Why is it?

Why is it that people feel compelled to defend themselves rather than simply listening and dialoguing? For example, recently I was talking with someone and they brought up the current tax structure (not something I enjoy discussing). They talked about a rich friend of theirs who has left the country and is now living in Panama. He talked about the beautiful setting, the fact that it was safely behind a barbed wire fence, and that the sunrises were beautiful to see.

I commented that I had a hard time reconciling that with scripture. I asked how they could interact with their neighbors. This person immediately began to talk about how many other houses there were in the compound and how they flew back to the States regularly to interact with others.

I replied that I couldn't see Peter or Paul living like that. That opened the floodgates (it almost always does!). They began to expound on how many good works that person did. The thousands of dollars that were donated to missions in Africa, the number of missions projects that were funded by them.

I simply said that I wasn't telling them how to live. I personally felt it was unbiblical and therefore chose to live more simply, in and among the people of my community. If they felt it was a justifiably biblical lifestyle, then fine. The other person still insisted on defending their rich friend's lifestyle. But they never once cited a scriptural text or precedence—although such texts could easily be found!

So, why is it that they felt compelled to defend that lifestyle in a confrontational way? I didn't say they were wrong. I didn't say they should change. I simply said that I couldn't justify such a lifestyle biblically. I thought it was an invitation to a discussion. I was willing to be shown where I was wrong. I figured that with all the learning and education this person had that they would be able to rise to the occasion with a biblical foundation.

Nope. Didn't happen. Never has. The response is always the same. How sad. We let culture define success. We value the asphalt of heaven instead of the true treasures of heaven...

Easy-believism

Likewise to insist that mere profession of faith irrespective of the character of one’s life and conduct is justifying is to engage in a kind of easy-believism, it runs foul of the warning of Jas. 2.14-26, and it denies the transforming power of the gospel. For Paul obedience is not a work in the sense that it makes a claim upon God (e.g. Rom. 4.4-5), but obedience is the tangible out working of faith. Faith and obedience are inseparable even if they are not completely identical. —The Saving Righteousness of God, page 177

<idle musing >
As I say so often, no transformation, no Christianity
</idle musing >

Days 2 & 3

I didn't post yesterday, so I'll run two days together (they've already run together in my mind, anyway!).

I should have taken a picture at the beginning of each day, but the piles of new releases have dropped dramatically. We've sold out of a number of them and are down to one left on several. Time and the Biblical Hebrew Verb sold out the first day except for one copy. Diachrony in Biblical Hebrew wasn't far behind.

Had breakfast in the morning with Bobby K from Hendrickson; it's always a pleasure to talk with him. We talked business some, but also caught up on all the happenings in each of our lives since the last time we saw each other in March. Their shipment of Novum Testamentum Graece got caught in hurricane Sandy and was delayed.

Sunday evening Emanuel, Andrew, and I went to dinner together. Emanuel told me to pick the place, but he wanted it to be vegan. He told me that it was his way of recognizing the years of going wherever he preferred and me never complaining about it. I chose a place called Karyn's, on the north side. He called it the "last supper" as it is probably the last meal we will have together. The food was good, but I'm missing a good home-cooked meal right about now. I've been on the road for 2 weeks and am missing Debbie and home. Only one week left, with only 2 days of that away from Debbie.

This morning, I took Andrew around to the various publishers and introduced him. It's embarrassing to hear them talk so highly of me; I don't think I'm that good. Sure, I enjoy my work and put a lot of energy into it, but I'm just a faithful servant doing my job.

I went to lunch with Ramon from American Bible Society today. It's been an annual tradition of ours to have lunch and share what God's been doing in each of our lives. Hard to believe we've been doing it for nearly 10 years now. Those years have seen both my kids get married and have kids of their own. His kids have gone through the difficult teenage years and come out loving the Lord and wanting more of him. It's been good to see answers to prayer.

Monday night is always the Eisenbrauns dinner. During the conference, we don't always have a chance to share what we've been learning, what's working, what's not, what new proposals we've got, etc. So, Monday night we all go out to eat together and talk about the show. It's pretty obvious to us that our experiment of paying the tax or paying the shipping was a success. We're not sure about the PDF experiment yet. It appears to be a success, but probably could have benefited from more advance publicity. Of course, that was pretty hard to do when we didn't get the technical details working until less than a week before the conference started!

Tomorrow is the final day and it starts earlier than the other days. At noon we tear down, which is always a fun and interesting experience. I'll be curious to see what Dan and Andrew's reactions are to seeing the dark underbelly of a conference for the first time. I'll try to get some good pictures and post them on Facebook.

AAR/SBL, Day 1, part 2

Because AAR/SBL is in Chicago this year, we decided to bring as many staff up for a day or two as possible. Today, we had 5 extra people. Melody and Carina, two of our customer service people, Bev, one of our editors, Pam, our prepress manager, and Andy, our graphic artist, all came. Actually the first four came up Friday and spent the night. Andy caught an early train and got there a bit later.

Melody and Carina manned (personned??) the booth and did a great job. They enjoyed putting faces to the names they see every day. Bev and Pam met with people. Andy wandered around getting ideas, taking pictures (he's a great photographer), and deciding what he wanted to do differently for next year with our booth.

This year, we are trying some different things. First, we are paying the sales tax if you buy a book at the conference. Chicago tax is 9.5%, so that is essentially giving an extra 10% off. Second, if you decide to order the book at the conference, we are paying the shipping. Third, we are selling PDFs of our books. If you want the book and the PDF, we are only charging an extra $19.00—and you get the book on a 2 GB USB drive that says Eisenbrauns. How's that for a deal? And the PDF is DRM free...we call it our No Wait, No Weight sale—you don't have to wait for the book to be shipped and it doesn't add any weight to your suitcase.

Of course, we also are offering our new mug for free if you order or purchase $150 or more. If you want to buy the mug—and who wouldn't—it is only $9.95. A steal at twice the price :)

The rest of the day after my ASOR excursion was relatively uneventful. As always, I saw a lot of old friends, met some new ones, and had a good time pointing people to books that I thought would be helpful to them. That's the best part of the conference; it's all about the people and helping them find what they need.

The problem with where the conference is this year is that there is nothing in the area when it comes to restaurants. You have to drive or take a cab to everything. Tonight, we didn't want to go anywhere near downtown, so we looked for something relatively close. Someone, who shall remain nameless, found what sounded like a good place close by. So, after bidding the day trippers adieu, the remaining ones of us, except Andrew, whose wife and daughter were with him, loaded into Gina's vehicle and drove there. Turns out the place is a takeout only. No problem, so we thought. A quick Internet search revealed an alternative about a block away. So, we walked on over to what turned out to be another takeout only. Hmmm...back to the Internet. Back into the vehicle. We headed for an Italian restaurant that was nearby. Parked the vehicle, walked past a burger joint, a Subway and into the restaurant. An hour and a half wait! Not happening. So, we walked back past the Subway and the burger joint and went to a Thai restaurant that Jim had mentioned as being very good as we walked past it on the way to the Italian place.

It was very good. And cheap! Rare combinations, but welcome to our travel budget...While we were there, Dan checked his Facebook and saw that Andy had gone to a Greek restaurant before boarding the train and was having flaming cheese. Andy and I had gone to that restaurant at an AIA conference in Chicago several years ago. Unfortunately, he had misjudged his schedule and had to run to get his train before he could do more than have an appetizer. He always wanted to go back. Tonight he did...

AAR/SBL Day1, or a comedy of errors

Day one is always the most tiring day for me. I make sure I stick around the booth to answer questions that may arise. About 4:30, I usually realize I haven't sat more than about 15 minutes all day. This year was a bit different, though.

Eisenbrauns always attends ASOR before AAR/SBL begins, but we have always ended Friday around noon. This year, because both are in Chicago and we had staff coming up for Saturday, we decided to sell at ASOR on Saturday as well. Merna volunteered—or was volunteered, not sure which!—to man the ASOR booth on Saturday. The plan was to close up there around noon and then have me drive from McCormick Place to ASOR's downtown exhibit and help her pack up.

Problem: I have a "clipped" driver's license. What that means is that I have a new Minnesota driver's license coming and am still using the Indiana one with a clipped corner and a piece of paper saying that the new one is in the mail. The problem is that the paper expired and the new license came the day after I left for Indiana. So, essentially, I have no driver's license. While the probability that I would be stopped was small, that was not a chance I wanted to take! The profit margin at conferences is thin enough without a hefty fine like that to pay.

So, Gina drove me up there so I could play pack mule for the books. Commence comedy of errors. Gina assumed I knew where the ASOR hotel was; I assumed she knew. We got out of the parking ramp and she asks where we were going. I looked at her with a mystified look and said that I thought she knew. She pulled off to the side of the street while she entered the name of the hotel into the GPS. We knew it was the Marriott on Miracle Mile. Fine, the GPS sent us down Michigan Ave. No problem...except that the festival of lights was going to happen Friday evening. And there was going to be a Disney parade at 5:00 PM. And they were going to close Michigan Avenue to traffic and pedestrians. And everybody and their brother seemed to be downtown.

Fine, so it just will take a bit longer. But the GPS took us to the Marriott Courtyard on the Miracle Mile. Gina dropped me there, not knowing it was the wrong one, and went to get gas in her vehicle. So, here I am in the wrong hotel with no idea where the correct one is. So, I called Merna. The call dropped before we could say anything. That happened three times. Finally, I got through, found out that the hotel was only about a block or so away. No problem.

