Joke o’ the month
Two cars were waiting at a stoplight. When the light turned green, the man in front didn’t seem to notice. The woman in the car behind him did though, and she started pounding on her steering wheel and yelling at the man to move. But he didn’t. The woman began to go ballistic inside her car, ranting and raving at the man and pounding on her steering wheel and dash. When the light turned yellow the woman let out a long blast on her car horn, flipped him off, and screamed something out her window about “male drivers.” This finally got the man’s attention and, looking up, he saw the yellow light so he put his foot on the gas and scooted through the intersection just as the light turned red. This left the woman practically beside herself with rage – the man had made her miss her chance at getting through the intersection!
In mid-rant she heard a tap on her window and looked up to see the barrel of a gun held by a very serious looking policeman. He told her to shut off her car and “keep both hands where I can see them.” She complied, speechless at what was happening. When she got out of the car the policeman quickly cuffed her and hustled her into his patrol car. Too bewildered by the chain of events to ask any questions, she was driven to the police station, fingerprinted, photographed, searched, booked and placed in a cell.
After a couple of hours, a policeman approached the cell, opened the door, and escorted her back to the booking desk where the original officer was waiting with her personal effects. “I’m really sorry for this mistake,” he said “but when I pulled up behind your car you were blowing your horn, flipping that guy off, and cussing a blue streak at the car in front of you. When I noticed your ‘Choose Life’ license plate holder, the ‘No Jesus, No Peace; Know Jesus, Know Peace’ and ‘Follow Me to Church’ bumper stickers, and the chrome plated Christian fish emblem on the trunk I naturally assumed you had stolen that car.”
Source: Adapted from a joking winging its way around the Internet
Where do babies come from?
Perhaps one of the best non-explanations ever, from a Waltons episode:
little girl: “So where did you find me pa?”
pa: “I found you hiding behind one of your mother’s smiles.”
Death penalty discussion
In a discussion on the death penalty I came across a Reformed Christian who was adamantly against it but only because he wanted to give the convicted murderer as long a time as possible to repent. He was worried that if this killer was going to repent on Wednesday, but was executed on Tuesday then his executioners would have effectively sent him to hell. What this brother was overlooking is what God has taught us about His own power – if God has predestined this murderer to heaven, then nothing that man could ever do would supersede God’s plan for that killer. This Christian was Reformed, but in this argument he was adopting an Arminian view of the death penalty – he denied God’s ability to choose his followers from before the beginning of the world.
Not all values are equal
“Once upon a time we knew what to do. A British district officer, coming upon a scene of suttee, was told by the locals that in Hindu culture it was the custom to cremate a widow on her husband’s funeral pyre. He replied that in British culture it was the custom to hang chaps who did that sort of thing. There are many great things about India – curry, pajamas, sitars, software engineers – but suttee was not one of them. What a pity we’re no longer capable of being ‘judgmental’ and ‘discriminating.’”
– Columnist Mark Steyn
The Bible as a textbook
The Siloam Tunnel in Jerusalem is an engineering marvel ahead of its time. Built by King Hezekiah the tunnel burrows a third of mile south to connect a spring outside Jerusalem with the Siloam pool within the city walls, giving the city a secure supply of water they could count on even when besieged. But while the Bible credits Hezekiah with this amazing tunnel’s construction (2 Kings 20:20), for years critics argued that it was built five hundred years later, in about 200 B.C.
The Bible’s critics were wrong, of course, and eventually the proof came. In a September 11, 2003 Nature article geologists from Hebrew University described how they had carried out carbon-14 analysis on wood, coal and ash found in the plaster walls of the tunnel. They also ran isotopic tests on the uranium and thorium present in stalactites hanging from the tunnel’s ceiling. The test results corroborated the Bible’s account and left critics look for new ways to disbelieve.
Our God is different
There is only one real God, so if Muslims worship a being who created the universe and who will judge it, and Christians also worship a God who is both Creator and Judge, does that mean we are both worshipping the same God?
No. God is more than just an abstract idea; He is more than his job description. God is a real person – three persons in one, in fact. The Muslims’ god never had a son (they would say it is blasphemous to even suggest such a thing). He never sent that son as a mediator. Their god never humbled himself taking on human flesh, and he most certainly never died on a cross to save them from their sins. So how can their god be our God?
Put this in human terms for a moment. Imagine that someone comes up to one of my friends and claims to know me.
“I know the editor of Reformed Perspective.“
“Oh you do, do you? Well what is he like?”
“Oh, he has black hair, is three feet tall, and hates basketball.”
“Sorry” my friend might reply, “You don’t know Jon, and the reason I can tell you that is the person you describe is not Jon – Jon is tall, grey-haired, and loves basketball.”
“But I’m sure the guy I know is editor of RP. Doesn’t Jon edit RP?”
“Yes he does, but the guy you’ve described is most definitely not the RP editor”
God has revealed himself to us and when Muslims describe their god it’s clear they aren’t describing God. They’ve got the wrong person. And it’s up to us to tell them so.
