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Christmas in Northampton, Massachusetts, 1734

Dec7

From A Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of God by Jonathan Edwards.

And then it was, in the latter part of December, that the spirit of God began extraordinarily to set in, and wonderfully to work amongst us; and there were, very suddenly, one after another, five or six persons, who were to all appearances savingly converted, and some of them wrought upon in a very remarkable manner.

Particularly, I was surprised with the relation of a young woman, who had been one of the greatest company-keepers in the whole town. When she came to me, I had never heard that she was become in any wise serious, but by the conversation I then had with her, it appeared to me, that what she gave an account of, was a glorious work of God’s infinite power and sovereign grace; and that God had given her a new heart, truly broken and sanctified. I could not then doubt of it, and have seen much in my acquaintance with her since to confirm it.

What a wonderful Christmas celebration, even if the Puritans didn’t celebrate Christmas!

Sunday Salon: Love and Marriage

Oct16

The Sunday Salon.com

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP) — If leaders of Mexico City’s socialist democrat Party of the Democratic Revolution have their way, the city’s 2009 law legalizing gay “marriage” will be followed this year with temporary marriage licenses.

The minimum marriage contract would be for two years and could be renewed if the couple is happy, the bill’s co-author, Leonel Luna, told the Guardian newspaper. The licenses would include a pre-divorce agreement on the disposition of children and property if the couple decides to terminate the marriage.

“The proposal is, when the two-year period is up, if the relationship is not stable or harmonious, the contract simply ends,” Luna told the Guardian. “You wouldn’t have to go through the tortuous process of divorce.”

I wonder if one could write a dystopian/utopian novel about a society in which this kind of contract was the norm. What would a practice of moving every two years or so from one relationship to the next, always in search of that elusive “happiness”, do to people and families and societal stability? Would it be so very different from the society we’re living in now?

Why young Christians aren’t waiting anymore by Joe Blake.

“The article in Relevant magazine, entitled “(Almost) Everyone’s Doing It,” cited several studies examining the sexual activity of single Christians. One of the biggest surprises was a December 2009 study, conducted by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, which included information on sexual activity.

While the study’s primary report did not explore religion, some additional analysis focusing on sexual activity and religious identification yielded this result: 80 percent of unmarried evangelical young adults (18 to 29) said that they have had sex – slightly less than 88 percent of unmarried adults, according to the teen pregnancy prevention organization.”

So how is our culture very different from the Mexican socialist proposal that we legitimize short-term relationships and go on from there?

I still believe in marriage, life-long and for one man and one woman. However, if our culture has reached the point that this ideal is no longer practiced, even among a majority of professing Christians, what can we do to get the culture moving in a different direction?

Sociologically speaking, the one big difference – and it’s monstrous – between the biblical teaching and our culture is the arranged marriages of very young people. If you get married when you’re 13, you don’t have 15 years of temptation. ~Scott McKnight

I’m not suggesting, and neither is Mr. McKnight, that 13 year olds should be marrying. But what about seventeen, eighteen, and nineteen year olds? Why is it that eighteen year olds are old enough to join the army and old enough to vote, old enough to have sex, but not old enough to marry, according to cultural expectations?

We need stories, historical fiction, dystopian fiction and others, that explore the ramifications of these and other questions about marriage. If you are a writer, you have the power to move the conversation in our nation, not in a propagandistic way, but as a powerful by-product of the stories you choose to tell.

Small Town Sinners by Melissa Walker

Aug3

Nominated for 2011 Cybil Awards, Young Adult Fiction category. Nominated by Ashley at Book Labyrinth.

This YA novel featuring small town Christian young people gets many things right. The story is absorbing. The characters are believable and interesting. The themes and issues in the book–teen pregnancy, homosexual temptation, drunk driving, etc.—are issues that young people do face; the presentation is realistic and sensitive. The author shows respect for the beliefs of conservative Christian people. I thought the parts of the book where the main character and narrator, Lacy Anne Byer, is experiencing God through her “prayer language” (charismatic speaking in tongues) were particularly well written and understanding.

However, (you knew there was a however) I am somewhat annoyed by books in which it is assumed that Christians, young and old alike, have never thought about the things that they believe, and it takes some enlightened outsider to bring them to their senses and make them realize their parochialism and blindness. In this book, Lacey’s new boyfriend is that enlightened, understanding, broad-minded outsider who makes Lacey Anne see that the Christian answers that her parents have given her are inadequate and unsatisfying. I don’t have a problem with Lacey Anne questioning the things she has been taught; I would question some of things that Lacey Anne has apparently been taught. And often it does take a new person’s perspective or a new experience to jumpstart that questioning process. Tyson, Lacey’s new friend in the book, is so perfect, however, that his answers seem obviously right and good while Lacey’s conservative Christianity comes off looking ineffectual and untrustworthy.