Once I got to the hotel, I went up to the 5th floor, found Merna and we went to get our empty boxes to pack the books in. The room was locked. No one was at the registration desk. No one with a key was anywhere on the floor...not good.

I went down to the first floor, found someone with a key, and they opened the room for us. We packed up the books and proceeded to the first floor. Now we had to contact Gina, warn her that the GPS sent her to the wrong hotel and try to get her to the correct one. We couldn't trust the GPS, though. It had sent her on a wrong path the night before as well...so we tried to tell her where to go and how to get back to us, but one way streets downtown can be a problem...

We finally got reunited, loaded the car and headed back out to the massive amounts of traffic. We made very slow progress, and I had an appointment to choose next year's booth locations. It looked like I wouldn't make it, so I called Jim to have him cover for me. No answer. So, I called Andrew; he answered, but he and Jim both had a meeting at the same time I did. Bummer. Major bummer. If you miss your appointment, you risk losing a choice spot. Andrew did get a hold of Dan, though, and Dan said he would go. The problem is that Dan had never done this before and wasn't sure what to do...

Well, we managed to get to Lake Shore Drive and from there is was smooth sailing. We made it back to McCormick Place 5 minutes before my meeting. I moved quickly to get to the meeting. I got there only to discover I had the wrong time...I had another 25 minutes!

We got the booths we wanted.

Day zero

Day Zero is setup day. It began early, as I mentioned yesterday, with a check-in at the Truck Marshalling yard. We got the necessary paperwork and drove to the exhibit hall.

In case you've never been to McCormick place, it is huge. The road snaked around underneath to a checkpoint. The guard looked at our paperwork, wrote down our license number and told us to go ahead. We drove up a relatively steep ramp, only to find a line of trucks. I've been in lines like that before...sometimes for a hour or more. But, this one moved in a few minutes. I was very relieved to find out that all of them turned left to the South building; we are in the West building. We drove up and found the dock had plenty of open bays. We had a low back rental and they didn't have dock levelers.

I thought we might have to tear the skids apart and rebuild them on the ground—not something I wanted to do at 7:30 in the morning!

I needn't have been concerned, though. A forklift driver just lifted the skid off the back, pallet jack and all (we had brought along a pallet jack in case they were going to charge us to use theirs—you can never be too careful). Then he put the pallet jack back on the truck so we could move the back skid close enough for him to lift it off. We built a third skid consisting of the Skyline on the spot (The Skyline is the back display that we use).

Set up went the best it ever has, except for my little snafu :) We were done before 2:30, but Deo and Carta hadn't arrived yet, so I stuck around, doing the Deal-of-the-weekend—a great deal, by the way—and waited for them. They both arrived in due time and I wondered the conference hall, drooling over the books.

Last night, I went out for dinner with Emanuel (from Carta) and his granddaughter to a nice Italian restaurant. Emanuel usually tries to have a family member who lives in the States with him. The restaurant was nice, noisy, but nice. The company was delightful, as well. In a massive brain fart, I ordered a mushroom and spinach pizza, forgetting all about the cheese on it! That was the first animal protein I have had in about 14 months!

Transformation is the goal

Romans 12–15 are, homiletically speaking, the most under preached passages in Evangelical churches. This is travesty since in these chapters we find manifold resources for living out the Christian faith in a polytheistic, pluralistic and pagan world not so different from our own postmodern setting. Paul is not interested in merely imparting copious amounts of theology to the congregation in Rome (an impression you could get if you finish reading Romans in chapter 11) but seeks transformed lives and changed behavior as the result of his epistle. Any theology of Paul that focuses solely on doctrine and does not address the kind of lives he aspired for his converts to live is deficient and defunct.  —The Saving Righteousness of God, page 151

<idle musing>
Amen! No transformation = no salvation. Jesus came to deliver us from sin—from sinning! That's a transformed life—and it is all by the power of God. All—and I do mean all—the glory goes to him because all the power comes from him through the Holy Spirit.
</idle musing>

And we're off again

To AAR/SBL, that is. Yesterday afternoon, we left Warsaw with a truck full of product and display material. This morning, about 6:30, we got the necessary paperwork to unload the truck. Then we waited until 8:00 before they would let us unload.
Setup went well; we're getting more organized and better at it each year...but take a look at these two pictures. See the difference?

I had all the books set out and nicely organized—early, too. Then I realized that I had forgotten the Eisenbrauns table drape : ( I had to take all the books off, put the new drape on, and re-place the books. Of course, they didn't go back the same. I couldn't find room for one of the books and had to rearrange again.

Union with Christ means...

The exhortation to righteousness in Romans 6 is predicated on one crucial premise: the transforming power of the gospel and the new obedience created by union with Christ. Christ is the sphere of holiness, righteousness and redemption (cf. 1 Cor. 1.30) and believers are emancipated from the old age of sin and death and are uniquely empowered by baptism into Christ to live their lives in complete service to God. This thought is expressed most aptly as the indicative and imperative of Pauline ethics; because you have been united to Christ, you need not offer your body into the service of sin. —The Saving Righteousness of God, page 147

<idle musing>
Amen! Good preaching! If we are united with Christ—which we are—then we are free from the necessity of sin. Why don't we see more of it? Because a. we don't here it preached or taught and b. most people don't really believe it. After all, aren't we sinners? No! We are saints and the righteousness of Christ—at least that's what the scripture says. So, whom are you going to believe? Scripture or doctrine? Your call, but I'm going with scripture!
</idle musing>

Calvin and works

"We dream not of a faith which is devoid of good works, nor of a justification which can exist without them: the only difference is, that while we acknowledge that faith and works are necessarily connected, we, however, place justification in faith not works ... Thus it appears how true it is that we are justified not without, and yet not by works, since in the participation in Christ, by which we are justified, is contained not less sanctification than justification."—John Calvin, cited by M. Bird in —The Saving Righteousness of God, page 111

Hmmm..Luther's right

Quod quisque timet, amat, colit, credit, hoc illi deus est [What a person fears, loves, worships, trusts—that is his God].—Luther's Works, 16:35, cited in Martin Luther's Understanding of God's Two Kingdoms, page 129.

<idle musing>
I couldn't have said it better myself. Idolatry isn't seen as idolatry by those who are worshiping an idol. We deceive ourselves into saying that it isn't really worship. We need the Holy Spirit to open our eyes...
</idle musing>

Presuppositions

I am constantly made aware of my own prejudice of reading Paul and the New Testament via the grid of soteriological inquiry where I often assumed that the question underpinning every Pauline text was “what must I do to be saved?” A far better question to embed at the back of our minds as we read Paul (and indeed the entire New Testament) is this: who are the people of God and in what economy shall they be vindicated?—The Saving Righteousness of God,  page 109

Tuesday's thought

Remember the former things, those of long ago;
        I am God, and there is no other;
        I am God, and there is none like me.
     I make known the end from the beginning,
        from ancient times, what is still to come.
    I say, ‘My purpose will stand,
        and I will do all that I please.’
     From the east I summon a bird of prey;
        from a far–off land, a man to fulfill my purpose.
    What I have said, that I will bring about;
        what I have planned, that I will do.
     Listen to me, you stubborn–hearted,
        you who are now far from my righteousness.
     I am bringing my righteousness near,
        it is not far away;
        and my salvation will not be delayed.—Isaiah 46:9-13 (TNIV)

More than forensic

Yet as soon as we acknowledge that union with Christ is forensic and issues forth in a transformed status such a bifurcation becomes a grossly inadequate generalization. Justification cannot be played off against union with Christ, since justification transpires in Christ. To be sure, union with Christ is not something that is entirely synonymous with justification. Yet neither is union with Christ an ancillary concept subsumed under justification or vice-versa. Rather, union with Christ comprises Paul’s prime way of talking about the reception of the believer’s new status through incorporation into the risen Christ by faith.—The Saving Righteousness of God, page 86

<idle musing>
Say what? What he is saying here is that union with Christ is greater than justification; it includes justification, but goes beyond it...
</idle musing>

Inclusio

No, that's not the name of a new Sci-Fi novel—or some new "enhancement" drug.

Inclusio is a technical term in ancient rhetoric whereby an idea is "framed" with an opening and closing statement. In Herodotus, we call the same thing a "ring composition." Fine, you say, but how does that have anything to do with the real world?!

Glad you asked! What? You didn't? Well, let's pretend that you did, OK?

I've been thinking about the last 9 years, from the time I started with Eisenbrauns until the present. I discovered that the time is marked by a whole bunch of inclusiones (Latin, plural of inclusio—I know, technically that should be genitive instead of nominative/accusative...). I've mentioned a couple of them earlier, but we'll start from the top:

<inclusio>
E-mail from Eisenbrauns asking me to apply for the position
<inclusio>
Stay at Super 8 motel
<inclusio>
Meet Jim at American Table restaurant for breakfast
<inclusio>
Rent bicycle from Trailhouse bike shop
<inclusio>
Return to Minnesota, rent a bicycle and the seat settles on a 40 mile ride because after adjusting the seat for my long legs, they don't tighten the seat post enough.

