Antsy Angst

‘Evolution vs. God’ Filmmaker Responds to Atheists’ Calls for Unedited Footage and Delivers a Stinging Message to Richard Dawkins

Aug. 28, 2013 7:53am

Billy Hallowell

Reproduced from TheBlaze 

Evangelist Ray Comfort’s 38-minute “Evolution vs. God” documentary continues to spark debate and angst among the atheist activist community. It’s no surprise that non-believers dismiss the documentary’s contents and deride Comfort’s claim that scientists cannot offer definitive evidence for Darwinian evolution.

TheBlaze spoke with Comfort on Tuesday, who said that this particular project, which premiered on July 9, has been “polarizing,” as he has received many praise-worthy comments as well as a multitude of angry rebuttals. He said there’s been a “love-hate attitude” surrounding the short film.

“Normally with a video you get 20, 30, 40 comments, maybe 100,” he said. “This is at 46,000 comments on YouTube at just over three weeks.”

Logo for Ray Comfort’s “Evolution vs. God” documentary (Photo Credit: Ray Comfort)

As for those who are angry over the film, Comfort was candid. Non-believers, he claims, are simply frustrated that their worldview is being eroded by what’s exposed in “Evolution vs. God.”

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 31

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Reproduced from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith: so do. —I Timothy 1:4

Devotional:
So then God has not given us his word to feed us only without profit, as the world would that we should tickle their ears, and that there were nothing in us but only to delight their mind and make them merry.
God does not mean to dally here with us, but his mind is that we receive some good instruction, that is to say, that we receive profit by his word.

Therefore all they that do not apply the word of God to good profit and use, are contemners and falsifiers of good and wholesome doctrine. In short, the word of God is as it were profaned and made vile, unless we apply it thus profitably that we receive good instruction to our salvation by it.

Therefore let us learn that God will not have temples here to sport and laugh in as if there were plays played here; but there must be majesty in his word, by which we may be moved and touched; and moreover a profitable instruction to salvation, and we must be nourished with this spiritual food, so that we may feel that it is not in vain that God speaks to us. —Sermons

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John Calvin was the premier theologian of the Reformation, but also a pious and godly Christian pastor who endeavored throughout his life to point men and women to Christ. We are grateful to Reformation Heritage Books for permission to use John Calvin's Thine Is My Heart as our daily devotional for 2013 on the OPC Web site. You can currently obtain a printed copy of that book from Reformation Heritage Books.

Positive Changes

Making Bail Laws More Reasonable

We have commented in recent weeks on small changes the New Zealand government is making for the better.  Most of these have focused on welfare beneficiaries, with authorities being more comprehensively demanding of beneficiaries that they find a job, lest their benefits get reduced.  Authorities are working in a more co-ordinated fashion to the same end.  It is making an impact upon beneficiary culture: the message, "you have to get a job" is sinking in.

Another incremental change has just been made--this time to bail laws.  It is going to be much harder for serious offenders to get bail. 

Bail has always been a bad idea made necessary because of overcrowding in remand prisons and because the justice system moves at a glacial pace.  The prospect of having an accused sit in jail for over two years waiting for a trial, at which he or she is subsequently found non-guilty is a manifest injustice.  Hence the device of letting accused folk out on bail to await trial.  "Innocent until proven guilty" is a fundamental principle of justice, after all.  But that application of that principle to criminals awaiting trial has been applied in such a way as to increase crime in New Zealand.

Vacuous Greenism

Anti-Fracking Luddiocy

Think of any technology that involves carbon based energy and its utilisation, and the lunatic fringe can be found parading, placarding, and protesting.  By-and-large these folk are anti-science, anti-technology luddites.  Their "case" is made by means of various ad hominem attacks, lies, innuendo, exaggerations, and hysteria.  Lots of heat.  No light.  Typical greenist propaganda.

The latest cause d'celebre amongst these intellectually challenged folk is fracking--which, if the histrionic loonies are to be believed, threatens humankind.  Phelim McAleer, fracking protagonist, profiles repeated anti-fracking impeccable ignorance, courtesy of Spiked

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 30

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Reproduced from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
If I have walked with vanity, or if my foot hath hasted to deceit; Let me be weighed in an even balance, that God may know mine integrity. —Job 31:5, 6

Devotional:
Let us learn also to humble ourselves, seeing that the devil is trying to put us to sleep by hypocrisy in order that we may not recognize our faults, and that they may grow worse and worse.

Let us then look within ourselves, and after we have examined our imperfections, let us cry out before God, "Alas, Lord! thou hast given me thy grace to go forward in thy service; I do my best, I strive, I resist all my passions, and I fight against myself; and yet I am not righteous before thee, but there is much wrong with me still."

That is how the faithful, after striving to the limit of their strength, ought always to retain this opinion when there remains any sinfulness mingled with the good which God enables them to do; they must learn to plead guilty before him and to humble themselves, that they may receive grace.

Haters of Humanity

Baalism or the Christ

Neutrality is not an option.  It is a chimera.  The Scriptures declare that one is either for the Lord Jesus Christ, or against Him.  No middle ground.  And our Lord added, he who does not gather with Me, scatters.  These statements are not startling; they are entirely predictable and expected.  After all, our Lord is the light of the world.  Darkness cannot continue or abide in the light.  They are opposites.  When men are confronted with the light, they will either come to Christ, into His light, or they will flee Him.  No neutrality.

The secular humanist state, now regnant throughout the West, professes neutrality towards the Christ.  It is officially neither for Him, nor against Him.  The secular humanist state considers Him irrelevant.  If He exists at all, He belongs to a realm that has no bearing upon earthly reality.

But what of His followers?

Douglas Wilson's Letter From Moscow

The Great Cat Poo Medallion

Posted on Monday, August 26, 2013  

By Douglas Wilson 

Blog and Mablog

Rod Dreher has a good piece here on the great looming alternative that now confronts us.

Within the biblical framework of a rightly-ordered patriotism, it is easy for Christians to take our native loyalties to our native land as a simple given, while reserving to ourselves the right to disagree with or oppose the decisions and mandates of the current administration. Jeremiah was no less a patriot for challenging King Zedekiah. Seems simple.

But when the canker of rebellious idolatry is well-advanced in any nation, the possibility of the regnant idolaters seeing believers as part of a loyal opposition begins to steadily erode. A totalitarian miasma sets in, and any disagreement with the current forms of legislated disobedience is taken either as mental illness or treason. When Stalin wanted to deal with his political enemies, he used psychiatry to define them into his version of the outer darkness. When the ancient Romans persecuted the Christians, they did so because the Christians were enemies of mankind. And in our day, simple disagreement with the proposals surrounding same sex mirage is categorized simply, routinely, and quite handily, as “hate.” That was an extraordinary move, and entirely predictable.

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 29

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Reproduced from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. —I John 4:10

Devotional:
Thus, by a pure and gratuitous love towards us, he is excited to receive us into favor. But if there is a perpetual and irreconcilable opposition between righteousness and iniquity, he cannot receive us entirely, as long as we remain sinners.

