In Answer to Ross

I wonder, then, what Calvin would have made of the various attempts since his time to build "transformed societies". Looking at the examples of South Africa, Northern Ireland, Scotland and the Netherlands, one is left with the impression that these initiatives have had fairly short half-lives. And, while I am not in the Reformed family, it's not exactly clear to me as to why.
OK, comment/criticism/clarification welcome.
 -- http://baylyblog.com/comment/36667#comment-36667

I am also not sure how far into (i.e. theological depth) the Reformed family I am. ;) What little [good] theology I have came from being humbled before the Scriptures as a liar (and hypocrite), false religionist, and anomous do-gooder trained-up (wrong) in neo-evangelicalism...for transforming society, but that also left me with [too much to] say here in reply: if the end is to build a society here on earth, compromise is necessary: part-and-parcel with "biblical" theology is that salvation is of God, and Him only; He authors, He either hardens or softens hearts; He makes the seeds planted by preachers (of whatever) grow or whither...anything attempting to transform on a grand scale and which won't be stopped, da*n it! will have to compromise in some serious ways if it is to do all it can to ensure that it remains effective, and either way will be subject to *little* temptations to adjust method and message (see McLuhan on this--it's something the world but not evangelicals get, when the Scriptures themselves authorize but one method of reaching sheep within the world for God).

Put another way, it must be God who causes the growth or, despite a the appearance of health on the surface, what lurks beneath is cancer. From what I can grasp (because I know the trajectory causing the PCA to depart from where it should be) from discussions and watching, in the past, of that denom., or closer-to-home (heart) the likes of "reformed baptist" assemblies like Sovereign Grace Ministries (er...more difficult to digest due to its origins and lack of ever having truly and publicly repented of false apostles and the very structures it has maintained since and now the revelation that the same dynamics and abuses of the shepherding cults--which my old long-time church also arose out of, and also with a false apostle), what usually happens is the dilution of offense and twisting of words, e.g. probably around the time the Baylies were working with the CBMW I was, despite being in theological and spiritual turmoil, beginning to duke it out with "complementarianism" seeing its trajectory, that it had already become established because it avoided "patriarchy" and allowed the feminist-ettes in the church to dance-around submission or the hard-to-stomach about it, not to mention men to be effeminate about it all; "patriarchy" was even caricatured as much among these type of folks as it is in academia--something reacted to rather than understood or studied carefully. (No offense to the Baylies btw.)

And that's all despite being raised TO change the world, being told that is what the gospel is and for on the macro--for "changing lives" on the micro. The dynamics you see with failures to actually convert a soul though you transform include, among other things, such dancing-around: instead of telling anyone the thing which would offend them, which btw is likely also what is needed to convict them of their idolatry and sin, many other things that sound wonderful are told, then build a relationship, and once you've got the emotional leverage and interpersonal credit, ONLY THEN! should you go on to teach those offensive things, gently, prodding and pleading, reassuring and "adjusting" words as fit to keep the hearer/new friend/convert/potential convert...e.g. you'll find in a certain popular author's IVP book how it's best to let the topic of Sovereignty alone, until someone is converted and then grows into a stomach that can handle it...I loved [listening to] that book, but couldn't believe my ears when Jesus himself not only frankly declared it to the crowd (and continues to in the gospels--what do you do when you first arrive at that reading, rush past it and urge no one to pay much attention?) but was even doing so to offend men away from believing to whom it had not been given... I realized this once to break the false gospel-ization of a girl who had been told very little of Lone-Author of salvation and looked very much to her "my decision", though explained it along with the other keys of the gospel: those who supposedly tag-teamed to convert her glossed-over in the eyes and looked bored, she was crying and saying "God did all this just for me?" and marveling that she had no part in it: that's good theology (I think), and the stuff it's meant for--producing proper understanding of our position and role with regards Him in all things.

