The Word rebukes our sidelong glances at the world. Not that kind of laughter. The Word rebukes our choreographed repentance. Not that sancitmonious smarminess. “Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: Receiving the end of your faith, …
Gladness
“The godly are characterized by gladness. The doctrines of godliness are the doctrines of gladness. If it does not come at the last to gladness, then to hell with it” (Angels in the Architecture, p. 75).
Justification and Taste
“In this futile world, in this world where vanity reigns, we can know that the grace of God has burst through to us by one indication only: “Go thy way, eat thy bread with joy, and drink thy wine with a merry heart; for God now accepteth thy works” (Ecc. 9:7). A man who stands …
The Reformational Creeps
“It is easy for modern Christians to think of Luther, Calvin, and Zwingli standing around a cauldron at the beginning of some reformational Macbeth, coming up with the doctrines of predestination and depravity. The lightning flashes, the murky brew belches a loathsome smell, and one can readily tell by the pricking of his thumbs that …
Truth and Laughter
“The truth of the gospel leads inexorably to laughter. Those who want to glower as they cling to truth want something that can never be. Whatever it is they have in their hands, it must not be the truth, unless it is perhaps just a fragment of it. The dour Calvinist, the cranky sabbatarian, and …
Rejecting the Numinous Gods
“Our idea of holiness is greatly truncated today; we limit it in thousands of scrupling and schoolmarmish ways. We have lost any understanding of the numinous. We do not know what it would be like to walk through a grove of ancient trees sacred to the holy and terrible gods, and then be converted to …
Smoke in a Gale
“The psalmist asked the God of Israel to rise up and scatter His enemies; whenever the Power of His right hand is pleased to do so, those enemies are driven before Him like smoke in a gale. The Church today is a stranger to victories because we refuse to sing anthems to the king of …
Uncle God
“Our contemporary theism is really a pathetic and sorry affair. We want an avuncular figure in the sky, someone to hand out celestial candies when we are feeling a little blue” (Angels in the Architecture, p. 42).
Mystic Puddles
“But we moderns have little interest in such redemptions or their results because the Church in our era is slack and effeminate. We do not look at an unbounded northern sky and by analogy see the eternity of God; rather, we look mystically inward to the swamps and standing puddles of our own hearts and …
Finite Limitations
“No created intellect can conceive of a single word suitable for God’s most infinite and simple essence. Any word we use to describe God will quickly fall to the ground exhausted–like us, our words fall short of the glory of God. But this does not mean that the use of such words is pointless. We …