Why Are You So Arrogant?

Posted on by metroupe

I came across this story in the book “Gratitude Works” by Robert Emmons. It is not a “christian” book but does contain a lot of helpful discussion on gratitude and entitlement.

From Hassidic Rabbi Rafael of Barshad (19th century Europe):

“When I get to heaven, they’ll ask me, why didn’t you learn more Torah? And I’ll tell them that I wasn’t bright enough. Then They’ll ask me why didn’t you do more kind deeds for others? And I’ll tell them that I was physically weak. Then they’ll ask me, why didn’t you give more to charity? And I’ll tell them that I didn’t have enough money for that. And then they’ll ask me: If you were so stupid, weak, and poor, why were you so arrogant? And for that, I won’t have an answer.”

This is one of the strangest things to me. We are so weak, so inadequate, so evil, and yet we insist of thinking so highly of ourselves.

The Longing of the Heart and the Search for Meaning

Posted on by metroupe

This admission from Aldous Huxely is refreshing in its honesty and also despicable. It is an admission of confirmation bias, not on some narrow question of scientific fact, but on the fundamental questions of reality. It is one of those statements that makes you chuckle for a moment until you realize how underhanded it is. Humans are not calculators that arrive at fixed conclusions based on data inputs. Cranmer said it this way: “What the heart loves, the will chooses, and the mind justifies.”

‘I had motive for not wanting the world to have a meaning; consequently assumed that it had none, and was able without any difficulty to find satisfying reasons for this assumption. The philosopher who finds no meaning in the world is not concerned exclusively with a problem in pure metaphysics, he is also concerned to prove that there is no valid reason why he personally should not do as he wants to do, or why his friends should not seize political power and govern in the way that they find most advantageous to themselves. … For myself, the philosophy of meaninglessness was essentially an instrument of liberation, sexual and political.’

The Covid Wars

Posted on by metroupe

I think Jay Bhattacharya has been a hero on the healthcare scene over the last few years. He has been as gracious as a man in his position could be, refusing to fall into ad hominem fallacies even when he has been savagely slandered. He has upheld the need for healthcare professionals to actually use scientific data when making decisions and been unapologetic about the damage caused by our response to covid. This article summarizes much of what I think is important on the healthcare side of things. There is a huge discussion of civil rights that is important and beyond this article. But we have the tragic advantage of knowing that most of the things that were done to violate our rights were also based on bad science.

The saddest and most alarming reality is that we have hordes of people in power that think our problem was not locking down hard enough. The zero covid faction is a cult that won’t let any facts get in the way of their devotion to the narrative.

Ethics- Pagan vs. Christian

Posted on by metroupe

This is one of the most thought provoking articles I have read in a while. It has that effect of putting into words, with citations, the things you were suspecting. The author is not a Christian, and I don’t even agree with the whole thing. Yet, it is still very important to read and reflect on this. This makes me want to read her book “The Case Against The Sexual Revolution.”

Here is a taste:

“There’s a very short and very brutal poem by the Scottish poet Hollie McNish, written in 2019 and titled “Conversation with an archaeologist”:

he said they’d found a brothel
on the dig he did last night
I asked him how they know
he sighed:
a pit of babies’ bones
a pit of newborn babies’ bones was how to spot a brothel

“It’s true, you know,” said the writer and lawyer Helen Dale when we had lunch in London last year and I mentioned this poem, which I chose as one of the epigraphs to my book The Case Against the Sexual Revolution.Helen was a classicist before she was a lawyer, and as a younger woman she had taken part in archaeological excavations of ancient Roman sites. “First you find the erotic statuary,” she went on, “and then you dig a bit more and you find the male infant skeletons.” Male, of course, because the males were of no use to the keepers of Roman brothels, whereas the female infants born to prostituted women were raised into prostitution themselves.”

The idea that all humans have value because of their humanity, regardless of their status or strength is rare in the history of the world, and it is distinctly Christian.

A Little Inspiration From Russian Literature

Posted on by metroupe

A couple of years ago I came across an interview with Gary Saul Morson on Thinking in Public. I loved it so much I looked for some of his other stuff. Just these few conversations have made me want to wade into the world of these Russian authors. Definitely worth your time.

