This article has so many great quotes:
If I could say it, do you think I should have danced it?
Anno Pavlova

Myth is my tongue, which means not that I cheat, but stagger in a light too great to bear.
E. H. W. Meyerstein

Is the Gospel Really Good News?
Most American evangelicals don't know the Gospel. I am certain this is true because the Gospel story most of them tell me, (when I ask them), is not good news. It is the same nasty old Bad News repackaged and relabeled. And what is that bad news? God demands perfection - and you ain't near perfect, sucker.

Oh, sure - they can throw around phrases like "saved by faith" and "redeemed by the blood" like they know what it means, but the way they act, it sure isn't the mind-blowingly Good News that the Gospel is supposed to be.

So what is the Gospel? Just this:

Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners!

Of course, most evangelicals would agree, but I can tell they don't really believe it. Or maybe it would be more accurate to say that they believe they no longer qualify for it.

Most evangelicals apparently think something subjective happened to them at the moment of their conversion, (whatever that may happen to be), and - presto-changeo! - they suddenly ceased to be sinners. They are now - what? Something special that shouldn't sin any more and is in big trouble when they do, right? I can list all the adjectives and the nouns that evangelicals use to describe this special mystical state of those who stand on the "saved" side of that divine Line in the Sand. But - dang - they sure look like, act like, talk like, think like and smell like your typical garden-variety sinner, don't they?

Lemme ask a question? Don't you just totally groove to those dramatic conversion stories? You know the kind - Joe Bad-Ass has spent his whole life kicking sand in the face of 98-pound weaklings, biting the heads off live bats and listening to head-banger-hip-hop-grunge-gansta-rap-rock. He then gets miraculously converted, and immediately starts a successful, (and highly visible), ministry to skinny beach bums. He dresses like Pat Boone, combs his hair like Benny Hinn, listens to CCM day and night and best of all has a godly and beautiful ex-Hawaiian Tropic bikini model for a wife.

Don't we just love those stories?

And in comparison, don't our own pathetic, puny, pitiful Christian lives make us want to hurl? Our lives are mundane, we struggle with the same stupid actions and attitudes we've fought for years. We still don't like skinny geeks. We still enjoy the taste of a good steak. And we honestly think that CCM sucks.

What kind of Christians are we, anyway?

I'll tell you what kind I am - I'm the kind that Christ Jesus came into the world to save. I'll be honest - I'd really like the heart-stopping conversion story and the million-dollar public ministry. But if I had it, I still kinda doubt that I'd be much different from the miserable stinking wretch I am. I'd just have better packaging. And I might start to believe my own press. I might start to think that I was somebody who had power over the ravages of sin, somebody who had some mystical control that the unwashed masses lacked. I might get really, really depressed about the undeniable fact that, in spite of memorizing a squillion verses and having a quiet time 3218 days in a row, I still occasionally lust after my neighbor's wife. I might get a little weird and stupid trying to explain that my fecal matter doesn't really stink, but I'd never be able to get away from the stark truth that I'm not nearly as well-behaved as I ought to be, not nearly as pure of heart as I should be, and not nearly as righteous as I hope to be.

But if I'm convinced that I ain't no longer a sinner, what hope is left for me?

Naw, I pass - you can have your cheap suit and your ministry to beach geeks and your cheesy music. As for me, I'm a sinner utterly unable to do a thing to save myself. I couldn't do it 35 years ago when I first put my faith in Christ, and I still can't do it. Fortunately, Christ Jesus came into the world to save people just exactly like me.

And that, my friends - that is Very Good News Indeed!

I stole this from somebody else, but I prefer to call it "research":

I have found that all human beings have limitations, which is something everyone should take into consideration. We should recognize that everybody is capable of making a mistake, and we should not raise any more hell about somebody else's mistakes than we expect to be raised when we make one. Who does not make mistakes? Who is not limited? Everybody but God.
Duke Ellington

Somebody in England "Gets It"
There's a lot of stuff that makes the rounds on the internet that is fantasy. So when I got sent a copy of a copy of a copy of a story reportedly written by a "liberal" in the UK, I was deeply skeptical. But I did a little research and discovered, to my delight and surprise, that the article was real.

Here's what Tony Parsons of the UK's Daily Mirror had to say about European anti-Americanism.

