Tag Archives: church

January 17, 2012

Baptism Last Call

By Pooka

Cover for Item ReviewedContinuing from Sunday’s Baptism Retread, I want to demonstrate this from my own past and that of my kids. My oldest, was “baptized” into a pagan family. She was born to witches and dedicated in accordance with her family’s beliefs. No choice there.

Now we were more honest than Christians at the time as well. We, as parents, determined to raise our daughter with freedom to choose her beliefs by not explicitly indoctrinating her into witchcraft’s creeds or practices. Credo-baptist Christians do not do this with their own – they create a half-way dilemma for their kids in which the dedication and upbringing are Christian, but do not provide for inclusion in the covenant family of God. Essentially, this creates pagans being accepted into the family and church. Does the term Christian-in-name-only come to mind?

The world has the concept of baptism down perfectly. Children born outside the church, to non-Christian families are “baptized” into the religion of their fathers by full acceptance as just what they are; no “of age” requirements or professions of faith required at any point in order to become part of the family or culture or nation.

Once again, it seems most natural to me to think that the position of “believer’s baptism” as the only acceptable view of baptism is backward and unfaithful to the Scripture and God’s revealed system.

For additional reference:

I find that the arguments against paedobaptism are similar to the arguments against paedocommunion. I think that the analyses of PC are fitting where they do not similarly suit PB. Analyses of PB included in these references point toward validating the baptism of infants and young children. So far, it appears that PC isn’t for minor children because of the complexity, obligation and depth of the Lord’s Supper as opposed to baptism.

OPC paedocommunion – a great layout of the scriptural and historical grounds concerning paedocommunion.

PCA paedocommunion – a collection of position papers and statements on the issue.

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January 15, 2012

Baptism Retread

By Pooka

http://www.newlifelamesa.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/hero-baptism.jpg

I have a few more thoughts on infant baptism. Stuff I didn’t mention here in three big arguments for covenant baptism.

Primarily, I’d like to discuss this in a way that demonstrates how God’s system permeates even our “godless” society and traditions. Children are remarkably claimed by everything into which they are born, except for One Big Thing which mystifies me to no end. A year ago I was unsettled and unwilling to commit to the idea of infant, or covenant, baptism. It was foreign to me, and didn’t make much sense. I was more than willing to at least explore the idea, being more than aware that my Christian education was lacking in most areas, especially in the Reformed ideas of covenants and sacraments. So I read. And read and read. And then I wrote. And wrote.

Denial of infant baptism actually breaks a pattern that has been running for millenia. I’ll keep it really brief. Children have had no choice in things like birth-parents, family name, Christian name, nationality, race, religion or what’s-for-dinner for as long as children have been around. Why in the world do we come up with the idea that they are not members of the church? The church is not a business that only “hires” people of legal working age. The church has never been a club that “cards” prospective patrons to see if they’re old enough to enter. The church has ever been considered an outpost, a consulate or embassy of God’s kingdom in the world. Therefore, I think it should make sense to baptize infants with the understanding that essentially is corroborated by practices of historical and modern custom and legal matters. Here are some references.

Birth abroad … Citizenship … Family Law Basics

Now, to quell the suspicion that I’m using the World to interpret the Bible in a Christian issue that needs to be resolved, I must refer back to my previous posts and the Word in general to make the claim that there’s no argument here. The Scriptures assume, just as they assume covenants in general, that children born to believing parents (or covenant families) are considered participants in the covenants. Isaac did not have to wait to be the covenant child until Genesis 24. Jacob and Esau did not have to wait until they were “of age” to begin the battle of who would be the continuation of the Promise. The firstborn children of Israel had no say in their survival on the day of the passover when the Lord’s angel came into Egypt and started the holocaust.

In every case of children I can think of, none had to prove themselves or hit a certain age before they were anointed or circumcised or sprinkled. Children were partakers of the covenants of God as soon as they entered into the world. The fact that there was this mysterious baptism thing in the New Testament really doesn’t come to bear on the children:

  1. They didn’t need to be included in the revision of being called out: They inherited whatever was going to happen, regardless, because they were children.
  2. Baptism was simply a modal shift from circumcision, not an entirely new practice that completely wiped out all past meaning and practices from the times of the Patriarchs. In fact, Baptism wasn’t even an entirely new idea in the first place. What people apparently are all worked up over was nothing more than the most obvious and poignant means of “setting apart” or “cutting off” seen in circumcision. Baptism, sprinkling, anointing and other means of marking the one who belonged to the covenant all made it into the omnibus version of applying God’s promises in word and touch – baptism.
  3. They weren’t the main actors! Those in the New Testament were primarily conversant adults because they were required to interact with Jesus and His apostles on the level at which the Scriptures speak. And those adults were automatically responsible for those children.
  4. Jesus gave it to them, without mention of their age or eligibility: Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” (Matthew 19:14)

Finally, we who are believers in the doctrine of election, of God’s sovereignty, all should be convinced that it is God’s work and choice that we have become His children and that we were not really given the option to turn to Him for our salvation. He dragged us, kicking and screaming, from our place at the brink of hell into His courts where we may enjoy Him forever. What more could help us to understand that His children are as much in our place as we are? More so, for we were afar off, but our children, born into our Christian families and churches are not so far off, are they?

I hope that helps.

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January 1, 2012

Idols Of Marriage

By Pooka

There are a great many similarities between Christ and the church, our relationship to the Father and our relationship in marriage. It’s been said consistently that marriage is a shadow that greatly symbolizes Christ’s relationship to His bride, the Church. Ephesians 5 pretty much lays this out for us:

“Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior.Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for herto make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church—for we are members of his body. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church.However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.”

I’d like to trace this out a little bit differently. As Christians, our sinful nature separates us from our Lord in our own lives over and over again. It must be understood, and remembered, that it is our God who steps into our lives and interacts with us, brings us into communion and community with Him and our fellow saints. All our good actions, thoughts and words are results of His intervention in our lives, specifically through His Spirit who dwells within us.

Outside of Christ, all good is vanity, merely a superficial sugar coating on what is ultimately twisted and evil, so appearances deceive. We must not base our lives and qualities on that which the World puts on display as right or righteous. So I’m talking most to Christians here, from what I believe should be the proper Christian perspective.