Therefore, to remove all occasion of enmity, and to reconcile us completely to himself, he abolishes all our guilt, by the expiation exhibited in the death of Christ, that we, who before were polluted and impure, may appear righteous and holy in his sight. The love of God the Father therefore precedes our reconciliation in Christ; or rather it is because he first loves, that he afterwards reconciles us to himself.

But because, till Christ relieves us by his death, we are not freed from that iniquity which deserves the indignation of God, and is accursed and condemned in his sight; we have not a complete and solid union with God, before we are united to him by Christ.

And therefore if we would assure ourselves that God is pacified and propitious to us, we must fix our eyes and hearts on Christ alone, since it is by him only that we really obtain the non-imputation of sins, the imputation of which is connected with the Divine wrath. —Institutes, II, xvi, iii

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John Calvin was the premier theologian of the Reformation, but also a pious and godly Christian pastor who endeavored throughout his life to point men and women to Christ. We are grateful to Reformation Heritage Books for permission to use John Calvin's Thine Is My Heart as our daily devotional for 2013 on the OPC Web site. You can currently obtain a printed copy of that book from Reformation Heritage Books.

Bad Examples

Finnish Contumely

Deborah Hill Cone is a NZ Herald columnist. She wrote a provocative piece on government education the other day.  It seems that the Finns are doing particularly well in education--along with South Korea and Poland.   Her column makes reference to a new book by Amanda Ripley How Do Other Countries Create Smarter Kids?.

Journalist Amanda Ripley went on a worldwide quest to try to understand the mystery of why kids in some countries were doing well academically while more privileged kids in the US were struggling.  Ripley said she was stumped, until one day she saw a chart and "it blew my mind". The chart showed Finland had rocketed from the bottom of the world education rankings to the top "without pausing for breath".  Yet children in Norway, right next door, were floundering, despite their nation having virtually no child poverty.

So, after a bit of old-fashioned investigative journalism and research, Ripley presents her conclusions.  As you all no doubt are anticipating, the causal factors were all so humdrum and ordinary.  But--and we say this with reflective deliberation--they are also factors impossible to introduce into the New Zealand's enlightened education system as it currently exists.

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 28

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Reproduced from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
But ye have not so learned Christ; If so be that ye have heard him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus: That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; —Ephesians 4:20-22


Devotional:
This is a proper place to address those who have nothing but the name and the symbol of Christ, and yet would be called Christians. But with what face do they glory in his sacred name? For none have any intercourse with Christ but those who have received the true knowledge of him from the word of the gospel.

Now the apostle denies that any have rightly learned Christ, who have not been taught that they must put off the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and put on Christ. Their knowledge of Christ, then, is proved to be a false and injurious pretense, with whatever eloquence and volubility they may talk concerning the gospel.

Modern Aristo-Plutocrats

Do As I Say, Not As I Do

Marie Antoinette's infamous, "Let them eat cake" has entered the popular lexicon as a byword for sociopathic disdain for the poor.  There is some serious doubt as to whether poor old Marie ever uttered the phrase.  It was attributed to her by one Jean Jacques Rousseau who never let the facts get in the way of a ripping slander. 

Rousseau's Confessions (in which the slander appears) was written in 1768--two years before Marie Antoinette moved to France.  The line also appears in Rousseau's journal notes "years before Antoinette was born."  Ouch.  But it proved a useful pretext and propaganda tool to stir up envy and anger, inciting the odd riot or two.  [Jonah Goldberg, The Tyranny of Cliches: How Liberals Cheat in the War of Ideas (New York: Sentinel/Penguin, 2012), p.172.]

The picture of an uncaring, wealthy aristocracy who hate the poor abides.  It appeals to our baser instincts.  It certainly appealed to Rousseau who, himself, was an acute despiser of the poor and a "suck-up-to-nobility-kind-of-chap".  If Rousseau could not join the aristocracy, he hated them; when he was welcomed and celebrated in their circles, he fawned over them.  He was a pathetic fellow in so many ways. 

But his bitter word, falsely attributed to Marie Antoinette, lives on.  Ironically, it is amongst modern democrats and socialists that the sentiment conveyed by Rousseau has the most traction.  Uber-wealth and gaudy displays are the hallmark of the modern celebrity culture, along with a fashionable assuaging commitment to socialism.  The latter serves to salve the conscience for all that wealth so ostentatiously on display.  Marie Antoinette had nothing on our modern aristo-plutocrats.

Douglas Wilson's Letter From Moscow

Ares, Aphrodite, and Hermes

Posted on Wednesday, July 3, 2013 

By Douglas Wilson 

Blog and Mablog

A friend asked about a biblical worldview perspective on civil unions for homosexuals, and so here goes.

1. When involved in discussions about things like this, it is crucial that we think three chess moves ahead. Does anybody seriously think that adopting civil union legislation would make the pressure for homosexual marriage decrease? If we accept the legitimacy of civil unions, have we granted any premises that would make it impossible to deny a pending conclusion that we would otherwise want to deny? To ask the question is to answer it.

2. If limited like marriage (say, to a maximum of two people), then civil unions are a mockery of marriage, not marriage itself. In that case, why would any recipient of that status be satisfied with it? Homosexuality runs on envy, and you don’t make envy disappear by creating a second class shanty right next door to the nice house. And if civil unions are made utterly unlike marriage, so as to include up to six other people, say, then what would prevent heterosexual “polygamous” civil unions from springing up overnight?

3. I’ll tell you what would prevent it — the cost of the benefits packages to employers, that’s what. Health insurance, full coverage, for a man, his wife, and four concubines, would be way more expensive than the current set up.

And this brings us to one of the hidden sources of all the mischief,

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 27

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Reproduced from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
For I will defend this city to save it for mine own sake, and for my servant David's sake. —Isaiah 37:35

Devotional:
"For my own sake." When he says that he will do this "for his own sake," he calls on Hezekiah and all believers to remember his gracious covenant.

In order to prevent them from despairing, he shows that God will be their defender, not because he finds any cause in them, but rather because he looks to himself; first that he may adhere firmly to his purpose, not to cast away the posterity of Abraham which he adopted, not to abolish religious worship, not to blot out the remembrance of his name on the earth by destroying his sanctuary; and, secondly, not to expose his name to the jeers and blasphemies of the nations.

And these words contain an implied reproof which that nation ought to have felt to be severe, and justly; because the good king had more difficulty in pacifying them than in repelling the enemy; for they distrusted and stormed and thought that no hope of safety was left for them.

The Lord, therefore, did not look at the merits of the people or of any other person, but only had regard to his own glory; for the contrast which is expressed by Ezekiel must be here understood, "Not for your sakes, 0 house of Israel, will I do this, but for my own sake" (Ezek. 36:22).

Gentile Madness

Gender Bender

When God gives a culture up to the ravages of its own sinfulness its mind becomes darkened (Romans 1:21).  The culture starts to do stupid, laughable things with all due solemnity and seriousness. 

Here is an example of Gentile madness:  US army solider, Private Manning stole state secrets.  He has been judged and found guilty, and sentenced to thirty-five years in prison.  But Private Manning is taken in self-absorbed lust.  He wants to be a woman.  He has made application for medical intervention that would change him into a woman.  This is serious stuff.  It is serious because medical "experts" have discovered there is a bona-fide disease named Gender Identity Disorder ("GID").  Wow.  A disease.  But that means its treatable--using hormones, the surgeon's knife, counselling and a truckload of other medical interventions.  Hey presto, Manning can be turned into a woman. 

