Bully’s Blog

A rejection of Biblical history and its chronology of the planet might be the cause for one of science’s greatest mistakes.

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“I am against religion because it teaches us to be satisfied with not understanding the world.” — Richard Dawkins

Well, there’s one statement I don’t understand, unless Mr Dawkins means every religion except Christianity. Modern science was born of a distinctly Christian worldview. This next quote is one I understand to a point, but only because Mr Dawkins has a broken worldview.

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“The entire free world could be shipwrecked by a teleprompter.”

I remember Carl Sagan commenting on the oddness of books, a collation of leaves covered in squiggles, in symbols. This is only odd if you are a godless fool (biblically defined) whose worldview is entirely at odds with reality.

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“There is a curse on Mankind.
We may as well be resigned.
To let the devil, the devil
take the spirit of man.”

War of the Worldviews

I first heard Jeff Wayne’s musical version of The War of the Worlds when I was 11. My brother and I and some cousins listened to it in a dark room. It was electric and terrifying. Hearing it again years later, the worldview behind the story is much more apparent. One song in particular lays it bare, The Spirit of Man.

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My composer friend Walter Robins’ oratorio Breath of God: A Walk Through the Bible will be world premiered by Capitol Opera Harrisburg PA in May 2011 (visit www.capopera.com)

I love Walter’s music because it has an angular beauty, just like the Bible. It constantly hints through its structure that there is more going on than immediately meets the ear.

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Veritas Hall westlake - Christian Education from Darren Doane on Vimeo.

Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby. (Hebrews 12:11)

It becomes apparent that every one of God’s curses in the Bible sooner or later turns out to be a blessing. Every judgment has one eye on the present, which is usually grievous, and another eye on the future. Every discipline is a pruning to bring greater fruit. You just want to make sure you are one of the good figs, not a bad one. God’s justice is always visionary.

“There’s no such thing as a dead-end job. There are only dead-end people.”
—Zig Ziglar

Work seems like a curse, but even before the Fall there was work. After the Fall, work was a curse-cloud with a silver lining. Imagine a world where people didn’t have to work? Imagine what all those idle hands would get up to? There are places in the world where this is the case; depressed places where nothing ever changes, nothing improves; where people look at our western rat race with envy.

By faith, we understand that all employment is part of the glorification of the world.

Many Christians view work as something holding them back from ministry. This is not only incorrect, but a terribly gnostic way of viewing the world. Our work is actually not only central, but something extremely important to God. I read this old article I posted in Be Still years ago, adapted from a book by Dallas Willard. I have one of the best jobs in the world and I still grumble, so I really needed to hear this again. Here’s an excerpt:

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Tim Nichols recently posted concerning whether Christians should participate in martial arts that have a pagan background.[1] I suggested that postmillennialism naturally sees what can be salvaged from pagan cultures and “redeemed”, rather than writing it all off as corrupt, as many Christians do. His response was worth repeating:

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“There is a very important connection between the Church’s worldview and the Church’s hymns. If your heart and mouth are filled with songs of victory, you will tend to have an eschatology of dominion; if, instead, your songs are fearful, expressing a longing for escape—or if they are weak, childish ditties—your worldview and expectations will be escapist and childish.

Historically, the basic hymnbook for the Church has been the Book of Psalms. The largest book of the Bible is the Book of Psalms, and God providentially placed it right in the middle of the Bible, so that we couldn’t miss it! Yet how many churches use the Psalms in musical worship? It is noteworthy that the Church’s abandonment of dominion eschatology coincided with the Church’s abandonment of the Psalms.”

—David Chilton, Paradise Restored.

I saw in my dream, that the Interpreter took Christian by the hand again, and led him into a very dark room, where there sat a man in an iron cage. Now the man seemed very sad. He sat with his eyes looking down to the ground, and his hands folded together, and he sighed as if his heart would break.

Then said Christian, “Who is this?”

“Talk with him and see,” said the Interpreter.

“What used you to be?” asked Christian.

“I was once a flourishing professor, both in my own eyes, and also in the eyes of others,” answered the man. “I was on my way, as I thought, to the Celestial City and I was confident that I would get there.”

“But what did you do to bring yourself to this condition?” Christian asked.

“I failed to keep watch,” the man replied. “I followed the pleasures of this world, which promised me all manner of delights. But they proved to be an empty bubble. And now I am shut up in this iron cage—a man of despair who can’t get out.”

No further explanations were given. No one said who put him there. But the Interpreter whispered to Christian:

“Bear well in mind what you have seen.” [1]

.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .

Another thought related to the ideas in Behind Closed Doors.

The whole aim of the construction process, whether in sex, foetal development, education, business, art, music, family or state government, is the ultimate revelation of a mature glory. We are given the opportunity to create, and that involves certain God-given freedoms. If the freedoms are abused, what we construct for ourselves is a cage. Lust is a cage. A dysfunctional family or state is a cage. Enforced egalitarian socio-economics is a cage. Undisciplined children are a cage.

Jesus laid down His life for this world, and the freedoms of western culture have been a direct outcome. In its final stages, we have rebelliously inverted each of these freedoms (including the economic ones) and turned both our Christian protection (including our God-given wealth) and Christian mandate into a cage. Ancient Israel did the same. Why does this inversion process seem such a logical path for fallen human nature?

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