Just a little bit

Perhaps when a person says, “I’d just like a little God, thank you very much,” she or he is really saying, “I’d rather not give the parts of my life that I really care about over to God, so I’ll just hold on to this, that, oh, and that, too…”

It doesn’t work that way. When I read Scripture, I see the truth and necessity of a life wholly surrendered to and dependent upon the Holy Spirit.—Forgotten God, page 21

<idle musing>
Sad isn't it? Here's the creator of the universe, who has never stopped wooing us, trying to show us that he is all love. And we say, "Thank you very much, but I'd rather wallow in my pigsty."
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It is enough

[W]hatever You give me besides Yourself, whatever You reveal to me concerning Yourself, and whatever You promise, is too small and insufficient when I do not see and fully enjoy You alone. For my heart cannot rest or be fully content until, rising above all gifts and every created thing, it rests in You.—Thomas à Kempis

Thought for a Tuesday

Beware lest even as a Christian, you fall into Satan’s trap. You may have found and come to know God in the Lord Jesus Christ, receiving Him sincerely as your Redeemer, yet if you do not enter in the mystery of godliness and allow God to be in you the origins of His own image, you will seek to be godly by submitting yourself to external rules and regulations, and by conformity to behavior patterns imposed upon you by the particular Christian society which you have chosen, and in which you hope to be found “acceptable.” You will in this way perpetuate the pagan habit of practicing religion in the energy of the “flesh,” and in the very pursuit of righteousness commit idolatry in honoring “Christianity” more than Christ!—The Mystery of Godliness, page 49

Too much?

Some of you would like it if I said we were going to find a healthy balance between unhealthy extremes. That’s not what we’re going to do. When we are referring to God, balance is a huge mistake. God is not just one thing we add to the mix called life. He wants an invitation from us to permeate everything and every part of us. In the same way, seeking a “healthy balance” of the Holy Spirit assumes that there are some who have too much Holy Spirit and others who have too little. I have yet to meet anyone with too much Holy Spirit.—Forgotten God, page 20

Finney on theological education

With hearts as cold as marble, instead of going right to the source of light, they go and gather up the husks of learning, and peddle it out among the churches as religious instruction. Horrible! While they do thus, we never shall have an efficient ministry. It is right they should get all the help they can from learning, to understand the word of God. But they ought never to rest in anything they get from book learning, until they are satisfied that God has put them in possession of the very idea which he would have them receive.—Charles Finney

Subordination (grammatical!)

Among the early Indo-European languages, Ancient Greek and especially Latin present a highly developed system of finite subordination, with embedding and consecutio. Naturally, a distinction should be made among different authors and genres, since consectio is not always respected in popular or unofficial writings. Even Cicero, whose elaborate modus dicendi is largely responsible for the complex organization of the sentence in the literary languages of the Romance domain, does not always abide by consecutio in the letters to his intimates. However, a remarkable difference may be noticed between a text in Latin or Ancient Greek on the one hand and a text in Hittite or Indo-Iranian on the other, since the latter languages make extensive use of adjoining by means of correlative elements, without any obligatory temporal or modal predetermination of the subordinate verb. The Germanic, Baltic, and Slavic languages, as well as Classical Armenian, are positioned somewhere in the middle of the two extremes—Latin and Hittite—since they often attest embedded constructions, but do not have a productive system of consecutio. Latin and Ancient Greek consecutio is probably related to the spread of oratory and rhetoric in these languages. The art of persuading in judiciary and politic discourse needs an attentive manipulation of backgrounded and foregrounded information, as well as a careful distinction among more or less reliable sources and among more and less subjective viewpoints. Such exigency is less cogent in narrative texts.— The Bloomsbury [formerly Continuum] Companion to Historical Linguistics, page 245

<idle musing>
Having studied Classical Greek, Latin, and Hittite, I can vouch for the dramatic difference in the way they express subordination. Hittite is definitely simpler—in that area, anyway!

But it got me to thinking about discourse analysis and Aspect/Actionsart/Tense/Mood and the ramifications this has. No ideas yet, but just food for thought.