Dear Europe,

My vicar from my home church in England sent me an article regarding the war written by Robert Fisk, the so-called "Liberator of Kabul". This article, (which I am unable to link to - sorry), no doubt captures the mood of many of you in England and Europe regarding America and Americans. It reeks of a mistaken belief many Europeans have about us, namely - that we are wreckless, unintellectual, blood-thirsty simpletons. What is most maddening about this misconception is that the only possible way an American can convince a European that he is not an unsophisticated rube is to agree with the European. Europeans apparently cannot conceive of the possibility that they might be wrong.

We Americans, on the other hand, are very aware that we might be wrong. We remember Vietnam and the Bay of Pigs and Carter's abortive attempt to rescue the hostages from Iran. Like the English and you Europeans, we are cynical and distrustful of our government. We hate what the government did to innocents at Ruby Ridge and Waco and Miami, but we remember also that these attrocities were visited upon us by an administration whose leader wasn't sure how to define the word "is". For the first time in a very long time we have a president who actually seems to rely on principle rather than polls for guidance.

We do not all agree that Saddam poses a direct immediate threat to our security, but this President - the one who actually seems to have some semblance of moral vision - made it clear on 20 September 2001; before a joint session of Congress when he warned the nations of the world that those who are not with us in the fight against terror are against us.

The Butcher of Baghdad has proven beyond a reasonable doubt that he is not with us.

Americans are overwhelmingly in favour of removing Saddam, not because we are the doltish, uneducated dupes of a cowboy oilman and his neo-con henchmen, but because we have images of burning, crumbling buildings seared into our national consciousness. We are very aware that politicians are capable of all sorts of nefarious behaviour - remember that we had a front row seat at The Slick WIllie Show for eight miserably long years - but we also know that criminally wicked and evil people who hate the west and will stop at absolutely nothing to destroy us are even now plotting something more devastating than 11 September. And we will not stand idly by and wait for it to be brought to our shores.

In American football, we have a saying that perfectly captures the essence of our response to terrorism: The best defense is a good offense. We were caught napping on nine-eleven, but we are fully awake now and we are determined to carry this war - a war we DID NOT start - to the enemy. We are sorry you don't like it, but quite frankly, it wasn't your WTC and your Pentagon and your Flight 93 that were destroyed.

As I read European and British news reports about the anti-war fervor there, I cannot help but think of Winston Churchill thundering unheeded warnings about Nazi Germany from the backbench of Parliament in the 1930s. Your leaders were proclaiming peace even as an unspeakable evil was being hatched in your midst. How do we know these days are any different than those? How do we know your leaders are any wiser now than then?

Maybe you're right, maybe we are "simpletons". But you, Europe, have little in your recent history to convince us that anything short of a nuclear, chemical or biological attack in the heart of London, Paris or Berlin could possibly shake you out of your moral and intellectual torpor. Your revered principle of moral equivalency has eaten away the very soul of Europe. Your leaders are no longer capable of judging anything as absolutely right or absolutely wrong. Oh, anything that is, except where America is involved; in that case we are apparently wrong all the time.

We here on the western shore of the Atlantic wonder at the moral vacuity of a Europe which could dispassionately observe, (and therefore passively condone), genocide in Yugoslavia and then lecture us on principles of right and wrong. We wonder how many millions more would have died in Slovenia and Bosnia had the United States left it to you to resolve the mess in the Balkans. We remember Sarajevo 1914, too. We marvel that anyone could dare to compare a popularly elected government such as exists in Israel with Yassar Arafat's thugocracy. We remember that all of Europe would be speaking German if not for American "intervention". We remember that it was American military, industrial and economic might that liberated Europe from a Nazi terror that could have been prevented had you heeded the early warnings.

11 September was an early warning.

For generations, we Americans have perceived ourselves to be somehow slightly inferior to our older, more sophisticated cousins on the east side of the Atlantic. But we are slowly coming to conclude that your sophistication is a sham. Europe has become our embittered, crazy, never-married great-aunt who swears and rails and cackles insanely at us from her attic loft. We love her and tolerate her because we remember the relationship we used to have back before she lost her mind and forfeited her soul. We'll shelter her and care for her until she dies, but we now know she has nothing useful to say.

Finally, I can think of no better description than "simpleton" for any person who would argue that this fight is about oil. This is about survival. America was viciously, brutally attacked by an enemy that has no morals we recognize and no creed beyond infidels must die. We recognize, even if you don't, that this is a battle to the death between the ideas that have formed the west for nearly 2000 years and the ideas that hold sway in those poor benighted countries suffering under the tyranny of Islam.

We have been thrust into a war we neither wanted nor asked for. We know we are not virtuous; we are not pure and we are frequently ham-handed in our dealings with others. But we are also very, very angry. And your silly, simplistic and naive arguments do nothing to convince us that you are anything more than the unwitting accomplices of those who would destroy us all in the name of Allah.

