Not an Indentured Servant

Some folks out there in cyberspace seem to think that young adults who remain at home are little more than indentured servants.  That may be so in some cases, but I think that in our family's case, it is not so.

My 20 year old daughter got up yesterday morning and went out immediately to care for her horse, and her sister's horse.  This is a joy for her.

She came in to get a bite to eat, then sat with us in the living room as we read 1 Timothy 4 and 5 together.  She had plenty to add to the discussion, as she always does.  We prayed together and had a tea with her older sister who came with her four children to spend the day with us.  The 20 year old enjoyed cuddling a couple of babies and teasing a 3 year old.

After that, she went out to her own computer, where she completed an assignment on 1 Timothy 4:12.  She loves theology, and it is her joy to dig into a verse and to write about what she finds there.  While I did the dishes and began preparations for lunch, she checked her email, read some blogs, and wrote some of her story.  She's a writer, and hopes to be published some day soon.  She also is an illustrator, so she spends time working on that skill as well.

Lunch was next, and she came into the kitchen to help prepare wraps.  We have odd allergies, so we had to chop up different vegetables and had different items to add to wraps, so each person prepared their own.  Again we had tea and a bit of a chat.  While I tidied the kitchen with my married daughter, the littles went out to play for a bit and the 20 year old went back to do her thing...which is writing, studying, reading, illustrating.

While I taught the kids in the afternoon, she worked on various projects of her own choosing.  She joined in the math quiz to prove to siblings and nephews that you can learn your math facts perfectly!  She blew them all out of the water, then she went in to the kitchen to stick the roast into the oven, along with sweet potatoes and butternut squash.  She brought tea to those slaving away in the classroom, and practiced piano for a while.

After a while another married daughter and her husband dropped in for a visit.  While I sewed badges on my youngest's Calvinist Cadet Corps uniform, she helped another married sister (who also dropped by) get supper ready.  It was a matter of getting someone to slice the roast beast, and mash the squash.  The married sister made the gravy, and the green beans were a snap.  (Pun intended!)

Later, this 20 year old hitched a ride to town with her sister to pick up our Cadillac which needed an oil change and a new horn.  On the way home she RAN OUT OF GAS (my fault!) and had to be rescued by her brother.  While she was in town with all of that, I cleaned up the kitchen, fed the dogs, and did all of the dishes with help from her brothers.  

When she arrived home, she played a game on her computer, just to relax.

When you think about it, does she sound like an indentured servant to you?  

Belgium & The UN Convention on the Rights of a Child

A dystopian future is one where the social problems of today become greater in magnitude, producing a future that is filled with crime, war, and similar evils.

Today I read with horror a report about Belgian control of society.  In order to produce a society that is healthy and vibrant, medical doctors have committed murder, calling it assisted suicide.  Assisted suicide is bad enough when it is the suicide of a grown person who is somewhat rational and aware and able to make an informed decision.  Many advocates have clearly taught that suicide is not the answer, because the despair of dealing with illness or disability often passes, and afflicted people often live contented and fulfilled lives.  It ought to make you shudder with horror upon horror when you realize that the people the Belgians are supposedly assisting are less than a year old.  

Big Brother is watching, and making all of the decisions.  He has decided that hand-made clothing is dangerous, so it must be banned (see sidebar, at top left).  He has decided that life with disabilities is not worth living, so he kills and destroys.  He has decided that parents cannot choose curriculum with wisdom, so he has decreed.  And the people are so busy playing with their toys that they have not even noticed the curtailment of certain inalienable rights.

When I was a teenager, I read Animal Farm, 1984, and Brave New World.  The authors, George Orwell and Aldous Huxley, had contrasting views of the future:

Social critic Neil Postman contrasts the worlds of 1984 and Brave New World in the foreword of his 1985 book Amusing Ourselves to Death. He writes:

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions." In 1984, Orwell added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we fear will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we desire will ruin us.

My fear is that both men were right.  In our search for pleasure and our desire to control, we have allowed leaders to make laws to protect us.  We do not want to take responsibility for our own actions, preferring to blame the government if things go wrong.  Our fear that life might not be full of pleasure has ruined us.  We have lost the ability to think, to discern, to judge correctly.  Scary.

Woe unto those who call good evil, and evil good.

YES!! Amy's got it right!

I am thrilled that Amy has tackled the issue of the great divide between Patriarchy and those who disagree with it. She writes with wisdom and candour.

I am a member of the Patriarch's Wives, and have developed relationships with many women in that group over a number of years. We share our lives with one another (to a certain extent - nobody shares online what is known in real life by those closest to you) and we pray for one another.

The women I know on that group are from varied backgrounds. They seek to serve the Lord and their families. They share recipes and ideas about life as they seek to walk humbly with their God. What that looks like varies from family to family. There are no "cookie-cutter" Patriarchalists. In fact, many of the members would not describe their families as such. It's just a group we belong to.

I have visited many a blog and website written by sincere, thinking, Christian women who have been burned by "Patriarchy". I appreciate their position, and I know that what they have experienced is real hurt. They want to help those "stuck" in Patriarchy to flee from the prison in which they are trapped, yet they don't have the whole story.

I have known families that have been dysfunctional, where the Father/husband was a tyrant to both his wife and his children. That kind of Patriarchal family is dead wrong...certainly not full of grace and truth.

Amy's open letter says exactly what I would say, had I the readership she enjoys. I tried very hard to express similar thoughts on some blogs, but was shut down quickly. I have definitely expressed this on the Patriarchs' Wives board.

We are sisters in Christ. We need to learn to love one another with grace. What does love look like? Sometimes it looks tough: exhort one another, rebuke one another, pray for one another. But when our opinions are expressed with grace and truth, with a sincere heart, they are edifying to our sisters. And that's what pleases the Lord.

