John Calvin: 500 years

Today marks the 500th anniversary of John Calvin’s birth. Born Jean Cauvin, in a small town in northern France, he became the most well known and influential theologian of the second generation of Reformers.

As many of my readers already know, Calvin fever is high this year in both popular and scholastic circles. Conferences are running in Geneva (and elsewhere) as many undertake a Protestant pilgrimage. A few new biographies have come out this year (John Calvin: A Pilgrim’s Life, John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor, etc.) as well as studies, coffee table books (The Piety of John Calvin: A Collection of His Spiritual Prose, Poems, and Hymns, and a historical fiction novel (Betrayal). Undoubtedly, Calvin himself would be embarrassed by this publicity; his will directed he be buried in an unmarked grave.

However, there is good reason to study John Calvin; he systematized Protestant theology in his The Institutes of Christian Religion; he (along with other Reformers) helped create the ‘Protestant work ethic’ with his teachings on vocation. Like Luther, he expounded the sovereignty of God in all things and our absolute dependence on grace for our salvation. His definition of justification in his Institutes is classic:

Now he is justified who is reckoned in the condition not of a sinner, but of a righteous man: and for that reason, he stands firm before God’s judgment seat while all sinners fall….Thus, justified before God is the man who, freed from the company of sinners, has God to witness and affirm his righteousness. In the same way, therefore, he in whose life that purity and holiness will be found which deserves a testimony of righteousness before God’s throne will be said to be justified by works, or else he who, by the wholeness of his works, can meet and satisfy God’s judgment. On the contrary, justified by faith is he who, excluded from the righteousness of works, grasps the righteousness of Christ through faith, and clothed in it, appears in God’s sight not as a sinner but as a righteous man.

Although John Calvin is known primarily as a great theologian, he considered himself primarily a pastor. His letter-writing was prolific, offering godly counsel and practical advice. Likewise, his sermons have also been overlooked. (Fortunately, some previously untranslated sermons are now available in English.) As we remember Calvin, let us not only remember his great contributions to systematic theology or the logic of his description of salvation; let us also remember his piety, his zeal for godliness, and passion to see Christ preached.

As for myself, I’ll read a Calvin biography this year and probably pick up a copy of his sermons on Genesis.

Cult of Celebrity

news |n(y)oōz|
noun
newly received or noteworthy information, esp. about recent or important events
from New Oxford American Dictionary, Second Edition

In the last two weeks, most media outlets have tirelessly broadcast the untimely death of Michael Jackson. So much so that that other news (Iran, Al Franklin, Congress debating on universal health care, etc. [even other celebrities' deaths]) have been pushed to the sidelines. I saw an advertisement for a TV news special entitled. ‘Is the media coverage of Michael Jackson too much?’ I think that by the media asking the question, they have their answer. Apparently journalists have no one else to interview and have begun reporting on themselves.

For another interesting perspective, Carl Trueman has a post A Very English Death Scene at Ref21.

Posterous.com

I’m probably a little behind but just noticed that my friends have been using Posterous.com lately and thought I’d try it out. So, this is my first use of that service.
 
Also, I took this picture in San Diego when I went the weekend after Memorial Day; I’ve been increasing my knowledge of Adobe Photoshop. I like the subtle use of lilac in this composition; Heather also enjoys this picture.

Soon I hope to update the blog with more on my series on whole foods with some links to blogs and further reviews of books. Until then enjoy the above picture.

Posted via email from Christopher’s posterous

Marketing to the Young, Naïve, and Impressionable

In Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser tells the story of the fast food industry. He covers various aspects from history, to marketing, to artificial (and natural) flavour, to slaughterhouses, to why French fries taste so good. Although most us know fast food is not healthy, I suspect most of us do not know how fast food became so prevalent in American culture, and do not realize all the details of how the food gets to us.

The two sections I found the most interesting discussed artificial flavouring and marketing. During the research for the book, Schlosser toured a flavour factory in New Jersey. Here various artificial flavours are created; the products of chemical reactions. In addition, natural flavours are distilled from flora. In the end, the final makeup of natural and artificial flavours is very similar.

The most interesting part of the book was that statistics and practices of marketing to children. The author relates sever of the fast food industry’s past marketing campaigns, many of which my wife and I remember from childhood, such as McDonald’s Teenie Beanie Baby Giveaway and Pizza Hut’s Book It Program. It is disturbing how much is spent on advertising to children. TV ads and give-away programs are not the only marketing, increasingly companies are signing deals with schools to allow advertisements on campus in return for additional funds. Tastes developed in childhood persist into adulthood. America’s health problem is due in no small part to the availability of cheap food.