As Husband and Wife, there are idols which replace our proper relationship to each other. They may seem right, or even be essentially indistinguishable from our marital relationship. But as we have our perpetual idol factories going on all our days, separating us from our Lord’s good will and commands, those same sorts of idols do double duty to divorce us from our marriages. I perceive most of these because they are little shadows and great chasms in my own family, but some are based on what I’ve observed outside as well.

What they are, specifically, I would think becomes obvious, as soon as we think of our barriers to proper marital relationships as idol-like things. Obsession with work (in order to provide, of course), obsession with the kids (replacing that of husband or wife), preservation of the house or living status or any number of other material things. All sorts of little and big things we may believe are part of our familial duties become more important to us than the family itself. Even the devotion of a husband to his wife can be compromised by just the secret little place of spite that is hidden away but resides in every thing he does for her. Hypocritical commitment is not commitment at all, but is a living, breathing divorce that endures over time, seeping bitterness and alienation into what is God’s greatest (and first) establishment of human interrelation.

We create idols for our marriage just for the same reasons that we do so in place of God. Because we only want to trust what we control, what we can manipulate. Or worse, what we think we can understand and develop. Yes, she isn’t easy to figure out or he isn’t easy to live with. No, she isn’t what you originally bargained for (bargained? What? I think that’s pretty shoddy, considering all good things come from the Lord and He is the one who designed her and presented her to you in the first place). No, he isn’t obsessed with you like he was in the beginning.None of these things holds water to what God designed in marriage and none of the substitutes make up in any way.

Here is the answer. It’s probably disappointing to read, but it’s all I’ve been able to figure out in 15 years of marriage. Christ. The directions we have for our relationship to Christ are our directions for doing right by our spouse. I mean that literally: If we are to love our wives as Christ loved the church and we are to submit to our husbands as the church submits to Christ, then lets do that first. Look for devotion to Him and devotion to spouse should follow suit.

The church, being the Bride, should as a whole be alert to this equation and seek to build it in the marriages that comprise her membership. Members of the Body of Christ should be able to come to their church for support and leadership in marriage trials. But all of this depends on the whole being devoted to Christ, His Word and sacraments. Without the elements of the Faith, ain’t nonna this going to go much farther. All else that has developed in and outside the Christian religion is but works without belief and trust in the Savior. Counseling, tips, guidebooks, philosophy, 12-steps, all of these are works. The sacrifice, devotion, empathy, sympathy, emotion and everything else that comprise the sweetness of marriage are only real if they develop out of a commitment to the Lord and because we believe and love Him first. He makes it work, not us. The mystery, of course is that God makes the trials and efforts we endure and enact build our relationships. Ponder that, but depend on Him.

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November 23, 2011

Where we go, will you go?

By Pooka

Where you go, I will go...

Here is what Ruth said to Naomi:

“Do not urge me to leave you or turn back from following you; for where you go, I will go, and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. Thus may the LORD do to me, and worse, if anything but death parts you and me.”

Here is R.C. Sproul’s note on Ruth:

The Hebrew for clung in Ruth 1:14 is the same word used to describe the marriage relationship. In other words, Ruth clung to her mother-in-law in covenant fidelity, knowing that she was bound by her promise before the face of God to remain with and aid her mother-in-law, no matter how difficult it would be. This is the same devotion we are to have to the Lord’s people today. No matter our flaws, we Christians must love and serve one another.

And Matthew Henry’s Commentary:

Nothing could be said more fine, more brave, than this. She seems to have had another spirit, and another speech, now that her sister had gone, and it is an instance of the grace of God inclining the soul to the resolute choice of the better part. Draw me thus, and we will run after thee. Her mother’s dissuasions made her the more resolute; as when Joshua said to the people, “You cannot serve the Lord,” they said it with the more vehemence, “Nay, but we will.”

We might say today that no one can commit to such a thing as Ruth did without some move of the Spirit. This is an amazing speech from someone like Ruth, amazing and weighted with intensity. She’s entering into the covenant here. And we can’t think she doesn’t know what she’s saying, either. There is plenty of evidence that God’s covenantal structure was present in ancient non-Jewish traditions as well. This fine lady is dropping everything to align herself with Israel.

These are the membership vows we took upon joining our church. I’ve edited so they are personal and line up. The reference is the PCA Book of Church Order, Chapter 57.

I acknowledge myself to be a sinner in the sight of God, justly deserving His displeasure, and without hope save in His sovereign mercy. I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ as the Son of God, and Savior of sinners, and I receive and rest upon Him alone for salvation as He is offered in the Gospel? I now resolve and promise, in humble reliance upon the grace of the Holy Spirit, that I will endeavor to live as becomes the followers of Christ. I promise to support the Church in its worship and work to the best of my ability. I submit myself to the government and discipline of the Church, and promise to study its purity and peace.

I wonder that Ruth 1:16 isn’t commonly considered in the basic introduction for new believers. I certainly never encountered it. I don’t think it was covered much in the years I was in the church as a kid, either. I think this is something to plumb out in discussion with those who frequently reach out in evangelism. When we follow-up with folks, should we not use such clear examples of covenant-making? I must admit, a die-hard Arminian can see the value in Ruth’s declaration here.

Someone could say that Ruth didn’t know what she was getting into here, and was just being expedient about the whole cleaving to Naomi. Ruth just needed something to hang on to, right? I doubt it was that easy, though certainly some pragmatism should be understood. Ruth wouldn’t have a naive approach to what she committed to, considering it was a Jewish family into which she’d married and a Jewish woman with whom she was returning to Israel. Though Alimelech had taken his family out from Israel, I highly doubt he could have conceived of taking Israel out of his family. The traditions and practices would’ve remained, and from first meeting to final words in that relationship, Ruth and Orpah would have been exposed to the richness of the Israelites’ relationship to God. No doubts she had the best introduction to what she was getting into well before she committed herself to Ruth and the One True God on the roadside.

I wonder that our churches do not query us in the way that Ruth volunteered herself. I wonder if there’s anyone today who has been asked,

“Where we go, will you go? Where we lodge, will you lodge? Will our people be your people, and our God, your God? Where we die, will you die, and there be buried? Shall thus the LORD do to us, and worse, if anything but death parts you and us?”

