Sunday, February 17, 2013

"... overflowed for me"

WHAT GOD DID FOR ME: 1 Timothy 1:14

and the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.

When John, our older son, was about five, he gave us a vivid illustration of overflowing grace. We were living in the parsonage at Lusby, which had a bathroom on the upper bedroom floor, over a second bathroom on the ground level by my office. One day, for reasons I can no longer remember, he decided to fill the bathtub with water. He turned the taps on, then went away and was distracted by something else. Like all modern tubs, this one had an overflow relief drain; but the overflow was not sufficient to compensate for the inflow. Gradually, first the tub and then the floor began to fill with water, so that we were beginning to work on a healthy little aquarium on the second floor.

John, bless him, was oblivious to the problem he was creating. So was I, until I interrupted my work for a relief break downstairs, and went into the bathroom. When I turned on the light, it seemed odd, so I looked up. That's when I noticed that the large dish which served as the cover for the light bulbs was full of water. I knew this, because of the unaccustomed cool rippling effect of the light coming through the fixture, and because of the small stream which was even then beginning to make its way to the tile floor of that bathroom. Quickly, I flipped off the switch to prevent half the house from shorting out, and ran to investigate the problem. John, who was by this time pleasantly immersed in other quiet pursuits, was innocently amazed at the deluge of which he was the small creator. Fortunately, we didn't have to replace the whole ceiling.

St. Augustine of Hippo taught that God uses something he called operating grace, by which God woos and draws us to Himself. This grace is always active, and always effective, whether we are aware of it or not. It continually seeks us, draws us, and would enfold us in the love of Christ. John Wesley referred to this as preventing grace (we now call it "prevenient" grace), or the grace which comes before. Its fruit is faith, and the love of Christ calls forth a reflecting love from us, who taste God's goodness.

God's grace is above, showering down on us, even before we know it. As for Paul, so also for you and for me.

Lord, thank you for your astounding grace, which is at work before I'm aware of it. Let me draw upon this grace to grow in faith and the depth of my love for you and for others. In Christ, Amen.


Dunkirk, Maryland

Saturday, February 9, 2013

"Ignorantly in unbelief"

GROUNDS FOR MERCY: 1 Timothy 1:13 (part 2)

But I acted ignorantly in unbelief.

Paul here sets down the first of two grounds he will cite for God’s forgiveness of him: he didn’t know what he was doing, and did not understand what was at stake.

This is a statement deeply rooted in the Jewish tradition. The Torah makes a clear distinction between unintentional sin and that which is done “with a high hand” (as the old KJV puts it): the first is pardonable and the latter is far more grievous. So also the Psalmist asks to be kept clear from “hidden faults” (Ps 19:12). In the New Testament, Hebrews 10:26 ff. reflects this same sense, and the present tense of “to sin” in 1 John 3 probably does as well (as is so translated by ESV: “keeps on sinning”). Paul, in the words of Jesus’ intercession for His persecutors from the cross, “did not know what he was doing”.

Yet Paul still feels the weight of this sin, and carries a sense of unworthiness even as he claims the freedom of grace (which is the second great ground of redemption as we will see). Sin is a serious thing, known or unknown; and the closer we get to Christ, the more aware we are of that fact and of our tendency to be on the wrong side of it. It is by the forbearance of a merciful God that we find grace.

Lord of all knowledge, forgive my faults done in ignorance and with a lack of faith, or faith in the wrong thing. Fill me with your presence, and give to me the wisdom that comes from you so that, like the Apostle, I may turn and bless and help others along their pilgrim way. Amen.


(Lusby, Maryland)

"Though formerly ..."

CHRIST CHANGES LIVES (1 Timothy 1:13)

... though formerly I was a blasphemer, persecutor, and insolent opponent. But I received mercy because I had acted ignorantly in unbelief ....

Paul has outlined his call and charge, the sacred trust Christ has given him and the task for which He gives strength. Now the Apostle offers a kind of “truth-in-advertising” disclaimer, pointing to his own humanness in the form of a very sinful past, rebelling against God’s purpose and indeed seeking to stamp out the work of Christ.

Paul was a blasphemer. The word refers to someone who slanders God. By opposing Christ, Paul was opposing God Himself. By saying and doing terrible things against the Way, Paul had been deriding and disrespecting God.

