Chesterton created a happy Calvinist

John Piper writes an excellent article here regarding G.K. Chesterton, one of C.S. Lewis's mentors. Piper explains how Chesterton, though Catholic and very opposed to the doctrine of predestination and other such Calvinistic doctrine, created in him a love for the mysterious paradoxes found within Christianity.

Having read Orthodoxy within the last year myself, I'd say this book did a similar thing for me as well. I doubly recommend reading this book.

Here's how Piper's article starts:

"May 29 is G. K. Chesterton’s 134th birthday. He was a British journalist and brilliant writer. Nobody exploits the power of paradox like Chesterton.

I celebrate his birthday by recommending his book Orthodoxy.

The title gives no clue as to what you will find inside. It had a huge influence on me forty years ago in ways that would have exasperated Chesterton. He did all he could to keep me from becoming a Calvinist, and instead made me a romantic one—a happy one."

Keller's thoughts on the Gospel

Tim Keller writes about the gospel in this article in Christianity Today. He speaks to the wide range of answers we might give when someone asks us to explain the gospel. He says there is only one gospel (Gal. 2:7), but many forms of presenting it. Having listened to him a good bit over the last several years, I think he does a very good job at biblically giving more of a big story version of the gospel. I would suggest you read the whole article, but here's an exerpt that shows the basic way Keller presents the gospel:

"I use both a 'kingdom' and an 'eternal life' gospel. I find that many of my younger listeners are struggling to make choices in a world of endless consumer options and are confused about their own identities in a culture of self-creation and self-promotion. These are the people who are engaged well by the more individually-focused presentation of the gospel as free grace not works. This is a lot like the "eternal life gospel" of John. However, I have found many highly secular people over the age of 40 are not reached very well with any emphasis on personal problems. Many of them think they are doing very well, thank you. They are much more concerned about the problems of the world—war, racism, poverty, and injustice. And they respond well to a synoptic-like "kingdom gospel."

Instead of going into, say, one of the epistles and speaking of the gospel in terms of God, sin, Christ, and faith, I point out the story-arc of the Bible and speak of the gospel in terms of creation, fall, redemption, and restoration. We once had the world we all wanted—a world of peace and justice, without death, disease, or conflict. But by turning from God we lost that world. Our sin unleashed forces of evil and destruction so that now "things fall apart" and everything is characterized by physical, social, and personal disintegration. Jesus Christ, however, came into the world, died as a victim of injustice and as our substitute, bearing the penalty of our evil and sin on himself. This will enable him to some day judge the world and destroy all death and evil without destroying us."

(HT:Justin Taylor)

Attention spans

Al Mohler comments on an interesting article about attention spans in this digital age. Here's a snippet from the original writer, Courtney Martin. (She made these observations after visiting her alma mater, Columbia University)

"Take those Facebook-surfing students, missing out on a potentially life-changing lecture about war and courage. Their diffused attention isn't criminal, but it certainly doesn't do justice to professor Dalton's lectures, their own potential for learning, or the $51,976 they or their parents are paying for a year of Ivy League education. They mirror something very real in most peoples' lives--the sense that your life is happening 'to you,' instead of feeling truly intentional about how, with whom, and on what you spend your time."

As easy as it is to point fingers to others, I realize that I've become increasingly vulnerable to all of this. I find myself more and more distracted by different "things."

Congrats to Justin and Paisley

Review of The Shack

Having not read the book yet, Tim Challies provides an excellent review on what the book is all about. Having read the review, I doubt I will venture into reading the book. I suppose you'll see why...

The Fleeting Pleasures of Sin

I've been reading The Great Divorce. It's a very interesting allegory written by C.S. Lewis. In it we meet Ghosts and Solid People. The Ghosts take a bus ride up to heaven and take a look around. Most of them end up prefering where they came from and want to leave. However, the Solid People try and help the Ghosts understand that this place is what they were made for. Here's one of the Solid People, George MacDonald, explaining how sin works.

"The sensualist...begins by pursuing a real pleasure, though a small one. His sin is the less. But the time comes on when, though the pleasure becomes less and less and the craving fiercer and fiercer, and though he knows that joy can never come that way, yet he prefers to joy the mere fondling of unappeasable lust and would not have it taken from him. He'd fight to the death to keep it. He'd like well to be able to scratch; but even when he can scratch no more he'd rather itch than not."

