I meant to post this last week but failed to in the midst of other things. Last Sunday Lee Tankersley, one of our pastors currently on sabbatical, was back with us and preached on Romans 8:18-30 in our ongoing series through Romans. Here you can read the text and find a link to the audio. It was an excellent sermon on a variety of levels. It is a good example or preaching pastorally. Sermons ought to expound a biblical text and be rooted in sound exegesis. However, exegesis is the engine and not the destination of the sermon. Some times in reaction against shallow preaching, people tend to think bare exegesis is the goal. Bare exegesis is better than nothing of course, but the goal is to explain what a text means so that people can follow and then to apply that well to a specific congregation. This sermon is a good example of this.
"Month of Man"
This past Monday night I spoke to a group of guys here at Union on the topic of manhood. Some students had organized “The Month of Man” (“official” website) for some humorous celebration of manhood and also to call on themselves and others seriously to pursue maturity in manhood. I applaud their efforts and was honored to speak at the event.
You can see the rough notes of my address here as well as a link to the audio. This is not a sermon, but more of a “sit down chat”. Somewhere I came across an author saying every young man needs an older man who regularly gets in his face about growing up and becoming a man. That is basically what I have tried to do here.
One of the real needs in the church is for us to encourage, help and challenge our young men to resist the culture’s call to perpetual immaturity and encourage them instead to pursue maturity.
ETS Annual Meeting
Guns for General Washington
This book tells the story of Henry Knox’s daring mission to cross 300 miles of forest bring 183 cannons from Fort Ticonderoga to George Washington’s army in Boston. This is a significant event in the early part of the Revolutionary War, a mission which many thought was impossible. This book tells the story from the perspective of Knox’s 19 year old brother Will.
This is one my boys (ages 11, 9 and 7) read on their own. They all said they learned more about Henry Knox and this mission. I was glad for this since Knox is often ignored even though he was one of Washington’s closest advisors and eventually served as the first Secretary of War. Nathan also mentioned that perseverance was highlighted often.
My two older boys both said the story was a bit slow though. Matthew said, “Don’t expect action-packed in spite of what it says on the front cover.” Jonathan, however, enjoyed the book more.
So, it was a worthwhile book for them to read. I think it simply did not live up to some of their favorites; and, even kids can be disappointed by overstated PR. 🙂
Amend ETS Article Online
I have commented here previously about the effort to amend the doctrinal basis of the Evangelical Theological Society. Following the “ETS” label at the bottom of this post will take you to the previous posts. Denny Burk and I have been working on this and have written an article to explain our concern, proposal and rationale. The ETS Annual Meeting will begin next week and our proposal is to be read to the members. The proposal would not be voted on until next year.
Below I have slightly reworded Denny’s announcement about this article being made available.
In order to get the word out about this amendment, Denny and I have written an article that was published this fall in the Criswell Theological Review. The title of the article is “Inerrancy Is Not Enough: A Proposal to Amend the Doctrinal Basis of The Evangelical Theological Society.” The editor of CTR has allowed us to post a free copy of the article on the journal’s website, and you can now download and read our rationale for the amendment. Even though the article relates most directly to voting members of the ETS, the issues we raise here are relevant to anyone who is concerned about the shape of contemporary American evangelicalism.
Denny Burk and Ray Van Neste, “Inerrancy Is Not Enough: A Proposal to Amend the Doctrinal Basis of The Evangelical Theological Society” Criswell Theological Review n.s. 5 (2007): 69-80.
[For more information, visit the website www.AmendETS.com.]
[For information on how to subscribe to CTR, visit www.CriswellJournal.com.]
The Sign of the Beaver
This is pretty good book set in the frontier of Maine in colonial America. The main character, 12 year old Matt, along with his father has gone out to their newly purchased land in Maine to build a house and plant their crops. Then the father leaves his son with the home and crops to retrieve the rest of the family. On his own the boy must work hard, deal with visitors and Indian encounters. When his father’s return is delayed he faces difficult choices regarding survival, friendship, loyalty and perseverance.
The key value of the book, in my opinion, is the portrayal of responsibility and perseverance. The story is adventurous in places but slow in other places. The value of books emerges in the story when an Indian chief wants Matt to teach his grandson to read. The value of good stories is particularly highlighted. The boy even realizes along the way that the best stories he has are Bible stories. However, there are also less positive takes on the faith in the book.
This book has won numerous awards, but I was not so overwhelmed. In the end, it is a worthwhile read though not a “favorite.” It provides a good portrayal of frontier life in this era.
