Back again

by Phil Johnson

I'm back from my weekend trip. We got back early Monday, but I have been too busy to read the blog, much less make a post explaining where I was over the weekend. Sorry to have been so mysterious.

Darlene and I were in Florida. My best friend for almost 35 years is Steve Kreloff, who is celebrating his 25th anniversary as senior pastor of Lakeside Community Chapel in Clearwater. (Incidentally, Steve is now podcasting. I'll add a permanent link in the sidebar when I get a minute.) The Lakeside elders graciously asked me to come and preach as part of Steve's anniversary celebration. My coming was supposed to be a surprise. Steve figured it out anyway. It was still a great day, capped by a long reel of bloopers and comic moments from Steve's preaching career.

Anyway, now I'm back, with an even more hectic week on deck. The illustrious Pecadillo will graduate from the LAPD Academy Friday morning, and hordes of relatives are coming to town for the event. So don't expect me to be very prolific this week.

However, James Spurgeon reminded me today that I began a series on 2 Corinthians 5:21 several weeks ago, and the "series" seems to have stalled right out of the gate.

To tell the truth, I almost forgot I started that. Let's get back to it:



Why put so much weight on the doctrine of justification?

In a post last month, I argued that justification by faith is the marrow of the gospel message. The apostle Paul said something similar in 2 Corinthians 5:21—where he gives a simple, succinct statement of the essence of evangelical truth, with the principles of substitution, imputation, and propitiation all printed in bold type and highlighted.

In other words, justification by faith is no optional second- or third-tier truth. On the contrary, I'd put it at the head of any list of fundamental, non-negotiable doctrines.

Why give such prominence to this one doctrine? After all, there are many other, more widely-agreed-upon doctrines that are absolutely essential to true Christianity. The deity of Christ, His incarnation, His bodily resurrection, and the promise of the second coming—all of those are explicitly named in Scripture as nonnegotiables—essential to true Christianity and essential to authentic faith. Not to mention all the key doctrines of Trinitarianism. Deny any of those and you have in effect departed from the Christian faith. Or the doctrines of the inspiration and authority of Scripture. Abandon your confidence in Scripture, and you have opened the door for every other kind of error.

So why put justification by faith at the head of a list like that?

Justification by faith is unique, I believe, precisely because it distills the pure essence of everything else that is fundamental to and distinctive about Christianity.

Here's what I mean: A person can affirm the deity of Christ, give lip service to the authority and inerrancy of Scripture, be very sound in all the basic points of Trinitarian doctrine—and still come under the curse of Galatians 1:8-9 because he preaches a different gospel.

Someone could also affirm the virgin birth of Christ, have a solid grasp on the incarnation, believe in the bodily resurrection of Christ, and yet be one of those described in Romans 4:4 and Romans 9:32 and Romans 10:3 who—rather than trusting in Christ alone for justification—are seeking to establish a righteousness of their own by works.

In other words, you can be basically sound on Christology or theology proper and unsound on the gospel. If so, believing the wrong gospel will damn you without remedy, regardless of how well-tuned your Trinitarianism is.

The converse is pretty hard to imagine. I've never met anyone who had a sound belief about justification by faith but who was unsound on Christology or Trinitarian doctrine.

After all, if you affirm the principle of imputed righteousness, then you are almost certainly going to affirm the deity of Christ. Because the imputation of righteousness requires a perfect Substitute, with perfect righteousness—as perfect as the heavenly Father is perfect. The only Substitute who qualifies is a Christ who is also God. So the necessity of Christ's deity is practically built right into a sound understanding of justification by faith.

I realize there are probably exceptions to that rule, but it is a plain fact that every major denomination and creed that affirms sola fide also affirms the deity of Christ and all the other doctrines generally referred to as "fundamental."

That's because all the fundamental doctrines of Christianity—the incarnation, substitutionary atonement, the death and resurrection of Jesus, the truth of a Trinitarian Godhead, the doctrine of original sin and the fallenness of all humanity, the freedom of divine grace, and the authority of Scripture—are all linked in one way or another so that the better you understand this doctrine of justification by faith, the more sound you will be in all of your theology.

That's why if you were to ask me to name the one principle in all of theology that is most vital; the one doctrine that carries the most weight; the one conviction to hold most tightly; the one precept most important to handle with care and most vital to proclaim accurately; the one article of faith you need to master well—it would not be a difficult choice. It's the doctrine of justification by faith—the Reformation principle of sola fide. This one doctrine encompasses the heart and soul of everything that is essential to Christianity, everything that is fundamental to our faith.

The doctrine of justification by faith is the very life and nerve of the gospel itself.

That is, I believe, one of the inescapable implications of 2 Corinthians 5:21.

We'll look more closely at the text itself in some upcoming posts. Hang on; this series is far from over.

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Believing scholarship is passionate scholarship

by Dan Phillips

The quality with which one engages in some endeavors can be gauged by its effects.

For instance, concerning karate practice, you could say, "If you don't end up sore and achey, you're not doing it right." Or consider cooking: "If it doesn't make your mouth happy, you're not doing it right." Smooching your loving wife: "If it doesn't feel good, you're not doing it right."

Similarly, concerning Biblical scholarship: "If it doesn't increase your passion, and your love for God, you're not doing it right" (Psalm 119:138 [HCSB]; Jeremiah 23:29; Romans 12:11). When Christ is the teacher, the hearts of His listening students are set on fire (kaiomene) within them (Luke 24:32).

James White well said what I tried to put into words earlier:

...I write as a pastor/theologian/apologist who believes firmly that man is a singular whole--you cannot divide man's mind from his heart, his soul. I am passionate about theology, passionate about the faith. I honestly do not understand how anyone can say "I believe the Bible is the Word of God" without being passionate about that confession. I love the Trinity, justification by faith, the Resurrection, and sola scriptura. I do not pretend to be dispassionate about these things, and, as such, I stand firmly on this assertion: Christian scholarship that lacks passion about the truth is not worthy of the name Christian to begin with. If dispassion and detachment are necessary attributes of scholarship, then I do not seek the appellation. I cannot comprehend dry faith, arid confession, or mere mental assent. (Scripture Alone [Bethany House: 2004], p. 10.)

Amen!

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“something better to do”

A supplemental dose of Spurgeon
posted by Frank "li'l Phil" Turk

The PyroManiacs devote space each week to highlights from The Spurgeon Archive.

Well, Coyote has beaten me to the punch, as they say, and has prepared a dose of Spurgeon for Sunday which frankly is in continuity with the rest of the stuff going on here at the teamPyro blog, so I'll let him have his fun. I have a mere snippet which I will post here today, and if you like it, think about it on Sunday. Unlike Phil, I am not completely immersed in the great preacher’s works, and that is a terrible short-coming on my part. However, I have a few favorites from CHS which I turn to from time to time, and one of my favorites is The Eccentric Preacher.

