Aug 25, 2021 | Epistemology - Trust
Now that’s a real click bate title! I bet there’s never been one like it. What in the world does it mean? Well, I’m glad you asked. We all have heard of organic food, you know, stuff that’s natural and supposedly better for you than non-organic stuff. It supposedly doesn’t have pesticides or GMOs if it comes out of the ground, or isn’t given hormones or antibiotics if it’s fish, fowl, or mammal. For the latter, they’re supposed to be grass fed or cage free, and live their short lives not part of the big industrial machinery food industry. Most people know that. But what about epistemology? Far fewer have ever heard the word, let lone what it means. That’s a shame because it’s something they encounter every day of their lives whether they know it or not. That’s what it is, what we know, how we know, why we know, and the study thereof. Or think we do. But, what in the world does epistemology have to do with organic food? More than you might think. (more…)
Aug 15, 2021 | Parents and Family
Instead of giving my wife flowers or taking her out to a nice dinner for this the 34th anniversary of our marriage, I thought I’d give her a blog post. It’s easier, and less expensive. Not to mention that it will last longer. It’s this kind of thoughtfulness that has kept her putting up with me for all these years, or maybe it’s the mercy and grace born of the cross of Christ to which we dedicated our lives before we ever met. I’ll go with mercy and grace! Any successful marriage that stands the test of time needs plenty of both. When we were walking into church this morning, Sarah, that would be my bride, needed a reminder of how long we’ve been married (you lose track after a while), and when I said 34 years, she replied, “Holy crap!” I know! The swift passage of time is a cliché I’ve commented on many times on this blog, but no matter how many times you talk about it, it is still incomprehensible just how swift that passage really is for we mere mortals. Since this is a post about marriage and not time, I’ll stay focused on the former. (more…)
Aug 13, 2021 | Explanatory Power
The subject of this post might sound slightly familiar. It comes from a statement on the other side of the metaphysical divide from world-famous atheist Richard Dawkins who said that, “Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist.” What Darwin actually did was to give atheists an excuse to reject their Creator by denying he even exists. Atheists, however, are increasingly fighting a losing battle as scientific knowledge advances. Every day it becomes more difficult to deny that nature appears to have been designed and could be not a product of chance. Even Dawkins himself said nature has the appearance of design, but Darwin allows him to be blind to that design all the while claiming the mantel of “science.” And now we know in the age of COVID that “science” is often used as an ideological cudgel to silence anyone who disagrees with the standard narrative of our cultural elites. (more…)
Aug 4, 2021 | Culture
One of my pet peeves is how easily Christians buy into the hostile secular cultural caricature of conservative Christians. What do I mean by that? The culture via its many powerful and ubiquitous means of communications communicates that Christians are generally unsavory characters. Then, being persuaded by the caricature not only do non-Christians believe it, but most Christians do too. So, in a book I recently read, Culture Apologetics, I found a perfect example of this lamentable trait among Christians. The book is great, but this is disappointing. I will quote the author to make my point.
The church is seen by many as an intolerant and judgmental community.
For Christianity to be desirable, we must narrow the gaps between how things are and how things ought to be.
According to Barna Research Group, the most common complain of those outside the faith . . . is that “Christians no longer represent what Jesus had in mind, that Christianity in our society is not what it was meant to be.” Christians today are known primarily by what they stand against instead of what they sand for. For the majority of people aged sixteen to twenty-nine, Christians are anti-homosexual, judgmental, hypocritical, too political, old-fashioned, insensitive, boring, unaccepting of other faiths, and confusing.
It is no secret that Christianity has a public relations problem.
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Jul 23, 2021 | Culture, Gratitude
That will depend on what our eyes and brain have been programmed to see, whether it is by the secular culture in which we daily swim, or God’s word. If it is the former, we’ll see a pretty butterfly, beautiful colors that amaze us, and that’s it. If it is the latter, we’ll see God! If it is the culture, the beauty will point to nothing beyond the beauty. If it is God’s word it will point to God! How could it not? If this butterfly doesn’t reveal God, what does it reveal? Chance? How does one explain where such exquisite and intricate beauty comes from? If there is no God, then the only explanation can be chance. How persuasive is that? Not very. When you understand that God is the consummate eternal all powerful creative artist, everything in nature compels you to worship so great a being that could create everything, including this very butterfly. We need to commit the words of Paul in Romans 1 to memory, and teach them to our children, and share them with everyone we encounter:
For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
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