The older I get, the more I realize why Jesus said that the law and the prophets can all be summed up in . . . . love. The problem with love, “twue wove,” is that it’s hard, as in really difficult. That’s because love means a certain dying to self, and we fallen, sinful creatures are quite fond of our selves. We are loathe by nature to see anything as not about us, our pleasure, our feelings, our desires, and on that goes. This brings to mind a story I recount in the book about learning this painful truth about love and my sinful self-centered self, and something I’ve used on my kids many times as they’ve grown up. I heard the phrase of this post’s title on a podcast recently, and it captures well the end to which love brings us: Right Relationship. The story recounts one among many ways God has tried to build this into my life.
When I was eight years old the Apollo 8 astronauts took the first ever trip around the moon. The trip was launched on December 21, 1968, and became the first manned spacecraft to leave low Earth orbit, reach the Moon, orbit it, and return. Even as an eight-year-old I remember it well. The three-astronaut crew—Frank Borman, James Lovell, and William Anders—were the first humans to witness and photograph an Earthrise. The picture beamed back to earth was stunning; a little blue ball of life in a vast cosmic wasteland. Human eyes had never beheld such a contrast human minds had only speculated about. It inspired the crew to read the first verses of Genesis 1 as a billion people on that little blue ball listened and watched. Maybe it wasn’t a coincidence that this happened on Christmas eve. (more…)
Every year our family watches A Charlie Brown Christmas. The show premiered on December 9, 1965, and the most powerful scene almost didn’t make it on air. The CBS honchos were afraid a biblical declaration of the gospel coming from Linus would offend too many people. Needless to say, in 2018 the scene wouldn’t have a chance. Thankfully, every year, or any time we want via this amazing thing called the Internet, we can enjoy it’s profundity again and again:
Charlie Brown: Isn’t there anyone, who knows what Christmas is all about?!
Linus: Sure Charlie Brown, I can tell you what Christmas is all about. Lights please?
8Now there were in the same country shepherds living out in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night.9And behold, an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were greatly afraid.10Then the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people.11 “For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.12“And this will be the sign to you: You will find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger.”13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying:
14“Glory to God in the highest,
And on earth peace, good will toward men!”
Until recently, I had never thought of revelation as a gift. God’s revealing himself and the truth about the nature of reality just was what it was, revelation. I can’t remember now where I’d read this phrase, but it struck me as profound. Humanity without revelation, without something beyond human experience and knowledge, is in every sense benighted. That is, we are “in a state of pitiful or contemptible intellectual or moral ignorance.” In other words, we don’t have a clue! Most Christians, unfortunately, don’t act as if God’s revelation to us is a gift. Our tendency, all of us, is to take it for granted. (more…)
If you’ve ever heard, read, or interacted with an atheist you’ll be familiar with one of their most absurd tropes: there is no evidence for the veracity of Christianity. Thus they define “faith” as a religious term that means believing without evidence, or in spite of the lack thereof. But faith, as I argue in the book, is more accurately defined as trust based on adequate evidence. As such it is not a religious term at all. We use the same faculties of assessment, for instance, to believe in the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth from the dead, as we do when we fly in an airplane. There is enough evidence for both, so we can trust the former for our salvation, and the latter our safety. Can we have absolute certainty as Descartes? No. Absolute certainty doesn’t exist in anything, but beyond a reasonable doubt does. Being finite creatures our knowledge is always limited, and so some level of trust, or faith, is required in everything we do.
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