day no. 15,349: reformation day!

Today, we celebrate the faith of our fathers and the inheritance they left to us in the form of this testimony...

“We are resolved, by the grace of God, to maintain the pure and exclusive teaching of His only word, such as is contained in the Biblical books of the Old and New Testaments, without adding anything thereto that may be contrary to it. This Word is the only truth, it is the sure rule of all doctrine and of all life, and can never fail or deceive us.” -- John, Elector of Saxony, the first to sign the protest at the second Diet of Speyer (source)

day no. 15,348 continued... a state of emergency

A state of emergency doesn’t require a marketing campaign.

"I was at this casino minding my own business, and this guy came up to me and said, 'You're gonna have to move, you're blocking a fire exit.' As though if there was a fire, I wasn't gonna run. If you're flammable and have legs, you are never blocking a fire exit." -- Mitch Hedberg

#fauxvid19

#panicdemic

day no. 15,348: word, water, bread and wine

"Word, water, bread and wine" -- Douglas Wilson, The Face of Jesus (sermon)

The Christian faith is based on themes as basic as words, water, bread and wine. It is a faith built around things said, wet, fed and sipped. It is tangible. It is undeniable. And yet it is as profound as Word, water, bread and wine.

The Word of God in the beginning spoke the worlds into being. The Word of God in the middle became flesh in order to be in our world. The Word of God in the end will appear and end the world as we know it.

Water is the universal solvent. It washes away most things with which it comes into contact. Water comes down and water can drown. Water rushes and water gathers. It gets us wet and it whets our appetites. it greases the gears of our inner workings.

Bread can be chewed. It can be felt when swallowed. It contains energy and it is produced by energy. Bread does not grow in fields, but wheat does. Bread is produced by gathering, refining, making and baking. All of which require energy. Our daily bread is produced by bread powered hard work.

Wine makes the heart glad and is a miracle of waiting on grapes. The same grapes that taste sweet in time taste strong.

These elements of our faith are earthy and spiritual in one. They are hypo-static in their retention of two worlds. They are visible tokens of invisible attributes. They are basic and simple. They are divine and profound.

day no. 15,347: kept the way a floor is swept

Oh! how sweet to view the flowing 
Of His sin-atoning blood;
With divine assurance knowing,
That it made my peace with God.
--  Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Morning and Evening

Peacekeepers do whatever to keep the peace, but the peace they produce is counterfeit. It is fueled by compromise and flattery and it has no ability to bear the tension between parties. This is why it must be kept the way a floor is swept. It requires constant maintenance. It is a flurry of activity and maneuvering merely to maintain a semblance of sanity. It is anything but peaceful. 

Only the blood of Jesus produces peace with God. It ends the tension by satisfying fully the conditions of lasting peace. The only party who can hold a grudge, God, is satisfied completely with Christ's sacrifice. In Jesus, we have peace made. Not just peaceful feelings intermittently kept, but tangible peace permanently made. Peace you could lay down and take a nap on. Peace upon which you can confidently build. Peace that is currency that spends unto salvation and sanctification. Not a peace in the clouds, but a peace under your feet.

day no. 15,346: counting and recounting

"Let us for a moment recount those precious things which are a delight to our souls, telling them over as misers count their gold." - Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Morning and Evening

Someone who loves their money can easily spend their time counting and recounting every dollar and cent. They do this because they want to guarantee they haven't misplaced a single penny. They do this because they delight to take a census of their treasure. It is natural. We count and recount what we highly value. 

If a miser can take such care to count and recount his gold, we can take such care to count and recount the blessings of God in the inexhaustible vault of His treasure. 

Ephesians 1:3-10
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as He chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us for adoption to Himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of His will, to the praise of His glorious grace, with which He has blessed us in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace, which He lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which He set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Him, things in heaven and things on earth.

day no. 15,345: division is not the arch enemy of multiplication

"So when our first parents disobeyed Him at the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they did not introduce division into the world. What they introduced was a fragmented, inharmonious division, which is what sin always does. The division between one note and a completely different note is what makes harmony possible—but it is also what makes a discordant lack of harmony possible. We sometimes think that our first parents’ sin brought differences into the world, but what it actually did is take a world already full of glorious differences, and make them all jar and clatter against each other. The differences in themselves were good and necessary." -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

God likes distinctions.He said so, on record, in the beginning. The differences He deliberately created were good, very good in fact. So when we speak of sin, we cannot speak of it as the agent of division. Sin takes advantage of those divisions by exaggerating them beyond their created arrangement by either bringing them too close to each other or too far away. The widening or narrowing of the divine distinctions create disharmony, just like complementary notes shifting too far away from or toward their proper stations produce discord. 

