The Vow and Walker Percy "We have sinned and grown old"

This week I went with my wife to see The Vow. In the film, a wife (Paige) emerges from a coma forgetting who her husband (Leo) is. He spends the film trying to win her back and trying to learn how to love this new woman his wife has become. For my own part, I liked the movie. It wasn't great filmmaking, but I was partial to the soundtrack (some prominent songs by The National) and found myself somewhat absorbed by the whole concept of a man trying to get his wife, who has forgotten him, to love him again.

In reflecting on the film, I was reminded of the first chapter of Walker Percy's book Lost in the Cosmos. In the book, Percy spends time exploring man's self-alienation and desire to escape from himself. Percy appreciates that this is a somewhat modern phenomenon (Percy rightly observes that there was no word in the ancient world for 'boredom,' for example). Why is it that man so strongly desires to not be himself? Percy asks. In particular, Percy spends some time getting his reader to reflect on the usage of amnesia as a plot device in movies.

A variant of the amnesic-plot device is the inadvertent return of the amnesiac to home territory, where he is welcomed by a lovely woman, unknown to him, who is evidently his wife. The crucial scene is his being led off to bed... The source of pleasure for the moviegoer is not the amnesia but the certified and risk-free license to leave the old self behind and enter upon a new life, whether by amnesia or mistaken identity.

There is, indeed, a similar scene in The Vow where Leo decides to take Paige out on a date and try to get her to remember him. Though they have been married for years, here they end up sleeping together and spending the night as a brand new couple who barely know one another. The viewer is, of course, tantalized to a certain degree at the newness of all of this, but then they keep reminding themselves that these two people are married. Percy should have stopped writing brilliant novels and worked on some screenplays.

The Vow has been a popular movie, and I understand that the movie was 'inspired' (loosely) by a true story. But I think Percy is on to something in his comments. People go to movies to find an escape. In many respects, there is something romantically intriguing about a tale where a woman wakes up with license to throw away the encumbrances of the decisions made for a half decade. After all, she has no choice in the matter - she has amnesia. What person does not - on some level - want to abandon their life only to experience the life she knows from a new perspective? Recall at the end of the movie 50 First Dates. Drew Barrymore wakes up in a strange bed, on a boat. She watches a video summarizing her life up to that point and being told that she has a daughter and she should come above deck to meet her family she has made anew for another day. Every day for her is new. Every day is a delight and discovering of the new.

One of the keys to living a life of joy (and I stress this is not the only or even the best key) is choosing to see each moment from Drew Barrymore's perspective in that movie - only without the amnesia. I quote Chesterton now:

It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical encore.

What we need is not to lose our memory in order to reclaim the joy of life. What we need is perspective. "And he is before all things, and by him all things consist" (Col. 1:17). I turn to Jonathan Edwards:

It is plain, nothing can exert itself, or operate, when and where it is not existing [because] what is past entirely ceases when present existence begins…it does no more co-exist with it, than it does any other moment that had ceased twenty years ago.

There is a reason why God every morning cries out, "Again!" It is because the Sun cannot speak for itself. It does not have the power of self-sustenance. Every moment is anew. We have become bored of God's continuous work in creation, not because we understand it, but because we have ceased to understand it.

All Israel Will Be Saved

Romans 11:25-26 reads, “Lest you be wise in your own sight, I do not want you to be unaware of this mystery, brothers:a partial hardening has come on Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. And in this way all Israel will be saved, as it is written, 'The Deliverer will come from Zion, he will banish ungodliness from Jacob.' ” (Romans 11:25–26 ESV)

There are many who expect a worldwide conversion of Jews before Christ can again return in judgment, and for the most part that view is based on this verse. I thought that Calvin's words on this verse would provide some food for thought, as well as a confidence in God's preservation and salvation of his Church - who have been ingrafted into Israel.

Many understand this of the Jewish people, as though Paul had said, that religion would again be restored among them as before: but I extend the word Israel to all the people of God, according to this meaning, — “When the Gentiles shall come in, the Jews also shall return from their defection to the obedience of faith; and thus shall be completed the salvation of the whole Israel of God, which must be gathered from both; and yet in such a way that the Jews shall obtain the first place, being as it were the first-born in God’s family.” This interpretation seems to me the most suitable, because Paul intended here to set forth the completion of the kingdom of Christ, which is by no means to be confined to the Jews, but is to include the whole world. The same manner of speaking we find in Galatians 6:16. The Israel of God is what he calls the Church, gathered alike from Jews and Gentiles; and he sets the people, thus collected from their dispersion, in opposition to the carnal children of Abraham, who had departed from his faith.

