Frustrating Kindness

 “One who loves instruction is one who loves knowledge, but one who hates correction is an ignoramus” (Prov 12:1). It's nothing new: those who dare embrace the label Christian must be known by their love—indiscriminately to all, and especially to each other in the household of faith. They must practice, in a word, friendship. They must risk shame; they must wash feet. They must exclaim, at least in actions if not in words, “Hosanna!” So, in the proverb quoted above, we see that they must “love instruction”; otherwise, they’re just ignoramuses—brutish, senseless creatures—indeed, less human than God desires. Enter the amazing grace of our triune Lord, without which our destiny, declared by the Creator to be a life centered around him,...

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You Don't Love Me Like I Love You

This past Lord's Day, I visited Mosaic Cincinnati as my wife sang in the band during the service. The pastor, as is typical in churches of this sort, preached topically (though exegetically at times) on a theme especially pertinent to fathers: discipline. It was a good word, and timely for a culture that not only belittles fatherhood, but in which fathers themselves eschew their fatherly responsibilities. At one point, the issue of unity among parents, husband and wife, was unpacked. It got me thinking about unity in marriages in general, about first loves, about long marriages, and about the church (because, unlike many evangelical churches, I am a "churchy" guy. Or, put differently, "He can no longer have God for his Father, who has not the...

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A Sacred Place

A long time ago, as Genesis 1 recounts, God began naming, separating, and assigning functions and roles to his creation. In other words, he spoke purpose for his creation into existence (often when God speaks, reality changes). The garden that resulted—Eden, by name—was pervaded with the presence of God, not in the general sense of omnipresence but in a special, intimate way—a perpetual, ongoing presence. The garden was the temple of God Almighty. Fast forward a good amount of time (but not too much, say, between 2,500 years and 2.2 million years), and we come to the building of God’s dwelling place among his people, Israel (see Exod 25:10–40:33). Clearly, the look and materials employed throughout are meant to symbolize the original creation...

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The Stuff That Sticks: Ron Nash

Oftentimes, the best we can hope for (besides dying in our sleep) is that some of the good stuff we experience throughout life sticks. I know that those of us who mentor, teach, counsel, parent, and so on, hope the same for those in whom we invest. First in my journal-like series about the stuff that sticks centers around a professor I had in graduate school at RTS-Orlando. He's not first in the series because he has priority of place or anything like that. He's just the first stuff that stuck I thought of when thinking through what this series would contain. His name is Ron Nash (1936-2006). To get a glimpse of his life and work, follow that link attached to his name above. Professor Nash gets a spot here not because I'm a devotee—that I...

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