From Sunday's Sermon

A paraphrase of Puritan pastor Thomas Brooks, regarding a person believing himself righteous based on being less sinful than the person next to him: When you are in Hell, suffering God's wrath for all eternity, will it comfort you to know that you are better than the person next to you?  Gotta love those straight-shootin' Puritans.

There was apparently a time when people who worked on large wheat farms were taught to escape a sudden oncoming bush fire this way: they were to burn the area around them, stamp out the fire, and try to get down into the dirt as much as possible.  This way the fire would go around and over them but would have no fuel where they were laying, leaving them unharmed once it passed.  In the same way, we cling to the cross of Christ because it is the only place where God's wrath has already been poured out and spent.  When the day of judgment comes and God's wrath falls, we will be safe in Christ.

In Which I Am Reminded of An Important Truth

(Incidentally, doesn't that sound like the beginning of a chapter in Winnie the Pooh?  If it said "Pooh is" or "Piglet is" instead of "I am" especially.  Or if it ended with "Important Truth About Hunny.") 

I was reminded recently of something very important, which I either didn't realize or had forgotten.  A dear friend sent me a brief text with just a couple of sentences addressing something I'd been angsting about -- honest words that stung a little, to tell you the truth.  It wasn't a sermon or a long conversation, just something I really needed to be reminded of about my affections.  Which I'll come back to.

I'm a pretty cerebral kinda gal.  Being cerebral is one of those characteristics that's a lot like the Girl with the Curl from the nursery rhyme: when it's good, it's very, very good, but when it's bad, it's horrid.  The good part is that I love to think deeply and ponder and muse and learn and wonder and teach my students to do the same. The horrid part is when I get so far inside my head that I can't escape, and what ends up happening is that I live an almost parallel life, some self-narrated alternate reality in my head until I'm so wrapped up in it that everything about real life seems less real and far, far more disappointing.

So back to the affections.  Jonathan Edwards wrote of the affections that they "are no other than the more vigorous and sensible exercises of the inclination and will of the soul."  Wait, what?  Are you trying to tell me that my affections are exercises of my will?  To be used sensibly and thoughtfully, not merely letting them light wherever they want, but to be directed and applied in a godly way?  Far out.

In that self-narrated alternate reality that's constantly competing for my attentions, I have allowed my affections to be directed toward things and circumstances and people thoughtlessly.  Rather than choosing to set my mind on -- to direct my affections toward -- "things above" as the Scriptures say, I have too often chosen to allow my affections to be cast about by my mood, my temperament, my situation, and countless other factors. 

I needed (and am very grateful for) the reminder that my deepest affections belong only to God.

Conversations With My Students

My poor little darlins... their brains are just fried from end-of-school craziness.  We were talking today about how our Kindergarten and 1st/2nd grade classes are almost full for next Fall, but there are only a handful of kids in 8th-10th grades.  Bless 'em:

Me: Well, y'all need to pray that the Lord sends us some families with older kids who've been classically educated so y'all can have some more classmates.

Boy: They have to be guys.  And they have to be athletic, so we can play basketball!

Girl 1:  And they have to be cute!  We'll pray for cute guys.

Me (rolling my eyes): Yeah.  Why don't you go ahead and pray that a couple families will move here and enroll at CCA with upper-school-aged boys who've been classically educated and are athletic and cute... and why don't you throw in that they have Australian accents too?

Girl 2 (fists in the air): YEAH!!

Me (as their parents): Honey, I appreciate your newfound interest in prayer, but you've been kneeling there since you got home from school and it's time for dinner.

Pride is a Trap. No Really.

A blog-acquaintance of mine just put up some musings about homeschooling and asked about a particular curriculum she's thinking of using for her kiddos. It got me thinking.  Schooling is one of those topics that can turn mild-mannered Christian parents into red-faced UFC contenders in the time it takes to say "unschooling."  It's ridiculous, and I see why it makes people so neurotic -- even once you've decided on public or private or home, you still have to choose between classical! Montessori! Charlotte Mason! Waldorf!  And then curriculum!  Do you go for the tried-and-true Abeka even though it's KJV-only?  Or Sonlight?  Or Veritas?  Or one of those online accreditation things?  Or WHAT?  And then methodology -- five days a week, 8-3, nine months a year?  Or something else?  Dedicated school room or kitchen table?  Or picnic table?  Or the table in your RV?  No wonder so many threads about homeschooling end with people getting all capsy and BUT YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG!  WROOOOONNNNGG!