I am guessing the Reformed world has been all-too-happy to accept, without discipline, people with no good theology or doctrine at all since, for a long time, they grew by birthing and, though in secret, assured themselves that baptisms meant regeneration for their infants (watch as the semi-devout women untutored in the file-cabinet orthodoxy of the affluent Presbyterian social clubs begin to go berzerk when some minister who baptized their children as infants is exposed to have been in some heinous sin or two: it's quite a temptation to fall into that self-assurance just as much as churches everywhere are tempted to keep it comfortable and civil and expose and shame and convict no one, "after all, we need the new blood and growth and it'll be good for them to be able to come sit comfortable and hear the word...").  I am quite certain they largely came from my old quarters in the neo-evangelical mix, and that they go after becoming intellectually dissatisfied, and that these Churches are also easily duped for finding how wonderful these newcomers are in being very active, zealous, excited to do things, push people into the open and run programs...but their theology and actual substance barely tested and they haven't left their old homes over becoming horrified at the realization that the teaching and practice is false, indeed no--all manner of disorder and insobriety and false teaching filled those times and they still attribute it all to God's name and call it all a stepping stone that somehow He authored what they needed at that precise time, and you dare not say anything against my former [false] pastor!--so they...

So you end-up with masses and masses of converts who never sorrowed unto unto the repentance not to be repented of...and masses and masses of converts into "more intellectually satisfying" (and that's how it's put, "we had learned all we had at that [old] church" <-actual a="" affiliations="" and="" are="" as="" atop="" been="" boot-strapped="" br="" brian="" but="" change="" changed="" changes="" changing="" churches="" counterfeit="" day="" declared="" deep="" despite="" doctrine="" either="" everything="" expect="" false="" for="" get="" god="" goes="" have="" his="" how="" impressive-sounding="" in="" into="" it--to="" it.="" it="" leaven="" leaveth="" little="" long="" lump="" maclaren="" more="" never="" not="" of="" one="" only="" opposed="" or="" over="" participants="" people="" perils="" quote="" read="" religion="" remain="" renewed="" rolled-over="" should="" sin="" so="" some="" someone="" sorrowed="" soul="" sound="" suit="" systematically-rigorous="" teachers="" teaching="" the="" then="" theologically="" these="" they="" things.="" to="" transformed="" unchurch="" us="" washed="" we="" which="" who="" whole="" will="" with="" within="" you="">


* I had been invited to see this [spectacle] by a friend.
**  I was writing to this friend in frantic terror on the back of the pamphlet given-out there how the things being taught were false, and all sounded like the sort of claptrap from the mouth of the false teacher Brian MacLaren, just before this teacher shouted that sentence.

This is not liberation theology or a social gospel, but it is about being social and liberating the oppressed-by-wicked, and the oppressed-by-ignorance

I've been thinking about these things and, want to do more than just find a job, but find a means to be both upright and efficient--in its old term--as well; to effect just outcomes and preach righteousness, embody it, and demand it, for the sake of my Lord and His good name (all to myself in secret, first of all). This also means being social, in the sense of interacting, as well as loving--in the sense of obeying and conforming to Christ, and it also means persuading--meaning finding co-workers with the same ends in view. In our context, it also means legally bypassing power structures of the wicked, to avoid lending them any strength, demanding they go back within their limits, using every measure available to obtain that end, and to call for the proper trial and punishments of those who have done unjustly even though in the name of good.

I'm confident that the contemporary-Reformed community--which you never see madly urging people into the kindgom on the busiest of streets where you'll find plenty of the heretics, babbling preacherettes, and televangelist pento-charismatical knock-offs--is currently too plagued with indifference, leisure, comfort, the proud, the intellectually-stuffed (the we-came-cause-we-outgrew-evangelical-insanity-and-became-intellectually-dissatisfied-with-their-stupidity-but-are-still-evangsmellicals-who're-here-to-be-intellectually-satisfied!) as things go; whether OPC or PCA or URCNA, you'll find one kind of off-the-deep-end or another no matter how hard you look for purity, it's appalling; the PCA is infecting the RBs with Tim Kellerism and the last one I attended had men laughing at the idea of fighting over his mis-teachings; the OPC has men proclaiming better to worship with Lutherans than the schismatic baptists because they all deny the validity of their baptisms--despite so commonly Baptists, unlike Landmarkists, actually just require a credible profession of belief and evidence of sanctification (you know, real or Augustinian-type spiritual realities thinking).

