Random Friday Thoughts

I should really write a more cohesive post today, but here are just a few random thoughts:

1. I wish I had taken a few classes in culinary arts. While I know I am doing something I love, I also would love to know more about cooking from a creative and world-cuisine level. Not Iron Chef-level, mind you, as I have no appetite for trout ice cream. Still, something more than just open-a-can cooking.

2. I think it is in bad taste to mock any President of the United States as a rodeo clown. Even ones that make a mockery of the dignity of the office themselves. They don’t need any help—and guess what? It’s been done to most Presidents in the last three decades. And I don’t think it should be illegal. It’s just not something I like.

3. I find it remarkable the number of people who want to justify their own preferred universal policies and laws by citing one specific case or specific individual who has a rare situation. Guess what? You cannot structure a society based on general rules that fit every specific situation. That’s when legitimate exceptions should be made to general rules.

4. So far, the mandate for employers to provide insurance is delayed. The mandate to cap out-of-pocket costs for consumers is delayed. What’s not delayed? The requirement on me as an individual to purchase coverage including coverage that I do not need—the ability to put my family into an insured group that will not have certain expenses and therefore reduces the cost to me. How is that helping affordability?

5. People who make a big campaign for a public office then after one term head for the “next level” make me regret supporting them for the office they got. All you wanted was a stepping stone, and you really weren’t out to serve the public. You beat out another person who might have been interested in serving that district, state, ward, whatever for some time.

6. I maintain that every politician should be required, by law, to live in whatever zone they represented the same length of time they were in office. They should also be prohibited from being lobbyists or government employees at the time. And that should just be the cost of their time in power. So, Mike Huckabee and Bill Clinton: move back. You owe Arkansas a few years of living with the results of your time in office.

7. I also maintain that political salaries should be pegged to military salaries and all Administration (not necessarily the career folks, just the political appointees) and Congressional benefits operated out of the same system as the VA. There are no political appointees worth more than a field military leader and no staffer worth more than a good NCO. I would think many aren’t even worth that. And Congressman Bob needs a shingles shot? Put him in line behind the veterans that are waiting 3 months for theirs.

8. Hollywood is out of ideas and lives now on destroying all of the good ones they once had.

9. We Baptists would do well to pay attention to the world around us and stop trying to use laws to make non-Christians as good of Christians as we are. Instead, let’s us try to be as good of Christians as the Bible calls us to be. Then see what happens.

10. I’m not sure why it’s a good idea to wake up a person to give them medication to help them sleep or to treat a condition caused by being over-stimulated by the world around them.

Spies Like Us: Numbers 13

That’s right, one of the greatest espionage thrillers of the 1980s has its basis in the Bible. The classic Dan Akroyd/Chevy Chase film Spies Like Us was indeed inspired by Numbers 13. After, no one qualifies as spies like us better than the dozen men of Numbers 13.

Here’s the story to this point: the people of Israel have come out of bondage in Egypt. They have received the Law of God at Mount Sinai. They are now at the point of entering life in obedience and dependence on God in the Promised Land. Life that comes with a glorious mixture of freedom and responsibility, worship and work. Before they go into that life, they are told to take a look at what it will take to finalize the acquisition.

So, at God’s command a dozen spies are sent out. One is sent from each tribe, except for the Levites. No representative is sent from the Levites—instead we see here the twelve landed tribes sending spies. I do not know that any real meaning should attributed to this, but I find it interesting. It could simply be practical: the Twelve Tribes that will receive land send out spies, perhaps to pick out their land. It could also be spiritually significant: the Levites are going with the Tabernacle, wherever it goes.

These spies go. They explore. They return six weeks later.

And they have given up. Ten of them have seen too much bad to think moving forward is going to be any good. Two of them have seen too much good to think moving forward is going to be bad—but even they recognize the cost. All through the exploratory group, tension about the future resounds.

Then it spreads. The populace of Israel only knows what they have heard, and they have heard that the land is going to be a challenge. Giants. Walled cities. Pain, heartbreak…and work to do. Even the wealth of fruit reflects that there will be some major vine dressing to do when the land is theirs.

Two of the spies, Joshua and Caleb, see the future as connected to the past. God has been good so far, so let us go forward with Him. Ten of the spies see the future in the past: we were pressed to hard labor in Egypt, but we could go back and not have to fight our way in. (Also, depending on when you place the Exodus in history, it’s possible there was a dynastic change in Egypt and the Israelites expected a decent welcome. Maybe.)

Both sides are responding to the unknown. Both want to trust in what they have seen before. It is that Joshua and Caleb are willing to trust that the God of the Wilderness, the God of the Mountain, and the God of the Red Sea will also be the God of the Land. The others? They are not so sure.