It sounds a bit harsh for these modern days, doesn’t it?

So there’s another version:

1. Do you acknowledge yourselves to be sinners in the sight of God, justly deserving His displeasure, and without hope save in His sovereign mercy?

2. Do you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ as the Son of God, and Savior of sinners, and do you receive and rest upon Him alone for salvation as He is offered in the Gospel?

3. Do you now resolve and promise, in humble reliance upon the grace of the Holy Spirit, that you will endeavor to live as becomes the followers of Christ?

4. Do you promise to support the Church in its worship and work to the best of your ability?

5. Do you submit yourselves to the government and discipline of the Church, and promise to study its purity and peace?

Updated for modern parlance and conversant with the realized covenant of Grace, of course, but isn’t it quite similar? The God of Israel instituted the church; and it is Christ’s body, sustained by Him, founded on Him, with all members finding their place in Him. We can all agree on that, it being well-developed throughout the New Testament.

So I find that this pair of vows, in Ruth and in the church are important enough to make me wonder what in the world could possibly be right about a church that refuses to require this of her members? Shouldn’t that be cause for deep concern? That one who hasn’t committed to the people of God, to Israel, to Christ is seen as an accepted, acceptable part of the Body? Good Lord! What standard is there for communion if not this? It would be like the President just walking in after elections and taking over the Oval Office without first standing in front of the nation and taking the Oath of Office! Only worse! God’s people are in office for far more than 4 years in a country far larger than one nation. We’re eternally bound to God and His country! And in our commitment, do we not absolutely have to have a door into that commitment? Dare I say a public one?

I didn’t have a problem taking the vows of membership at New Life. Now, after a year here, having learned much more about what Reformed, Confessional, Creedal and Covenantal really mean, I would retake those vows in a heartbeat, and say them again with far more gravity than the first time. I realize that we have a situation very analogous to Ruth’s covenant promise when we come to Christ’s church. I don’t see how a church could survive otherwise, for without these covenant oaths, there isn’t even a door-keeper. Ruth understood that, and said the password – and I don’t for a minute assume she didn’t intend to make this in front of God as much as Naomi and then expect to have to maintain the same before the Israel she was about to encounter.

Sheesh. The severity of these oaths, the commitment God has delivered to us, in light of the salvation He has made for us, all should take our breath away. If the continuity of God’s covenants and the Biblical consistency of our own promises which we make in return isn’t obvious by now, where can we go? I guess the test really is, at some point, to look carefully and see if we can honestly say, along with Ruth,

“where you go, I will go, and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. Thus may the LORD do to me, and worse, if anything but death parts you and me.”

If that can happen, then we’ve at least the satisfaction of the keepers of the keys to Heaven.

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November 21, 2011

People Are Designed Covenantally

By Pooka

The following quotes are definitions of covenant and come from a .PDF created by Grace Community Churc in PA.

Meredith Kline (1922‐2007)

…a berith (Hebrew word for covenant) is a legal kind of arrangement, a formal disposition of a binding nature. At the heart of a berith is an act of commitment and the customary oath‐form of this commitment reveals the religious nature of the transaction. The berith arrangement is no mere secular contract but rather belongs to the sacred sphere of divine witness and enforcement. The kind of legal disposition called berith consists then in a divinely sanctioned commitment. In the case of divine‐human covenants the divine sanctioning is entailed in God’s participation either as the one who himself makes the commitment or as the divine witness of the human commitment made in his name and presence.

J. Ligon Duncan

Now, berith in the Old Testament signifies a binding, mutual relationship with mutual obligations, a binding mutual relationship with attendant obligations.

Michael Horton

So what exactly is a covenant? Anticipating the definition in the next chapter, we can start by saying that from the most commonly used Hebrew word for this concept (bent), a covenant is a relationship of “oaths and bonds” and involves mutual, though not necessarily equal, commitments. As we will see shortly, some biblical covenants are unilaterally imposed commands and promises; others are entered into jointly. Some are conditional and others are unconditional. In other words, under the overarching concept of oaths and bonds we encounter a substantial variety of covenants in Scripture.

Something that I wonder at is how covenants are insanely far reaching. I think that this idea stems from God’s eternal perspective and, though we are “in time” where He is “outside time”, there is a reflection of our Lord’s span of attention. God steps in and does things that are temporal, of course, but we look at the first recorded covenant and see that it is one that comes before creation.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will,

This is the classic predestination verse, right? It’s covenantal language. There’s a word study on this that I think is fitting: Ephesians 1:4 and that leads to another verse, 1st Corinthians 15:22 which talks about another covenantal impact (Adam’s federal headship).

When God declares or sets a covenant, it’s not a short-deal. It lasts. The first one He made with Adam is still killing us today. The second one, about the snake and the heel? Took us right to Christ.  The promise for Noah – still on: no water apocalypse. Moses? Law still here, though in Christ we’re freed from it. Redemption – always been in God’s agenda and as soon as it was served to us in Christ, became permanent backwards and forwards.

I’m just thinking about how we, as God’s creation, were first introduced to relationships by lasting relationships, or covenant agreements. And when we tried to sidestep or violate the covenants, retribution was swift and disastrous. But the covenants were there and in force, irrevocable and lasting.

Just because men were dispersed after the garden, Babel and then reset at the flood doesn’t seem to have eradicated the existence of God’s covenants. They, we might say, are in the blood. People are designed covenantally. The effects of the fall is that we become covenant breakers.

There is no point in history where we are found free of God’s promises, threats, commitments or agreements. What is happening, though, is that we’re getting worse about the whole thing. Our sin nature is denying God’s framework more and more fanatically which brings us to today where we’ve tried to delete the concepts entirely.

I don’t know how useful this line of thought really is. It doesn’t give me much to work with. Now, it’s helped me greatly in getting what I think is an improved understanding of our weekly Covenant Renewal, which is Sunday worship. It’s helped me understand baptism and the Lord’s Table better. It’s definitely built a bit more sense of responsibility and dedication to my family. But so far as “doing something” I’m not sure there actually is something to do. Perhaps this increased understanding is a thinking-changer rather than an imperative generator.

