(I was talking with Bryan today, and the matter of blog attacks came up. He was wanting to write something to the list, and I volunteered to do it. So, you can blame him as the instigator, but I’ll take the blame for what I actually say.)

A couple of years ago, I was honored to meet Pastor Tim Bayly of Church of the Good Shepherd in Bloomington, Indiana. Just recently, on his blog, Pastor Bayly wrote as follows:

“Without question, there are husbands who refuse to take out the trash, clean up the kitchen, change the baby’s diapers, provide for their family, treat their wives with dignity, and die to their own desires for the sake of their wives and children. Without question these sins must be corrected and rebuked by faithful pastors and elders.

But also without question, this is not the most common problem in the evangelical and reformed church today. Speaking from many years of observation of our culture, as well as personal pastoral care, I say without hesitation that the breach in the wall needing our attention today with regard to marriage and family issues is not just chastity
in singleness and fidelity in marriage, but equally the connection between sexuality, authority, and submission; the authority of husbands over their wives and the submission of wives to their husbands…These are the biblical doctrines under attack today, and anyone with the slightest discernment can see that seminary professors, Titus 2 women, elders, and pastors who understand their calling will focus their efforts here. Church officers are soldiers, and the soldier is tested at the breach in the wall…Shepherds who
show zeal for opposing male chauvinism within the church, but lack any zeal for opposing egalitarian feminism and female rebellion, are culturally brain-dead, at best. At worst, they have decided to avoid standing in the gap precisely because the gap is the place faithful soldiers die.”

(http://timbayly.worldmagblog.com/timbayly/archives/028768.html)

For those of you who do not know, of late there have been a number of anonymous blog attacks launched against men like Doug Phillips of Vision Forum and R.C. Sproul, Jr. of the Highland Study Center. The circle is beginning to widen, including even one of our elders, James McDonald. These men are being defamed on the Internet, largely for holding and defending unpopular views on things like the Biblical structure of the family, God’s designs for the sexes, and things of this nature.

Now, I freely acknowledge that I do not agree with all of the positions and methods that these brothers of mine have employed in their teaching ministries. That’s fine; I’m sure that they would say the same of me, if they knew me. I also freely acknowledge that these men are sinners. That’s fine; I know that they acknowledge this, too. Nonetheless, I do believe that these men are “standing in the gap” on these vitally important issues of our day, and they are suffering as a result.

I’m not going to go into details of the various defamations that are going on. To be honest, it breaks my heart to see God’s people fighting amongst themselves like this. So, I will move on to my prayer requests.

First, I believe that we need to begin by repenting of our own harsh, foolish words. I’ve been a Reformed Christian all my life, and we are taught pride at a young age. How often have I been flippantly critical of another brother, simply because he wasn’t “Reformed” enough? God have mercy on me for my proud heart and unclean lips. Could it be that He has sent this scourge of bloggers as judgment for our own haughty words?

Second, I believe that we should pray for these men. It is better to light a candle than to curse the darkness, and I believe that this is what these men are doing. Their efforts are imperfect, but they are striving forward, seeking to do great things for Jesus. They need to be lifted up in prayer by us. Pray that they will receive encouragement and comfort in these hard times. Pray that they would repent of sin where appropriate but without yielding on what God has instructed. Pray that God would sanctify this trial to them, so that they would be even more effective in His service.

Third, I believe that we should pray against those who defame these men. It is one thing to seek to rebuke a brother in love. It is another thing entirely to abuse him in public, let alone defame with falsehoods. Our God defends us against those that verbally ambush us, firing their words from hiding. (Psalm 64). He knows what lies behind the pseudonyms and pious justifications that they give. Let us pray that our God will defend His servants and fight against their enemies, turning their own words against them, that they might be ashamed (Psalm 64:8).

Here’s another one of Murphy’s Laws of Combat applied to Christian life.

The only thing more accurate than incoming enemy fire is incoming friendly fire.