For those, a stable servitude is better than an uncertain freedom.

This is how they are spies like us.

We fear, it seems, to live in the freedom God has given us. We fear it spiritually, relationally, nationally.

Nationally, we know that freedom can be messy. It can also be hard work, and freedom empowers others. The challenge is that others then are not always willing to use their freedom in moral and ethical ways. So we decide that bondage to laws and bureaucracy is our solution. Is that really the only option?

Relationally, we know that allowing people in our lives to live in freedom can be challenging. People may abuse our trust, wreck our plans, or just generally be pains in the posterior. Yet what is our option? To pigeonhole every relationship away from meaningfulness? To control the behavior of others to suit our needs? Is that really how you want to live?

Spiritually, we know that forgiveness in Christ is effective and complete. There is no condemnation, and only through the love of God driven by the indwelling Holy Spirit do we choose that which is good and right. Through this we are free. Free to do, free to grow and to become. Fear begets legalism, for we build laws to protect ourselves from failing our freedom. Then, we extend that legalism to benefit others and suddenly, rather than walking free in Christ, we live, together, bound with chains of our own making. Is this what Jesus died for? Or are we substituting for His purpose?

Freedom is work. Freedom is messy. Freedom is a gift from God. Will we embrace it?

Or will we show just how truly these were spies like us?

Today’s Nerd Note: Special Problem in Numbers 13: The Nephilim. This term shows up once before the Flood (Genesis 6) and here afterwards. The Septuagint (Greek translation of the Old Testament from 200 BC) does not help us much by rendering Nephilim as “giants.”

The general idea from Genesis is that the Nephilim are a race of warriors and big, bad dudes. We would expect them eliminated by the Flood. Then they show up in Numbers.

We have a few options here. Some are worth mentioning only to discard. Such is the idea that the Nephilim survived the Flood—unless one can demonstrate that one of Noah’s sons’ wives was of that line, which is doubtful—the Nephilim are among the dead from the Flood. It was a universal flood.

Another view is that the Israelites called the larger warriors Nephilim because of the legends from antediluvian times. This would be akin to labeling an opposing force a Legion, because it reminds one of the organization and discipline of the Roman Army. That’s a possibility.

I would look at a third view, though I can find no real substantial support for it. Linguistically, Nephilim is related to the Hebrew for “fallen ones.” While many people build a spiritual dynamic here that has fallen angels and people breeding, I think there’s another possibility. It relates to the above view, but is not a labeling based on size. It’s based on morality.

We, to this day, refer to some people as barbarians. Especially in looking at the treatment of people in warfare, like civilians or prisoners, we see certain behaviors as being wrong, even for victorious groups. You are not supposed to, for example, shoot prisoners or rape and pillage the countryside and its inhabitants. Whether in reality when it has happened or in fiction, those are behaviors that show us that an enemy is not honorable but is instead, barbarian.

I think Nephilim is that type of term. It is not the size that truly intimidates the Israelites, it is the behavior. In 40 days, they have seen both good and bad in the land, and they have, perchance, observed just how the Amalekites, Jebusites, Amorites, and What-Not-Ites behave. It is not simply the fear of the size differential that disturbs the Israelites. It is the imagining of what will happen facing an enemy that has no moral restraint.

The Beginning Revisited: John 1

We finished Romans, which means we need to do two things. The first is to recommend that you re-read Romans and grab yourself a good commentary or study tool for the book. I have not finished all of C. Marvin Pate’s Teach-the-Text Commentary on Romans, but I have no qualms about commending it to you as a study help. I’ll be digging into that whole series later.

The second item is to determine where to go next. I had leapt from Mark to Romans, and now need to go somewhere else. I should have kept the New Testament side of Through the Whole Bible in canonical order, but I didn’t. So, we did a Gospel, now a Pauline Epistle, and we’re going back to a Gospel. We’re going to process John. Actually, I think I’m going to do the Johannine corpus, so we’ll move through John, 1,2,3 John, and Revelation. That’s right. If Revelation doesn’t happen before too much longer, you’ll have to endure a blog on it.

If you were to pull up the trailer for the upcoming movie Thor: The Dark World, you would hear Anthony Hopkins state that

“Some believe that before the world, there was nothing. They’re wrong. There was darkness.”

He goes on from there to follow into a theology that’s a mix of Marvel Comics and Semi-Norse Mythology, so I don’t commend the whole thing for theology. Just for fun. I love a good superhero film.

