THOR GOES DOWN- Alabaster
box [todays update]
https://youtu.be/ThzXxv8wfos [Thor]
https://youtu.be/3AXlZLzk5ck
[Alabaster box- update]
ON VIDEOS
.Pops update
.2 Jasons
.Utopia
.Church history
.Wizard of Oz n Christmas story
.Boniface
.Cop’s 3 Hail Mary’s
.Catholics- Protestants
.Chicago protests
.Molly Hatchet
.You killed my dad!
. ‘Mary’land
.Utopia
NEW STUFF- I’ll try and mention a couple of things I talked about
on the video- and have never written about before
BONIFACE- After the fall of the western empire [Rome] the Church
took up the slack during the middle ages and provided a stability that the
empire could no longer do.
The eastern part of the empire- Constantinople- lasted till the 15th
century- it fell to the Turks at that time.
Russia was converted to orthodoxy in the 10th century-
and saw itself [Moscow] as the ‘New Rome’- sort of like the standard bearer
that would keep the flame going for Orthodoxy.
Ok- the Roman Church did indeed evangelize the Germanic
‘barbarians’ from the north.
One of the most famous stories took place in the 8th
century- a Christian missionary [who later became the bishop of Mainz] by the
name of Boniface-
He entered the ‘sacred’ forest where the god of thunder was
worshipped [Thor].
They had a sacred Oak tree dedicated to Thor.
As the story goes- Boniface had a type of Elijah confrontation
with the false God- and he took an ax- and with one chop- felled the cultic oak
[oh yea- God sent a strong wind- that helped].
How true many of these stories are- we never know.
But the northern barbarians were indeed converted to a form of Christianity
over time.
They leaned toward the teaching of Arianism [which I taught about over
the years] and technically are not considered 'Orthodox’ [in this sense-
meaning they did not hold to the true teaching of Christianity about the Deity
of Christ].
But they did abandon their ‘gods’ for the Christian God- and the
story of Boniface and the Oak- might have helped.
PAST POSTS [verses below]
.[these are old posts- but as you can see- I’ve been talking
politics for a while] [1766] ‘LIL’ KIM- LUTHER AND HITCHENS
Okay- we had the passing of some famous folk these last few
days. Havel [former Czech President] - a great man indeed.
Then we had ‘lil’ Kim die [not the singer- the leader of
North Korea. Though there was an on line rumor it was Lil Kim- yeah the fans cried-
until they realized it was the crazed leader of one of the world’s most
dangerous countries- you know- the hair trigger Nuke. Well when the fans found
out it was him- not the singer- they relaxed]
Actually- the surreal video of the North Korean people
crying in the streets- the look of shock and despair on their faces- I mean I
haven’t seen the followers of any political leader act this way in a long time-
not since the Perry debates.
Then old Hitchen's kicked the bucket- yeah- he was a famous
atheist.
I really do not hate atheists- some are nice people- most
don’t know the real case for the existence of God. But Hitchen's- well when I
reviewed his book- ‘God is not great’ I did get into the many distortions and
misrepresentations that he made.
He simply lied- and often. He was mean and arrogant and
insulted people often- he has referred to princess Diana as a ‘land mine’ [she
had a charity that worked for the abolition of these weapons] he said she was
like a land mine ‘she was laid all over the country- and when you stepped on
her everything blew up’.
No- many Christians and leaders have come out and done the
‘we respected him for his views’ type thing- not me- I’m not gad he died- but
won’t make him sound like he was a ‘good’ man- he was not.
I read a piece form the N.Y. Times- they went into Libya and
investigated the reports of the deaths of many civilians caused by NATO and the
U.S. during the ‘no fly zone’ debacle.
They found evidence of many civilians that were killed. They
presented the report to the new leaders of Libya- they could care less.
In Benghazi- the main city in the eastern half of Libya-
they were openly flying the Al-Qaida flag.
We just spent 10 years and many lives fighting in Afghanistan. Why?
Because they gave territory to Al-Qaida- they gave them a place to work out of.
We fought the Taliban for 10 years over this. Yet in a few
months NATO and the U.S. gave Al-Qaida their own capitol to fly their flag- I
mean the terrorists must be thinking ‘if we knew these guys were this stupid-
we would have never bombed the towers’.
In Tripoli- the real capitol of Libya- the various militia
groups [terrorists] are all claiming they are the security/armed forces of
Libya. I heard a doctor- on N.P.R. - not a right wing radio show- he said in
his hospital these various militias are all trying to take charge- they walk
around with guns- sometimes walk into a room and shoot a patient who they think
is not on their side- and the doctors say they have no security at all.