Nine years of wonderful stuff at Eisenbrauns, fulfilling a dream since graduate school. Our kids both get married and we end up with 7 grand kids. I get to have a greenhouse (OK, really a hoop house, but the same results).

</inclusio>
Receive phone call asking us to assist at Sawtooth Cabins. We know it is from God, so we move to Grand Marais.
</inclusio>
Come back to Warsaw to train my replacement and I stay at Super 8
</inclusio>
Jim and I have breakfast at American Table
</inclusio>
I rent a bicycle from Trailhouse—the same bike I rented 9 years earlier!
</inclusio>
The seat settles on a 35 mile ride because after adjusting it for my long legs, the seat post isn't tightened enough

<idle musing>
I think God has a sense of humor—or at least the Classicist in me does...
</idle musing>

Incorporated righteousness

...the notion of imputation fails to grapple with Paul’s in-Christ language that gravitates more towards the concepts of incorporation, substitution and representation. Given the supremely christocentric ingredient in Paul’s formulation of justification it is far more appropriate to speak of incorporated righteousness for the righteousness that clothes believers is not that which is somehow abstracted from Christ and projected onto them, but is located exclusively in Christ as the glorified incarnation of God’s righteousness. In my judgment this term represents a reasonable description of what is happening at the exegetical level in the Pauline corpus regarding how the believer attains the righteousness of Christ.—The Saving Righteousness of God, page 85

<idle musing>
I like that, incorporated righteousness. Has a nice sound to it—and is theologically sound, as well.
</idle musing>

Isaiah on a Friday

This is what God the LORD says—
    he who created the heavens and stretched them out,
        who spread out the earth with all that springs from it,
    who gives breath to its people,
        and life to those who walk on it:
    “I, the LORD, have called you in righteousness;
        I will take hold of your hand.
    I will keep you and will make you
        to be a covenant for the people
        and a light for the Gentiles,
    to open eyes that are blind,
        to free captives from prison
        and to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness.
    “I am the LORD; that is my name!
        I will not yield my glory to another
        or my praise to idols.—Isaiah 42:5-8 (TNIV)

<idle musing>
And an idol doesn't have to be a physical thing. Anything that comes before the Lord is an idol. It could be work, family, kids, country (we've seen a lot of that lately!). It doesn't matter what it is...
</idle musing>

Which kingdom?

Wonderful post today at The M Blog. Here's snatch of it:

f God is the one who "deposes kings and raises up others" (Dan 2:21), does it really matter what are the names of the current puppets set in place by God that advance both the New World Order and the Kingdom of God? Neither Herod, Pilate nor Cesar were truly important for the development of the Kingdom. That is exactly why Kingdom people do not play in the Second League, but the First, the one that matters. The one that puts the Kingdom first, and everything else-including their own nation-second.

The problem of the current commotion and insecurities arises when even the people that call themselves after God keep confusing the Kingdom of God with the United States of America. And when that happens, especially through Christians with a public voice, then we have truly lost all perspective of the coming Kingdom of Jesus Christ and the predictions he has made that will precede his coming.

<idle musing>
Amen! Do read the whole thing. It will be worth your time—and then get down on your knees, pray, and ask God to forgive us as a nation for putting the wrong stuff first. Then put God first—in everything!
</idle musing>

There and back again

No, this post isn't about The Hobbit!

As most of you know, we left Warsaw, Indiana at the end of June, moving to Grand Marais, Minnesota. In Grand Marais, we spent the summer helping out at Sawtooth Cabins. I continued to work part-time at Eisenbrauns. I also did some freelance proof-reading for another publisher—more on that at a later date (I need to get approval before announcing the project).

We closed the cabins up in the middle of October; they won't re-open until next April or May, so I had some extra time on my hands—right...Eisenbrauns needed some extra help because of the upcoming ASOR, AAR/SBL conferences. And, my replacement, Andrew, was starting, so they needed help training him as well. Long story short: I am in Warsaw again (hence, there and back again) until the AAR/SBL meetings...

I guess you could say this is my last hurrah. After Andrew learns all that he needs to know—let me reword that—once Andrew learns enough to be able to find what he needs to know (I still don't know all I need to know after 9 years!), then my time with Eisenbrauns will come to an end.

It's bittersweet. I'm staying in the same motel I stayed in when I flew down for the interview 9 years ago in August; this morning Jim and I met for breakfast at the same restaurant I met him at for that interview. Huge difference, no difference...time marches on; God has done amazing things in my life in that time. I praise him for the time at Eisenbrauns; it was always one of my dreams to work here...

Short circuit!

Evidently, becoming God’s righteousness is tied to union with Christ, not imputation. For Paul, being “in Christ” means identifying with Christ’s death and resurrection where union with him is sphere or realm of justification. Far from being “vague” the righteous status believers possess derives from union with the “Righteous One” (Acts 3.14; 7.52; 22.14; 1 Jn 2.1), who is also the very locus of righteousness (1 Cor. 1.30) and was justified upon his exaltation into glory (1 Tim. 3.16). To resort to imputation at this stage is to skip an important element. Isaiah 53 should provide our paradigm as Paul perceives justification as occurring in the one whom God has justified. Justification ensues because believers are now identified with the crucified, risen and vindicated Christ and, furthermore, believers participate in that vindication. Thus, whether it is reconciliation, justification or new creation – all are “in him”. —The Saving Righteousness of God, pages 84-85

<idle musing>
We need to re-examine our methodology. Do we interpret scripture by our theological presuppositions? Or do we let the scripture speak—even if it means we let go of our sacred cows...imputation is one of those...
</idle musing>

Where's your hope?

From Jesus Creed

Somewhere overnight or this morning the eschatology of American Christians may become clear. If a Republican wins and the Christian becomes delirious or confident that the Golden Days are about to arrive, that Christian has an eschatology of politics. Or, alternatively, if a Democrat wins and the Christian becomes delirious or confident that the Golden Days are about to arrive, that Christian too has an eschatology of politics. Or, we could turn each around, if a more Democrat oriented Christian becomes depressed and hopeless because a Repub wins, or if a Republican oriented Christian becomes depressed or hopeless because a Dem wins, those Christians are caught in an empire-shaped eschatology of politics

<idle musing>
Read the whole thing. And then ask yourself where your hope really lies.
</idle musing>

Whence comes holiness?

The possibility of holiness in a corrupt and perverse world derives exclusively from union with the one who himself was fully righteous and empowers others with righteousness. —The Saving Righteousness of God, page 80

<idle musing>
Exactly! It isn't in ourselves; we can never make ourselves holy. But, because it is "in Christ," there is no reason we can't be holy! I'm liking this book...
</idle musing>

What is the gospel?

To equate the gospel as consisting of the doctrine of imputed righteousness makes about as much sense as saying that the gospel is the pretribulation rapture. Furthermore, if we look at the most concise summaries of the gospel in the New Testament (e.g. Rom. 1.3-4, 1 Cor. 15.3-8; 2 Tim. 2.8) justification language is entirely absent. The gospel should be more properly related to the kingdom of God and the righteousness of God revealed in the death and resurrection of Christ. —The Saving Righteousness of God, page 69

<idle musing>
Ah, but some do. Indeed, some would say that both are the gospel...
</idle musing>

Isaiah on a Monday

Those who walk righteously
and speak what is right,
who reject gain from extortion
and keep their hands from accepting bribes,
who stop their ears against plots of murder
and shut their eyes against contemplating evil—
they are the ones who will dwell on the heights,
whose refuge will be the mountain fortress.
Their bread will be supplied,
and water will not fail them. (Isaiah 33:15, 16 TNIV)

Further thoughts

Go now, write it in blog post for them,
inscribe it on your Facebook wall,
that for the days to come
it may be an everlasting witness.
For these are rebellious people, deceitful children,
children unwilling to listen to the Lord ’s instruction.
They say to the seers,
“See no more visions!”
and to the prophets,
“Give us no more visions of what is right!
Tell us pleasant things,
prophesy illusions.
Leave this way,
get off this path,
and stop confronting us
with the Holy One of Israel!”
Therefore, this is what the Holy One of Israel says:
“Because you have rejected this message,
relied on oppression
and depended on deceit,
this sin will become for you
like a high wall, cracked and bulging,
that collapses suddenly, in an instant.
It will break in pieces like pottery,
shattered so mercilessly
that among its pieces not a fragment will be found
for taking coals from a hearth
or scooping water out of a cistern.”
This is what the Sovereign Lord , the Holy One of Israel, says:
“In repentance and rest is your salvation,
in quietness and trust is your strength,
but you would have none of it. (Isaiah 30:8-15 TNIV with slight revisions in verse 8)

Thought for a Saturday

Woe to those who go to great depths
to hide their plans from the Lord,
who do their work in darkness and think,
“Who sees us? Who will know?”
You turn things upside down,
as if the potter were thought to be like the clay!
Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it,
“You did not make me”?
Can the pot say to the potter,
“You know nothing”? (Isaiah 29:15, 16 TNIV)

The litmus test

To use reformation theology as a litmus test for theological accuracy represents a departure from the Reformers themselves and places them upon a pedestal which they would not otherwise care to sit on. —The Saving Righteousness of God, page 68

<idle musing>
And this is from a Reformed scholar! Would that some of the more toxic Reformed theologians would heed his advice! The only standard that should be final is the scriptures themselves, interpreted through the enlightenment of the Holy Spirit and weighed in the balance of 2000 years of theological insight. But, scripture is primary.
</idle musing>