It doesn’t help that the adults in the book are mostly hypocritical, in a mild, unthinking way. There are no real villains in the book (other than Satan); even the bully is seen to be reacting to the abuse he receives at home from his alcoholic father. However, Lacey’s parents have difficulty dealing with her friendships with kids who are not perfect Christians from perfect families, and Lacey’s dad, a pastor, is quite over-protective. I have dealt with what I consider to be over-protective families in my church and in the homeschooling community, and Lacey’s dad is not uncommon. However, he is something of a caricature and his views on homosexuality, dating, and teen pregnancy are not very nuanced or well articulated.

I also didn’t like the way the book strongly implied that if a guy is a nerd and artistic and creative in his clothing choices, and if he hangs out mostly with girls and gets bullied, then he might be suppressing his homosexual identity. Especially, he might be smothering those tendencies if he has grown up in a small town and been taught that homosexual behavior is immoral. Talk about stereotypes. Artistic men are not naturally gay and do not necessarily, or even probably, have same sex desires. And if one does have those temptations, I would argue, like the people in Lacey’s church, that it’s not a bad thing to reject homosexual behavior for yourself. In fact, I would still maintain that the repudiation of homosex is what the Bible teaches and what is best for a man or woman who is tempted in that way.

Overall, Small Town Sinners is a good book, but it does encourage the view that there are no answers, only questions. And parents are not the ones to go to with your questions; a kid your age from out of town who has experienced so much more of Life is more likely to know the meaning thereof than your small town, uncomprehending parents. My final complaint is that there is very little or no gospel in Lacy Anne’s church or in her ideas about Christianity, only rules. Ty, who encourages Lacey Anne to question that legalism, doesn’t have much concept of what to replace it with either. Forgiveness is discussed, but staying “pure” and avoiding sins (of the flesh) are the main focus of Lacey’s brand of Christianity.

I didn’t even get into the “Hell House” aspect of the plot, which provides an interesting bit of evangelical Americana for those interested, but you can read more about that drama at Linus’s Blanket or at Presenting Lenore. Take it with a grain of salt, and some questions of your own, but Small Town Sinners provides a good story and some challenging ideas for evangelical Christian teens and non-religious ones alike.

The Hardest Thing To Do by Penelope Wilcock

Jul24

I was re-reading The Peacemaker by Ken Sande of Peacemaker Ministries when I received Penelope Wilcock’s new book, The Hardest Thing To Do, in the mail. What a lovely (and convicting) serendipity! Ms. Wilcock’s new installment in the saga of the monks of St. Alcuin’s Abbey is a long time in coming. The original trilogy of books about St. Alcuin’s and Father Peregrine its abbot began with The Hawk and the Dove and continued in The Wounds of God and The Long Fall. These three books were published by Crossway in the early 1990’s.

Now we have a fourth book in the series, twenty years later, and it lives up to the fine standard set by the other three. In The Hardest Thing To Do, St. Alcuin’s has a new abbott, Father John, but the brothers are still serving each other and the same Lord, still living quiet, peaceable lives, still striving to practice the rule of St. Benedict in a fallen world. And of course, as is the way of this world, the brothers have a new challenge when they must decide what to do with a human “wolf” who has come into the sheepfold and who threatens to spoil both their peace and their way of life.

In The Hardest Thing To Do, Ms. Wilcock has dropped the framing story that she used in at least the first book of The Hawk and the Dove trilogy. In that first book, a mother was telling stories about the abbey of St. Alcuin’s to her daughters who were experiencing some of the same growing pains as the monks. The part of the novels that is most memorable, however, is the story of the monks themselves, so it was a good move to drop the frame and concentrate on the abbey.

I was concerned that this sequel, twenty years later, might not live up to the quality and depth of the first three books in the series, but I needn’t have worried. Ms. Wilcock, a Methodist minister, has a fine grasp of human foibles and sin and peace-making and the cost of following Christ in our interpersonal relationships. The book is about radical, costly forgiveness, and it doesn’t sugarcoat the difficulties of such a choice to forgive our enemies. Forgiveness and reconciliation in the face of real hurt truly are the hardest things to do.

