Martin Luther and Christmas
December 26, 2007
Dr. Philip Ryken, senior minister of Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, has written about Martin Luther’s contribution to Christmas hymnody on Reformation21.
To God who sent his only Son
Be glory, laud, and honor done.
Let all the choir of heaven rejoice,
The new ring in with heart and voice.
Praying before eating (along with Calvin)
December 26, 2007
John Calvin’s suggested prayer for a family before a meal:
Lord God Almighty, you have made the world; you uphold all things in it by the word of your power. You sustained the children of Israel in the wilderness with food from on high. Will you also bless us, your humble servants, and sanctify to us these gifts which we have received from your generous hand? May we use them temperately; help us to devote them to their proper purpose. May we thus acknowledge that you are our Father and Source of all good things. Grant also that we may at all times and above all things yearn for the spiritual bread of your Word. May our souls thus be nourished unto everlasting life, which you have prepared for us through the precious blood of your beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
Better for nothing than for a nuisance
December 21, 2007
Here’s a Sweet Dropper Christmas tradition [which, being interpreted, means, 'I posted this last Christmas and can't come up with anything better.']
It’s Friday. There must be another Christmas party to attend–I hosted one last night. There must be another little gift to buy. Who’s going to be so favoured as to receive one of my signature fruitcakes? C.S. Lewis wrote a short essay for the December 1957 edition of the publication, Twentieth Century. Under the heading, ‘What Christmas Means to Me,’ Lewis launches a scathing attack on the ‘commercial racket’ that overwhelms the season–NOT because it isn’t ‘religious,’ but because it drains our energies and undermines the merry-making, and hospitality that ought to characterize the season:
The interchange of presents was a very small ingredient in the older English festivity. Mr. Pickwick took a cod with him to Dingley Dell; the reformed Scrooge ordered a turkey for his clerk; lovers sent love gifts; toys and fruit were given to children. But the idea that not only all friends but even all acquaintances should give one another presents, or at least send one another cards, is quite modern and has been forced upon us by the shopkeepers. Neither of these circumstances is in itself a reason for condemning it. I condemn it on the following grounds.
1. It gives on the whole much more pain than pleasure. You have only to stay over Christmas with a family who seriously try to ‘keep’ it [in the commerical sense] in order to see that the thing is a nightmare. Long before December 25th everyone is worn out—physically worn out by weeks of daily struggle in overcrowded shops, mentally worn out by the effort to remember all the right recipients and to think out suitable gifts for them. They are in no trim for merry-making; much less (if they should want to) to take part in a religious act. They look far more as if there had been a long illness in the house.
2. Most of it is involuntary. The modern rule is that anyone can force you to give him a present by sending you a quite unprovoked present of his own. It is almost a blackmail. Who has not heard the wail of despair, and indeed of resentment, when, at the last moment, just as everyone hoped that the nuisance was over for one more year, the unwanted gift from Mrs. Busy (whom we hardly remember) flops unwelcomed through the letter-box, and back to the dreadful shops one of us has to go?
3. Things are given as presents which no mortal ever bought for himself—gaudy and useless gadgets, ‘novelties’ because no one was ever fool enough to make their like before. Have we really no better use for materials and for human skill and time than to spend them on all this rubbish?
4. The nuisance. For after all, during the racket we still have all our ordinary and necessary shopping to do, and the racket trebles the labour of it. We are told that the whole dreary business must go on because it is good for trade. It is in fact merely one annual symptom of that lunatic condition of our country, and indeed of the world, in which everyone lives by persuading everyone else to buy things. I don’t know the way out. But can it really be my duty to buy and receive masses of junk every winter just to help the shopkeepers? If the worst comes to the worst I’d sooner give them money for nothing and write it off as a charity. For nothing? Why, better for nothing than for a nuisance.
From C.S. Lewis, “What Christmas Means to Me,” in God in the Dock: Essays on Theology and Ethics (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994), 304-305.
Proverbs: urban lions
December 5, 2007
The sluggard says, ‘There is a lion in the road! There is a lion in the streets!’
As a door turns on its hinges, so does a sluggard on his bed.
The sluggard buries his hand in the dish; it wears him out to bring it back to his mouth.
The sluggard is wiser in his own eyes than seven men who can answer sensibly.
~Proverbs 26:13-16
Proverbs’ depiction of the sluggard contains a vivid illustration of the deceitfulness of sin and its operations in the human heart. Twice in Proverbs we hear the sluggard claiming that there is a lion in the streets. Why would he do that? He is creating imaginary circumstances to justify neglecting his work. He shifts the discussion from the sin of laziness to the danger of lions. No one will condone his staying home because he is lazy. But they might sympathize with him and agree with his decision to stay home if there is real danger in the streets. So, to hide his laziness and justify himself, he deflects attention away from laziness (truth) to lions (an illusion).
Do you see the broader insight into the human heart Scripture is giving us? The heart can exploit the mind to justify what the heart wants. We are not always willing to deal with things as they really are. We are not neutral when it comes to understanding our situation. On the contrary, we feel powerful desires and pressing fears, and then our mind can bend reality to justify the desires and fears and seek fulfillment or find relief.