One thing

The Protestant tendency to view salvation in terms of a series of consecutive ideas (justification, sanctification, glorification) fails to grapple with Paul’s conception of justification as a comprehensive and holistic term relating to redemption, forgiveness of sins, peace, resurrection and the gift of the Spirit. Thus justification is not merely the erasure of our failure supplemented by an alien righteousness, but emerges as the supreme act of God in Christ for our salvation. Furthermore, its christocentric dimension means that the imperatives of continuing love, faith and obedience are never isolated from justification itself. —The Saving Righteousness of God, page 66

Thought for today

“Surely this is our God;
we trusted in him, and he saved us.
This is the Lord, we trusted in him;
let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation.” (Isaiah 25:9 TNIV)

They go together

Jesus’ death and resurrection should be regarded as being inseparably part of the one redemptive event. The cross without the resurrection is sheer martyrdom, an act of solidarity with the persecuted nation. Conversely, the resurrection without the cross is a miraculous intrusion into history and a salvation-historical enigma. Together they constitute the fulcrum of God’s righteousness in handing over Jesus to the cross and raising him for our justification. This highlights that the justifying death of Christ is not efficacious without the resurrection. —The Saving Righteousness of God, pages 57-58

<idle musing>
How can we separate them? Yet, we tend to emphasize one at the expense of the other; some emphasize the cross to the point of depression, while others would prefer the cross never happened. Either one is a mockery of the gospel.
</idle musing>

Finney on a Tuesday

Sinners act as if they were afraid they should be saved. Often they seem to be trying to make their salvation as difficult as possible. For example, they all know what Christ has said about the danger of riches and the difficulty of saving rich men. They have read from His lips, "How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God." "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God." This they know, and yet how many of them are in mad haste to be rich! For this end, some are ready to sacrifice their conscience--some their health--all seem ready, deliberately, to sacrifice their souls! How could they more certainly ensure their own damnation!—Charles Finney

Isaiah, again

The Lord, the Lord Almighty,
called you on that day
to weep and to wail,
to tear out your hair and put on sackcloth.
But see, there is joy and revelry,
slaughtering of cattle and killing of sheep,
eating of meat and drinking of wine!
“Let us eat and drink,” you say,
“for tomorrow we die!”
The Lord Almighty has revealed this in my hearing: “Till your dying day this sin will not be atoned for,” says the Lord, the Lord Almighty. (Isaiah 22:12-14 TNIV)

Fall in Grand Marais

This time of year, you really feel the remoteness and wildness of the area. The streets are pretty much empty--even on the weekends. But, the lake is beautiful; the clouds make a magnificent backdrop to it. When the sun shines through them, it is more a painting than real. The street we take to walk to Joel & Renee's house has a wonderful view of the harbor, Artist's Point, and the lake.

We went for a hike last weekend with some friends on the Superior Hiking Trail--actually a spur off of it; there are lots of spurs : ) It took us to the top of a hill that overlooked the lake in one direction and the boundary waters (BWCA) in the other. Breathtakingly beautiful. The leaves were mostly gone, so you had the stark white of the birch, the black of the deciduous, and the dark green of the spruce and balsam. So beautiful it almost made you hurt--like it was a foretaste of the new heavens and new earth. And here I feel a mixture of what C.S. Lewis said about paradise and Bonhoeffer's writings about the foretaste of glory. (If that isn't a weird mix of theologians!)

Some thoughts on a non-holiday

From Joel (my son-in-law), on death and Halloween:

I was really bothered today by the way Halloween makes light of death. I couldn't help thinking of the last moments of Emily's life as she lay on the hospital bed covered in blood because they'd been doing chest compressions on her 5 lb body a day after heart surgery. I remembered how it felt to hold her head as the fluid began to pool behind her skull. I remembered wrapping her body in a white fuzzy blanket a few days later in the funeral home, her bruises barely disguised by make-up.

And now, when a kid comes to the door dressed as the living dead with fake blood all over his face I'm expected to smile and give him candy?

How can we make light of death?

I think of the thousand upon thousands upon thousands of children who've been mutilated by war. Those today who walk streets of terror and are no stranger to death and gore. Would they celebrate a holiday of fear? We are so ignorant in our safe little suburbs of the realities of the world.

I hate Halloween.

<idle musing>
We are ignorant of the reality of what Halloween is, aren't we? It, by design, is a celebration of death. As Christians, we are to celebrate life...
</idle musing>

Union with Christ

...union with Christ is union with the justified Messiah and the now Righteous One. Jesus by fact of his resurrection is the locus of righteousness and redemption (cf. 1 Cor. 1.30; 2 Cor. 5.21; Eph. 1.17) and believers are justified only because they have been united with the justified Messiah. Whereas believers formerly shared the verdict of condemnation pronounced on Adam, now they partake of the verdict of justification pronounced of Christ. The believer passes through the eschatological judgment by virtue of their association with Christ in his death and is co- quickened into the eschatological life through his resurrection. The union is symbolized through baptism but the conduit is, as always for Paul, through faith (cf. Gal. 3.26-27; Col. 2.12; Eph. 3.17). It is union with Christ in his death and resurrection that constitutes the material cause of justification.—The Saving Righteousness of God, page 56

<idle musing>
I've heard it said that if you take the phrase "in Christ" out of Paul's letters you end up with morality. In Christ is central to Paul—and the resurrection is central to being in Christ!
</idle musing>

Isaiah on a Thursday

In that day you will say:
“I will praise you, Lord.
Although you were angry with me,
your anger has turned away
and you have comforted me.
Surely God is my salvation;
I will trust and not be afraid.
The Lord , the Lord , is my strength and my defense ;
he has become my salvation.”
With joy you will draw water
from the wells of salvation.
In that day you will say:
“Give praise to the Lord, call on his name;
make known among the nations what he has done,
and proclaim that his name is exalted.
Sing to the Lord, for he has done glorious things;
let this be known to all the world.
Shout aloud and sing for joy, people of Zion,
for great is the Holy One of Israel among you.” (Isaiah 12:1-6 TNIV)

Thoughts from Isaiah

This is what the Lord says to me with his strong hand upon me, warning me not to follow the way of this people:
“Do not call conspiracy
everything this people calls a conspiracy;
do not fear what they fear,
and do not dread it.
The Lord Almighty is the one you are to regard as holy,
he is the one you are to fear,
he is the one you are to dread...
When someone tells you to consult mediums and spiritists, who whisper and mutter, should not a people inquire of their God? Why consult the dead on behalf of the living? Consult God’s instruction and the testimony of warning. If anyone does not speak according to this word, they have no light of dawn. Distressed and hungry, they will roam through the land; when they are famished, they will become enraged and, looking upward, will curse their king and their God. Then they will look toward the earth and see only distress and darkness and fearful gloom, and they will be thrust into utter darkness. (Isaiah 8:11-13, 19-22 TNIV)

It sure is!

There can be little doubt that the resurrection vindicates the message, person and death of Christ. The resurrection unambiguously announces the perfect obedience of Christ to the Father, his declared sonship and affirms the reality of his death as a sacrifice for sins. Furthermore, it removes any misunderstanding of Jesus’ death solely in terms of a martyr theology. Despite this, in reading the Pauline epistles one is struck with the suspicion that the resurrection is far more intrinsic to justification than merely comprising an authentication that our justification has taken place at the cross.—The Saving Righteousness of God, page 42

<idle musing>
We sell the meaning—and power—so short. It is almost like a bookend; as Michael Bird says, we tend to think of it as a martyr theology. For Paul, it is far, far more than that. We need to reacquaint ourselves with what it means; hopefully the snippets from this book will help us...
</idle musing>

Why do we do it?

Stop trusting in human beings,
who have but a breath in their nostrils.
Why hold them in esteem? (Isaiah 2:22 TNIV)

Finney for a Tuesday

While they [sinners] inwardly know He [God] is their real friend, yet they practically treat Him as their worst enemy. By no motives can they be persuaded to confide in Him as their friend. In fact, they treat Him as if He were the greatest liar in the universe. Wonderful to tell, they practically reverse the regard due respectively to God and to Satan--treating Satan as if he were God, and God as if He were Satan. Satan they believe and obey; God they disown, dishonor, and disobey. How strangely would they reverse the order of things! They would fain enthrone Satan over the universe, giving him the highest seat in heaven; the Almighty and holy God they would send to hell. They do not hesitate to surrender to Satan the place of power over their own hearts which is due to God only.—Charles Finney

The place of the resurrection

The problem is that Paul’s gospel knows of no divorce between the cross and the resurrection and their ensuing effect. The resurrection figures equally prominently in Paul’s most concise summaries of the gospel (cf. Rom. 1.3-4; 10.9-10; 1 Cor. 15.3-8; 2 Tim. 2.8). The tendency in the Protestant tradition to view the crucifixion in isolation and as a thing in itself apart from the resurrection represents a failure to grapple with Paul’s view of the indissoluble connection between the cross and the resurrection (cf. 1 Thess. 4.14; 1 Cor. 15.3-8; 2 Cor. 5.15; Rom. 4.25).—The Saving Righteousness of God, page 41

<idle musing>
Yep! Without the resurrection, the crucifixion is simply a tragedy; sin is still victorious. But with the resurrection, we have a hope and a deliverance!
</idle musing>

Thought for today

See how the faithful city
has become a prostitute!
She once was full of justice;
righteousness used to dwell in her—
but now murderers!
Your silver has become dross,
your choice wine is diluted with water.
Your rulers are rebels,
companions of thieves;
they all love bribes
and chase after gifts.
They do not defend the cause of the fatherless;
the widow’s case does not come before them.
Therefore the Lord, the Lord Almighty,
the Mighty One of Israel, declares:
“Ah, I will vent my wrath on my foes
and avenge myself on my enemies.
I will turn my hand against you;
I will thoroughly purge away your dross
and remove all your impurities. (Isaiah 1:21-25 TNIV)

Me, me, me!

