day no. 16,930: democracy and total depravity

“I am a [proponent of democracy] because I believe in the Fall of Man. I think most people are democrats for the opposite reason. A great deal of democratic enthusiasm descends from the ideas of people like Rousseau, who believed in democracy because they thought mankind so wise and good that every one deserved a share in the government. The danger of defending democracy on those grounds is that they’re not true… I find that they’re not true without looking further than myself. I don’t deserve a share in governing a hen-roost. Much less a nation. . . . The real reason for democracy is just the reverse. Mankind is so fallen that no man can be trusted with unchecked power over his fellows. Aristotle said that some people were only fit to be slaves. I do not contradict him. But I reject slavery because I see no men fit to be masters.” — C.S. Lewis, Present Concerns

Democracy can only be supported by Pelagianism or Total Depravity. If every man, no matter how bad, has a spark of good within, he should not be prevented from letting that light shine on election day. But if every man, no matter how good, has some sin within, he cannot be trusted to be the light of a nation, let alone the entire world. 

Slavery is not inherently sinful, but men are. If slavery were mala in se, the New Testament would not have commands to masters on how to handle themselves as Christians. It would simply rebuke them for having slaves and command them to liberate them. Yet, in Christianity the seeds of liberation are planted so that even in a slave-holding society, when saved and sanctified according to God's Word, the natural result is less slavery, not more as men are raised and nurtured in the discipline and instruction of the Lord, freedom prevails. As such, it makes sense that the more the world is conformed to the image of Christ, the more it will accept the Christian doctrine of total depravity. And the more it does that, the less it will accept the leadership of any man who takes exception to that reality, especially when it is himself that is concerned.

The Fall of man must moderate the power of any man, both in kind and in scope.

Democracy is only justified where demos confesses itself depraved.

Democracy without this doctrine is merely despotism in denial.

day no. 16,929: paper straw men

“Straw men are frequently not imaginary men, but rather are the least capable men in any movement.” — Douglas Wilson, In Defense of Worldview Thinking

A straw man may be easy to defeat, but he is difficulty to avoid. We seem to run into them anytime an argument erupts especially online. He may not be the best representative of a particular idea, but rest assured, he will be one of the first ones you meet if you speak against his cause. 

Some take these straw man captives and carry them around in case they need a boost of morale at a later date. It is easier to keep a cadre of cucks around than it is to face real, solid men. But beating up straw men is not the mark of a man. A man must recognize them and defeat them, but he must not copy their tactics by fighting dire with dire and he must not assume he's arrived because he's dismissed the easiest arguments the enemy has. 

day no. 16,928: doers and documenters

“Desperate times call for faithful men, and not for careful men. The careful men come later and write the biographies of the faithful men, lauding them for their courage.” — Douglas Wilson

The contrast between faithful men and careful men can be the difference between faith and unbelief, but it can also be the difference because the work of doing and the work of documenting. During the desperate times, doers are more needed than documenters, but once a deliverance from the desperation has been achieved, someone needs to write it down. Ideally, that someone should have been taken mental notes while lending their hands to the doers so that they're ready to put their hands to the pen once the crisis has been calmed.

1 Chronicles 11:9-11

So David waxed greater and greater: for the Lord of hosts was with him. These also are the chief of the mighty men whom David had, who strengthened themselves with him in his kingdom, and with all Israel, to make him king, according to the word of the Lord concerning Israel. And this is the number of the mighty men whom David had.

David was a great man and doer of deeds and so were his mighty men. That said, they were often too busy doing great deeds to take up a pen to write them down. That said, David did write down many things. He is an example of a great doer who also documented. There are also documenters whose contribution is their careful preservation of great men's achievements.

There are those who hide behind their pens and there are those who hide their hearts behind their busy hands. 

At the end of the day, someone has to be a protagonist and someone has to tell the story. There is a place for both kind of men. Without great deeds, stories fall flat or are embellished bits of propaganda. Without story tellers, great deeds are forgotten.

History is the handshake between great deeds and good reads.

Let those gifted with the duty to document not resent their station or envy their faithful brothers and may those gifted with gusto not belittle those carefully dedicated to protecting their reputations and preserving their legacies.

