Sea Ships and Bitter Pipes

Up to Philippians 1.10

2005-01-28T16:29:00.000-08:00

I shall continue where I left off in Philippians.

Paul starts out showing his thankfulness for the Philippians by always joyfully making request for them in his prayers. He does this because of their fellowship in the gospel. He reassures them by telling them of his confidence in Christ completing the good work in them. By this we can also know that when Christ begins a good work in us, justification, he will complete it, through sanctification, until we are purified. Paul states that just as he can be confident of this truth, he can be confident that they are fellow partakers of grace.

This section brings out the fact that even our works are not our own but are instead gifts from God. Through their actions/works, he can know they are fellow partakers of grace. He goes on, though, to say (in vs. 6) that these very works were started in us by Christ (salvation), and it is him who is completing, or bringing to perfection (sanctification), our works until they are purified at the day of Jesus Christ.

In verses 9-10 we have the content of one of Paul’s prayers for the Philippians. He prays that their love may abound, but in 2 areas, in knowledge and in discernment. This is an interesting statement, to say the least. How does love abound more and more in knowledge and in discernment? Here are my thoughts in this mater. 1) 1 Corinthians 13.2 states that knowledge without love is nothing. 1 Corinthians 8.2-3 states that “knowledge puffs up, but love edifies,” and that to love God means we are known by him, which is the deepest sort of knowledge. 1 Corinthians 13.11-12 also states that through love we no longer understand as a child but become men. We understood in part but know just as we also are known (just as we are known by perhaps as 8.8 says?) The problem here though is that these verses use love to describe knowledge whereas in the Philippians text knowledge and discernment further define love. So, how does that work?

Reading Matthew Henry’s Commentaries on this text have focused my thoughts some. Could it be that they were not to have a blind love. Looking closer at verse 10 might shed some light on the issue. He states 3 main things that love abounding in knowledge and discernment will do for them. 1) They may approve that which is excellent. 2) They may be sincere. 3) They may be without offence. The need a love filled with knowledge and discernment for all of these things. In order to approve that which is excellent you need to know what is excellent (knowledge, specifically in Christian’s beliefs maybe?) And be able to discern that which is false and not truly excellent. States, “that we may approve the things which are excellent upon the trial of them, and discern their difference from other things. Observe: The truths and laws of Christ are excellent things; and it is necessary that we all approve them, and esteem them as such. We only need to try them, to approve them; and they will easily recommend themselves to any searching and discerning mind.”

Notice: What Paul is talking about here is not knowledge and discernment alone, but love abounding in these things. This is confusing still! I am used to thinking of Love, Knowledge, and Discernment separately. So are they separate? Maybe it is foolishness to try to separate or combine them. Could they be separate but so entwined that you can not talk of on without the others, thus having more of a separation in thought and words alone? This would be similar to the attributes of God. You can not describe one attribute without defining it in terms of the other attributes.

Studying Philippians

2005-01-26T10:14:00.000-08:00

I am back. I have decided to start posting some of my notes on philippians since I am studying it now. Criticique and or Criticism would be appreaciated. : )

I have decided to read through Philippians. Yesterday I read it once through to read it as it was originally meant to be read, as a letter. I shall continure to do that periodically throughout my study. Today, though, my readings have brought me up to 1.11

Audience: The saints who are in Christ Jesus and who reside in Philippi. Since he states the saints in Christ Jesus, I want to think of this as those who really are Christians (yes because of my Baptist-New-Covenantal leanings); although I can’t rule out the possibility that this is an expression he is using for the entire church at Philippi. He also states “to the Bishops and Deacons.” Why, I don’t know, maybe it is to the saints but should go through them?

What do we know about the saints at Philippi? They are mostly Gentiles who Paul is encouraged by the way God is working in that church, but who possibly will be facing persecution in their near future. So there is joy under girded by graveness for them to strengthen themselves even further for the persecution coming.

He references God as our father and Christ as our Lord in the beginnings of this chapter. Martin Luther has an interesting insight into calling God father. 1) It is a friendly, affectionate, deep, and heartfelt way to address him. 2) By doing this we acknowledge ourselves as children of God.