Under Gadhaffi things ran well- like a normal society- now
their country is a terrorist haven- run by these guys.
I could go on and say the same for Egypt- and tell the
stories of how the military have been killing protestors in the street. All
these things are being done under people that the West [we- NATO- France] have
enabled by removing their former leaders.
And France this week passed a law making it a crime to deny
the genocide that took place in Turkey in the early part of the last century.
Yes- the Ottoman Turks did slaughter many Armenians-
Christians- at the time. And getting Turkey to officially admit this has been a
problem for years. But France passing a law to make it a crime to deny it-
while they just finished committing ‘crimes against humanity’ themselves- by
killing all the Libyan civilians- it’s just too much.
Okay- let’s start a brief overview of some church history.
Over the next few weeks I want to hit on the 16th century Protestant
reformation and try and cover some of the key figures of the movement.
Martin Luther- the German reformer who had the most
influence in the movement was born and raised in Germany.
As a boy his parents were peasant farmers and eventually his
dad became a miner and became a very successful businessman- he would go on and
eventually own 6 foundries.
He sent his son to law school- and young Luther excelled. At
the age of 21 he accomplished more than many of his peers. One day on his way
home from the university a thunderstorm broke out and Luther was almost struck
by a bolt of lightning.
In fear he cried out to Saint Ann [the mother of Mary] and
said ‘Saint Ann- if you save me I will become a monk’ [Ann was the patron Saint
for miners- thus Luther was familiar with her].
He was spared and off to the monastery he went. Luther
eventually became an ordained priest and even though his dad initially was
upset that his son became a priest- yet he was proud of his boy later on.
Luther would eventually make a Pilgrimage to Rome- on foot
[a few month walk from Germany to Rome!] and what he saw devastated him. Rome-
and the Vatican- were in bad shape. Many of the priests lived in open sin- and
the city that he saw as his headquarters for the faith- well it was a mess.
Luther made the famous penitent walk/crawl up the stairs of
the Lateran church [this church was the most famous church before the
construction of St. Peters. The actual stairs of the church are the same stairs
that Christ walked up during his trial under Pontius Pilate. Yes- you hear many
‘stories’ while studying church history- things like the relics or left over
pieces of the Cross- well these stories are usually fake. But the stairs of the
Lateran church are indeed the same stairs that Christ walked on- the early
‘church’ builders dismantled the stairs at Pilate’s court in Jerusalem and
installed them at this church building in Rome].
When Luther got to the top of the stairs- it is reported
that he questioned the faith- he had a crisis of faith and thought that maybe
the whole thing was a sham.
Okay- as we do a few more posts over the coming weeks- I
want you guys to see that the main players of the Reformation were sincere
Catholic men who had many questions about what they saw as corrupt in their own
church. These men did not want to start a breakaway church- they simply wanted
to reform the church they loved.
Keep in mind that Luther excelled during his legal studies-
he had a keen legal mind- this will be important later on when we see the
debates he has with Rome over the doctrine of Justification by faith- the letters
of the apostle Paul [Romans- Galatians] use lots of legal language- and his
early education will help him in these debates.
Okay- that’s it for today. Maybe do a Google search on
Luther and familiarize yourself a little with the history.
The ‘readings’ for this week are 2nd Samuel 6-7
and Psalms 89. See what they have in common.
[1768] LUTHER- THE TOWER EXPERIENCE
Let’s start with some church history. In the last post I
covered the early years of Martin Luther- probably the most significant figure
of the Protestant Reformation.
Luther studied for the priesthood in Erfurt, Germany. He
would eventually wind up in Wittenberg- one of the major university cities of
the Reformation. Wittenberg was actually a small insignificant town- but the
political leader over the region- Frederick the Wise- sought to put it on the
map.
He wanted to turn Wittenberg into a German ‘Rome’. He wanted
it to become a major Pilgrimage city where Christians would see Wittenberg as a
destination- just like they saw Rome.
So Frederick embarked on this plan and he searched thru all
the Catholic learning centers of the time and finally recruited 3 top scholars
to teach out of the university at Wittenberg- Luther was one of the 3.
Just as a side note- Frederick would succeed at making
Wittenberg a major catholic center. He would eventually obtain over 19,000
Relics for the Cathedral church there [Relics were used in the ancient system
of buying indulgences and making special pilgrimage trips to important
Churches. If the church/city that your making the Pilgrimage to has a lot of
Relics- bones or other famous material objects from church history- then the
value of the Pilgrimage was high. In theory Frederick collected so many that if
you added up all the ‘time off’ from Purgatory- you would get 1 million, 900
thousand years off! Some of the famous relics at Wittenberg were a hair from
the beard of Jesus- straw from the manger Jesus was born in- and even a branch
from the famous burning bush of Moses! As you can see- there was a lot of
commercializing going on- even back then].
