Dress and cultural de-sensitising

Here, a secular (as far as I know) writer in the Telegraph points out what I was saying a few weeks ago - something that all people ought to know: pornography is pornography, in whatever context it is presented. Naked or semi-naked people who you are not married to are not for ogling. The context does not make a difference except in the twisted reasoning of people who want to justify what cannot be justified.

Pornography is inherently degrading, and also de-sensitising. My wife and I have realised this in a more personal way since coming to Kenya. Here in Eldoret, we just don't see badly dressed ladies, unless they are prostitutes or Western visitors - and there's not huge numbers of the latter (or the former if you aren't looking for them!). Increasingly though the middle class are aping the West. When we spent some time in Nairobi a couple of years ago, it was a real revelatory experience. We went out to the shops, and were amazed by how many ladies were badly dressed. So, we realised... this is how the non-Western world feels. "Reverse culture-shock", it's called - you suddenly get a personal, non-theoretical insight into how cultural outsiders had been seeing yours.

When female visitors come to see us, we give them a visitors' guide of helpful things to know. One of the matters mentioned is dress. We found that we have to make it fairly explicit in its descriptions, because when we just talked in vague terms, many folk from the West didn't get it. These were godly, serious Christian ladies we are talking about. I wonder why? Likely I think it's that the debased standards of the West have desensitised. What is "normal" has shifted so far, that people still showing far more flesh than other cultures would ever do actually think they're now being conservative.

God turns out to be wiser than the world's wise men thought

My mother is not an economist. However, she is from Yorkshire. Moreover, she reads her Bible.

One thing I was regularly taught whilst growing up is, that it is wrong to live off debt. If you want something, then work and save. Do not live off money you do not have. It's foolish in itself, and a recipe for disaster in the future.

The people running the world's economies are very clever people, with lots of letters after their names. They went to big universities. They can juggle all kinds of big words and concepts. However, they appear to have neither come from Yorkshire, nor read their Bibles. As a result of one or t'other, they seem to have missed this vital lesson. Hence the Great Debt Crisis, which after 5 years still has no end in sight.

But of course, someone says, the Bible is just religion. And running economies is the real world. Aah...

Psalm 119:97 Oh how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day. 98 Your commandment makes me wiser than my enemies, for it is ever with me. 99 I have more understanding than all my teachers, for your testimonies are my meditation. 100 I understand more than the aged, for I keep your precepts.

Pray in faith

From Calvin's commentary:

Matthew 7:7. Ask, and it shall be given you It is an exhortation to prayer: and as in this exercise of religion, which ought to be our first concern, we are so careless and sluggish, Christ presses the same thing upon us under three forms of expression. There is no superfluity of language, when he says, Ask, seek, knock: but lest the simple doctrine should be unimpressive, he perseveres in order to rouse us from our inactivity. Such is also the design of the promises that are added, Ye shall find, it shall be given to you, and it shall be opened Nothing is better adapted to excite us to prayer than a full conviction that we shall be heard. Those who doubt can only pray in an indifferent manner; and prayer, unaccompanied by faith, is an idle and unmeaning ceremony. Accordingly, Christ, in order to excite us powerfully to this part of our duty, not only enjoins what we ought to do, but promises that our prayers shall not be fruitless.

Atheists, make up your minds!

On the one hand, Richard Dawkins wants school children to read the Bible, so that they will be turned against Christianity.

On the other, a Canadian humanist has won a hearing to ban the Gideons from giving Bibles to schools, on the grounds that it is not fair for Christian literature to be given out, but not atheist literature.

So which is it? The Bible promotes atheism? Or does the opposite?

The enemy has many strategies. Since he's the father of lies and confusion, you can't expect them to cohere.

Reading isn't cool?

The news story here - http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2199561/Be-seen-book-Its-just-cool-say-children.html - frames the problem as being that children think that "reading isn't cool".

But that's not the underlying issue. The solution isn't to try to make reading cool. The underlying issue is that "cool" is the barometer being measured with. Unless you ultimately aim to change that, you're re-arranging deck-chairs.

Christian rap

Tim Challies posts to promote "Christian rapper", Lecrae, who I heard about for the first time in his post.

Let me direct you to Google Image search.

Where I've come across it, one invariant of rap music culture has been "look at me, look at me - I'm the big guy. I'm hard, moody, and you mess at your peril."

Now, look again at those images. Did they make you say "ah, the culture of Christian rap is so refreshingly different! Go, Lacrae - you'll show people a different way!".

'Nuff said. Now get off my turf before I blow your brains out. Apologies if my lingo reminds me of your grandad's attempts to be cool.

A stream of nonsense

I'm presently preparing a course on the "Wisdom Books" (Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs).

True wisdom humbles us. And the Wisdom Books humble Bible college teachers with a sequence of apparently impenetrable mysteries!

Here's one thought from Job. The structure of Job is crucial. We are let in on the secret at the beginning. Job suffers because he is to be a test case for the power of true faith and true religion. There is a contest in the heavenly courts. Job, on earth, is the focus to prove who is right - are Satan's accusations true? Or will God's people love him regardless of what it costs them?

When we read Job, we know that that is the true meaning of Job's sufferings. But Job and his three friends Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar, have no idea. They had no such revelation before they entered it all.

There then ensues page after page of back-and-forth philosophical discussion between those four on the meaning and reason for Job's sufferings. And none of them even gets close. It's a stream of nonsense. A lot of talk which gets quite heated - accusations fly back and forth. But all, as the reader who began at chapters one knows, garbage.

And therein lies today's lesson. There's a lot of talk in the world. We get quite worked up as we pursue the arguments. But when we talk about matters that we do not know about, especially unseen spiritual matters, the likelihood is that it's absolute nonsense from start to finish. The truth, were it known, would expose our bold exclamations as laughable folly.

The Bible gives us light, and on matters where it reveals truth, we should hold it fast and not let a single letter fall. But otherwise, it's quite wise to just shut up (Proverbs 17:28).

God's answer to Job's questions is also enlightening in this regard. Neither does God tell Job why he is suffering. Rather, he shows him that he is not only ignorant of this, but very many other things too. Man thinks he's cornered almost all knowledge now. God, rather than explaining to him the supposed last piece of the jigsaw, instead shows him that he's missing virtually all the other pieces too. I personally find that quite refreshing as I read. Why, God? Why is it like this? Why can't I understand any of it? Well will I understand? Answer: that's not the only thing you can't understand, my son - there's a million other things besides, and then some. So in this, as in every other thing, just trust me, because I know it best.