All I need to do is think of the ongoing furor in the blogosphere about pastors like R.C. Sproul, Jr., Mark Driscoll, Doug Wilson, or Doug Phillips to see how this one applies. The majority of opposition to these men and their ministries is from other Christians. It’s as if we have forgotten that the enemy is over there and that we’re supposed to be fighting them, not each other.

And, honestly, I don’t want to hear about “keeping these men accountable” or “rebuking in love”. That’s…well, that’s nonsense. Rebukes come from friends, and these bloggers are acting like these men are the enemy. Point the weapons at the real bad guys!

Or, as another one of Murphy’s Laws states:

Friendly fire–isn’t.

Last night (or rather, early this morning), around 12:30 a.m. or so, I heard a gunshot near my house. I didn’t hear any sirens or anything, though. Anyone out there know what happened?

There are two parts to my sense of humor. The first part is the Ben-Ezra side, which tends to revolve around obscure puns. So, for example, when my brother talked about being confused by sound baffles, he was using Ben-Ezra humor. The second part is Anderson humor, which tends to be a fairly bleak gallows humor. It must have something to do with being Norse. Or maybe it’s a coping mechanism. So, when my grandfather’s hearse got lost on the way to the cemetery, we all laughed because of Anderson humor. We all agreed that, had Grandpa Anderson still been alive, he would have thought that his body getting lost on the way to his grave was pretty stinking funny.

I’ve never been in the military, but I like their sense of humor. In particular, I’ve appreciated the folkloric “Murphy’s Laws of Combat” that can be found floating around the Internet. (Here’s one copy.) On Sunday, it occurred to me that many of these could apply to the Christian life. After all, if we believe that we are in a war, then maybe some of these apply, eh?

I’ll probably come back to this from time to time until I get bored.

Let’s start with these:

No combat ready unit has ever passed inspection.
No inspection ready unit has ever passed combat.

Recently, I posted a link to Peter Leithart’s discussion of theological rigor. This is probably the follow-up point.

To wit, it seems to me as though the majority of folk who are oh so hot and bothered about preserving the true faith or standing for Reformed theology are not folks who are in the trenches of the spiritual war that surrounds us. When you are in the ivory tower of a seminary or in the backwaters of some Truly Reformed church, it’s easy to put a priority on having all the theological ducks in a row. After all, you never know when you might have to pass a presbytery exam.

But, those who are in the trenches seem to be less concerned with such things. Rather, they tend to be thinking, “What do I say to that single mother who is running out of money?” or “How do I confront that overbearing father?” or “How can I comfort this couple after their child died of cancer?” When these people minister the Word, it’s not as pretty as the first group, with all the various tensions balanced and proper vocabulary employed.

But it is effective.

First there was this one. But now, in addition, there is his confessed love of Dungeons & Dragons:

Here.

Here (for real).

This is an otherwise content-free post.

Back on January 8, I took Crystal out for a date in Champaign. I had been planning on writing up a little report on our day, but then, suddenly, we were moving that weekend. So, I figured that I’d finally sit down and write this up.

The original reason for going to Champaign was to watch a movie that was not playing in Peoria. Thr3e is adapted from a novel by Ted Dekker, a Christian author that my wife really enjoys. So, when she found out about the movie, she really wanted to see it. So, I figured out a way to make it happen.

Of course, it seemed silly to drive all the way to another city and only watch a movie, so I did a little bit of research on things to do in Champaign. Along the way, I discovered that downtown Champaign actually has its own website. Nifty restaurants, little shops… This is exactly the kind of thing that Crystal and I enjoy doing together. So, I figured that we’d wander around downtown, explore a bit, and scout out the restaurants for dinner after the movie.