The Abiding Truths of Russian Literature: A Conversation with Gary Saul Morson

‘Wonder Confronts Certainty’ — A Conversation with Professor Gary Saul Morson about the Deep Mysteries of Great Russian Literature

And this article is magnificent. It shows some of the roots of our polarized political landscape. Lenin was a man that thought and acted in absolute ways. If you agreed with him 99%, your 1% disagreement made him your enemy. Read more here: Lenin Think

Comfort When Your News Feed Is Full Of Chaos

Posted on by metroupe

Last year I purchased a devotional collection of the letters of John Newton from Banner of Truth. This book is a great introduction to one of Newton’s most valuable contributions to the church. And each selection is just one page. He has a heart warming, though rambling style and a powerful way of expressing the truth.

This morning I read the entry for February 26th and felt its relevance to our current moment. He had read a book of history and was explaining how it shows God’s purposes through both good and evil. His explanation practical to our own troubled times. The news is full of chaos and disaster. What can steady our hearts? God is at work in mysterious ways.

“I have lately read Robertson‘s history of Charles V, which, like most other histories, I consider as a comment upon those passages of scripture which teach us the depravity of man, the deceitfulness of the heart, the ruinous effects of sin, and the powerful, the secret, rule of divine providence, moving, directing, controlling the designs and actions of men, with an unerring hand, to the accomplishment of his own purposes, both of mercy and judgment.

“Without the clue and the light which the word of God affords, the history of mankind, of any, of every age, only presents to view a labyrinth and chaos; a detail of wickedness and misery to make us tremble; and a confused jumble of interfering incidents, as destitute of stability, connection, or order, as the clouds which fly over our heads… But with the scripture key, all this plane, all is instructive. Then I see, verily there is a God, who governs the earth, who pours contempt upon princes, takes the wise in their own craftiness, overrules the wrath and pride of man to bring his own designs to pass, and restrains all that is not necessary to that end; blasting the best concerted enterprise is at one time, by means apparently slight, and altogether unexpected, and another times producing the most important events from instruments and circumstances which are at first thought to feeble and trivial to deserve notice… What an empty phantom do the great men of the world pursue while they wage war with the peace of mankind, and butcher (in the course of their lives) perhaps hundreds of thousands, to maintain the shadow of authority over distant nations, whom they can reach with no other influence than that of oppression and devastation! 

“But though the effects of this principle of self are more extensive and calamitous in proportion as those who are governed by it are more elevated, the principal itself is deep-rooted in every heart, and is the spring of every action, till Grace infuses a new principal, and self, like Dagon, falls before the Lord of hosts.”

Miller, Ferrie. Jewels from John Newton. 1st ed., Banner of Truth, 1992. p. 403.

Prayer for a Pastor’s Day Off

Posted on by metroupe

It is well known that pastor’s often struggle to rest. That is not an excuse but a reality. Over the years I have tried to collect my thoughts and commit these struggles to God in prayer. I offer this here for your encouragement.

God thank you for all you have done. You have sustained me through the labor and trials of the last week. You have kept me for yourself and answered my prayers. Thank you for the blessing of being your adopted son in Christ. Help me to rejoice in this freedom! Thank you for the honor of serving you and your church.  Help me to recognize all of your work as I rest from my work.

God, you have called me to yourself and invited me to rest. You have also commanded me to rest each week. You have given examples of sabbath rest in scripture for your people and the land. You have warned me not to rest in false hopes.  Fulfill all of this in me. I cannot do it on my own. Help me to rest my body, mind and spirit today in all that you are.

God I give you all of my cares and anxieties. Would you carry them? I struggle with truly resting because I worry about your people, the health of the church, the sin and sickness of our community, financial concerns, the opinions of others.  I commit all of these to your safe keeping. 

Forgive me for all of the places that my anxiety is due to sin and unbelief. Lord, I am sorry that I struggle to trust your promises. I am sorry that I struggle with something as simple as a day off because my confidence in you is so weak. I believe, help my unbelief!

Help me to trust in YOU and not in the effectiveness of my own plans or efforts.  I want my work for you to stand, but I know that only your power can make anything last.   Today, would you do everything that needs to be done while I am at rest. Show me that it is your work and not mine that brings victory.