In his own words, Spurgeon says he published this volume in “self-defense”. However, what he was defending himself against was not something he did, but something he in fact didn’t do, due to sloppy reporting by an American publisher. Spurgeon had preached on the topic of eccentric preachers, and a reporter took some notes on that sermon, and butchered it badly. Spurgeon thought at first merely to publish the corrected version, but in reviewing the notes for his own words thought the topic worthy of expanding into a booklet, for which he said, “I hope the reader will not be a loser by my resolution.”

As if. The booklet is, of course, a gem with so many high points that it’s hard to pick which is the best. It is a keen resource for those who want to improve their blogging, among other things. However, since you will go to church on SUnday (right?), and you at least read blogs about the Christian life (well, you read this blog), it would probably do you good to read this brief excerpt from Spurgeon’s intro to this volume, which has to do with the fact that God’s word is drawn out in earthen vessels.

Read for yourself:

I desire by this little volume to plead against the carping spirit which makes a man an offender for a word, and the lying spirit which scatters falsehood right and left, to the injury and grief of the most zealous of my Master's servants. Many hearers lose much blessing through criticizing too much, and meditating too little; and many more incur great sin by calumniating those who live for the good of others. True pastors have enough of care and travail without being burdened by undeserved and useless fault-finding. We have something better to do than to be for ever answering every malignant or frivolous slander which is set afloat to injure us. We expected to prove our ministry "by evil report and by good report," and we are not therefore overwhelmed by abuse as though some new thing had happened unto us; and yet there are tender, loving spirits who feel the trial very keenly, and are sadly hindered in brave service by cruel assaults. The rougher and stronger among us laugh at those who ridicule us, but upon others the effect is very sorrowful. For their sakes are these pages written; may they be a warning to wanton witlings who defame the servants of the Most High God.

As ministers we are very far from being perfect, but many of us are doing our best, and we are grieved that the minds of our people should be more directed to our personal imperfections than to our divine message. God has purposely put his treasure in earthen vessels that the excellency of the power should be ascribed to himself alone: we beseech our hearers not to be so occupied with the faults of the casket as to forget the jewel. Wisdom is justified of her children, and grace works by such instruments as it pleases. Reader, be it yours to profit by all my Master's servants, and even by Yours truly,

C. H. SPURGEON.

Have a care today as you think about your Pastor, your church, and God’s word.

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A couple things...

by Phil Johnson

Our friend Kevin D. Hendricks at "Church Marketing Sucks" is now eight posts into his series on Church growth, and he is still dealing with the issue of "numbers" while blithely ignoring the actual problem most critics of contemporary "Church Growth" strategy have complained about: pragmatism.

It's almost as if we never had this conversation.

Meanwhile, here's something closely related to my concerns about pragmatism and the dumbing down, cheapening, and trivializing of our churches in the name of pragmatic populist man-pleasing. It's a fine post by the enigmatic "Dissidens" over at Remonstrans. He introduces us to Reptillia, the "worship leader; shares some thoughts about teaching children about beauty; and reflects on why the typical contemporary evangelical church is utterly absent anything truly glorious these days.

Anyway, I can't write much. It's 9:30 AM PDT as I write this. I'm in an LAX departure lounge about to board a long flight to an undisclosed location. When I get back, I'll tell you where I've been, but I'm clocking out for the weekend.

To keep from posting quickly on top of James Spurgeon's more important post, I'm going to have him post this item for me this afternoon. Hopefully, James or someone will also post the weekly dose of CHS. See you Monday.

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God, evil, and the Cross

by Dan Phillips

The relationship of the holy, infinite-personal God of Scripture to evil is a theological conundrum, but it's far from merely theoretical. We confront it daily. Evil's thriving presence makes itself felt with every glance at the news media, with every surf of the internet, with every human encounter, and, most dishearteningly, in every succession of thoughts and desires in our own souls. We see its baleful fruit in physical evil such as cancer; we see it more devastatingly in moral evil such as the Cross.

Man has always tried to solve the problem of evil, and he's always failed. He's tried denying the existence of God; but with that denial, he loses his right to call anything "evil." He's tried denying the sovereignty of God; but with that denial, he loses his right to call the God he has created "God." (See further God and Evil: A Brief Theodicy.)

You might truthfully say that evil is a problem precisely because God is who He is. If He were not good, or if He were not sovereign, evil would be no surprise -- but, in that case, neither would God be God, by any Biblical explication of the term. But God is good, and He is sovereign, and evil is a reality.

One of the most suggestive and meaning-laden texts about the relationship of God to evil is Genesis 50:20. It unveils realities about this area that we'd not otherwise know, and is worth careful unpacking.

We all know the background. Joseph had revelatory reason to believe he'd have ascendancy over his brothers. Possibly boastfully, certainly unwisely, he shared his dreams with his family. That, with his tattletale ways and his daddy's-favorite zoot suit, combined to make him the object of his brothers' hatred. They meant to kill him, then changed their minds and merely sold him into slavery in Egypt, concocting a cock-and-bull story that broke their father's heart and (they hoped) rid their family of Joseph forever.

Evil acts? Beyond a doubt: evil in intent, feeling, design, and execution. Not a shred of charity or holy intent in what they did.

And we also know that, while progressively bad things happened to Joseph (enslaved, entrapped, imprisoned, forgotten), God nevertheless exalted him from the very depths to the very heights. Through Joseph God preserved the nation of Israel, thus saving the human line of the Messiah, thus making possible the salvation of the world.

And here is what Scripture says about that whole complex of events, plot-twists, conspiracies, surprises, and happenstances: "As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today." This relatively brief assertion fairly bursts with meaning. Let's come a little closer and examine the details.

The Hebrew text. The ESV "As for you" indicates what the NIV (natch) misses, that the Hebrew has an emphatic pronoun; thus "You, you intended." Joseph stresses his brothers' personal involvement, their ownership of this evil intent.

But what is interesting is the fact that the next clause is an asyndeton, which is to say there is no conjunction. Though the ESV supplies "but," there is no such word in Hebrew. The two facts are simply laid out side-by-side: "And you, you planned evil against me. God planned it for good...."

Also significant is the repetition of forms of the same verb, chashab, meaning to think, plan, devise. Both actors shared the same activity, but with different intent, and to a different end. The brothers planned, God planned.

One complex event. Note that Joseph does not split the recent events of his life into many events, and say that the brothers meant something for their parts, while God meant something for His. Rather, he encompasses and speaks of the many disparate events as one: "God meant it," the event, viewed as a single complex whole. The same event.

Two wills. In this same, single event, two intentions confluesced.

One was the brothers' intention, and make no mistake: their intention was evil. The goodness of God's intent does not make their intent moral, nor does the sovereignty of His intent make theirs insignificant nor robotic. Their intent is spoken of as their intent, and emphatically so, as noted above. Though good resulted, they did not intend good to result. They intended evil, and only evil.

But the other intent was God's intent, and His intent was wholly good. Notice that this intent takes in the same complex of events, the unambiguously evil actions of the brothers: "God intended it." In, above, through, and overriding the evil intention and action of the brothers was the good intention of God.

