Thoughts from Escape from Reason by F. Schaeffer September 25, 2010

I’ve been reading a fantastic book by Francis Schaeffer: Escape from Reason. It’s a small book, 94 pages, but it has helped me understand the historical and philosophical movements that have shaped our modern way of thinking as well as the fact that philosophy really does have an impact on culture and society. It’s usually not the philosophers themselves that have the most immediate impact, but people who pick up on those ideas and popularize them through movies, music and marketing. In any case I hope to be able to share some thoughts from the book as I go through it and would love to hear ya’ll thoughts on it.

Schaeffer’s thesis is simple: The human hope and endeavor for an autonomous human intellect has resulted not in the rationalistic unity we had hoped. Rather it has led to the abandoning of all hope for a reasonable/unified understanding of life and world and pursues in its place an purely irrational “leap experience”. This is true in secular society and exists in the form of drugs, sex and the hope for a better tomorrow through technology and education, and it is true in the church existing in the form of a vague therapeutic moralistic deism and contentless “Jesus experiences” with little reference to historical truths or discussable propositions.

Ironically Schaeffer attributes the birth of this pursuit to a churchman, Thomas Aquinas and his view that while human will is fallen, the human intellect, though weakened was still left intact. Perhaps not condemnable in and of itself, this idea did however open up the way for a purely autonomous logic and reason, which through the course of history resulted in ever growing inconsistencies in the thought structures of succeeding generations and eventually led, ironically, to an essentially irrational modern culture and modern man.

“Rationally the universe is absurd, and you must try to authenticate yourself. How? By authenticating yourself by an act of the will. So if you are driving along the street and see someone in the pouring ran, you stop your car, pick him up and give him a lift. It is absurd. What does it matter? He is nothing, the situation is nothing, but you have authenticated yourself by and act of the will. But the difficulty is that authentication has no rational or logical content-all direction of an act of the will are equal. Therefore, similarly, if you are driving along and see the man in the rain, speed up your car and knock him down, you have in an equal measure authenticated your will. Do you understand? If you do, cry for modern man in such a hopeless situation.”

Oh france… September 22, 2010

“Malraux is an intriguing man. He came through existentialism, fought in the Resistance, took drugs, led a very rough and tumble life at times, and finally turned out to be the Minister of Culture of France.”

-Escape From Reason by Francis Schaeffer

Faith fulfills the Law September 20, 2010

I started reading Martin Luther’s commentary on Romans recently and found this helpful in understanding the relationships between faith and the works of the Law.   he says,

But God judges according to what is at the bottom of the heart, and for this reason, His law makes its demands on the inmost heart  and cannot be satisfied with works, but rather punished works that are done other wise than from the bottom of the heart as hypocrisy and lies.

Accustom yourself, then, to this language, and you will find that doing the works of the law and fulfilling the law are two very different things. The work of the law is everything that ones does towards keeping the law. To fulfill the law, however, is to do its works with pleasure and love, and to live a godly and good life of one’s own accord with out the compulsion of the law.

Hence it comes that faith alone makes righteous and fulfills the law…This is what he means in chapter 3, after he has rejected the works of the law, so that it sounds as though he would abolish the law by faith; “Nay,” he says, “we establish the law by faith,” that is we fulfill it by faith.

nobody loves me September 19, 2010

I decided Saturday night that I would invite people from Church over to my house for lunch after church on Sunday. I put in a pot roast into my new crock pot at night and set it on “low” to cook for 10hours! Muahaha….Anyway, so I didn’t actually tell the kids from church that I wanted to invite them till they were about to get one the bus to go back to campus from church. It was a hurried invitation and there really wasn’t time for them process or decide. People were trying to figure lunch plans in collegetown and ministry meetings. I met them on north campus to see who would get off and join me for lunch at the Mott house. No one did. I cried. Not really.

I’m sure atleast a few people would have had I let them know earlier. It reminded me that a big part of serving people is in planning ahead and giving people the time and the room to process and decide. Alot of times well meant ideas and events flop simply for lack of fore notice and communication of details.

Tab kids, two weekends from now Oct 3rd, ya’ll are invited to lunch at my place after church!

smashedNtrashed September 1, 2010

Thought this was kinda funny. I did notice a few of my friends making the transition to email adulthood.

