2012 in review

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

600 people reached the top of Mt. Everest in 2012. This blog got about 2,300 views in 2012. If every person who reached the top of Mt. Everest viewed this blog, it would have taken 4 years to get that many views.

Click here to see the complete report.

The Mystery of Language and A Theory of Man

This semester I am doing a directed study on the writings of Walker Percy. He was a 20th C. American Southern Novelist who also published a large number of non-fiction works. Percy is most well known for his novel The Moviegoer but is also known for his non-fiction essays on the subject of language. Percy was always intrigued by the phenomenon of language and wondered why there was so little serious study of the subject. Percy believed that, for the most part, scientists who studied language refused to seriously look at the topic. It is important to note the difference between communication and language. Percy saw that language was the unique characteristic that sat man apart from other beasts who could merely communicate. However he saw that all scientists wanted to do was prove that language was not unique to man. He states:

Scientist are more interested in teaching apes to talk than finding out why people talk. It is one of the peculiarities of the age that scientists are more interested in spending millions of dollars and man-hours trying to teach chimps to use language in order to prove that language is not a unique property of man than in studying the property itself. Scientists tend to be dogmatic about the nature of man. Again they remind me of the Scholastics battling with Galileo. Scholastics spent thousands of man-hours inside their heads trying to prove that Jupiter couldn’t have moons and that the earth was at the venter of the universe. To suggest otherwise offended their sense of the order of things. Galileo pointed to his telescope: Why don’t you take a look? Today we have plenty of Scholastics of language. What we need is a Galileo who is willing to take a look at it.

Walker Percy is right. To ascribe to the reality that language truly is a unique characteristic of man would upset most secular humanist’s order of things. To see that language is unique to man is to force one to change their concept of man. To truly look at a theory of language is to look at a theory of man. The next time someone tells you that man is just like all the other animals ask them to account for the peculiarity and uniqueness of language.

Until Next Time,

Michael

Jesus: The Prince of Peace

This is such an incredible story of God’s grace throughout generations. The story of how the Gospel came to the Sawi people and brought peace between themselves and their enemies is truly amazing. There is only one Prince of Peace and he is Jesus. Without him our treaties for peace are merely outward oaths for personal advancement. The Gospel of Christ truly changes the heart and it is from a changed heart that peace can truly perpetuate without the root of self-interest.

Watch this video in its entirety. It is truly an amazing testament to the grace of God.

Never the Same from Pioneers-USA on Vimeo.

Until next time,

Michael

Bonhoeffer on Leadership

Not too long ago I began reading a biography on Dietrich Bonhoeffer who was a german theologian during the rise of Hitler and the Nazi Regime. The book is named Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy It is a truly intriguing book and I am really enjoying it!

One of the things that I have just read is an excerpt from some of Bonheoffer’s writings on the topic of leadership. I found it truly insightful and provocative and thought that I would share it here.

If he (the leader) understands his function in any other way than as it is rooted in fact, if he does not continually tell his followers quite clearly of the limited nature of his task and of their own responsibility, if he allows himself to surrender to the wishes of his followers, who would always make him their idol—then the image of the leader will pass over into the image of the mis-leader, and he will be acting in a criminal way not only toward those he leads, but also towards himself. The true leader must always be able to disillusion. It is just this that is his responsibility and his real object. He must lead his following away from the authority of his person to the recognition of the real authority of orders and offices…He must radically refuse to become the appeal, the idol, i.e. the ultimate authority of those whom he leads…He serves the order of the state, of the community, and his service can be of incomparable value. But only so long as he keeps strictly in his place…Now a feature of man’s maturity is responsibility towards other people, towards existing orders. He must let himself be controlled, ordered, restricted.

The part of this passage that I find most intriguing is the part where Bonhoeffer says,

if [the leader] allows himself to surrender to the wishes of his followers, who would always make him their idol—then the image of the leader will pass over into the image of the mis-leader, and he will be acting in a criminal way not only toward those he leads, but also towards himself.

Is this not devastatingly true? look at the state of politics in our nation. The presidential campaigns of the past two presidential elections have been nothing short of massive popularity contests. The leaders in our nation have surrendered to the wishes of their followers and become their idols. There is truly no other word that amply describes our political system of the past few elections other than idolatry. We have turned our leaders away from those who simply manage the state of the nation into those who reach far beyond the intended bounds of their offices because those who idolize them wish them to do so.