You are altogether committed to the pleasing of self. Jesus may plead with you--your friends may plead; heaven and hell may lift up their united voices to plead, and every motive that can press on the heart from reason, conscience, hope and fear, angels and devils, God and man, may pass in long and flashing array before your mind--but alas! your heart is so fully set to do evil that no motive to change can move you. What is this can not? Nothing less or more than a mighty will not!—Charles Finney

<idle musing>
Will not versus can not is a huge gap. Yet, that is the chasm that grace bridges. Your "can not" is no longer valid, as God—through the power of the Holy Spirit working within you—has raised you to the point where it is now "will not." What is that but willful rebellion and putting self before God?
</idle musing>

How big was that?

"the righteousness of God, at least in Rom. 1.17, introduces the entire package of salvation including justification, redemption, propitiatory sacrifice, forgiveness of sins, membership in the new covenant community, reconciliation, the gift of the Holy Spirit, power for a new obedience, union with Christ, freedom from sin, and eschatological vindication. God’s righteousness is an all-encompassing action that includes both redemption and renewal."—The Saving Righteousness of God, page 16

<idle musing>
A bit bigger than the "say this prayer" version of the gospel, isn't it? We've been sold a watered down version of what Christ came to do to us and for us. I'll be posting from this book for the next week or two. Very interesting read—it only took me 5 years to get to it!
</idle musing>

No doubt about it

All summer long I've been meaning to do it and yesterday I finally did it. Ever since we moved here back in July, I've been meaning to ride the Gunflint Trail, a 1000 foot climb in less than 4 miles, and then ride Highway 7, a mere 600 foot rise is a little less than 4 miles.

I had been told several years ago that Highway 7 was a tougher ride than the Gunflint. The only way to really know was to do them back-to-back. So, yesterday was finally the day. It was a nice crisp 50°F, with a slight breeze from the East—not enough to affect the ride. I started with the Gunflint. About 1.3 miles into the ride, the road does a switchback—on a killer slope. I looked at the cyclometer: 8.1 MPH. I felt like I would need to get off and walk. After the switchback, it levels off some and I was able to get up to about 17-18 MPH again. Then there was another steep section and I dropped down to about 10-11 MPH. I got to the top, went over the ridge a bit and then turned around and rode down.

The view is normally beautiful, but yesterday it was so foggy you could barely see the lake. Artist's Point was wreathed in fog; it made me wish I had a camera. I hit the switchback at 23 MPH, coasting, and in less than an 1/8 of a mile, I was going 35 MPH, still coasting. I must say, coming down was a lot easier!

At Highway 7, I turned and began the climb on it. Going west is a relatively gentle slope, 5 miles to climb 600 feet. At the end of Highway 7, I took a right and rode to Cascade State Park, where I turned around. The lake was definitely fogged in! I couldn't see more than 50 yards out. It would be easy to believe I was at the end of the earth.

The real challenge was climbing the hill on Highway 7 going East. It starts out very steep. You go from cruising along to creeping in about 50 feet! I looked at the cyclometer: 10.6 MPH. Then, I heard a deer beside me in the woods, heading toward the road. I stopped pedaling and let it cross—hitting or being hit by a deer in not on my bucket list! My speed dropped to 9.6 MPH instantly. The road leveled off some, only to get steep again. 10.1 MPH. Then it leveled off again. One more steep incline: 10.6 MPH. Then it was relatively mild until the top. The descent was fast and easy.

So, I can definitely say that the Gunflint is the harder of the two. I did the climb on Highway 7 after riding 20+ miles, and I still managed to stay about 2 MPH faster. Granted, the climb going East starts out with a bang! That is probably why people say it is the harder climb...

Here's a screenshot of the route, complete with elevations.

Wealth

Those who love money never have enough;
those who love wealth are never satisfied with their income.
This too is meaningless.
As goods increase,
so do those who consume them.
And what benefit are they to the owners
except to feast their eyes on them? (Ecclesiastes 5:10, 11 TNIV)

Your daily Finney

You are altogether committed to the pleasing of self. Jesus may plead with you--your friends may plead; heaven and hell may lift up their united voices to plead, and every motive that can press on the heart from reason, conscience, hope and fear, angels and devils, God and man, may pass in long and flashing array before your mind--but alas! your heart is so fully set to do evil that no motive to change can move you. What is this can not? Nothing less or more than a mighty will not!—Charles Finney

Why I believe the Bible

Excellent look at inerrancy by Roger Olson. As always, a nice tidbit to get you to read the whole thing:

Finally, if you base your belief in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord on the truth status of the Bible rather than the other way around (basing its truth on its power to transform through relationship with Jesus Christ), you are risking idolatry. Jesus is the “Sache” [theological message] of Scripture. Luther knew it as did Calvin. But fundamentalists and neo-fundamentalists put Scripture over Jesus when they try to make belief in him as Savior and Lord dependent on the inerrancy of the Bible. The Bible, then, becomes the gift in place of Jesus Christ. It should be (and is) the other way around—Jesus is the gift. The Bible is simply the Christmas-wrapped box that delivers him to us. I believe in the Bible’s truth and authority because of him. But that in no way requires belief in absolute, technical, detailed accuracy of every statement of Scripture.

<idle musing>
He says it so much better than I could. I especially like his example of textbooks: "common sense says that a person or book does not have to be flawless in every detail in order to be true and authoritative in its main subject. Hardly any textbook meets the standard of strict inerrancy. Probably none do. And yet some, at least, are considered authoritative and trustworthy."

Read the whole thing to get the full context before you flame me : )
</idle musing>

Yes, yes! Yes!!

Old, but still good, reference to cycling programs and helmet use. Here's an excerpt:

But bicycling advocates say that the problem with pushing helmets isn’t practicality but that helmets make a basically safe activity seem really dangerous. “The real benefits of bike-sharing in terms of health, transport and emissions derive from getting ordinary people to use it,” said Ceri Woolsgrove, safety officer at the European Cyclists’ Federation. “And if you say this is wonderful, but you have to wear armor, they won’t. These are normal human beings, not urban warriors.”

<idle musing>
Yep. Another good little snippet, "Statistically, if we wear helmets for cycling, maybe we should wear helmets when we climb ladders or get into a bath, because there are lots more injuries during those activities." So, get out those helmets next time you enter the shower!
</idle musing>

Thought for today

One’s own folly leads to ruin,
yet the heart rages against the Lord. (Proverbs 19:3 TNIV)

Toy pistols and battleships

"But in the midst of it all I made a great discovery. There were demon forces, of which I had never dreamed, governing this world. The Bible was right. My spiritual weapons in the face of such an enemy were as a toy pistol before a great battleship. I had been attempting to take Leviathan captive with my little toy fish-hook. Furthermore, to my utter dismay, I found that my own carnality and selfishness had given the ground they held to these monsters of hell. I myself had invited them in. I must get rid of 'self'--that was as clear as the noon-day sun. Else there could be no hope of final victory. These powers of darkness (demons are as real to me now as God Himself) which were oppressing me to the point of despair, were standing on the very ground which secret selfishness had conceded to them. How was I to get rid of this 'self-life' which had so long been standing out against Christ and making a way for the enemy to come in like a flood? Ah! had I but known of that 'Standard,' the Cross, which must be lifted up against this prince of darkness. But my hour had come. God was leading me all the while. Not a tear but what had fallen in His bottle. It was then that He focused all my being upon the Cross of Christ, and opened up to me its wondrous meaning. Every day brought its revelation. Such a struggle as mine would never issue in Victory except the Cross be given the place of absolute supremacy in my life and ministry."—F.G Huegel in The Cross of Christ--The Throne of God

Selfishness

Selfishness takes on a thousand forms and types; but each and all are sinful, for the whole mind should give itself up to serve God and to perform every duty as revealed to the reason.—Charles Finney

<idle musing>
The definition of sin: selfishness. We are called to die self and live for God. Of course, we can only do that by the power of the Holy Spirit...
</idle musing>

Today's thought

“Then [when disaster strikes] they will call to me [wisdom] but I will not answer;
they will look for me but will not find me,
since they hated knowledge
and did not choose to fear the Lord .
Since they would not accept my advice
and spurned my rebuke,
they will eat the fruit of their ways
and be filled with the fruit of their schemes.
For the waywardness of the simple will kill them,
and the complacency of fools will destroy them;
but whoever listens to me will live in safely
and be at ease, without fear of harm.” (Proverbs 1:28-33 TNIV)

