Dad’s Thoughts...

Visiting David and Leah’s Church in Atlanta

Mon, 19 Jul 2010 19:54:23 +0800

Speak O Lord...

Speak, O Lord, as we come to You
To receive the food of Your Holy Word.
Take Your truth, plant it deep in us;
Shape and fashion us in Your likeness,
That the light of Christ might be seen today
In our acts of love and our deeds of faith.
Speak, O Lord, and fulfill in us
All Your purposes for Your glory.

Teach us, Lord, full obedience,
Holy reverence, true humility;
Test our thoughts and our attitudes
In the radiance of Your purity.
Cause our faith to rise; cause our eyes to see
Your majestic love and authority.
Words of pow'r that can never fail—
Let their truth prevail over unbelief.

Speak, O Lord, and renew our minds;
Help us grasp the heights of Your plans for us—
Truths unchanged from the dawn of time
That will echo down through eternity.
And by grace we'll stand on Your promises,
And by faith we'll walk as You walk with us.
Speak, O Lord, till Your church is built
And the earth is filled with Your glory.

Words and Music by Keith Getty & Stuart Townend
Copyright © 2005 Thankyou Music

5 Dangers of Computer Unreality

Thu, 15 Apr 2010 18:36:43 +0800

...
One can look into one’s own heart and see the weaknesses of the flesh and say to God: “I know that, left to myself, I will make a mess of my life. I do not presume to have the ability in myself to keep promises or vows that I make to you. I thank you for the biblical promise that you will put reverence in my heart to keep me from leaving you (Jeremiah 32:40), and that you will work in me what is pleasing in your sight (Hebrews 13:21). I believe that one small means you have ordained to keep me from sin is the making of vows. Please, show me when this would be fitting, and grant me the grace to do what I promise.”

Here are five computer dangers and five resolutions (or vows) that we all might do well to make.

1) The hook of constant curiosity
Personal computers offer a never-ending possibility for discovery. Even the basic environment of Windows can consume hours and days and weeks of curious punching and experimenting. Color schemes, layouts, screen-savers, short-cuts, icons, file-managing, calculators, clocks, calendars, etc. Then there are the endless software applications consuming weeks of your time as they lure you into their intricacies. All this is very deceptive, giving the illusion of power and effectiveness, but leaving you with a feeling of emptiness and nervousness at the end of the day. RESOLUTION: I will strictly limit my experimental time in the computer and devote myself more to the truth than to technique.
2) The empty world of virtual (un)reality
How sad to see brilliant, creative people pouring hours and days of their lives into creating cities and armies and adventures that have no connection with reality. We have one life to live. All our powers are given to us by the real God for the real world leading to a real heaven and real hell. RESOLUTION: I will spend my constructive, creative energy not in the unreality of “virtual reality” but in the reality of the real world.
3) "Personal" relations with PC
Like no other invention, the personal computer comes closest to being like a person. You can play games with it. There are programs that will dialogue with you about your personality. It will talk to you. It will always be there for you. It is smarter than your dog. The great danger here is that we really become comfortable with this manageable electronic “person,” and gradually drift away from the unpredictable, frustrating, sometimes painful dealings with human persons.
RESOLUTION: I will not replace the risk of personal relationships with impersonal electronic safety.
4) The risk of tryst
“Tryst \‘trist\ noun: An agreement (as between lovers) to meet." Sexual affairs begin in private time together, extended conversation, and the sharing of soul. It can now be done in the absolute seclusion of your private email screen name. It can be immediate and “live,” or delayed and “recorded.” You can think that “it’s just nothing”—until she shows up in town.
RESOLUTION: I will not cultivate a one-on-one relationship with a person of the opposite sex other than my spouse. If I am single I will not cultivate such a relationship with another person’s spouse.
5) PC Porn
More insidious that X-rated videos, we can now not only watch but join the perversity in the privacy of our own den. Interactive porn will allow you to “do it” or make them “do it” with your mouse. I have never seen it. Nor do I ever intend to. It kills the spirit. It drives God away. It depersonalizes women. It quenches prayer. It blanks out the Bible. It cheapens the soul. It destroys spiritual power. It defiles everything.
RESOLUTION: I will never open any program for sexual stimulation nor purchase or download anything pornographic.