But wait, there's more.  The issue here is not just the perverted fixations of a lost proud soul.  The soul that is lost includes the United States medical establishment.

Douglas Wilson's Letter From Moscow

When a Public Mind Cannot Repent

Posted on Thursday, July 18, 2013  

By Douglas Wilson 

Blog and Mablog 

Many Christian activists and reformers are in that position because they see — they anticipate, they look forward, they can run out the consequences. If they were in a position to do so, they would be good providers for our society. The word provide comes from two Latin words, meaning to see beforehand. You can give the provision because you saw it coming.

When someone sees ordinary things coming — springtime and harvest, for example — he is considered diligent. The sluggard is surprised by the arrival of winter. He wants desperately, but has nothing (Prov. 13:4). He is reduced to begging in the time of harvest (Prov. 20:4). But can you warn him beforehand? Not a bit of it — he is wiser in his own conceits than seven men with good reasons (Prov. 26:16).

When someone sees extraordinary things coming — the famine that threatened Egypt, for example — he is considered a prophet like Joseph. When someone truly identifies future things in a way that is not consistent with chance, we say that he is a prophet of God (Is. 41:23). And (in a movie) if someone were able to predict the winning lottery numbers, we would say it was clairvoyance . . . or cheating.

But when someone sees damnation coming to someone, the more his prediction is confirmed, the more it is discounted and despised.

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 26

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Republished from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
And of his fulness have all we received and grace for grace. —John 1:16


Devotional:
"And of his fulness." True indeed, the fountain of life, righteousness, virtue, and wisdom, is with God, but to us it is a hidden and inaccessible fountain.

But an abundance of those things is exhibited to us in Christ, that we may be permitted to have recourse to him; for he is ready to flow to us, provided that we open up a channel by faith. He declares in general that out of Christ we ought not to seek anything good, though this sentence consists of several clauses.

First, he shows that we are all utterly destitute and empty of spiritual blessings; for the abundance which exists in Christ is intended to supply our deficiency, to relieve our poverty, to satisfy our hunger and thirst.

Secondly, he warns us that, as soon as we have departed from Christ, it is in vain for us to seek a single drop of happiness, because God has determined that whatever is good shall reside in him alone. Accordingly, we shall find angels and men to be dry, heaven to be empty, the earth to be unproductive, and in short all things to be of no value, if we wish to be partakers of the gifts of God in any other way than through Christ.

Thirdly, he assures us that we shall have no reason to fear the want of any thing, provided that we draw from the fulness of Christ, which is in every respect so complete, that we shall experience it to be a truly inexhaustible fountain; and John classes himself with the rest, not for the sake of modesty, but to make it more evident that no man whatever is excepted. —Commentaries

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John Calvin was the premier theologian of the Reformation, but also a pious and godly Christian pastor who endeavored throughout his life to point men and women to Christ. We are grateful to Reformation Heritage Books for permission to use John Calvin's Thine Is My Heart as our daily devotional for 2013 on the OPC Web site. You can currently obtain a printed copy of that book from Reformation Heritage Books.

Modern Words

Downward Progress

We were intrigued the other day to read what was intended to be a damning criticism of a US politician.

The time-capsule quality of Cruz’s politics is lost on no one who knew him at Princeton, none of whom could point to a political position that he held 25 years ago that he does not seem to still hold today. For some, that amounts to a laudably consistent belief system. For others, it reveals a man of calcified thinking, dangerously impervious to facts, reality, and a changing world.

 "More than anyone I knew, Ted seemed to have arrived in college with a fully formed worldview,” Butler College colleague Erik Leitch said.  “And what strikes me now, looking at him as an adult and hearing the things he's saying, it seems like nothing has changed. Four years of an Ivy League education, Harvard Law, and years of life experience have altered nothing."

Imagine we attended Harvard Law School as a tyro, but with a deep conviction that the world was over 70 percent ocean.  Now, years later, replete with a Harvard Law degree, years of life experience, and presumably wiser, we still hold the same view: that the earth's surface is predominately water.  Critics could doubtless allege that we were closed minded, of "calcified thinking, dangerously impervious to facts, reality, and a changing world." 

Whilst the slur would be expectorated full of sound and fury, it would signify precisely nothing.  Well, actually, it would signify something about the person doing the slurring.  Let's deconstruct.

Letter From the UK (About State Tyranny)

Ta-ta UK freedoms! Miranda matter outs vindictiveness of wounded police state

Annie Machon is a former intel­li­gence officer for the UK's MI5, who resigned in 1996 to blow the whistle. She is now a writer, public speaker and a Director of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition.

Published time: August 19, 2013 20:10

RT

 

As you read the article below, keep asking yourself this question: What had David Miranda to do with planning or conspiring or perpetrating acts of terror?  The answer is obvious. How then could be be detained under "emergency powers" that are designed to interdict those actively involved in plotting or carrying out terrorist attacks?  Only by a drawing a long, tyrannical bow: namely, he who opposes the powers of government to combat terror is by definition aiding and abetting terrorist acts by others.  This would make most citizens complicit in, and guilty of terrorism, by association.  The beast is unchained and loose.

Ed.

 

U.S. journalist Glenn Greenwald (L) walks with his partner David Miranda in Rio de Janeiro's International Airport August 19, 2013. (Reuters/Ricardo Moraes)

As the definition of terrorism has expanded to cover activists, placard wavers, protesters and now, apparently, the partners of journalists, the arrest of Glenn Greenwald's partner is just another nail in the coffin of British Freedoms.

David Miranda had just spent a week in Berlin before flying back to his home country, Brazil, via London's Heathrow airport. As he attempted to transit on to his flight home - not enter the UK, mind you, just make an international connection - he was pulled to one side by the UK's border security officers and questioned for nine hours, as well as having all his technical equipment confiscated.

He was detained for the maximum period allowed under the draconian terms of Schedule 7 of the UK's Terrorism Act (2000). His apparent "crime"? To be the partner of campaigning journalist Glenn Greenwald, who broke the Edward Snowden whistleblowing stories.

Miranda's detention has caused outrage, rightly, around the world.

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 24

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Republished from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
Therefore let no man glory in men. For all things are yours; Whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours; —I Corinthians 3:21, 22

Devotional:
But believers should accustom themselves to such a contempt of the present life as may not generate either hatred of life, or ingratitude towards God. For this life, though it is replete with innumerable miseries, is yet deservedly reckoned among the Divine blessings which must not be despised.

Wherefore, if we discover nothing of the Divine beneficence in it, we are already guilty of no small ingratitude towards God himself. But to believers especially, it should be a testimony of the Divine benevolence, since the whole of it is destined to the advancement of their salvation. For before he openly discovers to them the inheritance of eternal glory, he intends to reveal himself as our Father in inferior instances; and those are the benefits which he daily confers on us.