We have clearly created a paternalistic state. A state that is ignoring any sort of responsibility for the people and loves to hear the voice of the people idolize them for doing the things the people should be responsible for.

The thing that is most worrying is that in Bonhoeffer’s time the leviathan of the state took this power and with it committed genocide. Considering that our own government has already commit infanticide (millions of gov’t funded abortions) and consequently gendercide (A staggering percent of those abortions being of girls) it is scary to see what is on the horizon if we do not repent for our political idolatry and take responsibility for our own lives.

Until next time,

Michael

The State of The Church

I just read a very insightful article by Michael Horton (A professor at Westminster Theological Seminary). In the article he tries to answer the question, “What is the largest threat to the church today?. His response is not what most would expect. Horton believes that the church is suffering most from compromise within the church rather than the threats of outside forces. (Moral relativism, loss of religious liberty, etc.) Horton believes that the church is loosing any understanding of ecclesiology, what he means by this is that there is no sense of church leaders being, well, “church leaders”.

Horton wants to show that the church has very much turned everything over to the people of the church to pick and choose what they like rather than the church leadership proclaiming truth to the church from the word of God. He states:

I hear “every believer is a minister, we’re all ministers … every sheep is a shepherd.” Basically, the pastor has become the chief motivator and coach and planner for events, and that’s a big concern I have. Maybe the greatest concern in this milieu that I have is that we’re losing a sense of the catholicity of the church. We’re carving the church into niche markets and setting generation against generation, and socio-economic group against socio-economic group. As such, we are increasingly unchurching the churched.

In an age when the faith of young Christians is going to be tested more than ever before, they are the least equipped to meet those challenges because they have not been integrated very well into the life of the living church. They have been in children’s church, youth group, then in a campus ministry, and they never had to join a church. And we wonder why according to one study eighty percent of those raised in evangelical churches leave the church, they don’t join a church, they don’t even go to church by the time they are sophomores in college. Well, you have to ask the question: are they really leaving the church, did they ever belong to it?

I think Horton hits the nail on the head here. We have turned the church into a “shopping mall” he states in this same article. People of differing socio-economic classes, generations, and moral convictions can pick and choose between stores, I mean churches, that they want to shop at, I mean worship at. Ultimately the church is increasingly “unchurching the churched”.

Instead of in encouraging the children in the church to be apart of the body of Christ and to participate in the communion of the saints on Sunday mornings we send them off to youth group. This only perpetuates the divisions between ages, race and class in the church. Ultimately when these children grow up and go to college there is no desire to attend a church; they have only ever been with people of their own age. When they graduate college there is no longer and youth or college ministries for them and so they have to find a church of people their age and stage that they can connect with. When they find that this doesn’t exist they figure that they do not need the church because the only thing they have been taught from their childhood is that “the only thing that matters is your personal relation to Jesus”. This sounds great but it’s just not biblical.

The New Testament frequently speaks of the importance of the fellowship of the saints of all ages in the church, particularly in John’s letters. The church needs reform. It needs leadership that feeds the people the word of God, not people who choose leaders that sooth their itching ears.

Until next time,

Michael

A Free People’s Suicide

It has been a while since my last post and for those of you who frequent my blog (the undoubtedly few of you) I apologize for the lack of fresh content. However, that being said the 2012 presidential election has just finished and President Obama won re-election. It is in this political spirit that I write today.

I have just finished watching a lecture given by Os Guinness titled “A Free People’s Suicide”. I found his address insightful and extremely applicable to the place American’s find themselves in history today. The address was given earlier this year in New York and I will embed the video below my post with every hope that you will invest 40 minutes to watch it.

The topic that Os Guinness takes up in his address is the topic of “freedom” a word that everyone (both on the political right and left) claims to be fighting for. Guinness begins his address by quoting St. Augustine who once famously said that,

A nation can be judged by the loved things held in common.

In other words, if what a nation holds dear is nobel than you can assume that the nation is nobel. Augustine put forward that it is not the size or population of a nation that defined it but its “loved things held in common.” Guinness puts forward the idea that in the 230 so years that America has existed “freedom” has been America’s “loved thing held in common”. He states that freedom was what the founders not only set out to acquire for the nation but also to SUSTAIN for the nation.

