day no. 16,291: for eff's sake, stop cussing so much

Ephesians 4:29

Let no evil talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for edifying, as fits the occasion, that it may impart grace to those who hear.

Cussing is a kind of cheap authority. It is a lazy way to be taken seriously. Profanity forces people to take notice without doing anything worth noticing. 

Cussing is a kind of counterfeit currency. It claims value without being backed by anything. It is inflationary. It reduces the buying power of words by flooding the market. 

Casual cussing waters down the whiskey

It dulls the edge of its blade by banging it around. It is no longer edgy in any sense.

It is easy to grab at grubby words. They are always right there in the gutter where you left them. A foul mouth is easily found.

Speaking with true authority, however, is hard work. It cannot be arrived at by shortcuts. Which is why authoritative words are rarely spoken.

Matthew 7:28-29

When Jesus had ended these sayings, the people were astonished at his doctrine: For he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.

Cussing does have a context. The coarse word may be the right word. There is a time where you really need some grit to match the roughness of the surface you are working with.

Ecclesiastes 3:1

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.

This requires discernment, however, and a concern for clarity, not merely an appearance of authority.

1 Corinthians 14:8-10

For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle? So likewise ye, except ye utter by the tongue words easy to be understood, how shall it be known what is spoken? for ye shall speak into the air. There are, it may be, so many kinds of voices in the world, and none of them is without signification.

A trumpet blast is sharp and abrasive, yet it calls the troops to war. But in a world full of cacophony, a clear blast is muted. But this is what casual cussing does. It makes a call to war indistinguishable. It drowns it in noise.

The opposite error of trashing the trumpets also leaves them silenced. It ignores the fact that a sharp blast is sometimes needed to get a rise out people. But if there is no battle cry, no one battles, and everyone loses.

All that to say, for eff's sake, stop cussing so much. Save your f-bombs for declaring war. Take it seriously enough to plan if, when, and where you are going to drop it and whether or not it's worth it. In other words, do not curse anything you are not willing to destroy.

day no. 16,290: life in padded cells and death in open country

"In the bathroom two water tumblers were sealed in cellophane sacks with  the words: 'These glasses are sterilized for your protection.' Across the toilet seat a strip of paper bore the message: 'This seat has been sterilized with ultraviolet light for your protection.' Everyone was protecting me and it  was horrible. I tore the glasses from their covers. I violated  the toilet-seat seal with my foot... I began to formulate a new law describing the relationship of protection to despondency.  A sad soul can kill you quicker, far quicker, than a germ." -- John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley

Nobody, child or adult, likes to be reminded to put their coat on before going outside, but it's better than having a coat forced upon you. It is one thing to be bullied by the concerns of another who can't bear to see you in danger, but quite another to be bound by the sensitivities of others who can't bear any kind of danger whatsoever. 

The "better safe than sorry" crowd cannot bear the risks of danger, no matter how much the reward may be. They were those who once said, "Better Red than dead," and proclaimed that they'd rather "Live on their knees than die fighting." Freedom is too small of thing for them to surrender their fears. They'd rather live under tyranny than die for freedom. They'd rather live in padded cells than die in open country.

Steinbeck is reading our mail. A nanny state is suffocating. It smothers others by perpetually enforcing what's best for them with no end in sight and no joy or fun to be had by anyone. Fun is often dangerous and contagious and safety simply can't have that.

There are worse things than germs, Germans of the 1940's variety, for example. Incidentally, those were some people who hated "germs." They hated them so much, they launched a crusade to rid the world of them. Some people just won't rest until everyone else has their rest taken from them. They just can't sleep unless someone else is robbed of theirs.

You can be safe from infection in a sterilized room and yet in grave danger. If germs and scrapes and broken bones and blood and sweat be the risk of living, then I say let's risk it all and have ourselves a time. 

"I know I shall die, and I shall die on time. Therefore, I must make the most of the moments between here and there.” - St. Boniface

There are fates worse than premature death, like immature living for example.

Let us stand fast in what is right and prepare ourselves for trial. 

Let us neither be dogs that do not bark, nor silent onlookers, 

nor paid servants who run away before the wolf. 

Instead, where the battle rages, let us find ourselves. 

Run towards the roar of the lion! 

Run towards the roar of battle! 

That is where Christ's most glorious victories shall be won!

- St. Boniface

day no. 16,289: converting wine into grape juice

"If your pastor tells you that Jesus turned 160 gallons of water into grape juice, how can you trust anything he says?" — Douglas Wilson

Call me ol' fashioned, but I prefer preachers who can read. I know, that may be controversial; but still, I'm stuck in my ways.

Biblical literacy presupposes basic literacy. If you cannot read in general, you cannot read the Bible. If you don't know what words mean, you won't know what the Word means.

So, why do some labor so hard to convert the wine into grape juice? Why do they send missionaries far and wide to convince the wine to repent of its sins?

The only reason to do so is if you carry into the text a presupposition about wine. You have to have a reason to keep wine away from Jesus because you:

(a) like Jesus, but you

(b) don't like wine.

But where, pray tell, does the dislike of wine come from? Was it Biblically informed?