That reaction?  Is all about pride.

So I was amping up to do a thundering post about pridefulness in schooling choices, when it hit me: I am just that bad about my "stuff."  People who watch Glenn Beck.  People who send their kids to school with a can of spaghetti-o's for lunch three days a week.  People who use the N-word.  People who tell rude jokes about Obama.  People who roll their eyes at women who want a natural birth... All those people just get my blood pressure going.

And that reaction is ALSO all about pride.

AUGH.

Links!

I'm going to be extra-American and gush for just a second about Mikey Lynch -- I think his blog, Christian Reflections, is one of the most quietly impactful blogs going right now in Theology Land.  Mikey doesn't feel compelled to make a bunch of high-falutin' theological points or write a sermon for every post, but in the meantime he's evaluating and making connections in an incredibly smart way.  Just about everything he writes I wish I had written instead, that jerk.

Anyway, take a look at his series on Crowded House, which is full of alternately fascinating, funny, and important insights.  Here's Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.  Check back for more of his thoughts -- I know there will be a Part 4!   

And An Update At Long Last

Hey y'all, as usual I've hit the Crazy Time at the end of the school year, and haven't had the time or energy to post.  Only two weeks left of school!  Here's what's been going down:

My students, God love 'em, have been going crazy writing their end-of-year thesis papers.  We use this curriculum, The Lost Tools of Writing, about which I was extremely skeptical at first.  Having taught it for a year now, I've changed my tune -- it's terrific.  I can't imagine a more valuable program for helping kids do every single part of a paper, from coming up with ideas to fine-tuning their sentences. 

I've gotten a little obsessed with Australian Rules Football (which, fyi, is neither soccer nor rugby) in the last week. I got to see an old Tassie friend last weekend when he came up to play against the Louisville Aussie Rules team, and it was so much fun that I've been watching games on ESPN3 to try to pick a team to follow.  My friend Kate (mum to Pablo) is a Carlton supporter but says I have the freedom in Christ to support any team except Collingwood.  It's nice to be able to shut my brain off for a little bit while I'm watching the games!

I participated (briefly and with much eye-rolling) in a little dustup in the comments section of a post by well-known worship music writer Stephen Altrogge called How To Write An Awful Worship Song.  As usual, a few humorless trolls came and took a tongue-in-cheek post and started making accusations and dropping big words like "judgmental."

I'm starting to get really, really, REALLY excited about going back to Australia in less than two months!!  Yes, I'll be there in the dead of winter, but I'm super pumped to see everyone.  I've been thinking about all the fun stuff I'll get to do... and "fun" in my universe is best defined by good food, good drink, good friends, and maybe some footy on the tv.  What could be better on a cold winter night?

Fasting From Facebook: Part Deux

I just re-read the little snippet Daniel wrote after Lent, about the stuff people had fasted from and how the fast had impacted them.  Great stuff.  Did you know that around 2 million people gave up Facebook for Lent?  Crazy. 

Anyway, it got me thinking about how to continue the pattern of 1 Corinthians 6:12 -- not everything is beneficial, and I will not be mastered (I think "overpowered" would be a good paraphrase of the Greek) by anything -- even though Lent is LONG over.

I put a couple of things on FB about how to keep from drowning when you're drinking from the firehose (hide people from your feed, check FB rather than keeping it up in your browser all the time), but I'm thinking about how to expand that to my other online time.  Using a feed reader has helped a bunch, so I'm not going to eight zillion separate blogs and sites every day. 

Do y'all have any other ideas that could help me streamline online time?

Oh My Gosh I Think I Figured It Out.

Kinda.

On Sojourn's discussion/message board, The City (think Facebook + old-school chat room + newspaper classified ads + online church directory), a few discussions of late have just caught fire -- one about John Piper inviting Rick Warren to speak at a conference, one about Dallas Willard and whether or not he's orthodox, and one about The Shack that only died finally because the "listen, it's fiction and it speaks to people's pain" crowd bowed out of the conversation. 