When Luther arrived in Wittenberg- he made a name for
himself as a top scholar. Many protestants- who revere Luther- usually are not
aware that he was a master Linguist [sort of like Rick Perry!]
Yes Luther mastered language- and he showed it in his
teaching on the book of Psalms.
In 1515 he began his famous study on the book of Romans and
as he went thru the very first chapter- something shook him. He came across the
passage that says the Just shall live by faith. This verse first appears in the
O.T. book of Habakkuk- and is quoted 3 more times in the N.T.
Luther was very aware of the concept of the righteousness of
God- he struggled for many years trying to reconcile his own sinful nature with
Gods holiness- but he never really ‘saw’ the biblical concept of righteousness
as a free gift that God ‘imputes’ to the sinner.
Yes- for the 1st time in Luther’s life- after his
years training for the priesthood- the pilgrimage he made to Rome- the
thousands of hours he spent confessing his sins while a monk in Erfurt- he
never really understood that the righteousness of God was a free gift given to
those who have faith.
It was a giant weight lifted from his shoulders- Luther did
not need to try any more to live up to the standards of God- in a way that would earn for him forgiveness-
but he would simply believe- and the righteousness of God would be counted to
him as a gift.
Luther would go on to call this an Alien Righteousness- that
is it is not found within the person who tries to do all the church works he
can- or buying all the indulgences- or any other of the many religious actions
he was practicing- but this free gift of being right with God- it came to those
who had faith- the Just shall live by Faith- this was indeed good news for the
scholar.
As time went on- Germany would get embroiled in the
political machinations of the day- Luther’s top political cover was Frederick
the Wise- hardly a Protestant Reformer! He spent lots of time trying to make
Wittenberg the major Catholic center in Germany.
But at the time there was a political fight raging between
Rome and some of the other nation/states. There was a figure head office called
the Holy Roman Emperor. This office was really in name only- but it rose up
during the first Millennium of Christian history and sought to replace the
influence that Rome was losing.
So you had France, Spain and England all vying for the
title. Eventually it would go to King Charles of Spain- but the Pope- who
played a major role in nominating the person- he did not want any of these top
3 to get the position. Henry the Eighth was the king of England at the time-
and these ‘3 kings’ were sort of in competition with Rome- so the Pope tried to
get Fredrick the Wise to throw his hat into the ring.
Frederick just happened to be one of the Electors of this
position.
His actual title was The Elector of Saxony.
So Fredrick had lots of influence- and as Rome would
eventually but heads with the stubborn bull of Wittenberg [Luther] Frederick
would become the major protector of Luther.
Okay- I think we’ll stop here for today. The experience that
Luther had- the enlightenment that came to him while teaching the book of
Romans- this is often called The Tower experience of Luther- it took place in
the year 1515.
[1770] TREASURY OF MERIT
Let’s pick up where we left off 2 posts back. We were
talking about Martin Luther and the events that led up to the Protestant
Reformation.
In order to understand the key act that caused the protest- we
will have to teach some Catholic history/doctrine.
In the 16th century Pope Julius began the effort
to build St. Peters basilica in Rome. He got as far as laying the foundation
and died. Pope Leo the 10th would pick up after him.
The church needed to raise money for the project- and the
German prince- Albert- would play a major role.
It should be noted that both Catholic and Protestant
scholars agree that the Popes of the day were pretty corrupt. They came from
what we call the Medici line of Popes.
If you remember last month I wrote a post on the
Renaissance- I talked about the Medici family and how they played a major role
in supporting the Renaissance that took place in the 13th century in
Florence Italy that would spread to the region.
Well this very influential family also played a big role in
who would get top positions in the church.
At the time of Luther and prince Albert- if you had the
right connections and the money- you could literally buy a position in the
church.
Albert already held 2 Bishop seats- and there was an opening
for an Archbishops seat in Mainz [Germany] and he wanted that one too.
It should be noted that official Canon law [church law] said
you could only hold one seat at a time- Albert was bidding on his 3rd one! And
he was too young for all of them.
So even the Pope and the officials held little respect for
what the church actually taught at the time.
So Albert opens up negotiations with Leo- and the bidding
starts AT 12,000 Duckets [money] Albert counters with 7,000- and they agree on
10,000. How did they justify the numbers? 12- The number of Apostles. 7- The 7
deadly sins. 10- The 10 commandments.