My reading may have brought me up to 1.11 but obviusly not my notes. That will be later.

weekend at the olive st.

2004-10-26T10:01:00.000-07:00

This weekend was great. Two of my roomates and I hung out with our respective, fiances' and girlfriend here at the olive st house, and at my parents. Friday, my entire family was here in this little house. Darci and I cooked for sage, abi, the girls, trev, and antonia; then later my parents even dropped by. It's nice whenever we can get the entire family together.

(for some pictures of the weekend, head over to trev's blog web.umr.edu/~tjacorn/blog)

smokerings

2004-09-12T18:46:00.000-07:00

As most of you know, I am an engaged man. With this engagement have come many thoughts, about being a husband, a father, a leader, etc. I do not know much but I do know one thing; I am not ready for this, yet I also know I am as ready as I will ever be. I know this because I know I will never draw near He who is my example. Hehe, I will be a grandfather some day, and I still will not be ready for this :). Already I have started thinking about many of the new responsibilities I will have. As a leader I will have responsibilities for those I am leading, my family, and to lead them as Christ leads the church. As a husband I will have the responsibility of loving my wife more than myself, with Christ as the ultimate example. As a father I will have the responsibility of raising my children to love and obey God, with God the Father as My example. The family is truly of great importance in God's plans, and this I have started to realize. I am always amazed by those who want to marry but do not want the kids. In reading the scriptures I have come to realize that when people marry but do not want kids, they are in fact refusing one of the signs of God's blessing upon their marriage.
Talking with Darci about this has been very good, for she often has different insights into it that will really open my eyes. There needs to be a balance of the responsibilities and an understanding of how they work together. I see sometimes people trying compartmentalizing the different responsibilities, and that I think will not work. For instance, one of the ways the man will show his love for his wife will be in how they both work together in taking care of the kids, instead of them both sacrificing their relationship in order to take care of their relationships with the kids.
Anyways, these are some things I have been thinking about. Now I do realize that I am only 20 years old, and so have no experience whatsoever in this area, but I am trying to base this all upon biblical examples, and reason. I think we place too little importance on the family anymore. Strong biblical families can, and I believe probably will, affect the church for the better. These types of families I think will also affect our culture. For example look at the reason Pharaoh enslaved the Jews. The Jews' strong and large families made Pharaoh afraid that the Jews would out populate the Egyptians and take over the pharoahdom.

Glory to God

2004-08-16T09:15:00.000-07:00

When we desire to be respected and loved by others, seeding only to experience a false joy, we lead a distastefully showy, miserable life. Then it is revealed that we don’t love You and don’t sincerely fear You. You resist the proud, but give grace to the humble. You thunder against the world’s greedy pursuits, and “the foundation of the hills” tremble. But some people find it necessary to be loved and honored by others. The enemy of true happiness presses hard against us. He scatters hi traps of “well done, well done” everywhere. He hopes that while we eagerly collect these praises, we will be caught suddenly. We will detach our joy from Your truth and fasten it to human deception. We will take pleasure in being loved and respected, not for Your sake, but in place of You. As a result, we will become like the enemy. He will own those who, not in harmony of love but in the fellowship of punishment, seek to serve him and to honor his dark, cold throne. He will own them by imitating You; in perverse and distorted ways. But we, O Lord, we are Your “little flock.” Own us, stretch Your wings over us, and let us escape under them. Be our glory. Let us be loved for Your sake and have Your word feared un us.

St. Augustine

summer hibernations

2004-06-24T18:08:00.000-07:00

This blog doesn't actually have much to do with the title, except maybe as an explanation/excuse for why I haven't blogged in forever and then some. Work has me gone a lot and so I don't often have access to a computer (although I am usually home every weekend so that is not much of an excuse).

I started a new blog. It's a book review blog called books and smokerings. It's cool you should check it out.