Division in the not archenemy of multiplication.

God divided the world and infused creation with distinctions not to parcel it out into tiny, disconnected, disinterested factions, but to make it possible for harmonious fruitfulness and multiplication.

day no. 15,344 continued.. Deo volente

 

day no. 15,344: the greatest story ever told

"On the other end of their wilderness wandering, they had fashioned the ark of the covenant by this time, and so that is how the presence of God was manifested at that crossing, causing the waters of the Jordan to stop flowing (Josh. 3:8) And the next time the mercy seat came down to the Jordan it was to be baptized by John (Matt. 3:13). And when He came down to this same river, the waters didn’t part—but the heavens did (Luke 3:21-22)" 
-- Douglas Wilson, Psalm 114: The Song of the Exodus

I love the story of the Bible. The mercy seat crossed over Jordan and parted the waters as God led His people into the promised land. Many years later, the Mercy Seat made flesh made His way to the Jordan and was submerged under its waters that the Heavens may part and provide safe passage for God's people into His very presence.

day no. 15,343: resurrection as ultimate reality

"Believers know that Jesus came back to life in a garden, and He has thereby made the whole world fruitful. We therefore look at cemeteries as gardens, as planted gardens. We read the names of believers on their stones the same way we would read how a gardener labeled his row of sweet corn." -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

Psalm 126:5-6
Those who sow in tears
shall reap with shouts of joy!
He who goes out weeping,
bearing the seed for sowing,
shall come home with shouts of joy,
bringing his sheaves with him

We lay our loved ones down like a gardener planting his seeds. We tenderly, carefully pick the place and label it with the seed that was planted. One day the graven gardens of the world will spring to life. But until then, we wait. 

James 5:7-8
Be patient, therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient about it, until it receives the early and the late rains. You also, be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand.

We bury our beloveds by faith, watching and waiting for the rain and sun that God will send. 

1 Corinthians 3:6-7
I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth.

We are at His mercy until that which is planted begins to grow. We sow in tears and wait in hope. We die in order that we may live. We believe in the resurrection as a reality stronger than death. We see resurrection by faith as a future more certain than the cemeteries we see at present.

John 12:24
Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

day no. 15,342: forty-two

Today I begin my forty-third circuit around the star we call our sun. God has allowed me to successfully complete forty-two trips around our universe. My body has spun 15,342 rotations along with the earth on which I was placed. I am where I am and I am who I am because of God.

Acts 17:26-27
(God) made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us,

day no. 15,341: my own personal mother's day

On this day in history both my mother and my wife's mother were born. I've said it before, but I'll say it again... today is the day that made me. My birthday is tomorrow, October 24, but today, on the 23rd my mother and the mother of the mother of all my children were born. I exist because of today and my children exist because of this day. 

So happy birthday today to the mother's that have respectively made me.

day no. 15,340: a sleeping beauty

"In the book of Philippians, the apostle Paul says he longs to stay in this life because to live is Christ, but he then adds that to die is gain. Staying awake is good, going to sleep is really good, and waking up is just the best." -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

Sleeping is practice for eternity. It is dying to yourself and finding yourself again the next morning. It is giving yourself up and receiving yourself back. It is death and resurrection on the small scale. It is the opening act before the main event. In falling asleep, we let ourselves go. In waking up, we rise again.

day no. 15,339: sin cannot ride sidecar

"Sin is lawlessness, and because grace is not sinful, grace is not lawlessness. Grace conquers sin, and not by putting up with it. Grace overcomes, and grace restores. Grace loves, grace rejoices, and grace loves to die and rise." -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

Grace conquers sin. The land of sin is the object of grace's conquest. Grace does not merely move in next to its new neighbors. It dispossesses its inhabitants. It doesn't offer to take the top bunk. It evicts sin. Grace does not rent a bicycle built for two or let sin ride in the sidecar. It doesn't settle for one pedal while letting sin push the other. It doesn't offer to ride in the little basket up front. It rides the bike or it doesn't come along for the ride. 