He was a persecutor. The Greek means one who “pursues”, i.e., chases with a malicious intent. From house to house, city to city, Paul travelled with letters and instructions to oppose the Church. Yet Christ identifies with His Church; for as Jesus said, “For as much as you do it to one of the least of these, you do it to me.”

He acted in a fashion which was insolent. With the shiny-eyed focus of a True Believer, Paul knew that he was 100% right. There was no margin for moderation, mediation, meditation, or even new information – until the Lord Himself met Paul on that Damascus Road.

It has been said that there are a lot of “used-to-be’s”, a lot of “formerly’s”, in the Kingdom of God.
Thank God for that! Christ is able to transform lives wherever and whenever He encounters us. This is also a bulwark for each of us who are growing into discipleship as we take it to heart; for no matter how “advanced” one becomes, no matter how “perfect”, each of us is still a “formerly”. If it was true of Paul, it is true for each disciple since.

Lord, thank you for calling me from what I was, to what you will make me. The transformation has begun, but it is not yet complete. Keep me from complacency, or pride of achievement, or the self-righteousness which so easily takes hold. Let me be ablaze for you, as Paul was. In the Name of Christ. Amen.


Lusby, Maryland

Wednesday, February 6, 2013

ENVISIONING A SCIENTIFIC FUTURE

BOOK REVIEW: Michio Kaku, The Physics of the Future.

Theoretical physicist and futurist Michio Kaku has given the general reading public a treat with his The Physics of the Future, a tour de force of current developments and enticing possibilities about what may be to come, based on projections of science in the near, middle, and more distant future (defined approximately and variously as within about 10 years, within about 20-30 years, and out 50-100 years or more).

The strengths of Kaku's work are immediately evident. It is a short course on emerging technologies ranging from robotics and the biology of pedagogy to propulsion to nanotechnology. Spanning the physical and life sciences, it represents amazing breadth. It is a vision of tomorrow anchored in science and reason. I found the book to be, in many ways, a literal education.

There are some limits to the book, however, beginning with the title. Though himself a physicist, the book Kaku has authored is really less about science than about its practical applications. It might have more accurately been titled, "The Engineering of the Future". (Realizing as I do that authors often have little control over the titles of their books, this is perhaps more a critique of the publisher than the writer.)

Other limitations include:

1. In spots, the imagination of the writer seems limited. The projections are basically straight-line based on current technical developments, and do not allow for the sudden transformations of paradigm or surges of knowledge which take place in the real world, as we have often seen in modern times but by no means only in recent history. Such sudden, transformational breakthroughs have included: the phonetic alphabet, the arch, printing, and of course the digital computer. Unexpected breakthroughs are of course not things which can be anticipated; however, Kaku's writing and viewpoint, at least in this work, appears to leave little room for them.

2. All religion is seen as superstition. (Though he does occasionally quote from texts viewed as holy by various traditions.)

3. Possibly in part as a consequence of #2, there is a breathtaking moral naivete in the book. The author's position seems to be that if we could just put the smartest, most rational and scientifically-grounded people in charge, then all would be well. Not only does this not take into consideration the difference between various kinds of knowledge and wisdom, but it flies in the face of recent history in terms of the brutality of regimes marked by godless or totalitarian ideologies.

Kaku frequently refers to science conferring "godlike" power and making human beings as gods. This is chilling, not only as an echo of Genesis 3 ("you shall be like gods"), but in implicitly raising the question (as Kaku never does) of what our present society would actually do with "godlike" power.

4. There are a few "dreams" or "visions" of the future which strike this reader as being more in the nature of nightmares. For example: the possibility of robotic replacements for human bodies, offering a kind of faux, cybernetic immortality. On the other hand, when Kaku states that there is nothing inherent in human life that preprograms it for mortality (for instance, the DNA molecule itself transmits immortally from generation to generation), he comes closer than he realizes to affirming principles of Christian theological anthropology.

Very informative and frequently entertaining, Kaku's book is great for what it does. As with many authors, however, when he strays over into areas where he presumes understanding that he does not really possess, he reveals the limitations of his futurology, and provides an unconscious warning about possible things to come.

Kaku, Michio. The Physics of the Future: How Science Will Shape Human Destiny and Our Daily Lives by the Year 2100. Anchor, 2012. 480 pp. in paperback ed. (I listened to the CD edition.)