Psalm for the day

Set a guard over my mouth, Lord;
keep watch over the door of my lips.
Do not let my heart be drawn to what is evil
so that I take part in wicked deeds
along with those who are evildoers;
do not let me eat of their delicacies. (Psalm 141:3-4 TNIV)

Thought for a Sunday morning

Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.
If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,”
even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you. (Psalm 139:7-12 TNIV)

Thought for today

Paul has a doctrine of the saving righteousness of God whereby God acquits and vindicates the ungodly because of Jesus’ death and resurrection, and what is more, this enacted verdict is the gateway for membership into the cosmopolitan people of God. The saving righteousness of God means the end of all boasting whether it is in performance or possession of the law, whether it is in one’s ethnicity or religious effort. Justification is the act whereby God creates a new people, with a new status, in a new covenant, as a foretaste of the new age. Justification is forensic (it refers to status not moral state), eschatological (the verdict of judgment day is declared in the present), covenantal (Jews and Gentiles belong at one fellowship table), and is effective (sanctification cannot be subsumed under justification but neither can they be completely separated).—Michael Bird in The Saving Righteousness of God, page 4

<idle musing>
In other words, all inclusive of your entire life : )
</idle musing>

Psalm for the day

It is better to take refuge in the Lord
than to trust in human beings.
It is better to take refuge in the Lord
than to trust in princes.
I was pushed back and about to fall,
but the Lord helped me.
The Lord is my strength and my defense;
he has become my salvation.
I will not die but live,
and will proclaim what the Lord has done. (Psalm 118:8, 9, 13, 14, 17 TNIV)

The unexpected side effects of GMO crops

You won't see this in a Monsanto ad...

Marketed as Roundup and other trade names, glyphosate is a broad-spectrum systemic herbicide used to kill weeds. About 95% of soybean and cotton crops and more than 85% of corn in the U.S. are planted to varieties genetically modified to be herbicide resistant.
“Resistant weeds have become a major problem for many farmers reliant on GE crops, and are now driving up the volume of herbicide needed each year by about 25%,” Benbrook says...

Overall pesticide use in 2011 was about 20% higher on each acre planted to a GE crop, compared to pesticide use on acres not planted to GE crops.

<idle musing>
What else should we expect? We used DDT to kill mosquitoes; we created DDT resistant mosquitoes. Why wouldn't the use of GMO crops do the same thing?

The real gem is here, though: "The presence of resistant weeds drives up herbicide use by 25% to 50%, and increases farmer-weed control costs by at least as much." Guess who pays? And guess who benefits?
</idle musing>

Thought for today

Praise the Lord.
Praise the Lord, you his servants;
praise the name of the Lord.
Let the name of the Lord be praised,
both now and forevermore.
From the rising of the sun to the place where it sets,
the name of the Lord is to be praised.
The Lord is exalted over all the nations,
his glory above the heavens.
Who is like the Lord our God,
the One who sits enthroned on high,
who stoops down to look
on the heavens and the earth?
He raises the poor from the dust
and lifts the needy from the ash heap;
he seats them with princes,
with the princes of his people. (Psalm 113:1-8 TNIV)

Primitive? Or common to humanity??

"One final point needs to be made concerning “sacrifice” and history. Theoreticians from Robertson Smith (1973) to René Girard (1979) have portrayed sacrifice as a product of a certain historical moment, an artifact of primitive magico-religious thought or of underdeveloped social mechanisms for mediating violence. These universal originary claims for sacrifice, however, serve Western culture as origin myths of primitive violence and the birth of inequality—yet just as religion became a “thing” in the moment of its marginalization at the hands of science and secular rationality, so too the category of sacrifice serves to exoticize safely and partition us from the social violence with which it is often associated. If the distinction between religion and politics is a modern invention, however, then the possibility of distinguishing purely “religious” violence becomes untenable, and if we recognize the culturally constituted and frequently affectively loaded nature of violence, then we must also admit that ritualized, ideologically charged killing and destruction is still very much with us. Whether they are framed as national interest, progress, ethnic purity, or sectarian atavism, our gods still demand sacrifice, and blood has not ceased flowing down their altars."—Roderick Campbell
in Sacred Killing , page 321

<idle musing>
Ouch! Too true, especially this: "Whether they are framed as national interest, progress, ethnic purity, or sectarian atavism, our gods still demand sacrifice, and blood has not ceased flowing down their altars." Good to remember as we mark 2000 dead in Afghanistan...national interest is a thirsty god! Better to serve the living God than that one.
</idle musing>

Thought for today

My heart, O God, is steadfast;
I will sing and make music with all my soul.
Awake, harp and lyre!
I will awaken the dawn.
I will praise you, Lord, among the nations;
I will sing of you among the peoples.
For great is your love, higher than the heavens;
your faithfulness reaches to the skies.
Be exalted, O God, above the heavens;
let your glory be over all the earth. (Psalm 108:1-5 TNIV)

Religion?

"...attempting to demarcate sacrificial practices on the basis of a distinction between religious and secular actions or motivations is difficult, and I would argue that this approach is fundamentally, historically flawed.

"While my objection to embedding discussions of sacrifice in “the sacred” or “religion” may seem like a case of the perennial anthropological conundrum of finding an appropriate etic term to fit emic realities, the problem, in fact, runs much deeper. The issue lies in the pernicious intellectualist reification of “religion” as a unique and independent sphere of practice and (especially) belief (W. C. Smith 1962). Though scholars of ancient societies frequently note that, in the societies they study, religion was inseparable from politics, daily life, and so on, it is nonetheless difficult for post-Enlightenment Western academics to take home the point powerfully made in Asad (1993) that “religion” has come to denote little more than a perspective in the modern West. That Christianity went from “the faith” to “a faith” and then to “a religion” does not merely reflect the historical development of a concept but rather marks seismic shifts in relations of truth, power, being, and world. Though the contributions to this volume have largely steered clear of direct discussion of “religion,” it nonetheless accompanies the concept of “sacrifice” like a shadow and has problematically entangled writing on the archaeology of religion in general with its conceptual framework. Practices of ritual killing and offering were (as are all practices) embedded in intertwined ways of knowing and being in the world. In other words, “religion” (to the extent that this is even a locally meaningful category) is neither thought of nor practiced as a separate compartment of social life in most times and places. It is not just (or even mainly) about beliefs, and the same is true for putatively “religious” practices such as “sacrifice"."—Roderick Campbell in Sacred Killing , pages 306-307

<idle musing>
The heart of it is here: "In other words, “religion” (to the extent that this is even a locally meaningful category) is neither thought of nor practiced as a separate compartment of social life in most times and places. It is not just (or even mainly) about beliefs..."

The secular/sacred distinction doesn't exist in reality; your whole life is lived either for God or for self—all of it, all the time...
</idle musing>

Alien thoughts

"As diverse as the various local or regional settings of ritual killing might have been, the intricate relationship between killing and order is a particular feature of the world view in ancient Near Eastern communities. Killing, rather than being considered a complete annihilation, served either transformative, reordering, or reintegrative purposes when occurring in a ritually controlled environment, a concept alien to Western thought."—Beate Pongratz-Leisten in Sacred Killing , page 292

<idle musing>
It is hard for us in the Western world to get our minds around ritualized killing. We can handle it in the name of science, though...
</idle musing>

Thought for today

So men, in their sins, treat the realities of the spiritual world as if they were not real, but follow the most empty phantoms of this world, as if they were stern realities.
They also act as if self were of supreme importance, and everything else of relatively no importance. Suppose you were to see a man acting this out in common life. He goes round, day after day, assuming that he is the Supreme God, and practically insisting that everybody ought to have a supreme regard to his rights, and comparatively little or no regard for other people's rights. Now, if you were to see a man saying this and acting it out, would you not account him either a blasphemer or insane?—Charles Finney

Sacrifice

"In the ancient Near East in general, the sacrifice as an offering to otherworldly beings is always part of a complex ritual as a communicative action that also includes greeting, kissing, and clothing the deity, exorcistic rites, and liturgical and performative procedures. It is usually performed in a sacralized space that serves cultic practice dedicated either to the gods or to the ancestors. Rituals such as these must be distinguished from other forms of ritual killing, which pertain to eliminatory rituals designed to dispel evil and generally occur outside the temple."—Beate Pongratz-Leisten in Sacred Killing , page 291

<idle musing>
So, she makes a distinction between "sacrifice" and scapegoat or appeasement offerings. How valid is that distinction, I wonder...
</idle musing>

Thought for today

In spite of all this, they kept on sinning;
in spite of his wonders, they did not believe.
So he ended their days in futility
and their years in terror.
Whenever God slew them, they would seek him;
they eagerly turned to him again.
They remembered that God was their Rock,
that God Most High was their Redeemer.
But then they would flatter him with their mouths,
lying to him with their tongues;
their hearts were not loyal to him,
they were not faithful to his covenant.
Yet he was merciful;
he forgave their iniquities
and did not destroy them.
Time after time he restrained his anger
and did not stir up his full wrath.
He remembered that they were but flesh,
a passing breeze that does not return. (Psalm 78:32-39 TNIV)

Ritual or religious?

