Radicalism – Islamic or Otherwise

Daveed’s Stud Pose

First off, let me mention that I’m very proud of my friend, Daveed. When I first met him, he was a Muslim and well on his way to being a radical one. Since then, by the power of the resurrected Christ, he’s become a Christian. Praise God! This whole process has given him something of a unique perspective on radical Islam, both domestic and international. You can read all about his experience in My Year Inside Radical Islam. A couple of years ago he also authored a book about how America is not winning the war on terrorism called Bin Laden’s Legacy.

Alright, enough pluggin’ his written work. How about Daveed’s recent work on CNN ? Dig this:

A discussion worth watching

As it comes to the content of that discussion, I admit that I know virtually nothing. Even so, one thing stood out to me that seems quite helpful. Daveed distinguished between “radicalization” and the willingness to engage in violence. These two things are most certainly distinct and need to be understood as such.

Let me illustrate how important this distinction is. I would be (and probably should be) viewed as a radical Christian.

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Spiritual Maturity and Theological Knowledge

What is the relationship between spiritual maturity and knowledge of things theological and biblical? This question could be addressed by way of a similar question in a different arena. What’s the relationship between knowledge about how to have good marriage and actually having a good marriage?

If asked in that way, I think a significant portion of the answer is immediately apparent. Can one have a good marriage without knowledge of how to have one? No. That knowledge can be attained from experience (as opposed to reading). What’s more, a person might have that knowledge from experience and not be able to formulate and articulate it. Even so, knowledge about having a good marriage is necessary to having a good marriage, but it is not sufficient to have a good marriage. Clearly, the knowledge must be applied.

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Duncan’s The Brothers K

The Brothers K by David James Duncan

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I was given this book by a non-Christian neighbor. I traded him reads. I gave him Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep, and he gave me this.

I have to give Mr. Duncan a hand on an energetic, well-written book. From a literary standpoint, it was a pleasure to read. It had me laughing out loud enough to irritate my wife. The characters came across as, for the most part, honest and believable. Sometimes I thought that the brothers’ star qualities seemed a little over the top, but it still read well.

The title obviously alludes to Dostoevsky’s famous book, a book that I’ve read but once, but that I loved. This tale of divergent brothers takes places within a home where the mother is a committed Adventist and the father is a committed baseball player. These varied influences bear exceedingly varied fruit in the lives of the children (four sons and younger twin girls). They all go off in different directions and mostly reap the whirlwind (similar, in this respect, to Dostoevsky’s book).

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Sweet, Sweet Calvinization

Augustine and Calvin

This post is mostly a personal recollection about how I came to know “the doctrines of grace” or “Calvinism.” There have been a couple of instances recently that have prompted me to think about how it was that I became a Calvinist. Before I delve into some personal reflection, however, I should like to tidy up things on a terminological level. What’s meant by the terms “Calvinism,” “the doctrines of grace,” “sovereign grace,” and the like?

Typically, people use all of those words/phrases to point to John Calvin’s emphasis on the sovereignty of God in salvation. Calvin, however, was no innovator. The set of teachings that bears his name has very little to do with him specifically.

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Classical Homeschool Education

Pondering deep Christian thoughts, to be sure…

Maile and I currently have four kids. Calvin is coming up on 8, Anuhea 6, Anselm 4, and Ambrose 2. Needless to say, I’m interested in education. Being a Christian, I’m interested in Christian education. Being a Christian, I’m also interested in excellence. Put it together and I’m interested in excellent Christian education. So far, so good.

We’ve been homeschooling, of course, from the beginning. However, when it came down to moving beyond simple reading and arithmetic, we found it challenging to make sure that things were getting covered. By contrast, one thing a good school has going for it is that all areas of importance have been brought together and the scope and sequence of each have been planned out. It was the whole making-sure-everything’s-covered-and-covered-well thing that seemed to Maile and me to be a bit of a bugger.

There are various ways for homeschool parents to address this issue. The way we have found has been glorious. Classical Conversations is group that is engineered to empower and help homeschool parents by forming local communities committed to classical and Christian education. Calvin and Sissy took advantage of their stellar Foundations program this past academic year. Next year, we’ll add Anselm into the mix. That ought to be interesting: yeah, he’s pretty loud.

‘Round these parts, in Columbia County, Oregon, we have a wonderful little (and growing!), committed community. Please take a look at it. It you’re interested in talking about this wonderful aid to your homeschool labors (even if you’re just curious), please contact me. The CC website is quite informative, so be sure to check it out.

CC’s been a great blessing to us this year. We’d like to see it grow, thrive and become a greater blessing to more families. Come join us.

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Henty’s Young Carthaginian

Young Carthaginian by G.A. Henty
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

We borrowed this book (on CD) from some friends and listened to it in the van whilst traveling hither and yon. To my shame, it’s the first Henty I’ve read. I have heard good things about Henty’s work for a number of years, but this was my first experience.

I wish I could have given the book 3 1/2 stars, but I bumped it up to 4… I’m a nice guy.