The difference between the wackos on the streets and the Reformed in their steeple-churches (or God forbid, unchurch hip-scene constructs, or messianic-Jew-Judaizing-synagogues-to-reach-Jewry-with-Jewishness), with the former they're truly mad, though in love with something; we're sane-ish, calculating, just not in love at all. The tutelage of people I wouldn't really trust to help me isn't one I wish to put children under, yet the ones attempting to change things or do good, though often misguided, are also unsound in doctrinal matters: woe are we (as a nation) for the divorce between orthodoxy and orthopraxy. Each alone gives rise to madnesses, and madness to destructions of various sorts. How can our kind perpetuate the unadulatered gospel attended by the Spirit of God, however, without going raving mad in the midst of such tragedy? Why aren't we raving mad exposing the false preachers in the streets, instead of civily speaking of their pros and cons in academic circles, and conferences of celebrated Reformed personalities speaking to the layment-from-far-off just as vainly done by the evangsmellicals, seeking acceptability? Where are the old-school PCA men being brotherly to expose and denounce Dispensationalism and its two-means, two-flocks, two-plans and other heresies, amidst RBs who profess to holding to the London-type Confessions, the 1st-Londoners who reject the second on the grounds of myths because their fundamentalism procludes them from carefully attending to history, or the RBs denouncing the baptismal-regeneration that is, indeed, common amidst the baby-sprinkling women of the paper-orthodoxy neo-orthodoxy professing Reformed-ism? Don't the let's-all-just-be-warm "civils" know that true friends sharpen each other like iron--that clashing with swords can be a good thing and is what friends do? My Chinese friend likes to say that true friends "fight" each other, both to exact understanding from one another and to urge one another to be better.

I am not out there because I do not believe I am altogether theologically sound, I am unlearned and mean, without understanding or proper instruction in doctrine; I was given over to much babble in my youth, and though I have worked to undo it, I confess acedie and also succumbing to terrible conditions: oppressive and awful as they may have been, it is still no excuse, I repent. All said, I am also unaware how to escape such traps without help--the poor are needy such as to lack even the means to their own improvement, such is I for now, but perhaps I have just enough to work, incrementally, out of it. It is not that there is no talent or opportunity, either, but that men need help anyway, if only in the acceptation of others to share their substance in exchange for value, whether work or a good, and the men we are surrounded with are not laborers or producers, they are consumers whether or not they wish to be. Many others are stuck. There is even a name for this when the non-choice is poverty, the "poverty trap"; indeed this applies to more than income, but the ability to gain knowledge and understanding, for instance.

If men were fair and rulers good, no one would be impoverished, for everyone could produce and be rewarded according to need and his labors, trading and working without fear or taxation or burden or exploitation or being leveraged. The reality is far different. Guys like me cannot accept, though we love, the MacArthurian-and-quasi/really/kinda dispensationalist RBs, 2nd-Lond-Baptist-Confession-is-bad-'cause-[we're-ignorant-of-history-and-still-fundamentalists-attempting-intellectualism-as-though-sophomores/schoolboys], charismatic-enthused-for-Reformed-theology-but-Arminian-in-practice, or even Orthodox-Presbyterian-but-Neo-Orthodox-in-practice camps; impurity and lukewarmness alike are all bad. I am myself guilty of another sin: despairing rather than looking in hope for strength after having been bludgeoned in life so long. But the solution to hard slogging is to slog harder, and get smarter to slog harder and wiser, and to keep going incrementally building strength until you laugh at the mire, something I've had to learn several times before and accomplish extreme feats and which, I realize, I should not only do again, but keep doing.

Guys like me have such bad current situations they are even attempting, foolishly, to take-in as much as possible reformulate, and undertake massive exploits which might undermine injustice, and give them space to live...legally, by which I mean homeless people can't sleep in a garage without violate some kind of "public protection" (taxable market values and "character of the neighborhood" i.e. town-created-privileging of property holders' interests over common-to-all rights and liberties) measure or "law" though of course do so outside and police are just as likely to come "greeting" as the crazy crack-addict (or other homeless guy) is to come to your aid if there are only one or two of them popo. That is unacceptable, and I think the first line of assault on entrenched and pervasive injustice is to take-up the means to defend, and do everything one can, to discredit those things which make defenseless, the most needy. Undermine privileges popularly supported which undermine rights, especially those made because ya'-don't-wanna-have-poor-foot-traffic (an actual argument in the original case where zoning was under assault/being defended that decided that zoning was legitimate), or a bad view, or a noisy poor person in his garage working next door (when ya know, you just can't be bothered to better insulated your household office and get thicker windows), or a rooster next door...