And that’s pretty much what we did. We spent a lot of time in the Jane Addams Book Shop, poking around in the 2 1/2 stories of used books. In particular, I was looking for Ross MacDonald and Raymond Chandler books, and I managed to pick up a few of them. Then, as we continued wandering around the downtown area, we actually came across a game store (Dragon’s Table) and comic store (G-Mart) that were sharing retail space. Oddly enough, we didn’t buy any games, but we did pick up some comics. They actually had issues of Fell available, which I’ve been trying to purchase. I suppose that this qualifies Crystal and I as geeks, but we’re okay with that.

Then we left the area to go watch our movie, which we enjoyed.

After the movie, we didn’t really feel like eating dinner yet. However, Crystal had scouted out a restaurant called Ko Fusion earlier in the day, and she really thought that I’d like it. Plus, it was $1 sushi night (which feels like an upscale version of $.25 wing night at other places). So we went. I’m glad we did. Sadly the website doesn’t have pictures of the restaurant, but I’ve found some others (here, here, here, and here). Those pictures are about a year old, but if you look on the fourth picture, we essentially sat in between those two pillars next to the fish tank. There’s a water fall behind the bar, also lit up with colored lights, and all the lights cycle through colors in sync. It was very cool. The service was quick and friendly, and I enjoyed the sushi, particularly because they had eel on the menu. Normally, I wouldn’t eat eel, but sushi is an exception, especially when it’s in a sushi roll with bacon. Mmm…bacon.

Ahem.

So, yeah, we really liked the restaurant.

Then we drove home to Peoria while discussing the design and graphical feel of my latest game project Dirty Secrets. There were several useful insights that came out of this discussion, including the centrality of race and social status as a part of the game.

When we arrived back in Peoria, we ate dinner at One World.

By the time that we arrived home, Crystal and I agreed that we were ready to be home. It had been a good day, restful and relaxing. Which was good, too, because insanity lurked around the corner. The next evening would be spent painting until 5:00 a.m. to try to prepare for a house purchase and move by Saturday.

God knew that we needed the break, and so He gave it to us.

‘Any idiot can face a crisis; it is this day-to-day living that wears you out.’–Anton Chekov

Today we threw a big party, celebrating God’s gift of a new house. All told, there were over 30 people who showed up to celebrate with us. I was particularly pleased that our new house handled all the traffic quite well. The children had a place to play, while the adults could sit and talk in several different rooms. There was enough food for everyone, and everyone went home happy. It was a good celebration.

And now I am tired.

“Do not bury our glorious orthodoxy in the treacherous pit of a spurious conservatism.”–Abraham Kuyper

Recently my family discussed the Nicene Creed during family devotions. Of necessity, this required a discussion of the Trinity. The Trinity is one of those funky doctrines that people have died to defend, but which few moderns could actually apply to “real life”. Often this doctrine is treated as a shibboleth to test for orthodoxy, but the practical outworkings of this doctrine are not known, let alone discussed.

Of late, though, this has been changing. Theologians like James Jordan, Peter Leithart, and Doug Wilson have begun to apply the practical outworkings of the doctrine of the Trinity to life, especially our corporate life together as believers. Let me explain how this works.

The doctrine of the Trinity states that there is only one God, but He is three distinct Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. These are not parts of God or roles that God plays or masks that God wears. They are really separate Persons, and they are really one God. As the Athanasian Creed states:

5. For there is one person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Spirit.
6. But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit is all one, the glory equal, the majesty coeternal.

Or, to quote the title of a friend’s blog, “Me and you and God makes…5“.

The important thing that I want to stress here is the equal ultimacy of the statements “God is one” and “God is three”. These are both equally true. This is how Christianity resolves the classic problem of the “one and the many“. We point at God and say, “Both are true. There’s nothing to resolve.”

The reality, though, is that we tend to undercut the truth that God is three. In practice, we are modalists, believing that God is “really” one, and that this Trinity thing is imposed somehow on God’s “true” essence.

This undermines our understanding of Christian unity. In John 17, Jesus prayed, “…that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.” (John 17:21). Our unity is the same as that of the Trinity. So, seeing how the Trinity is unified should help us understand our own unity in Christ.

