The Diabolical Lie of “No Truth”

“The ordinary lie was but the omission or the contradiction of a truth, which still subsisted elsewhere and still judged us. But the diabolical lie denies the judge. It proceeds only from itself and proliferates autarchically, like a cancerous cell, introducing into the universe that sophism of pure anguish: the lie of no truth.”

~ Denis De Rougemont, The Devil’s Share (New York, NY: Meridian Books, 1956), 41.

Salvation in Enemy Territory

“Sinners hate the idea of a clearly identifiable authority over them. They do not want to meet God. They would gladly make themselves believe that there is no clearly discernible, identifiable revelation of their Creator and Judge anywhere to be found in the universe. God’s work of redemption through Christ, therefore, comes into enemy territory. It comes to save from themselves those who do not want to be saved, because they think that they don not need to be saved.”

~ Cornelius Van Til, A Christian Theory of Knowledge (Phillipsburg, NJ: P & R Publishing, 1969), 27.

The Sorrow and Joy of the Seasoned Soul

“It is not a sign of a seasoned Christian soul that steady joy is untinged with steady sorrow.

Or to put it positively, the seasoned soul in Christ has a steady joy and a steady sorrow.

They protect each other. Joy is protected from being flippant by steady sorrow. Sorrow is protected from being fatal by steady joy.

And they intensify each other. Joy is made deeper by steady sorrow. Sorrow is made sweeter by steady joy.

For the seasoned Christian soul, I do not see how it can be otherwise while people are perishing and we are saved. I do not see how it can be otherwise while these two passages are written by the same inspired man:

I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh. (Romans 9:2-3)

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. (Philippians 4:4)”

~ John Piper, “The Sorrow and Joy of the Seasoned Soul”

(HT: Desiring God blog & Josh Etter)

On the Meaning of Everything

“Because reality is theistically grounded, human beings do not have the freedom of, the justification for, or even the capability of creating and ascribing an independent meaning to the universe. They are not free to do so because God already has done it. They are not justified in doing so because it is a violation of their subordinate, creaturely status. And they are not capable of doing so because of their formidable limitations. Only the rebellious, the proud, and the deceived, that is, only a human nature that is corrupt, would attempt such a ridiculous feat. The meaning of the universe and the authority to determine it are not open questions since both are fixed in the existence and character of God.”

~ David Naugle, Worldview: The History of a Concept (Grand Rapids, Mi.: Eerdmans, 2002), 261-262.

Resurrection & the Fulfillment of Promised Possibilities

“Because the resurrection vindicates the Crucified, not the crucifixion, the gospel story undercuts any easy moralism or sentimental liberalism. Yet, though the resurrection opens up possibilities that could not even be imagined by ancient man, it also promises the fulfillment of those possibilities. If it provokes unimagined hunger, it also gives hope for unimagined satisfaction.”

~ Peter J. Leithart, Deep Comedy (Moscow, Id.: Cannon Press, 2006), 25.

Moving Towards a Deeply Comic Climax

“For the biblical writers, history is moving toward a deeply comic climax in which all wrongs are righted, all tears dried, and all loses regained with interest. Pain and the cross remain indelibly embedded in the narrative, and there is real waste and loss which is felt absolutely to be waste and loss. Yet, the final telos of the biblical story is absolute joy, peace, justice, and love. For the biblical writers, God’s victory is without question a victory in the ‘exterior world,’ for the Fall took place in this world, Israel was called in this world, Jesus was born, died, and rose again in this world, the Spirit came into this world, the gospel was preached to the nations in this world, and the new creation is a transfiguration of this world.”

~ Peter J. Leithart, Deep Comedy (Moscow, Id.: Canon Press, 2006), 33-34.

The Gospel in Context

“The gospel is integrally tied to the Bible’s story-line. Indeed, it is incomprehensible without understanding that story-line. God is the sovereign, transcendent and personal God who has made the universe, including us, his image-bearers. Our misery lies in our rebellion, our alienation from God, which, despite his forbearance, attracts his implacable wrath. But God, precisely because love is of the very essence of his character, takes the initiative and prepared for the coming of his own Son by raising up a people who, by covenantal stipulations, temple worship, systems of sacrifice and of priesthood, by kings and by prophets, are taught something of what God is planning and what he expects. In the fullness of time his Son comes and takes on human nature. He comes not, in the first instance, to judge but to save: he dies the death of his people, rises from the grave and, in returning to his heavenly Father, bequeaths the Holy Spirit as the down payment and guarantee of the ultimate gift he has secured for them—an eternity of bliss in the presence of God himself, in a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness. The only alternative is to be shut out from the presence of this God forever, in the torments of hell. What men and women must do, before it is too late, is repent and trust Christ; the alternative is to disobey the gospel (Romans 10:16; 2 Thessalonians 1:8; 1 Peter 4:17).