Survey Article Online
The 2007 Bibles and Bible Reference Survey Article which I mentioned in the previous post is now available online here. Due to space I was not able to say a lot about each book, but I aim to give an overall feel for what has come out in the past year in each area and which books might be helpful in specific ways.
2007 Bibles and Bible Reference Survey Article
The latest issue of Preaching Magazine has just come out containing my article which surveys new study Bibles, commentaries and other books on Bible study that have come out since last Fall. The print magazine has a shorter version of the essay dealing with Bible commentaries, introductions, etc. Eventually the article will be made available online, and the online version will also include books on theology, church history and some other books which arrived too late to be included in the print edition.
Michael Duduit is the editor of Preaching Magazine and he does a good job with it. There is much helpful information in the magazine. If you get the print version I would welcome any feedback on the article. Once it goes online I will mention it here and will be interested in more feedback. I am slated to do the article again next year so I want to do what I can to make it as useful as possible to pastors.
Reformation Day 2007
It is Reformation Day once again! There is much to celebrate and remember on this day commemorating the recovery of the gospel. This year I want to highlight two related points that I don’t think are thought of enough in connection with the Reformation. They are: suffering and missions.
The Reformation had a missionary impulse from the beginning. As people understood the gospel for the first time they instinctively sought ways to take this gospel to their neighbors and other countries around them. As they went with the gospel, then, many of these individuals were killed for their allegiance to this gospel. Through the years many have criticized the Reformation for not being missionary enough because there were no mission “boards” and little was done outside of Europe. However, this criticism of people who gave their lives for the gospel by people who suffer little for the gospel rings hollow. Europe it self was a dangerous mission field in the 16th century, and Calvin did support the first mission endeavor to the Americas. I have written elsewhere on Calvin’s missionary concern and a recent significant book has detailed Luther’s concern for missions
At this time preaching the gospel of grace almost certainly brought persecution. So, I want to post here a hymn Luther wrote in response to the first martyrs for the evangelical cause. The background of the hymn is given by cyberhymnal:
On June 23, 1523, two young Augustinian monks, Heinrich Voes and Johann Esch, from Antwerp, had been, after examination by the Cologne Inquisitor, Jacob von Hogstraten, and at the instigation of the Louvain professors, condemned to death and burnt at the stake in Brussels. On receipt of the news of this first martyrdom for the Evangelical cause Luther’s spirit was fired, and he wrote this spirited narrative, ending with the prophetic words [translated by Richard Massie, 1854]:
Summer is even at our door,
The winter now hath vanished,
The tender flowerets spring once more,
And He, Who winter banished,
Will send a happy Summer.
Here is the hymn:
Flung to the heedless winds,
Or on the waters cast,
The martyrs’ ashes, watched,
Shall gathered be at last.
And from that scattered dust,
Around us and abroad,
Shall spring a plenteous seed,
Of witnesses for God.
The Father hath received,
Their latest living breath,
And vain is Satan’s boast,
Of victory in their death.
Still, still, though dead, they speak,
And, trumpet tongued, proclaim,
To many a wakening land,
The one availing Name.
[Words: Martin Luther, 1523 (Ein neues Lied wir heben an); translated from German to English by John A. Messenger.]
May we be so faithful with this glorious gospel.
Aging and Maturity
Yesterday I commented on an article by Carl Trueman which criticized infatuation with youth and appearance. Just this morning I read Dorothy Sayers essay “Strong Meat” in her book Creed or Chaos
“There is a popular school of thought (or, more strictly, of feeling) which violently resents the operation of Time upon the human spirit. It looks upon age as something between a crime and an insult. Its prophets have banished from their savage vocabulary all such words as adult, mature, experienced, venerable; they know only snarling and sneering epithets, like middle-aged, elderly, stuffy, senile, and decrepit. With these they flagellate that which they themselves are, or must shortly become, as if abuse were an incantation to exorcize the inexorable. Theirs is neither the thoughtless courage that “makes mouths at the invisible event” [Shakespeare] nor the reasoned courage that foresees the event and endures it; still less is it the ecstatic courage that embraces and subdues the event. It is the vicious and desperate fury of a trapped beast; and it is not a pretty sight.”
“From the relentless reality of age they seek escape into a fantasy of youth – their own or other people’s.”
“Now, children differ in many ways, but they have one thing in common. Peter Pan – if indeed he exists otherwise than in the nostalgic imagination of an adult – is a case for the pathologist. All normal children (however much we discourage them) look forward to growing up.”