Asking for forgiveness:

I am filled with terror lest you turn me away. I long for the beautiful Gospel that has always puzzled me, but that I know has a beacon in the life of this house. For the forgiveness and gentleness I have found, I should like the chance to show my gratitude. For the hurt and anger I have caused, I should like time to try and make amends. And I have glimpsed the face of Christ here. Before that glimpse dims and is smutched and bleared by the sordid life of the world, I should like to try if I might to touch for myself the vision of that fair loveliness. . . compassion . . . faith . . . peace.

I would pray that all of us could be enabled to do the hard work of forgiving and asking and receiving forgiveness because it’s the only way to true heart peace.

Jesus, My Father, the CIA, and Me: A Memoir . . . of Sorts by Ian Cron

Jun7

Official release date: June 7, 2011

Thanks to NetGalley, I was able to read this funny, touching sort-of memoir by recovering alcoholic pastor Ian Cron. I laughed out loud several times while I was reading, even though some of the subject matter in the memoir is quite serious and sad. Abuse, anger and an alcoholic father give the young Ian several reasons to lose trust in God and in his own ability to cope with the world.

I’ll give you a taste of the style and wit of the author so that you can see if it would suit your sense of humor and literary bent:

“I practiced in our basement with the bell of my horn stuffed into a pillow so the sound wouldn’t disturb my father. This practice regimen had the same effect marathoners experience when they train at high altitudes and then run a race at sea level. Once that pillow came off, I was like Miles Davis after six cans of Red Bull.”

“I discovered that if I titrated my overdeveloped vocabulary with just the right amount of sarcasm, my peers thought it was funny, not to mention impressive. Teachers call this kind of student a precocious pain in the butt. In Washington I’m told they call them press secretaries.”

“Most seventh graders don’t set out to make trouble. They are like puppies with impulse-control disorders. Opportunities for mischief arise, and they can’t stop themselves. This is why they should be crate-trained.”

“Tyler and I planned to put the convertible top down and drive around the beach in search of girls to impress. I’m told male peacocks do the same thing, but with tail feathers.”

If not one of those excerpts gives you a little giggle, you probably won’t enjoy the book because there’s a lot more of the same as Ian Cron retells the story of his childhood and his alcoholic CIA agent father and his mother who was, according to Ian, some amalgam of “Lucille Ball, Grace Kelly, and Margaret Thatcher.”

The religious part of the story starts out with a traditional Catholic upbringing, veers into agnosticism and anger with God, slowly slides into evangelicalism (Young Life) combined with Episcopalian charismatic revivalism, and then settles into a faith that is grounded in personal experience and study of Scripture and tradition, with a bit of emergent mysticism and love of Christian liturgy thrown in. Now that’s a journey, but Mr. Cron doesn’t make it sound nearly so confusing as I have managed to do, and he’s a lot more humorous. I’m not sure we’re in the same place, theologically speaking, but I think the man definitely has a God-touched story to tell. And I can “honor the story.”

Definitely read this one if you’re interested in an honest, open, spiritual memoir about a man with a dysfunctional family who struggles with forgiveness and with idolatry and with becoming the father that God wants him to be. The story in the penultimate chapter of the book (18) about Mr. Cron and his son and their adventure in diving and courage is worth reading, even if you don’t read anything else.

Thank you, Mr. Cron, for making me think and making me laugh. I need both.

Ian Cron’s blog.

Love Wins by Rob Bell

Jun4

Rob Bell is slick. I use that word to describe him and his book, Love Wins, because I believe it’s applicable, even charitable. (Charitable, because I’m trying not to say that he’s only interested in selling lots of books.) Immediately after I read the book, my first thought was, “What’s the big fuss?” I don’t agree with everything in Mr. Bell’s book, but I can certainly agree with much of it. Then, I began to go back and try to find the things I agreed with, those points that were supported by Scripture. First I found that even when I agreed with Bell’s exegesis of Scripture or his explanation of Christian doctrine, he often contradicted his own words in the next paragraph or on the next page. Then, I found that much of what I could support was phrased in the form of a question, and it was not a good kind of questioning. In fact, Mr. Bell seems to question in the same way that the serpent in the garden of Eden questioned: “Hath God truly said . . . ?”

Then, I saw, in the book and especially in the debate with Adrian Warnock linked below, that Mr. Bell likes to play games with words and with communication. When he is asked a question, he likes to not answer, but rather ask another question or turn the question back toward the interviewer, maybe with a slightly different emphasis or meaning. He reminds me of Humpty Dumpty who famously said, “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.” Only with Mr. Bell it’s usually more; words mean lots of things; stories mean lots of things, and Rob Bell chooses the story he likes the best and the meaning he wants to fit his chosen story.

