Nielsen’s Nook

It looks like the orthodox have had some more success in Virginia, where a judge sided with eleven breakaway Episcopal churches in their fight to retain property after their split. Read the article at Christianity Today.

WASHINGTON (CNN) — The Bush administration has launched a “significant escalation” of covert operations in Iran, sending U.S. commandos to spy on the country’s nuclear facilities and undermine the Islamic republic’s government, journalist Seymour Hersh said Sunday. … [It is reported that] Congress has authorized up to $400 million to fund the secret campaign, …

President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have rejected findings from U.S. intelligence agencies that Iran has halted a clandestine effort to build a nuclear bomb and “do not want to leave Iran in place with a nuclear program,” Hersh said.

“They believe that their mission is to make sure that before they get out of office next year, either Iran is attacked or it stops its weapons program,” Hersh said.

… [read the whole article on CNN]

Do we really need a third front in the Middle East? Is it wise to start a war which one’s administration will not be able to oversee? How will we afford a three-front war when can’t afford the two-front one? I’m ready for a different theme, myself.

Investigation Pending…

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Presently, there is a crisis in Anglicanism. Large numbers of Bishops are currently meeting in Jerusalem for the first ever Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON 2008). They are meeting to discuss the future of the Anglican Communion and we pray give leadership to it at a time when it is being systematically ripped apart. I commend to you the blog of Fr Greg Brewer who is on the Board of the Anglican Relief and Development Fund and Rector of the Church of the Good Samaritan, Paoli, PA. His blog is a chronicle of his experience first hand at GAFCON. Dr Os Guiness spoke at GAFCON on the Gospel and Secularism. Here’s a quote from Fr. Brewer’s blog chronicle:

Dr. Os Guinness on “The Gospel and Secularism”: The whole modern world represents the greats opportunity for the Gospel since the apostles. It also represents the greatest challenge to the Gospel. Never underestimate the profound anti-Christian assumptions of secularism. Never have evangelicals had clearer views on the authority of Scripture, but never has evangelical behavior been more chaotic and permissive that it is today. Those who choose to look to contemporary culture to guide their faith decisions, lose the authority of Scripture and cut themselves off from Christianity around the world.” (This quote was edited for spelling)

You may listen to the address via streaming audio on the GAFCON website or playing it here locally using the link above.

To follow up on the post I wrote this morning on the Supreme Court decision to strike down the death penalty conviction against a father who raped his 8 year old daughter, I thought it was encouraging to see Barack Obama making public statements against the decision today.

The New York Times reported today that those convicted of raping children may no longer be executed for their crime. I am generally not very excited about the death penalty as a form of punishment; however, the reasons given in this article made my stomach turn.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Wednesday struck down a law that allows the execution of people convicted of a raping a child.

In a 5-4 vote, the court said the Louisiana law allowing the death penalty to be imposed in such cases violates the Constitution’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

”The death penalty is not a proportional punishment for the rape of a child,” Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in his majority opinion. His four liberal colleagues joined him, while the four more conservative justices dissented.

There has not been an execution in the United States for a crime that did not also involve the death of the victim in 44 years.

Patrick Kennedy, 43, was sentenced to death for the rape of his 8-year-old stepdaughter in Louisiana. He is one of two people in the United States, both in Louisiana, who have been condemned to death for a rape that was not also accompanied by a killing.

The Supreme Court banned executions for rape in 1977 in a case in which the victim was an adult woman.

Forty-five states ban the death penalty for any kind of rape, and the other five states allow it for child rapists. Kennedy’s case is the only time a state has sought to execute someone. Montana, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Texas allow executions in such cases if the defendant had previously been convicted of raping a child.

Did you catch it? If you don’t kill someone’s body, the taking of your life is not permitted because to take your life when you have not killed another’s body is cruel and unusual.  I suspect that these justices have never been raped, certainly not as children - and certainly not by their own parents!

While I have never been raped either, I have dealt with those who have been raped as children. People, who in their fifties, are still trying to pick up the pieces, fighting suicide every moment of every day. It seems cruel and unusual to rape a child. It seems light-weight to give such a perpetrator the death penalty. Rapists may spare the body, though sometimes they don’t do that either. However, they take what cannot be returned, they lacerate the soul and only miracle surgery can heal such wounds and even then the scars are more than many can bear.