And this is exactly what I explained to my children. God is one, and so we can be one, being of one mind, directed at one goal. At the same time, God is diverse, which means that we can be diverse without sacrificing our unity. The Father and the Son are one, yet the Son does His work, which is not the Father’s work. In the same way, I can be united to other believers without sacrificing my individuality. Indeed, my individuality strengthens our unity, because I provide strengths, talents, and perspectives that are unique to me, which can help in supporting the larger Christian community.

In particular, when I discussed this with my children, I talked about my family. I have a wife, five children, and a sister who lives with us. That’s a household of eight people, who are very different from each other. To give an extreme example, my daughter Arianna is very different from me. Take a look at my blog. I entitled it “A Dark and Quiet Room”, for crying out loud! And I write about stuff like this! If Arianna had a blog, she would call it, “Happy Pink Pretty Things!”. It would be pink, with flowers and waterfalls. She would write about happy, pretty things that sparkle in the sunshine. How Arianna came from my genes is beyond me.

However, because we are Trinitarians, we can cheerfully accept our differences. I can say to Arianna, “We are very different people but that doesn’t matter.” We can love and serve Jesus together, helping each other without my having to like pink and without her having to dress in black.

Which brings me to my real concern.

There’s a lot of concern about “family culture” in the circles I move in. People around me see the erosion of the family and are zealous to shore it up. And right so, I might add. The truth is that our individualism has shattered us, leaving us without family or heritage. I remember reading about a man who, upon getting married, combined his last name with his wife’s to create a new family name for their family. I thought, “What about your children? Where will they have their roots? You’re cutting your descendants off from their past.”

At the same time, in our zeal to recover the “Biblical family”, we have this nasty tendency to veer into other kinds of problems. If modern day individualism is too focused on the “many”, I wonder if conservative Christian family supporters are too focused on the “one”. I have this nagging suspicion that, in the pursuit of “family culture”, we have forgotten to allow our children to flourish as individuals. Instead, we want to require them to fit into the mold of our family culture, requiring that they accept our cultural ideals and preferences instead of being allowed to develop their own delights and preferences within the context of wise counsel and guidance.

Another Arianna example. As I intimated earlier, Arianna is the black sheep in our family. She likes pink and things that sparkle and flowers and bunnies and cute things. This is reflected in her musical taste. Arianna has fallen in love with classical music and acoustic guitar music, which means that she tends to look down her nose at things like David Crowder Band or Evanescence. Go figger. Now, should I be requiring her to settle into my cultural preferences, by forbidding her to listen to classical music? By no means. Instead, I try to encourage Arianna in these pursuits. There’s no room for being unkind to those in the family that actually like Evanescence (like her father, for instance), but at the same time, there’s no need for her to like the same things that I like, just to fit into my family’s “culture”.

Indeed, Arianna’s delights and preferences are part of our family’s culture.

Let me restate that, to be clear.

The family culture is the culture of the family, not the father. I’m not denying the role of the father in all this. He is responsible to raise his children in “the discipline and instruction of the Lord.” (Ephesians 6:4) Among other things, that means providing guidance to his children as they explore their world, directing them, encouraging them, pushing them as necessary, correcting them as required. However, the familial culture is the sum of all the members of the family, not merely the father. And, as such, this culture will evolve over time into something bigger and stranger and more wonderful than any one person could produce.

The Ephesians passage that I quoted earlier starts with this instruction. “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger.” I have heard stories of children from good, Christian, conservative, homeschooling families that grow up and eject as quickly as possible, fleeing the faith of their fathers. Or were they? Is it possible that they were simply fleeing their fathers, who were determined to force a uniform mold onto them? Could it be that, in our zeal to preserve our families, we are destroying our children? Are we provoking our children to anger?