"I define rituals as acts that have a social meaning and are designed to communicate with an audience. Such acts are not necessarily related to the supernatural and thus are not necessarily part of religion (for example, Kyriakidis 2007); however, based on accounts provided by the ethnographic record, formal and repeated actions that result in the death of humans and modification of their remains are almost always tied in some way to beliefs in a supernatural world (Ucko 1969: 264ff.). "—Mary Voight in Sacred Killing , page 264

<idle musing>
A very good distinction. Not every ritual act is necessarily a "religious" act...
</idle musing>

Intersection or union?

"In our view ritual and sacrifice are concepts that intersect rather than interbed. Ritual implies repetition, the routinized sequence of actions, patterns that may or may not intersect with concepts of the sacred. The daily setting out of pens and pencils on your desk may be a “ritual”; whether that sequence is determined by ideas about the ineffable is a separate question. The point is that the actions are done again and again, so they may leave certain types of archaeological traces. Structuralists would suggest that these routines/rituals are expressions of core cultural values/issues (usually of a dualistic nature: male/female, us/them, and so on); thus, comparing the organization of these rituals may expose these deeper cultural skeletons. Here we enter the realm of sacrifice and its dual aspects of giving up and giving to, events that may be ritualized by repetitive sequence or events that may happen only once but, in either case, events that are infused with a deeper meaning in relationship to the sacred."—Hesse, Wapnish & Greer in Sacred Killing, page 230

<idle musing>
Our life is full of rituals—big ones, small ones, important ones, trivial ones. They are what give our lives order. As a Christian, our goal should be to live out our lives as a sacrifice—and, as they say here, that isn't necessarily the same thing!
</idle musing>

The Cosmology of sacrifice

"One thing is clear. It is being dead, rather than being killed, that seems to be uppermost in the disposition and meaning of these particular burials. Not only is there no evidence of public display, or even knowledge, of the enactment of sacrifice, but it seems possible that it was indeed carefully hidden, at least at Ur, where the wounds to the head were masked by helmet and headdress and turned to the floor of the tomb. Power may or may not be a consideration, and those sacrificed may or may not be retainers. But that sacrifice is a route to, or expression of, power is a question of function, not meaning. Systems of power can only be constructed on understandings of how the world works, and understandings of how the world works are based in notions of cosmology: where humans fit in a larger scheme that involves a host of supernatural beings, including the dead."—Ann M. Porter in Sacred Killing , page 211

-<idle musing>
I'm still trying to wrap my head around what she is saying here—but it seems pretty profound.
</idle musing>

Once they are dead...

"[it is] clear in all the materials relating to death and the afterlife here, that the dead have continued roles to play long after their demise. The dead establish the position of the living in time and space and their consequent interactions with others, human and otherwise. The dead have otherworldly status, even if they are not quite divine. Certain of them, often ancestors, act as intermediaries between all forms of being. In this framework, it may be the body, therefore, that is of central concern, and so how the body is treated and then disposed of after death is as important as, if not more so than, the moment of death itself.")—Ann M. Porter in Sacred Killing , page 194

<idle musing>
Interesting thought. I have always thought of the moment of killing as being the most important moment in sacrificial systems—and in many it is—but here (Ur) is a case where the way the bodies are handled after death is more important...food for thought. Now I'll have to look at the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament with different eyes and see if it is true there as well at times. I suspect it might be...
</idle musing>

Thought for today

Be still before the LORD
and wait patiently for him;
do not fret when people succeed in their ways,
when they carry out their wicked schemes. 
Refrain from anger and turn from wrath;
do not fret—it leads only to evil.
  For those who are evil will be destroyed,
but those who hope in the LORD will inherit the land.—Psalm 37:7-9 TNIV

<idle musing>
This set of verses jumped out at me this morning. The whole Psalm is great, but these verses were for me today.
</idle musing>

Why sacrifice works...

"Meaning inheres in why provisions, feasts, and gifts are considered appropriate, in what they are thought to accomplish, in what relationships they establish. Similarly with sacrifice, itself both function and meaning. Sacrifice cements alliances, creates passageways between this world and the next, and is a political tool, but its meaning ultimately lies elsewhere. It is why sacrifice is understood to be the proper way to do these things that is the ultimate object of inquiry."—Ann M. Porter in Sacred Killing , page 193 

<idle musing>
And we don't really know why, do we? "It just works" seems to be the default answer. Is there something inherent in humanity that thinks we need to offer something up? The Christian would answer yes and point to the cross.
</idle musing>

Salvation from what?

"Salvation, to be real and available, must be salvation from sin. Everything else fails. Any system of religion which does not break the power of sin, is a lie. If it does not expel selfishness and lust, and if it does not beget love to God and man, joy, peace, and all the fruits [sic] of the Spirit, it is false and worthless. Any system that fails in this vital respect is a lie—can be of no use—is no better than a curse."—Charles Finney

<idle musing>
How does your religion stack up on that basis? Is your salvation a deliverance from sin? Or is it "bed frame" salvation—great at the beginning as forgiveness (headboard) and a great at the end with the promise of heaven (footboard), but it sags in the middle?
</idle musing>

The leaves they are a turning

This last week, the leaves started to turn down by the lake. I guess that means fall is coming...so, it's time to plant a garden :) And that's what I did.

Renee had the kids pull the peas that were done. Then I planted spinach, chard, kale, and beets on Tuesday in a cold frame, and a salad mix on Thursday inside a hoop house. Because the nights are getting colder, Joel and I put the tops on the two hoop houses on Friday night. They are predicting 33 degrees on Monday and Tuesday, so the ends will have to go on soon, too. I guess that means we will have to build doors, doesn't it? It doesn't do much good to have a hoop house if you can't access the produce...

On a related note, I picked a patty pan squash last Monday. I planted them on July first and wasn't sure if we would get any. It was a bit small, but too cute not to pick. Debbie said we should just let it sit on the table as decor :) I ate it the next day; it was sweet and tender. I hope we get more before they give up for the year.

Why sacrifice?

"...sacrifice is effected to permeate the borders between the worlds of human and divine, natural and supernatural. Regardless of its immediate purpose, sacrifice is ultimately transformational. Sacrifice may have been a necessary step of display in the ritual of the “royal” funeral to gain community legitimization for inherited power. The display was not only for the living audience, but also the audience of the gods whose sanction was a necessary part of community acceptance of the social order and succession"—Jill A. Weber in Sacred Killing , page 162

<idle musing>
She is talking about the sacrificial killings at the Royal Cemetery of Ur. The king was buried with a lot of his retainers in a complex layout that imitated his everyday floor plan—guards and all.

Not a whole lot has changed in the last 4,000 years, has it? We still try to get to the divine by sacrifice—we call it something else, like self-denial, or the like. But, the bottom line is we are still trying to earn salvation! It won't happen. Now how, no way. We can never earn it. It is a free gift. Accept it, live in it, and rejoice in it.
</idle musing>

Taking the short-term view

You have gone on as if the motives to sin were all-persuasive, and as if sin's promises of good were more reliable than God's. When God spread out before you the glories of heaven, made all attractive and delightful in the beauties of holiness, you coolly replied-Earth is far better! Give me earth while I can have it, and heaven only when I can have earth no longer!—Charles Finney

<idle musing>
He's got humanity pegged, doesn't he? Take the short-term view and ignore the long-term cost. We aren't good at looking at the consequences of our actions and decisions; we need the enlightenment of the Holy Spirit!
</idle musing>

The life force is what counts...

"Ethnographic and historic examples such as the private farms, temples and public structures in Romano-British England where foundation deposits of animals and infants have been found suggest the release of a life force, anima, or last living breath is important to have value as a sacrifice, rather than the deposit of an already lifeless body (Green 2001). In order to create reciprocal relationships with deities or ancestors, consecrate spaces, or bring about apotropaic effects, the release of the life force or living blood spilled is usually necessary in rituals where human beings or animals are the “gift” or supernatural intermediary."—Sharon Moses in Sacred Killing , page 72

<idle musing>
There is a sermon in there somewhwere...
This book is fascinating. If you are interested in the latest theories about sacrifice, this is "must-have" book.
</idle musing>

And the answer is...

The whole question is, will you please God, or please yourself? Will you give your heart to Him, or give it to your own selfish enjoyment? So long as you give your heart to selfish pleasure and withhold it from God, it will be perfectly natural for you to sin. This is precisely the reason why it is so natural for sinners to sin. It is because the will, the heart, is set upon it, and all they have to do is to carry out this ruling propensity and purpose.—Charles Finney

<idle musing>
The whole reason we don't really believe it is possible to live without sin—we don't want to. Sad, isn't it?
</idle musing>

A different point of view

"Sacrificial victims who were selected not from captive groups or slaves but from within the community, were often regarded as inhabiting roles of honor; this is a crucial concept we must embrace in order to move forward with examining human sacrifice. Too often we correlate marriage with happiness and celebration and sacrifice with sorrow and loss, when in actuality sacrifice was a time of celebration as well in the cultures that practiced it."—Sharon Moses in Sacred Killing, page 71

<idle musing>
Certainly a different point of view from our narcissistic society, isn't it? Probably closer to the biblical one, too...
</idle musing>

Miscellany

I haven't been real good about updating this blog since we moved. There are multiple reasons for that: We are living in a small cabin with one bedroom; the computer has to sit in a corner of the living room that isn't terribly convenient, otherwise I can't get the wireless to work. So, when it does work, I generally try to do as much Eisenbrauns work as I can. That doesn't leave much time for blogging. Second, I've been busy with the cabins and with building a garden at Joel and Renee's. Third, the spare time I have is used for hiking and biking.