And ohmygoodness, I think I've nailed down what those three discussions have in common AND why stuff like that tends to be tinder just waiting to be set off.

What they have in common is what I'm going to call the "Driscoll" factor -- high profile, prophetic, controversial.  The reason Mark Driscoll chaps people's hides is that he's got a prophetic ministry, calling to folks from the front lines, being a bold voice in just a few areas.  The reason I love and appreciate him is that the Church needs men like that who are willing to take a whole lot of flak because they're passionate about seeing the gospel applied in places that we want to ignore.  We desperately need Driscoll and guys like him to shake us up about our self-righteousness, our confusion about sexuality, our immaturity.

When it comes to the discussions I mentioned above, the Driscoll Factor means that they draw people on both sides who are passionate, even outspoken and fiery, about that particular issue.  So, with The Shack, for example.  On one side you have people who say, "Look, not everyone resonates with the Puritans or a systematic theology text.  This book can speak to people in their pain, and that's a good thing."  What's at stake, to them, is the faith of their wounded brothers and sisters.  It's an issue of love.  On the other side are the folks who say, "We have to protect the body of Christ from error.  Letting heresy slip under the radar because it's in a work of fiction is not okay."  What's at stake to these folks is the Gospel, and it's an issue of Truth.

God bless my brothers and sisters at Sojourn, because a conversation like that could so easily have spiraled into name-calling and judgment-pronouncing, but the tone stayed civil and gracious.

And it occurs to me that we desperately need both those voices in the church.  We need people to stand up for the hurting, to encourage us not to snuff out the smoldering wick, to remind us of grace, to display mercy and demand mercy from us, as people who have received so much mercy from our loving Father.  Without them, we'd be a bunch of loveless, cranky pharisees nit-picking each other's theology until we all spontaneously combusted.  We need folks who will thoughtfully defend the Rick Warrens and Dallas Willards and C.S. Lewises of the church for the sake of adorning the Gospel with love.

And we need people to stand up for the truth, to encourage us not to settle for mediocre theology or a watered-down gospel, to remind us of reality, to display integrity and demand integrity from us, as people who have received the very counsel of God in his word.  Without them, we'd be a bunch of hippy-dippy weirdos, wallowing in our feel-good love fests while the blinding glory of the gospel slipped through our fingers.  We need people who will boldy stand up for the gospel and not back down from exposing error no matter what.

The reason these kinds of discussions get so fiery is because you've got people from both ends of the continuum calling to each other, often without realizing that they're all contributing to the life and health of the church just by having the conversation in a gracious, godly way.  

We need each other!

Criticism

Some days I wish I lived in the pre-internet age.  Or was Amish.  Or something.  Days like today, when I see a beautiful quote from a respected, wise, older brother in Christ, and then I see someone else, someone who claims the name of Christ, making snap judgments and hateful accusations about that man's character and doctrine.

Friends, we have to learn -- I have to learn -- to temper our words when we're on the internet.  We must.  The commands of God not to entertain accusations against an elder without corroboration do not cease to apply online.  I'm convinced that a great many Christians are experiencing personal stagnation in their growth in Christlikeness because they constantly allow bitterness, anger, self-righteousness, lovelessness, and pride to gain a hold on them in the comments sections of Christian blogs.  How often do we see characteristics and actions  that belong to the realm of death in people who call themselves by the name of Christ?  Gossip.  Slander.  Malice. 

How foolish!  How our enemy must laugh with twisted delight when we use God's language for the Devil's purposes.

What I Learned When I Gave Up Facebook For Lent

(Not much organization here, peeps -- just a collection of musings.)

I think, worry, and obsess way too much about what other people think of me.  In the first several days of my Facebook-free Lent I had far too many moments of, "Oh, man, I wish I could use that as my status update.  Bummer."  Which of course is all about pride -- wanting people to think I'm smart and clever and funny.

My first impulse in too many situations is to cling to other people rather than looking to Jesus.  I mentioned early on in this little experiment that I was learning to pray first rather than write on someone's wall or even pick up the phone.

That surprised me a little -- that the stuff I was learning by giving up Facebook weren't just impacting my online relationships.  I talked with my best friend Kelsey a few days ago about the fact that it's unloving for me to depend on her more than I depend on my loving Father.  Picking up the phone to call her (or my mom, or a friend, or whoever) ten seconds after I experience a moment of sadness or anxiety or fear -- that's giving too much weight to my deceptive, fickle emotions, and not giving enough credit to my Father, who has told me to cast all my cares on him.