If Calvin's interpretation of this verse is correct, then Romans 11 is concerned - not with spelling out the fate of ethnic Israel, but with reassuring the church that the hardening of Israel took place so that the true Israel could all be saved.

Don't Cultivate an Empty Legacy

I hesitate to write this for a lot of reasons. The fact is, Andrew Breitbart has died and for the last week or so we have observed a flood of contrary evaluations of the man. On the one hand, people hated his guts and thought he was the biggest slimeball who ever lived. On the other hand, some people are already lionizing him - Ann Coulter, for example, says that this is similar to the death of John Lennon.

My suspicion is, there are many Christians who would look at the life and career of Andrew Breitbart and - without having known anything of his religious life - say that Breitbart as "finished the race," borrowing Paul's own phrase. In reality, Andrew Breitbart fought for a temporal kingdom - one which will not endure in its present form. “But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved" (2 Peter 3:10 ESV). This points to a cataclysmic end for the world as we know it. When Christ ushers in the age to come, it will not come calmly and smoothly with the institutions and structures of this world relatively unchanged. Rather, we will inhabit a new heavens and a new Earth. The cosmos will be fundamentally remade, and so we see that the institutions, the news papers, the blogs, and the buildings of this world will not endure into the age to come.

The Bible points to very few things which will "endure forever": God's steadfast love (1 Chr. 16:34), God's righteousness (Ps. 111:3), God's praise (Ps. 111:10), every one of God's righteous rules (Ps. 119:160), God's name (Ps. 135:13), and whatever God does (Eccl. 3:14). This does not mean that nothing we do is of any benefit. However, it should cause us to make our ultimate end and goal the one which God has designed for us (WSC Q1), so that our endeavors and labors in this life are not "burned up" in the end (1 Cor. 3:15). "Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life" (John 6:27).

Andrew Breitbart... Ronald Reagan... John Lennon... Herod... All passing fads.

Cameron Under Fire in The Lowest form of Public Discourse

It is difficult to avoid the hubbub over Kirk Cameron's latest comments if you read the internet or have even a tiny bit to do with the social networking world (either Twitter or Facebook). Apparently, calling something a sin today can get you tarred and feathered - and then bloodied and bruised. The story, over at the Huffington Post has actually generated over 18,000 comments - almost as many as our story about the death of B.B. Warfield.

Now, If you should be brave enough to start digging through this muck which represents the lowest form of public discourse imaginable (try reading the comments on Huffpo or ABC News' story) then you realize that the commenters are pretty evenly split. On the one hand, there are original gems like "It's Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve. I love your show on TBN!" and then on the opposite end you have people calling out everyone who believes in right or wrong.

In other words, this is the opposite of rational public discourse, from both sides. I wanted to share an interesting sampling of self-contradictory and illogical comments.

• "Kirk Cameron is an idiot. Homosexuality is most definitely natural as it has been around for thousands and probably millions of years."
• "Kirk Cameron has a right to believe as he does but he doesn't have the right to make absolute comments."
• "I think many people are upset because he said that he thinks everyone else 'should do the same' as what he believed in."
• "Judge NOT. God is in charge of judging and condemning, none of us mere mortals is capable of that kind of responsibility."
• "For you to believe that GOD has any reference to this is just your way of trying to power play your beliefs onto someone else..DO NOT USE GOD AS YOUR BULLY TECHNIQUES!!!"

Every single one of these comments is poorly composed, self-contradictory and can be turned back on itself with very little effort.

I'll save the most seriously cautionary comment for last: "In the past, the Bible was used to defend slavery, keeping blacks and whites seperate, women from voting and all kinds of other absurdities that we know now to be wrong. And anti-gay bigoty will likewise be relegated to the past." Note that all of this persons' examples of 'bigotry' involved the active oppression others, and that this oppression was eliminated by laws and by force, not by changing the public's mind through arguments and reason alone. Who knows what lies ahead for free speech for Christians if every view is tolerated except our own? We may become like our brothers and sisters in the rest of the world who live in danger for proclaiming Christ as Lord and God's Law as supreme. As Christians, we should be ready and willing - not to fight for our rights - but to suffer for the Gospel.

Lessons for Christians from 'Take Shelter'

Take Shelter is not easily summarized. It is about a man named Curtis who continues to have nightmares which always seem to include stormy skies, lightning, and tornadoes. As the film proceeds along, the dreams become increasingly vivid. Curtis responds by building an expensive storm shelter, which becomes the center of the tale in a lot of ways.