Nicholas Alan

My friend and former roommate Nick has a new website/blog. He's a musician living in LA and is writing some good music and posting some interesting things. Check him out.

Radiohead

Roy and I went to see Radiohead last night. In short, it was an incredible show. But, there's a great story from the night that should be told. (This will a little longer than most of my posts...if you're into the quick version, check Roy's blog)

About a week ago, I bought two tickets via a third party internet site, for Roy and I to go to the show. Radiohead is one of Roy's favorite bands, and it worked out to be a birthday present for him. So, I get the tickets in the mail Monday. There are four sheets of paper in the envelope I received, and two of the sheets are the tickets (this will become important very soon).

Fast forward to last night. I grab two sheets of paper from my cluttered dresser right before we're heading out. The top copy is definitely a ticket and I see that I'm holding two sheets of paper, so the other must be the ticket (nope). I'm not really sure why I didn't take the extra half second effort to indeed confirm it was the ticket...I just didn't.

Roy asks me in the car, "Do you have the tickets?" And of course I reply confidently that I do. After getting down there, parking, and getting about 50 feet from the gate, I pull out my two sheets of paper...and my heart sank. The second sheet of paper was merely a receipt of some kind that does us NO good. I begin thinking I have absolutely ruined our night, just becuase I wasn't a little more careful. It was not a fun feeling. After standing there for about five minutes completely bewildered that I could have been so careless as to not double check myself, we moved toward the box office to see what our options were.

After confirming with a lady at the ticket window that she couldn't track my order that I had actually purchased two tickets, Roy and I stood there and contemplated our options. It looked like Iron Man was going to be our evening activity. And I remember praying and asking God to help me not freak out and just trust His sovereignty in this situation. And sure enough, one of the next voices I hear is from the ticket window: "...ever since this morning I haven't really wanted to go...could you just mark that I picked it up and just give it away to someone..." Roy and I looked at each other, and five minutes later we had the ticket! Thank you ticket lady, wherever you are.

My ticket was maybe 40-50 rows back on the very right side. It turns out that Roy's new ticket is dead center, maybe 15 rows back! And because there were a bunch of empty seats around him, five songs into the show, we were both rockin' out not 30 yards from Thom Yorke himself. The lights were great, the music was fun, and Thom was very querky. Even the people around us were really nice. One nice young gentlemen offered us some weed : )...to which we politely declined.

The phrase of the evening was "Happy Providence." If I had never have left the extra ticket on my dresser, we would have had mediocre seats and would have been without a cool story. Instead, we got to see God at work in the most random of ways, and allow us to have incredible seats to an incredible show. I don't think it was accident at all that I prayed yesterday that I would be able to worship God in the midst of a Radiohead show. He is in control of every dice that's rolled and every single atom floating around and every situation going on in our lives. And He showed me that last night. He didn't have to. He still would have been sovereign. But He chose to, and I was able to worship Him for His sovereignty. I thank Him for this bit of happy providence.

Anyway, here are some pics:

Evan McHugh at Smith's

Clear your calendars for Friday, May 23rd. Evan McHugh, good friend and current roommate, will be headlining at one of Atlanta's best musical venues, Smith's Olde Bar. And as a bonus, you'll get to hear Matthew Perryman Jones open up for him. Check them both out on Itunes or on their myspace pages.

Here's what CDBaby has to say about Evan:

Evan McHugh is poised to take the singer-songwriter genre and elevate its every aspect. Upon listening, it is clear that his songwriting sets him far apart from the current influx of mediocre peers. Though never one to discount the current music landscape, Evan has a gift that has already shown itself to be ahead of the curve.

With a background in graphic design, Evan's efforts have turned to the pursuit of the song, his voice, and his message. Learning a thing or three or four from his sister, Eryn, a passion for songwriting has motivated Evan from the first time he picked up a guitar at 17. He now stands at the onset of an unfamiliar yet skilled pursuit.

His debut LP, "From the Second Chair" welds together pieces of his person, his fiction, and his imaginative word smithing to create a captivating sound scape that is equaled only by his live performances. It was produced by Glenn Matullo (Shawn Mullins, Indigo Girls, John Mayer) at Orphan Studio in Atlanta, GA and will certainly be remembered as Evan's ground-breaking first effort at the end of his should be promising career.