Now that's not to say that I don't value and cherish the friendships the Lord has given me.  I do.  I believe that the folks in my community group and my precious family and my dear friends both near and far are gifts from the Lord.  They can be Jesus to me when I'm hurting or anxious or confused.  But I find myself far too quick to dump my "issues" on other people instead of dealing with them before the Lord.

I'll talk a bit later on about how my online time looks different now after this little adventure.  Lord willing, it'll be a permanent change for the better.

In Case You Don't Know This,

April is National Poetry Month.

I majored in English in college, which means I spent a good chunk of my late teens and early twenties reading, analyzing, and writing poetry -- everything from thousand-year-old Japanese haiku to postmodern poetry written by unreliable authorial personas.  

I can't even remember in which class we studied John Donne, but I remember being absolutely amazed and moved to tears by everything of his that I read, and that's true to this day.  Every one of his poems that I discover or re-discover stuns me.  I forget sometimes just how much I love him.

The best thing about Donne is that someday I'll get to meet him.  I wonder if he'll be as cheeky as I imagine him to be?

Anyway, Donne's Holy Sonnets are probably some of the best bits of Christian poetry ever to be written down outside the Scriptures.  Go read them, slowly and out loud. And then read this, also slowly and out loud, the fifth poem in Donne's La Corona cycle:

CRUCIFYING.

By miracles exceeding power of man,

He faith in some, envy in some begat, 

For, what weak spirits admire, ambitious hate : 
In both affections many to Him ran. 
But O ! the worst are most, they will and can, 
Alas ! and do, unto th' Immaculate, 
Whose creature Fate is, now prescribe a fate, 
Measuring self-life's infinity to span, 
Nay to an inch.   Lo ! where condemned He 
Bears His own cross, with pain, yet by and by 
When it bears him, He must bear more and die. 
Now Thou art lifted up, draw me to Thee, 
And at Thy death giving such liberal dole, 
Moist with one drop of Thy blood my dry soul.

Huh.

Sorry about that whole "accidental blog sabbatical" thing.  I didn't mean to ditch y'all, and I don't even have a good excuse this time (computer meltdown, insane busyness, lack of internet, etc. -- nope, none of that).  I just didn't have anything to say.  That's a symptom/side benefit of giving up Facebook for Lent, which I'll tell y'all about tomorrow.

I have a couple posts in the hopper, and then I'm going to try to get back in a routine.

Also, it's currently like 85 degrees in my condo, so if any of this doesn't make sense, blame it on the fact that I'm being slowly steamed to death.

Greatest Hits: Discernment

(Originally Posted August 1, 2008)

Since I won't be writing much while I'm on Spring break this week, I'll be posting some of my previous articles, slightly edited in this case.  I'll be back at it on Monday, March 29th.

In the church, there seems to be an idea that "discernment" means "praying and waiting for God's specific, personal direction on every decision in my life."  But is that the view of Scripture? Yeahno. Such an understanding of discernment leads to several errors:

1. A separation between Christians who "know God's will," i.e. the super-Christians that God speaks to, and the "ordinary" Christians who seem not to hear from God about stuff like the color of their wallpaper.

2. Using "discernment" to excuse unwise behavior and even sin. I don't know how many times I've heard people say, "Well, I've prayed about it for months and the Lord has told me it was OK," even if "it" was buying a $300,000 house when you're $60,000 in debt, or living with your fiance, or not disciplining your kids. Those are not areas about which we ought even to pray. The best advice I can give people who encounter this "God told me" business from people is to remember that it's not a trump card. We have a responsibility to one another in the body of Christ, and letting someone off the hook just because they played the "God told me" card is hardly showing love to our brothers.

3. Total paralysis in decision-making, stemming from not using your brain and instead waiting for some sign or feeling to show you that God has given you direction. I strongly believe that for the Christian, the ordinary way of making decisions goes like this: Learn, study, and love God's word. Use the mind that God is sanctifying to make wise decisions. Rinse and repeat. But too many people seem to think that's just not "spiritual" enough. A Christian's life IS spiritual -- it's life IN the Spirit! And it can look very ordinary, but an ordinary life lived faithfully still results in "Well done, good and faithful servant." That's not to say that I don't think God sometimes uses other methods to reveal his will to us -- I certainly do believe that he does! But the ordinary way seems to be knowing God's word and living wisely in accordance with that. 

