Capitalism Samizdat
I read nearly everything Carl Trueman puts out; I always find his analyses helpful. And he writes very well English. And he's a nice, uh, bloke, I happen to know from personal experience. His recent review essay shows how easy it is to boast that we're not "conforming to the world"—without ever considering some of our culture's most basic influences on our worldview. I'm guilty, too. It's extraordinarily difficult to look at your own eyes without looking through them. Trueman's essay, in this...
A TV Ramble
With all these new flat screens, they can't really call it the "idiot box" anymore. What, "idiot slate"? Just remember: the medium is the message. And if you're watching the idiot box, what does that say? I get the biggest kick out of the vision of our society painted by Idiocracy, a film I don't plan to see but haven't stopped meditating upon since I read about it (warning: the linked essay is not appropriate for our kids—because our culture isn't). In the projected future of our TV-saturated...
Why I Believe Again
The fascinating testimony of a Christian turned atheist turned (recently) Christian who once wrote a controversial biography of C. S. Lewis: Watching a whole cluster of friends, and my own mother, die over quite a short space of time convinced me that purely materialist “explanations” for our mysterious human existence simply won’t do – on an intellectual level. The phenomenon of language alone should give us pause. A materialist Darwinian was having dinner with me a few years ago and we...
Why I Am Writing My Dissertation, no. 2
I've already shared one blatant denial of my dissertation's thrust, courtesy of a high school Bible textbook. Here are five somewhat less blatant ones from the same book: Love is centered in the will, not the emotions; one who loves gives without reservation, for he places another’s well-being above his own. .... Love is not an emotion, but an act of the will. Feelings may ebb and flow, but love remains constant. .... Biblical love....involves solemn commitment...and is most clearly evidenced...
Five Famous Edwards Sermons
A friend recently mentioned to me that he had to read five Jonathan Edwards sermons for class. I've been getting more into Edwards for dissertation research (and for personal enrichment and enjoyment!) over the last while, so here's what I recommended. Four are famous, the last is just helpful: A Divine and Supernatural Light: Edwards's very important contribution here (this lowly blogger thinks) is that regeneration provides the soul with a taste for divine things that it did not and could...