Michael Shannon is a fantastic actor. Many of you may remember him for his role in Revolutionary Road as John Givings, the mentally troubled son of the Wheelers' neighbor. Shannon really blew me away in that movie, but in his newest film, Take Shelter, he completely unsettled me and moved me very deeply. If there is one thing Michael Shannon does well as an actor it is 'unsettled to the point of explosion'. That is most certainly his specialty.

Take Shelter is hard to categorize. Is it psychological horror? Is it family drama? Is it personal allegory? My take is, it's all of these things when viewed from different angles.

I don't wish to spoil the ending, but I was moved to tears by the climactic decision which Shannon's Curtis has to make. This surprised me since I spent most of the film a bit on-edge and - well, unsettled. I was not prepared for my own response to what was taking place in the movie. In the end, I was struck by Curtis' resolve to do whatever it took, in spite of what everyone said, to do what he could to protect his family from what he understood to be great danger. Too often, our willingness as Christians to really commit to follow Christ is shaped a great deal by how our radical decisions will be seen by others. Often we pull punches and soft-pedal because the world is watching and we want their approval. In this film, Curtis does whatever he can, even if it means being alienated from those around him, because he believes danger is approaching.

I am not saying that Christians should be as paranoid or afraid as Curtis is in this film, but I am saying that we could use a dose of Curtis' resolve and follow-through. If we (for purpose of illustration) believe that the wages of sin is death, and we really believe it, what would that really look like? Would our commitment to waging war on sin in our own lives and the life of our family look like lunacy to the watching world? Would we ultimately care whether people thought we were crazy?

One other aspect of the film which struck me was the importance of a good wife. In this movie, Curtis' wife, Samantha (wonderfully played by Jessica Chastain in her seventh movie to be released last year) is a much needed rock for Curtis. She becomes his anchor of reality in the movie and strikes me as a Proverbs 31 woman. She is a church-going woman, whereas Curtis is not. She and her family appear to frequently invite him to church, but it is evidently a sore subject which the family appears to be reticent to continuously struggle with him over. She makes things and sells them to help support the family and cares very much for their hearing-impaired daughter. When he is unable to cope with decision-making because of his own deterioration, she becomes a woman of action. In the end, she demonstrates great wisdom in understanding what Curtis needs to do if he is ever to overcome his fear of what he believes is impending doom.

Ultimately, this movie is more something that stands on its own than a lesson for Christians or a sermon-illustration in the making. It is a picture of a troubled man seeking to understand himself, of a family that hangs together through resolution and commitment rather than feeling or sentimentality, and in so many ways it is a fantastic example of what a film ought to be.

[This film is rated R for language. There is no sexual content whatsoever.]

Emergent is SO 2005

If I Were The Devil...

Some may consider this a bit easy of me, but I have a comment I want to make.

Rick Santorum: The Father of Lies has his sights on what you would think the Father of Lies, Satan, would have his sights on: a good, decent, powerful, influential country -- the United States of America. If you were Satan, who would you attack in this day and age? There is no one else to go after other than the United States, and that's been the case for now almost 200 years, once America's preeminence was sown by our great Founding Fathers.

I can think of someone I would attack if I were Satan. I would attack the Church of Jesus Christ, and I would do it through one very broad strategy. I would put on a snappy-looking sweater-vest and talk like Rick Santorum did in this now infamous speech. I would convince the Church that America is a bigger target than her. I would convince the Church to invest itself in a temporal institution which does not hold the keys to the Kingdom of God. I would convince the Church that if she closes the gap between herself and the State that she is fulfilling the great commission as well as the Adamic commission. I would convince the Church that she should care whether her political leaders are good theologians, but then have lax views about who should be in the clergy. I would convince the Church in America that she is more important than the Church in China or India or Bangladesh because of the country she is in.

All Books at Desiring God are $5

You read the title of this post correctly. Every book at Desiring God is $5 "while they last." If I might make a recommendation, I purchased the Festschrift for Piper, For the Fame of God's Name when it first came out and I paid over $20 for it. It is a beautiful hardbound book over 500 pages in length, and the fact that you can get it for $5 is almost a sin. They also have another large Piper book, What Jesus Demands From the World, for only $3.

Well I said it, now you can do what you will with such information.