He is partially right, though. If you look at Scripture, there was a time when God created the Heavens and the Earth (Genesis 1:1-2) and calls light into existence. Then, He separates light from darkness. Darkness shows up quickly in the beginning. I would, however, hazard that darkness is different in this situation than Odin is referencing. I would suggest that the darkness of Genesis 1 is representative of the universe in which God is present, but not actively creating.

Why?

Because we revisit the In the Beginning of Genesis 1 when we come to John 1. The words echo: In the Beginning…

Yet we also see a contrast between Genesis and John. In Genesis, In the Beginning, God does something. In John, In the Beginning, the Word simply is. The Word is there, when In the Beginning occurs. The Word is already God when In the Beginning occurs.

The Gospel of John, then, is not truly about origins. In the same way, Genesis is not about origins, either, because the origin of God is not addressed in either. These reflections on In the Beginning are about who God is and what God does—Genesis addressing the latter and John the former.

John, like Genesis, moves quickly to addressing darkness. Genesis gives us the creation of light and the separation of the two. John gives us something more: that the light of Genesis 1 is not an original thought but an echo of something, Someone, greater.

The light is in John 1:4-5. The Light is in Him, the life of mankind. The Light is so great that separating the Light from the darkness is an action of protection for the darkness—not a need for the Light. Not a need for the One, who is the Light that shines in the darkness without the dark even understanding, much less overcoming, Him.

This is the Light. God separates the Light from the darkness because if He didn’t, the Light would utterly destroy the darkness and all that goes with it—which means those men who love the darkness more than the light. Those are the same men from whom God draws, through the Light, to Himself.

How does He do that?

By the greatest verse in John: John 1:14, that the Word put on flesh and dwelt among us. Remembering to see John as he was: a man steeped in the Old Testament, we see that the Word puts on flesh and tabernacles among us, just as God dwelt in the Tabernacle in Exodus.

John opens his explanation of the life of Jesus by showing just how evident Jesus is within the Old Testament. He does so while showing just how clear the philosophical ideas of the Gentile world demonstrate Jesus with his discussions of light, darkness, and the logic of the world, which is referred to in the choice of the word “logos” for Word.

He then goes on to declare how much greater Jesus is because Jesus came down to be among people, to bring humanity back to Him. That is the message of John: how this was shown.

Today’s Nerd Note: John also addresses any identity issues for John the Baptist. First, by identifying John the Baptist he separates the authorship of this Gospel from that John.

Second, he makes clear that John the Baptist was, from the beginning, a supporting character. John had been executed by the Romans, just like Jesus, but it happened first. Was Jesus simply trying to follow John the Baptist? No, John the Gospel-writer posits. Jesus was always more important.

Third, the probably better label for John the Baptist is John, the one who immerses. Just a little pro-credo-baptist observation.

Book: The Hero’s Lot by Patrick W. Carr

Back in April, I pointed you to a new book series by a math teacher named Patrick W. Carr. That book was called A Cast of Stones, and the series is The Staff and the Sword. I enjoyed that entry into the world of Illustra and could not wait to go back.

Then I made the unfortunate mistake of agreeing to review, in a timely manner, the next book. The Hero’s Lot continues the saga of Errol and the Kingdom of Illustra and takes the reader into his backstory while moving toward the future of the kingdom that finds itself in need of a king.

We pick up not too long after the conclusion of A Cast of Stones as the survivors of those events are nursing their wounds and plotting their next move. From the beginning, A Hero’s Lot reveals that there are subplots and more intrigue afoot than the reader might have found in the first entry of the series. Not only do the bad guys have secrets, but the good guys have secrets. And there are still a few people that you don’t know which group they fall into!

The plot is complex but not convoluted. The overall plot, that is. The basic plotline is simple: our hero is commanded to into enemy territory and destroy the bad guy who got away last book. It is all the other events that make the plot complex.

That complexity is a great thing. This is not a fluffy little young adult novel. It is a full-bore action and intrigue novel, and one that is fitting for readers that can track such plots. I will continue to think a hand-drawn map would help, though. I need to get my daughter to draw one.

We further see the splintering in the religious hierarchy that has troubled the kingdom in this book. Also, the tone is overall a lot darker and heavier. It is, however, a second book in a trilogy. What do you expect? Even Back to the Future II was heavier than the others. If you made a trilogy of Care Bears Meet My Little Pony, the second film would have a heavy feel.

In all, if you like the idea of a semi-medieval setting where spiritual beings, political intrigue, and religious structures intersect, you should snag both the first book and this one, The Hero’s Lot, and read them both.

Oh, you’re wondering about the “unfortunate” comment? It’s unfortunate that I chose to do this in a timely manner. I read The Hero’s Lot, and now have to wait until February for the conclusion. And that’s just not good. Our hero is in danger…and we’ll be having Christmas dinner not knowing what he does.