It would be saying too much to say that God Himself did those actions, but it would be saying too little to say merely that He used those actions -- as if they were so many Lego's He merely found lying on the floor, and tried to make something of them. He meant those actions, those evil actions, for good.

One act, two intentions. Which intention overruled? Which intention was ultimate?

The question is not too difficult to answer, if one is concerned with preserving the teaching of Scripture rather than a particular doctrinal scheme. Some will try to find a way to evade the Biblical doctrine of God's sovereignty even here, though. I can imagine one trying to find refuge by saying, "Ah, yes, there it is: man's free will, and God's sovereign will, both independent of each other!"

It may be a popular dodge, but it certainly is not the teaching of the text. If that were the case, then Joseph's situation could never have resolved. The evil intent of the brothers and the good intent of God would battle as equals, as yin and yang, bringing a chaotic and unsettled conclusion -- or none at all.

Is this what Joseph is saying? Clearly not. Clearly Joseph is saying that the whole mess has ended well, it has ended as "good." So whose will overruled evil for good? Whose will triumphed? From this text alone, we must say that it was Yahweh's will that triumphed. Then of course, when we bring in other Scripture, this answer is confirmed a hundredfold (Psalm 115:3; Proverbs 16:1, 4, 9; 19:21, etc.).

This is how we must understand evil committed by personal agents. The evil intent, the activity, is truly and genuinely that of the agents themselves. Yet behind that intent, and over it, and overruling it, is the good and holy plan and will of God. This has a very meaningful personal application, which I develop at length pastorally in a sermon titled God and Our Tragedies, delivered 9/11/05.

But it also has application to the discussion that arose over at Adrian's blog, about whether God killed Jesus. We set ourselves up for a false dichotomy if we demand an answer to the question as to whether God killed Jesus, or man killed Jesus. If we choose the latter to the exclusion of the former, we have to waffle and wiggle with texts like Isaiah 53:10. If we attempt the reverse, we will not be dealing honestly with verses such as Acts 2:23 and 5:30.

Of course men did all they could do to kill Jesus. All the betrayers and the persecutors and the lynch mob stand guilty and wholly responsible for their loathesome acts.

But in the final analysis,

"For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again. 18 No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my Father." (John 10:17-18)

...and "the LORD was pleased To crush Him, putting Him to grief" (Isaiah 53:10). That verse is crucial in Isaiah, as we see better when we tie it back in with Isaiah 1:11 -- "What to me is the multitude of your sacrifices? says the LORD; I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of well-fed beasts; I do not delight in the blood of bulls, or of lambs, or of goats." We Gentile Christians don't feel the awesome impact of this statement. It is really a crushing, devastating accouncement: if God does not delight in the blood of bulls, lambs, or goats, they're utterly sunk! That's all they had, to deal with their sin... and now God was saying that He did not delight in those sacrifices. That left them nothing!

Ah, but then in Isaiah 53:10, we learn what Yahweh will delight in, for it uses the same Hebrew verb root (ch-ph-ts), in saying that Yahweh "was pleased" to crush His Servant. You could just as well translated that He "was delighted" to crush Him. The good pleasure of the Lord, in achieving the redemption of His people in a way both just and graceious, was accomplished when Yahweh Himself crushed His dear Son.

Man meant it for evil; but God meant it for good, for salvation, for redemption. And His will always prevails.

After all, He is God.

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Who Killed Jesus?

by John MacArthur

The murder of Jesus was a vast conspiracy involving Rome, Herod, the Gentiles, the Jewish Sanhedrin, and the people of Israel—diverse groups who were seldom fully in accord with one another. In fact, it is significant that the crucifixion of Christ is the only historical event where all those factions worked together to achieve a common goal. All were culpable. All bear the guilt together. The Jews as a race were no more or less blameworthy than the Gentiles.

This is very plainly stated in Acts 4:27, a corporate prayer offered in an assembly of the very earliest believers: "For of a truth against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod, and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel, were gathered together." So there is no justification whatsoever for trying to fix the blame for Jesus' death on any one people group. This was, in essence, a corporate act of sinful humanity against God. All are guilty together.

And yet even that does not exhaust the full truth about who killed Jesus. Scripture emphasizes from cover to cover that the death of Christ was ordained and appointed by God Himself. One of the key Old Testament prophecies about the crucifixion is Isaiah 53. Isaiah prophetically describes the torture of the Messiah at the hands of a scoffing mob, and then adds, "Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief" (Isaiah 53:10).

God put his own Son to death?

That is precisely what Scripture teaches. Why? According to Isaiah 53:10, it was to "make His soul an offering for sin." God had a redemptive purpose.

The designs of those who killed Christ were entirely murderous. They are by no means exonerated from their evil, just because God's purposes are good. It was still the act of "lawless hands" (Acts 2:23). It was, as far as the human perpetrators were concerned, an act of pure evil. The wickedness of the crucifixion is in no sense mitigated by the fact that God sovereignly ordained it for good. The truth that it was His sovereign plan makes the deed itself no less a diabolical act of murder.

And yet this was clearly God's holy and sovereign plan from before the foundation of the world (Revelation 13:8). Look again at that prayer from Acts 4, this time in its full context:

Lord, You are God, who made heaven and earth and the sea, and all that is in them, who by the mouth of Your servant David have said: "Why did the nations rage, And the people plot vain things? The kings of the earth took their stand, And the rulers were gathered together Against the LORD and against His Christ." For truly against Your holy Servant Jesus, whom You anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the people of Israel, were gathered together to do whatever Your hand and Your purpose determined before to be done (Acts 4:24-28, emphasis added).

Acts 2:23 echoes the same thought: "Him, being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, you have taken by lawless hands, have crucified, and put to death" (emphasis added).

God ordained the murder of Jesus. Or to put it starkly in the words of Isaiah 53:10, it pleased the Lord to bruise Him.

In what sense was God pleased by the death of his Son?

He was pleased by the redemption that was accomplished. He was pleased that His eternal plan of salvation was thus fulfilled. He was pleased with the sacrifice of his Son, who died so that others might have eternal life. He was pleased to display his righteous anger against sin in such a graphic way. He was pleased to demonstrate His love for sinners through such a majestic sacrifice.

For all the evil in the crucifixion, it brought about an infinite good. In fact, here was the most evil act ever perpetrated by sinful hearts: The sinless Son of God—holy God Himself in human flesh—was unjustly killed after being subjected to the most horrific tortures that could be devised by wicked minds. It was the evil of all evils, the worst deed human depravity could ever devise, and the most vile evil that has ever been committed. And yet from it came the greatest good of all time—the redemption of unnumbered souls.

The cross is therefore the ultimate proof of the utter sovereignty of God. His purposes are always fulfilled in spite of the evil intentions of sinners. God even works His righteousness through the evil acts of unrighteous agents. Far from making Him culpable for their evil, this demonstrates how all He does is good, and how He is able to work all things together for good (Romans 8:28)—even the most wicked deed the powers of evil have ever conspired to carry out.

