Truth without emotion produces dead orthodoxy and a church full (or half full) of artificial admirers (like people who write generic anniversary cards for a living). Emotion without truth produces empty frenzy and cultivates shallow people who refuse the disciplines of rigorous thought. But true worship comes from people who are deeply emotional and who love deep and sound doctrine. Strong affections from God rooted in truth are the bone and marrow of biblical worship.”
~ John Piper, in Desiring God (Sisters, OR: Multnomah, 1986), page 76
Archives for December 2010
Reasons Why Christians Should Study History
Below are some of the responses turned in by my students when asked to prepare a top ten list for the reasons why Christians should study history:
Serious
- History is teleological – where do we stand in God’s timeline?
- The events recorded in the Bible are historical.
- To avoid being misled by others.
- To be a more effective apologist.
- People will take you more seriously (credibility).
- To avoid having a narrow vision and a narrow mind.
- It makes available new evangelistic opportunities.
- To avoid looking at the events of the Bible as a separate world from historical events not found in the Bible – there isn’t a Bible world and the real world.
- To understand the Bible in its historical setting — grammatico-historical interpretation.
- To discover our cultural roots.
- To see how Christianity has shaped the world, and where it has been shaped by the world.
- Learn from previous mistakes so as not to repeat them.
- It is interesting!
- It is fun!
- History can be beautiful.
- It enriches our understanding of other fields of study.
- History is His Story.
- Helps you better navigate your life (you won’t make stupid mistakes like naming your mission trip to Egypt “The Crusade”)
- Being introduced to great men and women of the past can help you to be a better person.
- You won’t reinvent the wheel (or arguments, or …)
- It helps you grow in your understanding of God (God creates, God judges, God redeems, God… — The God who parted the Red Sea is the same God we serve today)
- It evokes praise and worship when you see God’s sovereign hand at work.
- You get a chance to see God fulfill his promises.
- The multi-local, multi-vocal perspective helps a person to become more discerning.
- Historical investigation can result in spiritual growth and a more committed faith.
- You can see further when you stand on the shoulders of your predecessors.
- Exposure to other cultures (the past is a foreign country) is an enriching experience.
- It helps one be thankful for the blessings of life, liberty, prosperity, etc.
- Make it possible to observe the “flow of history” (Francis Schaeffer)
- History lets us see philosophy lived-out and appropriately evaluate it by its end-results.
- Helps us to comprehend what it means to be human.
- Keeps us from being practical Deists – “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the Earth.” Then what?
- Helps us to understand other people groups and cultures and why they are the way they are, and to connect with them.
- Jesus was historical.
- It helps us to find solutions in the present.
- The past shapes the present, and the future.
- It is helpful to see how civilization and Christianity has developed through the centuries, and the relationship between them.
- Looking at notable figures from the past can be emboldening, motivating, and encouraging.
- To avoid the appearance of being stupid (Jesus wasn’t born on December 25th, 2010 years ago.)
- To more fully appreciate the sacrifices made by those who came before us.
- “The scholar has lived in many times and is therefore in some degree immune from the great cataract of nonsense that pours from the press and the microphone of his own age.” (C.S. Lewis)
- To behold the glory of God.
- Helps us to see what is unique and what is not. God is unique, other than that there is nothing new under the sun.
- God encourages collective memory. “Remember the days of old…”
- Historical perspective is necessary for the possession of a Christian worldview.
- To be equipped for every good work.
- Studying history is a practical way of seeing the effects of various ethical systems.
Picturesque and possibly humorous)
- Because Professor Stilley says so (and it is required to graduate).
- You are going to be history someday, and don’t you want someone to remember you?
- 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42
- It is the soap opera of truth.
- So that we can understand the process that led to the “mullet” being an acceptable hairstyle and AVOID it at all costs!!
- It will keep you from saying, “Hey, bring in that big wooden horse someone left outside.”
- To positively represent Christians in the event of an appearance on Jeopardy.
- You will reconsider going to a barbeque with Nero.
- To avoid being a recipient of the Darwin Awards.
- You won’t drink the Cool-Aide when going to Rob Bell’s church.
- So I can wear my cute new reading glasses.
