Breaking the Siege

Posted on by albrooke

Slide1A Pattern of Prayer, part 3: A Pattern of Desperation
February 28, 2016 | 2 Kings 19-20
(Hezekiah’s prayers)

Before the period of modern warfare, it was common for cities to be fortified and for attackers to camp outside the walls, laying siege to the city, hoping that starvation and plague would defeat the defenders. When surrounded by a competent army, it was difficult for a city to break the siege without outside help.

Air access now make sieges less likely, but occasionally they have been used in modern wars.

You will recall that in August 1939, Hitler and Stalin entered into a non-aggression pact which divided Poland and a number of other countries between Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia. This pact cleared the way for Germany to invade Poland and begin World War II. The Germans and Soviets refrained from fighting each other for nearly two years. Continue reading Breaking the Siege

Courting with Camels

Posted on by albrooke

ScreenShot065A Pattern of Prayer, part 1: A Pattern of Need
February 14, 2016 | Genesis 24 (Praying for a wife for Isaac)

Today, you may have noticed, is Valentine’s Day. You can tell by all the pink and red hearts and the candies and cards.

Valentine’s Day has a spotty history, or supposed history, having been established in 496 by a pope who listed Valentinus as a martyr “whose name is justly reverenced among men, but whose acts are known only to God.”

Although the pope could not say anything about what Valentinus had done, there eventually grew up a variety of legends about a priest named Valentinus who was martyred about 270 AD. Most prominent was the idea that he was martyred for performing marriages for Christians, and that’s the idea that had the most market appeal, so that eventually “Saint Valentine’s Day,” February 14, became associated with romantic and courtly love.

It really has no spiritual significance whatsoever, and the Catholic Church has dropped it as a part of the General Roman Calendar, but it continues to sell cards, candy, and clothes.

As we were trying to figure out how we were going to approach this sermon series, I realized that we would be starting on February 14, and one of the very first specific instances of prayer in the Bible just happened to concern how God brought about a particular marriage in a particular place in time. You may be surprised that it involves camels.

I thought it might actually sanctify Valentine’s Day a bit.

It is no secret that our current view of love and marriage (even before the Supreme Court’s
decision last summer) is historically odd. We tend to think that marriage is the result of being struck by an overwhelming emotion that leads you to realize that THIS IS THE ONE FOR YOU.

But most marriages at most times and places were not romantically motivated — indeed many, many marriages have been arranged by families for various practical and political reasons.

As we look at today’s passage in Genesis 24, we will see an early arranged marriage which
proceeds along different lines — with camels playing an integral role.

Let’s pray.

* * *

Abraham was chosen to be the father of the nation which would enter the Promised Land and there worship God, and from who Messiah would come. God had called him out of Ur, which is a land far to the east of what would become Israel.

And “called him out” means invited him to walk with his wife and household 600 miles to the land of Canaan. And Abraham, in an amazing display of faith in God, does this thing.
Eventually he and Sarah have a son, Isaac (I’m leaving out some pretty big parts of the story), and Sarah passes away.

Continue reading Courting with Camels

More on Dr. Hawkins

Posted on by albrooke

larycia-hawkinsMore careful irenic writing on the Wheaton College/Larycia Hawkins matter:

  1.  Tracy McKenzie, “Academic Freedom in a Christian Context” Faith & History (Jan. 18, 2016) [link], and (of course)
  2. Alan Jacobs, “Once more on the Academic Freedom Merry-Go-Round” Snakes & Ladders (Jan. 19, 2016) [link].

Jacobs is more or less critiquing a response which McKenzie got to the original piece.  Each writer is calmly thinking through the issues, which seems very appropriate, under the circumstances, and unusual, compared with the rest of the blogosphere.

Climate-change Jeremiah?

Posted on by albrooke

Katharine Hayhoe is a Christ-follower and a believer in climate change.  Apparently these are not contradictory positions.

I don’t think there are any churches that have “Thou shalt not believe in climate change” written in their actual statement of faith. However, I think it’s become an unspoken article of faith in many churches because of what we have been told. I’ve even had people tell me that I must not be a Christian because I think climate change is real. But you know, there’s nothing in the Bible that says that. The sad truth is that our thought leaders—many of them in the conservative media and politics—are the ones telling us this isn’t real, and we are believing them.

