Merry Christmas!

Isaiah 11:1-10

There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit. And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. And his delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide disputes by what his ears hear, but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked. Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist, and faithfulness the belt of his loins. The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together; and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play over the hole of the cobra, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder's den. They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.

In that day the root of Jesse, who shall stand as a signal for the peoples—of him shall the nations inquire, and his resting place shall be glorious.

Isaiah 40:3-5

A voice cries: "In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken."

Isaiah 9:2-7

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shined. You have multiplied the nation; you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they divide the spoil. For the yoke of his burden, and the staff for his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian. For every boot of the tramping warrior in battle tumult and every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire. For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.

Luke 2:1-20

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And all went to be registered, each to his own town. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear. And the angel said to them, "Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of a great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger." And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying,

"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!"

When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us." And they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in a manger. And when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning this child. And all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them. But Mary treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart. And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.

Zechariah 9:9-10

Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.  I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem; and the battle bow shall be cut off, and he shall speak peace to the nations; his rule shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth.

John 1:29-30

The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! This is he of whom I said, 'After me comes a man who ranks before me, because he was before me.'

Isaiah 53:3-12

He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

Surely he has borne our grief and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed.  All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth. By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people? And they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth.

Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for sin, he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days; the will of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors.

Psalm 24:3-10

Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in his holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to what is false and does not swear deceitfully. He will receive blessing from the Lord and righteousness from the God of his salvation. Such is the generation of those who seek him, who seek the face of the God of Jacob. Lift up your heads, O gates! And be lifted up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord, strong and mighty, the Lord, mighty in battle! Lift up your heads, O gates! And lift them up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord of hosts, he is the King of glory!

Revelation 19:6

"Hallelujah! For the Lord our God the Almighty reigns.”

1 Corinthians 15:21-23

For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.

1 Corinthians 15:54-58

"Death is swallowed up in victory." "O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?"

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Revelation 5:12-14

"Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!" And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all that is in them, saying, "To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!" And the four living creatures said, "Amen!" and the elders fell down and worshiped.

Merry Christmas everyone!

A Quick Follow-Up to a Previous Post

Remember in "On Partisanship" where I said that Republicans are becoming more and more moderate? This article is one instance where you can see this shift happening.

http://www.worldmag.com/2012/12/boehner_proposes_tax_increase_for_millionaires

Have a great week!

Casey

On the Revolutionary War

Recently I have been reading an interesting book called The American and French Revolutions Compared by Friedrich von Gentz. Von Gentz has a good summary of the American Revolution (I have not yet reached the French section yet, but hope to soon). Following are a summary of the things he says (with my comments)

Von Gentz: The American Revolution was far better and more justified than the French Revolution.

My comment: I completely agree. The French Revolution had no reason or sense to it, and went far too far in its push for “reforms”. The American Revolutionaries, in large part, attempted reconciliation before fighting for independence.

Von Gentz (VG): The American Revolution began as a result of multiple factors. The first was the fact that Britain taxed America. Now, this would not be a big deal normally (all the other provinces were taxed), but Britain had a monopoly of trade with America. This restricted trade hindered the growth of businesses in America, which hurt the economy. Second, America had no representation in Congress. If America had representation, then they would be considered as another part of England, thus promoted from colonial status (remember “No taxation without representation”). In addition to these major reasons are many other reasons, such as the decrease in dependability on England after the French-Indian war (which pushed France out of North America, thus securing Britain as the major power in America), the influence of the Sons of Liberty, and the insistence on taxing goods coming into American ports (the British could just as easily tax the same goods LEAVING British ports but stubbornly refused to do so, even though it would be easier and more profitable).

My comment: Nothing to say here, Von Gentz is pretty straightforward.

VG: The British started the war, not the Americans. Here are the following proofs:

1.       The British began to tax the Americans and could have taken away the tax when they saw the huge opposition to it. They stubbornly continued to stir the pot of rebellion.

2.       The Americans attempted reconciliation, even promising to pay the tax if they were considered part of Britain and no longer a territory.