I would suggest that a materialist world view has circumscribed this Supreme Court decision. One that sees death as merely a material bodily matter, and has turned a blind eye to the psychological and spiritual suffering that will accompany the rape victims for the rest of their lives.

Lord have mercy upon us, especially those who suffer in ways we’ll never know.

I have a feature in my blog engine that alerts me when people cite a post I have written. While that sounds like a cool feature, it was quite strange when I saw today for the first time a citation of an article I wrote, entitled “A Reformed Liturgical Diet,” from October 2006. The article itself is an exegesis of the Westminster Shorter Catechism which was aimed to show that Reformed churches have historically had a much higher view of the Sacraments than present day instances.

As one who deeply loves, cherishes and practices expository preaching, you can imagine my shock when the name of the post citing “A Reformed Liturgical Diet” was entitled “Expository Preaching under attack.” I would have appreciated the opportunity to interact with the post 2 years ago; however, since I didn’t then, I will do so now. So before you go any further, please take a moment to do the following:

1. Read my original post A Reformed Liturgical Diet
2. Read Expository Preaching under attack at the Two-Edged Sword blog including the comments.

A Two-Edged False Dichotomy

First, for the record, I believe deeply that expository preaching is crucial in the churches of Jesus Christ. So I take exception to the way I have been misrepresented. Preaching is “Christian storytelling” and it is every bit as sacramental as the Lord’s Table. God, after all, is not words of any language. He certainly transcends the confines of vocabulary and exegesis. Nevertheless, the Church has been picked up and carried throughout history through the Spirit’s attending to the preaching of the Word of God. In fact, I would say that to the extent we unfold the Word of God to the people is the extent to which God empowers the sermon. The point of my article is to urge readers back toward the balanced liturgical diet given us in the Scripture of Word and Sacrament. To pit the preaching of the Word over against the Sacraments is a false dichotomy, at least in the Christian economy.

Second, historically speaking the Reformers were fighting for an increased frequency of the Lord’s Table in worship. At the time of Luther the Eucharist was celebrated only once a year and then the laity only received the cup. Calvin is fairly clear that he would have preferred a weekly communion but had to settle for quarterly with the council at Geneva. So it is a bit strange to me, historically speaking, to hear modern-day Reformed so dismissive of sacraments for which our tradition gives instances of those who were once willing to give even their lives for them. Calvin’s seminary graduates had a life expectancy post graduation of about six months. Influences on Calvin, perhaps we should call them teachers, such as Peter Martyr Vermigli in turn had great impact on Thomas Cranmer such that the 1552 Book of Common Prayer is dedicated to Vermigli.

Third, when “Mr. Baggins” comments that “These guys don’t know what they’re talking about. They are attacking preaching itself,” I am compelled to remind us all that my piece was an exegesis of the Westminster Shorter Catechism on the subject of the Lord’s Table itself. I have spent a bit of time in the Westminster Confession and Catechisms, in particular to study the nature of the Sacraments in the life of the Reformed churches. I do not want to impute such lack of engagement to Lee at Two-Edged Sword; however, Mr. Baggins makes assertions without even hobbit sized amounts of substantive argumentation. Consequently, it is hard to see how he is not dismissing the Westminster Confession and significant influences on its development like John Calvin and other Magisterial Reformers all in one broad stroke.

In short, I would expect that Lee and I have different universes of discourse in approaching the question of the role of the sacraments in the life of the Church. John Chrysostom would never have gone for preaching apart from the sacraments and yet he is held up as substantiating Mr. Baggins assertions. What I leave you is not a gauntlet (for I have no desire to engage in polemics here); but, instead an exhortation to consider how Chrysostom, himself a huge influence on Calvin and other reformers, would approach the balance that has historically always existed between Word and Sacrament.