You can find Evan touring in support of this debut around the East Coast; soon to be country.

thoughts about atheists

I think Arnold has some interesting thoughts concerning atheists, specifically coming from some of the atheist blogs he keeps up with.

Hilton Head

I went to Hilton Head this past weekend for "Rooted", the Gathering retreat. I had never been to Hilton Head before, and my first experience was a pleasant one. It was very relaxing and I got to hang out with some great people. We had four different short sessions where a guy named Gary Purdy spoke. I really liked this guy a lot becuase I related with his story and he brought some great gospel centered truth. It was funny becuase some of the same stuff I had been thinking through last week (see Friday's post) was at the heart of his talks.

One quote has stuck with me that a professor told him one day about the secret to living the Christian life. He said to take a long enough look at your sin to be sorry for it...and then look to Jesus and how God sees you as He sees Jesus...righteous. And that's been my problem lately. I haven't been seeing a lot of my sin. But thankfully God answered my plea for help and revealed to me a ton of self-righteousness that I was embracing. So now, I can look again to the wonder of the gospel and the wonder that God has chosen me to be a part of His kingdom.

Now here are a couple of my favorite people from the weekend, for whom I am very thankful.

Jamie and IOur D-group minus Greg (we missed you buddy). Also, aren't our "Rooted" shirts cool (the dark one with the tree on it)? Thanks Roy and Kara.friend and future roomie, Scottfriends and drivers for the weekend, Caleb and Jackie. This was taken 100 miles east of Macon somewhere off I-16. They also got to feed goats, texas longhorns, geese, a llama, and an emu, somehow all cohabitating in the same pasture.

You can check out more pics here.

I am clean...and I am dirty

I was driving in my car two days ago listening to the song "You and I" by Shane and Shane. I've always loved that song, particularly because of the bridge. It's a wonderful picture of the gospel, particularly how we view our sin. Shane #1 sings the first part (God's words) and Shane #2 sings the second part (ours). Here's how it goes:

You are clean, I've called you clean...I am dirty
You are clean...so unworthy
I've called you clean...dirty
Clean...dirty
Clean...dirty

After that, Shane says "that's what I'm wanting." And I agree with him. I want to see myself as so messed up (becuase I actually am) and then hear God saying He's wiped it all away through Christ. I am dirty...but I now also have been given the righteousness of Christ. That's the gospel. And it's beautiful.

Johnny Cash

Check out this post by Matt over at the Gathering blog. He posts some good thoughts and a great video of Johnny near the end of his life, reflecting over his life.

NC weekend

I went up to North Carolina this weekend to do some hiking with a few friends. It was good times, though our hike was cut short by some heavy rain. It was my first experience with this kind of rain while hiking. We were about 2.5 miles into a 7 mile loop when it started pouring. We quickly made the decision to head back and spent a lot of the trek back sprinting, which added quite an adventurous spirit. That was a lot of fun. I recommend it some time.

I also went to my first casino on Saturday night. We were staying pretty close to Cherokee, so we stopped by Harrah's. My initial thoughts: really smoky and really old people. And when I say old people, I mean people in their 80s and 90s, with wheelchairs and oxygen tanks, who apparently consider it worthwhile to spend their last few days in a casino. It was kind of depressing. While walking through, Piper's "Don't Waste Your Life" talk came to mind. Our group managed to find a smokefree, less depressing area, and Caleb and John managed to win a few bucks at the digital blackjck tables.

I also started and finished "Franny and Zooey" by J.D. Salinger over the weekend. If you've never heard of it, you should check it out. It came highly recommended and I really enjoyed it.

So, overall, a great relaxing trip. I enjoyed all the hang out time, but particularly that of our car's driver...she is pretty cool ; ). Anyway, here are a couple of pics:Pre-rain pic heading in to the woods
Post rain

Why you should use Google Reader

Abraham Piper offers great advice on why you should use Google Reader to read websites/blogs that have an RSS feed. The advice also comes with simple step by step instructions. As a user already, believe me, this will save you a lot wasted time checking sites with no new updates. And who couldn't use a little more time?

