2010-08-15

Citing Greg Beale, “Peace was to be the main mark of the expected new creation that was foreseen by the Old Testament prophets. Isaiah’s well-known prophecy of the new heavens and earth include the image of antagonistic animals of the old creation lying peacefully with one another (Is. 65:17-25; see also Is. 11:6-9). The point of Isaiah’s depiction is to underscore that the crown of creation, formerly alienated as Jews and Gentiles, will be at peace with one another (Is 11:9-12). In fact, Gentiles even will become Levitical priests (Is. 66:18-22; so also Is. 56:3-8).” Peace – the Main Mark of the New Creation

Pyro: Phil writes about Magalyn Murray O’Hair, an abrasive, unpleasant, woman, founder of American Atheists. Atheism is  a destructive belief that breeds immorality and wickedness, and it was her God. She was kidnapped (none of her atheist ‘friends’ reported her missing when she disappeared – they moved in and took her home), tortured for weeks, and murdered by a group of fellow atheists, employees at American Atheists, who were apparently displeased with a meanspirited article she wrote. Her son converted to Christianity. She liked to hire violent felons because of the sense of power it gave here – and they were simply acting out the logical ramifications of the amoral philosophy Mrs. O'Hair had always promoted. Her own godless culture destroyed her. The Fruit of Their Own Way

SolaPanel – Nicole Starling has a post on education and the ‘missional lifestyle’, where she discusses the opportunities education presents for being involved in the lives of others for their good and their salvation, and the idolatries lurking to destroy. There is a lot of good in education. As parents, education is one way to train children to have skills, understanding, and attitudes to serve God. She suggests this goal: “how can our decisions about schooling and the way we approach our kids' education help to equip them to live for God's glory, to serve their neighbours, and to live holy lives, in the world but not of the world, seeking the good of others, that they might be saved?” Education is also about relations in the present, and she cautions against keeping children in a bubble for the first eighteen years, as mere theory in making Christ known in a world they know nothing about is not the best way to train them.  ‘Missional Lifestyle’- Education

Hays has an interesting post here, from which I would draw the application that one must seriously consider the implications of the New Covenant and the inauguration of the kingdom of God in Christ Jesus when we are looking at matters and applications of the Law, even the Ten Commandments. He’s following up on a retort that he would be stoned by Moses, etc. for breaking the second commandment for say, pointing out that Jesus invites pictorial mental depictions of Himself Stoning Jesus

Hays notes Psalm 23, John 10, Luke 15. One of the prime ways God represents himself is as a shepherd. i) When Jesus calls himself a shepherd, it’s natural to mentally picture it. That’s part of the appeal of concrete metaphors, which Scripture uses to this end quite often. Should we consciously suppress our imagination, make a point of not picturing the shepherd and sheep and wolf and staff and green pastures? Only allow bare ideas to enter the mind? ii) Is there a principled difference between a mental image and an extramental image? Between an artists rendering of Jesus as a shepherd, and our mental image? iii) What makes this representational is not that it corresponds to Jesus’ appearance, but to his metaphor: it depicts a divine self-depiction. This isn’t idolatry. It’s not comparable to the Egyptian pantheon. Pagan idols are unlike God. They misrepresent God. An artists rendering of Jesus as sheep and shepherd is like Jesus because the metaphor is like Jesus; its a true likeness in that figurative role. The Good Shepherd

Hays continues debating an Christian-evolutionist-naturalist: i) the question is not whether Genesis operates at the same level of technicality as modern cosmology/geology/biology, but whether it makes factual claims that intersect with scientific claims. ii) It’s hardly speculation to say its reading into the narratives that God’s creation would come fully formed with bio/geological history. The ancients knew how long things took. They knew of seasons. They knew the length of ordinary processes. Therefore they knew the implication of the Genesis narrative. iii) Since the naturalist’s arguments are predicated on modern science, a philosophical rebuttal is appropriate. iv) To say that the creation of fish is disanalogous because it was ‘special’ and God wasn’t going to wait a billion years is to neglect that creation week is ‘special’ too. [why would God wait billions for the world to come about?] v) the traditional interpretation of Genesis predates modern biology. It’s not anachronistic to understand Genesis literally. vi) Something that normally takes months or years is attributed to the span of a day – that’s mature creation. vii) That God instantiated creation midcycle is certainly not more worrisome than no more worrisome than other hypothetical conundra, like the Cartesian demon, brain-in-vat, or Last Thursdayism. viii) The biblical account has narrative features.  Genesis says the creation week is real. Exodus says the exodus history is real. ix) theistic evolutionists don’t see the external world. They see a mental image. Coded information. One more for the road