John MacArthur

This article was excerpted John MacArthur, The Murder of Jesus (Nashville: W Publishing Group, 2002).

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Another birthday

by Phil Johnson

So today was my 53rd birthday. They're less fun every year.

But some good stuff happened today. To start with, while I was getting ready for church, Jeff Williams phoned me from the Space Station to say happy birthday. He said he was passing over Indonesia at the time. I'm guessing the number of people who get birthday greetings from outer space is a pretty select fraternity. Not to gloat or anything.

Then this afternoon, I got another call from Edna Pearson, longtime friend who lives in Australia. Her birthday is June 12, and it was already Monday there, so we celebrated our different birthdays simultaneously over the phone. That doesn't happen every day, either.

Then Frank Turk sent me a hilarious birthday wish via an e-card from Dayspring that made me laugh out loud. (I'd give you the URL, but it was personal.) Frank also has a cool new t-shirt at his pawn shop. Check it out.

53. Thanks. It's all downhill from here.



Incidentally, on the phone, Jeff Williams reminded me that he started a blog at the end of last year: "Take Up and Read." When I last checked around the end of January, he had only 3 posts. But his reminder prompted me to check again, and I see he was posting more regularly, and still posting new stuff just days before his mission started.

I'm not sure if he can post directly to his blog from the Space Station, but he can send e-mail, so I don't know why not. I'm going to try to get him to guest-blog here at TeamPyro at least once before the end of his mission.

Meanwhile, be sure to keep Jeff in your prayers.

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Spurgeon on Church Growth

Your weekly dose of Spurgeon
posted by Phil Johnson

The PyroManiacs devote space at the beginning of each week to highlights from The Spurgeon Archive.

The following is an excerpt from Spurgeon's book, The Soul Winner. Spurgeon is commenting on Matthew 4:19—"And He saith unto them, Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men."

I think that there is a great lesson in my text to those who preach their own thoughts instead of preaching the thoughts of Christ. These disciples were to follow Christ that they might listen to Him, hear what He had to say, drink in His teaching, and then go and teach what He had taught them. Their Lord said, "What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light: and what ye hear in the ear, that preach ye upon the housetops." If they will be faithful reporters of Christ's message, He will make them "fishers of men."

But you know the boastful method, nowadays, is this: "I am not going to preach this old, old gospel, this musty Puritan doctrine. I will sit down in my study, and burn the midnight oil, and invent a new theory; then I will come out with my brand-new thought, and blaze away with it." Many are not following Christ, but following themselves, and of them the Lord may well say, "Thou shalt see whose word shall stand, Mine or theirs."

Others are wickedly prudent, and judge that certain truths which are evidently God's Word, had better be kept back. You must not be rough, but must prophesy smooth things. To talk about the punishment of sin, to speak of eternal punishment, why, these are unfashionable doctrines. It may be that they are taught in the Word of God, but they do not suit the genius of the age; we must pare them down!

Brothers in Christ, I will have no share in this. Will you? O my soul, come not thou into their secret! Certain things not taught in the Bible our enlightened age has discovered. Evolution may be clean contrary to the teaching of Genesis, but that does not matter. We are not going to be believers of Scripture, but original thinkers. This is the vainglorious ambition of the period.

Mark you, in proportion as the modern theology is preached, the vice of this generation increases. To a great degree, I attribute the looseness of the age to the laxity of the doctrine preached by its teachers. From the pulpit they have taught the people that sin is a trifle. From the pulpit these traitors to God and to His Christ have taught the people that there is no hell to be feared. A little, little hell, perhaps, there may be; but just punishment for sin is made nothing of.

The precious atoning sacrifice of Christ has been derided and misrepresented by those who were pledged to preach it. They have given the people the name of the gospel, but the gospel itself has evaporated in their hands. From hundreds of pulpits the gospel is as clean gone as the dodo from its old haunts; and still the preachers take the position and name of Christ's ministers. Well, and what comes of it? Why, their congregations grow thinner and thinner and so it must be.

Jesus says, "Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men;" but if you go in your own way, with your own net, you will make nothing of it, and the Lord promises you no help in it. The Lord's directions make Himself our Leader and Example. It is, "Follow Me, follow Me. Preach My gospel. Preach what I preached. Teach what I taught, and keep to that." With that blessed servility which becomes one whose ambition it is to be a copyist, and never to be an original, copy Christ even in jots and tittles. Do this, and He will make you fishers of men; but if you do not do this, you shall fish in vain.

It's noteworthy that Spurgeon preached the message from which this chapter was taken near the start of his ministry, in the mid-nineteenth century. Modernism was still a very new movement in the church, but Spurgeon could already see that it was having a negative effect on church growth and church attendance.

Every movement that has ever tried to tweak the Christian message in order to make it more "relevant" to that generation's Zeitgeist has wound up spiritually bankrupt and eventually bereft of people. The principle holds true even today: every method of "church growth" or "contextualizing" that attempts to modify and streamline the Christian message to reconcile it with the times ultimately works against church growth and evangelism. Even if a method draws a crowd for a brief time, it cannot succeed in the long run, because only the gospel—the original gospel, unmodified—is the power of God for salvation.



PS: Bruce Keisling's extremely perceptive review of Chris Seay's Faith of My Fathers perfectly illustrates Mr. Spurgeon's point in the above excerpt.

PPS: On a totally different matter, and regarding the death of Mr. Al-Zarqawi: Although it's well-known that I am no pacifist, I completely agree with the sober sentiments beautifully expressed by Reid Ferguson here:

There is place for sighs of relief and genuine gladness that the threat is gone—but no place, I repeat NO PLACE, for wicked gloating over the sin-bound life and violent death of one of Adam's sons made in the image of God as much as you or me. None.

Did he deserve to hear the Gospel? As much as you or I. Was he more sinful than you and me? Only in manifestion, not in state. There but for the grace of God go I—and you. And the pictures of his wounded, dead corpse only make me grieve over the horror of sin's claim on our lives apart from God intervening grace.

Yes, al-Zarqawi is a threat I am glad no longer exists. But dancing on his grave, is as depraved as excusing his crimes.

Reid is obviously no pacifist, either. But he is a fine a pastor, who understands what a profound tragedy it is when any soul is brought to judgment unprepared.

Like Reid, I am eternally grateful for the grace God has shown me in Christ, and I confess that apart from Christ and his undeserved kindness to me, I would have no more hope when I stand before God in judgment than the vilest miscreant.

PPPS:And for the record, I would agree with Reid (and with Proverbs 24:17-18) about these things even if Mr. Al-Zarqawi had met his demise at the business end of a Costco frozen ground beef chub.



PPPPS: Don't miss the "dialogue" with Kevin D. Hendricks, chief blogger at "Church Marketing Sucks" in the thread under last Wednesday's post. Kevin's replies are classic examples of the short-sidedness and blinkered thinking of most contemporary church marketing gurus, showing why the whole market-driven mentality well and truly deserves to be hoovered out of the evangelical movement.