We must say what God says and accept the consequences: whether from others or from our own prejudices. We must conform to His words and command others to do the same.

All that to say, if your pastor cannot read and will not repeat what is plainly on the pages in front of him, how can you trust him with that which is implicit, but not stated in so many words? If he makes hash of the words that are there, how can you trust him with the words that aren't? If he shirks the words on the page, how can you trust him with the words in his mouth?

The word for "confess" in the original Greek is homologeo which is literally homo "same" + logos "word." So when we confess that Christ is Lord, we are saying the same things God says. We are repeating His Words. When we confess our sins, we are saying about them what He has already said. We are agreeing with Him and aligning ourselves to His published opinion on the matter. If we refuse to use the words God does or prefer to use different words, we are confessing a different faith and relying upon a different word.

James 3:1

Do not become teachers in large numbers, my brothers, since you know that we who are teachers will incur a stricter judgment.

day no. 16,288: without a backbone to stand up for itself

"How should a jelly not conform?” -- C.S. Lewis

Jelly doesn't have the backbone to stand up for itself. It is always found in whatever shape it was last left in. It cannot rise to the occasion for the same reason it cannot rise on any occasion -- it cannot rise at all. It is soft where it should be hard. It lacks a nerve. It is pliable. It is whatever shape anyone else wants it to be and pointing in whatever direction anyone else wants to bend it.

Psalm 106:30

Then Phinehas stood up and intervened, and the plague was stayed.

The evanjellyfish cannot conform to God's will and stand up because that requires a resolution it does not possess. It can be conformed to any whim or fashion other than one that insists on consistency. It is no credit to the jelly that it’s bowed down. It cannot lay itself down because it cannot stand itself up. If you cannot stand, you cannot take credit for just laying there.

Jelly is tossed to and fro by the waves and winds of other’s opinions and can't stand its ground because it is not anchored down. There’s nothing to hang on.

James 1:6-7

But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord.

day no. 16,287: the best way to catch a falling knife

"A moderately bad man knows he is not very good: a thoroughly bad man thinks he is all right. This is common sense, really. You understand sleep when you are awake, not while you are sleeping. You can see mistakes in arithmetic when your mind is working properly: while you are making them you cannot see them.You can understand the nature of drunkenness when you are sober, not when you are drunk. Good people know about both good and evil: bad people do not know about either." — C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

The best way to catch a falling knife is to let it hit the floor. In other words, don't catch it. Pick it up when it's safe. You will only hurt yourself if you attempt to catch it before then. And at that point, depending on your injuries, you may not be able to pick it or your fingers up off the floor.

You cannot counsel a drunk while he is drunk. If he calls you at 3:00 am after last call in order to communicate that he's, "Gone and done it again," the time to work through it is not at that moment. He isn't thinking clearly and nothing productive can come of it. You need to let him hit the floor. Help him, if necessary, to hit his bed instead of his floor. Prepare some things in advance perhaps to help him with the hangover he will have in the morning. You are clear-headed, he isn't. You can see what's coming, he can't. That is why you may be of use to him tomorrow when he can understand you. But don't try to work through the sins and outs of drunkenness then and there. The time to talk through it all is after he's sobered up.

day no. 16,286: masculinity does not retire

"It happens to many men, and I think doctors have memorized the litany.  It had happened to so many of my friends. The lecture ends, 'Slow down. You're not as young as you once were.' And I had seen so many begin to pack their lives in cotton wool, smother their impulses, hood their passions, and gradually retire from their manhood into a kind of spiritual and physical semi-invalidism.  In this they are encouraged by wives and relatives, and it's such a sweet trap... Who doesn't like to be a center for concern?  A kind of second childhood falls on so many men. They trade their violence for the promise of a small increase of life span.  In effect, the head of the house becomes the youngest child... I did not want to surrender fierceness for a small gain in yardage. My wife married a man; I saw no reason why she should inherit a baby... And in my own life I am not willing to trade quality for quantity.  If this projected journey should prove too much then it was time to go anyway.  I see too many men delay their exits with a sickly, slow reluctance to leave the stage.  It's bad theater as well as bad living.  I am very fortunate in having a wife who likes being a woman, which means she likes men, not elderly babies." -- John Steinbeck, Travels With Charley In Search of America

Men were not made to live forever. They are born to die and go out with a bang. Too many men strive for what Steinbeck despises. They live their lives for the sake of forfeiting them in the end. They can't wait to be put out to pasture. They'd rather be petted than vetted. They step up in order to step down. They rise up in order to fall. They flex in order to flounder, spending their days full of nothing to do.

Judges 8:21

As the man is, so is his strength

Godly men don't retire. Masculinity does not take time off. Manliness cannot take a vacation and remain manly. Hardihood does not desire time off for good behavior. It doesn't want to be released from its responsibilities. It doesn't strive to slack off.