3.       The British attacked first, and the Americans were defending themselves.

My comment: I agree mostly with Von Gentz. I do agree that the British did much to arouse the Americans, but the Americans did much to arouse the British as well (remember the Boston Tea Party?). Of course, British replies to American aggression were extremely harsh and uncalled for, so even when America did not help keep the peace, the British did nothing to reconcile.

VG: America did not do anything unconstitutional (according to the British constitution) because the British in essence dissolved the constitution for America by breaking rules and refusing American attempts at reconciliation, so America creating their own Constitution and government was allowed and did not break any constitutional laws.

My comment: An intriguing thing to say. I would have to take a look at Britain’s old constitution before I made any final position, but I do think it is an interesting point.

Von Gentz says a lot more, but instead of recounting what he says here, why don’t you read it yourself? You can download a free pdf file of The American and French Revolutions Compared...somewhere. I can’t remember where I found it so you’ll have to find it yourself.

Have fun reading it, if you get a chance!

Casey

On Partisanship

For some of you, the following will be rather familiar, as Mr. Winther has talked about this before in his lectures. I agree completely with what he said, and I give him credit for much of the following, especially the graphs (mine are poorly drawn, and I apologize).

In America, politics are party-based, or partisan. The two major parties are-you guessed it- the Republican and the Democratic parties. Now, there is nothing very special about these two parties, other than the name and the important fact that they have different platforms (for example one party believes in immigration reform and the other doesn’t, or they both believe higher taxes, or whatnot. The platform is usually contained in a document showing all the views of a particular party). You may also notice that news sources tend to stick to their parties; Fox News will hardly ever say anything negative about Republicans, and the New York Times will hardly ever say anything negative about Democrats.

It is dangerous to stick to any one party. It is not a good idea to “vote the party line”. The danger is illustrated below.

Below is your typical graph. As you can see, there are relatively few people (the blue curve) who are ultra-conservative and relatively few people who are ultra-liberal. Most people lie between those two, in moderate land.

Now say that you have two parties, the Republicans and the Democrats. The Republicans are conservative, falling in between ultra-conservative and moderate. The Democrats are exactly opposite, falling in between ultra-liberal and moderate.

Now, somewhere along the line, the Democrats get smart. “What if we move our line a little to the left?” That would give them more voters (red) than the Republicans and the Republicans would have trouble gaining any majority in Congress.

Well, later on, the Republicans decide to do exactly the same thing, shifting their line to the right quite a bit, stealing precious votes from the Democrats. Now, the Republicans are a lot less conservative than they used to be, and the Democrats are less liberal.

Then the Democrats move their line to the left as well, taking some more votes again.

This process continues until:

Both Democrats and Republicans are barely off the moderate center. The major parties will always “find the hump”, so if most people are conservative, then the parties will probably be conservative as well.

This explains why third parties have such a hard time getting votes. The two major parties are hogging the votes near the center, and the third parties are left with minimal population far off the center.

The danger, then, with sticking to a certain party, is that the party values will always change to benefit the party the most. We can see this going on with the Republican Party, as it gradually moves toward the liberal side. But it moves so slowly that nobody notices! We act surprised when the Republicans nominate a moderate candidate for president, but the process has been continuing for a long time!

Thus, since parties will almost never conform to our views (and even if they do, they won’t for long), we should not “vote the party line”. I propose that each person should vote according to values, not on a party basis. If a Democratic candidate conforms to your views (however unlikely that occurrence might be), then vote for him! Of course, biblical values trump personal values every time, so first ask, “Does this candidate walk in the way of the Lord?” before you ask questions like, “Does he believe in small government?”

One final note: parties will almost never change their platform if you merely beg them to do so. They want voters, not any particular person. The best way to reform parties is to move the hump. Thus, if you want conservative parties, you need conservative voters. Now, you may try to convince your friends to be conservatives, but most likely they will not listen to you. The best way to move the hump is to teach your children biblical values, so when they vote, they vote biblically. If every Christian did so, we would see a change in politics in about 30 years! We shouldn’t merely look to the short term; we need to have a long- term vision.

Summary: I do not believe in a partisan system, and I will not vote the party line. I will vote for the candidates whom I believe are the best. I also believe that we need to train up biblical voters so we can move the hump. If we do, we will see some major reforms in politics in the not-so-distant future.