Some may object saying, "that doesn't sound all that graceful. That sounds mean-spirited and rude" But that brand of grace is counterfeit. It doesn't spend in heaven. It's impotent and flaccid. It produces "peace" with sin by letting sin win. It comes to terms with sin only by agreeing not to call it "sin" anymore. But that isn't grace... that's just another sin. 

Calling dark "light" and light "dark" doesn't make peace between night and day, the one still displaces the other. Grace that attempts to end the war of enmity between good and evil by erasing their distinctions loses the war without fighting, it surrenders and says, "no more war! ta-da." But that isn't grace. That's disgrace.

Where grace lives, sin dies; and grace resurrects those who die to sin.

day no. 15,338: when we diminish sin, we diminish grace

"The grace of God, while greater than the wrath of God, is nonetheless in some way defined by that wrath. In other words, if the wrath of God against sin were tiny, grace wouldn’t have to be very great in order to overcome it. It would not take great grace to overcome a mild divine irritation or annoyance. But if the grace of God needed to be great in order to save us, then the peril it was saving us from was great as well." -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

Romans 11:22
Note then the kindness and the severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God’s kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness. Otherwise you too will be cut off.

The severity of the severity determines the kind of kindness. If sin is not that serious, grace isn't that big of a deal. But if sin is serious business, then grace must be intensely industrious in order to appease it. The degree of God's hatred of sin informs the degree of His grace towards sinners. When we diminish sin, we diminish the glory and grace of God by making the step down to us that much smaller and easier to make.  In fact, it becomes so easily traversed that even we could safely make it... and perhaps we just might and cut out the middle man while we're at it come to think of it.

But if we take note of God's severity, we will note how kind His kindness is in sending His Son to die in the place of those who are ungrateful, evil and altogether unkind. What kind of grace is so kind? One that is that severe to begin with.

God's severity provides clarity to the degree of His charity.

Luke 6:35
But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for He is kind to the ungrateful and the evil.

day no. 15,337: grace escapes the inescapable

"The grace of God in the gospel is not squeamish about what has to happen to sin—it must be mortified. It must die. God’s grace does not make the death of sin optional, but rather it makes a resurrection possible. All have sinned and all must die. We either die in Jesus or away from Him. So then, Jesus did not die so that we might live; He died so that we might die, He lives so that we might live." -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

Romans 14:7-8
For none of us lives to himself, and none of us dies to himself. For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord's.

Romans 3:23
All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

Ezekiel 18:20
The soul who sins shall die.

Because of sin, someone has to die. Death is inescapable. But because of God's grace, escape from death is made possible. Grace escapes the inescapable without minimizing its certainty. Everyone must still die, but death doesn't get the final say. It gets to speak every time, but it doesn't get to continue speaking.

Resurrection confirms the seriousness of sin and the mercy of God.

day no. 15,336: a wedding story

"In this context, the first marriage between Adam and Eve implies that there will be a last marriage. The marriage in chapter one is a foreshadowing of the marriage that will occur in the last chapter... But this is not a trivial point. After all, someone might say, there will also be a last person to have a steak, or scratch his ear, or mow his lawn. Why make a fuss over something like this? Remember the Lord’s words—at the beginning, from the beginning. There were certain things God wanted us to note in the first chapter because He intended to develop them in a glorious way. In other words, this last couple is not just another couple, one more in an endless, meandering line of meaningless marriages; rather, they have the privilege of living right at the crescendo. Not only did the marriage of Adam and Eve set the pattern for all human marriages, the apostle Paul takes this truth as his basis for saying that all human marriages are a foreshadowing of the great marriage, the glorious consummation of all things. At the close of human history, our Bridegroom, the Lord Jesus Christ, will be presented with His bride, dressed in white, without any fault, without any blemish, and radiant in beauty" -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

The mention of marriage in the first few chapters of Genesis is meant to be a foreshadowing for those paying attention to the story. When it appears again at the very end, it does not surprise the reader who has been making notes of these things and tucking them away assuming their significance will be manifested. Marriage is the metaphor that stretches from beginning to end. It's initiation in Genesis 2 reaches its culmination in Revelation 19.