Let every anxiety today turn my heart back to you in prayer.  

Give me the blessing of self-forgetfulness. Help me not to obsess about my successes or failures. Help me to be lost in the blessings of Your goodness, Your word, my family, and hobbies. Help me to have a day off from work, but not from you.

Merciful father, through rest give me the strength I need to work hard for you. Let my body and mind be restored and fit for more usefulness.

Lord help this day to point me toward the eternal rest that is mine in Christ. Help me not to despair when my days off are interrupted or imperfect. Help me not to fret when I can’t sleep or find myself distracted. Let these trials raise hope in me of the perfect rest that waits.

Spiritual Disease, Spiritual Cures

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Commenting on Colossians 3:1-4, Hendriksen writes

“It was indicated that there is no material cure for a spiritual ill, that neglect of the body will never heal the soul’s sickness but will aggravate it, that heaven-born individuals cannot gain satisfaction from earth-born remedies. Christ, he alone, is the answer, Christ in all the fulness of his love and power”

 Hendriksen, William, and Simon J. Kistemaker. Exposition of Colossians and Philemon. Vol. 6. Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1953–2001. Print. New Testament Commentary.

The Abortion Lie Detector

Posted on by metroupe

What do you call a failed abortion? 

A child. 

And why wouldn’t we want to protect the lives of all children? Because if we had to provide medical care for these particular children, it would be a public acknowledgement that abortion is a deliberate act to take the life of innocent and helpless human beings.

Yesterday, All but 3 Democrats in the House of Representatives voted against a bill to require medical care for babies born alive after a failed abortion. This is horrific but not surprising because this has been the track record of pro-abortion politicians for years.

Several things are worth noting. This approach challenges the sincerity of the the way abortion is typically justified. Are we really serious in our conversations about “when life begins” or about the bodily rights of women as the foundation for abortion rights? In the case of an infant born alive after an abortion procedure, the child is no longer inside the body of the pregnant woman, thus there are no bodily rights. She is no longer “hooked up to the violinist.” Further, the baby is outside the womb, alive. Under what moral principal would anyone attempt to justify denying lifesaving measures to a living human infant? The woman is no longer pregnant, wasn’t that the goal?

The response to this law shows that we are currently protecting (and funding, and celebrating) the right, not simply to avoid pregnancy, or protect the rights of women. We are protecting the right to kill distinct living human beings. Even after they are viable. Even after they are outside the woman’s body. Even after our failed attempts to kill them.

What other conclusion can we come to? The only acceptable outcome of abortion is a dead child? And the fact that numerous children have survived after failed abortions is a mirror to show what we are trying to hide behind all of the casuistry and euphemisms. 

Suffering: If We Knew What God Knows

Posted on by metroupe
William Blake engraving on the book of Job

One of the interesting lessons from reading the accounts of Joseph (Genesis 37-50) and Job in scripture come from understanding our perspective vs theirs. We are being told the story in retrospect. As the reader we are given the view point of God in his omniscience. But neither of those characters understand what is going on during the long night of suffering. They are in the dark on their most distressing questions. How long will this last? Why is this happening to me? This is not what I expected, what is God doing? Where is God?

At the conclusion they will have answers to their questions, even if they are not the answers they wanted. But they will NOT have them in the middle. They will not know during the trial what we know as readers. One of the lessons for us is to apply this to our own circumstances. In the multiplied suffering of our perplexity, we may not know “Why.” But we may know and trust the God who does know why. And his purposes are gracious towards his children. We may trust the wisdom of the one that made all things. We may rest in the power of the one who directs all things. And we may trust the heart of the one who sent his son to die for us. 

There is an important and comforting statement that has helped me in the midst of suffering. I first heard it from Tim Keller, who may have heard it from someone else. “If we knew what God knows, we would choose what God chose. Every time. ” 

James 5:10-11 “As an example of suffering and patience, brothers, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. Behold, we consider those blessed who remained steadfast. You have heard of the steadfastness of Job, and you have seen the purpose of the Lord, how the Lord is compassionate and merciful.”