Wesley & Whitefield

John Wesley and George Whitefield were friends. They knew each other as young men, and each of them felt the Lord's call on his life to preach.

However, Wesley & Whitefield sharply disagreed on the doctrine of predestination. It is interesting to read the correspondence between the two men, as they each tried to convince the other that his beliefs were wrong.

It's not that the debate wasn't heated. Here is an excerpt from a letter George Whitefield wrote to John on the issue of predestination:

Honoured Sir, how could it enter into your heart to choose a text to disprove the doctrine of election out of Romans 8, where this doctrine is so plainly asserted? Once I spoke with a Quaker upon this subject, and he had no other way of evading the force of the Apostle's assertion than by saying, "I believe Paul was in the wrong." And another friend lately, who was once highly prejudiced against election, ingenuously confessed that he used to think St. Paul himself was mistaken, or that he was not truly translated. Indeed, honoured Sir, it is plain beyond all contradiction that St. Paul, through the whole of Romans 8, is speaking of the privileges of those only who are really in Christ. And let any unprejudiced person read what goes before and what follows your text, and he must confess the word "all" only signifies those that are in Christ. And the latter part of the text plainly proves, what, I find, dear Mr. Wesley will, by no means, grant. I mean the final perseverance of the children of God: "He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, [i.e., all Saints] how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?" (Rom. 8:32). [He shall give us] grace, in particular, to enable us to persevere, and every thing else necessary to carry us home to our Father's heavenly kingdom. Had any one a mind to prove the doctrine of election, as well as of final perseverance, he could hardly wish for a text more fit for his purpose than that which you have chosen to disprove it! One who did not know you would suspect that you were aware of this, for after the first paragraph, I scarce know whether you have mentioned [the text] so much as once through your whole sermon. But your discourse, in my opinion, is as little to the purpose as your text, and instead of warping, does but more and more confirm me in the belief of the doctrine of God's eternal election. I shall not mention how illogically you have proceeded. Had you written clearly, you should first, honoured Sir, have proved your proposition: "God's grace is free to all." And then by way of inference [you might have] exclaimed against what you call the horrible decree. But you knew that people (because Arminianism, of late, has so much abounded among us) were generally prejudiced against the doctrine of reprobation, and therefore thought if you kept up their dislike of that, you could overthrow the doctrine of election entirely.

The last paragraph is a plea for Mr. Wesley to study the Scriptures. It is passionate, but kind - caring as well as conciliatory. Mr. Whitefield does not back down one iota on his message, yet he does it in a gentle manner:

Dear, dear Sir, O be not offended! For Christ's sake be not rash! Give yourself to reading. Study the covenant of grace. Down with your carnal reasoning. Be a little child; and then, instead of pawning your salvation, as you have done in a late hymn book, if the doctrine of universal redemption be not true; instead of talking of sinless perfection, as you have done in the preface to that hymn book, and making man's salvation to depend on his own free will, as you have in this sermon; you will compose a hymn in praise of sovereign distinguishing love. You will caution believers against striving to work a perfection out of their own hearts, and print another sermon the reverse of this, and entitle it "Free Grace Indeed." Free, not because free to all; but free, because God may withhold or give it to whom and when he pleases. Till you do this, I must doubt whether or not you know yourself. In the meanwhile, I cannot but blame you for censuring the clergy of our church for not keeping to their articles, when you yourself by your principles, positively deny the 9th, 10th and 17th. Dear Sir, these things ought not so to be. God knows my heart, as I told you before, so I declare again, nothing but a single regard to the honour of Christ has forced this letter from me. I love and honour you for his sake; and when I come to judgment, will thank you before men and angels, for what you have, under God, done for my soul. There, I am persuaded, I shall see dear Mr. Wesley convinced of election and everlasting love. And it often fills me with pleasure to think how I shall behold you casting your crown down at the feet of the Lamb, and as it were filled with a holy blushing for opposing the divine sovereignty in the manner you have done. But I hope the Lord will show you this before you go hence. O how do I long for that day! If the Lord should be pleased to make use of this letter for that purpose, it would abundantly rejoice the heart of, dear and honoured Sir, Yours affectionate, though unworthy brother and servant in Christ, 10 GEORGE WHITEFIELD.

I have been surfing the web for the past few days, trying to make sense of a sharp disagreement of this modern day. The Bible states that there is nothing new under the sun, and that is apparent when you read Christian History. From Bible times to the present, men and women who love God disagree with other men and women who love God. This ought not to be so, but it is evidence that we live in a fallen world.

What grieves me is the rancour that I have witnessed. Even though some have suggested that if the two opposing parties sat down together they might even discover that they have much in common, and that they in fact, could like each other, they seem unwilling to do so. Fingers are flying as emails are composed in order to expose error or reveal lies.

I am not against exposing error or revealing lies, but what I am saying is this: Where is the peaceful confrontation made respectfully that I see in the letter above? Have we in this modern age simply become crass?

Although George Whitefield disagreed with John Wesley on some theological matters, he was careful not to create problems in public that could be used to hinder the preaching of the gospel. What mattered was the cause of Christ. George Whitefield continued to be gentle and gracious, even when Wesley did things to hinder him. George always considered John to be his friend.

When someone asked Whitefield if he thought he would see Wesley in heaven, Whitefield replied, “I fear not, for he will be so near the eternal throne and we at such a distance, we shall hardly get sight of him.”

I pray that those who have differences will tremble at the thought of grieving the Holy Spirit by attacking a brother or sister in Christ. I pray that disagreements will be tempered by a gracious and peaceful attitude which comes from knowing that God, who knows the truth, will make all things right on that day of judgment Whitefield refers to in the letter, above.