Yes- the church was pretty corrupt at the time.
So Albert works out a plan with Leo- he will borrow the
money from the German banks- and pay the banks off by the Pope giving Albert
the right to sell Indulgences.
What’s an Indulgence?
Okay- this is where it gets tricky.
The ancient church taught a system called The Treasury of
Merit. This was a sort of spiritual bank account that ‘stored up’ the good
deeds of others over the years.
You had the good deeds of Jesus at the
top- but you also had Mary and Joseph- the 12 Apostles-
[parts]
. [1486] ARIUS- a priest from Egypt who would challenge the
deity of Jesus in the 4th century. Arius taught that Jesus was the
Son of God, but not eternally the Son. He said Jesus was a created being whom
the father ‘bestowed’ son ship upon. He taught that Jesus was ‘like God’ but
not God. The emperor Constantine would call the famous council of Nicaea in 325
a.d. and the council would agree with Athanasius and say that the Son and the
Father were of ‘the same substance’ [homoousios] and Arius’s belief would be
rejected. The debate would still rage on thru out the century as Constantine would
die and the new emperor from the east would hold to ‘Arian’ views. Eventually
Orthodoxy would win out and Arianism would be rejected by the majority of
believers. I should note that many of the oriental churches would go the way of
Arianism till this day; some of these churches are not like the modern cults
that we would automatically reject, but they do hold to beliefs that Orthodox
Christianity has rejected. As I have written about before, it’s easy to see how
various believers have struggled with these issues over the years, some of the
ways people express things can be deemed heresy a little too quickly in my
view. There are believers who express the deity of Jesus in ways that some
Arians express it, and they are not full Arians! The point being, yes- Arian
went too far in his belief that Jesus was a created being, Johns gospel refutes
this belief strongly [as well as many other portions of scripture] but too say
that Jesus was/is the full expression of the father, because he ‘came out from
God’ is also in keeping with scripture. Today we should be familiar with the
issues and also use much grace when labeling different groups of believers; and
we should strive for a unity in the Spirit as much as possible. As believers we
accept the full deity of Christ, one who is of the ‘same substance’ of the
father- true God from true God. He who has seen the Son has seen the father-
Jesus said to Phillip ‘I have been with you a long time, if you see and know
me, you have seen and known my father’ Jesus is God come down in the flesh to
dwell among men, the true Immanuel, God with us.
[1484] ‘This is why I Paul am in jail for Christ, having
taken up the cause of you outsiders, so called. I take it that you are familiar
with the part I was given in God’s plan for including everybody… none of our
ancestors understood this, only in our time has it been made clear thru God’s
Spirit… this is my life work, helping people understand and respond to God’s
message. It came as a sheer gift to me, a real surprise, God handling all the
details’ Ephesians 3, message bible. As I said earlier in this study, the
‘mystery’ that God revealed to Paul was the reality that thru Christ all ethnic
groups would be on the same footing with God. This specifically related to the
religious belief of the day that the ethnic nation of Israel were the only ones
with special access to God. For Paul to have been preaching this message in his
day would be like us teaching that God’s plan for all people today- Jews,
Arabs, Palestinians, Iranians, etc., it would be like saying Gods purpose for
our day is to accept all of these ethnic groups as one group thru Christ. To be
frank about it, I believe many evangelicals today are not fully seeing the
reality of the Cross when they exalt the natural heritage of Israel as Gods
special people. Though I realize many of these teachings mean well [end time
scenarios and stuff] yet in practice they deny the equal footing that all
people have in Christ. Paul was preaching the great news that your
ethnic/cultural background no longer made any difference- thru Christ we are
all Gods special people. This does not mean that we are all accepted whether or
not we believe in Christ, a sort of religious syncretism, but it does mean that
the offer of Jesus is available to all.
[parts]
(1332) Been doing some reading on church
history/philosophy, it’s interesting to see the role that theology/Christianity
played in the universities. Theology is referred to as ‘the queen of the
sciences’ and philosophy was her ‘handmaid’. They saw the root of all learning
as originating with the study ‘of God’. Many modern universities have dropped
the term ‘theology’ and call it ‘the study of religion’. The study of religion
is really the study of how man relates to God, his view of God; this would fit
under anthropology/sociology, not under theology. Modern learning has lost the
importance of the study of God and the role it plays in all the other sciences.