day no. 15,335: honor

1 Peter 3:7
Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.

"There are forms of weakness that are a sign of great value, and not a sign of inferiority. You don’t want either of your linebackers to be frail, but you do want an expensive china tea set to be frail. You could protect your tea set forever by getting one made out of stainless steel—but if you did that, it wouldn’t be nearly as valuable. Peter is telling husbands that they are to stand up for their wives and open doors and step aside for them, not because the wife is an invalid and we should all feel sorry for her. Rather, he says this because only a husband who honors his wife in this way has the faintest notion of what a precious gift he has been given... A priceless vase may be a less sturdy container than a Tupperware bin. It may be weaker in that sense, but that is no reason to put the Tupperware bin in a place of honor on the mantle. A crown is weaker than a king, and yet it is the strength of the crown that is the strength of the king. Therefore the king honors that which is weaker than he is, and he honors it because it is his strength." -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

A piece of art is not valued by its durability, but by its beauty. In many cases, the more beautiful the piece, the more breakable it is. And when men recognize this beauty, they go to great lengths to protect it, to secure it, to keep it pure and safe from degradation or corruption.

So it has been given as the charge to men. Place this beauty in a place of honor for all to see and go to great lengths to keep it safe and pure and beautiful. Thus the charge to women is be beautiful. Be honorable in a way that wears your glory well. The more beautiful you become, the more lengths to which the man who loves you will go to secure your place of honor.

day no. 15,334: one leak sinks

James 2:10
For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it.

"One leak will sink a ship, and one sin will destroy a sinner" -- Charles H. Spurgeon, Morning and Evening

How many leaks does it take to sink a ship? Just the one. No matter the size, no matter the grandeur, one leak can sink it. One little entry point and everything grand goes down. So too one sin is enough to condemn a man. Perfection is an unyielding standard that cannot make exceptions without compromising its integrity. In order for there to be a person or place free of sin, without death, pain, sickness, sorrow, etc... it must be a person or place that insists on a zero tolerance policy when it comes to sin. Sin is the source of all destruction. To permit even a crumb of sin to survive is to corrupt the place or person in which it resides. Perfection is an all or nothing proposition.

By the grace of God He provided Christ on our behalf. His flawless, perfect existence is exactly the kind of righteousness we need to enter into and enjoy the presence of Perfection without being destroyed. Jesus' death on our behalf pays for the sins we committed and the dispositions within us that wanted to commit them in the first place so that in His new world not only are we sinners saved from our sins, but we sinners are made righteous as though never sinned so that the new world will never again suffer the presence of sin. It will be... perfection!

day no. 15,333: jettison and justifcation

Philippians 3:3-9
(We) worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh— though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh also. If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless. But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith

"Every ship master, when in a storm, will willingly cast that overboard which is of the smallest value in the vessel; but who will throw the best out first?" -- Charles H. Spurgeon, Morning and Evening

Captains do not jettison their cargo unless there is no other way to save the ship. And even in those rare circumstances where jettisoning good is employed, there is an order to how it takes place. You begin by tossing over the most expendable items on board. In other words, you lose first, what you can most easily afford to lose. It isn't until all hope appears to be lost and no other way of escape remains that the most precious cargo will be abandoned to the depths of the sea. At that point, the only thing remaining on the boat are the lives of those you are trying to save. 

A man will not turn to Christ until he sees his situation as so desperate as to toss even his best overboard. Until he sees that his ship is going down as long as any item of value remains, he remains in danger. But once he tosses it over, he finds he is able to receive the fullness of Christ's treasures onto his ship. His emptiness leads to fulfillment. The jettisoned boat makes room for the treasures of another vessel. 

day no. 15,332: assigned language

"Men are often offense-givers and women have a tendency to be offense-takers. Here is something that may help you as you sort this out—and all godly wives do have to sort it out. The temptation for women is to impute motives. In other words, you think something like this. 'If I ever said something like that to one of my friends, it would be because I was being cruel in the most calculating way possible. He just said that to me. Therefore he is being deliberately cruel to me.' The reasoning seems valid, but notice that the entire argument depends upon the false idea that men think and speak the same way that women do. But they do not, and one of the best things a wife can learn at the earliest possible time is that men say these things because they are Labrador retrievers, and Labs like to bark. For no particular reason. Another way of saying this is that dogs aren’t very good at being catty. So my charge to you is this. You both believe that you speak English, and you both do, after a sort. But he speaks men-English, and you speak women-English." -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