Computers and the Internet and e-mail are remarkable gifts of god. Yes, they are threats to our schedules and hearts and families--as is the telephone and television and radio and a hundres handheld electronic games. All god’s gifts can be made idols and even weapons of rebellion against the Giver. But they need not be.
...

© Desiring God
By John Piper. © Desiring God. Website: desiringGod.org

Gratitude and Grace by Roger Scruton

Sun, 11 Apr 2010 08:27:13 +0800

Earlier I wrote about “Big Government/Small Citizen”.
I mentioned there the balance we need to keep
between helping people and calling people to be
responsible for themselves.

You can see both sides of the issue within 3 verses in Galatians chapter 6:

Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. If anyone thinks he is something when he is nothing, he deceives himself. Each one should test his own actions. Then he can take pride in himself, without comparing himself to somebody else, for each one should carry his own load. Galatians 6:2-5

Today, I came across an article that adds another idea to what that balance looks like and what happens when we rely on the government to meet people’s needs:
...
The proper response to a gift, even a gift of charity, is gratitude. People who feel gratitude also wish to express it. The easiest way is to give in one's turn. By giving you pass on and amplify the goodwill that you received. Thus it is that, in America, where the tradition of giving is very much alive, and the state has not yet extinguished the desire or the need for it, people give to their old school, to their university, to the hospital that cured them, to the local rescue service that saved them, and to the veterans who fought for them. They give without seeking or expecting recognition, but simply because gratitude is expressed through giving.

However, the state is taking over many of the functions that were previously performed by charities -- not least education, health care, and the relief of poverty. And the state deals on impersonal and equal terms with its citizens. It has no favorites, and it is governed by the rules -- anything else is received by the citizens as an injustice. Hence charity is replaced by justice as the ruling principle upon which social benefits are distributed. But while charity deals in gifts, justice deals in rights. And when you receive what is yours by right you don't feel grateful. Hence people who receive their education and health care from the state are less inclined to give to schools and hospitals in their turn -- something that is borne out vividly by the figures concerning charitable giving. The spirit of gratitude retreats from the social experience, and in countries like France and Germany, where civil society is penetrated at every level by the state, people give little or nothing to charity, and regard gifts with suspicion, as attempts to privatize what should be a matter of public and impartial concern.

When gifts are replaced by rights, so is gratitude replaced by claims. And claims breed resentment. Since you are queuing on equal terms with the competition, you will begin to think of the special conditions that entitle you to a greater, a speedier, or a more effective share. You will be always one step from the official complaint, the court action, the press interview, and the snarling reproach against Them, the ones who owed you this right and also withheld it. That is the way European society is going, and American society may one day follow it. Agape, the contagious gentleness between people, survives only where there is a habit of giving. Take away gift, and agape gives way to the attitude that Nietzsche called ressentiment, the vigilant envy of others, and the desire to take from them what I but not they have a right to.

Moreover, ingratitude grows in proportion to the benefits received. When those good things, like food, shelter, education, for which our ancestors had to struggle, are offered as rights, and without cost or effort, then they are "taken for granted," as the saying is, which means quite the opposite from "taken as gifts." In such conditions there arises what we might call a culture of ingratitude -- one that does not merely forget to give thanks, but regards thanks as somehow demeaning, a confession of weakness, a way of according to the other person an importance that he does not have. This thanklessness is growing around us today. It is written on the faces of pop idols and sports stars; it is announced in all kinds of ways by the media and by our political representatives. And it is one reason for the radical decline in public standards. Politicians are unlikely to behave as they should when they feel that they are acting on behalf of an entirely thankless public.
...

You can read the whole article if you are interested.

Can a government play “fair”?