The sluggard desires to stay at home and avoid work. Instead of dealing with his evil desire, he uses his mind to create unreal circumstances to justify his desire. He may even believe the excuses he has fabricated. [Remember George Costanza's advice to Jerry: "It's not a lie if you believe it."] The deceitfulness of sin can actually make us mentally deranged!
Understanding this truth makes Proverbs 26:16 come alive: “The sluggard is wiser in his own eyes than seven men who can give a discreet answer.” The self-deception makes the sluggard resistant to any truth that exposes his sin. When seven wise men confront him and say, “There is no bloodthirsty urban lion in the street. We walked here safely. We’ve searched the neighborhood. You are not in danger of becoming a lion’s lunch,” the sluggard still will not get out of bed. Their testimony won’t change his mind. He knows better. He insists that the hungry urban lion is out there. Otherwise his laziness is exposed for what it is. Truth gets flushed down the toilet of self-justification.
No one is immune to this. It goes far beyond the matter of work ethic. Walking in the darkness of evil makes us hostile to the light of truth–and in the process our mind concocts and spits out “spin”–half-truths, equivocations, sophistries, evasions and lies – anything to protect the our evil desires from exposure and reproof.
The longer I serve as a pastor, the more I see this at work in people with addictions, people who harbor bitterness, people whose marriages are crumbling–in other words, sinners who need help. And, at the same time, it makes me cry out to God to deliver me from my delusions as well. I must reckon with God’s grace and truth as I really am and in the situation I am really facing–that is, without the urban lions.
Thanks are in order to John Piper for being the catalyst for these insights.
AIDS and ministry in Ethiopia
December 4, 2007
World AIDS Day was designated by someone somewhere as 1 December. The record will note that The Sweet Dropper is three days late in posting in this regard. But, here is a letter we received yesterday from our friend Andy Warren, who works in medical and church planting ministry with Mission to the World in Ethiopia. Andy and his wife Bev are dearly beloved among us here at FPC Kosciusko and were with us in October for our World Mission Conference. Below is the text of Andy’s letter:
Dear Friends,
December 1st is World AIDS Day. For me it is a day to think about the people I know personally that have been, and still are, being affected by this epidemic. In spite of being
thousands of miles from Ethiopia I still see their faces clearly in my mind, and the first ones I see are the children. They are the ones who regularly visit my office, show me
their report cards, beg for candy, scavenge in my desk drawers, and sit in my lap.
I cannot imagine anything in my life being more satisfying than helping these HIV+
children. While it still isn’t clear how long, or what kind of life these children will have,
it is thrilling to see them alive today and thrilling to see them well and going to school
and living normal lives.
We started out treating four children, Selam, Mikias, Leul and Estifo. Today we have at
least twenty children on treatment and another group that we monitor so that they can
start treatment when they are eligible.
Another satisfying part of work this last year was expanding into two new communities. Bole was the first new community and Danny, the manager for this new work, has done an amazing job. I met Danny eleven years ago when he was a 13-year-old boy. He has grown into a mature and talented young man. He recently sent me the story of one of the
new HIV+ women in the Bole community. Lemlem is a young woman who was idnapped as a young girl and held as a slave until she escaped and fled to Addis Ababa. he tells some of her story:
In Addis, I began to work in a grocery store as a cashier. While I as working there I had an affair with a man who was a driver. During he affair, I got pregnant but I aborted it after 7 months. I used traditional medicine to cause the abortion. The traditional medicine hurt me very much.
After this, I stopped working in the grocery because the owner transferred the store to another person as a contract. While I was there I had TB. Then I got a job at a draft house (bar). I still felt sick. I worked for 7 years at the draft house. Then, I got really sick and I wanted to stop working. I asked my boss to give me my salary but she would not give it to
me. I had no money and I was feeling very sick. I suffered a lot. When Selam, Mikias and Leul the grocery lady, who I had worked for before, heard, she called me and began to treat me. When my sickness got worse, Megenbesh, who is one of the project’s beneficiaries, told me to have my blood checked. I did and I found out I was HIV positive. When I heard that, I was shocked and I fainted. The doctors advised me to calm down and not be sad. I stopped working but refused to take any medicine. One day, I was very sick and someone knocked on the door. I was unable to stand up and open the door so I just said “get in.” It was the project staff (Danny).
Now I thank God because I am in a better position in life. I feel like I have been healed from the death. There are people who do not get the opportunity to experience this, but I do. So I am thankful. What matters for me now is my mom. I want to see my mother if she is alive. If she is not, I would like to see my brother. That has been my dream since my childhood.
On World AIDS day, I am thankful for the privilege of serving people like Lemlem,
Selam, Mikias, Leul, and Estifo. I am also thankful for the people who support us in the
many ways that make this possible.
Peace,
Andy Warren
AIDS Care and Treatment
Project Director