Integrity in the Bank

Populist Hogwash

The Reserve Bank of New Zealand has moved to restrict speculative lending by banks.  The predictable backlash has seen high dudgeon from the Commentariat which has been speaking up for those poor erstwhile "first home buyers" who are going to be shut out of the market because they cannot marshal the (now) requisite 20 percent deposit.  Populist rubbish.  But it sells newspapers and stirs the pot.

Spare a thought for the Reserve Bank.  It is charged with maintaining the solvency and stability of the New Zealand banking system.  It can only do this if the banks continue to maintain prudent practices with respect to lending.  And therein lies the rub. 

During the global financial crisis--largely precipitated by reckless housing lending in the United States, the UK, and Europe--the New Zealand government was moved to guarantee bank deposits for a time.  Without such a guarantee, it was argued, international creditors would no longer be willing to stump up capital to pay for the country's foreign borrowing.  A precedent was set and a moral hazard was unleashed.  We all learned that in a systemic credit crisis the government would bail out the banks. 

The government is now trying to back off that implicit state guarantee of bank liabilities.

Letter From America (About Scotland)

Scotland the Brave No More

Relentless leftism goes mostly unrebutted by the Scots.

By  Mona Charen

August 20, 2013 12:00 AM
National Review Online

In an old show-business routine, a stuffy characters complains: “I didn’t come here to be insulted!” to which the response is “Oh really? Where do you usually go?”

I went to Scotland. Don’t misunderstand, the Scots were delightful hosts — friendly, accommodating, and of course, a delight to the ears. The country is as beautiful as advertised, and the castles, museums, and lochs live up to their billing.

But a few days in Edinburgh during the “Fringe” festival is enough to bury images of thistles and bagpipes very deep. The two links to the Scotland of legend are the enduring Anglophobia (the country will vote on independence in September 2014) and the fondness for whisky. A nation of 5 million people boasts more than 100 distilleries and the cocktail hour seems to be interpreted most liberally.

But modern Scotland is deep-dyed in socialism.

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 23

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Republished from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
Jesus saith unto her, Go, call thy husband, and come hither. —John 4:16

Devotional:
"Call thy husband." Such too is the obstinacy of many, that they will never listen to Christ until they have been subdued by violence. Whenever then we perceive that the oil of Christ has no flavor, it ought to be mixed with wine, that its taste may begin to be felt.

Nay more, this is necessary for all of us; for we are not seriously affected by Christ speaking unless we have been aroused to repentance.

So then, in order that anyone may profit in the school of Christ, his hardness must be subdued by the demonstration of his misery, as the earth, in order that it may become fruitful, is prepared and softened by the plowshare. For this knowledge alone shakes off all our flatteries, so that we no longer dare to mock God.

Revolutionaries, Radical Ideologues and Mindless Sheep

Old and New Spies

The revised spying bill became law in New Zealand on the 21st of August.  Labour and the Greens have promised to repeal the legislation if they capture the Treasury benches in 2014.  A local blogger has helpfully completed a comparison/contrast chart between the legislation it replaced and new amendments.

The old legislation was drafted in haste by the Labour government (with concurrence from other parties) whilst the threat of planes flying into buildings was a decided risk.  It was during that mad time when not enough was known about Islamic terrorist groups and their methodologies, tools, and techniques.  Therefore, the risks were larger in the popular imagination than in reality.  Legislation drafted in fear and passed in haste is usually rued by those suffering the indignity of having to submit to it.  So it was in this case.  It turned out lawyers could not understand parts of it; the text of the law was equivocal in others, contradictory in yet other places.  As a consequence, the Government Communications and Security Bureau (our version of the National Security Agency ["NSA"] in the United States) subsequently broke the law, apparently because it mis-interpreted it.

The new legislation tidies a lot of that up, removing confusion.  In addition, and most importantly, the replacement legislation contains far more checks and balances than Labour's panicked legislation back in 2003.  It is thus a far better piece of law.  Citizens in the US must be green with envy when they compare and contrast our legal protections with those which don't exist in the United States.

Quote of the Day

Fighting the Good Fight

"We've been looking for the enemy for some time now. We've finally found him. We're surrounded. That simplifies our problem of getting to these people..."

Lewis B. Puller

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 22

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Republished from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
Offer unto God thanksgiving; and pay thy vows unto the most High: And call upon me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me. —Psalm 50:14, 15

Devotional:
There is in all men by nature a strong and ineffaceable conviction that they ought to worship God. Indisposed to worship him in a pure and spiritual manner, it becomes necessary that they should invent some specious appearance as a substitute; and however clearly they may be persuaded of the vanity of such conduct, they persist in it to the last, because they shrink from a total renunciation of the service of God.

Men have always, accordingly, been found addicted to ceremonies until they have been brought to the knowledge of that which constitutes true and acceptable religion.

Praise and prayer are here to be considered as representing the whole of the worship of God, according to a figure of speech.

Egypt Back to the Future

Moving the Deck Chairs

The Muslim Brotherhood proved to all who were paying attention that it saw democracy as a tool to achieve totalitarian control of Egypt.  It had no compunction about overriding minority groups once it gained majority control.  The Muslim Brotherhood demonstrated that it is ideologically committed to just one, open election. 

Once it was handed the reins of government, the rights of opposition and minority parties were to be forever curtailed and reduced, leaving the Muslim Brotherhood in a position of command and control. The Muslim Brotherhood has the same kind of commitment as Hitler and the Nazi's to democracy in Germany in 1933--a useful way to gain power, as a stepping to dictatorial control.

Islam as a religion requires some variant of "command and control" government.

Douglas Wilson's Letter (From Moscow)

Believing One Half of the Wrong End of It

Posted on Tuesday, August 13, 2013  

By Douglas Wilson

Blog and Mablog

An easy mistake concerning Calvinism is that it somehow must necessarily reduce to a stiff-upper lip Stoicism, particularly in its teaching on contentment. “It is one heart-quieting consideration in all the afflictions that befall us that God has a special hand in them.” This is from the great Thomas Watson, and some might find it easy to think that he and the other Puritans were stuck on this one speed.

The apostle Paul says similar things, but the reason he doesn’t get tagged as a Stoic is that we have read everything else by him, and know that he knew how to weep with those who weep. He was a passionate man, and to charge him with Stoicism is laughable — even though he tells us that all things work together for good.

But we are forced into fair play with Paul because a bunch of people have read the whole Pauline corpus. That is not true of history’s whipping boys, among whom we may place the Puritans in the front row. The Puritans can be easily slandered as those who decontextualized the command to be content, turning it into a charge to “be tough for Jesus.” But the real problem is that we have decontextualized the need to not misrepresent our brothers.

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 21

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Republished from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
And enter not into judgment with thy servant: for in thy sight shall no man living be justified. —Psalm 143:2

Devotional:
To this point our eyes ought to have been raised, that we might learn rather to tremble through fear than to indulge in vain exultation. It is easy indeed, while the comparison is made only between men, for every man to imagine himself to be possessed of something which others ought not to despise; but when we ascend to the contemplation of God, that confidence is immediately lost.

And the case of our soul with respect to God is similar to that of our body with respect to the visible heavens; for the eye, as long as it is employed in beholding adjacent objects, receives proofs of its own perspicacity; but if it be directed towards the sun, dazzled and confounded with his overpowering brightness, it feels no less debility in beholding him, than strength in the view of inferior objects.