“It’s important that we be honest about the fact that some stories are better than others. Telling a story in which billions of people spend forever somewhere in the universe trapped in a black hole of endless torment and misery with no way out isn’t a very good story. Telling a story about a God who inflicts unrelenting punishment on people because they didn’t do or say or believe the orrect thngs in a brief window of time called life isn’t a very good story.
In contrast, everybody enjoying God’s good world together with no disgrace or shame, justice being served, and all the wrongs being made right is a better story.” Love Wins, p.110-111.

Love Wins is supposed to be “a book about heaven, hell, and the fate of every person who ever lived.” However, don’t ask Rob Bell to tell you what the Bible says will happen to you after you die or whether you need to consciously choose to follow Christ in this life, or even whether or not God desires our obedient love for Himself so much that He gave His only begotten Son to secure our salvation from the ravages of sin and hell. Mr. Bell is likely to respond to those questions with a question of his own: “What do you think?” or even “What story do you want to be true about heaven and hell and your own fate?”

My answer to that bit of sophistry is: what I want to be true doesn’t change reality. I would dearly love to rewrite history and say that there never was any fall into sin. I would like for the Story to be all about God’s love and our obedience and love for Him with nothing to mar that perfect fellowship. But I live in a world of sin and suffering, some of that sin and suffering caused by me and the choices I have made, and the good news is that I can have hope and redemption and eternal life through the marvelous sacrifice of Jesus on my behalf. And because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, I can live an abundant eternal life with Him. That’s a good story and a true story, and it’s available to anyone who chooses to follow Jesus.

However, it’s also true that if any one of us chooses to go our own way, make up our own story, hold on to our sin, and worship some idolatrous figment of our own imagination, God will allow us our tragic freedom. And He will someday say, “Depart from me. I never knew you. (Because you never chose to know Me.)” And that, too, is eternal, and it will be an irrevocable decision. So, in a sense, each of us does get to choose his own story; either we believe the truth or we choose the lie.

I found the book Love Wins ultimately to be slick and slippery, and in the interviews and discussions I saw with Mr. Bell, he comes across as evasive and flippant. Although I think it’s O.K. to smile and even laugh as we discuss important things, Mr. Bell doesn’t seem to seriously care about truth. In fact, I’m not sure he believes that truth is knowable. If not, then we might as well eat, drink and be merry, right?

Adrian Warnock, a Christian blogger from the U.K., debated Rob Bell when Bell was doing a book tour in the UK, and then Warnock wrote a series of posts, engaging key points on which he disagrees with Mr. Bell.

Pastor Kevin DeYoung writes an excellent critique of the book from a Reformed perspective.

Prodigal Sons and Daughters

May28

I read about the following rebels and wanderers as an encouragement to myself. I will not give up on the people in my life who have chosen to walk away from God. I thought some of my readers might also need similar encouragement.

Abraham Piper, son of pastor and author John Piper, writes about 12 Ways to Love Your Wayward Child.

Reb Bradley on Solving the Crisis in Homeschooling:

I once believed and taught that a parent could follow the right biblical steps and be assured of raising children who remained faithful to God from childhood into their adult years. In fact, as a parent of young children I judged as a failure any parent whose young adult children were prodigal. However, as my own children aged and I discovered that they were self-determining individuals with their own walks with Christ, I came to the alarming realization that I had a lot of control over their outside, but not their inside. They were like all people who were faced with the choice of whether or not they were going to listen to Christ and follow him. As Christians we all encounter opportunities many times in our lives – to choose to follow Christ or not. It was a rude awakening for me when I saw that even the best parenting could not exempt a person from making the wrong choice when faced with temptation. I do believe that by our influence we can greatly increase the likelihood our children will love and follow Christ, but I see nothing in Scripture that guarantees well-trained children will never succumb to temptation.

Consider the parable of the Prodigal Son – the righteous father raised two sons who turned out sinful – one went deep into sin and then repented – the other stayed home obediently, yet was polluted with self-righteousness and bitterness. Could the Father take blame or the credit for their sinful choices? Not at all, for the story is about God the Father Himself – it is a lesson about His mercy to His children when they fail. May we learn from God’s example!

Loving Those Who Leave by Matthew Lee Anderson.

Some books that might be helpful in this regard:
Nonfiction
Confessions by St. Augustine.
Prodigals and Those Who Love Them by Ruth Bell Graham.
The Prodigal God by Tim Keller.
Rebel With a Cause by Franklin Graham.
Surprised by Grace: God’s Relentless Pursuit of Rebels by Tullian Tchividjian.