Now, men may and should rest, but that is intentional refreshment, not haphazard hospicing. Rest is intentional and active and aimed at invigorating. Retirement is inconsequential and passive and aimed at lazing. Men don't give up. They don't call it quits on kicking ass. They get up and get things done on behalf of those they love until they are forced to quit by a body that fails them or a mind that flees them, but they don't hang up their own uniform or sing their own so-long serenade. They throw until their coach approaches the mound. They work and are spent. They sow themselves for the sake of God and the good of their neighbor until He calls their number and retires their jersey.

day no. 16,285: faith plants the step and reaps the progress

"Faith needs no staff of flesh." -- George Herbert, Divinity

Faith does not lean on anything and it walks without a cane. It does not require a crutch. It does not have a limp. It plants each step and reaps the progress. It does not wobble, totter, faint, or fall.

Faith moves.

John 6:63

It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.

The flesh cannot walk without faith because the flesh cannot do anything without faith. It cannot walk for the same reason that dead things cannot... it's dead. Faith quickens and then faith quickens the pace. It quickens and then it thickens. The flesh leans on faith every step of the way -- for life, breath and everything else.

2 Corinthians 5:7

For we walk by faith, not by sight

The flesh can see, but it cannot walk; thus, we walk by faith and not by sight.

day no. 16,284: thoughts on trial

"By one of the monstrosities of the feeble-minded theory, a man actually acquitted by judge and jury could then be examined by doctors as to the state of his mind—presumably in order to discover by what diseased eccentricity he had refrained from the crime. In other words, when the police cannot jail a man who is innocent of doing something, they jail him for being too innocent to do anything." -- G.K. Chesterton, Eugenics and Other Evils

To be judged not guilty by reason of insanity is to be determined too innocent to be guilty, but too bound up to be free. The man convicted of a crime may be detained to do his time, but a man considered insane may be detained until the end of time. Crime carries its sentence with it whereas crazy can run on and on indefinitely. A society interested more in eccentricity than guilt may end up doing to innocent people what they never would have done to guilty ones. Dangerous ideas residing inside the dark corners of the minds of men may end up being punished more severely than the dangerous actions of those done in broad daylight. As a result, the thought criminal may be more likely to receive life imprisonment than the murderer and the "violence" of disagreeable thoughts may be met with greater retribution than the violence of disagreeable behaviors.

All that to say, “crazy” is a more severe sentence than “guilty” since crazy can be defined as anything currently out of fashion.

day no. 16,283: motherhood is the domestic theater

"Godly child-bearing is militant. The seed of the woman has crushed the dragon's head." 

-- Douglas Wilson, God Rest Ye Merry

Having a baby is a battle and carrying an infant is an act of war. Bearing a child is like bearing arms. Ever since the Author inserted enmity into the story line, every child has been born into an ongoing blood feud. God has given women the high calling of manufacturing munitions and running boot camps. Every major has a mother. Every warrior was nursed by a woman. Every dragon slayer had his diapers changed. Wars are won in backyards before they are fought on battlefields. Motherhood is the domestic theater of God's world war and serves as the home base of military operations and a beachhead for the advancement of His kingdom.

Childbearing is a charge and God's plan A for storming the gate of hell which is why the Magnificat of Mary sounds like the Battle Hymn of Eve.

Luke 1:51-52

He has shown strength with his arm;

He has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;

He has brought down the mighty from their thrones

And exalted those of humble estate.

World war is being waged in wombs everywhere. Join the fray. Raise soldiers in seed form.

day no. 16,282: the seagull of skepticism

"Cynicism is the ability to point to the price of everything and the value of nothing."

-- Douglas Wilson, God Rest Ye Merry

The skeptic is skilled in poking holes in everything except his own skepticism. It turns out he is not nearly skeptical enough about his own skepticisms. About those alone does he have the utmost assurance. The seagull of skepticism is great at crapping on other people, but fails to see he's chasing the wind and happens to be full of crap. The cynic sees the difficulty of something without seeing its important. Cynicism is a kind of intellectual laziness that can imagine a lion on the street, but not a way around it. The scoffer can find the flaw in everything other than his own standards.

Proverbs 21:24

“Scoffer” is the name of the arrogant, haughty man who acts with arrogant pride.

Proverbs 29:8-9

Scoffers set a city aflame, but the wise turn away wrath. If a wise man has an argument with a fool, the fool only rages and laughs, and there is no quiet.

day no. 16,281: perched precariously

"The doctor of science actually boasts that he will always abandon a hypothesis; and yet he persecutes for the hypothesis. The Inquisitor violently enforced his creed, because it was unchangeable. The savant enforces it violently because he may change it the next day... But even if I yelled out a credo when the Eugenists had me on the rack, I should not know what creed to yell. I might get an extra turn of the rack for confessing to the creed they confessed quite a week ago." -- G.K. Chesterton, Eugenics and Other Evils

Science is always sure of what it knows at the moment and never mindful of what it was sure of last week. Science majors have no room for history classes. A quick trip down the hallowed halls of science would provide some perspective, but perspective isn't something ideologues appreciate. Science only ever knows what it knows and often discovers later that it didn't know what it thought it did. But nevertheless, it insists that yesterday’s insufficiencies are all behind us and NOW we know. Like we know know.

