Making the Most of Your Sleep

Sleep is important. It is the most needed moment of vulnerability in the human existence. We would die without sleep. Our bodies demand that we slip away out of consciousness about 1/3 of the day. You just lay there incapable of production, your defense handicapped, your eyes and ears not functioning. It is humbling to think that we need this. God designed it that way.

We relinquish everything at the moment we close our eyes to the One who sustains the universe by the Word of His power (Hebrew 1:3). It is an act of faith, of trusting, of resting in the sovereign goodness of God. There is a means of grace there. So may we make the most of it at night and in the morning. The psalter helps us…

In peace I will both lie down and sleep; for you alone, O LORD, make me dwell in safety

(Psalm 4:8)


I lay down and slept; I woke again, for the LORD sustained me

(Psalm 3:5)

2010
02/09
CATEGORY
Psalms
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What is the glory of GOD?

What is the glory of God? God the holy Father, holy Son, holy Spirit. What is the kavod that Moses asked to see (Exod. 33:18)? What is the doxa that John declares we have seen (John 1:14)?

In the holy dialogue that Moses had with God in Exodus 33, we see that the request in v. 18 was not his first. That request is preceded by what he asked in v. 13, “Please show me now your ways, that I may know you in order to find favor in your sight.” The parallel shows us that Moses’ request in v. 18 is a re-articulation of what he asked to see in v. 13. Moses wanted to see something, God’s ways, viz., God’s glory. The Apostle John’s opening to his gospel affirms that reality of God’s glory. It is seen. John declares that we have seen the glory of God in the person of His Son, Jesus Christ, and that glory is full of grace and truth (John 1:14). The kavod and doxa of God is not a distant attribute or abstract description of God’s person. Rather, it is by its nature a manifestation. The glory of God is revelatory.

Moses’ request in Exodus 33:18 is heard by God. He answers Moses’ prayer. “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘the LORD’ (Exod. 33:19). The glory of the LORD is to “pass by” Moses (Exod. 33:22). And so it does in Exodus 34:5-6. The LORD descended and “proclaimed the name of the LORD. The LORD passed before him and proclaimed, ‘The LORD, the LORD…” (Exod. 34:5-6). God’s revelation of his glory is the proclamation of his name.

To say that God’s glory is the proclamation of his name is to say that it is the revelation of his “enacted identity” (Webster, 36). Webster continues to say that God’s enacted identity is “God’s sheer, irreducible particularity as this One who is and acts thus” (36). God’s identity, or essence, is utterly incomparable and eternally inexhaustible. And yet this essence is relational. For this incomparable and inexhaustible God is also a God who acts, who reveals, and who makes known inseparably from his essence. God’s doings is his ‘acting thus’ to who he is. The glory of God is the revelatory action of God proclaiming his name by means of all the ways that he acts out of who he is.

God’s glory is the force of his identity. By force I mean that it should have no connotation of being stagnant or distant. God’s glory is active and he is jealous that it be known. That is what he wills in Exodus, that the Egyptians and Israel would know that he is the LORD, that is, that they would know his name, know his ‘enacted identity,’ know his glory (7:5; 8:10, 22; 9:16; 10:2; 14:4, 18; 16:12; 18:11; 20:2; 33:18-19). Such is the motive for God’s action in Ezekiel where he recounts why he restrained his anger. His name being profaned was at stake. That is, his glory was at stake of being undermined. So he says, “I acted for the sake of my name, that it should not be profaned…” (Ezek. 20:14). “But I withheld my hand and acted for the sake of my name, that it should not be profaned…” (v. 22). For he concludes, “I did it that they might know that I am the LORD” (v. 26). The enacted identity of God is an illocution. To expand the biblical metaphor that God is light (1 Jn. 1:5), inasmuch as light corresponds to God’s essence, the radiance of light corresponds to God’s glory.

2010
02/06
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Biblical Theology
Ultimate
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Have You Not Read?

