Month: October 2005

Not Necessarily Wrong?

Tim Challies has a [post up](http://www.challies.com/archives/001376.php) on a family in Rogers, AK, which has just “celebrated the birth of their sixteenth child,” which has made them a bit of a local celebrity. They’re a godly Christian family, which seems to have determined that a good chunk of their “witness” is going to be through the godliness (and fecundity) of their family. In fact, from all reports, it sounds like they’re accomplishing with their family very much what I would *love* to do, though I doubt we’ll ever manage to reach **sixteen**.

The odd thing, though is the angle that Challies takes. The last time the Duggar family had a child, he wrote an article titled “How Fruitful is Too Fruitful?”, as if there could possibly be such a thing. The modern concept of family planning, i.e. limiting your numbers to how many children you can afford to pay flute lessons for, is clearly contrary to scripture. One wonders how Abraham, Isaac and Jacob might have reacted to such a suggestion.

After much thought and discussion, Tim and his wife decided that it’s “not necessarily wrong to have such a large family,” and then presents their reasoning, which seems to consist of a summary of the entire tenor of scripture. Not ***necessarily*** wrong? Good heavens! If you just use scripture as your moral compass, and shield yourself just a little from the mindset of modern Western culture, you should come to a more inverse conclusion:

Depending on your circumstances, and God’s particular direction for your family, it may not *necessarily* be wrong to **limit** your family’s size.

Upping My Antagonism

My mom always told me picking fights was bad.

Okay, that’s an oversimplificiation. What she said was that you can never convince anybody of anything simply by debating them into a corner. Debate, in any setting, is always for the sake of the audience. And, when the audience is your local church, picking a debate in the middle of, say, the morning service, is probably a bad idea. Odds are you’re more likely to stir up contention instead of bringing anybody to a closer appreciation of the truth. No matter who ends up being made to look stupid, both of you hurt the community of the church.

I’ve always tried to live by this standard of not picking theological fights in church. It’s a good standard. In fact, I’ve tried not to pick theological fights with anybody anywhere. Who ever has gotten saved because a Christian made them look stupid in public? But when it comes to blogging, not picking a fight may be exactly the wrong tack. Continue reading “Upping My Antagonism”

President’s Cabinet

Just as an addendum to yesterday’s post:

I was going to try to squeeze in there the fact that the British equivalent to the US President’s cabinet has members who are called *ministers* instead of the US term, *secretary*, because they serve… well somebody. But as I was looking around I found the official page listing the [US Cabinet members](http://www.whitehouse.gov/government/cabinet.html). Wow. Talk about integration! In the major department heads, WASP’s barely make up a plurality. Seven white guys out of fifteen total. I count two chinese, two hispanic, two black, and four women. Interesting to say the least.

I barely have that kind of diversity among my acquaintances!

Ministry

You know, I’m beginning to dislike the word “ministry.”

I just finished a conversation with a fellow student in my Greek class, and she said to me,

> “You know, I think the Lord is calling me to minister to Koreans.”
“Well,” I said, “There certainly are a lot of Koreans in the area.”
“Do you know xxxx in our class, he’s Korean, and we’ve been driving to class together. Well he ministers at a Korean church.” (I nodded. There *are* a lot of Koreans in the area.) “And the other day I saw the movie [Seoul Train](http://www.seoultrain.com/), and it really touched my heart. And *then*, the school where I work told me they had someone to tutor who is Korean and doesn’t speak a word of English. So I’m thinking, Lord, what are you doing here? Eh?”

Of course, the amazing thing was that she managed to convey all this information, I think, in a single breath. But it’s the word “minister” that get’s to me sometimes. Continue reading “Ministry”

Nobel for Discoverers of Ulcer Bacteria

[BBC News](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/4304290.stm):

> Two Australian scientists have been awarded the Nobel prize for medicine for their discovery that stomach ulcers can be caused by a bacterial infection.

I thought this was pretty fascinating. Before Robin Warren’s and Barry Marshall’s discovery in 1982, it was pretty much a given that ulcers were caused by too much stress and a poor lifestyle. Even in the 90’s, when my mom had an ulcer, she was told pretty much to try to reduce her stomach acid levels and chill out a bit. This was so much the case [that](http://www.uncommondescent.com/index.php/archives/388),

> “When Robin Warren and Barry Marshall first claimed that the bacterium Helicobacter pylori plays a key role in the development of both stomach and intestinal ulcers, they were roundly ridiculed. So much so that Marshall actually infected himself to prove the point.”

As William Dembski is pointing out, “The scientific community’s reception of this discovery *should* give us pause about the continuing controversy over ID” (emph. added). The image we often get of scientists is that of open-minded free thinkers, who consider each new idea on its own merits, without prejudice. Why shouldn’t we? That’s how *science* works, isn’t it? But science and scientists are two different things.

In reality, people always like to hold on to their old ideas, whether religious, or cultural, or scientific, and the scientific community can be every bit the masters of the close-minded imperium as the religious council that bid Copernicus recant. It usually takes a good firm shove in the right direction before a person will consider a blind spot. Barry Marshall had to give himself an ulcer to get people to reconsider a bacteria. What will it take to get people to reconsider Darwin?

George Will on “The Doctrine of Preemption”

From [the Curmudgeon](http://theconstructivecurmudgeon.blogspot.com/) I received word of an [excellent speech](http://www.hillsdale.edu/imprimis/) on preemptive war, nation building, and American idealism that is very well worth the read. It was both inspiring and wise.

The odd thing though, is that whatever his intended effect, the general impression I received had little to do with the content of his speech.

Man, I thought, if only *I* could do that with the *gospel*!