We know that we are to do unto others as we would have them do unto us. But sometimes we take this as far as to mean that what someone else did to us can only be why we would have done it to them. It is an inverse of the same logic. We impute to the other the same motives that would have been necessary for us to do or say what they did or said. But we are often wrong when it comes to this, particularly when we are talking about interacting with someone of the complementary gender.

day no. 15,331: the difference between delicate and deficient

1 Peter 3:7
Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.

"The apostle Peter tells husbands to dwell with their wives with understanding, bestowing honor on them as the weaker vessel. We frequently miss Peter’s point because we were distracted by the fact that he said 'weaker vessel,' which we take as insulting. Because of that we miss that Peter is telling husbands to honor their wives, and we think it is not an honor to have someone kindly overlook the fact of your inferiority. Perhaps we should rethink this." -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

There is a difference between delicate and deficient.

A bird's bones are delicate, but not deficient. They are beautiful, ornate and help one to fly. It would be nonsense to imply that a bird's wing is deficient compared to the wing of B-52. They are both wings and they both fly, but the one is not an improvement on the other. While the bird's wing may be more easily broken, it is easily more beautiful than the other.

day no. 15,330: offend or else

"There are two kinds of people in the world—those who give offense and those who take it." -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

Offense is inescapable. You will either be accused of being offensive or you will find yourself often offended. The irony is that those who possess and practice the peculiar fruit of the Spirit called "kindness" will often be accused of being offensive and mean. Those who are nice will be beloved, but those who are nice will often find themselves offended by the meanness of others. Christians are called, commanded and equipped to be kind. This will invariably offend someone. Christian kindness is considered mean by those who prefer niceness to kindness. And those who want everyone else to be nice often say as much in the accent of offense.

day no. 15,329: mr. and mrs. christian

"When Jesus Christ took His bride and said that 'with all my heavenly goods, I thee endow,' that meant that we as Christians took on His name and His riches." -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

One reason a woman take's a man's last name is that it is a symbol of the church taking Jesus' name. Those who follow Him become Christians. Whatever they were before, they are now defined by His Name. This is observed as a privilege, not an imposition. It is our joy to inherit His Name.

In addition to His Name, we gain access to His riches. By entering into covenant with Him, we not only take on His last Name, but move into His home, full of His treasures and are assumed into His credentials. Places previously prohibited to us, where only He had access, are now opened up to us on account of our being with Him. We have been given His PIN. He has given us a copy of His keys. We get His Name, His fame, His fortune and most importantly, Himself. We are one with Him.

day no. 15,328: sin rewards hospitality by murdering its hosts

"Adam was given the responsibility to cultivate both gardens, and he was given this responsibility to guard and protect both gardens. When the serpent came into the first physical garden, Adam’s apparent appeasement didn’t work. Appeasement with evil and sin never does work. We are told the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was in the very center of the garden (Gen. 2:9), and there the serpent was, right by it (Gen. 3:6). So when the serpent was not chased from the center of the physical garden, the very next thing he did was to turn his malevolence to the crown jewel of the garden, our Mother Eve. If he could pollute the first by his presence, then why would he not be able to pollute the second by his words?" -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

Adam failed first by allowing Satan to enter the center of his world. Adam's whole life revolved around Eden and he allowed the serpent to get all the way to the center without interruption. Satan, emboldened by being tolerated,became intolerant.

Sin rewards hospitality by murdering its hosts.