Changing your mind as you learn new things is actually okay if you're able to take yourself with a grain of salt. But if you insist on your word being Gospel, you cannot tolerate your discipline’s past undisciplined assertions being remembered. Instead, you must take yourself very seriously, especially when anyone watching the circus can recall a clown car of past shenanigans. Delusions of grandeur are always perched precariously. 

day no. 16,280: know brakes, no breaks; no brakes, know breaks

"Government has become ungovernable; that is, it cannot leave off governing. Law has become lawless; that is, it cannot see where laws should stop. The chief feature of our time is the meekness of the mob and the madness of the government. In this atmosphere it is natural enough that medical experts, being authorities, should go mad." -- G.K. Chesterton, Eugenics and Other Evils

A State with no agreed upon origin story will imagine itself its own creator, but the one thing the self-made always forget to include is limitations. No one builds in brakes. Everyone naturally concerns themselves with horse power, fuel, and acceleration, but none, by nature, considers slowing down.

If you know brakes, you avoid breaks; if you have no brakes, you will know many breaks.

All that to say, unless there is a law that limits the number of laws, the laws will never end. Unless there is Governor above, those who govern below will govern whatever they can get their hands however they feel like governing it. In other words, when those in authority are not under authority, they lose control. The more they try to take control, the more they lose their sense of proportion. The more jurisdiction they grab, the less jurisprudence they retain.

When you become your own standard, you can never go too far. When you are your own brakes, you never slow down. 

day no. 16,279: love your neighbors near and far

"I do say, to start with, 'What can we do for posterity, except deal fairly with our contemporaries?' Unless a man love his wife whom he has seen, how shall he love his child whom he has not seen?" -- G.K. Chesterton, Eugenics and Other Evils

The best gift a man can give to his children is to love their mother. A man cannot love his children well by doting on them to the exclusion of their mother. He cannot love them by neglecting them for the sake of their mother. He loves them well by loving their mother well and them as an extension of their covenant. A good and godly man practices hospitality and this begins by being warm and welcoming to those God invites to your home through the intimacy of your marriage bed.

Hebrews 13:4

Let marriage be held in honor among all

You teach your children to honor their future marriage beds by honoring the one down the hall from their bedroom. You teach them hospitality by inviting brothers and sisters into their home to share their rooms, toys, attention, affection, and inheritance.

A man who ignores his immediacy despises his legacy. If he does not love his neighbor who is nearest, he cannot love his neighbors who are far off. If he does not give himself for the one in his bed, he will not give himself for the ones made in it.

Malachi 2:14–15

The Lord has been witness between you and the wife of your youth, with whom you have dealt treacherously; yet she is your companion and your wife by covenant. but did He not make them one, having a remnant of the Spirit? And why one? He seeks godly offspring. Therefore take heed to your spirit, and let none deal treacherously with the wife of his youth.

Why does God bring a man and woman together? That in becoming one they may become many. His desires is that oneness would lead to fruitfulness and fill the world with the grace and knowledge of the one God in whose image they are made.

day no. 16,278: science must have an origin and an eschatology

"We are discussing whether we know enough, as responsible citizens, to put such powers into the hands of men who may be deceived or who may be deceivers. I conclude that we do not... Not content with the endowment of research, they desire the establishment of research; that is the making of it a thing official and compulsory, like education or state insurance; in short, they want a new kind of State Church." -- G.K. Chesterton, Eugenics and Other Evils

Science may not account for sin, but it still cannot escape it. A scientist can be tricked or a scientist can a be trickster; and as is often the case, he can often be a bit of both. In other words, a scientist may be duped or one trying to dupe others. The scientist who presupposes that he has no presuppositions, for example, is doomed before he even begins. However, the scientist who knows what he presupposes and picks through the data based on its ability to support his presupposed beliefs is doomed in the end.

Science is not neutral. It may claim to be, but in doing so, it is anything but neutral in its insistence on its neutrality. Science cannot start from a place of insisting that there should be no starting places for the same reason that no one else can. You cannot begin with the conclusion that beginnings and conclusions should be avoided.

Knowledge is not from nowhere. It comes from somewhere with the intention of going somewhere else. In other words, it must have an origin story and an eschatology.

Science cannot be mandatory. It isn't consistent enough to enforce. It proves itself wrong too often to be relied upon. To make science the standard for legislation is to make "change" the standard of stability. It's nonsense. By that standard, you could be found guilty of enforcing yesterday's laws. Standards do not evolve, but science does. Standards are based in reality and science is based on perception. This is why science makes for bad politics and even worse religion. It cannot promise anything because what it knows could change. That is the best thing about it when employed well and the worst thing about it when applied poorly.

day no. 16,277: materialism is the sacredness of the secular

"Materialism is really our established Church; for the Government will really help it to persecute its heretics. Vaccination, in its hundred years of experiment, has been disputed almost as much as baptism in its approximate two thousand. But it seems quite natural to our politicians to enforce vaccination; and it would seem to them madness to enforce baptism." -- G.K. Chesterton, Eugenics and Other Evils

Materialism is a religion complete with baptism, membership, catechism, creed, discipline, sacrament, sabbath, and regularly scheduled meetings. The only difference between Materialism and the religions listed in a Comparative Religions textbook is that those in the book know that they are religious, while the materialists would be shocked, even offended, to find out that they were. Materialists are skeptical of all religions, which is their version of the sinner's prayer and altar call. Skepticism is their catechism. They can throw shade at anything other than their own reflection. Materialism is the worship of worshiplessness. It is the faith of faithlessness. If is the sacredness of secularism. 