The one who shouts, "Geronimo, Amen!" often doesn't have time to write things like "Geronimo, Amen!" down for others to benefit from.

day no. 16,927: the old treasuries of Christendom

“The fact is this: that the modern world, with its modern movements, is living on its Catholic capital. It is using, and using up, the truths that remain to it out of the old treasury of Christendom; including, of course, many truths known to pagan antiquity but crystallized in Christendom.” — G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy

The West is living off the wealth of Christendom like the prodigal son lived off of his father's fortunes. He hired his prostitutes with his inheritance just like we do ours. But Christendom does not condone the present concupiscence anymore than the prodigal's father approved of his son's sins. That said, like the father, Christendom waits for it descendants to return. The fault is not in the bank, but in the purchases. Like the prodigal, the West is running out of capital and Christendom watches them waste their grace as it waits for them to hit rock bottom. It cannot spend forever. Eventually inheritances are exhausted. 

The treasuries of Christendom are being squandered by Satan's spendthrifts, but that bank won't always be there. The devil does not have a dowry. He can only blow through what the Spirit blew through. By the grace of God, His treasuries never end and His riches never rust or run out. Even now, we could turn by to Him and be overwhelmed with new mercies and unending wealth.

Ephesians 3:8

Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ.

day no. 16,926: milquetoast or militant?

“And we may be sure of this, that a theology which is more concerned to be contemporary than to be true will have neither the right nor the power to influence the contemporary world; all that it can do is to win a grudging and contemptuous toleration by the world, on the condition that, whatever else it does, it does not challenge the world’s assumptions about itself.” — E.L. Mascall, The Christian Universe

You cannot win the world to chastity by agreeing to get into the backseat with it.  At best, you may gain some fleeting affection from it, but most likely you will only get a brief moment of its attention. And what you gain in influence, you lose in substance. If you win them to what you're doing, you only leave the church more worldly, not the world more churched. You cannot wish for more water in your boat without sinking to sea level. You cannot allow more sugar into your salt shaker without losing your saltiness. 

"We are not to go out into all the world and tell the nations that they might have a point.” — Douglas Wilson, So Come and Welcome to Jesus Christ

The world does not need a compromised church and the church does not need any more lukewarm water in its baptismal fonts.

Mark 16:15

And Jesus said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation.”

We are not commissioned by Christ to concede to the world. We are the church militant, called by Christ to conquer in His Name, negotiating the terms of the world's surrender by begging them to come along quietly.

"The gods of chaos are going to be cut into pieces, and it is going to be Christian worship that does it... We are putting the world in order. We do not fight against flesh and blood, but rather with the gods of chaos." — Douglas Wilson,  Christ and the Gods of Chaos

We will either be milquetoast or we will be militant. 

We will either shake hands with evil or we will help Christ shake the world until all that remains is the unshakable kingdom of Christ.

Hebrews 12:28-29

Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear: for our God is a consuming fire.

day no. 16,925: sounding smarts

“I won't insult your intelligence by suggesting that you really believe what you just said.” — William F. Buckley Jr.

Trying to sound smart is a great way to sound silly.

Romans 1:22

Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,

There is a kind of prestige that can only be obtained by debasing oneself. There is a kind of knowledge that can only be acquired by ignorance. Some things are so ignorant, you can only believe them by obtaining an advanced degree from a state school.

1 Corinthians 1:19

I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.

Pretense and posturing cannot protect one from God. The wisdom from below cannot hold a candle to the wisdom from above. Anything based on abstaining from God will come to nothing.

Psalm 14:1-3

The fool hath said in his heart, "There is no God." They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good. The Lord looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one.

Fools build on false premises only to find themselves shocked when they discover that wish fulfillment holds no water. The one who tells himself that there is no God is telling others that he is good for nothing.

Proverbs 10:19

In the multitude of words sin is not lacking,

But he who restrains his lips is wise.

Even a wise man can out talk his thoughts.

Better to shut your mouth than open yourself up to evil.

day no. 16,924: not any good

“No man knows how bad he is till he has tried very hard to be good.” — C.S. Lewis

Don’t feel too badly; no one is very good at being any good.

Romans 3:10-12

None is righteous, 

no, not one;

no one understands;

no one seeks for God.

