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The most recent articles, videos, blog entries, and more that have been added to ChristianUnion.org.
Friday, August 24, 2018
Fasting for FathersMy son, do not forget my teaching, but let your heart keep my commandments,
for length of days and years of life and peace they will add to you.
Let not steadfast love and faithfulness forsake you; bind them around your neck; write them on the tablet of your heart. So you will find favor and good success in the sight of God and man.
Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.
In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.
Proverbs 3:1-6 (ESV)
This passage is one of the most well-known and well-loved in all of the Old Testament. It is one of my favorite passages, and, given that it is a record of a father instructing his son, my appreciation for it has only continued to grow as I have become a father for the first time this year.
Thursday, August 23, 2018
When Family is HardPut on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. Colossians 3:12-14 (ESV)
So much talk about family life in the church can feel like it’s describing near-heavenly experience. “True fulfillment is found in domestic life,” seems a constant refrain. It is true: marriage and children can bring incredible joy and meaning to one’s life. It cannot, however, bring ultimate fulfillment. Only God can do that.
Wednesday, August 22, 2018
Waiting with HopeMay the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope. Romans 15:13 (ESV)
When my children were little, my wife and I would read them The Chronicles of Narnia before going to bed each night. That has transitioned to watching The Good, the Bad and the Ugly with my now-teenage sons. The goal is the same as they grow: showing them the good, the beautiful, and the true (but adding a bit more of the reality of the bad and the ugly). I desire for them to have categories for the brokenness of the world, and the joy to which they should aspire. Every cowboy movie, even those old Clint Eastwood spaghetti westerns, has a happy ending. It just takes a while (like 3 hours!) to get there.
Tuesday, August 21, 2018
The God of All Knowledge“And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding beyond measure, and breadth of mind like the sand on the seashore, so that Solomon's wisdom surpassed the wisdom of all the people of the east and all the wisdom of Egypt. … He spoke of trees, from the cedar that is in Lebanon to the hyssop that grows out of the wall. He spoke also of beasts, and of birds, and of reptiles, and of fish. And people of all nations came to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and from all the kings of the earth, who had heard of his wisdom.” 1 Kings 4:29-30, 33-34
Public education in the United States has become a mostly godless enterprise. Unfortunately, the more “elite” an academic institution is, the more pride it takes in a secular approach to learning. Modern educators falsely presume that the best path to knowledge is one that is without bias of religion. However, in their pursuit for untainted learning, they keep themselves from the beginning of wisdom – the fear of the Lord.
Pure Spiritual Milk
Monday, August 20, 2018So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander. Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation. - 1 Peter 2:1-2 (ESV)
King’s College was founded in 1754, suspended instruction during the Revolutionary war, reopened as Columbia College in 1784, and later changed its name to Columbia University. Its purpose was to provide “future colonial leaders an education that would enlarge the mind, improve the understanding, polish the whole man, and qualify them to support the brightest characters in all the elevated stations in life.” The college president taught the first classes in a building adjoining Trinity Church in downtown Manhattan, and the campus later moved north to 116th street on the West side of Manhattan.
A Good Student is Hard to Find
Sunday, August 19, 2018You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also. Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules. It is the hard-working farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops. Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything. … Remind them of these things, and charge them before God not to quarrel about words, which does no good, but only ruins the hearers. Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth. 2 Timothy 2:1-7; 14-15 (ESV)
In this classic passage on discipleship (especially vv. 1-2), what immediately catches the eye is the nature of a sincere follower of Christ (“faithful”) and the principle of multiplication (“entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also”). Regarding the latter, we may even find ourselves—if you’re old school like me—dusting off a rudimentary graphic of pencil-thin stick figures in pyramid-like formations; an image that captured the wonderful vision of a wise disciple-maker’s investment in a few good men, that in due time would reach a multitude.
Lydia’s Legacy
Saturday, August 18, 2018“And on the Sabbath day we went outside the gate to the riverside, where we supposed there was a place of prayer, and we sat down and spoke to the women who had come together. One who heard us was a woman named Lydia, from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple goods, who was a worshiper of God. The Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul. And after she was baptized, and her household as well, she urged us, saying, “If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay.” And she prevailed upon us.” Acts 16:13-15 (ESV)
Who were the women who gathered at the river banks that Sabbath? The focus is on an enigmatic woman called Lydia who is identified as a tradeswoman in the lucrative and complex dyeing industry of her day. It would be fair to say she had specialized knowledge in sourcing and extracting prized color from Mediterranean mollusks which were used to dye garments for the upper echelons of Roman society and others who wore the distinguishing purple to mark their elite status. A woman involved in a niche luxury-goods business and someone who owned her own home, suggests that Luke is perhaps making a point that she was successful! However, larger than her business profile is her posture before God.
Our Father’s Business: Human Flourishing
Friday, August 17, 2018The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. John 10:10-15 (ESV)
Sometimes, just after starting my car, I say out loud, “Alright, Carola, the goal is to not hurt the humans. Jesus, help me to not hurt the humans.” I say this because in my rush to arrive somewhere on time or beat the traffic, I have oftentimes forgotten that there are other human beings around me—in cars, on bikes, on sidewalks—whose lives matter just as much as mine. When I do take for granted the preciousness of the lives of others, I find myself taking risks that, upon reflection, are not worth the potential cost.
In a similar way, business leaders can lose sight of the other humans that make up their businesses and are affected by their businesses. Volunteering with a labor-rights organization in Trenton, New Jersey, I heard the stories of men and women working in poor conditions for minimum wage, employed by companies of all sizes that seemed to be thriving economically. Yet, at what cost? Who is paying for those business leaders to flourish?
The Magna Carta of Humanity: Human Nature Post-Auschwitz, Post-Hiroshima, and Pre-Singularity; How the State Serves Both Salvation and Religious Freedom; Some Thoughts and Advice for the College-Bound Students in Your Life; Why Should We Care About the Arts?; Telling a Better Story and more, in this issue of Christian Union's bi-monthly email brief.
The eyes of the LORD are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their cry.
— Psalm 34:15
Thursday, August 16, 2018
How to Win Friends and Influence People“And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous wealth, so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal dwellings. One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much, and one who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much.” Luke 16:9-10 (ESV)
It is no secret that the priorities of Jesus regularly riled up the religious leaders of His day. Jesus’ proclivity for welcoming the disreputable “sinners and tax collectors” into relationship and community became a particular target of their ire and scorn. The series of four parables in Luke 15:1-16:15 function in tandem as a sort of “apology” for Jesus’ radical inclusion and acceptance of such shadowy characters as deeply consonant with the shape of God’s coming kingdom in the world.