Schlosser suggests that we ban (or limit) advertising to children. A conclusion with which I support. With the exception of a few child actors, children do not generate money. They are largely dependant on parents’ money for purchasing power. Several marketing studies show advertising to children incites them to nag their parents for the advertised product; several different nagging styles have been identified by researchers. Children, furthermore, cannot tell the different between the TV programme they are watching and the advertising, and do not realize the purpose of advertising; i.e, to sell a product. Advertising any products to children thus usurps the household œconomy and encourages them to break the Fifth Commandment (Honour your father and mother…). Children sadly believe advertisers over their parents and doubt their parent have their best interests in mind. While parents should not encourage or allow excessive TV use, and should not leave their children watching TV unattended, advertising to children is no friend to a family. Our laws should reflect the importance of the family, and not seek to weaken community.

Frivolity of the Word

A few weeks ago in our alternative newspaper Tucson Weekly, Tom Danehy posted this article about the third commandment. (Or second commandment since he is a Roman Catholic.)

I found it amazing that a Tucson alternative newspaper actually has a good discussion of what it means to take God name in vain. (A better translation would be, ‘Do not use the name of God frivolously.’) The writer focuses on claiming to speak for God where God has not spoken.

If he just went a little further and recognized that we are all guilty of breaking that command which should show us our need of grace.

Baby Food Web Article Link

My wife found this link about the quality of baby food: Cheating Babies: Nutritional Quality and Cost of Commercial Baby Food. Enjoy.

Here I Stand: The Wars of the Reformation

Recently I acquired the board game from eBay (as it is sadly out of print). The box came and everything is in great condition, it hardly looks used.

I was excited to have a physical copy of the rules (instead of just a .pdf file) and delved right in. Man! there are a lot of rules, the rule book is 40-some pages, and the sections of the rule book refer forward to unread sections and back to sections which I need to reread. However, once reading the entire rule book the rules do make sense, even if you need to refer to them occasionally. I look forward to playing the game with some friends I surprisingly convinced to agree to play with me. (Thank you, friends, I appreciate this.)

Some general info about the game: it covers the period from 1517-1555 in Europe. The playable powers are the Habsburgs, the Ottomans, the Protestants, the Papacy, France, England, Venice, Scotland, Genoa, and Hungary-Bohemia. Each of the major powers has their own path to victory. More updates as we play.

The Nature of Arizona

Last weekend, we went to the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum with some friends. Even after being there several times and living in Arizona my whole life I’m astounded by the amount of plants I didn’t know the name for.

I realized that soon Charles would ask me the names of these plants (and animals) and I want to give him better names than ’shrub’, ‘tree’, ‘flower’, and ‘#£!! if I know’. To alleviate my ignorance, I decided to purchase a general field guide for Arizona: The Nature of Arizona.

The book is a great introduction to the diverse wildlife of Arizona, from the Sonoran Desert to the Colorado Plateau. The book is filled with great illustrations of amphibians, arthropods, reptiles, mammals, trees, cacti, and wildflowers. Accompanying each illustration is a succinct description of the species’ characteristics including colouring and shape. I enjoyed the book, it is a great introductory tool to the wildlife of Arizona.

As an introductory book, of course, not all Arizona’s species are listed. In reading the book I discovered I am more interested in identifying plants (they have less of a tendency to hide) and will definitely have to follow it up with a book on plants of the Sonoran Desert.

Meeple Mods

Carcassonne: The name evokes an idyllic beautiful pastoral French countryside. Or a bunch of tiles with people figurines confidently stradling roads, cities, and fields.

Before I divulge my modification, let me explain a little about the game. Carcassonne is a German-style board game. (Often it is considered a “gateway game” to the style for its quick and simple play.) The game consists of several tiles with parts of a landscape printed on them — field, river, city, road, and monastery. To begin the game, one player places the start tile atop the table, and has the choice to play a meeple. Then play passes onto the next player, who picks up an unknown tile. He or she must place the tile to match the landscape pictures on the existing tile, and may also play a follower (affectionately known as a meeple) on a feature of the tile. No one may place a meeple on a feature already claimed if the feature extends across touching tiles. When features are completed the player with who has the most meeple on the feature scores points.

We bought expansion pack which added new tiles and, more importantly, the capability to add a sixth player. However, the sixth player meeples were gray which we thought an unimaginative colour. Since the original colours were black, yellow, green, blue, and red, we decided purple would make a great addition to those colours. I bought some model paint and a brush and got to work. Surprisingly they required more coats of paint than expected.

Also included in the expansion pack were large meeple which counted as two meeple for the purposes of the game. Inexplicably, the large meeple are only 4 mm taller (sadly, I actually measured this) than a regular meeple. To help distinguish them, Heather used a silver Sharpie™ to mark a crescent on them, which resembles a small smile.

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

I was given a copy of Susanna Clarke’s debut work 3-4 months ago, but regrettably put it on my shelf and forgot about it. Recently I decided to take a break from my usual fare and ventured to read a work of fiction.