Maybe comprehending God’s covenant system is likened to the Gospel? The Gospel is a proclamation, not a to-do list. Understanding covenants is not the same as making covenants. I’m sure that, should I encounter another relationship commencement in my lifetime, I’ll look upon it differently, but I don’t think I’m going to be taking action in my local church to affect some system of covenant-making gunk. Besides, whatever I do, as a natural covenant-breaker, isn’t going to pan out much anyhow.

It looks like, just as God created our relationships, He also sustains them and there ain’t much we can do about either. All we’re doing, as I see it, is hitching along for the ride. Elbow grease is always in response to something God has done, not to get God to do something. And He supplies the motive power for the response, too, right?

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November 17, 2011

Let’s Presuppose A Few Things

By Pooka

Courthouse

Part 3. The first two in this line of thoughts on covenants, community and our relationships are here: Anti-Covenant and Individualism  and I Might Just Need To Be A We

At first, this may appear to be more of a formal apology for Covenant Theology, but bear with me. Also, I’m quite sure this has all been said before, so I can’t claim any originality here. That’s safer anyway since any time we deny the last 2,000 years of church history, we’re claiming that our current religion is the only one that is Christian throughout all history. Scary thought, eh? And what I’m about to discuss reaches back just a bit farther than Tertullian or Irenaeus or even Pentecost. Maybe a few thousand years past that. This is long, but I hope it has good returns. And I hope I’ve portrayed this accurately and understandably.

This doctrine of covenants is not pure theology. It’s not a tight, air-less doctrine that we can take or leave and not be deeply affected by the ramifications of the choice. It is hugely important. Once the barrier of modern presupposition is torn down, the other conflicts will start to resolve themselves fairly easily. That’s my own experience, at least.

Let me make the claim about this presupposition thing. There’s all sorts of discussion about presuppositional hermeneutics and theology. And it is absolutely correct to presuppose there are presuppositions required in the study of the Word. Which presupposition, or assumption if you will, is correct is vital, of course. And here’s the basic premise: The Bible is not speaking in the context of the 21st Century, modernity, the Reformation or even back in the days of Augustine. The Bible’s context is the Biblical eras. Get that and you’re on your way to 1st base.

Next, the Bible itself is filled with assumptions. Do you know the importance of Boaz heading out to the city gate when he’s checking on the status of Ruth’s availability? The Bible doesn’t add a footnote or aside comment to plumb the depths of this significant event. It assumes the reader knows what’s going on. The history and cultural importance of what’s going on at the city gate amongst the elders of the community is far more than what some consider just a civil affairs court setting.  Lot’s story was another one with that gate thing going on. But let’s put all that in the back of our minds. We’ve got to go deeper to make better sense of this.

The Bible assumes Covenant Theology. Really. No joke. It assumes the stuff I’ve been writing about in the last few days. We’ve heard all the debate over baptism, the Lord’s Table and Israel’s future so many times. There are conflicts that are so persistent they’ve lasted hundreds of years. I think they’re more heated today than ever. And it’s because, primarily, we have lost the sense of community and covenantal relationships that are assumed in the Bible.

Look at this language:

The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off–for all whom the Lord our God will call.

When she and the members of her household were baptized, she invited us to her home. “If you consider me a believer in the Lord,” she said, “come and stay at my house.” And she persuaded us.

And then look at this list: And Your Children and Household

Everybody wonders or fights over these sorts of passages. The Covenant guys extrapolate a connection to things like baptism of infants and the Baptist guys extrapolate the non-existence of infants. All sorts of ideas come up to try to explain this. Sometimes, I wonder if some of the Covenant guys are just as disrespectful of the text as the Baptists when trying to explain their position through use of household and your children. Does the Bible explain what is meant by these sorts of terms? No, not any more than with the gate-court thing in Ruth or Genesis.

Here’s why it’s confusing in the New Testament: When these terms are used, they’re repetition of Old Testament Language. And no, that’s not to “bring” the Old Testament way of thinking back to these Jews of the first century. It was to remind them of the significance of events past that correlate to current events. In all that was changing around in the New Covenant, there was going to be some conflict. Pharisaical law, gentile inclusion, realized forgiveness and justification, missionary trips, diaspora – all these things were new and scary and confusing. People needed to, get this, hear that everything hadn’t just stopped or fundamentally altered!

Peter and his fellow apostles were using this language because the Jews understood it. This means that we cannot presuppose our own 21st century opinion, which is grounded not in the Scriptures but in modern, pagan, non-covenantal thinking. We must look at this language as the Jews did. That’s why we don’t get an explanation in the Bible about what gate-courts, households and your children mean. And that’s why we don’t get a greater development of what the Table and Baptism mean right out of the text. It’s in there, absolutely, but in a, wait for it… presupposition.

I’ll say it again. This is all so hard because we aren’t looking in the right place. The Bible started out its narrative in the context of covenants – relational, promise-keeping, life-sharing, trust-bearing covenants. We are the ones who have changed over the millennia, not the Bible and not at the triumphant entry of Jesus Christ whose birthday celebration we are fast approaching. We have lost the perspective the Jews had.

I’m not calling for a return to Judaism or tossing our technology so we can wear robes to tear each time we’re cut to the heart. I’m not interested in raking dust for a few measly rows of fava beans and wheat sheaves. I like my Pollo Loco too much and I’d much rather have easy access to the last 2,000 years of theology right here on my infernal machines. I’m calling for us to look at Scripture in the historical, cultural frame in which it’s set. No helicopters in Revelation. No civil affairs court for the young moabitess. No ditching of infants until they’re old enough to say they believe.

Side comment: Refusing baptism of our kids is telling them that they are no different from the other kids across the block (the ones who have Wiccan parents right over there). We’re destroying their identity in a Christian family! No sacraments = no sense of being in the family of God.

A few weeks ago, I put up a little bit about how painful it must have been to be one of the convicted Pharisees at Peters Big Sermon at Pentecost (I should rename the post “Cut To The Heart Thrice“). Think about this:

When Pilate saw that he was getting nowhere, but that instead an uproar was starting, he took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd. “I am innocent of this man’s blood,” he said. “It is your responsibility!”

All the people answered, “Let his blood be on us and on our children!”

Those Pharisees were almost certainly thinking of what they had done to their families! When Peter said this (emphasis mine):

“Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.”