Greatest Hits: What CAN I Do, Then?

(Originally Posted September 18, 2007)

Since I won't be writing much while I'm on Spring break this week, I'll be posting some of my previous favorite articles, slightly edited in this case.   I'll be back at it on Monday, March 29th.

Much as we claim to hate them, there's something kind of appealing about the simplicity of rules, isn't there? Do Not Feed The Lions. 45 MPH. Keep Off The Grass. Simple. There are people whose careers have been dedicated to figuring out rules for other peoples lives: advice columnists abound. There's even a book called The Rules. Heck, there's an entire genre -- the "self-help" genre -- that's dedicated to giving people rules for everything.


So here's the quandary: as believers, our lives are no longer defined by our adherence to the law. God's word makes it perfectly clear that we cannot live up to the standards God has set.  That's the bad news.  But the good news is that the Eternal God came into time and space in flesh and obeyed God's law, to the letter, in our stead.  We are free from the penalty of the law and from its curse.

But... I like rules. I would love it if someone would just tell me exactly how I'm supposed to behave.

So, rather than striving for Christlikeness, for actions defined and bounded by grace and characterized by love, I make myself a little rulebook. Don't look at x. Don't say x. Don't think about x. Don't do x. This much of x is all right, but this much is too much. No flirting. No R-rated movies.  No romance novels. No ice cream.

With all that running through my mind, is it any wonder that I stopped today and wondered, "Well, what CAN I do, then?"

You might be surprised --or, if you're alive, you might NOT be surprised -- at how difficult it is to figure out how to act when all you have to go on are injunctions and prohibitions. It's like a professor who gives a writing assignment, and when you ask for help he tells you, "It shouldn't be written in Swahili and it can't be about the 17th century Spanish monarchy." Not helpful.

In my daily interactions, I've discovered that the Law of Christ is harder than rules. Far from being an easier way to live, Christian freedom is much more complicated and mentally taxing than legalism. It requires that I search God's word. It requires prayer. It requires discernment, and accountability, and community. It results in mistakes, sometimes mistakes I don't even realize until later. But it also produces humility, maturity, wisdom, deep friendships, equanimity, contentment, and joy. It causes me to trust the Lord, because there's not always crystal-clear dictation in Scripture for the minutiae of life (by which I mean, there's no 3 Corinthians 8:14 that says, "And to my single sisters I say, not I but the Lord, that thou shalt behave thusly toward handsome young men..." Although, wouldn't that be kinda awesome? Anyway).

"This side of heaven," as my dad says, I'll never have it all figured out. I'll continue to fail in how I strive to be like Christ. But I praise God that he is already at work, never sleeping, always faithful, until I am conformed to the image of his Son.

Greatest Hits: Abstinence or Chastity?

(Originally Posted February 21, 2009)


Since I won't be writing much while I'm on Spring break this week, I'll be posting some of my favorite previous articles, slightly edited, in this case.   I'll be back at it on Monday, March 29th.

I'll be the first to admit that the abstinence movement (the stalwart True Love Waits and various smaller efforts) has been a joke and a general failure. A Slate.com article from a while back (one of many on the subject) called such programs a success on a sociological level, in that they motivated participants to delay sexual intercourse by around eighteen months, on average. Wow! Eighteen whole months! What a triumph...

"Joke" might sound like a bit of a strong word. It is. But in the words of Inigo Montoya, "Lemme splain. No, there is too much. Lemme sum up."

Abstaining is something teetotalers do, something Sylvester Graham touted. However fancy the packaging, the word "abstinence" still feels punitive. It's the absence of something, forgoing something, NOT having something.

But a proper view of human sexuality is not supposed to feel like eating celery sticks at the Food and Wine Classic. Sexuality is woven into the created order. It's got a whole book of the Bible dedicated to it. It's supposed to be honored and protected. It's meant to be celebrated by the community of faith. It's part of our identity as image-bearers of God.

Do you see why it's completely insufficient to say merely that true love (whatever that means) "waits"?