Speaking of gardens, we are in the process of putting up two hoop houses. I'm terrible about pictures—as you well know!—but I'll try to get some. We filled in the boxes with a pickup load of aged horse manure. I planted some green beans, peas, and carrots right away. The weather was warm enough that they sprouted almost immediately. Hopefully we'll get some beans before the weather turns cold. We should; I've got row cover and the hoop houses to keep them warm.

And, speaking of hiking and biking, we've done a good bit of that the last few days. On Friday, after taking care of the cabins, we went hiking in the afternoon at Temperance River State Park and then continued on for a mile or two on the Superior Hiking Trail. One of my bucket goals has been to hike the entire trail (not all at once!). We got a bit closer to that on Friday and Saturday.

On Saturday, again, after taking care of the cabins, we went hiking. This time we went to Magney State Park and hiked to the kettle. From there we took the Superior Hiking Trail west. At the beginning of the trail was a bear trap; Debbie wasn't too sure she wanted to hike the trail with a bear trap there. I told her it wasn't baited; if a trap is baited, it smells very strongly of licorice. This one didn't have even a hint of it. Nevertheless, she was a bit skittish. We walked for a good bit, then turned around and went to the Kadunce River, which is a spur train on the Lake Superior Hiking Trail. Noticing a pattern? Because we couldn't start until late afternoon, it was getting dark, so we didn't go very far. It will be a regular on our list, though.

On Sunday, we didn't do any hiking, although I rode my bike to Lutsen and back—about 40 miles. Day of rest and all, you know :)

Today, Monday, I got done cleaning the cabins and Debbie asked me if I wanted to ride the Gitchee-Gami bike trail. It will be a bike trail eventually connecting Two Harbors to Grand Marais. Right now, there is a section about 1/2 hour from us that we have always wanted to do when we would visit Joel and Renee. I said, sure. So, I loaded both bikes into the Prius and off we went.

It was a blast! We only rode about 20 miles, round trip; that's all that is done in this area right now. Ironically, we rode right through the Temperance River State Park that we had been hiking in on Friday. We stopped on the bridge—you can never see a waterfall too often or too long!—before continuing on. We both decided this would be on our list of regular occurrences, as well.

So, that's why I haven't been posting as much as usual. Oh, and the fact that the books I've been reading aren't electronic so I can't cut and paste...besides the fact that the ones I've read lately haven't lent themselves to excerpts very well.

Truly great

"Enduring great companies don't exist merely to deliver returns to shareholders. Indeed, in a truly great company, profits and cash flow become like blood and water to a healthy body: They are absolutely essential for life, but they are not the very point of life."— Good to Great, page 194

<idle musing>
Indeed! In the Theory of Constraints, a continuous improvement philosophy laid out in The Goal, there are necessary conditions and sufficient conditions. Necessary conditions are not the end in themselves, but contribute to the goal; without them, you can't get done what you want, but they are simply supporting the actual goal. That is exactly what he is saying here. Unfortunately, for most companies, it seems that making the almighty dollar is their goal and not just a necessary condition.
</idle musing>

Thought for today

“...what is being a Christian? Giving your heart to God. And what is giving your heart to God? Devoting your voluntary powers to Him; ceasing to live for yourself and living for God".—Charles Finney

<idle musing>:
Nice little nutshell description of Christianity, isn't it? Everything else is extras—not infrequently distracting extras, at that!
</idle musing>:

Holy or holey?

“The hole in our holiness is that we don't really care much about it. Passionate exhortation to pursue gospel-driven holiness is barely heard in most of our churches. It's not that we don't talk about sin or encourage decent behavior. Too many sermons are basically self-help seminars on becoming a better you. That's moralism, and its not helpful. Any gospel that says only why you must do and never announces what Christ has done is no gospel at all.”—Kevin DeYoung, The Hole in Our Holiness, pages 11-12

<idle musing>
Just saw this book in an e-mail and managed to read a few preview pages. This little snippet jumped out at me, though. Sadly, he's right; most of what passes for "holiness preaching" is little more than moralistic self-improvement. I have become firmly convinced that the practical theology of most american christians is just Pelagianism.

We really think we can do it, don't we?!
</idle musing>

Interesting comparison

God didn't send me out to collect a following for myself, but to preach the Message of what he has done, collecting a following for him. And he didn't send me to do it with a lot of fancy rhetoric of my own, lest the powerful action at the center—Christ on the Cross—be trivialized into mere words. (1 Corinthians 1:17 The Message)

For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel—not with wisdom and eloquence, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.
 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. (1 Corinthians 1:17, 18 TNIV)

<idle musing>
Interesting
</idle musing>

On the beach

That's the title of a 1960s dystopian novel about the end of the world because of nuclear holocaust—also made into a movie. But, that's not what I'm talking about here. On Saturday night, Joel, Renee, the kids, Nancy (Joel's mother, who is visiting for a week), Debbie, and I went to the beach by Durfree Creek (about 5 miles from Grand Marais). We planned on having a fire, popping some popcorn, and then heading home once it got dark.

When we got there, Joel was talking to some one and they mentioned that Saturday night was a predicted meteor shower, the Perseids. Joel and family decided it would be fun to spend the night under the (falling) stars. So, Joel and Nancy went back to town to get sleeping bags, etc. Debbie and I decided we would only stick around until about 3:00 AM.

Once it got dark, the kids wanted to go to bed—after all, what can be more fun than sleeping under the stars? Debbie and I volunteered to wake everyone up once the show started.

There were some nice meteors here and there, about one every 5-15 minutes. That went on for a while with some very spectacular ones, but not the heavy shower that was predicted. Around midnight, I went back to town to get sleeping bags for Debbie and me. The beach was getting cold!

I think both Debbie and I dozed here and there—at least she nudged me for snoring too loudly and I heard her snoring, too :) When 3:30 AM rolled around, we decided it was time to call it a night and go home. As we were walking to the car, a bright meteor flashed across the sky as if to say good-bye to us. We drove home and crashed.

Sunday afternoon, I read that the shower started in earnest right after we called it a night...of course!

Everything else is first

The farmer pleads, "I can't be religious; I can't serve God--I must sow my wheat." Well, sow your wheat but do it for the Lord. O but you have so much to do! Then do it all for the Lord. Another can't be religious for he must get his lesson. Well, get your lesson, but get it for the Lord, and this will be religious. The man who should neglect to sow his wheat or neglect to get his lessons because he wants to be religious, is crazy. He perverts the plainest things in the worst way. If you are to be religious, you must be industrious. The farmer must sow his wheat, and the student must get his lesson. An idle man can no more be religious than the devil can be. This notion that men can't be religious, because they have some business to do, is the merest nonsense. It utterly overlooks the great truth that God never forbids our doing the appropriate business of life, but only requires that we shall do all for Himself.—Charles Finney

<idle musing>
Why does everything seem so much more important than the things of God? Actually, everything is to be a "thing of God" if our focus is on God. It's too easy...we are the ones who make it difficult.
</idle musing>

Rules and regulations

I went to the friends of the library sale here in Grand Marais last Friday. I like going to look; I rarely buy much anymore—especially now, with very limited space! But, I did find a book on business that I have been meaning to read for a few years now: Good to Great.

The book is over ten years old and some of the companies highlighted are in serious trouble, but the concepts he talks about are timeless. In fact, the reason those companies are in trouble is because the strayed from the things that made them great.

Anyway, thought I would share this little tidbit with you:

“Most companies build their bureaucratic rules to manage the small percentage of wrong people on the bus, which in turn drives away the right people on the bus, which then increases the percentage of wrong people on the bus, which increases the need for more bureaucracy to compensate for incompetence and lack of discipline, which then further drives the right people away, and so forth.”—Good to Great, page 121

<idle musing>
Yep. I've seen it many times over the years and in several companies. It's endemic to our fear of letting misfits go; we try to manage them or at least minimize their negative impact. The result is we lose or at least dishearten the rest of our people.

I've done it myself. I feel sorry for a person or think I can transform them, so I don't let them go. The end result is almost always misery for them, me, and their co-workers. There's a HarperCollins book (now available from Zondervan, too) about that very thing. It's called Necessary Endings. I think I might have excerpted from it in the past. If not, I will be in the future :)
</idle musing>

Psalms and tense

Above (4.2.1. ), I argued that temporal succession is semantically effected by boundedness but is the pragmatically default interpretation of narrative discourse. What I propose here is that the association of this pragmatic-based temporally successive meaning with the narrative wayyiqtol allows the poets of Psalms to draw on the form to overtly mark temporal succession within a context dominated by static (temporally speaking), parallelistic poetry. The contrast between Hebrew narrative and poetry can be well appreciated in light of Jackobson’s famous definition of poetic function as transforming sequence into equivalency (1960: 358): “equivalence is promoted to the constitutive device of the sequence.” In other words, the relationship between predicates in successive lines (i.e., parallel stichs) in poetry is one of equivalency—that is, they refer to the self-same event—in contrast to prose narrative, in which successive predicates refer to successive events. Thus, to force a sequential reading of events in poetry, the wayyiqtol form is employed with its implicature meaning of succession from the prose narrative.—John Cook in Time and the Biblical Hebrew Verb(forthcoming from Eisenbrauns)