All have turned aside; 

together they have become worthless;

no one does good,

not even one.

“No one” here is not a select group of elite someones.

Everyone is a complete success at total failure.

There is no one who does not excel at falling short.

If you're not convinced, you haven't tried very hard.

Imagining that you are good is an easy business.

Hard work heals that daydream.

day no. 16,923: carefully, but Christfully

“Life without war is impossible either in nature or in grace. The basis of physical, mental, moral, and spiritual life is antagonism. This is the open fact of life.” — Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest 

Enmity is inescapable.

Life is the word we use to describe the state of conflict between forces that keep you alive and those that try to kill you.  Surrender, in this case, is death. A ceasefire is to be deceased.

Galatians 5:17

For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other:

So, keep fighting the good fight of faith and strive toward the upward calling of Christ while resisting the downward pull of the world, the flesh, and the devil.

Genesis 3:15

And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.

God has called you to fight the seed of the serpent. He has enlisted you to march with the seed of Eve.

Romans 5:7

The carnal mind is enmity against God.

So, don't be surprised when the seed of the serpent strikes back.

Tread carefully, but tread Christfully.

Romans 16:20

And the God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen.

The Church Militant marches on.

day no. 16,922: love must be served with a side of hate

"The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him." — G.K. Chesterton

We should be more about what we're about than against what we're against.

We must be against some things and we must be glad we're against them, but not before we're grateful for what we're for. To be for something is to be against whatever would come against it. The love should be substantive and the hate derivative. Love must drive and hate must ride shotgun.

Revelation 2:2-6

I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, and how thou canst not bear them which are evil: and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars: And hast borne, and hast patience, and for my name's sake hast laboured, and hast not fainted.  Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love. Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent. But this thou hast, that thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaitanes, which I also hate.

It is good to be against the Nicolaitanes. They must be opposed. But it is not enough to merely be against heresy, one must be for pure doctrine. Heresy hunting is a natural side effect of holding to the one, true religion, but it is a poor top priority. It can only be done rightly if done secondly.

"You cannot love a thing without wanting to fight for it. You cannot fight without something to fight for. To love a thing without wishing to fight for it is not love at all; it is lust." — G.K. Chesterton

Hate is a healthy et cetera, but a horrible main course. Love must be served with a side dish of hate, but it must be second in priority and proportion.

Psalm 97:10

Ye that love the Lord, hate evil.

If you love something, you will hate something else. It is part of the absorbed price of doing business. In our case, if you love the Lord, you must hate evil. You cannot call on Christ to save you without calling your sins insufferable.

Proverbs 8:36

He that sinneth against me wrongeth his own soul:

all they that hate me love death.

Again, if you love, you will hate. Here the inverse is highlighted. Those who hate God, love death. Their rejection of life drives them to delight of death.  Not only so, but they even flip the script by beginning with their hate. They love hating God and so they hate loving life. He is the Author and Creator and so they worship chaos and destruction. When you begin with hate, you loves are corrupted.

As observed above, if you begin with hate for heresy, you will not end up with a perfect love of pure doctrine. How much more so then when you begin with hating goodness do you end up with a twisted worship of wickedness.

Love and hate are inescapable and one cannot serve two masters, You will either love the one and hate the other or hate the one and love the other (Mt. 6:24).

day no. 16,921: patriarchy is not the problem... it is the solution

“It is painful, being a man, to have to assert the privilege, or the burden, which Christianity lays upon my own sex. I am crushingly aware how inadequate most of us are, in our actual and historical individualities, to fill the place prepared for us. But it is an old saying in the army that you salute the uniform not the wearer. Only one wearing the masculine uniform can (provisionally, and till the Parousia) represent the Lord to the Church: for we are all, corporately and individually, feminine to Him. We men may often make very bad priests. That is because we are insufficiently masculine. It is no cure to call in those who are not masculine at all. A given man may make a very bad husband; you cannot mend matters by trying to reverse the roles. He may make a bad male partner in a dance. The cure for that is that men should more diligently attend dancing classes; not that the ballroom should henceforward ignore distinctions of sex and treat all dancers as neuter. That would, of course, be eminently sensible, civilized, and enlightened, but, once more, ‘not near so much like a Ball.’” — C.S. Lewis, God in the Dock