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a cup of water

by Frank Turk

OK -- I'm up late because I'm an occational insomniac, and I was reading some of the blogs from my side kicks. As I was reading, I ran across a link on one of them which just made me shake my head, and in order not to get involved directly with the controversy, I am going to blog a parable about the controversy, and you-all can take it wherever you want to go.

Imagine it's a hot day outside -- not one of those tepid 85 degree days they get in Ohio in late July but one of those 104 degree days we get in AR in early August. I'm in my bookstore, and some fellow walks in who is obviously in some kind of distress.

"Can I help you?" I ask, in honest concern. "Are you alright?"

"Dude," he chokes out, "I need a cup of water. I just walked 10 miles from my broken-down car, and I'm ... I'm ..."

I grab him as he teeters over, and I sit him in one of the reading chairs. He's not unconscious, but he's obviously weak and sick. So I go behind the counter, I get a clean rag, and I soak it in rubbing alcohol (which we use to clean our counters and our windows), and I go back to this fellow in distress.

"Here," I say to him, "This will make you feel better."

He grabs the rag, and it feels very cool and wet to his touch, but as he lifts it to his mouth he realizes by the smell that something's afoot.

"Dude," he gasps, "What is this?"

"It's cool and wet, friend," I say to him, "which is exactly what you need. Go ahead."

Now, without watching this little scene play out all the way to the end, let me ask you: was it a fair substitution to give him a rag soaked in alcohol when what he needed was a cup of water? Put another way, at what place did I stop giving him the aid he required as I was substituting out the essentials of his need with counterfeits or with handy (but inappropriate) spare parts?

And would you be some sort of malcontent or trouble maker if you pointed out to me that it would do more harm than good to give a dehydrated man an ounce of rubbing alcohol to drink?

Let me propose to you that this little scene is a metaphor for orthodoxy in the Christian faith. If we think that somehow we are coming to the aid of someone by bringing them a sloppy mess which has absorbed something that only superficially appears to be like what they need, rather than a self-contained measure of the actual stuff that they need, we're not helping anybody. And clearly, in some cases, we are actually hurting them worse.

You apply that as you see fit.

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What kind of temperament does God use?

by Dan Phillips

Ah, the joy of being someone else. Don't we all see traits in others that we wish we could make our own? (Watch out for the ones who answer "No.")

I'm inclined to constant self-doubt, second-guessing... and third, and twelfth, and forty-second; to protracted inner debates; and to endless introspection. (Every post of mine that you read, as a rule, has gone through a dozen or two re-writes, and I am still re-working my sermons the morning I am to preach them, no matter how long I've been laboring over them, or how many times I may have preached them before.) Vulnerability to melancholy and bitter regret is a constant battle. I hope that those for whom I'm answerable profit from my thorough worrying and quadruple-checking, but it's a wearisome way to be.

I envy men I've known -- and there have been, and are, quite a few -- who never seem to doubt or second-guess themselves. Ever. They always have The Answer, and they have it instantly. Further, they have absolute confidence in everything they say. It doesn't matter what the topic; they make a pronouncement, and that's it. In the Bible, not in the Bible, no matter. They just know. Every notion is Canon. They're seldom wrong, or if they are, they're seldom much troubled about it. I imagine such men sleep very well, never agonizing in the dark hours of the night over this or that decision, past or anticipated.

I recall a pastor I knew. He felt he actually heard God speaking to him. He was able, without blinking, to tell folks in and out of his church exactly what to do with their lives. If they didn't follow his counsel, he was ready to see them punished. Last I knew, it worked out really well for him: nice family, nice ministry, everything going just great. Maybe not so great for some of those left in his wake.

Is that the way to be? What kind of temperament do you have to have, to be pleasing and useful to God?

If I were to ask you to name a great, effective, model leader, I bet I'd hear "Nehemiah" before long. Beyond question, he would be a great choice. Chuck Swindoll isn't the only one to do worthwhile studies of the good governor's abilities. He was one of those sorts who I wish I resembled more closely. Passionate, decisive, proactive; knew the Word and his own mind; had a sense of himself and his mission. And when he found out that the folks he led had sinned, no miserable, corrosive, self-digesting introspection for Nehemiah. No, he exploded, berated them severely, and even pulled out their hair (Nehemiah 13:25)!

Don't try this at home, by the bye.

Surely Nehemiah should be our model, right?

Ah, but if so, what of Ezra? Ezra was also principled and proactive, but he was of a very different temperament. He, too, faced terrible failure on his people's part. But where Nehemiah exploded, Ezra imploded, and pulled out his own hair (Ezra 9:3).

Which one had the right temperament? Which one was used by God?

Consider the prophets. What kind of man did you have to be to be an effective prophet? Surely Ezekiel is our model here. I think of him as the Clint Eastwood of the prophets: stoic, dogged, imperturbable. God tells him to cook his food over cow dung, and he says in effect, "Okay -- oh, wait: won't that defile me?" God says he can use cow dung instead, and Ezekiel shrugs. "Mm-kay," he says, and soldiers on (Ezekiel 4:12-15). God tells him not to mourn his wife's sudden death. "Mm-kay," Ezekiel says, and soldiers on (24:15-18).

Surely Ezekiel should be our model.

Ah, but if so, what of Jeremiah, "the weeping prophet"? His style is beautiful, and it is emotional and passionate. He is a man of intensive and vivid feelings, and his emotions are out there for all to see and hear.

The prophet makes the most astonishing complaint in Jeremiah 20:7-10. It almost sounds blasphemous. He cries out to God that God had overpowered him, that He had given Jeremiah a message that was overwhelmingly negative and offensive, and that it brought him nothing but heartache. What's worse, Jeremiah can't even bear to stop, for if he forbears, the Word is as fire in his bones, and cannot be held in.

So which kind of prophetic temperament was pleasing to God -- Ezekiel's, or Jeremiah's? It is, or should be, a silly question. Time would fail me in laying out other Biblical temperament contrasts, playing Peter against Thomas, Paul against Barnabas, or Timothy against John Mark.

We can turn from the Bible to the pages of church history. Who served God more effectively, fruitfully, enduringly? Charles Haddon Spurgeon, or Jonathan Edwards?

I have tried and tried to connect with Edwards, and I just can't seem to do it. I've read Edwards himself; I've read Murray on Edwards; I've listened to Murray, to Packer, to Piper and others on Edwards. Piper! -- you can't pick up a book of his without his going on about how marvelous Edwards is. And I'm sure to people better than I, Edwards is Da Bomb.

To me Edwards is correct and he's pithy, but he's distant, he's bloodless, he's passionless, he's made of alabaster. Over and over, I read about how great he is, then I go back to the man himself with renewed determination to connect -- and it just does not happen.