It gets jaw-dropping amazing in Matthew 22. The confrontations between the Jewish leaders and Jesus come to a peak leading up to 22:46, “… nor from that day did anyone dare to ask him any more questions.”

It is the Sadducees in the passage from 22:23-33 that shakes me this morning. They try to trip our Savior with a question about the resurrection and the kinsman redeemer OT law. Out Lord’s answer goes right to the heart in verse 29. His first response, “You are wrong…” You are wrong in asking the question. You reveal how much you don’t get it by the things that you are concerned about.

Moreoever, you are wrong “because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God.” What? But this is their profession. It is what they do. And they are ignorant. Ignorant to the very thing by which they were to shepherd others. And here comes the blow, verse 31. Jesus says, “have you not read what was said to you by God…”

God has said something to them. To them. God has said something. God has spoken to them. God has spoken to them. And they haven’t any read it. It probably doesn’t mean never looked at the words. They haven’t understood. They haven’t grasped. God has said something to them that they are entirely stupid about. May it never be with us. I want to hear Him. May their be light when we open holy Scripture, by grace.

2010
02/04
CATEGORY
Matthew
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The Inscrutable Grace of Our Capacity to Know Anything Right and True About God

It is miraculous that man can know anything right and true about God. It is a deep, inscrutable grace that there be any flicker of apprehension in the heart of man that there is an Ultimate Reality and that that Ultimate Reality is outside of man himself. It is a wonder that God put even the capacity of such flickering in man. Although the sense is flawed and tainted, God has imprinted humanity with the truth that He is there and that He is to be known and worshiped.

Paul tells us that the knowledge of God is plain and that the evidences of His Being are clearly understood in the things made by Him that are all around us (Rom 1:19-20). The conscience of man bears witness to some inner law that has been engraved into his person (2:15).

But in our falleness, we have turned the slightest apprehension into a god of our own choosing. We have all turned from the true God to that which is not God (Rom 1:21-23). This is the story of humanity and it is our story…

2010
02/04
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Romans
Ultimate
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Consistency in the Middle: Ryan and Schumaker as a Cardinal Mainstay

I don’t mention it in the ABOUT page, but I am a baseball fan. In particular, I have been a fan of the St. Louis Cardinals since I was an infant. It is the closest experience that I had with pedobaptism, except no water involved and nothing Christian about it. But my dad somehow inaugurated me into Cardinal nation. I liked them in preschool and I like them now. I  am a sinner redeemed by the grace of God in Jesus Christ. I am a Christian who currently lives in America… I like baseball, I like the Cardinals (I like to think that if baseball were back in Babylon that Daniel would have liked it, too).

With all that said, let me express some excitement for the upcoming 2010 season. No, I am not talking about Holliday. Nope, not our new hitting coach. Not even our beloved first basemen, Albert, who I admire as a person first and athlete second. I am happy about all of that, happy about Carp and Wainwright being the best 1-2 punch in the game, etc. Everyone else is happy about that, too.

But one thing that I’m most excited about (and perhaps has been the most unnoticed by Card fans) is the middle infield. I really like the double-play combo in Ryan and Schumaker. I really like that the first time since I can remember the Cards are keeping the same guys up the middle two years in a row. A solid, durable middle infield. Baseball has made that part of the game the most transient (Yankees are the exception, Bro. Riccardi). Most teams move guys in and out (Jeter is the last Ripken).

But the Cardinals are on to something that I hope is a mainstay. Let there be t-shirts with Ryan and Schumaker on the back.

2010
02/03
CATEGORY
Baseball
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So Which Interpretation is Right?

The canon is the ancient witness to what God has already accomplished and it is also the ongoing reminder of what He has yet to consummate. It is the covenant record of His past faithfulness and the unwavering promise of His faithfulness in that which is yet to come. What fits into this far exceeds the human conjectures of any interpretative community.

We must submit our (or any) interpretation of Scripture to the canon, that is, to the greater reality of what God is doing through Jesus Christ and by His Spirit.