The problem with men is not that they are too manly, but that they are such poor representatives of the Man, Christ Jesus. Toxic masculinity, if such a thing exists, is not the result of an excess of manliness, but rather a deficiency. It is a disease that presents where testosterone is too low not too high. That is to say, Western Civilization does not need to go on a testosterone diet, but to begin taking testosterone supplements. The regiment needs a regimen of masculinity prescribed, not extra training in sensitivity and DEI. The problem with the patriarchy of the past is not that it elevated fathers, but that the fathers were not adequately Father-like. The mess of masculinity is how effeminate it is, not how macho it is — how etiolated it is, not how saturated it is.

Men do not need lessons in femininity, they need to take masculinity more seriously.

Patriarchy is not the problem; it is the solution.

Masculinity is not toxic in excess, but in absence.

It is only scary in its scarcity.

It’s not that men should never apologize, but that they should stop apologizing for being men.

day no. 16,920: making a mess

Genesis 1:31

And God saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

The creation of the world was not the downgrade of the cosmos. Creating matter didn’t ruin the perfect immaterial ether anymore than Jesus was ruined by becoming fully man. Making something doesn't always make a mess of something else.

John 1:1, 14

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…  and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

The stuff did not ruin the spiritual. The material did not tarnish the meta. Grace and truth are not worse for having been embodied. They are not pure as concepts, but compromised as actions. They are pristine in the packaging and devalued by being played with. Love is not worse for being displayed. Holiness is no less high for bending down low.

2 Corinthians 5:21

For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.

Jesus became a man in a crib. This was not a sin.

He became sin on a cross. This saved us from ours.

day no. 16,919: authoritarian provision

Exodus 16:8

And Moses said, "This shall be, when the LORD shall give you in the evening flesh to eat, and in the morning bread to the full."

Good authors, like good fathers, don't forget to feed their children

Just think how many stories neglect the fact that its characters need to eat. The story may be compelling and the pages may turn quickly, but consider how many characters in how many stories would starve to death if they were real. How many pages have they gone without anything to eat or drink? Because they are creatures, they can be made to endure chapters of story grip without any nourishment or sleep needed to keep going. But that is because they are less than living and their authors are less than Almighty.

How many stories get caught up in the details of a battle, but forget the nourishment of the warriors? How many worlds and weapons have been provided without mention of water? How many authors forget to provide life, breath, and everything else?

Not God.

He goes to great lengths to remind us that He doesn't forget to feed His people. They may not have always liked the menu, but they didn't have to worry about the dinner bell. Our Author does not get caught up in other details only to get distracted from our basic needs.

God provides. He gives us what we need: which is a story and some bread. He gives us sleep and tense situations, He gives us climates and climaxes. We have everything we need. 

Psalm 84:11

No good thing will He withhold from them that walk uprightly.

Praise God for being a good Author and looking not only to His own interests, but also to the interests of His characters.

day no. 16,918: you sunk my censorship

“We do not need a censorship of the press. We have a censorship by the press.” — G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy

In order to have censorship, you must have a censor. Without someone or something determining what is allowed and what is not, you cannot have censorship. The same can be said for blasphemy laws. What standard determines what cannot be said? In a sense, censorship and blasphemy laws are inescapable. Someone or something will draw the line somewhere. Things that try to go beyond that line will be hindered or altogether made to halt. The only question is what is that line and says who? There will be a standard and someone will determine it.

For too long, the media have sought to be the standard. The storytellers imagined they were authors and instead of relaying the news, they determined the narrative. Instead of reporting what happened, they tried to write what should happen. They stopped being objective by objecting to the reality they did not prefer.

"Journalism and conjuring will always be incompatible... The two trades rest on opposite principles. The whole point of being a conjurer is that you won't explain a thing that has happened; the whole point of being a journalist is that you do explain a thing that hasn't happened." — G.K. Chesterton, Magic: A Fantastic Comedy

Magicians keep the real thing secret and give you a show. Journalists give you a show by keeping everything else quiet. Magicians invent new tricks. Journalists invent the news.

day no. 16,917: peace and quiet

"I prefer peace. But if trouble must come, let it come in my time, so that my children can live in peace." — Thomas Paine

Peace is better than war, but only if it is a good peace.