Ah, but Spurgeon! His writings and his preachings live and breathe. He was a man who suffered greatly, felt deeply, lived and loved the Lord largely and with a robust spirit. Whereas Edwards labors to phrase his thoughts precisely to his own satisfaction, Spurgeon labors to communicate his thoughts to living persons, men of flesh and blood. I feel that I know him. A sentence of Spurgeon's connects with me more profoundly than every word I've ever read from Edwards.

But which one was a profitable servant? Whose temperament was more useful to God -- the robust, hearty Englishman, or the austere, pallid New Englander?

Surely these are all silly questions. God made the daisy as surely as He made the Indian Paintbrush, the grain of sand as surely as the diamond, the chip of ice as surely as the blazing furnace of our sun.

And so He made men and women with different grids, different default settings, different temperaments. Edwards was used mightily of God, and though he doesn't connect with me, he surely connected with John Piper, and John Piper has been used by God in my life. But Spurgeon speaks directly to me; and, hard as it is to believe, there are actually good folks who just don't connect with him. Yet somehow they get something out of what I write and preach.

It does not matter what kind of heart we have -- bold or timid, extroverted or introverted, naturally happy or naturally somber. Each mindset, each temperamental cast, has its strengths and its weaknesses. The always-positive, always-certain man may get a lot done -- but he needs to learn to judge himself, to suspect his own heart (Jeremiah 17:9), to distinguish his plans from God's, and his ideas from Scripture. He needs to humble himself before God and others.

Equally, the more melancholy sort needs to learn to grasp God's wondrous promises, to preach the truth to himself (Psalms 42-43), to point himself to God's person and word, to be of good courage, and to get going in His service (Joshua 1:6-9).

None of us should subscribe to a cookie-cutter mold of personality development, or of leadership style. It does not matter so much what kind of hearts we have. What matters is what we do with our hearts.

What matters is that our heart be wholly God's (Deuteronomy 6:5f.; 2 Chronicles 16:9; Psalm 86:11; 1 Peter 3:15).

Then the cut of the instrument will matter far less than the skill of the Musician.

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For those who still don't get it. . .

by Phil Johnson

A blog that was in my private blogroll long before I entered the blogosphere is the rather inelegantly-named "Church Marketing Sucks." It has a crisp look with better-than-average graphics. What first intrigued me was the name (although I don't like the lowbrow sound of it and certainly don't agree with
the half-baked rationale their chief blogger uses to justify using a word his mom doesn't approve of: "We're being authentic. We're being real. We're doing the same thing we're asking the church to do when it comes to communicating and marketing who they are." Yikes.)

Anyway, the name of the blog caught my attention because when I first heard it I assumed the site was going to be against the whole concept of market-driven methodologies for church growth. Unfortunately, on my first visit to the site, I could see that's not the case.

Turns out they just don't think most church marketing these days is "authentic" enough. (A defect which, by their way of thinking, could presumably be solved by putting some words our moms might find offensive on the church marquee.)

So the clever lowbrow blogname turns out to be an empty promise. In fact, the driving assumptions behind the "Church Marketing Sucks" website actually begin with the premise that Christianity is first and foremost a commodity to be peddled. They think the central challenge of evangelism is basically a packaging problem. They think in terms of pimping the gospel rather than preaching it.

So Tuesday they made this post, Is Church Growth the Highway to Hell?—"the first in a multi-part series on the supposed evils of church growth"—which reveals an unbelievably clueless perspective on why some of us are wary of the contemporary market-driven approaches to manufactured church growth. It's an inexcusable cluelessness, given the fact that "marketing the church" is the whole focus of their blog.

"The bottomline is that churches are supposed to grow," they intone. As if someone might seriously argue otherwise. Then they speculate that perhaps the real difficulty we critics see is a potentially unhealthy fixation with "numbers."

Most of their commenters didn't get it, either. Several picked up on the theme of "numbers" and discussed the pros and cons of counting heads and dollars.

Nowhere in the post or comments did anyone even touch on the real problem most critics of the church growth movement have been talking about for years.

For the record, virtually no one is opposed to "church growth." (Certainly no one whose opinion matters.) No one I've ever spoken to is seriously opposed to judiciously watching "numbers," either. After all, God commanded Moses to take a census in Numbers 1:1-3. (At the same time, it's definitely worth considering carefully what made David's action sinful in 1 Chronicles 21:1.)

But what most critics of contemporary church growth theory actually deplore is the pragmatism that drives most popular church-growth methodology.

I guess when your whole framework for judging the "success" or "failure" of every method, every man of God, and every ministry is completely market-driven rather than biblical, the idea that unbridled pragmatism might be a Bad Thing would never even occur to you.

Even though some of us have been saying so for many years.

See my pastor's superb book on the subject, Ashamed of the Gospel.

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On keeping up with popular worldly ideas

Over at the Pulpit Live blog, I've been posting a serialized version of the transcript from my Shepherds' Conference seminar on the Emerging Church Conversation. It occurred to me that this one brief point would make a pretty good stand-alone blogpost:

Some actually believe the "emerging church movement" is the polar opposite of "modernism." So if you criticize the movement at all, you will automatically be accused of blithely and unthinkingly buying into the errors of "modern" thinking. A few loud voices in the Emerging conversation will always chant that mantra—as if they have been pre-programed to respond instantly and reflexively to every criticism by labeling the critic a "modernist."

(Specifically, they like to accuse their critics of parroting a brand of philosophical foundationalism that owes more to René Descartes than it owes to the Scriptures. Lots of naive people have been drawn into the movement by sophisticated-sounding philosophical arguments like those.)

That claim is based on the assumption that postmodernism itself represents a correction of the philosophical errors of modernism, rather than just a further step in a wrong direction.

How any Christian can uncritically adopt that view of carnal, worldly, humanistic philosophy is an utter mystery to me. It ought to be obvious to people in the church that postmodernism poses at least as much a threat to the truth and the clarity of the gospel as every other humanistic philosophy that has preceded it in the long parade of human foolishness that has brought us to the postmodern moment in which we are living.

Postmodernism is just the latest, and possibly the worst, in a relentless procession of bad ideas that ought to have conditioned the church to despise and distrust the folly of human wisdom (which, by the way, is what Scripture commands us to do).



PS: Fair warning: Pecadillo's coming back.

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A typical gospel invitation from Spurgeon

Your weekly dose of Spurgeon
posted by Phil Johnson

The PyroManiacs devote space at the beginning of each week to highlights from The Spurgeon Archive.

Spurgeon was well known for his evangelistic appeals. As an unregenerate adolescent, under intense conviction about his sin, he listened to sermon after sermon, longing to hear how he could be saved. In the end, he came to Christ after hearing a wholly unprepared sermon by an uneducated lay preacher who (happily for Spurgeon) knew nothing more to preach than the barest essence of a gospel invitation.

So Spurgeon as a preacher resolved to try to make the gospel as clear as possible in every sermon he gave, and he often punctuated it with a strong and forceful appeal. Some of the more priggish high Calvinists in Spurgeon's day were offended by this, but Spurgeon was undeterred.