What are your views?

Casey

On Education

This past Sunday, my dad, during both the sermon and Guardians, preached on training and those teachings are the inspiration for the topic I will talk about today. Clearly, training children is a fundamental aspect of life and a very important topic to consider. Education is merely one extension of this massive topic, but a very important extension.

When children are young, it is imperative to train them well, as things they learn early in their life will stay with them long after they leave their parents’ home. Many parents do not take seriously the task of training their children, and we see the fruits of their neglect wherever we go: rebelliousness, carelessness, laziness, naivety, etc.  

Parents are to “teach a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.” (Proverbs 22:6) Thus, the number one goal of education is to teach our children the ways of the Lord. If we fail to teach the fear of the Lord to our children, then there is no point in teaching them science, math, English, or any other thing. If our children do not obey the Lord or fear him, any other teaching we do is futile. The teachings of the Lord should be the focus of our education.

Deuteronomy 11:18-25 summarizes this point very well:

You shall therefore lay up these words of mine in your heart and in your soul, and you shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall teach them to your children, talking of them when you are sitting in your house, and when you are walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates, that your days and the days of your children may be multiplied in the land that the Lord swore to your fathers to give them, as long as the heavens are above the earth. For if you will be careful to do all this commandment that I command you to do, loving the Lord your God, walking in all his ways, and holding fast to him, then the Lord will drive out all these nations before you, and you will dispossess nations greater and mightier than yourselves. Every place on which the sole of your foot treads shall be yours. Your territory shall be from the wilderness to the Lebanon and from the River, the river Euphrates, to the western sea.  No one shall be able to stand against you. The Lord your God will lay the fear of you and the dread of you on all the land that you shall tread, as he promised you.

These reasons are why I believe homeschooling is infinitely better and more effective than public school teaching. At home, I can teach my children to obey the Lord, to keep is commandments. I can teach them about Jesus, their Savior, and the God who created them. I can teach them Scripture, I can speak of the Lord when they rise, when they are walking by the way. I can write Scripture on the doorposts of my house, on my gates, I can lay up the word of the Lord in their heart and soul. Where else can I do all this? Not at a public school, where my kids go for 9+ hours every day and are fed the poison of evolutionary theory, feminism, and liberal indoctrination.

When should we teach our children? We are to teach them every waking minute of the day, from when they rise up to when they lie down. The world views “school” as something you go to five days a week and learn math, science, and history. “School” (I prefer “training”) is not five days a week, it is all the time.

The teachings of the Lord should be present in everything we teach. Whether we eat or drink, or whatever we do, we should do all to the glory of God. (1 Corinthians 10:31-32) If we teach math, do it to the glory of God. If we teach science, do it to the glory of God. Everything we do is for God’s glory. Does secular education teach the things of the Lord? No, it doesn’t. Should we teach science, math, English, and history to our children? Yes, there is nothing wrong with learning: it is good to learn, but only if we do it to the glory of God.

Slightly off topic, but related to education, is the argument used by many Christians who support Christian participation in the public school system. If you’ve seen the documentary IndoctriNation (which I highly recommend), you know what I’m talking about. These people argue that since the public school system is such a dark place (which it is) and needs the light of Christ to shine in it (which it does), we should send our Christian children to evangelize other children. Beware! Remember Deuteronomy 11:25, which says that the world will fear and dread those who follow the Lord and will smother your children as quickly as it possibly can! Don’t be surprised when you find that your children abandon the faith of their fathers and walk away from the Lord. When our children are young, they are easily teachable. We need to teach them the right things when they are young, not teach them the ways of the world! If we teach them correctly when they are young, even when they are old they will not depart from that teaching. But poor company can corrupt morals and young minds are easily swayed. This should be a solemn reminder for us.

In summary: all education is to God’s glory, and we need to teach our children the ways of the Lord above all else. God first; math, science, grammar, music, and all other subjects come in their logical place, after.

Closing passage:

Ephesians 6:1-4

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. "Honor your father and mother" (this is the first commandment with a promise), "that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land." Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.