Waits for what? Waits how? Waits why?

I think we need to completely remove the idea of "abstinence" from our discourse -- particularly the discourse we aim at young people -- and put in its place the idea of chastity. Chastity is both broader and narrower in its focus than "abstinence." To abstain is to do without something -- in this case, sexual intimacy. To be chaste is to view sexuality and sexual intimacy as something godly, valuable, and noble, to be experienced freely and joyfully in the right context, and to be directed toward that context. It's not a "don't." While abstinence is necessarily temporary, chastity is to be practiced throughout the Christian life.


I signed a True Love Waits pledge as a young teen, and I even wore a promise ring for a while until I misplaced the darn thing (sorry, Dad!). But I did so alongside dozens of friends who went on to forget those foundationless and hastily-written promises, which sounded so meaningful at age fourteen but somehow wore thin over time.

The truth is, we have failed to give young people a compelling reason to direct their sexuality toward marriage. At the same time, we've encouraged them to put off marriage, making even the most compelling reasons ring hollow as their "wait" gets longer and longer. We've hinted -- or said outright -- that sex is dirty and sinful. We've told them "No, No, No, No," and that's the end of it. We've told them they have to conquer the beast of temptation alone. We've spoken in hushed and shocked tones of "fallen women" and porn addicts and all manner of other sexual sinners, driving the struggling and fainting heart into isolation.

We've failed to tell them of the provision of Christ for our every need, and for the precious gift of the Holy Spirit who comforts us in our distress and guides us into all truth.  We've failed to offer grace to those who've stumbled.  We've turned our entire discourse on sexuality into a list of The Bad Sins, The Really Bad Sins, and The "If You Struggle With These You Are Beyond All Hope" Sins.  Worst of all, we've failed to put before them the beautiful plan of the God of the universe for human relationships -- His good, wholesome, hope-filled, joyous plan -- and the blazing, incomprehensible glory of Christ.  Apart from Christ, no discussion of "abstinence" makes sense.  In Jesus, though, we see human perfection and human sinlessness.  And as God works to sum up all things in Christ, He also works to make us more like Jesus in every aspect. 

Greatest Hits: Does God Change his Mind?

(Originally posted July 31, 2009)

Since I won't be writing much while I'm on Spring break this week, I'll be posting some of my previous articles.   I'll be back at it on Monday, March 29th.

An email from my favorite theologically minded friend started this post. Recently, Craig Blomberg, a well-known New Testament scholar whose work on the historical accuracy and reliability of the Gospels has been of great help to many a student, pastor, and layman, wrote an article explaining why he is a "Calminian" -- a jokey riff on the "Why I Am/ Am Not a Calvinist" books of recent years. Blomberg is basically trying to put himself clearly outside the Reformed mindset once and for all. I've read a few expressions of disappointment, and an article agreeing with his position, which is basically what I'm going to attempt to respond to today.

First of all, let me point out that Craig Blomberg is way smarter than I am. I don't pretend that I can tangle with him intellectually. Despite that, I still think he's wrong. Second, let me point out that Craig Blomberg is also a brother in Christ, in spite of what I think are his mistakes on this front. I'm not denigrating his faith or his commitment to the body of Christ, nor am I trying to write off his contribution to the Christian community. One of his books sits on my shelf, and it's staying there! *does not throw baby out with bathwater*

At one point in his article, Blomberg refers to the story of Joseph's brothers coming to him in Egypt for help during the great famine. Joseph's famous line, "You intended it for evil, but God intended it for good," Blomberg insists, is not a declaration of God's sovereignty, but a mere statement of fact. He says: "Two separate agents, two separate wills, at cross purposes with each other, neither described as logically or chronologically prior to the other. Neither is said to cause the other; they occur simultaneously." What's really happening, he says, is that both wills operate at the same time, without one being over the other.

Well, hold up. Joseph says to his brothers, "You sold me into slavery out of a wicked intention, but God's power trumped your evil desires!" In fact, God's purposes to preserve his people included the brothers' evil plans and actions. God is so powerful that he can even use human evil -- the condition of our fallen nature! -- to accomplish his purposes. That's comprehensive sovereignty! Blomberg's a great guy, but he just does NOT want to be in the "God is totally sovereign" camp AT ALL. (Plus, calling himself a "Calminian" is cute, but the fact is that there isn't a responsible Arminian on the planet who wouldn't totally acknowledge God's sovereignty in human history. So he's really a Cal-Open Theist-ian. Which isn't quite as cute.)