"The special mark of the modern world is not that it is sceptical, but that it is dogmatic without knowing it." -- G.K. Chesterton

day no. 16,276: when assistance leads to insistence

"There is now a false idealism of turning Government into God, by a vague notion that it gives everything to everybody." -- G.K. Chesterton

When the State creates laws ex nihilo, it is begging to be seen as the Author of everything. When it is the highest authority it knows, it imagines itself a god.

Free men, who do not need the assistance of the government, are in no danger of mistaking it for their Maker, but men dependent on its assistance for anything may come to insist that it is the source of everything. Those who can carry their own loads are not likely to become indebted to those who offer to carry it for them.

day no. 16,275: in constant trouble

“Jesus promised his disciples three things – that they would be completely fearless, absurdly happy, and in constant trouble.” -- G.K. Chesterton

There is a difference between one who stirs the pot in order to better blend the ingredients and one who stirs it in order to see some spill out. The first has improvement in his mind while the second has nothing. The first has a purpose envisioned that determines the number and intensity of the swirls while the second may stir violently just the once or repetitively and subtly. Since the first has an end in mind, their stirring, likewise, comes to an end; the second, however, may go on stirring endlessly or until everything in the pot ends up outside of it.

Jesus got into trouble. He chose the trouble He got into. He didn't get into trouble by accident or for no other reason than being in trouble. Jesus did not seek out trouble per se, He sought the will of His Father and gladly accepted the trouble that came with it. In this world, following God will mean colliding with the world. In that regard, we must also be not only willing to get into trouble if it should come looking for us, but be willing to seek it out and hunt it down when faithfulness demands it. We must not be mess averse, but we must not make messes without good reason.

John 16:33

These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.

The promise of God is that we won't go it alone and that we will enjoy the ride, however long it lasts, wherever it takes us, and whenever it ends. Christians should be stirring the pot in order to improve the stew, but we shouldn't mix things up just for the sake of the mess it makes.

day no. 16,274: the stake and the stakes

"The State did not own men so entirely, even when it could send them to the stake, as it sometimes does now where it can send them to the elementary school." -- G.K. Chesterton

Sending a man to the stake is certainly more extreme than sending his son to elementary school, but the one is within the jurisdiction of the State and the other isn't. God has appointed the magistrate to be His deacon of wrath, not His department of education. As such, God has given the government the responsibility to execute convicted criminals, but has not given them the ability to educate covenant children. In this regard, conscripting kids to the secular catechism is an overreach of the State. The audacity is not in severity, but in scope. To send any man to his death is more severe than sending all men to school; but acting violently upon one man in a a single moment pales in comparison to acting subtly upon all men's children over time.

day no. 16,273: evangelegal

Preach the gospel.

Practice theonomy.

If you preach the Gospel, you will be accused of being antinomian and licentious.

If you practice Theonomy, you will be accused of being ungracious and legalistic.

Some, try to reconcile the two by charging for grace while others try to cheapen the law, but abbreviating the law doesn't make grace abound and making grace more expensive doesn't pay off the law.

You cannot honor both by compromising either. You can only hold both together by covenant. The two must be married and become one flesh.

Psalm 85:10–11

Mercy and truth have met together;

Righteousness and peace have kissed.

Truth shall spring out of the earth,

And righteousness shall look down from heaven.

When law and gospel say, "I do," before God and man, kiss, and walk back up the aisle, the result is obedience springing up in mankind and grace raining down from God.

Preach the Gospel.

Practice Theonomy.

Be an Evangelegal.

Romans 3:31

Do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means! On the contrary, we uphold the law.

day no. 16,272: the Christian laughs more at danger than the pagan does in pleasure

Yea, I will bless them as they bend and love them where they lie,

When on their skulls the sword I swing falls shattering from the sky.

The hour when death is like a light and blood is like a rose, -- 

You never loved your friends, my friends, as I shall love my foes.

To see this fair earth as it is to me alone was given, 

The blow that breaks my brow to-night shall break the dome of heaven.

The skies I saw, the trees I saw after no eyes shall see,

To-night I die the death of God; the stars shall die with me;

One sound shall sunder all the spears and break the trumpet's breath: 

You never laughed in all your life as I shall laugh in death.

-- G.K. Chesterton, The Last Hero

The Christian loves his enemies lives more than the enemies love their own and welcomes death more eagerly than the wicked welcome life. The Christian laughs more in the face of danger than the pagan does in the face of pleasure and hopes more in defeat than the worldling does in victory.

That on you is fallen the shadow,

And not upon the Name;

That though we scatter and though we fly,

And you hang over us like the sky,

You are more tired of victory,

Than we are tired of shame.

That though you hunt the Christian man

Like a hare on the hill-side,

The hare has still more heart to run

Than you have heart to ride.

 That though all lances split on you,

 All swords be heaved in vain,

 We have more lust again to lose

 Than you to win again.

