Month: May 2006

Cycling can be bad for you Health…

Kyle and I started biking around our neighborhood this weekend and had a really nice time. Since it’s a good way to get excercise, we decided to go out this morning for a ride before getting to work on school stuff. It was going well and we decided that we would stop at the apartment to drop off my jacket and get some water before heading over to Hammond Castle which is about a mile and a half away or so along Hesperus Ave. Just before we got to the apartment I had a slight accident. Continue reading “Cycling can be bad for you Health…”

Sci-Fi Takes a Bow to Office Life

When I have more time, I blog. Classes start on Monday, and I have lots of research-oriented things to do (Including building a new web-site for our church – the current one expires on Monday), but I had to pause for a moment and direct your attention to Howard Taylor’s Schlock Mercenary.

The last few days, Howard has been proving that he has done actual office work in his life. These two strips in particular are hilarious. The plot calls for our intrepid heroes to evacuate an office building quickly, under the guise of an emergency. Apparently, imminent doom is too foreign to the office worker to get them to run. So our soldiers-for-sale have to *make up* an emergency.

Oh yeah. That’ll get you running.

Beholden?

One of my great mistakes last semester was choosing Calvin’s *Institutes* as my theology text. The assigned reading for my theology class had merely required that I read the appropriate sections in any theology text, and then listed about fifty examples. I figured now was as good a time as any to bone up on my Calvin, since I’d heard so many good things about him.

Last semester was not the time. Three weeks after classes, I’m still slogging through it.

Understand, Calvin is good. In fact, as theologians go, he’s by far one of the most interested in the actual working out of the Christian life. I’ve even mentioned before that reading the *Institutes* was the closest thing in reading a book I’ve ever come to a direct worship experience: reading Calvin promotes a heart attitude of worship. But.

The problem with reading Calvin is that he wrote 400 years ago, and he wrote in Latin. (To his credit, he also wrote in 16th century French, but that doesn’t help me any.) And for some reason, even the best translations are horrible. They seem to think that Calvin has the best impact if they use the vocabulary and phrasing of mid-19th century Britain. So, they throw in extra commas, just for effect, and truly, the verbage choice is most astonishing, in its anachronism. Continue reading “Beholden?”

Trepidation

My wife and I have been married for just under a year. We were dating for nearly four years before that. Which is to say that she knows me pretty well. She can predict my moods. She knows that when I pour myself a glass of milk at night, I’m liable to leave the milk out. She knows that I don’t make things.

Which is why I’m nervous. Continue reading “Trepidation”

A Means to an End?

Nick, a member of Chesapeake Church, a Sovereign Grace church near Baltimore has made some very pointed comments regarding my “roadmap” post from about a month ago. He dearly loves the Sovereign Grace movement, particularly the King of Grace church in Methuen, which has received a lot of support from his home church. My post seems to have struck him as taking a lot for granted from an organization I barely even know, and so he suggests maybe I’m going about it the wrong way. The biggest concern is the impression that I’m looking to Sovereign Grace Ministries as merely a means to an end. I felt his thoughts were significant enough for me to make a new post by way of reply.

Reading back through what I wrote, I can see how it might strike a passing visitor that I was being flippant, even arrogantly presumptive, especially from the perspective of a member of the community upon which I am declaring intentions to inflict myself. And to a certain extent I was being flippant, but my intent was for it to be self-directed. Continue reading “A Means to an End?”

Christ’s Humanity

Honestly, in today’s environment, convincing somebody of Jesus’ humanity is hardly difficult. If they believe he existed at all, people believe that Jesus is human. Nevertheless, it’s important to recognize that Jesus was a man for the sake of saving us. Hebrews 2 says that “he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one origin… since the children share in flesh and blood, he himself took of the same things…. He had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.” If any part of him is less than human, it is precisely in that area that his salvation is less than effective. With that in mind, it’s worthwhile still to examine him as he was examined in Jerusalem, to see if there is any “flaw” in him, that is, any inhumanness. Continue reading “Christ’s Humanity”

Study and the Holy Spirit

It is a very foolish thing to attempt to study theology without the help of the Holy Spirit. Theologically, this makes sense because it is only through the Spirit that you may know the Son, even as it is only through the Son that you may know the Father. For how is it that we know that the scriptures are true? Not from facts and figures and undeniable proofs. Such things may be encouraging, but they aren’t enough to really convince. No, it is by the Holy Spirit’s witness to each individual that causes them to be able to say, “I believe.” Just as it is only the Holy Spirit who can open a person’s mind and heart, so that they can witness that Jesus Christ truly is the Son of God, and that his sacrifice was sufficient to accomplish all that he intended, it is only the Holy Spirit who can make us to believe, and therefore understand the scriptures. Who is it who is said to search the mind of God and reveal his secrets to us? In what real way may God be known at all, except by means of the Holy Spirit?

But more practically, it is foolish to attempt to study God without the aid of the God who wishes to be studied. Continue reading “Study and the Holy Spirit”