We know what happened:

When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?”

Now look again at Peter’s response:

Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call.”

That’s reaching all the way back to things like:

They will not toil in vain or bear children doomed to misfortune; for they will be a people blessed by the LORD, they and their descendants with them.

The OT said this in Deuteronomy 12:

Be careful to obey all these regulations I am giving you, so that it may always go well with you and your children after you, because you will be doing what is good and right in the eyes of the LORD your God.

Here’s what changed when Christ fulfilled the Law, died in our place and rose again: I’ll grossly paraphrase this:

Be careful to believe this good news I am giving you, so that it may always go well with you and your children after you, because you will be doing what is good and right in the eyes of the LORD your God.

Nowhere is the concept of covenants, community and our relationships altered in the New Testament. It’s ratified by simply not changing the language.

End of story? We have to look at the Bible and realize that our presuppositions that make us unwilling to include our children in sacraments, unwilling to include them in worship are modern insertions to the Scriptures. Also, equally important are the concepts of family solidarity, congregation solidarity, discipline, submission, faithfulness and loyalty to our heads, elders and rulers. These things are assumed to be normal in the Scripture even more than they are overtly commanded. Dropping the concept of covenantal theology kills more than just National Israel’s future and sprinkling babies. It can kill our faith, folks – by confusing the message and hiding the promises God has made to us (and our children).

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November 15, 2011

I Might Just Need To Be A We

By Pooka

Calvin not Hobbes

In the last post, Anti-Covenant and Individualism, I was trying to start my line of though by expressing my impression of the extreme difficulty we have in communicating the idea of covenant baptism in general. I believe it is difficult because there is so little framework in our modern culture with which to understand it. We’ve lost the concept of covenants and commitments. Everything has to be spelled out on paper and even then there’s always somebody ready to weasel a way out of (or into) something in the relationship.

In fact, I was listening to Albert Mohler’s Thinking In Public today: Believing Without Belonging? A Conversation With Sociologist Grace Davie. The discussion ranged around quite a bit but hit on what I’m pondering here. I think it’s well worth a listen.

Yesterday, I was ultimately lamenting how our one-istic, individualist culture seems to have separated us from what God set up as the standard pattern for human relationship. That being family, church, Him. We’re so unrelated to each other nowadays that it’s really hard to come together under a single creed. I do believe that the confessional Reformed folk have the best understanding and therefore the closest stance on being united in relationship. I mean, we believe it, strive to inculcate it and act it out. But the culture, 7 days a week, fights tooth and nail for us to return (right after church on Sunday) to our covenantal relationship to computers, food, drink, cars, idle silliness, community service and everything else. We don’t look back, as we’re doing our mundane things, at our relationships with family, church and God to connect and assess value.

I certainly understand and embrace the beautiful assertion (I believe Calvin and others have said it too) that God is our Father and Church is our mother. It’s just that I don’t, in my own experience, value that hugely important pair of facts enough – and if I’m in sorry shape here, I’m willing to bet there are plenty of others as well. Not because we don’t want to, but in many ways because we can’t – the code has been obfuscated or even deleted to the extent that we just don’t get it. The concept is opposed from the start. Even the Biblical family is under attack (and in many cases demolished) as a valid relationship.

I think I begin to see the challenge our loving pastors face – they are fighting to reintroduce the concept of covenant relationships and rework our thinking so that our responses are in the right place. They know our belief is made deeper because of what we see, hear, touch and taste in preaching, the Table and baptism. They also know that to appreciate and embrace these things, we need to chew hard on the idea that we’re not just I, me, personally or “this is just me, but…”

Parting thought,

“If a man is not faithful to his own individuality, he cannot be loyal to anything.” — Claude McKay

What if it’s more like: If a man is not faithful to his identity in Christ, he cannot be loyal to anything but himself?

We are saved by grace through faith and enter into a relationship with God as our Father, Christ as our Savior, brother, priest, king, prophet. But we are not alone. We are, individually, grafted into a group. A family. Into a whole that is our mother, the church. Thinking like a child would, our identity is there. I am a child of God and I belong in His church. I don’t do church or go to church. I am in it. With the others. Never alone. You’re never alone when you’re in Him.

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November 14, 2011

Anti-Covenant and Individualism

By Pooka
Cuz it's all about me!Note: There’s a Part 2 after this: I Might Just Need To Be A We.
 
The pastor’s comments on Acts 16 last night resound in my mind. In my study toward accepting the doctrine of paedobaptism, I pretty much discarded paedo as the paradigm in preference for oikos. It makes more sense. Paedo may be clearer-cut for others to comprehend where we’re differing from non-paedo, but it’s way better and images our covenantal relationship so much more. Family, congregation, catholic church, history all have this covenant upon which we hang. Paedo doesn’t get us there. Oikos does. If you don’t know, Oikos means household, so I’m talking about the household baptism concept which is all over the N.T. and O.T. in both circumcision and baptism.
 
It also sure does say something about where modern culture has lost the concept of family hasn’t it? When would we ever baptize our household just because the daddy or the mommy or even the grandpa got dunked? There’s no way to understand what Genesis 17 says about Abraham and the circumcision party he held on his 99th year unless we look at this household thing.

So by “lost the concept of family” I mean we’re individuals even in our families. The dad is just the individual. He is not truly Dad-the-head-of-a-body-that-is-a-family. If a family today was entirely comprised of witches and the father converted to Christianity, the rest wouldn’t think twice about whether they should follow Dad’s lead. They wouldn’t. You can see it in just about any family. If Gospel truth comes from the leader’s mouth, the response is rarely positive affirmation or ponderance. If the mother decides something is best, the rest of the family won’t assume anything, but tend to ignore it unless it clearly serves self-interest. From the root, we are anti- or a-covenantal.

This is something I would dearly love to get conditioned right out of me ASAP. And following that, same for my family. I speak in extremes here: Attending church as a family? Unimportant. Missing out on Sunday or Sunday Communion? Forgiveable. Burning commitment of one family to another in the church? Not a chance.

