Daily Archives: July 12, 2010

Standard

Posted by

Posted on

July 12, 2010

Posted under

Heidelberg Catechism

Heidelberg Catechism: Lord’s Day 19

Q: 50. Why is it added, “and sits at the right hand of God”?
A: Because Christ is ascended into heaven for this end, that he might appear as head of his church, by whom the Father governs all things.

Q: 51. What profit is this glory of Christ, our head, unto us?
A: First, that by his Holy Spirit he pours out heavenly graces upon us his members; and then that by his power he defends and preserves us against all enemies.

Q: 62. What comfort is it to you that “Christ shall come again to judge the quick and the dead”?
A: That in all my sorrows and persecutions, with uplifted head I look for the very same person, who before offered himself for my sake, to the tribunal of God, and has removed all curse from me, to come as judge from heaven: who shall cast all his and my enemies into everlasting condemnation, but shall translate me with all his chosen ones to himself, into heavenly joys and glory.

Standard

Posted by

Posted on

July 12, 2010

Posted under

Pastoral

Give Me Witch Doctors

Nate Wilson’s Book Notes from a Tilt-a-Whirl is one of the best books I have recently read. It stirred up gratitude within me for the world God has made. He affirms God’s sovereignty over all of creation, but not with a grim countenance. Rather he rejoices in all that God has done, is doing and will do. I am not going to comment much on the book, but I thought I would post some of my favorite quotes.
After discussing various philosophers and their failure to explain the world Wilson says this:

Give me priests. Give me men with feathers in their hair or tall domed hats, female oracles in caves, servants of the python, smoking weed and reading palms. A gypsy fortune teller with a foot-pedal Ouija board and a gold fishbowl for a crystal ball knows more about the world than many of the great thinkers of the West. Mumbling priests swinging stinking cans on their chains and even witch doctors conjuring up curses with a well buried elephant tooth have a better sense of their places in the world. They know this universe is brimming with magic, with life and riddles and ironies. They know the world might eat them, and no encyclopedia could stop it…Marx called religion an opiate, and all too often it is. But philosophy is an anesthetic, a shot to keep the wonder away.