Thus I picked up Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell: A Novel. The book starts slow but is intriguing, holding promise of more interesting material ahead. Clearly, the author does not want to show her cards all at once. The story begins with a meeting of the Learned Society of York Magicians, discussing the decline of English magic. All of the magicians now in England are theoretical magicians and practical magic has not been seen in England for many years. In the first chapter, one of the principal characters, Gilbert Norrell, is introduced. Mr Norrell is England’s only practical magician. The first section of the book chronicles Mr Norrell’s experience in London as he attempts to restore English magic.

Eventually, a third of the way into the book, the 2nd major character is introduced: Jonathan Strange. The book details their work for the government, a strange prophecy concerning them and the restoration of English magic. Along the way, a woman is brought back to life, connexions between England and Færie are re-established, and the magicians quarrel.

The author has a very interesting writing style. She has elaborate descriptions of characters and settings similar to Charles Dickens. Her wit resembles Jane Austen, wherein she combines keen social observations with a dry sense of humour. To give the story an antiquated feel, she employed archaic spellings of some words, for example, ‘chuse’ and ’sopha’.

The work is quite long, around 1000 pages, but reads very quickly once you get into it. The version I was given was divided into three paperback volumes to facilitate reading. I finished the book in about a week reading at a moderate pace. I enjoyed the work quite a bit and highly recommend it if you enjoy fantasy. As a side note, Susanna Clarke spent a decade writing Jonathan Strange & Mr Norell. The rumour is she is working on a sequel which will involve secondary characters from this book; I hope it will be written in less time as I will be sure to pick it up.

Let them Read their Cake

This is a cake I would love to come home to. But it’d be such a shame to eat.

Reading Plans

I have a found a few posts which will enable the reader to read thru various documents in a year. Sure I’m a little late in composing this list but I’m sure my reader will be able to catch up.

The first is the plan from the ESV Study Bible (an excellent Study Bible, review forthcoming).

The second allows you to read the Three Forms of Unity and the Westminster Standards in the course of a year.

And my final link, is for a blog allowing you to read Calvin’s Institutes in a year, with commentary from the folk at Reformation 21

Enjoy.

Last Sermons of the Year and a Legacy

Our pastor has accepted a call in Houston. The last Sunday of the year was his last Sunday in the pulpit of Desert Springs Presbyterian in Tucson. He concluded an excellent three-part Season of the Incarnation Series. Before I describe the series, let me first describe the man.

Dennis is an amazing pastor. I met him my freshman year (2000) when he was the Campus Minister for Reformed University Fellowship at the University of Arizona. He was very engaging and zealous for the Scriptures and God. Coming out of a fundamentalist/evangelical Baptist church, I had heard of Calvinism but thought the theology to be inconsistent with the Bible. However, I was intrigued and during my first semester I attended one of the RUF Bible Studies. I remember one of our first conversations one evening after the Bible study concluded. Dennis explained he was interested in what Scripture said and that our theology should conform to Scripture. He encouraged me in the study of the Bible and even stated that if we found the Bible was soteriologically Arminian then he would (by his adherence to the text) be compelled to change his position.

Well, from studying the text I came to the conclusion that God is sovereign over salvation and does ordain all things. At first I accepted this position, but didn’t rejoice in it (It was after all a humiliation of man.) Dennis taught that right doctrine leads to doxology and I came to see the glory and freedom of the Gospel.

For my four years in the University, I attended RUF and grew in my Christian faith. Even in my dark times, Dennis loved me and worked to show me the Gospel. He lived in light of the Gospel and tirelessly proclaimed it. He always explained that Christians, just as unbelievers, need to hear the Gospel, and reminded us that we continued in the Christian faith the same way we were inaugurated in it, by the grace of God.

He clearly delineated the Gospel as the news of what God has done for us. God took upon himself all the curses of the covenant; and in the life and death of Jesus Christ he humbled himself and bore the wrath of God for us, that we may be exalted and enjoy restored fellowship with God.

Dennis also expressed the beauty of the Reformed and Presbyterian tradition. Calvin did not stand alone in teaching the sovereignty of God in all things, but he stood upon a previous generation of reformers and was versed in previous theologians going back to the Church Fathers. Many men came after Calvin and the Reformed tradition continued to flourish. God has been gracious to us in history to give us a legacy of godly men throughout the ages (even godly men of other traditions).

Dennis was RUF minister for five years and in 2005 accepted a call to the church I attend, Desert Springs Presbyterian. He faithfully exegeted the Scriptures weekly (in season and out of season) and humbly showed forth what a great God we have, and how great his salvation is. The church was shown the centrality of Word and Sacrament under his leadership. In the service, he often explained the liturgy so it would not become rote. In all things, Dennis emboldened us in the Gospel and God used him to transform our church into a more outward-oriented, missional church.