What’s all this? Duh, individualism. We’ve isolated and isolated until “my responsibility is only to God” which really means “my responsibility is only to me” – a lie, of course. Now, I’m not down-playing individuality. The God we worship is a God of great diversity and colors. He created individuals and uniqueness, called it all good and then set all in motion. We individually contribute to a whole that is greater than the parts. We are hands and feet and eyes and mouths, some one and some many in their gifts and abilities. But we’ve overgrown the garden of plenty so much that the unity is gone for the sake of the individual branches and fruits.

One factor, a cause and a symptom is the idea of Individual Liberty. First off, I think that 200+ years ago the Liberty we had was not the same as it is today. Back then, there was a concept of unity that is missing now. So I don’t think (especially today’s) liberty is necessarily a good thing. There are so many out there who call our liberty a great blessing, but I’d rather lean toward it being just a thing, an event that is comprised of good and bad.

The bad is really bad – it allows me to interprete everything myself. Nobody can hold me to a covenant. That means my family is a group of 6 islands loosely connected by reefs of common ideas or dependency. We don’t cleave to each other and so cannot conceive of cleaving to the church. In modern day, our modern culture and nation, in my modern family, I can worship the way I want.

Doesn’t that just sound wrong? I’m free to choose New Life PCA and if the pastor says something from the pulpit that I don’t like. I’m leaving. No commitment. And though my family may follow me, they certainly don’t have to, and might not. The pastor preaches in and out on Sundays to a crowd of people who are saturated in “my way” Even if they’re born-n-bred old school uber-presby saints, it’s still lurking in there. The pulpit’s constant litany of covenants, corporate worship, community and family must continue – it’s fighting the insanity of Individual Liberty’s dark side.

Once upon a time, the wife, the son, the workers, the grandchildren and great-grandchildren belonged to the father. They served each other under his watchful care and their sins were his responsibility. He was accountable for his family. Today? I do not belong to my father, nor do my kids, or anything else. His responsibility is to love me in some distant way, and though as a God-fearing man I’m sure he cares for me, wishes the best for me and prays for my growth and godliness, I can’t look to him as the head of a covenant family. Who can? I know this is insanely silly for today, but I’m exaggerating the point on purpose. We’ve sacrificed our vital corporate identity for our excessive and decadent individual identity.

So excessive is the individual identity today that I begin to wonder how much of me is entirely false. How much have I been italicized and underlined and bolded and iconified and nicknamed and networked until what’s important about me is blown out of proportion. I’m purely the sum of me and no longer does belonging come easily. I don’t belong to my family, to my church, to Christ…! because I’m too much me. I wonder if that is part of the root of strife in the family. I wonder about a lot of my problems and if they’re because of the devilishly inflated selfishness of this age? Heck, I try to find me in the Bible – how does it apply to me is more important than God’s people most of the time.

Relevant Tangent: I find that when I’m at the Lord’s Table, awaiting the food and drink that we are taught is our sustenance, I must consciously break from me and think of the others. I watch the plates served to others, I pray for my girls or whoever in the congregation comes to my mind – that they would be sustained and gathered into the arms of the rest of us as Christ is gathering us at His Table. I perceive the Supper as a sharing, not an individual act. I’m not savoring the choicest gift of all time on my own, but participating in a toast, a communal sharing of life. I try to visualize this, or recite it, as breathing from the same air, just for the moments we are together. I’m not bragging on my piety or spirituality here, rather I’m lamenting the effort it requires! All of this is a force of will. It does not come to me naturally.

Don’t get me as if I’m going all mystical, though the word mystical is there in our words. I’m not talking about contemplative prayer and zoning out to the collective consciousness junk. I’m talking about how we are all united in Christ and that this means something more than just me and you and him and her across the room. Think about it – lift the bread so that the ones around you can see you lift it, and place it in your mouth with them. Ever see a real wedding where the husband and wife feed each other the cake? That’s it. That’s us. Same with the cup – it’s a toast, too! A toast to the love the father has for us that has given us His Son, the best gift ever given.

Now can we apply that to any other part of our lives? Can we see that He has fed us on Sunday as we are united and this does not change on Monday? We’re still one, just separated by different places. From space, from God’s perspective, we’re all right next to each other. And we’re all in the same time zone.

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November 1, 2011

Mormons are NOT Christians: Here’s Why 3

By Pooka

I’m not sure if this is the last installment of this little series. “You have a nice day” sounds suspiciously like Bilbo’s final use of “Good Morning” toward Gandalf in the beginning of The Hobbit. In light of this potential end to our relationship, I tried to tie up what was said and make some clear statements one more time. It’s been thought provoking and worthwhile to me, engaging in this conversation. I hope others have found it equally valuable.

Continuing on, I would like to repost the continuing conversation that started with Mormons are NOT Christians: Here’s Why. The 2nd part of this series is Mormons are NOT Christians: Here’s Why 2.

The original forum from which all this comes is Mormons ARE Christians: Here’s Why.

WhatAboutThis says:

No bitterness or resentfulness here. Whichever church you belong to has some curious beliefs? Boy are you going to be surprised some day.

The restoration of the church was not a bottom-up affair. It was Top-down. The 14 year old uneducated Joseph Smith didn’t go looking for heavenly visitors or to restore the church. It came to him.

We make no claim to be a church that “repairs” all the shortcoming of those that already existed at the time. People outside our church seem to always want to compare us with some traditional view. We have no such attachments or need no traditional pedigree. In fact, largely, we don’t even know what the other churches do or did or for that matter where they came from except in the broadest sense. It’s just not important to the path we’re on.

In our church we don’t talk about other churches, discuss them, refer to them or have lessons about them. We don’t have seminars like the evangelicals, invite sensationalist videos or presentations featuring former disaffected Methodists or Baptists. ALL of that is totally foreign to us and we’re mystified why the traditionals even care enough about it to spend time and money on it?!?!

These people have too much time on their hands or someone is making money from it.

We don’t seek legitimacy by squaring ourselves with other faith’s teachings or history. It really doesn’t make any difference to us if the Pope likes us or approves of us or not. I’m not trying to be disrespectful but its just not part of our calculus…it’s a non-issue.

What does make a difference however retaining a remission of sins by feeding the hungry, clothing the naked and administering relief to the poor and that is something that is done most effectively in cooperation with other faith’s efforts in those areas, regardless of what their doctrines are. We give tens of millions of dollars to Catholic Charities and many others if they are already set up in an area. Rather than duplicating efforts, we augment their work. There is no competition or glory to be had by one-upping another group.