- So I can be smarter than my 7-year-olds 1st grade teacher (okay, so I can be smarter than my 7-year-old).
- To remember the loudest person is not necessarily the smartest person.
The Value of Learning History
The Value of Learning History: A Lesson from Jude
by John Piper
The little letter of Jude teaches us something about the value of learning history. This is not the main point of the letter. But it is striking. In this next-to-last book of the Bible, Jude writes to encourage the saints to “contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints” (verse 3).
The letter is a call to vigilance in view of “certain persons [who] have crept in unnoticed… ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into licentiousness and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ” (verse 4). Jude describes these folks in vivid terms. They “revile the things which they do not understand” (verse 10). They “are grumblers, finding fault, following after their own lusts; they speak arrogantly, flattering people for the sake of gaining an advantage” (verse 16). They “cause divisions, [and are] worldly-minded, devoid of the Spirit” (verse 19).
This is a devastating assessment of people who are not outside the church but have “crept in unnoticed.” Jude wants them be spotted for who they really are, so that the church is not deceived and ruined by their false teaching and immoral behavior.
One of his strategies is to compare them to other persons and events in history. For example, he says that “Sodom and Gomorrah . . . since they, in the same way as these, indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh, are exhibited as an example in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire” (verse 7). So Jude compares these people to Sodom and Gomorrah. His point in doing this is to say that Sodom and Gomorrah are “an example” of what will happen when people live like these intruders are living. So, in Jude’s mind, knowing the history of Sodom and Gomorrah is very useful in helping detect such error and deflect it from the saints.
Similarly in verse 11, Jude piles up three other references to historical events as comparisons with what is happening in his day among Christians. He says “Woe to them! For they have gone the way of Cain, and for pay they have rushed headlong into the error of Balaam, and perished in the rebellion of Korah.” This is remarkable. Why refer to three different historical incidents like this that happened thousands of years earlier – Genesis 19 (Sodom), Genesis 3 (Cain), Numbers 22-24 (Balaam), Numbers 16 (Korah)? What’s the point?
Here are three points: 1) Jude assumes that the readers know these stories! Is that not amazing! This was the first century! No books in anyone’s homes. No Bibles available. No story tapes. Just oral instruction. And he assumed that they would know: What is “the way of Cain” and “the error of Balaam” and “the rebellion of Korah”? Do you know? Isn’t this astonishing! He expects them to know. It makes me think that our standards of Bible knowledge in the church today are too low.
2) Jude assumes that knowing this history will illumine the present situation. The Christians will handle the error better today, if they know similar situations from yesterday. In other words, history is valuable for Christian living. To know that Cain was jealous and hated his brother and resented his true spiritual communion with God will alert you to watch for such things even among brothers.
To know that Balaam finally caved in and made the Word of God a means of worldly gain makes you better able to spot that sort of thing. To know that Korah despised legitimate authority and resented Moses’ leadership will protect you from factious folk who dislike anyone being seen as their leader.
3) Is it not clear, then, that God ordains that events happen and that they get recorded as history so that we will learn them and become wiser and more insightful about the present for the sake of Christ and his church. Never stop learning history. Gain some knowledge every day. And let us give our children one of the best protections against the folly of the future, namely, a knowledge of the past.
Learning with you, for Christ and his kingdom,
Pastor John
Used by Permission: John Piper. © Desiring God. Website: www.desiringGod.org. Email: mail@desiringGod.org. Toll Free: 1.888.346.4700.
Reading Your Textbooks
Advice to my students in regard to reading your textbooks:
In the days in which we live, the zeitgeist promotes the idea that more is better. This philosophy of life has somehow extended itself into the area of religious education. I am not suggesting that you should not read broadly, you should. However, I believe that you will be better served by reading deeply. In Sven Burkitt’s book, The Gutenberg Ellegies, he distinguishes these approaches as intensive reading versus extensive reading.
I have tried to find textbooks for you that are enjoyable to read, comprehensive in nature, and either consistent with a Christian worldview or culturally significant. I encourage you to challenge yourself by going beyond the assigned readings and exposing yourself to other authors and ideas. However, if the choice is between intensive reading of the class texts or the books on the class bibliography, I hope you will choose to read the class texts, then re-read them, and then read them again.