Commentary

[1] ἐπιλαμβάνομαι to take hold of, grasp, catch. When followed by a genitive, as is the case here, it can entail the idea of taking hold violently of something or someone, in order to make the object of the grasping one’s own (BAGD, 295). If Hebrews 2:16 is taken out of context it is somewhat vague; however, Hebrews 2:17 gives a context of the Incarnation that sheds light on how this verse should be understood. Hence, the KJV, “For verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham.” From this writer’s vantage, verse 16 speaks to the nature of the Incarnation, which includes Crucifixion and Resurrection, not as something that Christ took on reluctantly; rather, he lay hold of it with even the vibrant tenacity that a husband has for his wife after having been separated for a lengthy time. This is reciprocated in St. Paul’s charge to Timothy, ἐπιλαβοῦ τῆς αἰωνίου ζωῆς! Take hold of Eternal Life! For the Christian, Eternal Life is not a status obtained but a Person pursued, loved and cherished. As Christ has laid hold of Timothy to make him His own, St. Paul exhorts him to the same with Christ Jesus to which he was called and had given good confession.

Commentary

[a] κεκοινώνηκεν perfect active indicative of κοινωνέω, to share, participate (BAGD, 438).

[b] κεκοινώνηκεν αἵματος καὶ σαρκός by the last half of the second century (i.e., shortly after St. Polycarp was martyred for his life) we find in the record of his martyrdom a similar phrase, κοινωνῆσαι τῷ ἁγίῳ αὐτοῦ σαρκίῳ (Martyrdom of Polycarp [MP], §17.1). … to receive part of his holy body … (author’s translation). A difference here is that Hebrews 2:14 employs a perfect active indicative form of κοινωνέω while MP employs an aorist infinitive. Apparently, at the time of the writing of MP, it was customary for Christians to receive a part of the martyr’s sarcophagus as a holy relic (BAGD, 438). Perhaps, that ancient tradition stems from Hebrews 2:14.

[c] παραπλησίως The word does not show clearly just how far the similarity goes. But it is used in situations where no differentiation is intended, in the sense in just the same way (BAGD, 621).

[d] μετέσχεν in light of the modifier, παραπλησίως, emphasizing the sameness of participation of the children and that of the Son, μετέσχεν would seem best regarded as a synonym for κοινωνέω here. In other words, there is a mutual participation or sharing in the children’s partaking of the flesh and blood and his participation in the flesh and blood.

[e] τούτους, ὅσοι literally, those, as many as.

[f] ἔνοχοι ἦσαν δουλείας literally, were subject to slavery.

[g] διὰ παντὸς τοῦ ζῆν through all the life (literally an infinitive, to live).

Every now and then things just come together in such a way that one has the sense that God is writing his poetry across one’s life. Today has been a moment like that for me.

My daughter, Ashley, has been patiently waiting for admission to the Lord’s Table for months now. Recently she would address the priests directly while Cynthia and I were receiving the elements, saying (sometimes a bit loudly), “I want the Body of Christ too!”

We went to a class on the Eucharist yesterday where a pair of very gifted people taught her a bit about the Good Shepherd and the Table. Today when we went forward for Communion, Ashley was in my arms. We knelt down as a family at the sanctuary rail and I helped her put her hands together extending towards our dear Father Houk. I watched him put the wafer in her hand and the tears just flooded me as they do now while I write this.

There is something most moving about a God who would commune with us, not by merit in ourselves, not on the basis of our performance, not by our ability to articulate fine points of theology, but on the basis of His love to us. It is Christ who chided and perhaps continues to chide his disciples for impeding children from coming to him. He is a God who wants us to grow up into him and that is precisely what happens in the Eucharist as we receive Christ in worship throughout our lives. Indeed, the mystery of the Eucharist is that all of scholarship and all the mysticism from all the ages cannot circumscribe the mystery of God communing with his people through mere bread and wine.

It seemed then, so perfect, that after Ashley’s first Eucharist, we went to the Dallas Arboretum and celebrated the beauty of these botanical gardens, which embody the participation of humanity with God. For nature is gorgeous and yet the Lord has created such that humans can order nature into gardens. The beauty of a garden is that it is an organic sermon that proclaims God’s participation with humanity even now. To watch Ashley run through the grass, wanting to smell every flower along every path, lifted the wonder of the Arboretum to the level of the magical.

Thank you Lord, for the most wonder-filled Father’s Day ever.