2 John 1:9-11
Everyone who goes on ahead and does not abide in the teaching of Christ, does not have God. Whoever abides in the teaching has both the Father and the Son. If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not receive him into your house or give him any greeting, for whoever greets him takes part in his wicked works.

day no. 15,327: the new earth will not be less than Eden

"As Christians, we are engaged by the Holy Spirit in the renewal of all humanity in Jesus Christ, and, through Him, we are laboring for the renewal of absolutely all things. Jesus says in the book of Revelation that He makes all things new (Rev. 21:5; cf. 2 Cor 5:17). Whatever it means to make all things new, it does not mean that we are to carry on just as before. It does not mean that we are to make our peace with the current corruptions. In order to participate in the process properly, one of the things we need to do is imitate the example of Jesus, to go back to how things were in the garden before our primeval rebellion put everything out of joint. We know from Scripture that the work of the second Adam, Jesus Christ, will far surpass the work of the first Adam (Rom. 5:15–17), but when Jesus takes us far above the blessing of the first creation, we can be sure that it cannot mean that He will actually take us below the level of that first, unfallen creation. The re-creation of all things is greater, not less, than the first creation." -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

God's kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven will not be less than when He walked on the earth. The new earth will not be less than Eden was. The garden is not the high water mark of creation going forward although it is the benchmark of our hindsight. And if hindsight is 20/20, imagine how well we see when faith is made sight in front of us. The invisible will become visible and our new eyes will behold the goodness of God and His re-creation no longer as a blurred reflection, but straight on, face-to-face, and with perfect clarity.

day no. 15,326 continued... the priestly blessing

In addition to the Apostles' Creed, I also wanted to nail down the Priestly Blessing from Numbers 6:24-26... 

The Lord bless you, and keep you:

The Lord make His face shine upon you, and be gracious to you:

The Lord lift up His countenance upon you, and give you peace.

Amen.

This is another one of those things that I knew well enough to imperfectly fumble my way through. I had heard it frequently enough to summarize it, but had never committed the precise verbiage to memory... until today.

day no. 15,326 continued... the apostles' creed

I have been familiar with and studied the Apostles' Creed before and even have a children's song that sings through a summary of the words, but I've never committed the actual creed to memory... until yesterday.

I don't know why yesterday, but it seemed as good a day as any to memorize it. So, I looked it up and spent some time rehearsing it in my head and saying it out loud and printing it out and laminating it and handing it to my children and asking them to read it as I recited it to make sure I didn't miss or mangle a single word and by the afternoon, I had it down and today reflecting upon it, it stuck.

It is coming more easily and more naturally so that I can think not just about which word comes next, but about the truth being expressed as I'm saying it as my brain struggles less and less to hold on to the words and is free to confess more and more the sentiments expressed in the words. If you haven't done so, review the creed and consider committing it to memory.

The Apostles’ Creed

I believe in God the Father Almighty;

Maker of heaven and earth,

and in Jesus Christ,

His only begotten Son, our Lord.

He was conceived by the Holy Ghost,

and born of the virgin, Mary.

He suffered under Pontius Pilate,

was crucified, died, and was buried.

He descended into Hades.

On the third day He rose again from the dead,

ascended into Heaven,

and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty;

from thence He will come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Ghost,

the holy catholic Church,

the communion of saints,

the forgiveness of sins,

the resurrection of the body,

and the life everlasting.

Amen

day no. 15,326: man is Eden incarnate

"When God created Adam out of the ground, He placed him in the midst of a glorious garden. When God made Eve, He took her out of the Adam-ground, and transformed her into a garden (Song of Sol. 4:12, 15). God had made Adam out of the dust of the ground (Gen. 2:7) and made woman out of the dust of the man (Gen. 3:19). So God made Adam out of dust and placed him in a garden. God made Eve out of that glorified dust and naturally made her into a glorified garden. And so it was that God made the woman into the garden of gardens, the crown of all creation."-- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

God crowned His creation by making a man out of the mud and God crowned the man by making a woman out of him. The woman is the crown of crowns, the most cherished possession in all God's creation. She is a garden within the garden, a source of life within the land of life, fertile soil living upon the fertile soil.

The man is Eden incarnate, dirt made flesh.
The woman is flesh glorified, man made Edenic.

Woman is Eden on the move, a garden on-the-go.

day no. 15,325: grace weights

1 Corinthians 11:7
For a man ought not to cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God, but woman is the glory of man.