The next, of course, is to start educatin' those po' self-destructives...self-destructives they may be, but they are also likely people, at least when related, that are most apt to help. They might be inconsistent--may turn on a dime, later, and exact from you some sort of penalty for daring associate--but they're likely also more open, maleable, to being urged to repentance and faith, cause the poorer the less likely to be in this life's comforts, thus often the better, though not always. I’m hoping, Deo Volente, to gain means or strength at least to start reading good books with such people, and maybe in tens years of prep to shake-up the world around me.

When I was Young I was a Fool, Older I know my Foolishness

Change the world.

I did not understand that doing so required more than just helping people materially, changing their minds or behaviors, but changing what they love. The gospel of evangelicaldom, which when examined writ-large is a broad way, appealing to people's emotions and pangs of anger and agony and "felt needs” over the state of their broken homes and misery, because of its roots in a philosophy of outreach based on felt needs, arising from paranoia over a perceive state in decline of conversions and Christian society many years ago.

With their indoctrination from youth that they should also help those less-well-off, which is not a bad thing, the people could be shown photos of need and misery far worse throughout the world, experience visceral responses desired by those holding some communicative event, induced to pledges of "I will go", and made ready for making the connection between the miseries shown and a dearth of faith, a need for the repeal of godlessness, a spread of Christianity...

Yet looking back, there was an offer only in superficiality of Jesus' name, empty of much substance or a definite integrity--as is like the broader movement. Meaning can be found here, yet in unity wrought of works, not the faith. Faith can be found here, yet not in the biblical doctrine of God. Its congregations are filled with the hunger for better life: whether in changed lives, fixed homes, happy family, purpose, direction for their activities and energies, feeling far better than the miseries wrought by sin too often bring, and the destruction it has reaped for their lives and society--whether theirs or the sin of their fathers and mothers.

In other words, it is filled with the kind of person to be logically expected from whatever, at a given moment, its members have used to catch people. The modern fishing metaphor applies well here, that you will catch people with what they love; an old warning of pastors that you will have to keep feeding people with what you lured them is also pertinent; the idea of catching men with what they are or you can make them think they are looking for while they are, to use the theological term, unregenerate, means one will continue on with people staid only by receiving what you first sold them.

Yet the fishing metaphor as found in the gospels is much different. Jesus's own words even about the persons who came for teaching and who were kept by the bread that made to fed the five thousand men (not even counting women and children) should strike at the thought of spreading religion by behaviorism, felt needs, inducing emotional responses and then offering catharsis (as you will find in thousands of sophisticated manipulative environments called "Churches" in their services, across our land), and should deal mortal blows at packaged and prominent, as well as extemporaneous and fluid forms of sociological approaches or Church-Growth philosophies and man-centered appeals and efforts to building little kingdoms by whatever seemingly successful means while saying it is all done in the name of Jesus and for God's glory, the Spirit be damned in this pursuit I guess, tragic since He's the Spirit of Christ and One who guides into all truth. Rick Warren writes on how Jesus was meeting felt needs and drawing crowds, as found in various stories of the gospels, yet to read those gospels one sees that after the crowd awakens where he has left them, and follows him across the sea, he confronts them as, really, unbelieving, that they sought him because "you at the loaves and you were filled." He does not in a group or committee plan the next means of drawing a large gathering or encourage these people; he fed them out of compassion on the hungry and looking after them--as the God who sends rain on both the just and unjust--yet tells them they will suffer hell in death for not believing, and even going on to say they do not because they cannot, because it hasn't been given them to...