I agree that the Gospel is the good news but after you’ve accepted it, there is a lot to be done as mentioned above and that’s where the to-do list comes in.

And by the way, I think that most angelic visits are private. Moses went to the burning bush alone. Jacob’s wrestle, Abrahams dreams and angelic education took place privately. When these things take place there is an issue of sacredness of space and normally a “crowd” is not compatible with that.

This is an interesting comment you made. “I hold the truth and I want you to hear it. Please listen.” In some ways that doesn’t sound too different from us except we really do have the truth, no joking. The difference is the way that it’s approached. The pronouncement by pastor jeffress and other traditionals who comment on this blog typically doesn’t sound like “…please listen…”

So the notion of debate and argument over points of doctrine again is foreign to us…”fisticuffs”…how melodramatic. Here are some Brass tacks…It doesn’t matter that people from other faiths don’t agree with me…so what. I am not diminished by their having a different point of view. We present correct doctrine and invite and if a person feels prompted to go forward, then we procede. If they don’t the Spirit may work on them and they may see things differently sooner or later. Our church isn’t on trial here. The people of the world are. We don’t seek permission, approval or legitimacy from anyone or church.

This thing I do know, that God is our Father and He loves us dearly as a perfect father would love his children. I am grateful for all that He has said and for all that He wants to tell me. I long for that and receive it openly when it comes.

I’m afraid you’ll have to go fishing for converts in a different pond.

You have a nice day.

_______________________________

Pooka says:

“I’m afraid you’ll have to go fishing for converts in a different pond.”

What drew me to this article in the first place, and to comment, was more a desire to offer an apologetic for why the orthodox, Gospel-believing church does not recognize the COJCOLDS as a Christian church. I would love to see someone consider what I’ve said here and respond in true faith, but that is not my job. Fishing belongs to the Great Fisherman, Jesus.

“feeding the hungry, clothing the naked and administering relief to the poor and that is something that is done most effectively in cooperation with other faith’s efforts in those areas, regardless of what their doctrines are.”
“I agree that the Gospel is the good news but after you’ve accepted it, there is a lot to be done as mentioned above and that’s where the to-do list comes in.”

This is noble, welcomed by just about anyone I can think of, and just what men should do. That said, it bears nothing on “remission of sins.” This is an entirely different gospel from the one Jesus preached. Smith, along with plenty of others from Christian and non-Christian backgrounds all miss this in the Bible. In fact, every man has made this error, namely that we can earn God’s favor through what we do. Even if done in His name, our deeds completely fail to get us anywhere.

“Here are some Brass tacks…It doesn’t matter that people from other faiths don’t agree with me…so what. I am not diminished by their having a different point of view. We present correct doctrine and invite and if a person feels prompted to go forward, then we procede.”

It seems to matter, as far as I perceive. The persistence of LDS people in asserting their Christianity isn’t exactly hard to miss. It’s all over. Asserting that LDS have correct doctrine is important to you just as my assertion of the same is to me. So I respectfully would like to observe that, though you posit to be inclusive, you’ve made a statement that says you have the truth.

The Christians also, those who understand just what you said about inviting and waiting for a response, do not feel “diminished” by others’ differences in “point of view.” Christians offer Christ’s Gospel just as He directed them to in the Bible. And when we are not received, we “shake the dust off” and get out of town.

“We don’t seek legitimacy by squaring ourselves with other faith’s teachings or history. It really doesn’t make any difference to us if the Pope likes us or approves of us or not. I’m not trying to be disrespectful but its just not part of our calculus…it’s a non-issue.”

The reason we “talk about other churches” and square ourselves with other faiths’ teachings and history in our Christian circles, vice LDS and others who do not, is because we have the truth – and that our belief in that truth is exclusive. We do not perceive another way to a right relationship with God. In wishing to offer the Bible’s accurate judgement of men and portrayal of God and His work to redeem His creation, we consult and converse in and out of Christian circles in order to reach out clearly and in the context of other faiths.

Why study another religion’s aspects if you believe there are other avenues? Why study another religion’s points of divergence if you, like the mass of world religions believe that righteousness before God is achievable by the works of men? I understand your position, I believe, and I was there. As a witch for 10 years, I didn’t need to worry about what you or the Christians believed – they were headed on the same “path” to perfection that I was, just using different terms.

At least, until God’s Word started talking about Christ being The Gate to salvation from a Holy and Just God. So either God had to change or I did. It’s hopefully obvious who listened to whom.

“No bitterness or resentfulness here. Whichever church you belong to has some curious beliefs? Boy are you going to be surprised some day.”

Our beliefs are not entirely curious, at least not to Christians, though there are quite a few Christians who lean more toward your LDS themes – and it saddens us just as much as thinking of the wonderfully moral image of the LDS church. Don’t get me wrong, if Christians want a picture of what good behavior and responsibility look like, we can’t do much better than observing you and your church (that’s not sarcasm but honest appraisal). Our beliefs in the orthodox, Gospel-believing church are in line with the apostolic traditions of the 1st century. Before the Nicene Council, rather, in line with the councils of Acts! So our beliefs curious to those who have been lied to about how Nicea “fixed” the Bible with corrupted teachings and to those who have denied the Scriptures of the Old Testament too – which have endured in Jewish culture for many, many centuries before Christ walked among us.

Perhaps I will be surprised one day, and so you should pity me and my ilk for our wasted lives, believing that God came and saved us when we could not save ourselves. We are the most pitiable of men who depend on a Savior if that Savior didn’t live a perfect life, die for the sins of men and then rise from the dead so that we can live eternally.

But may I turn the table. What if you were surprised one day? Surprised that everybody but us exclusive bigots happened to “luck out” and stumble upon the Real Story?

“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me…” Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”

Grace and Peace
Soli Deo Gloria

Again, let me recommend this blog: Progressing Pilgrims Anonymous for more detailed examination of the differences between LDS and Christianity.

