Attempts at Honesty

Reflections on the interplay of the Bible and Culture

Home Archives for Mark McIntyre

Dr. Luke Investigates

Posted on Written by Leave a Comment

Dr. Luke InvestigatesOur pastor is preaching through the Gospel of Luke on Sunday Mornings. During the sermon yesterday a thought struck me.

Luke was a physician which is why he sometimes gives very detailed descriptions of the infirmities of those who came to Jesus for healing.

The “aha” moment for me yesterday was when I realized that while gathering information for his Gospel, Luke would have had opportunity to interview some of those who had been healed by Jesus. The physician got to follow in the footsteps of the Master Physician and catalog the healings that took place.

I can appreciate the skill involved when listening to a master musician play or sing. But someone who has more training and skill can derive even more enjoyment out of hearing that same performance. His advanced training allows him to better appreciate the quality of the performance.

Luke, being a physician, perhaps was more astonished at the number and quality of the healings than those who do not fully appreciate the effects of disease.

I wonder if Luke walked away from his interviews with Jesus’ former patients saying, “how cool is that?”

Dorothy Sayers on the Incarnation

Posted on Written by Leave a Comment

Dorothy SayersI’m re-reading Dorothy Sayers’ book Creed or Chaos? and have to share another quote with you:

“It is not true at all that dogma is ‘hopelessly irrelevant’ to the life and thought of the average man. What is true is that ministers of the Christian religion often assert that it is, present it for consideration as though it were, and, in fact, by their faulty exposition of it make it so. The central dogma of the Incarnation is that by which relevance stands or falls. If Christ was only man, then He is entirely irrelevant to any thought about God; if He is only God, then He is entirely irrelevant to any experience of human life. It is, in the strictest sense, necessary to the salvation of relevance that a man should believe rightly the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ. Unless he believes rightly, there is not the faintest reason why he should believe at all. And in that case, it is wholly irrelevant to chatter about ‘Christian principles.’”

1 Corinthians 1:23 (ESV)

23 but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles,

Death is Dead

Posted on Written by Leave a Comment

No DeathDeuteronomy 14:1b-2

You shall not cut yourselves or make any baldness on your foreheads for the dead. For you are a people holy to the LORD your God, and the LORD has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.

As a child of God, death is no longer an enemy to be feared. As one in a covenant relationship with God, I should have a new and different perspective on death than those who do not know God.

The new perspective is that death is not an end but a transition from one existence to a better one.

In their role as a light to the nations, the Israelites were not to participate in the hopeless displays for the dead that the surrounding nations practiced. Israel was supposed to be a beacon of hope to those who did not know God, a beacon that God would use to draw people to himself.  Therefore, the Israelites were not allowed to disfigure themselves to honor the dead.

While most of us are not in immediate peril of experiencing death, we do face difficulties of varying degrees. As believers, we should look at difficult times in a different perspective than those who do not know God. The proper response to the fear of death should be instructive as to how to respond to less threatening difficulties. If death is not to be feared, why fear difficult times?

Yet, I do find myself gravitating toward fear. The antidote to fear is to refocus on the blessings I have in Christ that no political, economic or physical turmoil can take away. I am reminded of Peter’s prayer on the lake, “Lord save me . . . ” Or as the writer of Hebrews prescribes, “Keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus . . . “

Deuteronomy 13 – Don’t Rely on Pragmatism

Posted on Written by 1 Comment

Deuteronomy 13:1–3 (ESV)

“If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder, 2 and the sign or wonder that he tells you comes to pass, and if he says, ‘Let us go after other gods,’ which you have not known, ‘and let us serve them,’ 3 you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams. For the Lord your God is testing you, to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.

There is always a danger that we will get off track and into error by looking at what works instead of what is right.

In the reference mentioned above, the truth of a prophecy is one of the tests by which to judge a prophet, but not the only one. If the prophet is encouraging behavior which is clearly condemned by Scripture, that prophet should be stoned whether his prophecy comes true or not.

While we certainly should not begin stoning those who proclaim false prophecies, we should ignore them. We have people who bring all sorts of practical methods into the church to advance her programs and influence. The test is not whether these methods produce results, the test is whether the results are what God desires for his Body.

Categories

Archives

Blogger Grid
Follow me on Blogarama