I have always loved and appreciated the evangelical warmth of Spurgeon's brand of Calvinism. I think it represents the best strain of historic Calvinism, and lots of Calvinists today would do well to emulate Spurgeon's example. He was convinced (quite correctly) that Calvinism's stress on the sovereignty of God in salvation in no way rules out the evangelist's duty to plead with sinners to be reconciled with God (2 Corinthians 5:20).

Here's a sample evangelistic appeal from a sermon titled "The Form and Spirit of Religion," preached on April 4, 1858, at the Music Hall, Royal Surrey Gardens, London:

A plea to people without Christ

Now, before I send you away, let me make this last remark. I hear one say, "Sir, I renounce all trust in good works and ceremonies. Tell me how can I be saved?"

The way is simply this. Our sins deserve punishment; God must and will punish sin; Jesus Christ came into this world and was punished in the room, place, and stead of all that believe on him.

Your business, then, this morning is to make this inquiry, Do I want a Saviour? Do I feel that I want him? And my business, if you answer that question aright is to say, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ with all thy heart, and thou shalt be saved.

Ah! there is one in heaven to-day, I firmly believe, who was always a worshipper in this place, and at New Park Street—a young man who was led here to listen to the gospel, and was converted to God; and last Sabbath morning was caught away to heaven in the burning house at Bloomsbury—one of those young men who was taken out of the ruins, one who had been brought to a knowledge of the truth here.

It is stated in some of the papers, that his mother was far from a religious woman, and was somewhat given to drink; he had to struggle with some temptation and opposition, but he was enabled to hold on his way, and then, in such an hour as he thought not, the Son of Man came for him, and caught him to himself in the midst of flames and crashing timbers and the uprising of smoke.

Oh! I may have one here, that, ere another Sabbath morning comes, may be launched into eternity, if not by the same deplorable process, yet in as hasty a manner; and as my soul rejoices over that young man, to think that God should have honoured me in bringing him to Christ before he took him up to heaven, I must lament that there are any of you in a peril so frightful, as to be living without God, without Christ, without a hope of heaven; to have death hanging over you, and yet not to tremble at it. Oh! this morning I beseech you, close with Christ. "Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, while his wrath is kindled but a little: for blessed are all they that put their trust in him."

Incidentally, that invitation came at the end of a sermon against ritualistic tendencies in religion. While Spurgeon often made direct and passionate appeals to unbelievers, he had misgivings about the practice of formal altar calls—because he correctly foresaw that this could easily become a kind of Baptist "ritualism," obscuring the simplicity of salvation. In his book An All-Round Ministry, he wrote:

On Altar-Calls and Enquiry-Rooms

Let me say, very softly and whisperingly, that there are little things among ourselves which must be carefully looked after, or we shall have a leaven of Ritualism and priesthood working in our measures of meal. In our revival services, it might be as well to vary our procedure. Sometimes shut up that inquiry-room.

I have my fears about that institution if it be used in permanence, and as an inevitable part of the services. It may be a very wise thing to invite persons, who are under concern of soul, to come apart from the rest of the congregation, and have conversation with godly people; but if you should ever see that a notion is fashioning itself that there is something to be got in the private room which is not to be had at once in the assembly, or that God is more at that penitent form than elsewhere, aim a blow at that notion at once.

We must not come back by a rapid march to the old way of altars and confessionals, and have Romish trumpery restored in a coarser form. If we make men think that conversation with ourselves or with our helpers is essential to their faith in Christ, we are taking the direct line for priestcraft.

In the gospel, the sinner and the Savior are to come together, with none between. Speak upon this point very clearly, "You, sinner, sitting where you are, believing on the Lord Jesus Christ, shall have eternal life. Do not stop till you pass into an inquiry-room. Do not think it essential to confer with me. Do not suppose that I have the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven, or that these godly men and women associated with me can tell you any other gospel than this, 'He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.'"

I think he struck a good balance.

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IT'S A TIE!

by Frank Turk

In the midst of my berating CBA and anyone every associated with it besides myself, I tore myself away to re-read all the entries into this month's t-shirt contest, and the winner is ...

HOLY MACKEREL! IT'S A TIE!

Candy and BugBlaster TIED in making me laugh and also demonstrating that they know what kind of person I really am. E-mail me with your size and mailing address so I can place an order for you. Honorable mention to Brad Williams, Carla, daniel, wayne and Kent Brandenberg who all made my final list of potential non-losers.

The rest of you: better luck next month.

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Happy Birthday to Us

by Phil Johnson

During a lull in the space walk (which is spectacular and fascinating—but every now and then the Space Station travels through a region where we lose the TV signal), I was reminiscing through the past year's blogposts.

I decided to list my top ten most memorable events. Here they are, in descending order (because I don't know how to make .html's numbered-lists count down in reverse:

Top Ten Unforgettable Episodes in Year One of Pyromania:

1. The Great Comic-book Apocalypse of 2005. This occurred, oddly enough, on the very same day I met Frank Turk for the first time. I made the post early in the morning, before meeting Frank for lunch, so he is in no way to blame. But it's a remarkable and ominous coincidence, I think, that two such fateful and far-reaching events occurred within 4 hours of each other.
   
2. The Hamburger Helper Debate. A few people were piqued by a series of posts I did suggesting that total pacifism is inconsistent with Scripture. The more I tried to lighten the mood, the more "militant" some of my pacifist critics became. In one post, I pondered some rather far-fetched scenarios designed to show that lethal force against a terrorist like Osama bin Laden needn't automatically result in harm to innocent bystanders. If someone cornered the bad guy at Costco, for example, the judicious use of a frozen ground-beef chub could save untold numbers of innocent lives.
        Sadly, however, the very suggestion of a show of force in the aisles at Costco made some of our "peaceable" friends more angry than the notion of Osama running free and unmolested. The most notable response came from Joe Thorn, who seized the opportunity to question my manhood while appealing for a more "humble [and] thoughtful" attitude toward lost souls like Osama.
        My response, a desperate plea for a time out, made the fatal mistake of injecting another note of humor into a debate about one of the few dogmas certain forward-thinking evangelicals insist must be treated with a show of solemn reverence.
        Several commenters have said that was the funniest PyroPost ever. Others haven't stopped lambasting me for my unbridled cruelty.
        Two days later, I took a long break from blogging.
   
3. Speaking of poking fun at stuff we're supposed to be serious about, this was my personal favorite of all last year's comic-book covers. The various Biblezine® parodies also rank up there.
   
4. My week in London during the terrorist strike there was one of the most unforgettable weeks of my entire life. The posts from that week will make a great chapter in my biography someday. I'm willing to open negotiations for the movie rights here and now.
   
5. The series on "The Fad-Driven Church" still frequently provokes comments. See this post and its immediate predecessors. These posts summed up as well as anything the central message of Blogyear One.
   