I have decided that I have been looking at theology in too much of a disjointed fashion, issue by issue, with each issue almost separate from the others. I say almost because I do recognize that they are all interconnected, and I see some of the relationships between them but in a very limited way. I want to start working on connected the issues, that I have studied, together. :) of course I don't really know where to start but that is my overall plan. hehe vary vague I know but sometimes for me its figuring out the right questions to ask that is the hardest part. Once I know what questions to ask the answer's not far away. I think I am with Dr. Cochran in saying the questions are more important then the answers, for the questions decide what the answer will be.

2004-05-03T20:38:00.000-07:00

google

wow

2004-05-03T08:53:00.000-07:00

I am back... well I will be shortly.. in a day or two.

thoughts

2004-04-06T09:06:00.000-07:00

Just got out of my Philosophy class, which I am really enjoying. We're in the section of the book talking about God and religion. Dr. Cochran brought up an interesting question.

What is the most important attribute of God. Some attributes proposed during the class discussion was Love, Justice, Perfection, ect. What he meant by most important was which attribute in a sense brings them all together, or makes sense of them all, or that which makes God worth believing in.

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I got AutoCad 2002 from Trev last weekend. Now all I have to do is learn how to use it. :) If I can then it looks like I got a job in Branson with an engineering firm there.

waisting time instead of studying

2004-03-24T22:59:00.000-08:00

Right now for some reason I am finding it really hard to study. so I am going to write for a minute.
Questions:
Why do we feel the need to learn and better ourselves; to go to college or study a vocation and do something we love?
During the course of bible study tonight the question came up, did you take what your pastor said last sunday and apply it to your life this week? Have you ever done it? It made me think and I think I would have to say usually not.
I am working on making a bible study for Hebrews. I've started that more as a study tool for myself, in hopes that making this bible study it will help me to delve deeper into hebrews and get at the main meaning of each passage and the entire book. I really hope I actually finish this and not lose interest after awhile.
well I really need to get back to studying or this next test will kick me in the butt.
night all.

Weekend

2004-03-07T23:12:00.000-08:00

Be one of the leaders for the 6th grade boys this weekend during Disciple Now was great. I loved it. Although I am ammensly (sp?) tired right now. So I am headed to bed and will write more on the weekend later this week.
Night all, have a good week this week.

CT Fulfill

2004-03-02T09:15:00.000-08:00

According to Covenant Theology's view of Matthew 5:17, as I understand it:
"Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets..."
The Old Testament is not done away with or destroyed or irrevalent today. It is just as much true today as it was then. It is still in effect.

"I did not come to abolish but to fulfill."
Christ came to keep the Old Testament Law perfectly and therefore fulfill it by not breaking it.

Before I go on, Do I understand the Covenant Theology viewpoint correctly? Anything I need to add or remove? (this is mainly to anyone that believes in Covenant Theology.)

questions questions....

2004-02-23T13:53:00.000-08:00

The truth is, I am filled with way to many questions. Or so thats how it feels, sometimes. Other times it feels as if I don't have enough questions. hehe the wonderful paradox of life. well one of them. The other one that I can think of off the top of my head is the old addage, the more you know the more you realize how little you actually know.

So I should probably let everyone know whats been going on lately here at SBU. Truthfully not much. Studying my butt off, I am bound and determined to get all A's this semester. Don't really know why, because I have never really been that worried about A's before. I'm still not fretting about it, I have just decided to try it out. I also finaly got a job of sorts a few weeks ago. I am tutoring a sophmore, in highschool, in algebra. I like the kid, Elis is his name. Saterday Elis planned on going to a kickboxing tournament with me but a situation came up in his dad's business and he had to stay behind to help his dad out. So I ended up going down alone to see with sage. Twas lots of fun, :) I now have a big M on my hand to. The fight was in a nightclub, before the club opened for the night, so they wrote an M on my hand so the whole world would know I AM A MINOR.

Yes, I know I mentioned questions, so here's some of them. Prelude: I had a really good talk with Daniel sunday morning about New Covenant Theology and Covenant Theology. Here's some of the questions now raised in my mind. What does the word Fulfill mean (Matt 5:17-20)? It doesn't appear to mean abolish, and yet it seems to mean more than just "Christ didn't break the law," so what is its definition? When the Bible talks about a New covenant, what does it mean by NEW? what is the point of making this new covenant?
Others: not of NCT or CT,
How do you keep friendships with people that you want to keep friendships with but that seem to be going farther and farther away? How do you incite in other's an interest in theology? or in other words and interest in the tenets of christian faith and views? Should I try? Why did God put me here? (disclaimer: I am happy here, that is not the point the point is I don't know yet what my life means to God. hehe I'm serving Him and I don't even know HOW I am serving him... ironic.)