-- G.K. Chesterton, The Ballad of the White Horse

day no. 16,271: because men moved too late

"The wisest thing in the world is to cry out before you are hurt. It is no good to cry out after you are hurt; especially after you are mortally hurt. People talk about the impatience of the populace; but sound historians know that most tyrannies have been possible because men moved too late. It is often essential to resist a tyranny before it exists. It is no answer to say, with a distant optimism, that the scheme is only in the air. A blow from a hatchet can only be parried while it is in the air."

-- G.K. Chesterton

The time to protest your own murder is before it happens. The time to protest voter fraud is before you lose your vote. You cannot object to your own murder after the fact or vote for reform after voting has been voted down.

It always seems too early to act until it is too late to act. There is always the option to reconsider up until there's nothing left to consider. There will always be an option for inaction up until there are no options left. "Too soon to know," and, "too early to act," are real. They do exist. But so do, "should know by now," and, "too late." To insist on certainty is to insist on servility. You will not be able to convince everyone without hindsight and even then you will only see what you should have done. The only way to remove the possibility of being mistaken is to be sure that you were wrong.

day no. 16,270: the founding of a family is like the founding of a nation

"The founding of a family is the personal adventure of a free man... The act of founding the family, I repeat, was an individual adventure outside the frontiers of the State" -- G.K. Chesterton, Eugenics and Other Evils

The founding of a family is like the founding of a nation with similar risks and rewards that reach for generations. It is, as Chesterton says, an adventure. It is the romance of pioneering, planting, conquering, and cultivating. It is a self-governed man and a self-governed woman joining together to form a new government: a nation in seed form.

The man was given his last name and his citizenship by birth, but he gives his last name to the woman and thus begins a new nation by covenant. And all of this would be well and good if it were not for a State that imagined it had something to do with it. 

The family is the most fundamental threat to a State that imagines itself a sovereign benefactor. When the family comes along and says, in essence, "No, thanks. We got this," it sends the unrestrained State into cussing spells. There is nothing a totalitarian State fears more than a man who doesn't need or want them in his business. The family is a resistance movement from day one in that kind of society.  It is what Burke calls a "little platoon." It is set up to survive without the State's help or permission. And few things bring a State with a God-complex into fainting fits like a group of people who don't need someone to tell them what's best for them.

A household with a Father in Heaven and a father in the master bedroom has no need for a father in the capitol.

Joshua 24:15

And if it is disagreeable in your sight to serve the LORD, choose for yourselves today whom you will serve: whether the gods which your fathers served which were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.

day no. 16.269: the walking Word

John 7:15-16

The Jews therefore marveled, saying, “How is it that this man has learning, when he has never studied?” So Jesus answered them, “My teaching is not mine, but his who sent me."

This is a subtle proof of Christ's divinity. How did He know the Bible so well? He never went to seminary and yet He knew the Bible like the back of His band. He likely didn't even own a Bible or have physical access to all of the books and scrolls that made up the Old Testament; and yet He knew it inside and out.

How could this be?

He knew the Bible because, well, He wrote it. He didn't need to gather the scrolls together to know what was in there. He was the essence behind the ink and the power behind the pen. He didn't need access to the scrolls in order to have access to God. He was the Word of God in flesh appearing. Jesus loved the Scriptures because He wrote them, but for the same reason, He didn't need to attend Sunday school in order to apprehend them. That said, He did not point this out in order to convince people to put down their Bibles, but all the more to pick them up. The fact that He didn't need a hard copy was not to imply that you don't either, but to enforce, all the more, your need for one in order to get it into your DNA like it was in the walking Word who lived, breathed, died and rose again among us.

day no. 16.268: salvation is Trinitarian

"Each of the three Persons in the blessed Trinity is concerned with our salvation: with the Father it is predestination; with the Son propitiation; with the Spirit regeneration. The Father chose us; the Son died for us; the Spirit quickens us. The Father was concerned about us; the Son shed His blood for us, the Spirit performs His work within us. What the One did was eternal, what the Other did was external, what the Spirit does is internal.” — Arthur W. Pink, The Sovereignty of God

Salvation is Trinitarian.

While you do not have to know that in order to be saved by it, you cannot be shown that in the Scriptures, hear it, reject it, and still be saved by it.

You don’t have to understand the Trinity in order to be saved. If that were the case, who could be saved? But you cannot reject the Trinity without rejecting salvation. There’s a difference between what you must know and believe on the front end and what you must not reject as you go along.

One could believe the Gospel and be regenerated without ever having heard of the Holy Spirit per se, but could not believe the Gospel and reject the Spirit after hearing about it. Discovering the Trinity is not to be equated with being saved, but no one who is saved discovers the Trinity and then denigrates it.

day no. 16,267: tyranny is still tyranny even if it is tiny

Tyranny begins with sin.

We are all born with a miniature dictator on the throne of our heart with a mind set on world conquest. Sin doesn't stay seated there for long before it makes a run out to the tips of every finger, toe and tongue it can find. To be fair, the sins of little kids are sometimes quite funny, but they are no less sinful for being the more entertaining. Sin is strong in the heart of a child to be sure. Every child is a serial killer. They would burn down the entire world for the sake of their delayed satisfaction. The only reason they don't kill everyone and everything is because they lack the resources. But, rest assured, if they had the ability, they would end everything.