In Christ, there is room for our differences. As we are united with and dwell in the Triune God, we have space to be the individual that God has made us to be. But, in doing so, we also become more the corporate union that God has made us to be as well. So, let us teach our children to embrace their individuality. Let us encourage them to pursue odd paths that diverge from our own. Let us rejoice in that which makes our children rejoice, even if it is alien to us. And, in all this, let us teach them that they also must pursue unity, strengthening the Body with these pursuits, and not merely themselves.

Doug Wilson quoting Jeremiah Burroughs:

“Men naturally are wanton in nothing more than in the things of religion; and corrupt spirits are bent upon and pleased with opposition in these things above any other” (Burroughs, Irenicum, p. 29).

I blinked when I read this, because something finally clicked into place. Religious wars are generally acknowledged to be the bloodiest and most destructive. Those pursued for political ends (even corrupt ones) tend to be fairly pragmatic. Realpolitik can be permitted to function, since the goal is equally pragmatic: increasing the power of the conqueror or stopping him. Religious wars are fought because of principle, and there can be no compromise, if some god has spoken.

I hadn’t really considered that this applies on a smaller scale, too…

We started reading the book of Esther last night for family devotions. Pulling this one together for the eight-and-under crowd should be quite interesting.

So, we bravely truck into Esther 1, where Queen Vashti is deposed and divorced for refusing to show up at King Xerxes’ drunken party. When someone asked why she refused to come, my daughter wondered out loud if Vashti was supposed to appear with insufficient clothing.

Oddly enough, she is probably not far from the truth. Jewish commentators suggest that she was supposed to appear naked (see Adam Clarke’s commentary on Esther 1:11). Even without this possibility, it would have been highly improper for her to come. Matthew Henry notes, ” It was against the custom of the Persians for the women to appear in public, and he [Xerxes] put a great hardship upon her when he did not court, but command her to do so uncouth a thing, and make her a show. If he had not been put out of the possession of himself by drinking to excess, he would not have done such a thing, but would have been angry at any one that should have mentioned it.”

So, now the king and his advisers need to decide what to do. One of them suggests that Vashti needs to be deposed. But, what are his reasons? “This very day the noble women of Persia and Media who have heard of the queen’s behavior will say the same to all the king’s officials, and there will be contempt and wrath in plenty….So when the decree made by the king is proclaimed throughout all his kingdom, for it is vast, all women will give honor to their husbands, high and low alike.” (Esther 1:18,20)

In other words, they need to protect family values. The king wants to turn his wife into a stripper (either literally or figuratively), and when she refuses, she is deposed to protect good old-fashioned family values.

That’s funny.

Last week our van started overheating. This is a bad thing. So we took our van to Terry Doyle Automotive Service. It ended up being an expensive job, but Doyle’s has a good reputation, and I figured that they weren’t going to rip me off. Given that the issue was Dexcool coagulating in the coolant system, I’m glad that we got it fixed. I winced when I wrote the check, but at least it was going to a reputable, honest mechanic.

Well, today we received a phone call from Doyles. Apparently they discovered that they had overbilled us by $60 and wanted us to come down and pick up a refund of that money. I was impressed. Honestly, mechanics don’t have a good reputation for being honest and upright in their dealings. But this…this was more than I would expect from most businesses. So, kudos to Doyles for their honesty. They’ve earned my trust, and that’s saying a lot.

So, if you’re needing to find someone to work on your car, go to Doyle’s. You may pay a bit more, but you will be getting excellent, honest service for the price.

The Seamless Coat of Christ

Doug Wilson quoting Jeremiah Burroughs on the peace and purity of the Church. Burroughs notes that, sometimes, calls for peace in the Church mask ulterior motives:

So men would not have Christ’s coat divided; they would have no division in the Church. What do they aim at? Their own advantage, that they might enjoy quietly their own ease, honor, and means; that they might have none to contradict them, but that the stream may run smoothly and wholly with them.

Or, as Babylon 5 put it: “[S]ometimes peace is another word for surrender.”

Some just have a prettier smile while they twist the knife.