By the way, this is a wonderful book. It's making all kinds of stuff that I've noticed in the various languages I've studied over the years fall into place. Of course, there a paragraphs where I get to the end and don't have a clue what they are saying. Sometimes I wonder if it is even English!

[Updated 13:20] I added Mood to the Aspect/Actionsart/Tense because in Greek it is a sequence of mood, not just tense. I hadn't thought of that at the time of writing. So, it gets even more interesting (or less to some) in that you now have the whole TAM spectrum involved...
</idle musing>

Prayer for a Sunday

Grant, most sweet and loving Jesus, that I may seek my repose in You above every creature; above all health and beauty; above every honor and glory; every power and dignity; above all knowledge and cleverness, all riches and arts, all joy and gladness; above all fame and praise, all sweetness and consolation; above every hope and promise, every merit and desire; above all the gifts and favors that You can give or pour down upon me; above all the joy and exultation that the mind can receive and feel; and finally, above the angels and archangels and all the heavenly host; above all things visible and invisible; and may I seek my repose in You above everything that is not You, my God.—Thomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ

In the mail

Three books from Baker Academic/Brazos were in the mailbox today when we went to the Post Office. They were

A New Heaven and a New Earth

Bonhoeffer as Youth Worker

Kingdom Conspiracy

I was glad to see that they are all Green Press Initiative which means they are using recycled paper in publishing them.

I'm sure you'll be reading excerpts from them here sometime soon. : )

Mystery cults and Christianity

Modern research, on the other hand, has shown that the constructions of scholars around 1900 were ideologically motivated and were wrong in three important respects. First, there was no such category as ‘Mystery religions’ but only Mystery cults; the cult of Mithras was, perhaps, the only more-or-less exclusive Mystery cult, whereas other divinities were also worshipped outside their own Mystery cults. Second, these cults were not ‘Oriental’ religions, as Cumont claimed, but properly Greco-Roman, albeit with some exotic tinges (Ch. V.3). Thirdly, these cults had virtually no impact on the emergence of Christianity nor were they all interested in the afterlife (see Preface).

There never was a flood of ‘Oriental religions’, as suggested, once again, by Cumont. As we have seen, there were only a few Mystery cults of Isis, and although the number of followers of Mithras in the West was considerable, it should not be overstated. As far as numbers are concerned, Mystery cults never posed a serious threat to emerging Christianity. There are only a few possible references to pagan Mystery cults in the New Testament, which should not surprise us, as interest in the Mysteries flourished most in the second century AD. It is in that period that we start to notice a shared interest by both pagans and Christians in the Mysteries. Pagans seem to have been struck by similarities, but Christians stressed the differences.

The fact that initiation into the Mysteries could be a costly affair and that the Mithras cult was limited to males meant that pagan Mysteries were no competition for Christianity on the religious market, as the latter always received young and old, rich and poor, male and female into its fold. Moreover, unlike the Mysteries, Christianity was not esoteric but at first openly proclaimed its message, which was clear to all.—Initiation into the Mysteries of the Ancient World, pages 188-189

What if you were asked?

Had a materialistically minded atheist been consulted in the face of this dilemma [feeding the 5000], the first question he would have asked would have been, “How much money do you have?” What then would have been the difference between Philip’s outlook and that of an unbelieving atheist? There would have been no difference!—The Mystery of Godliness, page 30

<idle musing>
And what difference between Philip's outlook and most Christians? Little, if any, I fear...

In the immortal words of Pogo, "We have met the enemy and he is us." : (
</idle musing>

Hidden agenda

“Both the growth in historical analysis of early Christianity, as exemplified by David Friedrich Strauss’s (1808–1874) influential Das Leben Jesu, and the secularising trend in late nineteenth-century Germany had translated into attempts to derive early Christianity from its pagan surroundings. In other words, there was a hidden agenda here that was looking for support from antiquity for its own abandonment of the Christian Faith. That is why the more adventurous theologians, members of and sympathisers with the so-called Religionsgeschichtliche Schule of Göttingen, started to derive the apostle Paul’s theology from a Mithras cult in Tarsus, his birthplace, even though no Mystery cult of Mithras is attested in Tarsus nor is any Mithras Mystery found anywhere before the end of the first century (Ch. V.2).”—Initiation into the Mysteries of the Ancient World, page 167

