievers as well, in this case because it secures common grace and gives them time to repent.

A Christian psychotherapist discusses the problems caused to society by pornography.

Seven Habits of Highly Effective Christians is good for thinking about some of the qualities that help us tell others about Jesus.

The Meaning of Life - Psalm 30

2010-04-25T17:00:00.002+01:00

Psalm 30

I used to do a fair bit of theoretical physics. And one of the things that theoretical physicists are especially interested in is finding a theory of everything - one theory which explains all the physical phenomena we see in the universe.

I think David would agree with them that there's one dynamic underlying everything - one basic principle which the universe runs on. But David wouldn't look for the answer in quantum field theory or superstrings. For David, the single dynamic underlying the whole universe is this - worship. Everything that happens to people, everything that God does, according to David, is somehow because of worship.

Maybe that seems a bit weird to you, but bear with me.

The way that most people think most of the time is that worship is a response - God does something amazing for us, so we praise and worship him. And that's what happens in v1-3. David praises God for rescuing him from the grave and from going down into the pit. It's interesting that in v2 he uses "O Lord my God" rather than just "O Lord" like in v1,3. It's kind of an intense awareness of God's closeness to him, and the fact he doesn't use that language in v1 and 3 makes it stand out all the more in v2.

Then in v4-5 we get a slight development. Here, David generalises his own experience to the rest of the nation, and tells them that they can praise God because of what he has seen God is like, and that his love is so much stronger than his anger.

In verses 6 and 7, David develops this theme to describe his own individual situation. His security comes only from God's favour. We may think that mountains stand firm on their own, but it's only when God wants them to. When he hides his face, it doesn't matter how strong the mountain is, it won't stand firm. So why does God show his favour sometimes and hide his face other times? It's not just capricious, as we see in v8-10.

David calls to God for mercy - he recognises he needs it. But it's really interesting how his call is motivated, because it isn't actually about him. David knows that he isn't the centre of the universe, but doesn't then make the mistake that we so often make and assume that everyone is the centre of their own universe. David knows that God's glory and worshipping God is what it is all about. So his prayer for deliverance is motivated by the fact that he knows he will be praising God when God delivers him. Why does David want God to spare him? So that he can praise God for his faithfulness. Prayer motivated by a desire for God to be worshipped.

David doesn't worship because he has been saved, he is saved so that he can worship. Worship is so big and important that it's even behind the doctrine of salvation.

And we see the same again in v11-12.

You turned my wailing into dancing;
you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy,
that my heart may sing to you and not be silent.
O LORD my God, I will give you thanks forever.
Psalm 30:11-12, NIV

Why did God save David and clothe him with joy? So that his heart could sing to God and not be silent.

Quick application. Have we been saved? If so, we've been saved so that we can praise God?

Do we want to be saved? Why?

Do we recognise that the underlying dynamic of everything that happens in the universe is God's praise? Are we willing to make that the underlying dynamic of everything that we do?

Cranmer on Common Worship

2010-04-22T10:48:00.000+01:00

Moreover, the number and hardness of the Rules... and the manifold changings of the service, was the cause, that to turn the book only was so hard and intricate a matter, that many times there was more business to find out what should be read, than to read it when it was found out.
Thomas Cranmer, Concerning the Service of the Church (1549)

Some Ways in Which British Politics is Broken

2010-04-15T10:32:00.002+01:00

The Voter Power website is good at illustrating some of the problems with the British electoral system. Essentially, votes in small marginal constituencies count for far more than in large safe ones. (HT Bishop Alan)

Another issue is the whole clash between constituencies and parties. Realistically, most people vote for the party they want to win, but who they elect is a local representative who may or may not have anything to do with the area and may or may not be competent. When there is only a fairly small parliamentary majority (as in the Major government), the identity of the MPs matters quite a lot, but is largely irrelevant to the electoral process.

Furthermore, the Prime Minister is elected on a very small set of issues, but then proceeds to implement their policy across a whole range of issues. Topics like abortion and the death penalty are strongly emotive, but we don't get an opportunity to choose either way.

Most of the time, the British system works like an elected 5-year dictatorship, with decent representation for the communities who voted for the dictator (because those MPs are in the government), and less good representation for those who didn't (because those MPs are in the opposition). Of course, the communities don't have much say in which individual represents them, just which party. And that seems kind of dumb.