Mon, 5 Apr 2010 19:27:43 +0800

I read a good article on the interaction of government and the free market. It starts off explaining what happens to a football game when the referees start changing the rules on the fly to keep things “fair”. Then to keep everything straight takes people from the teams to help as referees. If it looks like one team might be doing better the referees begin to help with tackles. The article concludes with the following:

...
By its very nature, government has access to power and resources which no private enterprise
can equal. It can’t work any other way. We can’t treat the military as a business enterprise,
to be shut down if it doesn’t rake in sufficient profits. We must have government resources to
address disasters, and most citizens would insist the government be provided with funds to
care for the desperately poor and sick. Those who enforce the law must have a measure of
power beyond the law: sky marshals carry guns onto airplanes, soldiers have access to heavy
weapons and high explosives, government auditors can demand access to information a
business would never share with its competition.

To be trusted with such power and resources, the State must practice strict adherence to a
basic set of laws which constrain its behavior, and which it cannot easily disregard or change.
The rulebook for the American game is her Constitution. Fidelity to those rules would produce
a small State with less influence to satisfy the appetite of hyper-competitive players who wish
to cheat at the game… or its own appetite for purchasing votes and imposing its ideas of
“fairness.” Disdain for the Constitution has led us to the present spectacle of referees who
outnumber the players, unemployed players sitting dejectedly on the sidelines, and a dwindling
number of investors willing to bet on a rigged game that will be decided by the whims of
the officials.

The idea of a large, and yet scrupulously honest State is fraudulent to its core. As the State
expands in size, it inevitably develops interests that lead to corruption. Its power becomes
so valuable that bribery is an everyday transaction, camouflaged in sanctimonious rhetoric.
Taking responsibility for errors and wrongdoing will always be less attractive than dipping
into the public treasury for a few billion greenbacks to paper over the damage. As industries
are first taxed, then regulated, and finally nationalized, the referees begin tackling players
and running touchdowns. The only honest government is small government, so if you’re
sincerely opposed to political corruption, that’s what you should insist on.

read the whole article at The Parable of the Referee

Comments and Quotes from Answering the Guy Questions

Sun, 4 Apr 2010 17:37:26 +0800

As I continue to look for teaching resources for equiping my students for relating to others including dating and one day marriage, I came across a book by Leslie Ludy called, Answering the Guy Questions. Though it is never stated in the book, I feel like she has the view that there is one person that God has picked for you to marry. There is no question that God knows if, when and who you will one day marry I think guys need to be challenged to “find a wife” and therefore girls need to be findable. The most important idea is that doing it right is more important than finding the “right” person.

I did think there were a number of good quotes and good ideas to help people “Do it right!”

TWO TYPES OF COUNTERFEIT MASCULINITY VS. THE REAL DEAL
“When you take the ‘manly stuff’ out of masculinity, as my friend Jeremy says, you are left with ‘weak men and unprotected women.’ ”

“On the other end of the spectrum are the aggressive, domineering, animalistic men who use their masculine strength to conquer women rather than protect them.”

“A WARRIOR-POET has made a sacred covenant with his holy King. He has chosen to deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Christ. He no longer lives to please his own selfish desires.”

“Women have an incredible power to shape the direction of masculinity. In fact, it is largely women who are responsible for the wimpy, weak, slothful version of manhood we see all around us today. When women became obsessed with pushing the feminist agenda, we pushed men behind the scenes and forced them to take a backseat to our methods and opinions. We made it socially deplorable for a man to take a strong leadership position or even try to be a gallant, heroic gentlemen. ... Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against women having equal rights with men or women being a strong influence in politics and the work force. But when women begin to dominate men, take over a society, and become so arrogant that we won’t allow men to be men, the result is the twisted mass of dysfunctional male and female dynamics we see all around us today.”

“You may not know his name, but every decision you make right now--big and small--in relation to the opposite sex will affect the purity and beauty of your future marriage. So what kind of physical interaction is appropriate with a guy? here’s a great test question to ask in every situation: If you were married and your husband was standing next to you, would he feel comfortable with your actions?”

“My dad once told us, ‘Anything physical that you save for marriage will only be more beautiful and fulfilling as time goes on. Anything that you experience beforehand will eventually lose its luster.’ ... Instead of asking the question ‘how far is too far?’ God challenged us to start asking a new question--‘how far can we possibly go to honor Him in this area of our lives.’ ”

The book had a lot of practical suggestions to real life situations that I didn’t quote here. All in all it is a book worth thinking through.