It was a good story, packed with historical interests. The protagonist, Malchus, was quite lovable in a PG sort of way. He exemplifies many admirable character qualities. The downside, however, was that it made his character seem a bit flat: almost Ned Flanders-ish, but not quite. The story moved from one pond of action and adventure to another to another, to the point where young Machus’s life seemed reminiscent of an episode of 24. The action portions of the book, however, were fun and well-told. The streams between those ponds of action, though, were not as pleasing. It would appear that Henty had a penchant for supplying detail, much detail, tedious detail. I think the book would have been better without it, but it was still a good book with it. My seven-year-old liked the book, so I’m sure we’ll do more Henty. Maybe we’ll even borrow some more from our friends!

View all my reviews

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Emotions and Gun Laws

Can We Discuss This?

At the risk of beating the same drum (I’m no John Henry Bonham), I want to post another little ditty on the issue of gun control. In a word, this post is a plea for some clearheaded thinking in the discussion.

The furthest thing from clearheaded thinking would be insanity; politics is full of insanity. As it comes to this issue, there are plenty on the right side of the aisle who simply chant (read: scream), “FROM MY COLD, DEAD HANDS!” It’s hard to have a clearheaded discussion with someone who simply screams a mantra back in your face. On the other side of the aisle, we have some who view firearms as items just waiting to kill (note that they will almost never say murder) someone. It’s hard to have a clearheaded discussion with someone who is filled with both irrational fears and “righteous” indignation. What I’m saying, here, is that both sides paint each other as unreasonable and, to some degree, both sides are correct in that assessment. This unfortunate reality will stop the discussion from moving forward. It will not, however, stop public policy from moving forward.

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Having a Dead Baby

So, there we were driving down the road to the hospital, but it felt bizarre. We have had four children before this. Every trip to the hospital has been similar: I can’t drive fast enough, Maile’s exercised, red lights look green… plenty of you have been there. This one was different. The reason it was different was that our baby was dead.

I’ve never had a dead baby before. At least six month before, the docs told us that Mahalani (“Baby Lucy” – we always name our in utero kids a Peanuts name) suffered from Trisomy 13, which doesn’t bode well for longevity. We didn’t know if Lucy would make it to term, be born alive, or live ten years. Turns out that she lived 37 weeks in her mommy’s womb. That’s 37 weeks of blessing. Now she lives eternally with Jesus, the Savior of God’s elect.

Anyway, so there we were driving to the hospital. I thought that some grizzly business was at hand. The prospect of my wife delivering a dead baby wasn’t pleasant. In fact, at that point, I was wishing I could be somewhere else. God, however, has not created us somewhere else. He’s put us where we are and called us to serve him in that place.

That place turned out to be not grizzly, but glorious. There were numerous prayers answered, numerous tears shed, and a wonderful time had. We celebrated life. We celebrated eternal life. We spoke of covenant promises. In a word, the experience was a blessed tragedy.

Mahalani was and is exactly what Yahweh wants her to be. Eph 1:11 tells us that God works every little thing (and Mahalani is one very little thing) in accordance with his own will.

Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise him all creatures here below. Praise him above, ye heavenly host. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen and amen.

Kane’ohe Bay… not far from Mahalani.

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Homo ‘Marriage’ and Christians

Dr. D.G. Hart

A good friend of mine told me to get a load of D.G. Hart’s post… you should get a load of it, too. If you don’t read it, this post won’t make much sense. However, if you do read it, this post may still not make sense… let’s see.

For those of you who do not know Dr. Hart, he’s a stud. I read Recovering Mother Kirk in seminary, and I loved it. He’s a wonderful historian. I have enjoyed his work on American Presbyterianism and on Machen. I have wanted to read his work on Nevin for a number of years, but evidently not bad enough to do so. So, when we’re dealing with Hart, we’re dealing with an accomplished scholar, a seminary professor, and an ordained elder in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. The man even smokes tobacco. Not. Too. Shabby.

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Jesus in Starbucks

So, there I am, in my office (the Starbucks of St. Helens, OR, USA) minding my own business (by which I mean that of everyone around me), and I end up in a conversation with a cute little girl (probably about 7 years old). She’s all dressed up, lookin’ pretty, and she’s flanked by a small crowd of nicely dressed women (and a similarly dressed little boy of about 8 years of age). Okay, so there I am, talking to this little one. I asked her why she was dressed up so nicely. She said (with some help from the little boy and an older girl, probably 16, behind her) that they were off to share the good news with people. Somewhat surprised, I said, “Oh! Good! I believe the Good News that Jesus died on the cross to save sinners. Is that the Good News you’re telling people?” Then retorts the little sweetie, “Well, Jesus didn’t die on a cross; he died on a wooden stake.” This, of course, zeroed me in on the fact that they were not preaching the Good News, at all. Anyhoo, the boy pipes up and says, “The Bible says that it wasn’t a cross, but a stake.” So, I reply: “I bet you’re reading the New World Translation, aren’t you?” He nods.

Okay, so from there, I ask the threesome in front of me: “So, how is it that one can get to heaven?” Again, the boy pipes up and says, “By serving Jehovah.” I reply, “Isn’t it because Jesus died for your sins?!” “Oh, yeah.” That speaks for itself. But the JWs are not alone in propounding this particular soul-damning error. They are renowned, however, for the following one.

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