Church Blog

Church Blog

The Two Souls

“Two souls, alas, are housed within my breast,
And each will wrestle for the mastery there.”

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust

 

It’s no secret that fallen man’s heart is a battlefield. The issues differ from combat zone to combat zone, but all of Adam’s damaged children know the pain of living with a civil war raging inside.  We yearn to be valiant, noble and gracious, but even in the midst of minor victories we know that the treacherous self within has not been finally vanquished. The drunk who remains sober today, knows that he will face the foe again tomorrow. Just when we congratulate ourselves upon finally having tamed our tongue, we find ourselves secretly delighting in “dainty morsels” of gossip which the “whisperer” is so eager to share (Prov 18:8). We yearn for greater Christlikeness but all too often the enemy within betrays us. And the enemy within has powerful friends, like the skilful advertisers who normalize perversion, the trashy filmmakers who glamorize corruption and the postmodern educators who wage war upon traditional values.

But there is good news. The good news is that although he is embattled, the Christian has the equipment to defy and defeat the enemy.  He can starve the foe by saturating his mind with scripture (Psa 119:105) rather than with the values of Hollywood. He can choose to dwell upon the things that are “pure” (Phil 4:8) rather than upon the soap opera values of a society which has forgotten God. He can choose to pray without ceasing (1 Thess 5:17) rather than to worship the cult of self which is the stock in trade of the pop psychologist. In short, the child of God can choose to defy the world and drain the enemy within of his power by putting on the full armour of God (Eph 6:11ff). God has supplied the armour – but we must resolve to put it on.

 

The Kindness and Severity of God – Part 1

The Kindness and Severity of God – Part 1 I often find myself thinking about or quietly singing the comforting words of the modern hymn In Christ Alone. Still, sadly, those beautiful words sometimes bring back the unpleasant memory of a recent and very public controversy. In 2013, the Presbyterian Church (USA) voted to exclude the hymn from its new hymnal because the composers refused to allow a change to the lyrics. The issue was this:  the second verse contains the…

Hollywood Strikes Again

Hollywood Strikes Again In his 1977 Oscar-winning movie Annie Hall, Woody Allen’s character quipped, “I’m a bigot, but it’s okay, because I’m a bigot for the left.”  This classic one-liner reminds us of the adage that many a true word is spoken in jest, and some 48 years later, as we look at this year’s nominations for the 97th Academy Awards, it’s abundantly clear that Allen’s wisecrack still reflects the views of the movers and shakers in Hollywood. Year after…

Destroying God’s Gift

Destroying God’s Gift According to God’s inspired spokesman, “children are a heritage (gift NASB NET) from the Lord,” His “reward” or favour to those who enjoy the blessing of parenthood (Psa 127:3). But throughout history, when the light of His word has been extinguished or dimmed, innocent, vulnerable infants have suffered terribly at the hands of those who should have cherished them. For example, according to Plutarch, under Spartan law, weak and deformed children were put to death (Life of…

A City With Walls

A City with Walls Cain should have responded with remorse and repentance when God rejected his sacrifice, but instead, he became angry and sulked (Gen 4:3-5). His reaction was foolish, and the Lord replied with this warning: “…if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door; and its desire is for you, but you must master it” (Gen 4:7b). The bad news is that Cain has a deadly enemy—sin, an ever-present predator that desires to dominate him.…

Waiting on God

Waiting on God Like many good men before him and after him, the 7th-century prophet Habakkuk was taught in a very dramatic way that God’s thoughts are not man’s thoughts and that His ways are not man’s ways (Isa 55:8). A prophet in Judah on the eve of the Babylonian captivity, this sensitive man opens his oracle with a complaint to God that the violence, iniquity, and lawlessness of his own people have seemingly gone unnoticed by the Lord (1:1-4).…

Endurance – Part 1

Endurance (Part 1) Pearls are made by marine oysters and freshwater mussels as a natural defence against an irritant, such as a parasite entering their shell or damage to their fragile body…The oyster or mussel slowly secretes layers of aragonite and conchiolin, materials that also make up its shell. This creates a material called nacre, also known as mother-of-pearl, which encases the irritant and protects the mollusc from it. Natural History Museum. (n.d.). How do oysters make pearls? from https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/quick-questions/how-do-oysters-make-pearls.html…

Sure, and Steadfast Hope

Sure and Steadfast Hope The doctor left his little dog in the hall and entered the bedroom of his terminally ill friend. All he could do now was to offer some comfort to the gaunt figure whom he loved as a brother in Christ. As the men spoke quietly to each other, they became aware of sounds from outside the room, and they realised that the doctor’s faithful four-legged friend was scratching at the door, trying to join his master.…

Nothing But The Truth

Nothing But the Truth In his Modern Man and his Categories of Thought, C S Lewis makes this perceptive observation: Man is becoming as narrowly ‘practical’ as the irrational animals. In lecturing to popular audiences, I have repeatedly found it almost impossible to make them understand that I recommended Christianity because I thought its affirmations to be objectively true. They are simply not interested in questions of truth or falsehood. They only want to know if it will be comforting,…

God Breathed – Part 4

God-Breathed Scripture –Part 4     Paul’s assertion that “All Scripture (graphē) is inspired by God” (2 Tim 3:16) follows his reminder to Timothy that he had known “the sacred writings” from “childhood” (2 Tim 3:15), so it is natural to understand graphē here as a reference to the Old Testament writings. Wesley reminds us that “These only were extant when Timothy was an infant”, and Wayne Grudem points out that graphē “occurs fifty-one times in the New Testament and…

God Breathed Part 3

God-Breathed Scripture  Part 3 Best known for his defense of scripture against higher criticism and liberal theology, Princeton professor B B Warfield (1851–1921) would have agreed that 2 Timothy 3:16 “constitutes a ringing declaration of the Divine authorship of Scripture” (Part 1). In an article entitled Inspiration (ISBE 1915), Warfield discusses the term theópneustos, a compound word made up of theos (God) and, according to most language specialists, pneo (to breathe, breathe out, blow). Warfield argues that ‘The Greek word does…

God Breathed Part 2

God-Breathed Scripture Part 2             One of the “well-known difficulties” presented by 2 Timothy 3:16 (Part 1) has to do with the position of the adjective usually translated as “inspired by God” (NASB) or similar. Evidently, it is “grammatically permissible” for this word to be in “the attributive position or the predicate position” (H. Wayne House ‘Biblical Inspiration in 2 Timothy 3:16,’ Bibliotheca Sacra Jan 1980). Thankfully House explains what he means. He tells us…