Luther ad nauseum

"If I knew the world was going to end tomorrow, I'd pland a tree today."

Luther quote via Luther's new book, 'Plowing in Hopi' a collection of essays on old indian techniques in primative cultivation.

Stately Trees

Every state has a state tree. Which tree is not native to the state which claims it as a state tree? Hint: In this same state, beavers are also not native. That should give it away. If you need more help, look here. Or maybe here.

If you're very observant, you'll notice New York isn't even original enough to gets it's own state tree. Oddly enough, it also shares the beaver as a state symbol with Oregon.

intermissionisms

I interrupt this important tree dialogue to bring you the Inaugural Speech of our 44th president. Here's just a clip:

So it is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world.

more trees please

My next few post will be all about trees. It’s easy to take trees for granted. For example, when I was young I had only two uses for trees. Lumber or firewood.
Trees are a majestic plant. It was one of the main reasons North America was discovered. The King was looking for trees to build the navy because England was running out of wood…fast.
The old-timers admired trees. They knew exactly what kind of wood to use for what. Our fore-fathers used trees for nautical guidance, trail markers, hiding documents, dueling next to, and the list goes on. I was really quite amazed on what I found out about trees and colonial America. So, I’ll be linking cool sites on my blog over the next couple days.

Counting Rings

In the woods I spy a sapling,
It often grows without much happenin’.
As it grows it makes some friends,
Shrubs and bushes to greetings send.

Soon, though, over bush it grows,
As the sapling quite well knows.
It’s so unnatural you see,
For a sapling to remain short and puny.

Malicious words the bushes say,
‘You’re no longer of us, go away!’
The small tree new company must find
Others that share his growing mind.

The bark will stretch, the limbs must grow
And roots go deeper to ready for snow.
Leaves they change thru’ seasons four
While sap flows and rings keep score.

So the tree must find new friends,
Ones that will stick thru’ till the end.
Trees this size are few between
Amidst them dance the dusty sunbeams.

Conversing with a tree he did
With a canopy that spread.
The tree knew just what to say
But no buds had he for leaves that May.

On the North side of said tree,
Lived a nest of bumble bees.
The bees did sting and fly about,
Trusting in the tree so stout.

No confidant in this tree we find,
Having all made up in his mind.
Reducing life to facts and figures,
Is not of God nor shows His pleasure.

The bark will stretch, the limbs must grow
And roots go deeper to ready for snow.
Leaves they change thru’ seasons four
While sap flows and rings keep score.

So our tree is now grown old,
It stand alone thru warmth and cold.
In a hedgerow we can see,
The large and spreading canopy.

Our tree is massive and in it’s prime,
A home in it small animals find.
It breaks the wind and blocks the snow,
Rocks around it farmers throw.

But lo, on yonder peak do see,
Another massive and wise tree.
Along with that our tree makes seed,
To spread around his progeny.

The bark will stretch, the limbs must grow
And roots go deeper to ready for snow.
Leaves they change thru’ seasons four
While sap flows and rings keep score.

humble pie

In our day a man can preach for twenty minutes straight, pacing between two plastic ferns, and his personal life is as open and transparent as the pulpit he keeps walking past. He talks about himself the entire time, his experiences, personal anecdotes, foibles, etc. and the net effect on many is that such a man is so humble. Another man, a hairy Tishbite like John Knox, gets into the pulpit and tries to preach the truth as it would have been had he never been born. How does he come across? As proud and arrogant. It seems incontestable to me that in our subjective times, men who proclaim an unchanging and objectively true word will be thought arrogant. Men who just go with the flow will be thought humble. Doug Wilson

Who Us?

When I see the church today
I often wonder how it got this way?
Am I alone in thinking this,
Or just polishin' brass on a sinking ship?
Why oh why am I in despair
When churches are growing everywhere?

Just one reason simply put,
We should be covered in ash and soot.
Repentance, friend, is our only cure
For this putrid wound of lust and lure.
We went a whoring after things unclean
While acting like the libertine.

We are in a kind of buck and lurch,
The church is worldly, and the world’s the church.
We’ve lost our bearings and our first love,
Thinking that things will change only above.
The church got tired taking the lead
And handed the keys to babies on speed.

Where are the brakes on this darn thing?
Stop with that! Just clap and sing!
Make merry my brother and don’t ask that,
Go on a Jesus diet if you feel fat.
‘The only way to life’, says he
is doing things spiritually.

You are rejected, Christ will say
If you think that this is the way.
Christ has come to fully subdue
Each and every avenue.
He wants your each and every bone;
And don’t fret you are not alone.

He has a bride dressed wonderfully
Made up of people like you and me.
The earth is his and the fullness thereof
So take your cues from God above.
He wrote His words down on tablets two,
For us to follow and fully do.

His Son he sent to bleed for her,
His Spirit he gives to be a leader.
My friend you see we are so far
From God and his righteous bar.
Look to the Son lest ye die,
Or perish; because God can not lie.

