My Little Pony and Hot Wheels

In our household there are many sorts of devotion. I think that it's fair to say that my daughter Francesca has developed a devotion for My Little Pony, and my son Oscar has developed a devotion for Howheels. I provide photographic evidence for your consideration.

Magee and Politics

If you’ve been reading this rather inactive blog site, you’ll know that I’m rather keen on Bryan Magee’s ‘Confessions of a Philosopher’. Recently I found some comfort in rereading his reflections on his years as a Labour Party MP in the UK:

“At one and the same time they were richly educative years and disillusioning. Learning about everyday politics, and how to function effectively as part of it, was wholly to the good, but I was dismayed to discover how small a role ideas and ideals played in it all – and, to the extent that they did play a role, what shabby ideas and ideals they were, for the most part. Most political activity was actually a pursuit of self-interest in the light of situational logic. It was opportunistic in character; and in the Labour Party’s case originated with the material interests of the trade unions in particular, and after them the less well-off fifth or sixth of society. Most of the ideas articulated were rationalizations of this activity, and they went out not in advance as a beacon and guide, but after the event as justification. Most of these rationales were based on rudimentary notions of common humanity, justice and fairness, and when expressed by ordinary party members came out as a form of wet liberalism. That, at least, was the case with the majority. Alongside them was a substantial minority who were tougher in practice and more astringent in theory, and they were the dissident left. Their guiding light was Marxism, expressly so with many intellectuals, though more often making itself felt as an unarticulated influence on people who were not primarily intellectuals – and on their many organized groups who acted as apologists for the Communist regimes, and engaged in lying about them while savagely attacking anyone who told the truth. I found all this appalling.”

As I said, I found some comfort in rereading these words. I’m encouraged not to expect too much from our political leaders; and to I’m encouraged to pray for them.

The Lord's Reward

This Sunday I’m preaching on the Revelation reading (but I’m including the less pleasant verses also – so the whole of 22:12-21), and especially on the verse “See I am coming soon; my reward is with me, to repay according to everyone’s work”. What captured my eye in this reading when I first looked at it last Tuesday was the mention of reward. In the last few days I’ve been looking at different Scriptural passages that deal with reward, and at the Lutheran Confessions on merit.

The Scriptural passages I’ve been looking at are: Matthew 6:1-34; Luke 6:20-26; Romans 2:6-11;;Romans 13:8-14; Romans 14:12; 1 Corinthians 3:5-16; 2 Corinthians 9:6-7; Galatians 6:7-10; Ephesians 6:5-8 ; Ephesians 6:1-4.

What the confessions have to say is very interesting. Get a load of these quotes:

First, from the Athanasian Creed:

At his [the Lord Jesus’] coming all men shall rise with their own bodies and give an account of their own deeds. Those who have done good will enter eternal life, and those who have done evil will go into everlasting fire. This is the true Christian faith. Unless a man believe this firmly and faithfully, he cannot be saved. The Athanasian Creed

Then there’s this from the Small Catechism:

God threatens to punish all who transgress these [ten] commandments. We should therefore fear his wrath and not disobey these [ten] commandments. On the other hand, he promises grace and every blessing to all who keep them. We should therefore love him, trust in him, and cheerfully do what he has commanded. SC 22

And these quotes from the Apology to the Augsburg Confession:

After justification works merit bodily and spiritual rewards because they please God through faith. There will be distinctions in the glory of the saints. AC IV 355

We also concede, and have often declared, that though justification and eternal life belong to faith, still good works merit other rewards, both bodily and spiritual, in various degrees AC IV 366

And this from the Formula of Concord:

We believe, teach, and confess further that all men, but especially those who are regenerated and renewed by the Holy Spirit, are obligated to do good works. FC Ep. 8

And this condemnation from the Formula:

We also reject and condemn that teaching that faith and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit are not lost through malicious sin, but that the holy ones and the elect retain the Holy Spirit even though they fall into adultery and other sins and persist in them. FC Ep.19

The analogy that I’ve prepared to explain this teaching comes from the family, and it goes like this: It would be perverse for one of my children to think that they become my child by doing the things I reward. If one of my children thought and acted this way, it could destroy any chance of a good relationship between us. But it would also be perverse if one of my children thought that, since they are already my child, then it doesn’t matter how they behave. If one of my children thought and acted this way, it could also destroy any chance of a good relationship between us. The best possibility in my family would be for my children to trust that they really belong on the basis of their status as sons and daughters of the family, and that they would do things that please Margaret and me because we are their loving parents with authority over them to reward them or punish them. Well, so far the analogy.