91 Years Ago Today, Old Princeton Died

The folks over at This Day In Presbyterian History have a fascinating article. You see, today (February 16th) is the anniversary of day that B.B. Warfield died in 1921. I have always appreciated what J. Gresham Machen said upon reflecting on Warfield's death, and I thought it might be worth recalling:

Dr. Warfield’s funeral took place yesterday afternoon at the First Church of Princeton... It seemed to me that the old Princeton—a great institution it was—died when Dr. Warfield was carried out.

In many ways, Dr. Warfield was the agent God used to preserve the old, conservative, Confessional, Biblical heritage upheld by Alexander and Hodge. When he left, as Machen put it, Old Princeton died.

I highly commend to you the article over at TDPH. It has a fascinating anecdote from Johannes Vos that is not to be missed.

"Paulites and R2Kites" with a Backbone

I just came across this article by the Bayly Brothers in which they state:

Ron Paul is to national politics what R2K is to the salt and light of the Church. Both Paulites and R2Kites have never seen a battle they want to fight. So instead they come up with sophisticated reasons why Little Round Top is the wrong hill to defend and Colonel Chamberlain's bayonet charge was over the top. The wrong man led the wrong troops in the wrong charge using the wrong weapons at the wrong time and the wrong location.

In fact, watch these men closely and you find the only battle they're willing to fight is the battle opposing battles. But of course, I use the words 'battle' and 'fight' quite loosely because both require courage. I don't write this to demean them, but so readers will see the connection between their techniques, commitments, and character.

Well, as someone who is a supporter of Ron Paul and a holder of the Reformed Two Kingdoms perspective (that is what the "R" stands for, right?), I found this very interesting. Anyone who has read our blog for any length of time knows that we are not afraid of a fight. For example, I can think back to a post I did in which I "battled" both the Federal Vision and Lee Irons. In fact, the sheer fact that I am writing now shows that I am not just "battling against battling." I am battling the fact that those in the R2K camp do stand up for truth.

Or as another example, take my friend Jason Stellman who has stood up against the Federal Vision in his presbytery. He is an out spoken advocate of the Two Kingdoms view and someone who is known for having a backbone. In fact, at times, he is accused (wrongly I would say) of having too much backbone.

If the Baylys want to dialogue with those on the other side, putting up inflammatory posts like this one is not the way to do. It seems that those outside the Two Kingdoms view are fond of doing this, but this is not the way to convince those who disagree. All this type of rhetoric does is convince the convinced.

R.T. France: 1938 - 2012

I just learned that R.T. France died on Friday, February 10th. He was a great scholar and Christian, and an expert in the Gospel of Matthew. I have benefited tremendously from both of his commentaries on the Gospel of Matthew, as well as his commentary on Mark, and to date I consider his Matthew commentary for the NICNT series to be my favorite modern Bible commentary.

We should thank God for giving us good teachers. We now have one less.

Another Free Jerry Bridges Kindle Book!

At the moment, you can get Jerry Bridges' book The Transforming Power of the Gospel at Amazon for free. From the product description:

The apostle Paul writes that we are to be transformed, but for many Christians, figuring out how to approach spiritual transformation can be elusive. Bestselling author Jerry Bridges helps us understand that we have available to us the ultimate power source for true spiritual growth: the gospel.

In The Transforming Power of the Gospel, Bridges guides you through a thorough examination of:

• what the biblical meaning of grace is and how it applies to your life
• how Jesus’ work in His life and death applies to the believer in justification and adoption
• why basic spiritual disciplines are necessary for spiritual growth
• what role the Holy Spirit plays in both definitive and progressive sanctification

As usual, these deals don't last forever, so grab it while you can. Even if you don't have a Kindle, whenever you do get one someday down the road, this book will be available in the cloud for you to access when the time comes.

Get it here.

The Sixth Commandment is About More Than Murder

Our home fellowship group at my church has been going through the Ten Commandments. The nice thing about the time that we have is, we have two weeks to spend on each commandment. Virtually every lesson has included exploration of either the positive commands or the negative commands within each commandment. For example, "thou shalt not steal" is about more than taking what is not yours. It is also about preserving another's posessions.