A Day of National Celebration

As Plastic as a Politician's Promise

Homosexuals are now "allowed" to "marry" in New Zealand whatever that may mean.  In an orgy of self-congratulation, the media have told us we must celebrate the moment.  They have done their best to lead by example.  But the cheering is a tad hollow.

What we need in New Zealand is some consistent, principled radicals.  Not the kind that swan around in Gucci sunglasses and sip lattes whilst pontificating on the state of education in a post-constructivist world.  We need radicals who are serious about human rights, not mere lip-servers.  And until we get them, there is not much reason to celebrate, for the "moment" is as ephemeral as pot smoke.

The hypocrisy in our society has a nauseous stench when it comes to marriage.

Spiralling Downwards

Naivety in Spades

The following article has appeared in the NZ Herald:

Arab Spring Spiralling into Gloom  

By Catherine Field  
NZ Herald

Europe is battling a mix of alarm and gloom as it eyes the post-revolutionary crisis in North Africa, concluding that its early plans to steer the region on to the path of prosperity and democracy are dead.

Policymakers are bracing for years of turmoil in Egypt and Libya, although the outlook for Tunisia is more optimistic, and sense that Europe will have to play a longer and more strategic game, say analysts. "We are witnessing a revolutionary process, and this will take at least a decade," says Karim-Emile Bitar of the Institute for Strategic and International Relations (IRIS) in Paris. "When you talk about a revolutionary process, you are talking about revolution, counter-revolution, attempts to hijack the revolution - and this is exactly what is happening right now." . . .

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 20

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Republished from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
Quench not the Spirit. —I Thessalonians 5:19

Devotional:
But to come to the point, make a right use of the knowledge which he has for a long time past vouchsafed to you; and do not allow the zeal which he has at one time imprinted by the Holy Spirit upon your heart to die away; and do not knowingly quench the holy desire which has burned within you in bygone times.

Behold how God allows those to slip away who grow careless little by little, and how easily he permits them to be so utterly depraved that they go to perdition; and it is just that the Lord should thus avenge himself upon those who have preferred the vanities of the world to the treasure of his gospel.

Another Jigsaw Piece

Doctors to Help Reduce Welfare Beneficiary Numbers

Social expectation is powerful.  What people expect of us, along with society in general, is powerful--for good or ill. 

New Zealand is embarking upon a programme of changing social expectations of welfare beneficiaries.  The fruit of old nostrums lies rotten on the ground.  It's time for something different.  The government is trying to set a social expectation that its not acceptable to remain on a perpetual benefit unless circumstances are particularly pressing.  Lifestyle beneficiaries are to feel the heat of social expectations upon them. 

Sickness beneficiaries, whose numbers have exploded over the past twenty years, are required to go to doctors periodically to get medical approbation for remaining on a sickness benefit.  Now doctors are required to diagnose what is required medically and physically to get the beneficiary back to work--which will be a very different conversation to those of previous years.

Potemkin Villages

Why Bother?

Blog Turtle Bay and Beyond has been calling our attention to the Samantha Powers, new US ambassador to the UN, who has asked people to let her know what views and priorities she should promote on behalf of the US at the UN.

Samantha Power, the new U.S. ambassador to the UN, wants to know: how can she best promote American values and human dignity? What should the U.S. stand for in the world? . . .  Pres. Obama and former Sec. Hillary Clinton made abortion and sex (particularly homosexuality) top foreign policy priorities. A few years ago I was asked to give a speech at the UN on how marriage and family benefit women. A U.S. delegate came with a prepared statement criticizing me for not promoting sexual and reproductive rights.

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 19

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Reproduced from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors. —Isaiah 53:12

Devotional:
So then, to be submissive to our Lord Jesus Christ, let us confess him as our King and do it sincerely. There is no doubt we obtain from him liberty in the first place; and after that, the blessings we need and which we lack unless we receive them at his hand.

See how wretched we should be if Satan had not been plundered; for he possesses us, he enjoys us at his ease, just as our Lord Jesus declares. In a word, we are like his own possession and property.

So we have need that the death and passion of our Lord Jesus Christ brings forth its fruit in us, and that our enemies may be not only overcome but also put to flight; that Jesus Christ may, as it were, keep his foot on their throats, so that they may be powerless, though they scheme to do us harm. —Sermons

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John Calvin was the premier theologian of the Reformation, but also a pious and godly Christian pastor who endeavored throughout his life to point men and women to Christ. We are grateful to Reformation Heritage Books for permission to use John Calvin's Thine Is My Heart as our daily devotional for 2013 on the OPC Web site. You can currently obtain a printed copy of that book from Reformation Heritage Books.

The Wisdom of Ages

Bono, Africa, and Aid

Age and experience is reputed to bring wisdom.  Sometimes sadly this is not the case.  Growing years can cement the foolishness prejudices and simplicities of youth, which makes aged folly all the more ridiculous.  But often as people grow in experience, they become more subtle, discerning, and wise.  They learn that things are not always what they seem.  They realise that truth often lies beneath, not on the surface.  

David J. Theroux, writing in The Beacon, gives us an example of the latter.

Bono (nee Paul David Hewson) is the lead singer in the rock group U2, one of the most successful rock groups in history. Bono also became a major proponent of greatly expanded U.S. foreign aid and other government programs (including debt cancellation) to alleviate the dire plight in the world of HIV/AIDS, malaria, abject poverty, and other issues.

Bono's name and fame is synonymous, not just with U2, but with charitable activities in Africa.  He has publicly and passionately taken up the cause of that needy continent for most of his public life.  Bono is a professing Christian.

Douglas Wilson's Letter from Moscow, Idaho

Honoring His Stuff

Posted on Monday, August 12, 2013  

By Douglas Wilson 

Blog and Mablog

A friend pointed me to an important truth about property and giving that is found in Deuteronomy 26.

“And now, behold, I have brought the firstfruits of the land, which thou, O Lord, hast given me. And thou shalt set it before the Lord thy God, and worship before the Lord thy God: And thou shalt rejoice in every good thing which the Lord thy God hath given unto thee, and unto thine house, thou, and the Levite, and the stranger that is among you” (Dt. 26:10-11).

Note that the worshiper is told that he must include the Levite and the stranger in his worship of God — he must share as he worships with his tithe — but that the foundation of this sharing is the fact of property ownership. He is called to share “every good thing” which the Lord his God “hath given” unto him. God gave every good thing to him, and to his house.

This is the answer to those who think that any assertion of robust property rights is to absolutize them. The only absolute property ownership is God — the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof — but it is precisely for this reason that we may have robust private property rights. The absolute owner gives.

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 17

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Reproduced from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
I will praise thee, 0 Lord, with my whole heart; I will shew forth all thy marvelous works. —Psalm 9:1

Devotional:
Even irreligious men, I admit, when they have obtained some memorable victory, are ashamed to defraud God of the praise which is due to him; but we see that as soon as they have uttered a single expression in acknowledgment of the assistance God has afforded them, they immediately begin to boast loudly, and to sing triumphs in honor of their own valor, as if they were under no obligations whatsoever to God.