Tyranny is not merely defined by overreach. It is overreach, to be sure, but it doesn't merely become tyranny once it reaches over, it only reveals more obviously what it was more subtly before it did. 

"Tyranny is still tyranny even if it's tiny." -- Toby Sumpter

Tyranny is the audacity to claim authority that belongs only to God. It is the tenacity to trample down anything that stands between wish and fulfillment. It is rule without restraint or rule, currently restrained, attempting to remove its restraints. It is not just the end result, but the method of getting there.

It is not the practice per se, but the principle. If a resident of North Dakota gets a request for taxes owed to the State of Kentucky, it doesn't matter how small the bill is. The fact that someone would expect it is tyrannous. Tiny tyrannies do not remain in utero for long. Those suckers grow up, just like all sins do.

James 1:15

Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin; and sin when it is full-grown brings forth death.

So what do we do? I can tell you what we don't do: start a revolution. Revolution is just a temper tantrum with a bigger budget. Revolution, in fact, is merely relying on the tyrant within to deliver you from the tyrant without. Revolution is violent impatience and radical insistence upon one's preferred timeline.

Proverbs 16:25

There is a way which seems right to a man,

but its end is the way to death.

Tyranny always ends in death and destruction. It cannot produce liberty. It can free you, perhaps, from the tyranny of another, but it cannot set you free from the dictator within; and it wouldn't want to if it could. Tyranny has no brakes. It has no sense of proportion. It cannot be relied upon to self-govern. It will never restrain itself. It cannot be trusted. It is not to be engaged as a co-belligerent for a common enemy. You are its enemy and it only gains in sway what it helps you overthrow. It happily leads you to start a riot for the sake of securing more territory in your heart. While you're out burning the world down, it's setting up shop and stoking the fireplace in the den of your heart.

So defyrants, big and small, within and without. Submit everything to King Jesus and dethrone ever tinpot tyrant that seeks to secure a safespace for itself to reign.

day no. 16,266: greatertude

"Thou that hast given so much to me,

Give one thing more, a grateful heart."

-- George Herbert, Gratefulness

We have more reasons to be grateful than we have ability to be thankful. We need God to give us grateful hearts. All that we have been given can only be enjoyed by the gift of gratitude. And even our gratefulness needs help. We do not give as much honor and respect as He gives grace and mercy. And so, we pray even for more mercy — mercy for the inadequacy of our humility. We beg for the grace to be more grateful. We do not need more for which to be grateful as much as we need to be more grateful for what we already have been given. We need greater gratitude. We need… greatertude. May we go forward with grit and grititude in making it our aim to be more grateful and finding ever increasing reasons to beg for gratitude to keep up with God's generosity.

day no. 16,265: justification said and done or but for the moment

"There are only two possible bases of justification— one is the blood of Christ which frees us from accusation, and the other is relative superiority to somebody else, which only and always binds us to accusation." -- Douglas Wilson, All the Condemnation in the World

Because all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, condemnation is inescapable and because condemnation is uncomfortable, justification is inescapable. But the condemned cannot tolerate that state of affairs for very long and search for a way to find themselves cleared of all charges.

One way to do this is to confess your sins in the broad of day and throw your lot in with the Son of God who saves (1 John 1:8-10). The other way is to confess the sins of others in order to be comparatively more justifiable. The one is justification said and done, once for all and fully delivered; the other is justification maybe, it depends, and if at all, only for the moment. 

In order to be justified, we will be forced to confess our sins or forced to confess the sins of others. The former is accompanied by sincere repentance and eternal salvation whereas the latter is accompanied by manufactured guilt and constant condemnation.

Only Jesus can set one free. Justification will be sought because sin is real. We are not cleansed of our sins by the sins of others. We can, perhaps, justify our bad behavior by pointing to the worse behavior of others, but that won't fly if the standard is good behavior... and it is.

Romans 3:10

There is none righteous, no, not one.

Our only hope to measure up is righteousness applied, not achieved. In other words, we need the righteousness of someone else given to us where we could not grab it for ourselves or from someone else. Our only hope for our missed marks is the substitutionary atonement of someone else receiving the marks.

Isaiah 53:5

He was wounded for our transgressions,

He was bruised for our iniquities;

The chastisement for our peace was upon Him,

And by His stripes we are healed.

We need to be something we can't become and we need someone to take away what is too heavy for us to bear. So, Christ did.

2 Corinthians 5:20-21

Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God. For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

day no. 16,264: every fallen man and acorn

“There are two equal and eternal ways of looking at this twilight world of ours: we may see it as the twilight of evening or the twilight of morning; we may think of anything, down to a fallen acorn, as a descendant or as an ancestor.” — G.K. Chesterton, A Defense of Nonsense

Every fallen man, like every fallen acorn, is both a descendant and an ancestor. He is a seed descended from fruit and he will be buried as seed when it's all said and done. 

We honor our fathers and mothers by respecting what has been handed down to us as well as the hands that worked hard to hand it off and by becoming the kind of people who work hard to to improve and build upon that which we inherited in order to have something even better of our own to hand down.