"While a good peace is better than a good war, even a good war is better than a bad peace. These far-flung comparisons are nowhere so common as in the Gospels.” — G.K. Chesterton, The Everlasting Man

We must fight the good fight for the good peace. Peace without warfare is bad peace. It is compromise. It is capitulation. It is sin. Christ has called us to crush snakes and this cannot be accomplished by securing a signed affidavit from the snakes promising that they will not strike anymore.

Trouble must come if goodness has any grit. If goodness does not stand up for good things, it is not longer good... and the trouble still comes.

1 Thessalonians 4:11-12

And that ye study to be quiet, and to do your own business, and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you; That ye may walk honestly toward them that are without, and that ye may have lack of nothing.

We should want nothing more than to, as Augustine said, "Love God and do as we please." We should want this for ourselves and go to great lengths and personal discomforts to secure more of it for our posterity. We should pray for our magistrates to be less interested in everyone else's business and to be more interested in keeping the peace by keeping justice fair and swift.

1 Timothy 2:1-2

I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men; For kings, and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.

Peace and quiet cannot be secured without self control from our magistrates. May God give us the faith to fight the good fight in our generation that our posterity may fight new and better battles further up and further in as Christendom conquers the world.

day no. 16,916: second to one

”How can it be a large career to tell other people's children about the Rule of Three, and a small career to tell one's own children about the universe? How can it be broad to be the same thing to everyone, and narrow to be everything to someone? No. A woman's function is laborious, but because it is gigantic, not because it is minute. I will pity Mrs. Jones for the hugeness of her task; I will never pity her for its smallness.” — G. K. Chesterton

A woman's work is no more et cetera than her presence is. She was not created as an afterthought and her work was not made just to keep her busy. She is not a second-class citizen merely because she came second and her work is not secondary work simply because it supplements the mission of the man.Yes, her submission means that her mission is filed under his on the flow chart, but that does not make it small work. If it comes to that, one could just as easily point out that the point at the top of the flow chart is much smaller than the many subsequent tasks that hold it up just as many parts are needed to hold up the head.

A mother is world. She is a house for a baby before she runs the house into which the baby is born. She is cook, teacher, caretaker, nurse, counselor, maid, etc... She is the despot and the servant of the home and she runs her whole world best when she is content to keep her despotism quarantined to her own household and out of others.

Her task, like her God, is gigantic.

Her resources, like His grace, is endless.

Do not pity Mrs. Jones for the ho-hum drudge of daily affairs. If you must pity her at all, pity the hugeness of her task for she has been called to eat the elephant one bite at a time and there is much to do.

day no. 16,915: grabbin' mammon

"Life is so brief that no man can afford to lose a day. It has been well said that if a great king should bring us a great heap of gold, and bid us take as much as we could count in a day, we should make a long day of it; we should begin early in the morning, and in the evening we should not withhold our hand; but to win souls is far nobler work, how is it that we so soon withdraw from it? Some are spared to a long evening of green old age; if such be my case, let me use such talents as I still retain, and to the last hour serve my blessed and faithful Lord. By his grace I will die in harness, and lay down my charge only when I lay down my body.” — Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Morning and Evening

We could endure the drudgery of counting coin upon coin if counting them meant keeping them. In fact, we could do so with a smile on our face and gleam in our eye. We would not punch in late or leave early. We would not take a long lunch. We might, in fact, be willing to fast and go without a lunch in order to get more time to gather up more gold. We would find reserves to endure. We would dig deep within in order to dig more out. We would get up early and stay up late, grabbin' mammon until the clock hit midnight. We would hit that finish line with our chest. We would give it our all because we would believe in the value of what we were doing. We would count the cost because we saw the benefit.

How much more so then should we apply ourselves to our chores for the Lord?

1 Corinthians 15:58

Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.

day no. 16,914: handiwork

“Jesus gave both his hands to the nails, how can I keep back one of mine from his blessed work?” — Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Morning and Evening 

How prepared are we to put our hands to the good work God has prepared beforehand for us to do?