6. My first-ever post and the comment-thread it generated turned out to be a harbinger and a microcosm of virtually everything that has been posted since. Notice that all the current members of TeamPyro except DJP made comments on day one of the blog, and a minor skirmish with the iMonk broke out.
   
7. Speaking of TeamPyro, the shift to a team blog was sudden and not something I had contemplated long or planned out carefully, but I have never regretted it or second-guessed my choices about who should be on the team. I think the blog is better than ever, and every one of these guys has submitted several posts dealing with tough subjects in a much better way than I ever could.
   
8. I tried hard to stay on the periphery of the Great Thanksgiving Blogwar, but once again, a comic-book cover did me in.
   
9. This post summed up a year's worth of disagreements with the infamous iMonk.
   
10. I really miss the Monday Menagerie series, and I'm going to do more of this kind of stuff when time permits, but one a week was too much.
        I did some research, for example, and found that the young woman in the picture at the right is Mary Ann Bevan, who suffered from a disease known as acromegaly, and gained a modicum of fame as an Edwardian side-show exhibit, billing herself as "The World's Ugliest Woman." Her story, oddly enough, isn't as sad as you might think. She seems to have had a happy life, a lovely and loving family, and a career that in Edwardian times wasn't deemed as demeaning as it would be today. I think she really was a home-school mom. The story of her life would've made a good "Monday Menagerie" post.

There's other good stuff I've forgotten, I'm sure. Sometimes I'll come across an old post while searching for something else and get caught up reading an old comment-thread. It's a great way to waste an hour.

Thanks to TeamPyro members; the homeschool moms; my mindless, high-fiving comment-cult; the nattering nabobs of negativism who post semi-regularly; the Blue Raja; and Adrian Warnock for helping make the blog what it is today. I'm interested in readers' thoughts about the blog so far. What do you remember, appreciate, or hate the most about the first year of PyroMania?

Talk amongst yourselves. Leave comments.

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A few short items

A week's worth of blogging packed into one convenient post
by Phil Johnson

The Pecadillo Report

The esteemed Pecadillo has completed his training at the Police Academy. He received his shield in a very simple ceremony while we were in Italy a couple of weeks ago. I hated missing that, but his formal graduation ceremony is coming up in three weeks. I don't intend to miss that.

Anyway, he started doing actual police work today, helping provide security for the mayor's press conference in downtown Los Angeles. He's now authorized to carry a loaded gun pretty much all the time. Fair warning. He'll actually be working on the streets rather than sitting in class at the academy from now on.

Training at the academy is grueling. Recruits who double-fail any test are automatically expelled from the Academy. Some drop out of every new group simply because the training is so stressful. For Pecadillo (who hates mornings), the hardest part was having to get up at 2:45 AM most days in order to get to the Academy in time for the early-morning start.

Of course his mom and I are proud of him.

Jeff Williams Update

This evening, Jeff Williams will make the first of two spacewalks during his 6-month stint in the Space Station. NASA has posted some PowerPoint slides that show what the 5.75-hour spacewalk is designed to accomplish. Both Jeff and his mission commander, Russian Pavel Vinogradav, will be outside the Space Station at the same time. Pray for them today when you think of it.

I'm assuming Jeff will be taking lots of pictures. He's apparently going for the record number of photos taken by one astronaut on a single mission—having taken nearly 15,000 photos already.

One of his photos shows a spectacular volcanic eruption in the Aleutian Islands. On Jeff's earlier mission, one of the things he did was study volcanoes, but this photo is a rare treasure. I believe this is the first volcanic eruption ever spotted from space before it was seen on the ground. Click on the photo to go to NASA, where you can download a fantastic hi-res copy.

If you want watch the spacewalk, tune into NASA TV starting at 5:30 PM Eastern time. And remember to pray for the safety of the spacewalk.

Can you even imagine what it must be like to float freely and weightlessly in space with the whole world filling your field of vision? Wow.

Whether Jeff plans to stick his PyroManiac decal on the outside of the Space Station or not, he hasn't said. (Actually, Jeff, if you read this, just send me a good hi-res photo, and I'll Photoshop the sticker on.)

Odds 'N' Ends

For the record:

• The Cubs' season is over. I know. Everyone can stop asking me about it.
  
• I've been listening to the T4G sessions on my iPod. They've been summarized and thoroughly dissected everywhere, so I'm just going to say that I enjoyed them all thoroughly, and it made me doubly sorry that I missed the conference. I'm glad they made the panel discussions available. I recommend them all highly, without reservation. (And you know how rare it is for me to give anything an unqualified recommendation.)
  
• Speaking of which, our old friend NT Wright ("The Bish") came to Canada to drink beer and talk theology. (Always knew he was a BHT fellow at heart.) Read a glowing review of the bishop's Tavern-Talk here. Wright desperately needs to enter the contest to win the Pyro-T. That mauve shirt with the clerical collar isn't working for him.
  
• Bonus: Here's a pretty good summary of why we're uneasy with the Bish's position on justification by faith, and why we remain unmoved by the rhetorical tactics he and his disciples use to defend it (ht: CraigS).
  
• I had to redo one of the Biblezine parodies (see here, here, and here), because the image I used turned out not to be in the public domain. The person pictured in the original version of "The New Testament for Goth Girls" turned out to be a professional model who has had some rather unsavory gigs, and who once appeared on the cover of something called "Rule Satannia." She saw the parody and e-mailed me to say she wasn't happy to have her photo used on a Bible. So I immediately removed it. Then I redid it with a picture that has a reliable pedigree and which I have express permission to use. I actually like the revision better than the original:
  
  
• The designer Bibles actually being published these days work well as parodies of themselves anyway, such as this one: Immerse—A Water-Resistant New Testament. That's no joke. I think it's doing well among Baptists.
  
• I also adapted several old PyroManiacs graphics to make 50 blogheaders which are supposed to cycle at random. The randomize function doesn't always seem to work well, but we'll get it working. In the meantime, feel free to comment on your favorites (or complain about your least favorites).
  
• Happy 25th birthday to my second son, Jedidiah.

Update: Heads up for the Pyros—Sometime reader One Salient Oversight (famous dilettante analyst of the US political scene and my favorite Aussie critic of all things American) isn't happy with the direction of the blog. He says: "Ever since Phil Johnson invited others to blog for him, I've been less than happy with the direction of the Pyromaniacs blog. I don't know, maybe it's just too Baptist for me to feel accepted. Being Reformed, they're friends, but being Baptist and American, they're occasionally grating." "Occasionally"? Our batting average is dropping, guys. Let's work a little harder at rubbing the Aussies the wrong way. Anyway, I want to send OSO some love and "acceptance" with this gift: "Dubya, dubya, dubya dotcon." (ht: Nathan Casebolt).

PPS: Look who has surfaced in the drunk tank: The only real surprise about this is that it took so long.

Oh, and by the way...

Today's the anniversary of my entry into the blogosphere. That first post remains my most-commented-on post of all time, though a post in April by Dan Phillips nearly doubled the record that post set.

Now back to work.

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