Had a terrific day yesterday. Chris & Bryanne came up for lunch, Audrey brought a friend (Kat) from school, and Patrick was with us of course. There were 9 people around my dinner table - and that is good. Kat is delightful person - English Lit major who is getting into real meat. Currently into Milton and loving it. Bryanne asked Karen how she could improve her vocabulary and grammar usage. That girl is so motivated it blows me away. I see why Chris likes her. Chris told me about a new project he is working on, and agreed to let me help him plan it and bid it. Tyler and Ellyn were their usual hysterical and charming selves, and Patrick was able to regale us as he bantered with Kat about Jansenism, whatever that is. All in all, it was a terrific Sunday lunch.

We had a Sunday Night Praise meeting at Billy & Anita's house, and it was the best one by far. This little church is learrning how to love one another. Afterward's I came home and made my Red Bean Soup, which we'll have for dinner tonight. In fact, it is time fior me to head in that direction - I'm bushed.

I just read this line in my accounting textbook:

...some issues may be resolved by reference to the application of general priniciples rather than the generation of further rules. (Accounting, an Introduction )

These words are as true for law in general as they are for accounting practice. The United States legal code is so monstrously huge, it is a safe bet that nearly anyone is alive, ever was alive, or ever will be alive is a lawbreaker in some way. And why this sad state of affairs?

We have no idea what the general principles of law should be.

Therefore, we just crank out one rule after another, with the certainty that One Big Law, the Law of Unintended Consequences, will always kick in and kick some poor shmuck in the teeth.

I have much more to say on this, but I'm behind in my studies...

I didn't write the following, but I wish I did. You can complain to me if you don't like it, or blast the author, Judson Heartsill. Either way, this piece rocks.

War is on my mind.

I am a Christian, but I am not a pacifist. I am a dual citizen of the kingdom of God and the United States of America. In the kingdom, I've been naturalized. In the U.S., it's more like a green card.

What am I talking about? In practical terms, this means that, should the U.S. disappear overnight, I must be just as happy and content with my life as I am now. In fact, I am commanded to be just as happy. Such a perspective may seem bizarre to some, but to me it makes all the sense in the world.

This is not to say that I don't love the United States. I love it very much. My birth here, what some would call a lucky accident, is actually a colossal example of God's grace. The same goes for my being born to loving parents, being born into safety, meeting a perfect wife, and having a perfect child. None of these were based on my goodness-- they were all freely given gifts. Left to myself I would have done much, much worse.

That's why I am not a pacifist. I believe that some things are worth fighting for.

I know lots of Christians who are pacifists. In fact, Christianity in general almost seems split between pacifists and non-pacifists. I think the pacifists are zealous lovers of peace, and I share that with them.

The pacifists believe in common grace, like me. Unlike me, they believe it is better to let these things be destroyed, perhaps while protesting nonviolently. They believe this because they value their kingdom citizenship more than their U.S. citizenship-- just like me. They say it is more important to stoically endure evil, because Jesus did. They say that to fight for these common graces is to idolize them over Jesus.

Interestingly, some of these actually accuse me of wanting to fight for religion, since I talk about things like "common grace". In fact, my religion-- Jesus Christ-- is the only grace for which I absolutely, positively refuse to fight for with the sword! I use an entirely different sword for that. (That sword curiously resembles a book).

The pacifists I admire most are those whose souls are just too gentle to contemplate violence for any reason. I disagree with them but I admire their intense desire for peace. I think some of them need to read some more of Jesus's own words about what he, himself, meant, and what his self-proclaimed mission on earth was.

The pacifists I respect the most are those who remind me of the dangers of worshipping mammon. They help drive into my skull exactly how depraved our country really is, and how deluded we sometimes are. It is in part due to their warnings that, so far, I have managed to avoid falling completely headlong into these pits. I am always dangerously close, and it is terrifying to me-- much more so than a collapsing skyscraper.

When I was a teenager searching for my vocation, I first thought I wanted to be an active duty fighting man. Then I discovered disciplines and trades which I loved more, and followed those instead. My military desire did not go away, however. I decided to become a reservist.

I am a Navy man, a fighting man of the United States of America. If war comes, I may have to go and serve. My expertise is not with missiles, radios, or cannons. I know how to drive big ships. If my country needs me, I will probably be placed in service on commercial vessels, because the Navy needs officers to liason with civilian shipping.