Barnes Hall and the Legacy of John Mott August 30, 2010

Larry Lin mentioned in an email that Barnes Hall was originally built as a Christian ministry center under the leadership of John Mott ’88 (1888 that is). So I decided to do a little digging in Cornell archives. Here is something interesting that I found:

John R. Mott (’1888), later world leader of the YMCA and Nobel prize winner, was the driving force behind the Cornell University Christian Association (CUCA). Barnes Hall was intended to eradicate Cornell’s reputation as an un-Christian seat of corruption and was the first building in the country built for a college Christian Association. Barnes was the university’s first student union. It lost that function with the erection of Willard Straight Hall (1925). The religious function passed on to Anabel Taylor Hall (1952). The CUCA evolved into the ecumenical Cornell United Religious Work in 1929.

and

Alfred S. Barnes, in 1888, built Barnes Hall, “For the Welfare of God Among Men,” and this became the home of the Y. M. C. A. The Y. W. C. A. was organized several years ago and occupies the Eastern part of Barnes Hall, on the first floor.

Cornell has ever been proud of John R. Mott, ’88, who is now a world’s leader in Y. M. C. A. work, among colleges.

As encouraging as this is I’m honestly disappointed and grieved that time and foolhardy ecumenism led to the degradation of the CUCA into the modern day CURW which presents Christ as only one among many options for truth (and the YMCA to a sports club and song by the village people). I appreciate the heart and labor of the chaplains over at the CURW but in my opinion they are only sowing to the wind. Overcoming nonessential divisions in the Christian body is important to getting the gospel out to the folks here at Cornell, but we ought to guard the truth, clarity and centrality of the Gospel with all our might. In a few generations COAH, Cru, CBS and any other fellowship may also be just another carcass of a ministry with no real gospel to share because they thought that unity was more important that truth.

I’m thankful for the Grace of God that has allowed us to come back to Barnes more than a hundred years later and have an extended prayer vigil for our school and God’s work here. To sign up see here.

You can find out more about the life and work of John Mott at the website for the Nobel Peace Prize, which he won in 1946 for his work in establishing and strengthening international Protestant Christian student organizations that worked to promote peace.

The Jesus School August 29, 2010

A few weeks ago a guy named Cory Fehr came to my church and gave a message on “disciple making”. That’s Christianese for how one person can help another person (usually little kids and younger bros and sis’, but it goes both ways) grow in personal maturity and as a follower of Jesus. It’s deeper than just getting rid of bad habits or bad influences, it’s about living a life based on convictions rather than impulses,  loving people based on Christ’s love rather than simple personal affection and find our joy and rest in God himself. Cory made 3 observations about Jesus’  pattern of discipleship that really challenged me, both in their force of clarity and in how I have fallen quite short of them. They come from Mark 3:13-14

Jesus went up on a mountainside and called to him those he wanted, and they came to him. He appointed twelve—designating them apostles—that they might be with him and that he might send them out to preach and to have authority to drive out demons.

1. Grace and Intentionality.  Jesus chose and called a small group of guys that he wanted to invest and pour his life and love into. He didn’t have an application process, his choice was not based on performance or even of character. He chose them out of his grace and was going to create men of great faith and sacrifice because of the love and direction he was going to give them. Point? Prayerfully and intentionally choose a few people around you that you can invest and pour into. Don’t choose the highest potentials. Trust that if you are faithful in showing God’s love and truth God will make them into men or women of great faith and boldness.

2. Walk the walk and Plug them in. These 12 were not like the rest of the crowds that followed Jesus. These 12 would see how Jesus dealt with the daily routines of life. They would see how he reacted to challenges and disappointments, they would see how he treated people around him, they would how he dealt with money, with having plenty and having need. Would Jesus get annoyed at setbacks? Would he give into a little selfish pleasure after a long day of hard ministry? Would he make promises he really wasn’t planning to keep? Point? Two things. One, we gotta walk the walk. We can’t lead people where we haven’t been. We can’t disciple people into people that we are not.  And Two, we gotta plug people into the daily routines of life. Don’t just box discipleship into one hour blocks where both people share well crafted stories of the struggles of the past week. Do stuff together and meet challenges together and show by example how a Christ filled heart lives differently. Gotta go to Wegmans? Take someone with you and learn to be good stewards of time and money together(And how to be safe and responsible drivers). Gonna cook dinner for some people, ask someone to help you do it. It’s true people are busy, it doesn’t always work out. But be intentional. Many times you’ll strike out but every so often you’ll make a hit.