Moving on to broader arguments about God's sovereignty, I often encounter people who point to the word "relent" in the Scriptures and say, "See? That means that God goes back on his word! If he really is completely sovereign over everything, how can he appear to be influenced by the prayers of his people?" I used to use this argument myself! Well, yes, "relent" means that he will not do what he said he would do, out of a gracious desire to preserve and defend his people. But a couple things:

1) This DOES NOT MEAN that God changes his mind or that he's fickle or doesn't know what he's ultimately going to do. The problem with the argument here is that, while they're trying to just draw a line around the Reformed understanding of God's sovereignty, they END UP basing their whole view on the idea that God actually changes his mind. Listen up: this is where guys like Greg Boyd and Clark Pinnock got started, and where they end up is saying that God takes risks, that he doesn't even KNOW the outcome of certain events, and that in some cases WE have more sovereignty over circumstances than the creator of the universe. That's a pretty stupid place to end up and still call yourself a Christian. It's just like how the Mormons use the theories of 19th century German liberal philosophers (especially the evolutionary view of history -- that all history moves from the simple to the complex and that doctrines aren't revealed but evolve over time) to convince people that the Book of Mormon is true.  That argument might convince people, but you're cutting off the branch you're sitting on!

2) Check out this article. There's some uncool argumentation happening here, and this isn't the only place I've heard this line of reasoning, not by a long shot. You ever hear of "weasel words"? They're little words or phrases that a speaker or writer slips in, sometimes without even knowing it himself, that unfairly denigrate the other position -- it's like straw man + ad hominem all at once. The one that popped out to me was "real relationship." Yates and others imply that, unless God limits his own foreknowledge or sovereignty in some way, it's impossible for him to enter into "real relationship" with his creation. This is nonsense. We don't get to make up the rules for how God interacts with us based on our experiences with each other. The scriptures are full of the truths of God bringing the dead back to life both literally and figuratively. But does that one-sided interaction, that ultimate demonstration of total sovereignty, mean that God has some kind of counterfeit relationship with those he raises to life? Did Jesus have a more or less "real relationship" with Lazarus when he raised him, single-handed, from death?

3) There's also some plain old ridiculousness that gets shoveled around. To quote Yates, who is taking up a common anti-sovereignty argument: "The statements that Yahweh will harden the Pharaoh’s heart at the beginning of this process (cf. Exod 4:21; 7:3) are an expression that Yahweh’s purposes will ultimately prevail in this struggle but not that he dictates or determines the Pharaoh’s responses." Uh... what? What part of "I will harden his heart" is the tough part to interpret? "I will" meaning it's gonna happen... right?  And "harden his heart" meaning that's what he's gonna do... Yup. You have to do some pretty sexy contortionism to get around the plain meaning of that sucker.

4) The kicker is the "only a really sovereign God could accomplish his purposes in a universe where he has limited his sovereignty," also known as the "it's true because it ain't" argument. A God who can accomplish his purposes in such a give-and-take, unresolved universe that anti-sovereignty folks try to set up, is truly sovereign? Huh? So only a God who is truly sovereign and omniscient could operate in a universe where some things are outside his sovereignty and beyond his omniscience? Yeah, that makes sense. What's the purpose of prayer if the God we're praying to has chosen this event to be one of the hands-off parts of world history? How are we to know the difference? Or does he wait until we pray and then decide to re-institute the sovereignty he's chosen to put on hold?

Unlike Blomberg and lots of other people who use these kinds of arguments, I'm happy to live knowing that my choices are BOTH really choices that I really make with my time-bound will and mind AND are mysteriously part of God's plan. It's called paradox, and we have to embrace it, largely because our finite brains can't fathom the depths of God's will. Let's not try to eliminate paradox by making God more like us. That's a pretty dumb Bible study method. Dig?

Greatest Hits: How NOT to Give Advice to Single People

(Originally Posted October 27, 2008)


Since I won't be writing much while I'm on Spring break this week, I'll be posting some of my previous articles.   I'll be back at it on Monday, March 29th.

