Consider the Lilies

Got our first snowfall yesterday here in Wheaton. Stacey and I act like 5-year-olds each winter, eagerly anticipating the first snowfall and gleefully rejoicing in it when it arrives. Just love it. Goodness. What a strange joy, but very real.

Have you ever--ever--stopped and considered snow? I mean really considered it? Beyond the hassle it is for driving? What it does to your soul? Or have you (as I have in so many ways) 'sinned and grown old,' as Chesterton says, numbed by a lifetime of sit-coms, unable to wonder?

I was lying on the sofa yesterday too sleepy to keep reading a book and opening my eyes I saw out our front window, against the sky, a mass of hundreds of interweaving branches from three or four giant locust trees, each branch carrying a perfect little mound of snow along its winding tentacles. The complexity of it all seemed infinite. I could not take it all in. It was too much. My little mind cannot digest it. It is inexhaustible wonder.

Included in the Prophecies

'Of course!' said Gandalf. 'And why should they not prove true? Surely you don’t disbelieve the prophecies, because you had a hand in bringing them about yourself? You don’t really suppose, do you, that all your adventures and escapes were managed by mere luck, just for your sole benefit? You are a very fine person, Mr. Baggins, and I am very fond of you; but you are only quite a little fellow in a wide world after all!'

--last page of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Hobbit

Dependence

True, everything we have comes from our Father, our ability, our industry, our technical know-how. But when we use it without him, when we treat it as paid-out capital which we can use as we please, it decays in our hands.

--Helmut Thielicke, The Waiting Father: Sermons on the Parables of Jesus (trans. John Doberstein; Harper & Row, 1959), 23

A Sermon Is not a Speech

Perhaps not many are aware that Herman Bavinck was a pastor for a year before taking up his first teaching post. Ron Gleason writes of what this was like for the young man, beginning with Bavinck's first Sunday in the pulpit.

Bavinck was to preach his first sermon in his new congregation in the evening service. There is little known about what occurred in the time between the morning and evening services, but when Bavinck walked into the consistory room prior to evening worship he was noticeably distraught. The elders became a little concerned as their newly installed pastor began pacing back and forth. [Bavinck's father] Jan calmed everyone when he explained that his son was simply very much under the impression of what he was about to do: to preach the Word of God.

The Dutch call what was happening to Bavinck 'sermon fever' (preek koorts). It appears that Bavinck, even though he was an accomplished preacher, never outgrew this phenomenon during hiss entire time in Franeker. Hepp's observation that Bavinck would throw up every Sunday morning before he preached might be slightly exaggerated but appears to contain an element of truth.

--Ron Gleason, Herman Bavinck: Pastor, Churchman, Statesman, and Theologian (P&R, 2010), 79

Re:Train Testimony

An encouraging and invigorating word from Jim Reklis, a seasoned pastor who went through the excellent Re:Train program in Seattle last year.

Lutheran Airlines Preflight Announcements

HT: Paul McCain

Disunity: Passions Trumping Duty

Bishop Edward Stillingfleet, The Mischief of Separation (1680):

Although the Christian religion doth lay the greatest obligations on mankind to peace and unity, by the strictest commands, the highest examples, and the most prevailing arguments, yet so much have the passions and interests of men oversway'd the sense of their duty, that as nothing ought to be more in our wishes, so nothing seems more remote from our hopes, than the universal peace of the Christian world. (p. 1)

--quoted in Henry Knapp, 'John Owen, on Schism and the Nature of the Church,' WTJ 72 (2010): 333

Entrust to Reliable Men

I found myself moved by this photo from the ordination of our brother Brandon Crowe, a recent addition to the Westminster Seminary faculty.

Camels?

Yes, camels. We aren't familiar with these strange creatures here in the West, but of course they pop up all over the place in the Bible. Maybe it would be interesting to know a thing or two about them.

Here are a few factoids about these remarkable creatures--

1. Camels have three or in some cases four stomachs. Plants are chewed, sent down to the first two stomachs, regurgitated, the cud is chewed, then it is swallowed again.

2. Camels have slit-like nostrils that can close when needed, as in a sandstorm.

3. Their extremely long and thick eyelashes are one more protection against sandstorms. They also have bony humps over the eyes that act as natural shades from the sun.

4. A camel's teeth never stop growing their whole lives long. The longer and more protruding the teeth, the older the camel.

5. A camel's feet are unique among other mammals. Instead of walking on the tips of their toes covered by a hoof, their feet are broad pads that function like elastic and give maximal traction in sand.

6. Other mammals have round red blood cells. A camel's are oval, making them flow faster in dehydration.

7. A camel can lose up to 40% of its weight in water loss without being harmed. Humans die if they lose 14%.

8. Camels can drink even the slush left behind by salt water when fresh water is unavailable.

9. Unlike other animals that are created either for extreme cold or for extreme heat, a camel is created for both--the same camel can endure temperatures down to 40 degrees below (F) in the winter and 100 degrees in the summer.

10. Bother a camel and it will spit on you.

11. Camel fights have been known to escalate to such a degree that both combatants have died.

12. Camels can run up to 40 miles/hour, and can carry several hundred pounds of equipment for sustained lengths at over 10 miles/hour.

13. Those humps are not filled with water, but fat, and can sustain a camel several days. In the exact same conditions, a cow will lose water three times as quickly as a camel. A thirsty camel can drink 30 gallon of water in 13 minutes and then not drink again for a week.

14. A camel's mouth is so tough it can chew and swallow bushes with thorns.

As someone who appreciates efficiency, may I say that I am in awe. I would not be averse to the institution of a camel appreciation month.

In all seriousness, it is truly awe-some to consider the world God has made and placed us in. There are wonders all around.

Jesus in the OT

A nice summary from our brother John Starke, with a good addition from Tim Keller, of works helping us responsibly read the OT as Jesus himself read it--testifying, as a whole, to him (John 5; Luke 24).

On another note: is it really December already?