As seen on t-shirts and church and protest signs…
- A faith that demands nothing, and costs nothing, is worth nothing – seen on a church sign
- There is no God but YHWH and Moses is His messenger – written in Arabic on a t-shirt
- Let a wife make her husband glad to come home, and let him make her sorry to see him leave – Martin Luther
- Guns don’t kill people; Abortion clinics kill people – another t-shirt
- Christians keep the faith, but not from others – church sign
- Live in such a way that you would not be ashamed to sell your parrot to the town gossip – Will Rogers quote
- For every action, there is an equal and opposite government program – circulating on the Internet
- Choose life: it’s better than the alternative – should be on a t-shirt
Ignorance is bliss?
Since terrorists often do what they do to get attention we shouldn’t even report their names. That’s the thinking of psychiatrist and terrorism expert David Hubbard. In his book Winning Back the Sky, he recounts a number of terrorist incidents and names the pilots, policemen and victims involved, but the terrorists are left nameless or are designated with the letter X. As he puts it, “I believe we must give recognition to committed and courageous people, rather than to those who are destructive.”
Egyptian gods take a beating
Author James Nickel calls the ten plagues “one of the greatest blessings that ancient Egypt ever received from God.” A blessing for Egypt?
Yes, the ten plagues didn’t just show how powerful the true God was and is, but also showed how powerless the Egyptian gods were. The first plague turned the Nile into blood, showing that Khnum and Hapi, two gods associated with the Nile, were powerless. The plague of frogs mocked Heket (Heqt), a goddess with the head of a frog. The plague of darkness strikes at the very heart of Egyptian worship, humbling Ra the Sun god. The final plague, the death of all the firstborn, mocked Pharaoh himself, who was worshipped as a god – he couldn’t even save his own son and heir.
So God blessed the Egyptians by bringing judgment on their false gods (Numbers 33:4). And in Exodus 12:38 it sounds like some of the Egyptians took to heart what God was showing them, and joined up with the Israelites.
Source: Nickel’s “Mathematics: Is God Silent?” and Logos Quarterly Volume 3, Numbers 3 and 4
Deep thoughts
• We live in a society where pizza gets to your house before the police.
• Count your blessings! Recounts are OK.
• Midwives help people out.
• Quit griping about your church; if it was perfect, you couldn’t belong.
• Archeologists make the best husbands; the older you get the more interested he becomes.
• Get the last word in: Apologize.
“Poem” of the month: Clothes by BarlowGirl
Clothes aren’t what they used to be
They don’t seem to fit you and me, anymore
Modesty is out the door
Flaunting what we’ve got and more is in
Yeah, it’s in
They’re sayin’
“Don’t ask why, just wear what we say
You’ll look like a model if you’ll only obey
To get the attention, just do what we say”
Pay so much for clothes so small
Was this shirt made for me or my doll?
Is this all I get?
I looked so hot but caught a cold
I was doing just what I was told
To fit in
We’re sayin’
“Let’s ask why, don’t wear what they say
Don’t want to be a model; they can’t eat anyway
That kind of attention will fade with the day
So, I’ll stand up and say…
Clothes that fit are fine
Won’t show what’s mine
Don’t change my mind
I’ll be fine
Did Jesus have long hair?
Does the 2nd commandment forbid making depictions of Christ? One of the most popular Christian TV shows of today has no problems with doing so, and the many Christian fans of The Chosen must agree. Can we, so long as we don’t intend to bow down before it, make a picture or image of Christ?
To answer that question, I’m going to offer up a practical objection: even if the 2nd Commandment did allow it, how could we actually pull it off?
Back in 2004, Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ was loved by Roman Catholics and Evangelicals alike, and there was even a seeming uptick in interest in Christianity for a time after the film’s release, much as is being said of The Chosen‘s impact today. But how accurate was the film’s portrayal? It was a brutal film by all accounts, and Gibson’s emphasis on Christ’s physical suffering seems to have overshadowed His infinitely more significant spiritual struggle. Some have suffered worse than Christ did physically, but no one suffered more so spiritually. So when the physical is emphasized how accurate is the impression left, of what Jesus actually endured?
Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 11:14 are a good indicator that Jesus did not have long hair: “if a man has long hair it is a dishonor to him.” But what does every film portrayal of Christ do? Portraying Jesus with long hair – especially in the 60s but still today – presents Him as a “peace and love” persona. But is that a fit for the Jesus we read about who had harsh words for the Pharisees and performed a violent cleansing of the temple. And He talked an awful lot about hell too. The Chosen offers a swarthier Jesus, more in keeping with His Middle Eastern heritage, but the actor is still an attractive man, and we have Scriptural reason to think Jesus was not so (Is. 53:2): “”He had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him.” Worse still, the many paintings and films that show Jesus as a tall Anglo-Saxon, making him more attractive to Europeans (though for all the wrong reasons) but probably less so for people on other continents who may not have liked white men. I’ve sometimes wondered how purportedly Christian nations could ever have been anti-semitic – how can you hate Jews when your Lord was one? – and I’m left wondering if these misportrayals of Christ might have had a hand in it. If you paint Jesus as white, clearly you’ve forgotten He was not.
So even if the 2nd commandment doesn’t forbid depiction of Christ (and to be clear, I think it does), I’ll argue that the many ways we keep getting it clearly and sometimes terribly wrong would be good reason to, in humility, steer clear. But by reading Scripture, we can indeed encounter Jesus as He really was and remains.