Those ships don't have guns. Tactically, they are sitting ducks. In the open water they are defenseless. If a carrier group is nearby it's a different story, but the fact remains that the sailors on materiel ships have absolutely no illusions about their defense capability.

Nevertheless, I am not a hero, and I don't really know much at all about how to conduct sea warfare. That's the point, and that's why the Navy needs me. For almost all intents and purposes, I'm a civilian who has simply volunteered to be very much in harm's way, if necessary.

In the few days after 9-11, I entered what was probably the biggest depression of my life. Generally I am a happy guy. With all the wonderful people in my life, how could I not be? But my mood was positively, evilly black for weeks. You liberals of the marxist of nihilist variety: don't you dare preach to me for a second about "not letting them get to you" or "not sinking to their level". The fact is, their level is hell, and for a while I was right there. And I'm not about to apologize for being depressed or sad on the account of mass murder. If you weren't in hell too, then shut the fuck up.

For a while, I thought my depression was due to the possibility of a military call-up. My wife was pregnant with our first son. I dwelt on the blackest possibilities.

I slowly began to realize that my depression wasn't because I might be taken from my family, or because I might have to fight. It was because of the immense wrongness of the murders. The sheer willfull massacre clouded my heart and withered my mind.

So what of leaving my family, maybe never to come back? It did make me sad. But not depressed. What pierced me was the knowledge that they could be murdered like those in New York. What drove me further to despair was the knowledge that the murderers would love to kill them. To them, my pregnant wife was evil, and the only way that true righteousness could possibly flourish would be through her death.

Current events have got us all talking about heroes. To me, the Columbia astronauts were the truest heroes. They are the talented ones which I mentioned. They are incredible men and women, pilots and doctors, brimming with skill and determination, and standing on the shoulders of giants. They show us a glimpse of the good side of the world, the side away from evil, the side of imagination and triumph.

I am not one. I am a relatively immature, self-centered man who happens to be surrounded by huge amounts of grace. I am rough, not tough, as evidence by my language above. I haven't learned how to be graciously angry yet. (FYI- rough bad, tough good). But it occurs to me that the most important reason heroes exist is because they are necessary for the survival of hope and love and the human race. If we didn't need those things, we wouldn't need heroes. So, talented people work and train to become heroes. Ordinary people, like me, sometimes rise up and, through lots of agonizing, try to be as heroic as possible in order to save what they love.

Jesus of Nazareth claimed that he came in order to pay for the evil in human hearts. He told his comrades "A man can have no greater love than this-- that he lay down his life for his friends".

He said this right before he became a hero. His job was to make his friends free forever. Everybody wants to imitate him, or at least to imitate what they think he did. Nobody can do exactly what he did, I promise you. To a citizen-soldier like me, the best way to make my friends free is to prevent them from being murdered. This statement says a lot about who my friends are. They not only include my wife and child, but a whole lot of Iraqi people. In fact, they include every human on the planet who doesn't want to be murdered.

However, I didn't make myself a friend of those people. Someone else did, and I do not have a right to cut off those ties.

The murderers have it all wrong. True righteousness cannot flourish through my wife's death, or my son's death. It can only flourish through one man's death. The good news is, he already died. Think that's good? It only gets better.l

Dear Tyler & Ellyn,

This morning when I asked you two about your thoughts regarding the Columbia disaster, you said, "I don't see why they were called 'heroes'." I understand why you feel that way, and I wanted to take a few moments to talk about it.

Back when I was a kid, the United States of America was a different country. There are many, many things that have changed, too many to tell you about here, but one of the ways it was different is this -

No country had ever put a man on the moon.

I remember the day Apollo 1 exploded on the launch pad and killed three astronauts. I remember when Apollo 8 was launched and orbited the moon for the very first time. And I will never forget that night in July 1969 when my parents woke me up in the middle of a good sleep to listen to the broadcast of the very first landing. The words "The Eagle has landed" have an emotional impact on me today that cannot be overstated. We did it. The US put a man on the moon before 1970.

The next day, Neil Armstrong got out of the Lunar Module, climbed down the ladder, and actually walked on the moon. Little kids would never again look at a virgin moon - man had conquered it.

But that conquest came at a tremendous price. It required the combined, coordinated efforts of thousands of people, millions of dollars, and untold personal sacrifices by the engineers, scientists, astronauts, and all who knew and loved them to make it happen. It was a conquest greater than any in the history of man. It absolutely dwarfed Columbus' discovery of the new world, Magellan circling the globe, or De Gama seeing the Pacific Ocean. All those men were explorers, and their daring, their courage, and their dedication opened up new frontiers for the rest of us.