<idle musing>
Please don't confuse them with the facts! Christianity can't be real—that would mean they would have to change their way of life! Impossible! Man is the measure of all things. If the facts don't fit, then we'll make them fit!
</idle musing>

There's more

We are not all we were made to be when everything in our lives and churches can be explained apart from the work and presence of the Spirit of God.—Forgotten God, page 18

<idle musing>
Amen to that! We should embrace the presence of the Holy Spirit. That doesn't mean being weird! It means allowing the Holy Spirit to transform us. The changes in our life should be explainable only by the power of the Spirit.

Sure, there might be signs and wonders. There probably will be! But, and this is a huge one, the emphasis should always be a life transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit. Anything else is just showmanship. </idle musing>

Finney on Friday

No degree of learning, or power of discrimination as to the didactics of theology, will ever make a man a successful teacher of religion, unless he enjoys the illuminating powers of the Holy Ghost. He is blind if he supposes he understands the Bible without this, and if he undertakes to teach religion, he deceives himself, and all who depend on him, and both will fall into the ditch together.—Charles Finney

What? No da Vinci Code?

“In sum, we see that all efforts to derive earliest Christianity from the ancient Mysteries have been unsuccessful. Even the word mystêrion is rarely encountered in the earliest Christian writings.”—Initiation into the Mysteries of the Ancient World, page 177

<idle musing>
Take that, Dan Brown! : )
</idle musing>

Appearance versus reality

“It is clear from the many bones found in and near Mithraea that Mithras’ worshippers followed this example by dining and, especially, drinking together, but their sacrifices consisted mainly of suckling pigs and chickens, not bulls. In other words, the bull banquet represents the ideal sacrifice, not the real practice: representation of ritual and its actual practice should not be confused.”—Initiation into the Mysteries of the Ancient World, page 154

<idle musing>
So the problem of appearance versus reality isn't a new one! This is about the cult of Mithras, the bull-slayer. Maybe he didn't really slay the bull—just a chicken! : )
</idle musing>

The (de)evolution of Evangelicalism

Excellent post today by Ken Schenck, on the history of Evangelicalism—from the 1700s until today:

My point is that what we call evangelicalism today is a synthesis of two different traditions, a synthesis that took place in the late 1940s. The key focus of the earlier evangelicals was conversion, pushing individuals to a moment of decision leading to justification by faith and an assurance of salvation. In its Wesleyan form, it had always included social activism as well (think Salvation Army).

Now it was synthesized with the theology of the primarily Calvinist fundamentals. In reaction to the social gospel and the FDR administration, social justice was removed from the concerns of evangelicals. It now became questionable to focus on helping the needy. You will now hear these new evangelicals saying that, with limited resources, the church needs to put all its resources into conversion rather than the less important task of helping people.

Now penal substitution as a theory of atonement became very important. The word inerrancy, a concept that had earlier been invoked against the abolition of slavery, became part of the mix. These neo-evangelicals had money and would grow in power. They would set up publishing houses and magazines. They would take the name "evangelical" and dismiss the earlier stream as "fundamentalists," those stupid holiness, Pentecostal, and dispensational people who hid from the fight against an increasingly secular nation.

<idle musing>
And that is one of the biggest reasons I don't consider myself an Evangelical anymore. I am an 18th century Evangelical. I believe in conversion, justification by faith, assurance of salvation, and transformation that results in social activism!

The left doesn't like me because I believe only God can truly transform things; the right thinks I'm a compromising Socialist! What to do?

By the way, do read the whole post; it's quite short.
</idle musing>

The problem of e-books

I love books—hardback, paperback, yes, even e-books. I love the ease of carrying a large number of books that the e-book option gives me. I read them on my iPad, my MacBook, and my desktop computer. I read them as iBooks, Kindle books, Nook books, PDFs, Google books, even CBD's e-reader. I still prefer physical books, and I prefer PDFs in e-books.