The classic work of Homer [8th century BC] called the Iliad, has
Achilles debating whether or not he should ‘stay and fight along the city of
the Trojans’ and attain the legacy of a warrior; or to go ‘back to my homeland
and live a long life’. He chooses to fight and lay his life on the line. The
themes of the classics [courage, heroism, etc.] are biblical themes, even if
God is not directly mentioned. The point being to try and exclude God from
learning is silly, you can’t do it. Around the 17-18th century you had the philosophy of Existentialism rise
up, as an ‘ism’ it really is a misnomer; ‘ism’ is a suffix that you add to the
end of a word that makes it a system- ‘humanism’ ‘secularism’ etc. but
existentialism is a word that means ‘anti-system’. Nevertheless the person who
popularized this belief was a Christian, Soren Kierkegaard. The system he was
rebelling against was the dead institutionalism of the Danish church, he felt
that Christianity devolved into dead orthodoxy and lost all of its passion for
true living and experiencing God. Nietzsche would pick up on this philosophy
and apply it to atheism, and in the 20th century men like Albert
Camus and John Paul Sartre would also embrace it from an atheistic worldview.
They would say things like ‘man is a useless passion’ or write books titled
‘Nausea’ summing up the human condition. Though the 19th century
atheistic humanists tried to give value and exalt the state of man, in their
rejection of God and Christianity they were taking away the foundation for mans
value. If you tell society that they arrived on the scene by some cosmic
accident of evolution, and when you die you dissipate into nothingness, then
how do you at the same time glory in his natural abilities to reach some point
of Utopia? As the late Frances Schaeffer said ‘they were philosophers who had
both feet planted firmly in mid air’. The point being when you neglect the
reality and role that God and Christianity play in every sphere of life, you
are then removing the foundation that these spheres were built on, true science
and learning derive their basis from God. The greatest scientific minds of the
past were either Christians or Deists, they were too smart to try and reject
the reality of an eternal being.
[parts] In Rand’s work- she tells
the fictional story of John Galt [who is John Galt? This sign pops up every so
often]
Galt is the leader of the
‘productive’ class in society- the thinkers- producers- etc.
These noble ones rebel against
what they see as an all encroaching Entitlement society- a ‘world’ that keeps
blaming them for the ills of man.
Eventually these productive
people have had enough- and they withdraw from the world and start their own
world- based on the principles of Objectivism.
‘Every man for himself’ type of
thing.
There is one line in the book-
where you have this image of Atlas [the man who has the world on his
shoulders].
He is bowing and bending and
struggling under this Entitlement world.
The ‘have nots’ keep seeing the
‘haves’ as the cause for their problems.
The more pressure put on Atlas-
does not seem to appease the Entitlement class.
So- he shrugs- and walks away.
A couple of years ago when we did
a short history of Philosophy- I never covered Rand.
Why?
She never came up in any of the
stuff I was reading at the time.
Rand was a Russian American who
came to the states in the early 20th century.
She saw the rise of Communism in
her homeland- and she believed that the U.S. was in danger of going down the
same road.
She lived to see the presidency
of FDR- and his creating of what we call the Entitlement society.
But Rand- like other thinkers of
her day- also rejected Faith and Religion [Marx].
She believed that Reason was
enough to establish morality- and build an adequate Ethical society.
To be honest- Ayn was wrong about
this.
But- because she angered the Left
with her capitalist thought- and the Right with her anti God ideas- well she
would alienate not just the 47% [Romney’s gaff] but both ‘47’s’.
Thus- Rand never came up on the
radar when I was studying philosophy.
I have not read the book- but
from what I picked up on line- I can see how Christians would indeed have a
hard time with Objectivism.
In scripture- we don’t see
‘statism’ per se- but we do see a sort of collective ideal.
In the books of Acts we see the
early believers selling their goods and giving to those in need.
We read many-many portions of the
bible that speak about helping the less fortunate.
Yet- the argument is ‘should the
state force man to do this’.
The state- govt. - according to
scripture- has the right to tax.
Rand’s argument [and others] is
‘fine- but don’t demean me because I am one of the producers- don’t demonize
those in society who are holding the system up’.
Rand did not teach that you
should never help another- but she rejected the govt. forcing you to do it.
In Ayn’s Utopia- the John Galt’s
of the world withdraw- they take their toys and go home.
From a biblical perspective- we
are indeed our brother’s keeper.
That does not mean we encourage
people to be non productive- to live off the wealth of others.
But we see the goal of our lives
as more than seeking happiness- more than pursuing the Dream.
No- we often give things up-
material things- in order to pursue a more just society.
In our World- Atlas doesn’t
shrug.
Note- Do me a favor, those who
read/like the posts- re-post them on other sites as well as the site you read
them on. Thanks- John. Don’t forget to scroll down on the timeline [Facebook] -
I have posted lots.
No comments:
Post a Comment