"God’s grace is glorious, and glory, as Scripture shows us, is heavy. Fifty pounds of fruit is just as heavy to carry as fifty pounds of rocks, but there is nevertheless a difference... God gives us nothing to carry without also giving us the strength to carry it. In two difference senses, therefore, He gives us the grace of strength to carry and the grace of fruit to carry. And so it is that grace carries grace." - Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

Men and women carry different glories. They are both heavy so God provides strength respective to the weight of the grace He bestowed. The weight is itself a grace and the ability to carry it another. It is grace upon grace upon grace and the weight of fruitfulness is ours to gladly bear by grace through faith in Christ alone.

John 1:16
From His fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.

day no. 15,324: fertility and authority

1 Timothy 2:11-15
Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness. I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. Yet she will be saved through childbearing if they continue in faith and love and holiness, with self-control.

The essence of femininity is fertility. 
The essence of masculinity is authority. 

Authority flows to men who take responsibility
Fertility flows from women who have their period. 

Femininity is received through menstruation.
Masculinity is achieved through initiation.

A girl becomes a woman by going through puberty. 
A boy becomes a man by going through a rite of passage.

A girl becomes a woman, like it or not, once the way of women is upon her.
A boy becomes a man, like it or not, only if another man authenticates his manhood.

Femininity can be inferred;

Masculinity must be conferred.

day no. 15,323 continued... the plague was stayed

Numbers 25:7-9
When Phinehas the son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he rose and left the congregation and took a spear in his hand and went after the man of Israel into the chamber and pierced both of them, the man of Israel and the woman through her belly. Thus the plague on the people of Israel was stopped. Nevertheless, those who died by the plague were twenty-four thousand.

Epidemics can evaporate. Plagues can be stayed.

In the days of Phinehas, a plague broke out in Israel as a result of their rampant immorality. Many were saddened by it and many participated in it, but only Phinehas stood up and did something directly about it. He confronted it by confronting the sin behind it.

Psalm 106:28-31
They joined themselves also unto Baal-peor,
and ate the sacrifices of the dead.
Thus they provoked him to anger with their inventions:
and the plague brake in upon them.
Then stood up Phinehas, and executed judgment:
and so the plague was stayed.
And that was counted unto him for righteousness
unto all generations for evermore.

A moral stand can prove more deadly to a disease than a medical break through. An advance in moral responsibility may be more helpful to a society than an advance in science... Phinehas stood up and the plague was stayed.


Not only does this highlight the moral component of sin and its attending consequences, but it also points out that plagues can, like a mist, be here one moment and gone the next. No disease can withstand the sovereign hand of God. In all our panic math, have we factored for that? A plague ravaged twenty-four thousand Israelites in a very short time and then in an instance, it was defeated. It did not continue to live on any surface in all Israel. The sick recovered. The disease died. 

May God grant us a Phinehas to atone for our sins by boldly confronting our sins and its consequences and may God in kind delete COVID from the face of the earth.

day no. 15,323: more whole than if never broken

"One of the first things we see is that God loves to unite by dividing. He creates our beautiful world by dividing the land from the sea. He creates our earth by dividing the waters below from the waters above. He made the earth fruitful by dividing the inanimate world from the animate world, bringing forth the latter out of the former. He placed the sun and moon in the sky, thus dividing the day from the night. God is not fragmenting the world, shattering it to pieces; rather, He is tying everything together in a Trinitarian complex, binding everything together by means of thoughtful division. This is not the kind of division that sin brought to our race—the division of malice and hostility, of relationships fragmenting. No. This is the division of fruitfulness. The Lord created Adam out of the dust of the ground, and as Adam looked around, he should have seen that he was the only thing that was undivided. Everything else that God had broken in two He had pronounced good. But Adam stood, solitary, alone, and unbroken, and God said that it was not good that man should be alone. And so God determined to complete him, and He did this by placing Adam into a profound deathsleep, and He then divided Him, taking a rib from his side. From that rib, God fashioned the first woman, our mother Eve, or, as she was known to Adam, Ishah. God made the one into two in order, by His glorious wisdom, to restore them in a deeper and more fulfilling unity by making the two into one. If He had not made the one into two, He would not have been able to make the two into one.