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October 31, 2011

Putting On and Taking Off the Mantle – Brother to Pastor and Back Again

By Pooka

I’ve been mulling a theme around for a few months now. It may go back as far as last year while we were attending the membership classes. This week, largely due to our Sunday school studies on worship, the unique role of Pastor hit me with enough that I want to explore some of my thoughts.

So I’m thinking about the unique situation in which we find ourselves each Lord’s Day with our brother and minister standing in the pulpit, proclaiming God’s Word. There, he is not Mr. Tallman or Brian or brother; rather he is God’s minister, acting in the role of a herald. For that period of the worship service, the minutes in which he calls us to worship, repentance, proclaims us forgiven, teaches the Word and baptizes and serves the Table, then blesses us and commissions us to go out into the world, he’s not the personality we know and love between the services.

It must be a real challenge for our pastor to switch gears from The Voice back to our brother. I’ve tried to envision what it’s like to come down from the pulpit at the end of the service and suddenly be interfacing with the people back on their level (no punning intended). We come up and thank him for his good preaching or comment on something he said in the sermon – or even tougher, come up with something entirely unrelated – selfish even that simply drops the entire last hour’s reverence. Perhaps it’s just as simple as this, that he takes a deep breath, shrugs and comes back into regular life. I mean, there’s no good thing to append to a properly run service – the interaction is complete (I know this sounds rather cold, but I mean it in a sense that’s reaching out to the hard thing our hearts have to sort of cross through). So when all’s done, there’s a truth here that all’s done.

Is it hard? Is it painful to step down and suddenly have this mixed up relationship that is a half-life of reverence for the minister and then a renewed Second Kingdom relationship with a brother we can turn to for comradeship, guidance and regular Christian interaction? There are times when I think I grasp a little of it – specially after the longer and more involved services we’ve attended. I’m thinking of those that include the additional components of new membership, baptism or the Supper.

When we get our things together and start the shuffle out of the sanctuary, occasionally I’ll end up on a path that passes by where the pastor has been “captured” by some of us up at the front. I’ve been one of the praise or off-topic folk plenty of times – though I admit at those times I haven’t thought much of what I was doing. But this week in particular, I was thinking, how do I talk to this guy? Do I compliment his preaching or a comment he made? Do I thank him in a general sort of way and just move on? Or maybe ask him about something that’s been bugging me for a while that I’m pretty sure could be wedged into context with the sermon (if I try hard)?

Now, I don’t want to create the sense that I’m griping or even raising the bar on reverence either in general or specifically toward the Office of the Minister. I do think that my perception of our pastor while he’s in the pulpit is growing more toward a sense that he’s not BST for that hour on Sunday morning. Though he is not suddenly transformed into some other thing, like an angel, maybe or into an apostle type, he’s not “just a man” at the same time, though he is just a man. I just wonder at the transition – and the dynamic that follows until we’ve really left for home. It’s remarkable.

Perhaps this can be read in Acts where the apostles are going about the business of picking the replacement for Judas and then contrasted with Peter’s sermon. Mundane (sort of) and then high and holy, magnifying God through the preaching of the Scriptures, probably illuminates the differences pretty well. But where’s the switch? Maybe later in Acts where Paul and Barnabas are preaching and reasoning and then suddenly they must shake off their “mantles of royalty” very abruptly to beat down the mob of would-be worshippers who are ready to sacrifice to these two who appear to be gods.

These, then, are the things you should teach. Encourage and rebuke with all authority. Do not let anyone despise you. – Titus 2:15

Martin Luther served well to elucidate the high and serious position of the man in the pulpit in his Galatians commentary. Chapter 1 opened up right into the position of the minister.

“Every minister should make much of his calling and impress upon others the fact that he has been delegated by God to preach the Gospel. As the ambassador of a government is honored for his office and not for his private person, so the minister of Christ should exalt his office in order to gain authority among men. This is not vain glory, but needful glorying.”

“We exalt our calling, not to gain glory among men, or money, or satisfaction, or favor, but because people need to be assured that the words we speak are the words of God. This is no sinful pride. It is holy pride.”

There’s meat to all this. It’s not just a scholarly look into the philosophy or details of the Pastor’s phases of life. This is relevant to our view of worship in general. It presents a line, or boundary to our gathering that separates the church on Sunday morning from the church on Monday morning. There’s more than a functional gathering, more than something clinical to our practice.

I’ve occasionally visited a site that leads me to think about these things, and a couple of entries stand out: Pastoral Narcotic and Sabbath Preparation.

When Tolkien’s hobbits come home from Rivendell, they leave a sanctuary that is sort of transcendent-immanent, otherworldly with a far deeper connection to life and death, meaning and lore. And they cross the vale, the Bruinen Ford, heading west toward home, they start to see the familiar, commonplace world where carts kick up dust, taverns ply their meals and drink and people go about their days. And for Bilbo in the Hobbit and the Four Friends in the Return of the King, homecoming is somehow dimmer (at least that’s how I read it).

So our worship might be in turn: brighter and breathless, waiting for the sun to rise and elated when the Word is released to our ears and eyes and mouths. Though it means things may dim and lose their luster, once we’ve received our benediction,  perhaps it is good this way so that we are newly made and met each Sunday, out of the clay if only for a short while. It should increase our longing for the final Worship, which will not fade but will endure for all time.

I find that this growing sense of the immensity and value of the Worship time we have is something I want dearly for others. I want to see the Lord draw them from the water into a newness that they can savor. I think that this otherworldliness of our sanctuary on Sunday is more important than many of us are able (or willing) to consider easily. I don’t want to totally go mystical or sacramental on this – it’s not magical or miraculous in some occult or secret fashion. It’s secret to the degree that those who are not in Christ have no sense of or access to it. At best it must be a peripheral suspicion or inkling that something else is going on behind the obvious.

As with Rivendell, there is a mystical-ness to just being there, that does not follow once the Ford is crossed. The lore remains, in the minds of the departing as it remains in the Last Homely House. But for us, it remains in the gathered People of God, accessible when we are united in our worship on the Lord’s Day – we return to it each week. It is not passing, but enduring until a fulfillment which comes wonderfully and suddenly. I speak of an immediate time because it’s never very far off, the not yet of our Lord’s kingdom. Never far and we must live that way. Which is why the Lord’s day, the sacraments and the Word are not less frequently found than next Sunday.

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