Colossians 3:23-24

And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men; Knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance: for ye serve the Lord Christ.

Christ has called us to conquest. We must conquer the world in His Name and cultivate it according to His Word through His Gospel.

Colossians 1:17

And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.

The nails that held Christ's hands to the Cross were being held together by Him. If He did not hold the nail together, the nail could not have held Him to the wood. He endured those difficulties for us, we can endure some difficulties for Him.

1 Corinthians 15:58

Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.

Whatever you do, do it for the Lord. Anything done for His glory by His grace is not in vain. You cannot overdo it. You can never give Him more than He deserves.

day no. 16,913: homophobiaphobic

Ephesians 5:3

But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints.

Modern Western evangelicalism is more zealous to dissociate itself from the sin of being accused of being homophobic than it is from the actual, tangible sin of homosexuality.

Homophobia being named among them is anathema and anyone accused thereof is informally excommunicated from the speaking circuit. In other words, many have a phobia of being thought of as homophobic. Let's call it, "homophobiaphobic."

All that to say, many Christians would rather fellowship with sin than with those who are accused of confronting sin too harshly. They are more allergic to the idea of being called intolerant than they are to the reality of tolerating evil.

Of course, we ought to love homosexuals and share the Good News of the Gospel of God with them for such were some of us (1 Cor. 6:11,) but that is loving them on Christ's terms, not loving them on theirs. We cannot submit to their definitions of love and tolerance in order to try to win them to ours.

You cannot win someone to the merits of chastity by giving them your virginity. 

day no. 16,912: fulfilled, not faltered

"The Old Covenant is not the time in which God attempted to save His people through law, but, finding this to be a failure, decided to use grace and forgiveness in the New Covenant . . . the contrast in the New Testament is not between Old and New; the contrast is between Old distorted and Old fulfilled.” — Douglas Wilson, “Reformed” Is Not Enough, p. 65

Those who pit the two sides of the Bible against each other understand neither.  First of all, grace and law are not opposed to one another. Second of all, the Old Testament is not absent of grace nor the New Testament absent of law, which is to say that the Old Testament is not all law and the New Testament is not all grace. Those who insist on such either forget or intentionally overlook the wrath of the Lamb in Revelation and the grace of God in the Exodus.

Psalm 85:10-11

Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other.

Truth shall spring out of the earth; and righteousness shall look down from heaven.

Mercy and truth are different, but they are able to hold hands. In Christ the covenant contains mercy, justice, grace, and truth without compromise or confusion. If you imagine mercy and truth being different entities, well then, they hold hands as they walk together. If you imagine them being of the same source, then they are a left and right hand that work together.

The New Testament did not defeat the Old Testament. The Old Testament did not fail. The New Testament did not win. Christ completed the mission and commissioned the church. This is the Old fulfilled, not faltering.

There is no need to reconcile the Old and New Testaments. They are not fighting and no longer on speaking terms. They enjoy perfect commerce and consanguinity.

“C. H. Spurgeon was once asked if he could reconcile these two truths to each other. 'I wouldn't try,' he replied; 'I never reconcile friends.'" — J.I. Packer

day no. 16,911: if wishing worked

"If wishes were horses beggars wouldn’t ride." — Douglas Wilson, Ploductivity

If wishing worked, you wouldn't have to; but it doesn't, so you do.

Proverbs 28:19

He who tills his land will have plenty of food,

But he who follows empty pursuits will have poverty in plenty.

Even if wishing worked, it would be too much work for many... especially for those who wish the work was already done.

day no. 16,910: two swords

“Remember that the true war-cry of the Church is Gideon's watchword, ‘The sword of the Lord, and of Gideon!’ God must do it, it is his own work. But we are not to be idle; instrumentality is to be used--‘The sword of the Lord, and of Gideon!’ If we only cry, ‘The sword of the Lord!’ we shall be guilty of an idle presumption; and if we shout, ‘The sword of Gideon!’ alone, we shall manifest idolatrous reliance on an arm of flesh: we must blend the two in practical harmony, ‘The sword of the Lord, and of Gideon!’ We can do nothing of ourselves, but we can do everything by the help of our God.” — Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Morning and Evening

The battle belongs to God, but the fighting belongs to us. Of course, God fights for us. If He didn't, we would have no reason to believe our cause could succeed. But rarely does faith amount to sitting on the sidelines and even less often does it amount to refusing to fight.