When one reads the Larger Catechism, Q. 135, one finds a lilliputian world of commands contained within the one small seed of "thou shalt not kill." Here is the catechism:

Q. 135. What are the duties required in the sixth commandment?
A. The duties required in the sixth commandment are all careful studies, and lawful endeavors, to preserve the life of ourselves and others by resisting all thoughts and purposes, subduing all passions, and avoiding all occasions, temptations, and practices, which tend to the unjust taking away the life of any; by just defence thereof against violence, patient bearing of the hand of God, quietness of mind, cheerfulness of spirit; a sober use of meat, drink, physic, sleep, labour, and recreations; by charitable thoughts, love, compassion, meekness, gentleness, kindness; peaceable, mild and courteous speeches and behaviour; forbearance, readiness to be reconciled, patient bearing and forgiving of injuries, and requiting good for evil; comforting and succouring the distressed and protecting and defending the innocent.

One of the questions we are going to be asking this coming week is, what on earth is our catechism doing talking about sleep, cheerfulness, forgiveness, and charitable thoughts in a commandment that simply says, "Thou shalt not kill"?

I like what Charles Hodge says about this, because it's quite helpful in seeing how the layers of this onion get peeled back in the first place: "In the several commandments of the decalogue, the highest manifestation of any evil is selected for prohibition, with the intention of including all lesser forms of the same evil. In forbidding murder, all degrees and manifestations of malicious feeling are forbidden" (3.19.10).

This is, of course, confirmed in the New Testament when Jesus in Matt. 5:21-22 directly connects the command not to murder with a seemingly lesser command not to be angry with or to insult one's brother.

We don't normally think of our anger in traffic, malicious feelings toward this or that co-worker, or despising someone who publicly disagrees with us about something as being a violation of the sixth commandment - and yet that is precisely what it is. We may not all be killers, but we are all nonetheless be guilty of violating the sixth commandment in one way or another.

Thoughts on the New ESV Single-Column Legacy Bible

After spending a great deal of time researching and thinking about it, I decided to order one of the new ESV Single-Column Legacy Bibles from Crossway. I wanted to very briefly share some of my thoughts.

I want to state, right out of the gate, that this is already my favorite Bible I've ever owned. I have a Reformation Study Bible, an ESV Thinline, an NIV Thinline, a pocket NASB (which is quite amazing) and more than my fair share of NKJV Bibles that were given to me as graduation gifts at one time or another. I have a long history with thinline Bibles and Study Bibles, but I have never owned a Bible like this one. The Legacy Bible is a departure from my old tradition as it has a minimalist design. If you like Apple and keeping your desk tidy and see the appeal of minimalist aesthetic, this may be the Bible for you.

It is physically large - almost as large as my 12 year old Reformation Study Bible (but not as big as the ESV Study Bible), and yet it is only Bible text on the page. The pages have been specially printed so that the words on both sides overlap, meaning that there is white space around the words instead of seeing the grey of the text behind it bleeding through the pages. The minimalist design means that there are no cross-references, very few textual notes, and larger letters than are in my ESV Thinline. Section headings have been moved to the margins allowing for a fluid reading experience. At times when I was reading through Galatians I gloried in the thought that the section headings (and chapters) were never really there to begin with. Paul's book is one prolonged argument, and it is easier to enjoy the way that Paul meant it without the headings inserted into the body of the text. This was a winning decision by Crossway.

The margins are very nice and draw your eye towards the text in a very appealing way. You want to keep reading simply for the joy of it. [If you are interested in seeing some photos and a bit more in-depth discussion of the Legacy, look here.]

After spending two days reading this new Bible, I declare it to be my new favorite. It is a blast to read, an aesthetic experience, and an excellent Bible. My only regret is that I did not wait a couple of months to purchase one of the Calfskin versions. The black genuine leather Legacy Bible which I purchased (in my haste) is pretty stiff and "plasticky" in my opinion. I guess I'll just have to break it in. Regardless of the binding, however, this is going to be the Bible that I use for my own personal study, and it is hard to imagine a Bible any time soon eclipsing this one.

[In case there is suspicion about my glowing review, let me be transparent with you all. I bought this book and was not given one for review purposes.]

The Guy Waters Give Away

It's time for another Bring the Books giveaway. This time, there is a theme: the writings of Guy Waters. We will be giving away three prizes:

• First Prize: How Jesus Runs the Church
• Second Prize: Federal Vision and Covenant Theology
• Third Prize: Children and the Lord's Supper (edited by Guy Waters and Ligon Duncan)

To enter, you need only 'Like' Bring the Books on Facebook and then 'Share' our giveaway page with your Facebook friends. Remember: this time around, it is not enough to just like us, but we want you to 'Share' our giveaway post on Facebook as well.

The chance to enter ends on the evening of Wednesday the 22nd of February, so you have two weeks to enter and tell your friends. We'll have the drawing and announce the winners on the morning of Thursday the 23rd.