Guinness showed that the framers of America had three main tasks:

1. Acquiring Freedom,
2. Ordering Freedom, &
3. Sustaining Freedom

The first two of their tasks were not unique to America. Other countries like France, Japan, & Russia had all acquired freedom. Furthermore, nations like France had also ordered freedom in a constitution like America. However, it is the third task of the framers that was unique to America, namely the framer’s concern with making freedom sustainable. The question the founders where always asking themselves was how they were doing in perpetuating freedom. The reason that the founders where always worried about sustaining freedom was because they saw that freedom has three main menaces.

1. Outside Force
2. A Corruption of Customs
3. Time

The framers did not concern themselves with the threat of an outside force taking their freedom because, particularly at that time, America had no real threat. However, the framers took real concern in how the second and third menace to freedom where affecting America.

When it comes to a Corruption of Customs the framers knew that a corruption to the traditions and virtues of the people would ultimately lead to a corruption of the constitution (if not in language, definitely in application). And time is the menace that the framers where most worried about. They understood that with each knew generation the ideals of American tradition and freedom must be understood afresh. Without ownership of freedom, freedom is lost.

The reason that these last two menaces (Corruption of customs and time) worried the framers so much is because they understood that freedom is a paradox. What Guinness goes on to show about the paradox of freedom is that the largest threat to freedom is freedom. What comes most naturally with freedom is a lack of restraint and it is exactly this lack of self-restraint that undermines freedom. Freedom is not the permission to do what you like but the power to do what you ought. When freedom is only understood by the idea that one can do whatever they want. then freedom immediately comes under threat of extinction. Personal responsibility is the greatest defense of freedom.

After showing the framers deep concern for making freedom sustainable Guinness goes on to present what he calls The Golden Triangle of Freedom. What makes The Golden Triangle of Freedom so intriguing is that it is self sustaining. The three legs or pegs of the triangle are:

1. Freedom Requires Virtue
2. Virtue Requires Faith
3. Faith Requires Freedom

You can immediately see that each peg is sustained and dependent on each other. There can be no freedom unless the people who obtain that freedom are under some sort of code of virtues or ethics. It is for this reason that the founders were so apologetic towards Christianity. This is in no means to say that they desired to found a Christian nation but that they knew that freedom could not be sustained without virtue. This leads into the second peg that virtue requires faith. The state cannot be the maker of virtue. The state must be accountable to a higher power that makes virtue. If there is nothing above the state advocating virtue then there is no inspiration for virtue and no consequence for lacking virtue. Lastly faith requires freedom. There must be freedom to publicly express one’s faith in order for virtues to be promoted in a society and thus freedom to be sustained.

Guinness points out that at all three of these pegs the nation of America has been in serious decline in the past 100-150 years. The idea that virtues should be paramount in our society and that faith should be allowed in the public square are ideas that the founders thought necessary for the sustainability of freedom but are seen as hinderances to progress by many cultural elites in our own day.

I strongly suggest that you check out this video. I think that it will challenge everyone who watches it in a very positive way regardless of your political affiliations.

Thanks for reading what I think was my longest post!

Michael

Like Spoiled Kids Who Don’t Get Their Way

American society has gone so far astray from is the idea of heartfelt, genuine, civilized disagreement that it is almost sickening.

Yes, I said “heartfelt disagreement”.

The idea that you can disagree with someone, even strongly disagree with someone and not be worried that you will be accused of hate speech.

One of the tell-tale signs of a society in decline is the existence of totalitarian control over the thoughts and speech of its people. Now, thankfully America society has not reached the point of obvious government involvement in this area, yet. However, culturally speaking one of the greatest “sins” a person can commit is “intolerance” or an unwillingness to embrace “diversity” on every level.

This “cultural sin” is so frowned upon that you might hear something like this in response:

OMG!!! You think Homosexuality is wrong!?!?!?! Your so F#%*&#% hateful!!!

I wish this statement was over kill but I’ve actually heard it. Talk about hypocritical. But at this point we should no longer be surprised at the abounding irony in the “diversity” movement. We should all now know that when dealing with the “diversity” crowd their are only two ways to go:

1. Agree with their limited idea of diversity; or
2. Be stoned for the crime of thinking that they actually believe in diversity and your differing views were okay.

When faced with opposition the diversity movement looks like a bunch spoiled kids who don’t get their way. They are told by their parents they can do whatever they want. However, when other people start to do whatever they want the response is always a temper tantrum.

What’s sad is when its a group of 20 somethings having the temper tantrum…

Until Next Time

Michael