Piper and stimulus checks

Piper has some good thoughts over at Desiring God regarding the money we should be receiving soon from the government.

For a moment, forget the political puzzle of getting money back when the country is nine trillion dollars in debt. The more immediate question is: How will you make much of Christ with your "economic stimulus payment"? The president says it will be in the mail in time for Cinco de Mayo.

Clue: Nobody in the world will see you spend your money on yourself and conclude that Christ is your treasure. They will assume you are just like them, no matter how loudly you thank God for this boon. That doesn't mean you shouldn't spend it on yourself (the way we do with most of what we earn). Not everything we do can look different from the world—eat, pay utilities, fill up the car, wear clothes (even thrift-store clothes). And yes, we hope (somehow) that spending on ourselves in some way contributes to our being more Christ-exalting people.

But do we really need this money? Very few do. We would have gotten on fine without it. If we didn't know it was coming, we wouldn't even be feeling the desires we are feeling right now.

May I encourage you to be radically creative and hedonistic. Jesus said, "It is more blessed to give than to receive" (Acts 20:35). And those crazy Macedonians in a "severe test of affliction" and in "extreme poverty" had an "abundance of joy" that overflowed in a "wealth of generosity." They even begged Paul "for the favor of taking part in the relief of the saints" (2 Corinthians 8:2-4). They really believed what Jesus said. Really.

Before the check comes dream of some person or ministry which might make much of Christ because you treasured him above your next home project.

The reason God created money and enabled us to earn it is so that we could show by the way we use it that money is not our treasure, Christ is. That's why the checks are coming. So we can make Christ look great.

"Be content with what you have, for he has said,
‘I will never leave you nor forsake you'" (Hebrews 13:5-6).

Into the Wild

I saw this movie last Thursday night. I know I'm a little behind, but I highly recommend it. Since I want you to actually see the movie, I'm not going include any spoilers, but I did want to speak to a few things.

It's based on a true story of a young guy graduating from Emory in 1990, but who wants nothing to do with corporate America and the materialism associated with it. He decides to travel to Alaska and go into the wild to be free of all people and possessions. Throughout the movie he meets a lot of interesting people along his journey. And there is some incredible cinematography in the process. Without giving much away, it ironically shows the despair of isolation and the importance of living life in community.

Honestly, I can't write much more without giving away a lot of the movie. I just encourage you to see it.

Expelled

The documentary "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" came out this past weekend here in Atlanta. I haven't seen it yet, but hope to see it soon. It basically shows how creationists are laughed at in the scientific community. There's a good article here explaining more about it. And you can check out the Super Trailer here.

I've been exposed to a lot of this type of conversation recently, and it's interesting to see how atheists quickly dismiss creationism as illogical and silly. But how their own ideas sound even more far-fetched, as you can see in the article above. The bottom line is something can't come from nothing. And it seems many evolutionists/atheists know this, but their emotional distaste towards the idea of a God lets them completely reject the idea before even getting started.

My face is peeling

I had the opportunity to go to the Masters last Sunday with my dad. It was pretty cool...thanks again dad. While there, I sunburned the heck out of my face. And thus, the last couple of days I've been peeling. A coworker said something to me yesterday that I still think is hilarious. When I had something in my eye, she said "I think your face is getting in your eye." I don't know why, but I find that so funny. And today, my face was getting all over my suit. I love the simple things that can make me laugh.

More on Rob Bell

Erik posted a book review here of Velvet Elvis, by Rob Bell. You might also be aware that Rob is the creator of the very popular Nooma videos (check here for a review of those). In the review, the author Pat Abendroth reveals many of the ways that this book makes him mad. It's a good summation of why I also believe Rob Bell is dangerous, despite all the many things he might be doing right. Pat sums up his review with these words:

"In my opinion, the reason this book is resonating with so many is because we have seen the evangelical church abandon the Evangel Himself. Yes, much of evangelicalism is empty because the Evangel of our evangelicalism is gone or as David Wells so aptly put it: He has been dislodged from its center. Couple this with a general ignorance of the Bible and church history and you have a book like Velvet Elvis actually seen as publishable by a “Christian” publisher and selling as if it were something novel and good.

Because I love the Evangel of the Bible and therefore historic Christianity, I guess it is off to anger management class for me."