It is just over 30 years since mankind walked on the moon. 30 years after Columbus discovered the New World was 1522. It would be nearly 100 years before Europeans gained a meaningful foothold on the new continent, but the initial exploration had been completed. Columbus had proved it was possible, even if it was incredibly difficult.

In the same vein, the astronauts and the entire space program have proved that space flight is possible, that landing on the moon is possible - even if it is still incredibly difficult and terribly risky.

In some ways, the space program is a victim of its own success. They have had so many successes and so few failures that we have come to believe that space flight is routine. That it is about as risky and complicated as hopping on plane and flying to London. But as we saw on Saturday, it is many orders of magnitude more risky. Every one of those astronauts knew that they could die when they strapped themselves onto the rocket three weeks ago, just as Columbus and his men knew they might never return to Spain. But they did it anyway. They considered the risk to be worth the reward.

So when we say that the astronauts are heroes, we mean they are people who are trail-blazers, people who incur great personal risk, people who will actually get very little personal payoff from the risks they take and who may in fact pay for their daring with their lives, but people without whom all of humanity would be infinitely poorer.

Hope that helps you to understand.

Pop

The Athanasian Creed
Whoever will be saved, before all things it is necessary that he hold the catholic faith.
Which faith except every one do keep whole and undefiled, without doubt he shall perish everlastingly.
And the catholic faith is this, that we worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity.
Neither confounding the Persons nor diving the Substance.
For there is one Person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost.
But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost is all one: the glory equal, the majesty coeternal.
Such as the Father is, such is the Son, and such is the Holy Ghost.
The Father uncreate, the Son uncreate, and the Holy Ghost uncreate.
The Father incomprehensible, the Son incomprehensible, and Holy Ghost incomprehensible.
The Father eternal, the Son eternal, and the Holy Ghost eternal.
As there are not three Uncreated nor three Incomprehensibles, but one Uncreated and one Incomprehensible.
So likewise the Father is almighty, the Son almighty, and the Holy Ghost almighty.
And yet they are not three Almighties, but one Almighty.
So the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God.
And yet they are not three Gods, but one God.
So likewise the Father is Lord, the Son Lord, and Holy Ghost Lord.
And yet they are not three Lords, but one Lord.
For like as we are compelled by the Christian verity to acknowledge every Person by Himself to be God and Lord.
So we are forbidden by the catholic religion to say, There be Three Gods or three Lords.
The Father is made of none, neither created nor begotten.
The Son is of the Father alone, not made nor created, but begotten.
The Holy Ghost is of the Father and of the Son, neither made nor created nor begotten, but proceeding.
So there is one Father, not three Fathers; one Son, not three Sons, one Holy Ghost, not three Holy Ghosts.
And in this Trinity none is before or after other; none is greater or less than another;
But the whole three Persons are co-eternal together and coequal, so that in all things, as is aforesaid, the Unity in Trinity and the Trinity in Unity is to be worshipped.
He therefore, that will be saved must think thus of the Trinity.
Furthermore, it is necessary to everlasting salvation that he also believes faithfully the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ.
For the right faith is that we believe and confess that our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is God and Man;
God of the Substance of the Father, begotten before the worlds; and Man of the substance of His mother, born in the world;
Perfect God and perfect Man, of a reasonable soul and human flesh subsisting.
Equal to the Father as touching His Godhead and inferior to the Father as touching His manhood;
Who, although He be God and Man, yet He is not two, but one Christ:
One, not by conversion of the Godhead into flesh, but by taking the manhood into God;
One altogether; not by confusion of Substance, but by unity of Person.
For as the reasonable soul and flesh is one man, so God and Man is one Christ;
Who suffered for our salvation; descended into hell; rose again the third day from the dead;
He ascended into heaven; He sitteth on the right hand of the Father, God Almighty; from whence He shall come to judge the quick and the dead.
At whose coming all men shall rise again with their bodies and shall give an account of their own works.
And they that have done good shall go into life everlasting; and they that have done evil, into everlasting fire.
This is the catholic faith; which except a man believe faithfully and firmly, he cannot be saved.

That gives me chills.

Most people thrive only inside a stable culture. This fact is particularly apparent to me this week as our company experiences the effects of a massive reorganization. People desperately want to be working in an environment that is known and stable and reliable, even if it is not particularly amenable to them individually. In the same vein, people live with oppressive governments because, in spite of their faults, the rules are well-known and they are stable.

