Sunday, March 27, 2011

Hardware Mispronunciations, pt. 4

Some time ago I had posted three lists of mispronounced terms and words overheard at a hardware store I used to work for. After much delay, here are the last of those mispronunciations. Those who are interested in the rest may go here:

http://hymnusdeo.blogspot.com/2007/10/hardware-mispronunciations-pt-1.html

http://hymnusdeo.blogspot.com/2007/10/hardware-mispronunciations-pt-2.html

http://hymnusdeo.blogspot.com/2008/03/hardware-mispronunciations-pt-3.html

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Jig jag blades - jig saw blades

Inchulation - insulation

Eproxy - epoxy

Limber - lumber

Almanacre - almanac

Ben Gay Roach Spray - Bengal (the brand of roach spray)

Java rocks - lava rocks

Butane tanks - propane tanks

Helium tanks - again, propane tanks

Dr. Donald Grey Barnhouse, on the Differences Between the Heresies of Men and the Heresies of Women

From the book The Invisible War, by the late Donald Grey Barnhouse, former pastor of Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia. Dr. Barnhouse was writing in the early twentieth century, and so his times were slightly different than our own. As since his time American culture has found itself more confounded in its understanding of gender distinctions, the differences he notes aren't as sharp as they used to be. Nonetheless, he is addressing matters that are derived originally from the creational difference between men and women, and as such, the distinctions will always be largely correct, until the effects of the Fall are completely eradicated from the world.

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"(I)t is enlightening to note the familiar pattern of difference which runs through those false religions which have come from women teachers as opposed to those which come from men. The religion put out by an Annie Besant, a Mrs. White [Ellen G. White}, a Mrs. Eddy [Mary Baker Eddy] or their imitators, is much more subtle than what might be called a masculine heresy. For Theosophy, Seventh-day Adventism, Christian Science, New Thought, Unity and other religions which have come from women, stress the love of God, without His hatred for sin, and with fair words deceive. They offer a "key" to the Bible which says that the Book is true, and then denies its truth. Men are different in their heresies. Boldly they affirm that the Word of God is not true. Modernism strikes at the first chapters of Genesis as folklore and legend, and declares the birth of our Lord to be a biological impossibility. He was mistaken, they say, when He declared Moses to be the author of the Pentateuch, and so on throughout the account. There is a brazen characteristic in most of the heresies put forth by men which is not found in the women's heresies, and there was this same difference in the sin of the garden as seen in Eve and in Adam." (pg. 90-91)

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

On Mark 1:40-45

It is significant that Jesus, in healing the leprous man, chose to touch him. Such an act would have made Jesus ceremonially unclean, and unable himself to enter the Temple or to participate in Israel's cultic life. By touching the man, Jesus showed himself to be greater than the Temple system (Mt. 12:6), that his work was bringing it and the Old Testament order to an end. As Jesus' work was not complete and the old order still in effect, Jesus did command the man to act in obedience to the commands of Moses. Yet the man in his actions showed that the old order was becoming obsolete by Jesus' coming. Rather than proclaiming the law of Moses by his works, he proclaimed Jesus with his mouth. And this, in spite of the fact that we are told that "Jesus sternly charged him" (vs. 43). How could the man have ignored such a command? Though the man may not have known it, he had already shown himself to the Heavenly High Priest, Jesus, and whereas the earthly high priest could only declare him clean, Jesus the true High Priest could make him clean. We also see in this act that Jesus symbolically took the man's uncleanness upon himself, and gave the man His own cleanness, which he would later do definitively upon the cross. Jesus was shut out of Israel's religious life, and therefore shut out from God, on our behalf. The diseases that Jesus went around healing were exactly the diseases that made people unable to participate ceremonially in the life of Israel. He was opening the way into the Temple for those who had previously been excluded. Yet a new Temple had arrived, Jesus himself, and it was into himself that he was ultimately calling all men.

Tuesday, March 01, 2011

Two on Baptism

1 Peter 3:18-22 tells us that in the event of Noah's ark and the flood we should see baptism. As the ark passed through the flood, so we pass through the waters of baptism. But it also points to the baptism of Jesus (Matthew 3:13-17). The dove that Noah sent out first returned to rest at the ark, finding no land. Being sent out a second time, she returned with an olive leaf. And being sent out a third time, she found a resting place elsewhere, and did not return to the ark. The fact that she was sent out every seven days, seeking a Sabbath rest, in essence, should not be overlooked. This occurred as the waters receded, and the ark came up out of the waters, as it were. In Jesus baptism, the Spirit descended as a dove and rested immediately upon Jesus as he came out of the waters of the Jordan. Jesus is our ark of deliverance from the waters of God's judgment.

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In Matthew 3:11-12, John the Baptist tells of the coming of Jesus, who he says will baptize "with the Holy Spirit and fire". The baptism with water by John precedes the baptism with fire by Jesus. Baptism is a sort of judgment. For the righteous, it is purifying and saving. For the wicked, it is destructive. We then see in vss. 13-17 the arrival of Jesus and His own baptism with water. To accomplish is mission of baptizing with fire, He Himself must first pass through the baptism with water. This is echoed in Peter's treatment of the coming judgment in 2 Peter 3. The judgment on the ancient creation came first by water (vss. 5-6), speaking of the flood. But the judgment to come would be by fire (vss. 7-12). Jesus himself spoke of this judgment by fire in connection with baptism (Luke 12:48-49). He would first pass through His baptism by fire, only later to bring the fire of judgment upon the earth Himself. I will leave aside, for now, questions of the fulfillment of 2 Peter 3. It is worth noting, however, that Jesus Himself never passed through a judgment of literal fire.