We must apprehend two swords. We must wield the sword of the Lord and the sword of Gideon. The blade of faith cuts in both directions and the steel of obedience is serrated. The Word of the Lord cuts to the quick and the work of man saws slowly. We must by faith both wait on the Lord and get to work. We must serve Him and obey Him remembering that in Him our labors are never in vain.

1 Corinthians 15:58

Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.

day no. 16,909: hungry and thirsty

Matthew 5:6

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

The hungry do not complain about being compelled to eat again.

The thirsty do not complain about having to take another drink.

day no. 16,908: totalitolerance, a.k.a. the tolerance buzzsaw

“Evil preaches tolerance until it is dominant, then it tries to silence good.” ― Charles J. Chaput

Evil preaches, "Peace, peace," but there is no peace.

Evil uses the promise of peace to secure more power for itself or to escape the power of the good. If evil can get good to stop fighting, it has a chance. In fact, that is its only chance. 

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." ― Edmund Burke (attributed)

If good men do anything, evil is on its heels. So evil must convince good men to stand down. This sometimes comes in the form of a flex that promises it won't get worse if good concedes. Other times it comes in the form of a plea for mercy that begs good men to stop pursuing them.

Either way, when good men stand down, evil rises up. It cannot stand side by side with good, so it must convince good to stand down.

Psalm 106:30-21

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.

So what will it be Christian men? Stand down and let evil run rampant or stand up and put evil down?

Rise up, O men of God!

Have done with lesser things.

Give heart and mind and soul and strength

to serve the King of kings.

Rise up, O men of God!

The kingdom tarries long.

Bring in the day of brotherhood

and end the night of wrong.

Rise up, O men of God!

The church for you doth wait,

her strength unequal to her task;

rise up, and make her great!

Lift high the cross of Christ!

Tread where his feet have trod.

As brothers of the Son of Man,

rise up, O men of God!

― William P. Merrill,

Rise Up, O Men of God

day no. 16,907: the camouflage of humility

1 Peter 5:5-9

Likewise, you who are younger, be subject to the elders. Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another, for “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time He may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on Him, because He cares for you. Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world.

Young men were made to go to war, but they were not meant to go out without camouflage.

Humility is holy camouflage.

Pride never expects it and cannot see it coming.

Frodo could not be seen by Sauron because he never suspected anyone who had the ring wouldn't use it and he never imagined anyone who possessed it wouldn't be possessed by it. He had no category for someone seeking to destroy it. And that is why Frodo flew under his radar.

Pride presupposes that power and pride are the only things worth fighting for…  or with. 

Young men clothed in humility will escape the teeth of tyrants.

day no. 16,906: bless the lads, bless the land

Genesis 48:16

The Angel which redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads; and let my name be named on them, and the name of my fathers Abraham and Isaac; and let them grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth.

Bless the lads, bless the land.

Generations can lead to nations.

A family tree can become a family forest.

Where God gives grace, children grow and take dominion.

Genesis 24:60

And they blessed Rebekah, and said unto her, "Thou art our sister, be thou the mother of thousands of millions, and let thy seed possess the gate of those which hate them."

May our children grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth and possess the gates of those who hate them.

Habakkuk 2:14

For the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.

May our little flocks become a flood of faith that covers the earth as the waters cover the seas.

Matthew 28:18-20

And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen.

May the world be baptized by our covenant kids as they grow and spread leaven to every nook and cranny where Christ is King — which is to say, everywhere!

"There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, 'Mine!'" — Abraham Kuyper

day no. 16,905: honor your father and mother and let your neighbor do the same

Matthew 19:19

Honor your father and mother, and, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

This one verse captures the vision of Christendom, which is each nation honoring their fathers and letting their neighboring nations do the same. This is every man respecting his father and loving and respecting other men enough to allow them he same courtesy. Once we have begun to thank God for where He placed us, we can begin to thank Him for where He has placed our neighbors.

A man cannot honor the fathers and mothers of others until he honors his own.

