Adamic

2013-04-07

Skim milk is water that is lying about being milk.

— Ron Swanson (Parks & Rec)

2013-02-13

Thus says the LORD: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the LORD.

— God via Jeremiah the Jewish prophet, Jeremiah 9:23-24

2013-01-28

When a man becomes a believer, there are two great events which take place at this great turning point in his history. …

He is not merely forgiven the sin of every [single] evil work of which he had [previously] been guilty, but he is created anew unto the corresponding good work.

— Thomas Chalmers, The Power of Selfishness in Promoting the Honesties of Mercantile Intercourse [or, How “Honest” Business is Really Selfish], a discourse on Luke 6:33

2013-01-16

Worship with the Lights On

In contrast to the world, which worships in the dark, the gospel affords the church a unique opportunity: to worship with the lights on.

You ask, “How does the world worship in the dark?” Look at rock concerts, clubs, late night meetings where deals are made, bars, hook ups, murders, burglaries, rapes.

All of these have two things in common: they are acts of worship and they happen in the dark (or at least in secret, if you’ll allow me to use it figuratively too).

Don’t get hung up on the fact that I group murders with clubbing. I’m not saying that both are the same level of wrong or that going out at night is necessarily wrong. It’s not.

But they are both acts of worship, because everything we do as human beings is an expression of what or whom we worship.

And where the world worships in the dark, the church is freed to worship with the lights on.

The church has a Savior, an object of worship, Jesus, who knows all of our faults, even better than we do ourselves. And that same Savior has forgiven us at the cross.

Therefore, the church has no need of hiding in the dark out of fearful individualism or anything else. Because of the gracious love of Jesus, we can worship whole-heartedly, singing loud, being expressive, weeping, kneeling, rejoicing, all with the lights on, in full view of one another.

—-

In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve were “naked and not ashamed.” They lived in full view of one another.

The corrupting effect of human pride, sin, and idolatry makes us fearful, comfortable worshiping only in the dark.

But, in Jesus, the church is clothed in His perfection and therefore we live and worship in full view of one another, no longer ashamed.

The world worships in the dark. Only Jesus’ church can worship with the lights on.

→

It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved sleep.

— Psalm 127:2, ESV

2013-01-11

"We may not want to hear it, but Christianity is in peril, like no other religion."

Translation: “Too bad Christians are being persecuted by the hundreds of millions. Now we have to be nice to them.”

Kelly James Clark understands the bias, as evidenced by his paragraphs:

Why has the tragedy of Christians in the Muslim world been ignored? Short blames this on the media’s fear that criticizing Muslims is tantamount to racism. I attribute it as well to secular media’s lack of interest in and sometimes even scorn for religious belief.

Western media must overcome its fear of criticizing Muslims and its disinterest in religious belief. Religious liberties are the most fundamental human liberties — they are indicators of a country’s political willingness to allow people to choose their own way of life. In countries were religious liberty is conspicuously absent, one is likely to find a host of other liberties threatened as well.

I applaud. Now to pray that he see that key Christian principle: other people (read, “Western media”) are not the problem, I am.

—

On an unrelated note, it’s cool to see GVSU, my Dad’s old workplace, where I learned to love computers, get into a byline. And it’s nostalgic that they’re still rocking that ugly logo.

There are only two groups of people: witnessing disciples of Jesus who are willing to suffer for their faith, and ‘the world’, evil and condemned.

— D.A. Carson, The Gospel According to John, commenting on John 15:26-27, p. 482.

2012-11-23

The terrible thing the almost impossible thing, is to hand over your whole self—all your wishes and precautions—to Christ. But it is far easier than what we are all trying to do instead.

For what we are trying to do is to remain what we call ‘ourselves’, to keep personal happiness as our great aim in life, and yet at the same time be ‘good’.

We are all trying to let our mind and heart go their own way—centered on money or pleasure or ambition—and hoping, in spite of this, to behave honestly and chastely and humbly.

And that is exactly what Christ warned us you could not do. As He said, a thistle cannot produce figs.

If I am a field that contains nothing but grass-seet, I cannot produce wheat. Cutting the grass may keep it short: but I shall still produce grass and no wheat.

If I want to produce wheat, the change must go deeper than the surface. I must be plowed up and re-sown.

— C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, 197-198.