I am beginning to conclude that people are made for stability; that it is a characteristic we as a species were made for. God is a God of great order and made a world that has tremendous diversity inside high stability. (I am also learning to type on one of these funky split keyboards and it forces me to use the correct hand when I type various characters - like "B" - which I usually do with the wrong hand.)

People have a great capacity to ignore upheaval in the world around them in order to carry on with their daily lives. I see it here at work during this re-org and I see it in the lives of people who live through war. Something amazing happened in Britain during the blitz – the people kept doing their lives. We have marveled at their resiliency, but I am beginning to suspect that, more than anything, they were acting very human. We do not handle chaos very well, we tend toward stability of some kind, even if it is personally very costly, even if we would individually have more freedom in slightly more anarchic conditions. I suspect that is why many have derisively concluded that freedom scares many people. The jury – in my mind anyway – is still out on the question of whether or not that is a characteristic that deserves scorn, but I do think it is undoubtedly true that we prefer the stability of slavery to the chaos of freedom. Or at least the perceived chaos of freedom.

Perhaps that is part of the challenge – to create an environment that is both free and stable. I suspect the founding fathers understood this need of man very well, for we see them constantly working to create environments that were stable AND free. Most governments tend towards control and stability at the expense of freedom, a few try freedom without regard for control and this makes people very uncomfortable. I can begin to have an appreciation for people who trade freedom for stability, although I still think it is a bad trade. Most people are not capable of working with a rolling deck under their feet. As I get older and lose some of my adventurous spirit, the lure of stability becomes stronger. I must never give in to the siren song of stability at the price of freedom. The two are not antithetical, but it takes a great leader to provide both. In today’s business climate, people are probably prone to go with control and stability because freedom is so scary. Enron and WorldCom look like too much freedom, but that is only true if you believe that freedom and stability are antithetical.

God created a world order that is both free and stable. And that's the kind of world I prefer.

Many women today dress like prostitutes. They look like they are advertising for sex, and in fact, they are. Men want easy sex, and women act as if that is what they want to offer. They give the sex away very cheaply and then wonder that their relationships are not fulfilling. Men want easy sex, sure, but we want much more than that. We want to be inspired to be our very best.

When women dress, act and live the part of the easy score, they do not inspire us to rise to our best, instead they appeal to our basest instincts. Such women confirm for us through the way they dress, the way they talk and the way they act that the world really is as cheap and worthless as our basest instincts imagine. But a woman who dresses, acts, talks and lives with graciousness, virtue, style and discretion sends a distinctly different message - a powerful message - to the men in her life.

Women of easy virtue require very little of a man besides appetite. Women of style and discretion who will maintain those standards regardless of external pressure say to a man that there is more to the world than sheer appetite. Such a woman inspires us to be our very best.

London is full of single women who look and act like sluts. Is it any wonder then that men act like cads? Men and women share a strong desire to please the opposite sex - and the sex drive is particularly strong in men. When a women advertises her easy availability, she appeals to our strongest appetite and makes it very easy for us to live out of our lowest nature.

Do not fill a man's vision with nothing but sexual images if you want the very best from him.

Isn't it ironic that the women's movement has coincided with the rise of easy virtue? Women now behave like they have the sexual drive and standards of an adolescent male - they have become the sexual fantasy of every hormone-crazed 15-year-old boy in the western world. But underneath that raw appetite for sex, what men really want - even more than we want easy sex - is a woman who will help us rise above mere hunger to be the best we can be.

Dressing like a slut leaves little mystery, yet the best in a man wants a woman who is a mystery. You can be sensual and alluring without being slutty, can't you? If you cannot manage that, then at least be as feminine as you can. If you cannot manage even that, then do not complain when men respond to you with nothing but heightened sexuality and decreased respect.

Researching ways to make our company more productive. We have a formal methodology for conducting projects, but the methodology tools are spread out over hundreds of documents of various kinds. Since this is all proprietary information, we do not want to distribute it to our associates in a format that can easily "walk off", so CDs are out. Adding to the complexity is the fact that the various documents are in a constant state of lux, and most assoicates travel so connecting to a central server many times occurs over a dial-up line. Then there is the problem of getting our associates to actually use the methodology tools. So the problems I have to solve are:

- secure distribution
- on-line/offline clients
- data synchronization
- usability

I have a lead on a solution, and I am doing a good bit of research the last couple of days. But I am also largely working in the dark. The whole methodology "world" here at the company is largely unknown to me, and I worry that I am either re-inventing the wheel or heading off in a direction that has already been rejected.