This is God’s way. He takes something in His hands, He blesses it, breaks it, and the result is life for the world. This pattern was disrupted by sin, but sin has not overcome it or erased it. Even when the Lord Jesus was on the eve of His betrayal, He still followed this same pattern. He took the bread that was His body, blessed it, and broke it. And in that breaking, we who were scattered all over the world in countless little pieces were gathered back into Christ. By bring this kind of fruitful division, the division of sacrifice, to one, the many are made one. He was broken so that we who were broken might be made whole." -- Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

God's design for the world is to bring it back together after breaking it. In other words, the whole world will be more whole by being broken than if it had never been divided. The unity produced by bringing the pieces back together is more whole than the pieces were prior to being separated.

The story God is writing is better than the one we'd assume. We would write Eden and leave well enough alone, but God wrote a story where the new Eden, brought back together after the brokenness of sin, will be better for having been broken apart. His story is better and the unity produced by His division is better than the unity of our singular focus.

day no. 15,322: withered words

"The only difference between salad and garbage is timing." - Douglas Wilson, Bone of My Bones

Lettuce left alone becomes litter. At one point and time what was edible is at another point and time inedible. A comment made at one time may be helpful, made at another unhelpful. For a man to offer advise when his wife is advising him of her frustration is not helpful. It is making garbage out of a salad. If the man hears her, he gains the opportunity to later advise and have his helpfulness received as salad, not withered words.

day no. 15,321: active impatience required

"But the point is that a story is exciting because it has in it so strong an element of will, of what theology calls free-will. You cannot finish a sum how you like. But you can finish a story how you like. When somebody discovered the Differential Calculus there was only one Differential Calculus he could discover. But when Shakespeare killed Romeo he might have married him to Juliet's old nurse if he had felt inclined. And Christendom has excelled in the narrative romance exactly because it has insisted on the theological free-will. It is a large matter and too much to one side of the road to be discussed adequately here; but this is the real objection to that torrent of modern talk about treating crime as disease, about making a prison merely a hygienic environment like a hospital, of healing sin by slow scientific methods. The fallacy of the whole thing is that evil is a matter of active choice whereas disease is not. If you say that you are going to cure a profligate as you cure an asthmatic, my cheap and obvious answer is, "Produce the people who want to be asthmatics as many people want to be profligates." A man may lie still and be cured of a malady. But he must not lie still if he wants to be cured of a sin; on the contrary, he must get up and jump about violently. The whole point indeed is perfectly expressed in the very word which we use for a man in hospital; "patient" is in the passive mood; "sinner" is in the active. If a man is to be saved from influenza, he may be a patient. But if he is to be saved from forging, he must be not a patient but an IMPATIENT. He must be personally impatient with forgery. All moral reform must start in the active not the passive will." - G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy, The Romance of Orthodoxy

A patient is a passive participant in his situation, a sinner an active one. As such, a patient must sit back and let the physicians do their work while the sinner must get up to do the work of repentance.

Sinners must be impatient if they want to change their situation.

Sick people must be patient if they want to change theirs.

If we are only sick, passive patience is preferable.

But if we are sinners, active impatience is required.

day no. 15,320: processing or panicking

Most of our days are spent asking one of two questions:

What just happened?
What's going to happen?

We spend our time looking back, trying to figure out what's going on and how to make sense of what happened to us before.

Or we spend our time looking ahead, wondering what's going to happen and how we will deal with whichever way it ends up playing out.

As such, we are often filled either with regret and remorse or with anxiety and unbelief. Our time is consumed either processing or panicking. We are working through whatever happened before or working to avoid whatever we dread is coming next.

So we are at any given point and time always between one of these two realities. We live in the time between what happened? and what's going to happen?

But God does not call us to dwell on the past or to panic about the future.

Philippians 3:13-16
One thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained

We let the past rest on the bosom of Christ and we set the future aside to His wisdom and in the meantime, we run. We hold on to what we have (forgiveness and hope) which allows us to let go of our perseverating over yesterday or tomorrow. Forgiveness leaves the past behind and hope leaves the future ahead and allows us to live today by grace through faith in Christ alone.

day no. 15,319: grace inspires godliness not gaudiness

"Grace is the mother and nurse of holiness, and not the apologist of sin." - C.H. Spurgeon, Morning and Evening

Grace inspires godliness not gaudiness.

Grace does not wear sin like a designer label; it covers it up like a coffin. Grace bears with sin; it does not wear it boldly like a bare midriff for that would be evidence of ingratitude, not grace.