So the other day, I met a really nice couple. The husband was friendly and asked me a lot of questions about my life. We chatted about travel, and I told them about my trip to Europe with my family.

"Husband and kids?" he asked.

"No, parents and brother. I'm single," I replied.

And then... such a speech. Here's what he advised me to do.

1. Make a specific list of everything you're looking for in a husband. This advice was accompanied by a lot of questions. Have you thought about what kind of things you're looking for? Really? Specifically? In detail? What about things you don't want? Really? Specifically? In detail?

2. Realize that that man exists. Pray specifically for him. He is the only man for you.

3. Recruit other people to pray for that specific man (who, remember, is the only man for you). Don't forget about the parable of the unjust judge. Pester God until he brings your husband along.

4. Remain under your father's authority.

5. If that doesn't work, join eHarmony.

I definitely wished I could have made the whole conversation just STOP, for the love of heaven and all its angels, STOP!! It basically sums up all the bad advice I've gotten about singleness -- not just the advice itself, but the context in which it was offered.

So here (as revenge) is MY advice to married people who feel tempted to say any of the above things:

1. Don't give advice to single people you just met. Relationship advice should be given in the context of -- surprise!! -- relationships. Most people would never give marital advice to a couple they just met, but the rules somehow go out the window when talking to single folks.

2. Think about your attitude before you offer advice. As Christians, we have to recognize that the problem of humans is sin, and the solution is the Gospel. Singleness is NOT a problem to be solved. Do I want to get married? DUH. But please don't see my life as something you can "fix" with some pithy tips.

3. Keep in mind that every person's situation is different. Again, folks get this ordinarily. But with singles, it seems like people are so much more tempted to say, "Well, such-and-such worked for _____, so it'll definitely work for you." It's not that your advice is necessarily wrong, but... for example, I have ZERO problem with online dating services. And the courtship model makes sense for younger singles who live near or with their parents. And I wish more of my married friends would be bold enough to set me up with some dudes. But not all of those things is right for every person. For crying out loud, one of my dearest friends emailed a guy from halfway around the world because he read her blog and jokingly called her a feminist and she didn't like it and then they started talking and fell in love and now they're married and she's pregnant with their first child. Good GRIEF. PEOPLE ARE DIFFERENT. Ok. Rant over.

4. Please, please, please, don't perpetuate the idea that there's one ideal man out there for every single woman, and she'll never be happy until she finds him. The Prince Charming Myth has disillusioned and embittered countless young women, clinging to their "lists" while overlooking godly men all around them. Yes, in the grand scheme of God's sovereign plan, he knows and chose who I'll marry. But in my time-bound perspective, there are any number of godly, ministry-minded men with whom I could have a good, happy, sanctifying, Gospel-centered marriage.

OK, single peeps, any other advice for our married friends? ;)

Sunday Songs

O Sacred Head, Now Wounded

O sacred head, now wounded,
With grief and shame weighed down,
Now scornfully surrounded
With thorns Thine only crown:
O sacred head: what glory,
What bliss till now was thine!
Yet though despised and gory,
I joy to call thee mine.

What thou, my Lord, hast suffered
Was all for sinners' gain;
Mine, mine was the transgression,
But thine the deadly pain.
Lo, here I fall, my Savior! 
Tis I deserve thy place;
Look on me with thy favor,
Vouchsafe me to thy grace.

What language shall I borrow
To thank thee, dearest friend,
For this thy dying sorrow,
Thy pity without end?
O make me thine forever;
And should I fainting be,
Lord, let me never, never
Outlive my love to thee.

Yay! Baby!

Emma Roselynn Christine Roberts
Born 6:33 pm MDT
Saturday, March 20th, 2010
Sterling, CO

20" long
7lbs 8oz

Classroom Quotes From The Last Few Days

David: "He took a nap."
Me: "If by 'took a nap' you mean 'went crazy and killed himself,' then yes."
David: "That's exactly what I meant."

Hannah: "They tried to make me go to 'your mom' joke rehab, but I said, 'No, your mom, no.'"


Aaron: "Miss Roberts, does your dad have kids?"

Baylee: "That's not an angel, that's a llama."

Hannah Beth: "I found a fish with a transparent head."
Me: "... And that's going in the quotes."