The S-Files

To An Unknown Police Officer

The NZ Herald is reporting on a heroic rescue of a drowning man by a police officer.  The details, as recounted, are:

• At 6pm on the 12 August  a van plunged off Tauranga's Maungatapu Bridge.
• A 23 year old passenger escaped the sinking van, but was unable to stay afloat due to injuries
• A 53 year old police officer arrived at the crash scene, apprehended the person in difficulty in the water.
• He stripped off and dived in, reached the drowning man, calmed him and turned him on his back.
• He drew him to the shallows while being carried along by the tidal current.

Unfortunately the driver of the van did not survive.  The saved man would have certainly drowned, had not the police officer intervened.

Western Bay of Plenty Police Inspector Clifford Paxton praised the efforts of his officer, who was resting at home yesterday.  "What he did was pretty outstanding. He evaluated the situation, believed he could make a difference, and clearly he did make a difference."

ContraCelsum is pleased to bestow an S-Award on this unnamed officer--for actions in the course of duty that were Selfless, Saving, and Sacrificial.  You are a credit to your profession.

Douglas Wilson's Letter From Moscow Idaho

Becoming More Like the Squirmers

Posted on Saturday, August 10, 2013  

By Douglas Wilson 

From Blog and Magblog

Whenever God’s people take up the adventure that He sends them, there are always troubles that arise in the midst of the adventure that make you want to second guess your initial decision. In the midst of the turmoil that you have gotten yourself into, it is easy to wonder if you read the fine print carefully enough.

One example would be the path that many of you have chosen to follow—bringing many children into the world, caring for them, providing them with a Christian education, bringing them to worship every week, and doing so in a church where all the littles spend the entire worship service with us, worshipping together with us.

This is no fad—fads are not this much work. But it might be easy to think “this must have been a fad when we chose to do it.” I want to speak a particular word of exhortation and encouragement to you moms who are doing this.

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 16

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Republished from the OPC website.

Bible Text:
And looking upon Jesus as he walked, he saith, Behold the Lamb of God! —John 1:36

Devotional:
"Behold the Lamb of God." The principal office of Christ is briefly but clearly stated; that he "takes away the sins of the world" by the sacrifice of his death, and reconciles men to God. There are other favors, indeed, which Christ bestows upon us, but this is the chief favor, and the rest depend on it; that, by appeasing the wrath of God, he makes us to be reckoned holy and righteous. For from this source flow all the streams of blessings, that, by not imputing our sins, he receives us into favor.

Accordingly, John, in order to conduct us to Christ, commences with the gratuitous forgiveness of sins which we obtain through him. —Commentaries

---

John Calvin was the premier theologian of the Reformation, but also a pious and godly Christian pastor who endeavored throughout his life to point men and women to Christ. We are grateful to Reformation Heritage Books for permission to use John Calvin's Thine Is My Heart as our daily devotional for 2013 on the OPC Web site. You can currently obtain a printed copy of that book from Reformation Heritage Books.

To Explain is to Lose

Empty Slogans

We have commented previously upon the galactically stupid "marketing" line: "100% Pure New Zealand". It's deceptive and misleading.  It is a rod for our own back.  But help is at hand.  The Prime Minister, John Key who is also Tourism Minister has gravely informed us that this slogan is marketing spin.  It's not to be taken seriously.  Thanks for clearing that up, Mr Key. 

On Saturday, Prime Minister John Key, who is also tourism minister, told a National Party conference the slogan was not meant to be taken literally.(Stuff)

In the interests of clarity, and for the avoidance of doubt, we believe that this slogan is irresponsible and inadequate.  It needs further clarification.

This is a Slogan--Not to be Taken Literally

With this necessary clarification, we are more than happy to see "100% Pure New Zealand" retained.  But then it loses everything, does it not?  Which is the very point we are making.  The slogan only has traction and power if it is believed to be largely (if not entirely) true.  Which is to say that the slogan is deceptive and misleading. 

Tick, Tick, Tick . . .

Exploding Global Warming Myth Becoming Mainstream
 
Major Danish Daily Warns: “Globe May Be On Path To Little Ice Age…Much Colder Winters…Dramatic Consequences”!

By P Gosselin on 9. August 2013

 

Another major European media outlet is asking: Where’s the global warming?

Image right: The August 7 edition of Denmark’s Jyllands-Posten, featured a major 2-page article on the globe’s 15-years of missing warming and the potential solar causes and implications.

Moreover, they are featuring prominent skeptic scientists who are warning of a potential little ice age and dismissing CO2 as a major climate driver. And all of this just before the release of the IPCC’s 5AR, no less!

Hat-tip: NTZ reader Arne Garbøl

The August 7 print edition of the Danish Jyllands-Posten, the famous daily that published the “Muhammad caricatures“, features a full 2-page article bearing the headline: ”The behavior of the sun may trigger a new little ice age” followed by the sub-headline: “Defying all predictions, the globe may be on the road towards a new little ice age with much colder winters.”

So now even the once very green Danish media is now spreading the seeds of doubt. So quickly can “settled science” become controversial and hotly disputed. The climate debate is far from over. And when it does end, it looks increasingly as if it’ll end in favor of the skeptics.

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 15

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Republished from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep. —Psalm 127:2

Devotional:
It is not surprising to find those growing rich in a short time who spare no exertion, but consume night and day in plying their occupations and allow themselves only scanty fare from the product of their labor. Solomon, however, affirms that neither living at small expense, nor diligence in business will by themselves profit anything at all.

Not that he forbids us to practise temperance in our diet and to rise early to engage in our worldly business; but to stir us up to prayer, and to calling upon God, and also to recommend gratitude for the divine blessings, he brings to nought whatever would obscure the grace of God.

The New Jacobins

Banish One Demon, Inherit Ten More Malevolent

Why should New Zealanders treat the law, the courts, and the justice system with any respect from this time onwards?  It appears they are about to become a sick joke.  The government has announced it will change the fundamental concepts of justice so radically that if a person is suspected of a crime the courts can restrict their lives so as to place them in a virtual prison.  Even if the person went to court, was exonerated and freed, they will be able to be punished by the courts, nonetheless. This from the NZ Herald:

Wide-ranging restraining orders will soon be in use to keep suspected child abusers away from children for up to 10 years.  Some will be prevented from going to parks or public swimming pools. . . . High Court and District Court judges will be able to impose the new civil orders on people who are tried for serious offences against children such as incest, sexual grooming or sexual violation - even if they are not convicted of the offence.
Ms Bennett said the scope of such orders would depend on the circumstances, and could prevent the person from living or working with children, up to blocking any association with children whatsoever, such as sitting next to a child on the bus.

What happened to "innocent until proven guilty"?  Oh, that's so outdated, dearie.  We are going to get really serious about crime.  Now the judges can place restraining orders on individuals based on suspicion.

Ultimate Time and Chance

Both Feet Firmly Planted in Midair

Justin Taylor
August 09, 2013

Francis Schaeffer once described moral relativists as those “who have both feet firmly planted in mid-air.” (See Koukl and Beckwith’s helpful book built on that title.)

