education

What juice are people drinking?

eejoseph, , ,

Canadians are rallying today March 19th against the racism hoping to eradicate it.  Meanwhile in the United States an entire party, one of the two that make up the American political system, cannot see racism in America. I do not know whether they have convinced the preachers or whether the preachers have convinced the politicians that it’s better not to mention racism.   I suppose it is treasonous to announce the emancipation of the slaves upon whose labour the economy is based.  In Canada preachers  do not see the evil of  filling people with lies and false hopes, neither do the police believe that white people have been killing First Nations children and women.   Racism will be with us as surely as the poor will be with us until the end of the age. 

Part of the problem or slayer

What is taking society as long as it has to end the scourge of racism may be more than simply not being a part of it.  They will tell us we are crazy for saying that our societies need a makeover.  As courageous and visionary as we think Washington and McDonald to be we have contorted the foundations with our selfish and homicidal views. Israel did it too.  I suppose we in the western hemisphere are fortunate that God did not call us to be the guardians of the mystery of the ages.  We seem to be caught between being selfish and being good neighbours.  No one needs a neighbour like Russia, if you are Ukraine, or like China if you are Taiwan.  The problem of racial discrimination begins in homes where the nextdoor neighbour is devalued; his iron, wood and stone are not as valuable as ours.  Let us not keep up the delusion that automobiles made identically in Canada and the United States have sticker prices disparate by  tens of thousands of dollars.

The end of racism is beyond our telescope

From those who find Hitler attractive, hate Muslims, Jews, Christians, and despise all foreign cultures racism is a necessity, and it is curious that the most costly and highly treasured systems of legislation, jurisprudence and education have been taking little nibbles out of the racism beast for decades (in some cases centuries). Not only is the end of racism beyond our vision, it is beyond the reach of our ropes, hoses and ladders.

Sorry sobriety

eejoseph

Knowledge without the word is merchandising nonsense and the multiplication of grace is not a subject of ongoing knowledge. It is a sad and sorry alley to be in and there are many backing into it because of a soundbyte.

Grace is multiplied

2. Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; 3. seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence.

2 Peter 1:2-3

“Be multiplied” is the aorist tense, passive voice, and optative mood of plethuno, πληθυνω, I multiply.  There is one way that this verse is addressing a practical processs of acquiring knowledge of God or Bible content, and that way is the fevered production of confused minds.

Getting to the Core

eejoseph

An introduction to Jesus is not an introduction to Judaism. If that sticks in our throat we cannot be expected to always pick a winner. Not even a radically transformed Mosaic economy does any justice to Abraham’s historic faith and justification without law and works.

Our centre stage is the cross

We have no law, prophets and writings. All we have is gospel whose beginning and end is Christ. The law, through the thousands of years it was Israel’s pride, produced no children of God, but the gospel, on the first day in the life of the church, made 3000 persons heirs of the kingdom, complete with a downpayment.

Let’s get the main objection to the Cross out of the way. James (see 1:25 and 2:8), an avowed Pharisee and disciple of Moses calls the decalogue royal and liberating, turns out to be the only witness in the New Testament who lends lip service to Christ as Saviour, and is out on a limb as surely as Esau was hated (not chosen). He is silent on the saving grace of God to which John, Peter, and Paul have consistently pointed us.

James would be the kind of person one would eexpect in modern times to insist that one learns everything about the law before one can become a disciple of Jesus. That is a pathway that the church soundly rejected.

If someone is saying that he wants to introduce you to Christ why would that person try to teach you everything about the Christ (and God in the Bible!) when in fact you are safer when you are in Jesus’ care and have the Holy Spirit as Helper who alone is able to guide us into all truth?

Maybe the rationale is that there is nothing to learn after one meets Jesus. That falls through the cracks. Could it be that one is complete and mature upon meeting Christ and there is no growth possible neither in grace nor knowledge? Of course not! These two scenarios are classic brainwashing techniques.

Beware of the Pharisee. His convert-making has one result: more kids for hell-fire. Hear Yeshua in Matthew 23:15 making it clear what pretenders do to their disciples.

Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves.

Spiritual skulduggery

eejoseph

Thursday October 25 2018

I am sure you have heard the scriptures read in public – in church- and wondered what happened, due to the reader’s many stumbles? Or perhaps you’ve heard an assembly reading at the same time from 5 or six different English translations. When Paul encouraged to Timothy to give attention to reading he was not talking about private reading or study. In those days the public reading of the Scriptures was essential so that the entire body of witness could be heard by all. This was no different from Jewish practice. The learned read and the unlearned listened (and committed to memory).

Listening, reading and writing are intended to elicit thinking not mere haste to say “Been there, done that!”. Any hurry to click “got it” ends in disasters, such as answering questions that do not exist or something like making majors of minors

No founding apostle made his mark apart from accurately handling the message (orally delivered by Yeshua and later committed to writing).

Consequently there is no New Testament hymn to ignorance or death. God wanted us literate and hospitable. Attentive listeners become expert reciters, and in due course reciters become readers and exegetes themselves. So let us read our Bibles in pursuit of Christ because once we have drunk the living water our search changes. We will have changed.

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Getting the Message

Stay tuned

ee