{sigh}

Such are the travails of the knowledge worker who finds himself between jobs. I should probably brush up my resume and start shopping for another job since I don't need one right now. The state of the economy certainly tends to make me want to be conservative, but the realities of this work culture are that the best time to find a new job is when you don't need one.

Last night I was reading John Piper's Legacy of Sovereign Joy and ran across this thought from Augustine, (not a direct quote, btw - I'm doing this from memory): Most people are not only failing to delight themselves in God, they even fail to delight themselves in their own sins. They not only are passionless about God, they are passionless about everything. Augustine seemed to teach that the life of the elect should be dominated by a consuming passion for God Himself, and this makes sense to me. This thought occurred to me while reading: Though there are many prayers I could pray that God may or may not answer affirmatively, yet this prayer I know He will delight to answer affirmatively:

"Make me satisfied with you alone, Oh Lord".
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I hate doing my jam writing on the computer. The keyboard is loud - clacky, even - and the physical feedback of typing is not nearly as sensual and satisfying as the feedback from writing. I'm probably one of those people who will actually get excited about natural handwriting-recognition technology if it ever gets good enough to read my writing. I love the feel of ink pen on paper.
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This morning I was reading in Leviticus about the various rules for offerings and sacrifices and I came across this idea: If you were a leader in the community of the people and you committed a sin, either a priest or an elder, then you were required to bring a male animal for sacrifice. If you were a "common person", which I take to mean someone who does not hold either of the previously mentioned positions of leadership, then you were required to bring a female animal as a sin offering. Seems to me that the difference has to do with fruitfulness - a female can give birth to comparatively far fewer offspring than a male can sire. The requirement to offer a male animal may speak to "epidemic" effect of sin in the leadership. Just as a male can impregnate an almost unlimited number of females with his sperm, so a leader can "impregnate" an almost unlimited number of those "under him" with the effects if his sin.

I wonder if this is evidence of the reality of representation in a covenantal relationship. We moderns don't have a clue about such things, and in fact take great offence at the thought of (a) being held culpable in the "sins" of another and (b) causing our own guilt to be imputed to those under our authority. It strikes at the root of our independence and self-sufficiency.

I'd love to get some feedback on this thought.

OK, the paper is posted, little feedback one way or another. Big surprise. < yawn > I do find that the more I write, the more I enjoy it. I spent the last 9 months in England journaling nearly every day and it has become a most pleasurable habit. The biggest problem is that I really enjoy the physical act of writing - the whole "pen on paper" thing is a sensual, physically gratifying experience. Using keyboard and computer provides far less immediate feedback. Sure, it looks better, and it is a ton easier to edit, but it is a mediated experience wheras using my own pen on a nice sheet of paper is a direct experience. I guess I like the artistry of writing as much as the craft writing.

About six weeks ago, Michael Spenser over at The Boar's Head Tavern suggested I put my thoughts about the Law of God into a single paper. What an assignment. Today I finally finished version 1.

I sent the draft to Michael. More updates as events warrant.

To: Brian Micklethwait
Re: Where I agree with the Creationists

Brian,

You are spot-on in your analysis of the conflict between the claims of orthodox Christianity and the claims of Darwinism. Any Christian Church and any Christian person that believes orthodox Christianity and Darwinism can peacefully co-exist is deluded.

But I wonder why someone who posts to a "critically rational" blog would claim to believe that "creationism is bunkum".

Is it because you are already a committed materialist and Darwinism is the only theory of origins which supports your beliefs? Is it because so many so-called "creationists" are such obvious idiots? Is it because the prevailing weight of public opinion is biased towards Darwinism? Is it because anyone who claims that creationism is a better scientific model is reviled as a bible-thumping fundamentalist, and you cannot bear to be lumped in with those folks?

Surely it's not because you have carefully weighed the evidence and decided Darwinism is a better model. I have yet to find anyone who, after carefully reviewing the data, concludes that the evidence supports the Darwinian model and contradicts the creationist model.

Are the implications of creationism a little scary? Certainly. But are scary implications any reason to avoid studying anything? Only for the uncritical and the irrational.

Respectfully,

Jack Heald
London

The Political Compass is an interesting idea. It was obviously designed by someone who possesses a fundamentally socialist economic worldview, but I think it is valuable in that it splits the political spectrum into both vertical and horizontal axes - the Liberty/Authority axis and the social Left/Right axis.