We can discuss this more in class, but for now I share with you an excerpt from the Preface of Andrew Murray’s book, The New Life;
“Let every portion be read over at least three times. The great bane of all our converse with Divine things is superficiality. When we read anything and understand it somewhat, we think that this is enough. No: we must give time, that it may make an impression and wield its own influence upon us. Read every portion the first time with consideration, to understand the good that is in it, and then see if you receive benefit from the thoughts that are there expressed. Read it the second time to see if it is really in accordance with God’s word: take some, if not all, of the texts that are adduced on each point, and ponder them in order to come under the full force of what God has said on the point. Let your God, through His word, teach you what you must think and believe concerning Him and His will. Read it then the third time to find out the corresponding places, not in the Bible, but in your own life, in order to know if your life has been in harmony with the New Life, and to direct your life for the future entirely according to God’s word. I am fully persuaded that the time and pains spent on such converse with the word of God under the teaching of this or some book that helps you in dealing with it, will be rewarded tenfold.”
John Donne, Sonnet #14
Batter my heart, three-personed God; for you
As yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
I, like an usurped town, to another due, Labor to admit you, but O, to no end;
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captive, and proves weak or untrue.
Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain,
But am betrothed unto your enemy.
Divorce me, untie or break that knot again;
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me
Dorothy Parker – select quotes
By the time you swear you’re his,
Shivering and sighing,
And he vows his passion is,
Infinite, undying—
Lady, make a note of this:
One of you is lying.
Constant use will not wear ragged the fabric of friendship.
This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force.
You can lead a horticulture, but you can’t make her think.
What I Think About Email
My Lord, If I attempted to answer the mass of futile correspondence that surrounds me, I should be debarred from all serious business of campaigning. I must remind your Lordship—for the last time—that so long a I retain and independent position, I shall see that no officer under my command is debarred, by attending to the futile driveling of mere quill-driving in your Lordship’s office, from attending to his first duty—which is, and always has been, so to train the private men under his command that they may, without question, beat any force opposed to them in the field.
~ Duke of Wellington
The Islamic Fives
Five Basic Tenets of Islam
1. There is only one God, Allah.
2. Muhammad was the last and the greatest of the prophets.
3. The Qur’an is the sacred book—the last after the Torah and the Gospels.
4. Life on earth is a preparation for eternal life.
5. The faithful are expected to adore Allah, praise Muhammad, follow the Qur’an and perform good dees.
The Five Pillars of Islam
1. Shahadah—Profession of Faith: “There is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is His Prophet.”
2. Salat—Prayer: The prescribed prayers must be said five times a day facing Mecca. The chief prayer is the Shahadah. Special prayers are said on Fridays at noon in the mosque. This is called “The Assembly.” The Call to Prayer (Adhan), heard from the minarets or on TV and radio, is always in Arabic.
3. Zakat—Almsgiving: middle and upper class persons are expected to give 2 ½%, not of what they earn, but of the value of all they possess.
4. Sawm—Fasting: During the month of Ramadan (the 9th month of the lunar year) no food or drink may be consumed until sunset.
5. Hajj—Pilgrimage: If possible, each of the faithful should try to visit Mecca at least once in his or her life.
The Five Social Teachings of Islam
1. Brotherhood – this refers to the brotherhood of all Muslims, but does not include people of other religions. The Qur’an teaches: “Believers, do not make friends with any but your own people” [Sura 3:11], “Muhammad is God’s apostle. Those who follow him are ruthless to unbelievers but merciful to one another” [Sura 48:29].
2. The Muslims are the “favored of Allah,” unbelievers have incurred the wrath of Allah.
3. “An eye for an eye . . . a tooth for a tooth.” This is exemplified by the Shari’ah (Islamic Law.) There is no allowance for repentance and forgiveness.
4. Women must be veiled, preferably clothed in the chador, which covers them entirely. Their place is in the home. A man may have up to four wives at a time if he can provide for them equally. The majority of Muslims have only one wife. Male doctors may not treat women. Women may enter mosques to pray. Muhammad forbade female infanticide. Extra-marital sex is forbidden. Marriage is an honorable estate.