As is often the case, by meeting the one, we fulfill the other. The very act of honoring your ancestors is handing down a respect for ancestry to your descendants. Being an honorable descendant is the first act of becoming an honorable ancestor. Everyone must have the humility to realize that they did not arrive here by their own efforts and everyone must have the responsibility to realize that their descendants will inherit the world they leave to them.

The twilight reminds us of the warmth of the day already enjoyed and the hope of the warmth it will send tomorrow. Every acorn is an end and a beginning. Every son of Adam and daughter of Eve is a offspring and a parent. We all have harbors in which we safely docked and from which many will boldly launch.

And I would be remiss if I did not punctuate this principle here by revisiting Macaulay,

“People who take no pride in the noble achievements of remote ancestors will never achieve anything worthy to be remembered with pride by remote descendants.”

day no. 16,263: pray FOR your enemies, not TO them

Matthew 5:44

Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;

We are charged to pray TO God FOR our enemies, not TO our enemies as our gods.

The wrath of our enemy is not our chief concern. We are not on mission to make peace with them, but to proclaim God’s peace to them as enemies if they repent.

When we pray for our enemies, we do not pray to them. Too many seek peace with unrighteousness on terms outside our jurisdiction. We are deputized by Christ to offer peace per the terms of His Gospel alone. There is no other peace with God. We are not to crowdsource or synergize in order to find an arrangement that works for everyone. An agreement that works for everyone, will work for no one. We do not pray that our latest offering will finally appease them. We do not offer our compromises in exchange for a ghetto in which we can hold our personal beliefs in the privacy of our hearts. We do not need our enemies permission to hold on to Christ. He commands us to pray for them, not to them. We are not praying to turn away their wrath, but to continue in the peace of God whose wrath has been abated by Christ alone.

When we pray for our enemies, we first must recognize and resolve ourselves to the fact that we will have some. If we follow Christ, those who don't will throw shade at us. Luckily. darkness does not stick to light.

When we pray for our enemies, what do we pray? We do not pray that they would have "a good day." A good day by their standard would be the destruction of what we hold dear. We are not commanded to hope for their cause. No, when we are commanded to pray for them, we are invited to pray for their defeat: either in repentance and surrender or in hamstringing of their efforts.

day no. 16,262: making an appointment with yourself

“The man who makes a vow makes an appointment with himself at some distant time or place. The danger of it is that himself should not keep the appointment.” — G.K. Chesterton, A Defense of Rash Vows

In order to keep a promise, you must take responsibility. Anyone can make a promise, many cannot keep them. Anyone can commit to the future, but few follow through. You can make a promise by accident; but you cannot keep one that way. Promises require intention. Responsibility requires initiative.

Ecclesiastes 5:5

It is better that you should not vow than that you should vow and not pay. 

A vow cannot be imposed upon you. It is, rather, something you impose upon yourself. Vows cannot be forced on the front end, but they must be enforced on the back end. They must be entered into freely and kept without quarter.

Nothing is easier to make than a promise. A vow sounds good in everyone's mouth. Everyone seeks the benefits of making promises, but few seek the blessing of promise keeping.

Proverbs 20:6-7

Many a man proclaims his own steadfast love,

but a faithful man who can find?

The righteous who walks in his integrity— 

blessed are his children after him! 

More have professed their love at the front of a church than have kept their covenant to the back of the funeral. It is easier to vow at the end of an aisle than to stay faithful to the end of your life. Love is not in the strength of the profession, but in the durability of the procession. No one can promise to feel loving feelings forever and promises made upon emotion are destined to dissolve. Those who keep their covenants because they said they would bless their offspring with a living picture of the covenant love of the Lord for His elect.

day no. 16,261: playing it fast and loose with narrow-mindedness

Luke 15:13

The younger son gathered everything together and went on a journey into a distant country, and there he squandered his estate with loose living.

Those who choose a life of loose living often have a problem they never see coming. Their problem is that they define, "loose,” too tightly. They have a very specific idea of what loose looks like. Letting loose for them is serious business. If you, for example, attempted to boast of the looseness and freedom of keeping your marriage vows, they would scoff. That doesn't fit the narrative. That isn't "loose." That's tight and restrictive. But what they fail to notice in their indictment is the strictness of their definition.

The wild child needs to loosen up, beginning with their definition of what constitutes being free. Free to sin is not free enough. It is enslavement to a narrow idea of what liberates. A looser definition of looseness is needed, one that includes being loosed from sin.

Open and loose are too strictly defined in the mind of the modern day rebel. Even their word, "rebel" is only applied toward rebelling against a particular kind of thing. If you point out that a true rebel in today's world would have hair the color God gave him and khakis likely of a similar color which he marches off to work five days a week, you are mocked.

In the world, open-mindedness is defended violently and narrow-mindedness is disciplined severely. Loose living is celebrated a very particular way and freedom is limited in its scope. There is, therefore, no category for a woman enthusiastically enjoying her time as a wife and a mother, or one for a child freely choosing a spanking from a parent who is always there over a blank check from a parent who rarely is.

In short, modernity plays it close to the vest when it comes to open-mindedness and fast and loose when it comes to narrow-mindedness. There are any number of things they call narrow and very few things they call open.