3. Empower them. Crazy stuff. Jesus calls these twelve and what does he tell them to do? Go preach and cast out demons. That’s like giving an automatic rifle to 6 year olds. After only a few months of watching Jesus do his preaching and healing thing He sends them out with power and authority. That word authority in the Greek mean exactly what it says: Authority! The ability to make the decision on the spot. Point? We gotta empower the people we disciple. Give them responsibilities and ownership over tasks, events, projects. Give them room to explore, work, fail and recover. The line between a newbie and a veteran is only as thick as the the distance the next opportunity and only as long as the roadblocks we choose to put in their way. The truth is there are plenty of people younger than me who will surpass me in wisdom, passion and ability. How dare I stand in their way when God is calling them to service? Finally, aren’t we all facing new challenges we hardly know how to deal with ourselves? We need people ahead of us to point us away from the potholes and onto the open roads. So in all these things we should actively seek out those can learn from and grow with.

There is an audio version of the message. If you are interested in a copy ask me.

reaching our own August 29, 2010

Today was the Asian & Asian American Welcome Reception. It was an array of nearly all the Asian American interests group on campus ranging from performing arts groups, cultural groups, humanitarian aid groups and even religious groups, in an effort to engage and plug in as many freshmen as possible. CBS took up a booth between the KDPhi sorority and the Lambda Phi Epsilon fraternity near the front of the Balch courtyard where the event took place. To be honest I felt a little out of place. My name tag sported a ’09 in a sea of ’12′s, ’13′s and ’14′s .  I was tempted to run to the registrar, drop out of grad school and move on from Cornell like everyone else.

My own insecurities aside I was reminded of the immense importance of these college years. Boys becoming men, girls becoming women. Students don’t just choose a career path for life,  they choose a meaning for life.  Cosmically important events are taking place in the dorm rooms and apartments on this campus. Whole lives are setting sail for some distant shore of rumored peace and prosperity. They’ll never find it. It doesn’t exist. The true shore is somewhere else and can be reach only if one sails from another harbor all together. Jesus is the true shore and now is the time to reach them, while they are still at dock, loading up on knowledge and purpose.  There are few more strategic places to impact the world for Jesus than the campus. I’m glad I’m here. I’m reminded why God let me stay. Enough said, we have to get to work.

Are you prepared? Oh Lord let us be. August 28, 2010

I’ve been reading a book on campus revivals and came across this sermon by Charles Spurgeon. In it he says:

“Let us be silent, now, for a minute, and consider what is the that we desire of the Lord. The conversion of thousands, the overthrow of error; the spread of the Redeemer’s kingdom. Think if your minds what the blessings are which your soul pants after. Get a correct idea of them, and then inquire whether you are to receive them. Suppose they were to be now bestowed, are you ready? If thousands of converts were to be born unto this one church, are you prepared to teach them, instruct them, and comfort them? Are you doing it now, you Christian people? Are you acting in such a way that God knows you to be fit to have the charge of those converts that you are asking for?”

Let us get ready now. Lets love our friends more intensely, train, teach and disciple with greater passion that we might withstand the flood of blessings that the Lord might bring to us this year.

You shall hold your next meeting in my parlour August 26, 2010

“At Hampden-Sydney College there was also revival….Three students exercising their faith int he privacy of their dorm room were surrounding by agnostic peers who demanded they cease their personal acts of devotion. The disturbance grew so severe that the president, Dr. John Blair Smith, was called to investigate. When he realized that the charges against the young men were the “sins” of private worship and prayer, he replied with tears: “Oh. is there such a state of things in this college? Ten God has come near to us. My dear young friends, you shall be protected. You shall hold your next meeting in my parlour, and I will be one of your number.” Amazingly, half the college was at that meeting and what one nineteenth century writer terms as glorious revival sept not only the college, but the surrounding countryside as well.” Excerpt from “When God walked on campus: A brief history of evangelical awakening at American colleges and universities”