5. Jihad – “Holy War.” Those who die in holy wars are martyrs. The Qur’an states: “Idolatry is more grievous than bloodshed . . . fight against them (idolaters) until idolatry is no more and God’s religion reigns supreme.” [ Sura 3:169] Jews, Christians, Hindus and Buddhists are all classified as idolaters. Muhammad set the example for religious war when he conquered Mecca.
The above are excerpted from the companion guide to the video series Christianity and Islam which is hosted by Dr. Timothy George, dean at Beeson Divinity School.
Suggested Discussion Topics: Aristotle, Ethics
1. How does Aristotle apply praxis or practical wisdom to his ethical philosophy? What does the Bible tell us about practical wisdom?
2. How does Aristotle explain the role of ethos or character in his philosophy. How does character develop in the Bible?
3. What is Aristotle’s concept of the soul? How does it compare to the Christian idea of the soul?
4. Why is causation important to Aristotle’s philosophy? How does the Bible explain causation?
5. How did Aristotle influence the self-actualization philosophy of the twentieth century?
6. Explain the ethical system of Aristotle’s Golden Mean. Does it always work? How does the Bible state the golden mean or not?
7. What are Aristotelian virtues? How do they compare with biblical virtues?
8.What does Aristotle believe about free will, voluntary and involuntary actions? How does this concept compare to the biblical concept of free will?
9. How does Aristotle explain habits? What does the Bible tell us about our habits?
10. What is Aristotle’s concept of justice? What is the biblical concept of justice?
11. How does Aristotle see the body’s role, especially in the area of health? What is the biblical view of the body and health?
12. According to Aristotle, why is friendship significant? What is the biblical concept of friendship?
13. What is the final goal of happiness for Aristotle? How is it different from joy and pleasure? What is the Christian principle of happiness, joy, and pleasure?
Read Jerry Bridges
Looking for a good book to read? Check out one of the books written by Jerry Bridges. This is what some others are saying about the works of Jerry Bridges…
“I believe [The Pursuit of Holiness] is a modern classic. Few books have had the influence on me that this one has.”
— Charles Colson, Founder, Prison Fellowship Ministries
“For the believer seriously considering the lordship of Christ in his life, Respectable Sins is must reading!”
— Joni Eareckson Tada, Founder and CEO, Joni and Friends International Disability Center
“The price Jerry Bridges has had to pay in the pursuit of holiness has not been small. His pain has been our gain.”
— John Piper, Pastor for Preaching, Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis, Minnesota
“[The Pursuit of Holiness] is surely one of the most important books produced in the past fifty years.”
— John MacArthur, Pastor-Teacher, Grace Community Church, Sun Valley, California
“[Growing Your Faith is] solid. Practical. Needed. Shows readers why and how to come under the influence of God’s Word. I’m so thankful we have another book by this man of God.”
— Kay Arthur, Cofounder, Precept Ministries International
“Biblical, informed, accessible, and rooted in Jerry’s own deep experience as a disciple of Jesus and as a teacher. If you are seeking the way forward in Christlikeness, or wish to show that way to others, Growing Your Faith is a book you can count on for substantial help.”
— Dallas Willard, Professor, School of Philosophy, University of Southern California
“Jerry Bridges continues to be a leading communicator of the truths of God’s Word to believers — young and mature. In his clear, concise writing style, he makes spiritual truth easily accessible to everyone.”
— Steve Douglass, President, Campus Crusade for Christ
“Jerry Bridges charts the path for the development of a dynamic faith that produces rock-solid, dynamic lives.”
— Joseph Stowell, President, Cornerstone University
“[Transforming Grace is] practical, biblical, and powerful — a refreshing release from guilt and legalism.”
— Jerry White, Former President, The Navigators
“Sanity, realism, authenticity, and personal integrity are the hallmarks of Jerry Bridges’s writing.”
— Sinclair Ferguson, Senior Pastor, First Presbyterian Church, Columbia, South Carolina
“Few modern writers are able to make biblical truth more understandable than Jerry Bridges.”
— C. J. Mahaney, President, Sovereign Grace Ministries