According to the test, I fall almost exactly in the middle of the Authority/Liberty spectrum, but I think those who know me will admit that I am actually strongly Libertarian in my views toward the state. Many of the questions belie the fundamental bias of the test-builders. For example, I strongly agreed with the statement that abortion should be outlawed. In the worldview of the test-makers, that is a strongly "Authoritarian" response, but in reality, it is exactly the opposite. The Libertarian view is that no person has the right to forcibly deprive another of his property, and nothing could more forcefully deprive another of his property than the abortionist who deprives a baby of its life.

That is a strongly libertarian view.

The libertarian view is consistent with the 6th commandment prohibiting murder.
Abortion is murder any way you slice it. Only those who wilfully delude themselves, only those who claim that a baby must experience birth to be a person can argue otherwise. These folks claim that no murder is committed because no human died.

Words fail me.

The libertarian view is consistent with the 8th commandment prohibiting stealing.
Abortion deprives another of his property - his life - without his consent.

The libertarian view is consistent with the 10th commandment prohibiting covetousness.
John Piper has made the point in Future Grace that the essence of covetousness is trusting in something other than God to satisfy us. Believing that murder and theft are necessary ingredients in your own satisfaction is the height of delusion, the zenith of unbelief.

This is where the abortion issue gets really difficult, because for those women facing an unwanted pregnancy, it requires nothing less than an act of faith to carry that baby to term. Yet living a life which is consistently honouring to our Creator sometimes requires us to do things that our modern "have-it-all-right-now" culture perceives as utterly archaic.

As our brother Jude reminds us, sometimes we have to contend for the faith which was once delivered to us. That means we gotta fight.

Poverty and Justice... and Basketball?
Cool article over at Chalcedon- not written by me incidentally - analysing the relationship between poverty and justice. Here's a key phrase:

The underlying assumption, usually left unstated, is that the distribution of wealth that arises from normal property transfers (especially market transactions and inheritances) is unjust because some people wind up with more than others. Inequality and injustice are equated.

I wish there were some way to write across the sky that "Unequal" is not the same thing as "Unjust".

To illustrate: I love basketball. Back before my knees finally gave out, I would rather play hoop than eat. I loved everything about the game. I'm a white guy who used to have just enough juice in his tanks to dunk the ball during pickup games - if the stars were aligned and I timed my jump just right. In other words, I think I have actually dunked once during a competitive game in my whole life. I regularly dream that I am playing basketball and that I am a leaping, flying, dunking machine - think Michael Jordan in his prime or Kobe Bryant now. That is my absolute favourite dream and I hate waking up from it.

Now the fact of the matter is, as much as I love basketball, I was never a very good player and I am even worse now that I'm on the dark side of 40. As much as I would give to be as good as Jordan or Bryant, no amount of wanting to will ever get me to that level. When it comes to hoop, I am not now, never was, and never will be equal to those guys. But does the fact of our unequal skills imply some injustice has been committed? Of course not.

Yet if you translate the exact same argument into the field of economics and wealth, you will hear apparently sane people arguing that inequality equals injustice.

Wrongo.

Here's the last sentence from the article, which I think summarises it nicely:

Welfare programs... enrich and empower the state to the detriment of all other institutions in society.

More Thoughts on Freedom

Today I am pondering the implications of God's Absolute Freedom. As one who holds firmly to the conviction that it is God alone who chooses whom to save from eternal damnation, God alone who effectively executes that salvation, and God alone who perfectly carries out that salvation, I must also acknowledge that until a man is regenerated by God, that man's will is utterly in bondage to sin. He is not free to do anything except please the dictates of sin.

On the other hand, every man regenerated through the work of the Sovereign God is free to obey God. And the character of this freedom is different from the slavery of the unregenerate man. For while the unregenerate man is not free to obey God, the regenerate man is free to disobey God.

And this causes me stop and shudder - what a horror to be redeemed by the blood of Jesus and then use that marvelous freedom as an opportunity to indulge my flesh.

This would be like a man miraculously cured of emphysema using his new-found health to smoke as many cigarettes as quickly as possible. It would be like an alcoholic miraculously delivered from liver failure using his new-found health to drink even more booze. It would be like a convicted murderer miraculously pardoned using his new-found freedom to become a serial killer. This is not why God saved us!

Galatians 5:13 tells us that You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love.

Another way of viewing this is to recognise that until God saves us, we are not free to serve one another. Rather, we are enslaved to our own desires and must work to serve our own desires. It is only the free man, only the man whom God has foreknown, predestined, called and justified who can serve his fellow-believers. And this is one reason that we were set free.