The felt needs of natural man are often distinct from their true needs as declared by God. Men surely need bread, but they would come to make Him king, not to eat his flesh and drink His blood--to believe into and on Him for everything in trust. They would come to set him up as a King to subdue the gentiles and tax them into luxury and opulence, He would author faith in them to bring them into the Court of the temple before ripping down the wall of partition between Jew and Gentile and ushering-in an age where they formed for Him a people as one flock, despite the partitions He himself, at first, had erected to keep them separate: such was done to make many points, but are useless apart from a heart of faith like that of Abraham, no matter the outward signs.

And that faith is not a decision or option. Men will not, as natural men, if it has not been given to them. Just as the fishers of that time laid down a dragnet and scraped fish from waters, the fishing of which Jesus spoke is a dragging by the Spirit of God; to the very crowd who followed and to His disciples, he said, that none would come to Him except the father "drag" (the literal translation of the Greek term) the one to Him, which is the first half of a famous verse famously ignored to focus on the second half about none whom the Father gives Him will ever get away: men are happy to assure salvation to those who profess to accept, loatheful to announce that salvation is the gift of God, and not by works--even a willful act of assent to easily called "believing".

Our endless politicization of all things, as they have rendered moral points null and subjective, important only for political advantage and gaining leverage in rhetoric over a rival alike who is attempting, through schemes, to make utopia, forgot all these things. Even now, despite the much gossiped decline in religion, Jesus is to liberals and the [neo-]conservatives the one to bring egalitarianism, feminine liberation, individual license to self-actualize or liberty to self-express and build a business. To old conservatism he was an impediment to order and threat to practical means of producing desirable consequences, a potential threat to authority if preached plainly as espoused in Scriptures who might topple the heads of State or king who decides to divorce his wife. He is for some groups the way to excuse every deviation form the norm or misbehavior in the name of "being loving", condemning any criticism or "judgment" as its contrary rather than sound judgement being its corollary and partner, and for other the seat of a new moralism to save society, if not so much to demand genuine faith. He is the excuse for the productive to build mansions and little kingdoms for themselves by right and liberty from judgment because they are harmless or they are moral, the self-destructive and "liberal" to condemn their greed for refusal to give to the self-destructive and save them from consequence, and by use of his words to hide that they, themselves, are greedy.

He is the means for evil men and politicians to denounce application of religious sentiment to religion, mis-using "give unto Caesar what is Caesars", in their attempt to censure, silence, and exclude moral voices who oppose ungodly, unnatural, unlawful or unConstitutional actions and programs; yet He is one who gave full approval to the baptizing prophet who condemned Herod for ungodlines sand demanded repentance for taking his brother's wife: so we can do to renounce subversion, theft in the name of redistributivism not to the truly needy but the dissolute and self-destructive; funding of government at every level to interfere with necessary rights and liberties for the sake of men caring for themselves in whatever circumstances, even when those politicians and powers claim they act in the name of general welfare or public interest, and on and on, especially when we are charged by the standing Highest law to resist and even attack the courts themselves should they begin to subvert and ignore the Constitution.We are never anywhere compelled by any valid law to lay down our duty under good law and surrender to evil, if well-intention, people and their schemes' requirements to take liberty away.

Perhaps more than all things, Jesus is the way to determine what is real love, and what men love. He is beloved for His utility by many but not His teaching or own person. And love is what you look to for fulfillment, to obey, and therefore spend your own self on even unto abandon. Men claim his name to say that condemnation of sins like homosexuality is unChristian because it is "unloving" while He himself warned He did not come to abolish the law...and that the greatest in His kingdom (of heaven) would be those who teach it; such call themselves advocates for repressed people while reproaching Christians who likely do not call for any harm to come from those whom they simply disapprove, and then laws to criminalize disapproval as "hate"...just as Jesus said, on account of fidelity to His word, men would "blaspheme (reproach is a better term) and persecute you on account of me." Fake love says what does not make men feel good is harmful, evil, unloving; true love will make you as upset and uncomfortable as possible while doing you no real harm (i.e. moral, permanent physical damage, etc.) as it demands for your own sake, in the eyes of God, that you repent and look to Him for true salvation, truth, etc. Hell, men claiming to speak in the name of Christ call harmful those who disapprove of them and who will not lend them association or a hand, and call upon the government to harm them, while genuine Christians, in accordance with God's word, condemn (as the law) what they do and what they say as sin, while remaining harmless as doves. Men who try, by persecutions, to make for themselves a heaven here, make hell on earth for those misfortunates subject to their power and reach; how happily that the needy and oppressed of the earth are promised for their meek assurance of the faithfulness of God that they will, in His return, receive both heaven and earth recreated all anew, but most of all God Himself their treasure.