Free book received from the publisher in exchange for the review.

Sermon Wrap-Up for August 11

Morning Sermon:

Audio Link

Video Embed:

Evening Sermon Audio Link

Evening Video:

 

Morning Sermon Outline:

Central Idea: Prayer and Praise are the Rhythms of Life
Theological Idea: The Power of God shown in prayer and praise

Word for the Sermon: PRAISE

Introduction:

P: Pray

R: Rejoice

A: Ask

I:Integrity //Elijah

S: Sins

E: Experience

Application Action: Make a commitment to seek opportunities to praise no matter what.

August 9 2013

Here we are, back to the text of Proverbs. I hope you’ve kept reading even though we haven’t looked at the last couple of chapters in the blog.

 

The focus in chapter 9 is the invitation of Wisdom. I think there is some value here in realizing that wisdom is a choice—no one will force you gather wisdom. You can go through life foolish and suffer the consequences. So you can choose.

 

Focal verses:

 

Proverbs 9:8 reflects a truth that all you need is a blog comment stream to prove as absolutely true. Some people cannot be corrected, no matter what the situation. And in turn, they vent all the frustration back at you for correcting them. Others will take in correction and see how it applies.

 

Proverbs 9:18 gives the outcome of rejecting wisdom’s invitation. That outcome is death.

 

It’s hard for many of us in pluralistic societies to accept the truth as presented in Proverbs. We are not fond of the idea that there are really only two choices: wisdom with life or folly with death.

 

This is, however, the reality of the world. Just as most choices are truly about dichotomy, so is the pattern of life. We choose: up or down, right or left, wisdom or folly.

 

The outcome is clear, pending what we choose to embrace.

Book: One Year to Better Preaching

When I first started preaching, I was a terrible preacher. Then, with practice, training, and no shortage of ego, I became a great preacher. After this, I went to seminary, took preaching courses and went from great to lousy and back again. In the time since then, I have come to edge of something worse than lousy: complacent. I am the preacher that I am. Perhaps I can improve my pastoring, my Bible knowledge, even my evangelistic methods, but I’ll never be a better preacher than I am today.

Daniel Overdorf’s book, One Year to Better Preaching: 52 Exercises to Hone Your Skills, has been the perfect kick-in-the-pants for me to move past that attitude. This book highlights how almost any preacher can, spread across a year, improve the sermons that he presents.

This is not a book for a seminary or college preaching course—Saving Eutychus or Preaching God’s Word are more suited for the classroom. I would, personally, recommend both of these for a semester-long course. Yet we preaching pastors are not in that classroom these days.

Instead, we have to fit skill-building alongside skill-using. Added to that, we already have our habits of sermon preparation and methods of study. While you can teach an old dog a few new tricks, it is harder to teach a stubborn preacher new ones.

One Year to Better Preaching: 52 Exercises to Hone Your Skills does not attempt to teach all new tricks, though. Instead, Overdorf presents us with simple weekly tasks that will help us pastors improve the level of our preaching. He does not guarantee we will attain to John Chrysostom or Adrian Rogers, but each simple step will help put the edge back on our preaching razor.

These exercises range from forming a prayer group to listening to storytellers to learn their craft. (I recommend Jim Weiss at Greathall Productions, personally, for that.) Additionally, Overdorf provides some suggestions for pastors keeping their devotional life fresh, which we all should recognize as critical for preaching.

Many of Overdorf’s suggestions are things that, when I stop and think about it, I know I should do as a preacher. One Year to Better Preaching: 52 Exercises to Hone Your Skills does not really plow any new ground, nor does it present a new way of preaching that most of us have never considered.

Instead, this is akin to Vince Lombardi’s legendary speech that he allegedly gave the Packers every year: “This, gentleman, is a football.” Overdorf points us back to the sermon and says, effectively, here is a football.

He is encouraging: at no point does he act like he is speaking to slackers or bad preachers. Instead, he points to the idea that we should constantly strive to improve, no matter how good we are at the outset.

My biggest concern for One Year to Better Preaching: 52 Exercises to Hone Your Skills? If you’re a preacher, you need this book and you need to read and use it. If you know a preacher, he needs this book. But I don’t know if I would ever want to receive this as a gift. I might take it the wrong way. And certainly don’t have it anonymously mailed to your pastor’s house or leave it on his pulpit. That would be really, really bad.

So, give him a gift certificate and pray for the best!

Note: I received One Year to Better Preaching: 52 Exercises to Hone Your Skills from Kregel Ministry in exchange for this review.