But I've been running into a problem lately. I depend heavily on interlibrary loan (ILL) for lots of the books I read. I don't want to purchase books that I will only read once and never refer to again. And our local library isn't likely to purchase things like Pardee's The Ugaritic Texts and the Origins of West-Semitic Literary Composition or Rowe's Acts commentary World Upside Down! After all, we only have 1500 residents and maybe 3 people would even consider reading them. Not a wise use of library funds. So I use interlibrary loan.

But lately I've been running into a problem: e-books. Specifically, academic e-books. One of the big benefits of e-books, so they say, is that they can be accessed anywhere, that the Internet is leveling the economic barriers to a good education. Well, kind of. There is no doubt that some of the offerings through places like iTunes U are great. I've listened to some of the lectures from places like Yale; good stuff.

But have you ever tried to access an electronic book (EBSCO or ebrary) from a computer that is not located on campus? Have you ever succeeded if you aren't a current student/faculty member? Probably not.

That's a problem. If it were a physical book, I could request it via ILL and have it in a couple of weeks. Not so with an electronic one. For example, I recently tried to request a copy of Bloomsbury [formerly Continuum] Companion to Historical Linguistics via ILL. There are three copies available in Minnesota—two via the U of Minnesota and one in a library consortium. Not bad for an esoteric book like that...

So I tried to request it via ILL on the Internet. No success. So I went into the library to ask them to request it (they know me quite well...). This was about a month ago. I received the book yesterday. From the University of Oklahoma! A quick look at Worldcat shows that there are only 32 libraries with the physical book! Granted, that was a quick look; I'm sure I could uncover more if I looked more carefully...but the point remains the same: how can an independent scholar get a copy? The tendency, especially in linguistics and other more "esoteric" subjects, is toward e-books.

I understand the logic. Space is expensive and limited in a library. It makes sense to use that space on books that will be accessed by more than a handful of people. But what about access for those who aren't the privileged few? What about access for those of us who are 2.5 hours from an academic library and 5 hours from a really good one?

Just an
</idle musing>

What's the source?

The Christian life can only be explained in terms of Jesus Christ, and if your life as a Christian can still be explained in terms of you—your personality, your will-power, yourgift, your talent, yourmoney, your courage, your scholarship, your dedication, yoursacrifice, or your anything—then although you may havethe Christian life, you are not yet living it!—The Mystery of Godliness, page 28 (emphasis original)

Where did he go?

There is a big gap between what we read in Scripture about the Holy Spirit and how most believers and churches operate today. In many modern churches, you would be stunned by the apparent absence of the Spirit in any manifest way. And this, I believe, is the crux of the problem.—Forgotten God, page 16

Christ, our?

When it is said that Christ is our sanctification, or our holiness, it is meant that he is the author of our holiness. He is not only the procuring cause, by his atonement and intercession, but by his direct intercourse with the soul he himself produces holiness. He is not the remote but the immediate cause of our being sanctified. He works our works in us, not by suspending our own agency, but he so controls our minds, by the influences of his Spirit in us in a way perfectly consistent with our freedom, as to sanctify us. And this, also, is received by faith.—Charles Finney

<idle musing>
Amen and amen! A very good summary of what sanctification/holiness is. We aren't some kind of zombie, possessed by a foreign spirit; we are filled with the Spirit of God, but at any moment can act against that Spirit—but why would we want to?!

Unfortunately, we sometimes do. We don't have to, but we can. That is where the tension of living the Christian life arises.

Of course, if we believe we have to sin, we won't even try not to sin. The illustration that I read years ago in Turkeys and Eagles is that of a person wearing a white tuxedo versus someone wearing a pair of overalls that they use to slop the hogs.

Which one is more likely to try to avoid the mud? The one in the overalls, dirty with mud and pig dung? Or the one in the white tux?

Exactly! If you see yourself as dirty with sin, you are more likely to fall into sin. But, if you see yourself as a saint (the biblical view of a Christian, by the way), you are more likely to try to stay clean. Remember, you are only clean by the saving act of Christ! You are not clean by any self-effort.
</idle musing>