Vanhoozer writes:

Dramatic fittingness with what God has done in Christ is the supreme criterion for truth, goodness, and beauty alike…

Christo-dramatic fittingness means canonical fittingness. We must think through the canon in order rightly to think about Jesus Christ. The standard of fittingness is specification of this “whole and complete” action. Sounds doctrine is distinguished from the dross of mere opinion only because the former accords with the commissioned testimony of the biblical authors and the latter does not.

Vanhoozer, Drama, 258

2010
02/03
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Biblical Theology
Hermeneutics
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Recognition Instead of Rendering: Calvin on the Church and Canon

Thus, while the church receives and gives its seal of approval to the Scriptures, it does not thereby render authentic what is otherwise doubtful or controversial. But because the church recognizes Scripture to be the truth of its own God, as a pious duty it unhesitatingly venerates Scripture. As to their question—How can we be assured that this has sprung from God unless we have recourse to the decree of the church?—it is as if someone asked: Whence will we learn to distinguish light from darkness, white from black, sweet from bitter? Indeed, Scripture exhibits fully as clear evidence of its own truth as while and black things do of their color, or sweet and bitter things do of their taste

John Calvin, Institutes I.VII.2

2010
02/02
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Vanhoozer on the Canon

The canon is the abiding theological witness to God’s pattern of communicative action in Israel and in Jesus Christ. As theo-dramatic script, the canon is witness to what God has done. As covenant document, the canon is witness to the solemn agreement that binds God and God’s people together…

The canon, seen in light of its connection to the covenant, is much more than a theological slide rule or criterion for true propositions. It has a properly soteriological purpose as well. The notion of covenant document helps to put the canon into proper perspective, with regard to form and content alike. As to content, Scripture depicts the history of God’s covenantal relations to humanity, including those divine communicative acts—promises, warnings, commands, consolations—that witness to what God was doing in Christ. As to form, the canon is an authoritative and binding witness to the fact, and the terms, of covenant relationship. The canon is thus the instrument through which the Spirit of God ministers and administers the covenant today. The origin (and hence the authority) of the canonical Scriptures is thus far removed from that of human constitutions.

Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Drama of Doctrine, 138ff.

2010
02/02
CATEGORY
Quotable
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Doctrine as Derivative and Directive

The Pharisees and scribes were teaching wrong (Matthew 15:16). They contradicted the Scriptures and led people astray. Jesus called them blind guides (15:14). Isaiah nailed it. He prophesied well when he said, “This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me, in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men” (Isa. 29:13).

There is a relationship between their vain worship and the subsequent participle of them teaching the commandments of men to be the doctrine of God. Doctrine is directive preeminently in that it shows us the way of true worship. The Pharisees ordered their lives around the wrong stuff. We can learn something important about doctrine here, namely, the commandments of men propped up as the doctrine of God is a miserable endeavor that results in the worse kind of vanity.

Doctrine is holy because it is derived from God, it is of God. It is the Spirit-empowered exposition and articulation of the Holy Scriptures in the midst of life.  It leads us in all truth because it is the repetition of the gospel– it is sang, prayed, preached, taught, cried… generating, ordering, validating, refining true worship of the triune God.

2010
02/01
CATEGORY
Matthew
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The Intercession of Abraham and the Mercy of God, Part 2

The intercessory work of Abraham is a follow up on God’s promise to him in 12:1-3. We see it with Sodom and with Abimelech. The LORD told him that in him all the nations of the earth would be blessed (12:3; 18:18). Gentiles would be blessed by Abraham. Abraham prays for Abimelech in 20:17 and the “God healed Abimelech, and also healed his wife and females slaves so that they bore children.” Aside from the fact that the ailment that Abraham prayed to heal was caused because of Abraham’s own dishonesty, he is a clear picture of Abraham being a blessing to Abimelech.

2010
01/31
CATEGORY
Pentateuch
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