He cannot extend grace to another nation until he faces and forgives his own.

Nations are connected by their mutual respect for their neighbor’s respect for their own fathers and mothers. Each nation understands the other's desire to maintain what has been handed down to them.

Acts 17:26

God hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation.

From one man God has made men into nations. Each man is made in the image of God like their father Adam and each one has brothers with respective house rules. 

"There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, 'I don't see the use of this; let us clear it away.' To which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer: 'If you don't see the use of it, I certainly won't let you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you to destroy it.'"  — G.K. Chesterton

You cannot appreciate the house rules of another home until you appreciate the rules of the house in which you grew up.

"A people which takes no pride in the noble achievements of remote ancestors will never achieve anything worthy to be remembered with pride by remote descendants." — Lord Thomas Babington Macaulay (aka T.B. Macaulay)

Until you understand what motivated your people, you cannot weigh the motives of other people.

Genesis 35:11

And God said to him, “I am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply. A nation and a company of nations shall come from you, and kings shall come from your own body."

Kings and kingdoms can get along if they all bow before God. Two kingdoms can have borders and brotherhood. The world does not need to become one nation in order to be unified, it simply needs its nations to begin by honoring the fathers they have in order to respect the ones they don't. We love our neighbor by letting them honor their own fathers.

"People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors." —  Edmund Burke

The Kingdom will have come and God's will been done when men honor their fathers and mothers and leave their neighbors to do the same.

day no. 16,904: the glory of men

Proverbs 20:29

The glory of young men is their strength, but the splendor of old men is their gray hair.

Young men really are strong and full of zeal and older men really are wise. Young men need to keep their energy harnessed in holiness (Titus 2:6) and one of the best ways for them to do this is by talking less and listening more to their elders (1 Peter 5:5). 

The percentage of words in a given conversation should correspond to the number of years, that is to say, the youngest one in a group of men should not contribute the highest percentage of words.

Take a queue from Elihu. He waited to speak. He wasn't mute. He wasn’t thoughtless or distracted/disengaged from what was being said, but he waited. He was humble and patient.

Job 32:4-5

Now Elihu had waited to speak to Job because they were older than he. And when Elihu saw that there was no answer in the mouth of these three men, he burned with anger.

Old men need young men's energy to inspire their efforts and young men need old's men discernment to avoid an exciting disaster.

Reformation is the energy of young men paired with the wisdom of older men.

Revolution is the energy of young men ignoring the wisdom of their elders.

day no. 16,903: you cannot accept the Jesus of the Bible and reject the Bible of Jesus

“If you believe what you like in the Gospel, and reject what you don't like, it is not the Gospel you believe, but yourself.” — Augustine

2 Timothy 3:16-17

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

Either Scripture is sufficient or it isn't. At some point, we have to decide. If it is, then we need to think more Biblically. We need to be more principled and more practical. We need to be more acquainted with the content and context of the Bible and more interactive with the principles it provides. The Bible must be applied to the practices and predicaments of everyday life.

To say that Scripture is sufficient is not to say that you cannot consult or consider any other source of information, but rather to confirm which filters which. With what authority does the buck stop? Which worldview prevails? The one the Bible provides or one of its competitors?

"The Bible is thought of as authoritative on everything of which it speaks. Moreover, it speaks of everything. We do not mean that it speaks of football games, of atoms, etc., directly, but we do mean that it speaks of everything either directly or by implication." – Cornelius Van Til, Christian Apologetic

The Bible, in principle, speaks to everything. The more Biblically you begin to think -- that is to say, the more your thinking and assessment of situations is guided by underlying principles proclaimed and applied in the Scriptures -- the more you have a handle on life, breath, and everything else that happens here on a Tuesday afternoon.

"In the Bible, we have a perfect library." — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

John 10:35

...the Scripture cannot be broken

Jesus said that Scripture could not be broken.

He seemed to believe the Bible was timeless and timely, never not relevant and always up to the moment. The Bible is God's unbreakable, impenetrable Word.

"We cannot have the Jesus of the Bible and at the same time reject the Bible of Jesus." — B.B. Warfield

You can't believe in the Jesus we find in Scripture and reject the Scripture that Jesus believed.