I take the Scriptural testimony, and the Confessions, to say that we are children of God by God’s grace in Christ alone, and that as children we can behave in ways that merit the temporal and eternal rewards that God desires to give us

This also seems to the be the teaching of the Catholic Church – I just looked up their Catechism this (Saturday) morning, and found this:

2010 Since the initiative belongs to God in the order of grace, no one can merit the initial grace of forgiveness and justification, at the beginning of conversion. Moved by the Holy Spirit and by charity, we can then merit for ourselves and for others the graces needed for our sanctification, for the increase of grace and charity, and for the attainment of eternal life. Even temporal goods like health and friendship can be merited in accordance with God's wisdom. These graces and goods are the object of Christian prayer. Prayer attends to the grace we need for meritorious actions. (The italics are theirs, not mine)

So, there we have it. This is teaching that I have not given a lot of consideration to in my ministry so far, but which seem important and encouraging.

Three Kids

Here's a recent picture of the three kids.

Brown then Green

Without recourse to government-funded naked rain dancing, Bendigo has recently received some great rain. Check out these two pictures on how the land behind our church has changed in the last few weeks.

The Large Catechism

In preparation for this week's sermon I was reading through different passages in the Confessions, and came upon this from the Large Catechism:

All this, then, is the office and work of the Holy Spirit, to begin and daily to increase hoilness on earth through these two means, the Christian church and the forgiveness of sins. Then, when we pass from this life, he will instantly perfect our holiness and will eternally preserve us in it by means of the last tow parts of this article. (LC II, 59 -italics mine).

It's the second sentence here that interests me. On what passage(s) of Scripture, do you think, Luther's teaching of instant perfection in holiness is based?

Magee, Jesus, a Funeral, and the Resurrection

If you've read my musings on previous posts, then you'll know that I'm keen on a philosopher by the name of Bryan Magee, and that I think his book 'Confessions of a Philosopher' is a gem. As I was preparing for a funeral on Friday I found myself recalling some of the things Magee recounts in relation to his reading of the New Testament (and of the Gospels, it seems, in particular). After summing up his (perhaps rather idiosyncratic) interpretation of the Lord's teaching, he concludes:

[T]he fact that there was anyone at all going around preaching things like [Jesus preached] two thousand years ago in a desert area of the Middle East is, to say the least of it, surprising...[W]ithin the limitations of morality he goes as deep as anyone was to penetrate for the better part of two thousand years. When it comes to tellingness of moral insight, a question like 'What will a man gain by winning the whole world at the cost of his true self?' is unsurpassed. (pp 355-356).

Well, I hardly disagree. But what got me thinking was that this same Jesus, whose moral teaching is so striking that it has undeniable power for anyone who cares to listen to it, also said things like this:

In my Father's house there are many dwelling-places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? (John 14:3).

A great moral teacher who gives a personal promise of eternal life. He speaks with such authority when it comes to good and evil that I can't believe that he lies about heaven and hell. And yet this word of promise about the Father's house he gives privately, to his chosen disciples.

It makes me think about the mystery of the Resurrection of the Lord. His empty, open tomb was there for all to see. Accessible. Perplexing. Ambiguous in its meaning. But the Lord revealed his glorified body only to those whom he chose to be his witnesses; and he explained the meaning of his death and resurrection privately. And yet even his own hand-picked disciples, beholding his glorified body with their eyes, and hearing his words with the ears, could still doubt (Matthew 28:17).

The Resurrection seems almost as unbelievable as death.

The funeral I was taking was for a woman who had died in her mid fifties. She was a very active person who was evidently greatly loved by her family, friends, and workmates. Six weeks ago she was fine, but was quickly taken by very aggressive brain tumors (NB Nick Lindner, if you’re reading, Kate Drummond was this woman’s neurosurgeon). It was hard to believe that her body was in the coffin at the front of the church. Or that her body is now in a box six feet under in a cemetery at Spring Hill. Or that I will also die.

Lord Jesus, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.