Ann Neumann, “God’s Creation Is Running a Fever,” Guernica (12/15/2015) [link].

 

 

Joy to the world

Posted on by albrooke

Christian teachers and students alike can never forget that their views are not widely shared in the culture as a whole. We read a great many books written by people who don’t believe what we believe; we are always aware of being different. This is a tremendous boon to true learning, because it discourages people from deploying rote pieties as a substitute for genuine thought. No Christian student or professor can ever forget the possibility of alternative beliefs or unbeliefs. Most students who graduate from Christian colleges have a sharp, clear awareness of alternative ways of being in the world; yet students at secular universities can go from their first undergraduate year all the way to a PhD without ever having a serious encounter with religious thought and experience — with any view of the world other than that of their own social class.

Alan Jacobs,”Christian Education and ‘Intellectual Compromise’” The American Conservative (online post 12/18/2015) (link).

At this time of the year, it is well for Christian students and professors (and shouldn’t we all be both?) to recall that we are called to be “different.”  “Different” does not (of course) mean angry, or rude, or insecure.  It does not mean ignorant or lacking in humility.  It means loving the world in truth, and that invariably means going out into the places where the world lives.

The same God?

Posted on by albrooke

ScreenShot003Much has already been written about the Wheaton professor who — perhaps trying to make a mainly human rather than mainly theological point — prompted a furor when she asserted that Christians and Muslims worship the same God.  The question is complex, and has been discussed profitably many times in the past.

Here is an excerpt from a thoughtful (and irenic) article by Timothy George, published in the aftermath of 9/11:

Is the Father of Jesus the God of Muhammad? The answer is surely Yes and No. Yes, in the sense that the Father of Jesus is the only God there is. He is the Creator and Sovereign Lord of Muhammad, Buddha, Confucius, of every person who has ever lived. He is the one before whom all shall one day bow (Phil. 2:5-11). Christians and Muslims can together affirm many important truths about this great God—his oneness, eternity, power, majesty. As the Qur’an puts it, he is “the Living, the Everlasting, the All-High, the All-Glorious” (2:256).

But the answer is also No, for Muslim theology rejects the divinity of Christ and the personhood of the Holy Spirit—both essential components of the Christian understanding of God. No devout Muslim can call the God of Muhammad “Father,” for this, to their mind, would compromise divine transcendence. But no faithful Christian can refuse to confess, with joy and confidence, “I believe in God the Father. … Almighty!” Apart from the Incarnation and the Trinity, it is possible to know that God is, but not who God is.

Timothy George, “Is the God of Muhammad the Father of Jesus? Christianity Today (February 4, 2002) (link).

Cromwell’s rule

Posted on by albrooke

This was a favorite saying of my Jurisprudence professor (William Powers) in law school:

I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible that you may be mistaken.

Thomas Carlyle, ed., Oliver Cromwell’s Letters and Speeches, vol. 1, 448. (Harper 1855).

Even Christians who are very sure that they know the mind of God ought to reserve some uncertainty.  We all recognize that we are flawed and sinful and that we are subject to confusion and delusion.  Let us all take one small step back from certainty.  We may be unapologetic in our faith in the redemptive work of Christ without claiming that we have the final word on everything.

Fool’s Talk: “The Grand Secular Age of Apologetics”

Posted on by albrooke

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Everyone defends their viewpoint, says Os Guinness in a fascinating new book:

“From the shortest texts and tweets to the humblest website, to the angriest blog, to the most visited social networks, the daily communications of the wired world attest that everyone is now in the business of relentless self-promotion— presenting themselves, explaining themselves, defending themselves, selling themselves or sharing their inner thoughts and emotions as never before in human history. That is why it can be said that we are in the grand secular age of apologetics.”

Guinness, Os. Fool’s Talk: Recovering the Art of Christian Persuasion (Kindle Locations 153-156). InterVarsity Press. Kindle Edition.