Depart from me you evildoers,
Is a tune for all that have ears.
If you think you’re bulletproof,
Cut you’ll be in one fell swoop.
Pride goeth before a fall
Is not empty rhetoric at all.

If you’re cut off its because of sin
So don't react and then blame Him.
He didn’t sin or make you haughty,
You alone are the one who’s naughty.
Cover yourself with soot and ashes,
Be crushed by Christ till all of you smashes!

smoothbore pipe dreams

Some day I anticipate making my very own Kain-Tuck-ey Longrifle and rid the world of rodents and pagans. Go ahead and laugh. Yu'll see, Yu'll all see!!

explore what!?

Ya, like my dad uses Explorer 'n stuff. Really cool people use FireFox. You won't be disappointed.

Just as I am

Come as you are with all your pleas
Dress like you want, normally.
It’s time to sing and feel all cozy
Sit back, relax and blow your nosy.

As long as you’re here, that’s all that matters
Don’t think we’re climbing Jacobs ladder!
God’s up there and we’re down below
We can do no wrong; He loves us so.

So throw away the wine and liturgy
Get with the grove and make history!
Don’t dress all starched and stiff
Man, this is the week-end, get the drift?

Hear ye, Here ye

Blogging has reached a new age, a rebirth one might say. The wife of my youth, mi esposita, now, in her very own possession, by her very own unsolicited volition, has a BLOG.

invisible post

Within the [Westminster] assembly [Presbyterians] met stiff resistance.
These ‘dissenting brethren’ included Thomas Goodwin, Jeremiah Burroughs and
other leading Puritans. They argued that the only proper member of a local
church were professing Christians, and not, as the Presbyterians claimed,
professing Christians along with their children. But they were not alone. The
traditional status of children in the church was being increasingly questioned
during the 1640s. In the English town of Yaxley, a troop of Parliamentary
soldiers baptized a horse in protest against the baptism of infants. The final
version of the confession they produced reflected the unease of the
conservatives and the crumbling influence of the Scots. Irish Puritans,
Gribben, pg 85,86

This book by Gribbens is, in my estimation, the easiest intro to English History in the 16th century. He does a good job of showing how much strife and weirdness was happening. It also sheds some light on why there's still so much hatred in Ireland.

I now view some of the Puritans in a different light when it comes prophecy. J.Owen (the dead) cleary felt and firmly believed that the English, led by Cromwell, were fulfulling Rev 17-19 by destroying the Irish. Cromwell and his crew were nothing short of butchers.

Lastly, I think this lil' bit-o-context helps support some of our friends who rightfully critique the WCF because of it's underlying emphasis on the visible vs. invisible church.

Coming to a Farm near you! (Nantichoke?)

For some reason after spending an afternoon with James Jordan, all I could think about was robotic milkers

Cell counts are down and milk production’s up after the Holl dairy installs
robotic milker.

Friends Indeed

I recieved a gift packet today from friend who lives far, far, away in a distant land. A land where beards grow unaltered and books are read by authors who live in abscurity and controversy. Upon opening my wonderful gift, my wife said:

"Your friends are always getting you into trouble"

Ah, true friendship.

Utility vs. Sublimity

"When I see churches in which modern architects have tried to embody
the ideal of a "preachers church", I feel a sinking of the heart. A
church is much more than a building in which one listens to sermons;it is a place
for devotions, and merely as a building it ought to keep people at a devotional
level. But it can never do that if in every direction the worshiper's
eye is brought up short by walls. There is need of distance, of a
background, which lends itself to the mood of the worshiper, so that the outward
gaze can change to the inner one. The chancel, therefore, is not
something exclusively Catholic; it is part of the church as a church, and if
Protestant services are from their very nature defective there is not need for
the building to be so as well. The building ought to make the service a
complete whole, and become as much as element in the soul's experience as the
words heard,the singing, and the prayers." Albert Schweitzer

I really struggled with leaving that part about Protestants in the quote. I could have taken it out and nobody would have been the wiser. But I think it's a crucial element to the quote. He's quite obviously bashing 'garage turned church building'. Which I hate too. Why do Roman Catholics have the vast majority of cool churches? They stole them after the Reformation.

6718

'They did eat of the fruit of the land of Canaan that year'

We will this year gather celestial fruits on earthly ground, where faith and
hope have made the desert like the garden of the Lord. Man did eat
angels' food of old, and why not now? O for grace to feed on Jesus, an so
to eat of the fruit of the land of Canaan this year!

C.H. Spurgeon

Reformon

Word of Wisdom is the common title for a revelation that counsels Latter-day Saints on maintaining good health and is published as Doctrine and Covenants: section 89. The practice of abstaining from all forms of alcohol,tobacco, coffee, and tea, which may outwardly distinguish active Latter-day Saints more than any other practice, derives from this revelation. With the appearance of cola drinks in the early 1900s, the Church was confronted with cold beverages containing caffeine, a harmful substance believed to make coffee and tea unacceptable. While no official Church position has been stated, leaders have counseled members to avoid caffeine and other addictive chemicals.