me: 2, challengers: 0

That's the only statistic from tonight that I care about. ;)

And they were 4-person free-for-alls, too.

warm milk

I love warm milk. It's soooo good. My mental ideal of "home" includes warm milk appearing at unexpected times for me to enjoy, without even having to punch buttons on the microwave.



That, actually, was going to be the entire blog post. Now, I'm going to ruin it by getting very philosophical. The author of Hebrews (I think it was the Greek philosopher A. N. Onymous) tells us that, when we have become mature Christians, we should partake of the strong meat of the Word. And I've always understood that to be my goal. But now that I think of it....I still really, really like the warm milk. I delight in remembering that, despite (or including?) everything else that I know about Him...everything...I belong to Christ because He first loved me, and gave Himself as an offering to appease God's wrath toward me.

in marks of indelible Grace

A debtor to mercy alone, of covenant mercy I sing;
Nor fear, with Thy righteousness on, my person and off’ring to bring.
The terrors of law and of God with me can have nothing to do;
My Savior’s obedience and blood hide all my transgressions from view.

The work which His goodness began, the arm of His strength will complete;
His promise is Yea and Amen, and never was forfeited yet.
Things future, nor things that are now, nor all things below or above,
Can make Him His purpose forgo, or sever my soul from His love.

My name from the palms of His hands eternity will not erase;
Impressed on His heart it remains, in marks of indelible grace.
Yes, I to the end shall endure, as sure as the earnest is giv’n;
More happy, but not more secure, the glorified spirits in Heav’n.

--Augustus Toplady

A free weekend

It's the first time in a while. I think I have forgotten what I do with myself. I need to figure it out, because the next few weekends, at least, will all be free just like this one is. Frrreeeeeeeee.

If I have the time tomorrow =P I'm going to overhaul the back-end of this blog design, in order to allow for a bit more flexibility. Probably not 'worth it', but it's been so long since I did anything substantial with CSS.

I really, really like my job. Today was incredibly fun (and successful). I really enjoy working with computers: learning them; understanding them; mastering them.

Lunch was good today too. Brad is very helpful. And I had never seen a schoolday at Rockbridge before. It reminded me of Tall Oaks. I kinda miss school.

Also, this just in: Rich Mullins made some really excellent music.

I see the morning moving over the hills
I can see the shadows on the western side
And all those illusions that I had
They just vanish in Your light
Though the chill in the night still hangs in the air
I can feel the warmth of morning on my face
Though the storm had tossed me
'Til I thought I'd nearly lost my way

And now the night is fading and the storm is past
And everything that could be shaken was shaken
And all that remains is all I ever really had

Patience

...is a virtue, which I cannot wait to have!

thankful

I am not my own.

fear

I don't want to belabor the point. We should not fear sin. Sin no longer has any power over us. We should not fear believing the wrong thing, because though that is also sin, sin STILL has no power over us. The Spirit has power over us. Grace has power over us.

This is not to say that we should not be careful about what we believe. But I encourage you all to search your hearts - is your care motivated by trust in the Lord, or by fear?

This post comes to you courtesy of Martin Luther's advice to sin boldly. I strongly encourage you to read the context of that statement. I understand him to be saying that when we fear sinning - when we fear that we may sin in ignorance, especially -- we are doing wrongly by Christ and His grace.

Manner and Means, part six

I apologize for not finishing the series promptly.

The question for me, at this point, is: in what ways do we try to 'love' God by doing things, when we should be instead reflecting on how wonderful He really is, in order to inflame our hearts and minds to do His will? If you give your son a bicycle, and he adores it and spends all his time riding it, you will be happy for him. But your desire is that he would love you, not just the bicycle. If he loves the things you give him, this is not the equivalent of loving you. If he does the things you tell him to do, this also is not the equivalent of loving you. It may be a good thing, but it is not going to produce true joy or lasting communion.

Often, I think we (Reformed Presbyterians?) give the Word of God too much value. Before I am devoured by a pack of angry wolves, I should say that I think by doing so, we are not ascribing to it the glory it deserves. Just as our glory is not found in being exalted to the level of God, neither is the glory of the Scripture found in its being exalted to the level of God. We know that Christ is the Word. But I do not think that we can accurately say that the Word is Christ. If Christ is fully contained in the words written on the pages which we have (with all their footnotes, endnotes, and what-have-you), then there is not much to be excited about in terms of the life which lasts forever. We already have everything we could ever want. But this is manifestly untrue. If God has given us everything we could ever want, then what 'hope' have we? None. But no! He is reserving the best for last. He is reserving the fullness of His glory. Now we see dimly, but then we shall see Him face to face.