Darren is being a girl.. so I am going to get off now. (yes darren if you read this that is what I said. but it was said in brotherly love. If you take offense to it I will beat you up for being dumb cause that is not how I meant it.)

Am I becoming critical? I don't want to be that way. It takes way to much effort to be critical, and I'm too lazy for it.

Everyone within reasonable distance. 'Into the Woods' this weekend (yes Darci is in it). $5 for tickets. (unless a student)

Gad-flies and Mid-wives

2004-02-12T17:21:00.000-08:00

My blog got deleated and I had do redo it, so I am only going to post my last post for now (Thankfully I had it saved offline somewere)

Posted earlier:

Just got out of philosophy class and have a few minutes before my next class, but I wanted to try to makes sense of my notes.

Background -
Athens, Greece 5th century B.C. - thought of by many as the high mark of civilization. Standing before a jury of 500 we have Socrates, not defending his life, but defending his beliefs. Two citizens charged him with corrupting the minds of the youth with to many questions and being an atheist by only believing in one god. You know the end result, the found Socrates guilty and executed him.

Despite knowing that I still didn't know other things about that trial that I found out today. Socrates had 3 options open to him by which he could have escaped the death penalty. First, he could have paid a fine and gone free. That's it just a simple fine and then he could walk away. Secondly, he could have hired professional mourners to go before the court and plead for mercy. This was a civilized nation, they disliked his ideas but they probably would have let him go. Thirdly, he could have opted for exile from Athens instead of execution.
Why did he refuse?
As a class we came up with some possible answers. Socrates was a man of principle who held his principles above all else. He had no fear of death, for he believed that the philosopher was a person who's soul was liberated by wisdom. He had no fear of death. He believed that no evil could come to a good person. In fact, that a person doing evil to a good person actually did evil to himself. He also respected the law. He was condemned by the very law he had lived his entire life under and he could not shame that law by taking the easy way out by paying a fine or hiring mourners; and he could not forsake that law and liver under another law by being exiled to another country.
Here are some things about Socrates:
The man-
His life was devoted to the study of people not nature
His life was devoted tot eh pursuit of wisdom not wealth
He lived in order to learn and sought virtue above all else.
He was devoted to justice and a respect for the law.
The Teacher -
Teaching for Socrates was best done by asking instead of telling. No boring lectures by professors informing you what you need to know and then expecting you to just believe that. Here the teacher is a learner and the learner is a teacher. Learning comes to both the teacher and the student, the first by asking the second by answering. Socrates thought of himself as a "mid-wife" or "gad-fly" (horse fly), both analogies of his role as a teacher. The mid-wife asks questions to probe, excite, and aroused the ideas inside the student. The gad-fly nips at people keeping them from falling asleep, provoking, arousing, and prodding people to learn.
The Philosopher -
Socrates had 3 main convictions. First, he believed virtue and wisdom were the greatest of all human good, or if you will Moral character and truth. Secondly, Socrates believed that happiness can only be achieved by being virtuous. There is no other way to achieve true happiness, a happiness that last and that can not be taken away. Thus no evil can hurt a good person for the inner person can only be hurt by what the person thinks and does, not by what others think and do. Thirdly, everyone's duty is to enquire always about what is good, and beautiful.
He leaves us with some things he believed that might be worth thinking about. The unexamined life is not worth living. The Most important task in life is caring for the soul. A good person cannot be harmed by others. Know thyself.

Socrates believed that questions are more important that answers. So I shall leave with some questions.

from class:
1. What are you willing to die for?
Know that you know that answer to that one.....
2. What are you willing to live for?

from me.

What is your purpose for life? Why?
Can a "good" person be harmed by others?
What is the most important task in life?
WHY?