God has used Dennis mightily in my life and in Tucson; he is a giant among men and although this chapter of Dennis’s legacy is closed, God will use him powerfully in Texas as well. True, it is sad to see Dennis leave, but I believe, however, that God has prepared us for this, and it will be exciting to see the impact of Dennis’s legacy as we call a new pastor.

…Oh, yes, I was going to discuss his last triad of sermons: each of the three focuses on a birth: the birth of Isaac, the birth of Samson, and the birth of Christ. The first two foreshadow the latter, and discuss certain themes which find their fulfilment in Christ. Interspersed between these was a Christmas Eve sermon on Galatians 4:4-7 concerning our adoption as sons; and that God has not forsaken or abandoned us, nor has he left us alone. The Christmas Eve service included readings from all of Scripture from Genesis to Revelation to show the history of salvation.

Without further ado:
Unto Us a Son is Given (Isaac)
Unto Us a Child is Born (Samson)
Christ the Saviour is Born (Jesus)

As a concluding thought: Dennis is a man who is intoxicated with the ale of the Gospel and exhorted us to drink deeply of that draught. I am pleased to count him as my spiritual father.

Winter Rime

My friend Sean called me and challenged me to a little competition as to who could create the best Christmas poem. (I later found out that he had already written his before calling me.) I accepted and finished late yesterday. Enjoy and do leave comments as to what you like about each poem. (You may also vote for best.) Maybe next year more can join in the competition.

The Incarnation
©2008 Sean McGinty

The birthing cry announces the situation.
Into space, time and this dreary ghetto town
Comes something new, at least from our perception.
Joy, hope, fear embodied has to us come down.

This child will bring about the end,
In one way or another, of all.
The turning point of the immutable trend
Set about by the most treacherous of falls.

Our friends and lovers have failed and left.
All our expectations have crashed down on our heads.
God help us, the poor, the lonely, the bereft,
The sick, the tired, the living, the dead.

We who swallow our tears cry out
And tonight we are answered.
Blinding hosts invade to tell about
The long sought cure for our cancer.

These winter rifts will soon be healed.
The tattered things, certainly mended.
Tombs of every sort will be unsealed,
And this aching darkness ended.

Peace upon our wretched hearts,
Peace upon our addled brains.
Sin resolved by our Lord’s art
Of drawing mercy from His pain.

Christmas Chiasmus
©2008 Christopher Hall

And the Word became flesh.
The King of Glory descending,
Took on humanity.
Unplumbed of mysteries;
In pure humility 
He left his throne condescending.
Human and Divine mesh.

Born fallen man to redeem,
Like us in every respect;
Unlike Adam he obeyed
The Saviour committed no wrong;
And the whole Law he portrayed; 
Yes, sin did he reject.
Repealed Adam’s curse as theme.

Agreed before all time
Mercy to shower mankind.
God’s wrath on God pourèd;
Our covenant curses he took;
His ire now assuagèd.
Grace toward us God aligned;
God Triune in full rhyme.

This mystery ushers us praise;
Praise for his complete redemption!
The Trinity in Unity,
Exalt the Triune God who secured life!
Lo, Unity in Trinity.
Praise for God’s wrought salvation!
In song let us our voices raise.

Works we could not do;
Adam fully did deprave
Seed, Hope is Christ, keeping
Covenant blessings does he give
To his chosen. Sweeping
Second Adam burst the grave;
His pure work makes all new.

By his perfect life and death,
Our guilt he exchanged.
Evil broken evermore,
The Saviour left undone no good.
His people’s sin he bore
And our nature he changed.
His righteousness bequeaths breath.

God and man: Jesus,
Second Person of Trinity.
Come to earth, humbly born,
In hypostatic union,
To be counted forlorn.
Son of God from eternity,
And he dwelt among us.

Khet: Play like an Egyptian

We borrowed the game Khet from our friends, the Pixleys. The concept of this game is to direct a laser beam, using mirrored pieces, onto the opponent’s Pharaoh. This is not as easy as it seems; on our first game my wife wiped out her own Pharaoh with a misdirected mirror.

Khet has four types of pieces: an unreflective obelisk, a reflective pyramid, a doubly reflective djed, and the pharaoh. The pieces may move one square in any direction or rotate 90 degrees. The game instructions suggest three opening scenarios, but the players may create their own. On each turn, a player must move a piece of theirs and fire their laser beam. Since each player fires a laser beam, there are two paths that must be watched for an attack. If a laser beam shines on an unreflective surface of a piece, that piece is removed from the board.

What is interesting is that although the game is quite unlike chess in the mechanics, some of the strategy translates over. For example, there are pins, forks, and other such scenarios. Embarrassingly enough my dad, who is an avid chess player, learnt the game and actually won our third game.

Khet is a very fun game, with simple rules and complex strategy. I’m looking forward to acquiring the beam splitter and tower expansion packs.