And contrary to the notion of love as feelings, that by making men feel good you can gain over them leverage and influence, though it is true, such will not alter their spirits for the good and truly change the world with enduring success. It is rather, by display and proclamation of real love, which is costly, and the command to repent and to practice it, which is costly, and assertion of inherent rights to man by cause of His partaking in the image of God, though ruined, who therefore is said to endow them with innate capacities requiring liberty for exercise, without interference by those of other interests without the most pressing and sincere of necessity arising of their duty, perhaps say to defend from foreign invasion those taxes and compelled in some way, for which men will both die and yet by shed blood and the blessing of God plant seeds in men's hearts and, should God bless such labors, repent of their murderousness even those responsible for making them victims, and so reap to the oppressed and meek brothers in eternity who with them will shed tears, not as much for the wrongs committed against men who became by the Spirit of adoption their brothers, but the God who made them both sons and became their Father and brother, and bequeathed to them alike Himself as inheritance and His riches of benevolence by His graces.

A little prayer:

We go out this day, Oh God, to act in our own interests, yet hopefully in the interest of others and in show of thy great goodness and mercies, to the praise of you the Majesty and to glorify thy name, but in us are sins of ignorance, simplicity, malice, iniquitous hearts and deception of error, save us Oh Lord from such causes for harm, and protect us from those who would punish us for repentance and acting in accord with the rule of faith, by their defeat everywhere and submission to justice that is real to show men shall not, in whatever position they find themselves, blaspheme thy name or make mockery of your justice and vengeance against sin as though you are slow in coming. Grant us repentance therefore, before the shedding of blood, assuage thy own anger at us by outpouring of thy truth and power unto salvation from such sin, and by shedding tears of us by looking upon whom we have pierced, laying us down on the earth to wear sackclothe and ashes, and wait upon you in trust to provide us your righteousness and washing unto sanctification to be worthy, without fear or lies in hypocrisy or vanity, to speak thy name. Petitioned of you because we believe these are good petitions directed toward so benevolent and attentive a God, in Jesus name, Amen.

Jesus Plus Nothing His Word

Only the sick have need of a physician. Those who say they do not need to get better or do well, do not know of their need, and do not accept the Physician. And millions today who have words to that effect, were drawn not by nets or by conviction unto sorrow working repentance, but for a purposeful life, for a better changed life, for direction in life to do and see great things--to build "Jesus' kingdom", to acquire and finally have a not-dysfunctional/abusive/messed-up family but one with wisdom, happiness, comfort, love, folks worth trusting and listening to because that they have been promised Jesus can do...and I'm afraid that such has nothing to do with precisely with what He Himself said was necessary to possess Him. (Though versions of these things certainly can be--and some certain become--consequences of inheriting the King.)

For instance, millions--literally millions--scoff and blaspheme those who insist that doctrine not only ought be correct, but that it is Jesus Himself that warned it needs be correct, else one may have been taken captive by wolves in sheep's clothing, teaching and doing in His name--and doing noble things that are great powers!--but will be told, "I never knew you"; so often I have heard men say about this that whether one will hear this is dependent upon their works rather than Jesus', or that therefore they'll keep working to build His kingdom and draw men nigh unto a right life, "loving" and "preaching" what they call "Jesus"!

But of course, that's kind-of the thing, supposedly, the very men he speaks of coming to Him, having done in His name and yet, "I never knew you" is their reward along with being sent away. Millions more...have dead orthodoxy if any at all, while the zealous nowadays? Zealous for works, but their own. While pretending to themselves to be faithful they go and do what the "liberals" did a century ago--divorcing the life and walk from the doctrine, the thing ill-described with modern notions of "message" or "teaching" used vaguely and without precision to hew to the word, though perhaps a lot of ostentation and sophistry.