An even more vivid illustration is that of Cornelius Van Til who sought to describe the impossibility of unbelieving reasoning if their worldview is employed consistently:

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 14

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Reproduced from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
Doth not he see my ways, and count all my steps? —Job 31:4

Devotional:
Let us note the style that Job uses; which is that God marks his ways and steps and keeps a reckoning of them. This serves to indicate that God does not see them from a distance, nor does he see these things alone which are evident on the surface; but he looks closely at all our works and carefully notes every one of them.
His sight is not dim, nor does he look at random, but he counts and numbers all things, so that nothing escapes him or is forgotten by him. Now then, I ask you, have we not good cause to consider our own ways and count our own steps when we see that all of them come forth before God?

Why is it that men scarcely know the hundredth part of their sins? Some even commit the same sin a hundred times a day, and yet hardly think about it once. Why is this? It is because we do not think that God watches us, nor that we are so observed by him that nothing escapes his vision and nothing is forgotten by him.

National Insanity

A Few More Million Amongst Friends

Socio-economic determinism is an exploded urban legend.  But it is firmly lodged in the minds of the Commentariat as an infallible maxim.  Simply put, socio-economic determinism proclaims that if you want positive societal outcomes (for whatever) rain other people's money upon a particular target group, and hey presto, character, habits, attitudes, morals, self-discipline, conscience, and behaviour will improve exponentially.  Anyone who actually believes that is living in a another universe--and a non-parallel one at that.  Not even close to reality. 

Over the past fifteen years the New Zealand government has increased spending upon its government schools exponentially.  Millions upon millions more dollars have been spent, and most of it upon lower decile schools (that is, schools operating in lower socio-economic areas).  The fallacy of socio-economic determinism at full throated roar.

Letter From America (About Detroit)

Suicide by Government

Detroit is responsible for its own demise.

By  Rich Lowry 

 

NATIONAL REVIEW ONLINE           

www.nationalreview.com          

July 23, 2013 4:00 AM

 

The case of the city of Detroit isn’t much of a murder mystery. Various suspects have been fingered in its demise: The global economy. The fall of the auto industry. The decline of manufacturing generally. But it’s simpler than that. Detroit died of its own hand.

The city undertook a controlled experiment in what happens if you are governed by a toxic combination of Great Society big spenders, race hustlers, crooks, public-sector unions, and ineffectual reformers. It spent and misgoverned itself into the ground. It tried to defy the axiom of the late economist Herb Stein that “if something cannot go on forever, it will stop.” Detroit’s bout of self-destruction lasted for a few decades, and now may finally stop only when there is little left to destroy.

The city was at the pioneering edge of urban liberalism and discovered that all the social spending in the world doesn’t deliver order, family stability, education, economic dynamism, or effective governance. In the hands of Detroit’s rotten political class, it proved inimical to all of those things.

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 13

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Reproduced from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment: but I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and ... whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire. —Matthew 5:21, 22


Devotional:
The end of this precept is that since God has connected mankind together in a kind of unity, every man ought to consider himself as charged with the safety of all. In short, then, all violence and injustice, and every kind of mischief, which may injure the body of our neighbor, are forbidden to us.

And therefore we are enjoined, if it be in our power, to assist in protecting the lives of our neighbors; to exert ourselves with fidelity for this purpose; to procure those things which conduce to their tranquillity; to be vigilant in shielding them from injuries; and in cases of danger to afford them our assistance.

The Future of China

 Long, Slow, Lingering Decline

China's one-child policy is going to devastate that country more than any other ill-conceived utopian folly.  The grim harvest has just commenced.  The Middle Kingdom has condemned itself to a long, slow lingering decline, as its social fabric rots away.  

Some of the poisonous fruits include:

• A growing hatred of the government for its stupidity and folly and the damage, pain, and suffering it has inflicted upon its people.
• A sense of being betrayed by the government.
• Gender imbalance, leaving men without any prospect of marriage and children.
• Labour shortages looming.
• Depression amongst the aged.
• Financial hardship.
• Ever more intrusive state bureaucracy.

The piece below was originally published in the Washington Post, and republished in the Sydney Morning Herald.

Standing Ground

Ten Tenets of Covenantal Apologetics

Justin Taylor

From Scott Oliphint’s Covenantal Apologetics: Principles and Practice in Defense of Our Faith (pp. 47-56):

1. The faith that we are defending must begin with, and necessarily include, the triune God-Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—who, as God, condescends to create and to redeem.
   
2. God’s covenantal revelation is authoritative by virtue of what is, and any covenantal, Christian apologetic will necessarily stand on and utilize that authority in order to defend Christianity.
   
3. It is the truth of God’s revelation, together with the work of the Holy Spirit, that brings about a covenantal change from one who is in Adam to one who is in Christ.
   
4. Man (male and female) as image of God is in covenant with the triune God for eternity.
   
5. All people know the true God, and that knowledge entails covenantal obligations.
   
6. Those who are and remain in Adam suppress the truth that they know. Those who are in Christ see truth for what it is.
   
7. There is an absolute, covenantal antithesis between Christian theism and any other, opposing position. Thus, Christianity is true and anything opposing it is false.
   
8. Suppression of the truth, like the depravity of sin, is total but not absolute. Thus every unbelieving position will necessarily have within it ideas, concepts, notions, and the like that it has taken and wrenched from their true, Christian context.
   
9. The true, covenantal knowledge of God in man, together with God’s universal mercy, allows for persuasion in apologetics.
   
10. Every fact and experience is what it is by virtue of the covenantal, all-controlling plan and purpose of God.

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 12

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Reproduced from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
On the next day much people that were come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, —John 12:12

Devotional:
This entrance of Christ is more copiously related by the other Evangelists; but John here embraces the leading points. In the first place, we ought to remember Christ's design, which was that he came to Jerusalem of his own accord, to offer himself to die; for it was necessary that his death should be voluntary, because the wrath of God could be appeased only by a sacrifice of obedience.

And, indeed, he well knew what would be the result; but before he is dragged to the cross, he wishes to be solemnly acknowledged by the people as their King; nay, he openly declares that he commences his reign by advancing to death.

Rational Irrationalism

Quantum Mechanics and the Big Bang

The reviewer for the Dallas Morning News must have been having a bad hair day.  He or she declared that Leon Lederman's The God Particle: If the Universe is the Answer, What is the Question (New York: Mariner/Houghton Mifflin Company, 2006) was "the funniest book about physics ever written."  If that were true, physics must be world's apart from sophisticated humour.  Closer to the truth is Lederman's penchant for geeky humour, which often falls flat and is overdone.  Hardly humorous, unless the author was engaged in self-parody, which would be another matter entirely. 

But, humour aside, as a book about particle physics, Lederman's The God Particle is pretty good.  It covers all the usual "stuff".  The micro-world of the atom is counter-intuitive and abnormal (as far as our human experience is concerned).  Federman writes

So forget about normal; expect shock, disbelief.  Niels Bohr, one of the founders, said that anyone who isn't shocked by quantum theory doesn't understand it.  Richard Feynman asserted that no one understands quantum theory.  (Op cit., p. 143f)

 The overwhelming impression for the non-specialist lay reader is of extreme complexity in the micro-world of matter.