This story-line, and its connection with the gospel, could be fleshed out in a number of ways. But the point is simply this: the good news of salvation through Jesus Christ makes sense in the context of this story-line and in no other. If, instead of this world-view, this storyline, some other is adopted, the good news of Jesus Christ no longer makes sense or is so badly distorted it is no longer the same thing. For instance, if one adopts a pantheistic world-view, then ‘sin’ takes on an entirely different configuration and there is no transcendent God to whom to be reconciled. In that case, the ‘good news’ cannot be the announcement of God’s reconciling act in the death and resurrection of his Son, by which he bore his people’s penalty. If one adopts some naturalistic world-view, something similar could be said. If one holds that history is going nowhere or in circles determined by impersonal fate, then the notion of final judgement and ultimate division between bliss and the abyss is incoherent—and so too the good news that Christ reconciles rebels to their Maker, prepares them for glory, enabling them even now to enjoy foretastes of the kingdom still to be consummated.”

~ D. A. Carson,“The Biblical Gospel.” Taken from For Such a Time as This: Perspectives on Evangelicalism, Past, Present and Future, eds. Steve Brady and Harold Rowdon (London: Evangelical Alliance, 1996).

(HT: Justin Taylor)

Which Kind of Love Builds What Kind of City?

“We see then that the two cities were created by two kinds of love: the earthly city was created by self-love reaching the point of contempt for God, the Heavenly City by the love of God carried as far as contempt of self. In fact, the earthly city glories in itself, the Heavenly City glories in the Lord. The former looks for glory from men, the latter finds its highest glory in God. . . . In the former, the lust for domination lords it over princes as over the nations it subjugates; in the other both those put in authority and those subject to them serve one another in love, the rulers by their counsel, the subjects by obedience. The one city loves its own strength shown in its powerful leaders; the other says to it God: ‘I will love you, my Lord, my strength.’

Consequently, in the earthly city its wise men who live by men’s standards have pursued the goods of the body or of their own mind, or of both. . . . In the Heavenly City . . . man’s only wisdom is the devotion which rightly worships the true God. . . .”

~ Augustine, The City of God, quoted by David Naugle in Reordered Love, Reordered Lives (Grand Rapids, Mi.: Eerdmans, 2008), 52-53.

The Hopelessness of Atheism

I do appreciate it when an atheist is honest enough to state the necessary implications of his atheism. Imagine trying to “safely” build your life on the “firm foundation of unyielding despair”? If talk like this were not so tragic and destructive, it would be funny.

That Man is the product of causes which had no provision of the end they were achieving; that his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his love and beliefs, are but the outcomes of accidental collocations of atoms; that no fire, no heroism, no intensity of thought and feeling can preserve individual life beyond the grave; that all the labours of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius, are destined to extinction in the vast death of the solar system, and that the whole temple of Man’s achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the debris of a universe in ruins — all these things, if not quite beyond dispute, are yet so nearly certain, that no philosophy which rejects them can hope to stand. Only within the scaffolding of these truths, only on the firm foundation of unyielding despair, can the soul’s habitation henceforth be safely built.

~ Bertrand Russell, “A Free Man’s Worship” quoted by Thomas V. Morris in Making Sense of it All (Grand Rapids, Mi.: Eerdmans, 1992), 27.

The Deep Meaning of Happiness

For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be glory forever. Amen (Romans 11:36).

“If God is the proper reference point for all aspects and things in life, then God gives them their true meaning and puts them in the proper order in our lives. This grand union of God, ourselves, and the whole cosmos in a sacred synthesis of rightly ordered love constitutes the deep meaning of happiness.”

~ David K. Naugle, Reordered Love, Reordered Lives (Grand Rapids, Mi.: Eerdmans, 2008), 23.