So I would edit this^ (propaganda photo) if it were of my making. I need to get better--of my ignorance and sickness of heart, deadness in sin and ruin by its indwelling and fruits; by the false doctrines spread about in the name of Jesus and thousand little kingdoms built in His name and by attribution to His work blaspheming and causing Him to be blasphemed in regards the many departures and substitutes proposed in the stead of His own word, interpretations for a real reading of His revelations, and so forth: indeed perhaps more do I need repair from the counterfeits substituted for the real thing to draw me and others in, than many other things one could think needing healing for: if cancer, auto-immune conditions, depression, despondency, endless grief...let it be that I have instruction from the Father and Son, through the Spirit and by His leading, to be washed of poisoned and muddy waters, and kool-aid where the blood of the Only-begotten was needful for drinking. I need...to be made well by Him who is the truth and yet warned of the many counterfeits coming--a message His apostles spread and warned of, and wrote eventually "even now there are many antichrists" (in Gr. = substitutes for Christ).

Why write all this^? Because there is a false piety and love of "simple religion" consisting of "all I want/need is 'JESUS'", divorcing the Man from His word--the life from doctrine, the change of life from a heavenly birth and attributing it to "the philosophical result of the right use of the constituted means" (full context given below*), to give a quote (of an heretical quality) from the hero and model for contemporary "evangelicalism", which has nary an simile to the historical sort named such by the Lutherans; whether a behavioristic manipulation of men with clever speech and attention to what key phrases and current fads catch attention, or looking for "felt needs" (emotions) to take advantage of: no wonder they "burn out" and die, and must "refresh" endlessly at yet another empty well of conferences filled with men's ideas, who think they're rich and praise one another about their humility and knowing one another's hearts. (* "There is nothing in religion beyond the ordinary powers of nature. A revival is not a miracle, nor dependent on a miracle, in any sense. It is a purely philosophical result of the right use of the constituted means—as much so as any other effect produced by the application of means. . . . A revival is as naturally a result of the use of means as a crop is of the use of its appropriate means" [Charles Finney, Lectures on Revivals of Religion (Old Tappan, NJ: Revell, n.d.), 4-5].")

NO, in the modern context--due to the abuse of that language--though literally true I think it cannot be said while communicate truth accurately, "I just need Jesus": these have, after all, become words to which the "Christian" population is conditioned to react, to shut-down their thought and turn them upon critics and any who dare "attack" their religion, beliefs and actions alike--or forgive me, "spirituality"...for those who get offended even by this, "Just Jesus!"; those four little words cannot in such a poisonous context be used to proclaim faithfully--when one is cognizant of such difficulties or else fallen prety to the counterfeit now embodied in these few words--and explaining, very thoroughly, also all that entails and what He said--of which it seems the highest preachers are ignorant (I was shocked at the shock of Ted Haggard falling, for instance: around 10 years-old I was in his church several weeks upon invite of mother and I by her friend, and heard him blather about not sinning by mere will for weeks, and instructing all "pray about something only once, else you're doubting God!" obviously diverging from Jesus and apostles--and I hadn't even read the Bible, just heard exerpts in a Catholic mass to which my great aunt would take me). To the modern mind "Jesus" say person; to the ancient, and historical one, just as He said, He is not received apart from His word--or the Father's dragging a man to Him. (Apart from these, there is no surprise that men should abandon "their" faith: the faith--and its Object--were never theirs. Actually, such men are often better off: better such truth become evident to them, than remain in company of men deluded by false religion.)

And ostentatious as it may seem to use such words from another time and tongue, they're now a technical phrase which embodies--like most technical statements--so much more such that, for those who know that substance, they know whether they are here a fitting end,

Solo Deo Gloria.

Here you can find a wonderful photo blog:

Even better, this photoblog (http://rockmountainphotography.blogspot.com/) is of the Rocky Mountain region and its wildlife. It includes shots of landscapes and animals, and some videos.

Striking back...

The Real Book Blog.

Where are...

...the days going: two are missing. I don't know anymore...