Fiction
Beside the Bonnie Briar Bush by Ian Maclaren.
Les Miserables by Victor Hugo.
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson.
Home by Marilynne Robinson.

For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:38-39

What Good Is God? by Philip Yancey

Apr30

In his Bible study curriculum Experiencing God, and book of the same name, Henry Blackaby advised Christians to “go where you see God at work” and join Him in what He is doing. In this book by prolific Christian author and journalist Philip Yancey, Mr. Yancey does just that. He attempts to find the places where and people among whom God is working and introduce readers to what God is doing in the world.

Some of the people and places are: a convention of former prostitutes, Muslim background (Christian) believers in the Middle East, Virginia Tech after the shooting that claimed 32 lives in 200?, Chinese Christians in underground churches, South Africa where Christians work to overcome centuries of mistrust and racism, Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, a Memphis health center, and even a Bible College in the Southern U.S. where some can feel left out and left behind. In each of these disparate places, Mr. Yancey finds God at work and joins Him by speaking to the felt and unfelt needs of the group before him. I found these chapters to be inspiring, comforting, and challenging all at the same time.

I was inspired by Christian believers in difficult situations where following Christ is not a decision to be made lightly. I was reminded that Jesus said to take up my cross daily and follow Him, and that daily obedience requires sacrifice no matter where you live.

I was comforted to know that many Christians, former prostitutes and alcoholics and racists, realize that they live in daily dependence on God. So do I. I don’t have it all together, but God does. He will choose to use me, even to save me, in His sovereign will. I I just have to trust and obey, as best I can. He’s in control.

I was challenged to see that many people face much worse circumstances, both personal and political, than I do. Yet they remain faithful. I can surely follow Him daily in my little corner of Major Suburbia.

Mr. Yancey proposes to answer the titular question, “What good is God?” He does so by telling stories of God at work in the world, stories of humble people serving God as best they can, sometimes in difficult life conditions. This anecdotal evidence and reply format leaves the book feeling somewhat disorganized and disjointed, but ultimately such a question is best answered by the changes in people’s lives rather than a formal and systematic apologetic.

Faith ‘n Fiction Roundtable:
Linus’s Blanket
My Friend Amy
Book Addiction
Carrie’s Books and Movies
Book Journey
Ignorant Historian
My Random Thoughts
The 3R’s Blog: Reading, ‘Riting and Randomness
Word Lily
Tina’s Book Reviews

The Cross and the Switchblade by David Wilkerson

Apr28

David Wilkerson, author of The Cross and the Switchblade and founder of World Challenge Ministries, died in a car crash today, Charisma and CBN are reporting.

CBN reports that Wilkerson was 79. The church that he founded, Times Square Church in New York City, has more than 8,000 members. His wife Gwen, was also involved in the crash and was rushed to the hospital where she is said to be in critical condition.

Oddly enough, my English/History class at homeschool co-op is reading Wilkerson’s most famous book, The Cross and the Switchblade, this week. My son, who is in the class, told me yesterday that he thought the gang stuff in the book was exaggerated. I told him him he was mistaken. Gangs were and are very bad, but God is bigger.

I remember reading The Cross and the Switchblade over thirty years ago, and I re-read it last week. It holds up. The story of a country preacher who takes on the street gangs of New York City armed with nothing but the sword of the Spirit and the shield of Faith was just as compelling last week as it was when I read it as a teenager growing up in West Texas far from the evils of the big city, but not far at all from many of the same issues that Wilkerson faced in his work with street people and gang members. The poverty Wilkerson described in his book was foreign to me as a middle class teenager, but I had friends who had given themselves over to drugs and to illicit sexual relationships and who were just as much in need of a Saviour as anyone in New York City. And I saw in my own heart, too, the possibility for sin and evil just as horrific as that of any drug-addicted junkie in NYC. There but for the grace of God . . . Even though I never did agree with Rev. Wilkerson’s Pentecostalism, I certainly found his commitment to the Lord Jesus Christ and his dependence on the Holy Spirit to be inspiring and encouraging.

How did David Wilkerson’s life and minstry impact you? (on Facebook-CBN)

David WIlkerson’s last blog post, faithful to the end: “Beloved, God has never failed to act but in goodness and love. When all means fail—his love prevails. Hold fast to your faith. Stand fast in his Word. There is no other hope in this world.”

Now that’s a legacy.