Faith: January 2005 Archives

From A. W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy, Chapter 20:

Our Father which art in heaven, we Thy children are often troubled in mind, hearing within us at once the affirmations of faith and the accusations of conscience. We are sure that there is in us nothing that could attract the love of One as holy and as just as Thou art. Yet thou hast declared Thine unchanging love for us in Christ Jesus. If nothing in us can win Thy love, nothing in the universe can prevent Thee from loving us. Thy love is uncaused and undeserved. Thou art Thyself the reason for the love wherewith we are loved. Help us to believe the intensity, the eternity of the love that has found us. Then love will cast out fear; and our troubled hearts will be at peace, trusting not in what we are but in what Thou hast declared Thyself to be. Amen.

Discoshaman has a post about Ukraine President-elect Yushchenko's program for reforming the government there, focused on ending corruption, with steps such as cleaning up the way state-owned businesses are privatized, and cleaning out the tax code to make it reasonable enough that people and businesses will pay their taxes.

Discoshaman also links to this very interesting post, on developing an evangelical method for sanctification. It looks like worthwhile reading anyway -- with lots of links to previous entries with supporting material. I'm a bit too tired to tackle it at the moment.

I must say that the notion of a "method" for sanctification strikes the wrong note with me. Ultimately, God himself works sanctification in the hearts of his elect through means of his choosing. We're learning about one of God's tools for sanctification in a new Sunday School class at our church -- namely, marriage. The class, called "Sacred Marriage" (based on a book by Gary Thomas) asks this question: "What if God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy?" I can truthfully say that being a husband and a dad has revealed rough edges of my soul in need of sanding, edges that would never have been exposed had I remained single.

And if you need help finding a godly wife, X-ATI Guy comes to the rescue with a Biblical Guide to Wife-Finding -- and he has links to more about relationships in the strange little subculture he studies -- and it rings all to this one-time Campus Crusader.

Lileks offers his help to Blue Staters trying to understand what makes Red Staters tick. And he continues his latest creative project -- trying to imagine a life from a collection of matches (in alphabetical order).

Diplomad is a new addition to my blogroll -- it's the creation of members of the Republican Underground within the U.S. State Department. Here's an interesting post on foreign aid and unintended consequences.

Sunday morning our pastor challenged us to read the Bible through this year. Here's one site, set up like a blog, to make it simple. They've got several RSS feeds, too, for different reading methods.

The version is the English Standard Version, which stays close to the King James Version, while avoiding archaic language and making use of the best available manuscripts -- it's now the version of choice in our church.

It's been too long since I tried something like this, and consequently I no longer know the Scriptures as thoroughly as I once did. While years past of more diligent study have sustained me thus far, it's like trying to survive on your own body fat, without eating -- eventually all your reserves are exhausted.

Many years ago, my dad read the entire Bible in a single day. He used the Living Bible and the speed-reading techniques he had learned to get through it all in 24 hours. I remember that he had marked time estimates at the end of each book so he could pace himself. He was our little Baptist church's Church Training Director at the time, and the stunt was a way to encourage church members to read the Bible through at 1/365th the pace. How hard could that be?