Arts And Letters

How to Think Like an Editor: A Conversation with John Wilson

Justin Taylor 2:47 pm CT

Doug Wilson talks with one-of-a-kind Books & Culture founder and editor John Wilson:




HT: @wesleyhill

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 10

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Reproduced from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
And if any man hear my words, and believe not, I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. —John 12:47


Devotional:
"If any man hear my words." After having spoken concerning his grace, and exhorted his disciples to steady faith, he now begins to strike the rebellious, though even here he mitigates the severity due to the wickedness of those who deliberately—as it were—reject God; for he delays to pronounce judgment on them, because, on the contrary, he has come for the salvation of all.

In the first place, we ought to understand that he does not speak here of all unbelievers without distinction, but of those who, knowingly and wittingly, reject the doctrine of the gospel which has been exhibited to them.

Unrighteous Espionage

Doubts and Suspicions

We posted recently on the unavoidable necessity of espionage.  We also argued that those who spy and those who receive information from the espionage apparatus should not be trusted.  They need at all times to be checked and balanced by other powers.  "Trust but examine and verify" is the apt slogan.

The present spying legislation has been amended since first introduced to the House.  It is a better piece of legislation than it once was.  There are more checks and balances.  The issue of spying on behalf of other governments with whom we have espionage agreements is another matter.  As far as we can tell the Bill is silent or unclear when it comes to NZ espionage agencies spying on NZ citizens at the behest of the United States, Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom (our "Five Eyes" partners).

To cut to the chase: if the US wanted to spy on a New Zealand citizen (say, just for argument's sake, Kim Dotcom) would the NZ espionage agencies need a warrant under New Zealand law, and would those activities on behalf of a foreign power, be subject to the same checks and balances and disclosures that a New Zealand agency would require (for example, the NZ Police wanting to surveil a New Zealand citizen)?  We hope so.  We would argue strenuously that this ought to be the case.  We fear the worst, however.

Letter From Australia (About Child Protection Apartheid)

End Child Protection Apartheid

Miranda Devine 

Sunday, July 28, 2013 (7:31am)
Daily Telegraph
 
IN response to last week’s column on tragic Kiesha Weippeart, bashed to death by her mother at six, a social worker contacted me. She wanted to add her voice to the chorus demanding an end to the child protection apartheid which condemns indigenous children to subpar care.

For fear of creating another “stolen generation” state and federal agencies persist with policies which keep indigenous children too long in abusive homes, and require indigenous foster carers, despite chronic shortages. In Kiesha’s case, a court overturned a decision she be kept in foster care for reasons which are shrouded in secrecy but which are suspected to include her indigenous heritage.

“We work with this every single day,” said the NSW Family and Community Services caseworker, who asked to remain nameless.

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 09

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Republished from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
He withdraweth not his eyes from the righteous.... He openeth also their ear to discipline.... If they obey and serve him, they shall spend their days in prosperity.... But if they obey not, they shall perish by the sword.... —Job 36:7a, 1Oa, 11a, 12a

Devotional:
So then let us not murmur any longer when we see God sending such troubles into the world, neither let us be offended as though he had his eyes shut. For he well knows what he is doing, and he has an infinite wisdom which is not immediately apparent to us.

In the end we shall see that he has disposed all things in good order and measure. Let us learn not to be too greatly grieved when we are so afflicted, assuring ourselves that God by that means is furthering our salvation.

Besides, do we wish to be healed when we are in torment and pain? Do we want these things to have a favorable outcome? Then let us follow the way that is showed to us here, namely to hear and obey. How shall we hear? By being taught when God sends us to school, so that our afflictions may be like so many lessons to make us flee to him.

The Real Deal

 Can Fonterra Prove Up?

The bureaucrats and tourism industry big-wallahs dreamed up a marketing slogan for New Zealand Inc: "One Hundred Percent Pure".  Wow.  That sounded good.  Perception is reality to narcissistic marketers.  So the slogan became a mantra.  It was a most stupid move.

The slogan could only be taken seriously if it were regarded as hyperbole.  If it were a mere exaggeration for effect, no-one could complain.  But as a statement of a literal standard one has to live up to it is an impossible millstone around the neck.  The brute reality is that no-one and nothing in this life is one hundred percent pure (whatever that might mean).  Experimental chemists, working in the cleanest laboratory environments able to be achieved, are not infrequently frustrated by impurities messing up experiments.  No "100% Pure" there.  And if not there, not anywhere.  Certainly not when it comes to agricultural products, such as milk. 

When it comes to the marketing slogan, "NZ--100% Pure" we are guilty of engaging in deceptive and misleading behaviour.  There will always be markets, customers, and general idiots to take the slogan as literal truth, not hyperbole.  We have created a rod for our own backs and our stupidity is justly punished every time the rod whips through the air.

Stupid slogans aside, it is worthwhile considering the broader context of the Fonterra botulism scandal.

Letter From America (About Islam)

Islamism’s Likely Doom

The divisions of radical Islam offer us grounds for optimism but not complacency.

By Daniel Pipes 

National Review Online

July 23, 2013 12:00 AM

As recently as 2012, it appeared that Islamists could overcome their many internal dissimilarities — sectarian (Sunni or Shiite), political (monarchical or republican), tactical (political or violent), and attitudes toward modernity (Salafi or Muslim Brotherhood) — and cooperate. In Tunisia, for example, Salafis and the Muslim Brotherhood types found common ground. Differences between all these groups were real but secondary, as I put it then, because “all Islamists pull in the same direction, toward the full and severe application of Islamic law (the sharia).”

This sort of cooperation still persists in small ways, as shown by a recent meeting between a member of Turkey’s ruling party and the head of a Salafi organization in Germany. But Islamists have in recent months abruptly and overwhelmingly thrown themselves at each others’ throats. Islamists still constitute a single movement that shares similar supremacist and utopian goals, but they also have different personnel, ethnic affiliations, methods, and philosophies.  Islamist internecine hostilities have flared up in many other Muslim-majority countries. Sunni-versus-Shiite tensions can be seen between Turkey and Iran, in Egypt, and in Lebanon, where it’s Sunni versus Shiite Islamists and Sunni Islamists versus the army. In Yemen, it’s Houthis versus Salafis.

More often, however, members of the same sect fight each other:

Calvin's Daily Devotional

Daily Devotional

August 08

Thine Is My Heart: Devotional Readings from the Writings of John Calvin

by John Calvin (compiled by John H. Kromminga)
Republished from the OPC Website

Bible Text:
I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. —John 17:15

Devotional:
"I ask not that thou shouldest take them out of the world." He shows in what the safety of believers consists, not that they are free from annoyance, and live in luxury and at their ease, but that in the midst of dangers they continue to be safe through the assistance of God. For he does not admonish the Father of what is proper to be done, but rather makes provision for their weakness, that, by the method which he prescribes, they may restrain their desires, which are apt to go beyond all bounds.

In short, he promises to his disciples the grace of the Father; not to relieve them from all anxiety and toil, but to furnish them with invincible strength against their enemies, and not to suffer them to be overwhelmed by the heavy burden of contests which they will have to endure.