Perhaps I have sounded like I am tearing down the respect for God's Word and His multifarious means of grace. But this is not my intent at all. Just as we are to find great joy in being His people and doing His will (not in being exalted ourselves), so we are to find great joy in all the things which He gives us as means with which to love Him. Reading the Scriptures is something I have found to be more and more enjoyable, the more I see them as the things which give me one of the very best opportunities to see Him and to know Him. Why? Because seeing Him and knowing Him make me love Him! Doing His will makes me love Him! We CAN love Him more by reading His Word, and by ministering to our neighbors and enemies, and by fleeing from temptation. But I strongly suggest that we will not do these things well unless we love Him, and not just the means themselves.

Does this make love a means to doing good things, hence blurring the lines between end and means? Perhaps. The whole thing is certainly bound up in intricacies. But it is fairly clear that just as we do not save ourselves by works, we do not somehow "love" God with our works either. We love him with our heart, mind, and soul.

I will admit that my conclusion is poorly done. I find myself with very little to say, and less ability to say it. I strongly recommend that you read Matthew's recent post on Grace and Discipline. It is exactly the sort of summary which this topic deserves. You can find it here.

Manner and Means, part five

I would like to devote this part to addressing certain objections that may have come up in response to this series so far.

1) Are some non-Christians actually better than Christians? By God's standard, absolutely not. Romans tells us that there is no one who is good, except those who are in Christ Jesus. But this is not the point. The point is that the parts of the law which are technically "doable" without knowing or loving Christ (these tend to be the parts of the law everyone, even Christians, get particularly hung up on) are quite often kept better by some people who are not Christian than by many people who are. This is quite clearly the case, and again, it begs the question: is loving God the exact same thing as keeping the law? The answer must just as clearly be "NO." I also want to clarify that it is not my belief that the Pharisees kept the law perfectly - in fact, my point all along has been that "the love of God" is itself commanded by Christ. No one, no matter how good they look, is actually a Keeper of the Law.

2) Doesn't John 15 refute these claims about the love of God being the goal? Jesus follows the previously quoted verses by saying, "If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love."
Not at all! Go back to verse 9. Notice he prefaces with "Abide in my love". This is the "command." Looking at the overall context of John 15, we see that we only keep God's commandments BY abiding in His love. Therefore, Christ is showing forth the absolute necessity of being in communion with the Father - abiding in His love - if we are to have any hope of keeping the commandments. We will not bear fruit unless we remain attached to the vine!

3) Aren't "works" important? It sounds as if you are saying that all we need to do is love God!
The answer here is twofold. Firstly, works are quite clearly important. In Paul's seminal defense of "salvation by grace through faith", he follows up immediately with "so that you may walk in good works". James is very clear that faith without works is dead. So the answer is that works ARE important. But if the question is "do we need anything but to love God?", the answer must be found in the word "need". We need only Christ, and if that were not true, we would be hopelessly lost. But "need" and "ought" are not the same thing. Ought we to do good works? By all means! Need we do good works? Our salvation is not dependent on what we do. One of the most wonderful blessings of being in Christ is that we are finally freed from the power of sin, which makes us unable to enjoy doing good. Now that we can enjoy it, of course we will do it! We are finally free to do what we were created to do.

Lastly, it will be pointed out that keeping God's commandments is a way of stirring up our love for Christ. This is absolutely true. C.S. Lewis puts it like this, with regard to loving our neighbors:

The rule for all of us is perfectly simple. Do not waste time bothering whether you 'love' your neighbor; act as if you did. As soon as we do this we find one of the great secrets. When you are behaving as if you loved someone, you will presently come to love him.

There are three important things to note about this phenomenon. First, notice that the end is still love. We are called to love these people, and that is the result of having done the things that Christ called us to do. Second, it is Christ's love that enables us to love these unlovable people in the first place! Third, people are not the same thing as God. We cannot expect to find ourselves loving Him more simply because we have done good things, because the problem we are trying to overcome is not His unlovableness, but our sinful hearts. No. He graciously provides good deeds as a way in which we draw closer to Him, but this is only the means to an end, and an uncertain one at that. Many a person has spent his whole life doing good deeds in order to get closer to God, and has found himself at the end of a long life, exhausted, miserable, and no closer to the God of heaven than he was when he started. We must not allow ourselves to think that we will gain communion with God by doing the things He has commanded us. We lost that communion by choosing not to trust Him in the garden, we have regained that communion at Christ's expense, and He will maintain that communion on our behalf. We need do nothing. We ought to do many things, and by His grace, we will.