Prince Frederick, Maryland (Providence)

KEEP THE COLLEGE, BUT DITCH THE 22ND

On the Election and Continuation of the President of the United States

There has been chatter again lately ... as there has been with nearly every Presidential election going back to Jimmy Carter's in 1976 (and probably before, but I just cannot remember) about amending the U.S. Constitution to provide for the direct election of the President by popular vote, rather than through the framers' mechanism of the Electoral College. These calls increase in shrillness whenever a minority President (by popular vote) is elected, or when there is a contentious election like that of 2000.

This call seems to have greater appeal for Democrats than Republicans, perhaps because it seems to reflect a more populist mindset, or perhaps because the Democratic Party has traditionally enjoyed an edge in the plurality of party affiliation. But whether it's cold political calculus ("whether"? did I really say "whether"?) alone, or whether there is an admixture of philosophy behind it, it's a dubious proposition at best.

I say that the framers were wise, and doing away with the College would be a bad idea. Why?

First of all, because it fits with the federalist vision of the Constitution. The problem of population-versus-regional representation is not a new one: it goes back to Virginia and Pennsylvania versus Connecticut and Rhode Island in the 1780's. Abandoning the federalist model would lead to shifts in our political calculus as a country which could effectively freeze out some areas from the levers of power. My own state of Maryland provides an instructive example: since the 1960's, both houses of the General Assembly have been based on population, with the effect that, should any 2 of the three big jurisdictions in the state (by number of people) agree as touches anything on earth, or at least within Maryland, it shall be done for them almost assuredly. (The "Big Three" are Montgomery and Prince Georges counties, and Baltimore City.) This doesn't mean that the outlying counties have no voice (they just have to sway the Big Boys) or influence (the powerful president of the state senate is from Southern Maryland, for instance), but the political clout of much of the state is severely burdened and diluted by this strictly-representational scheme. Which, not coincidentally, also helps to maintain the perpetual majority of one party in power.

In the election of 2000, we witnessed the Florida Fiasco with the crazily compromised balloting of a few jurisdictions, most notoriously West Palm Beach County. Niceties like "hanging chads" would have been a humorous footnote to the election, to which only the most dedicated students of electoral arcana would have paid any attention, were the election not so close that a few popular votes within one closely-contested and very populous state could affect the whole election. This will happen from time to time in any system. There will also be occasional shenanigans, like the stuffed and missing ballot boxes of Texas in 1948, or the (alleged) unsubtle stacking of votes in certain urban precincts like Philadelphia in 2012. But make the whole thing by popular vote, and these problems multiply to potentially as many precincts as there are from sea to shining sea. Every county has the potential to become West Palm Beach. Do we really want that?

A strictly popular vote in a country with predictably "blue" coasts and upper Midwest and "red" prairie and South also invites a permanent sectionalism which would be seen (rightly) as effectively disenfranchising large swaths of the country whose values and political philosophy do not match those of the big cities or coasts. What happens when large numbers of people believe that the political calculus is permanently stacked against them? See 1776. Or 1861. Also not what we want. The current system provides enough uncertainty and shift to keep one region or cluster of regions from gaining a permanent lock on power.

So keep the College. On the other hand, I think we should scrap the 22nd Amendment, limiting the President to two terms in office. The idea of doing away with this amendment, which is particularly championed by Rep. Jose Serrano (D-NY), who introduces a measure to repeal every session and has done so again in the new Congress last month, is one whose time has come.

The 22nd is a codification of tradition going back to George Washington, which held sway from the first through the 31st presidents. The idea was that the American president is different from monarchs; a traditional limit of two terms prevents a king or Napoleon-like figure from emerging. The exigences of World War II was the rationale used by FDR for seeking a third, then a fourth, term. Congress decided to prevent that from happening again by passing the 22nd Amendment, which was proposed in 1947 and ratified almost exactly four years later in 1951. It limits the President to two terms or, in the case of succession to complete a predecessor's term, ten years (half of a term plus two more) in office. (Harry Truman, who was President at the time, was excluded from the law.)

In my opinion, there are good reasons for enacting a 28th amendment repealing the 22nd.

First, and in my mind the most compelling argument, is that any second-term President becomes a lame duck almost the day he (or in the future, she) takes the oath for that second time. The chief of state's hand would be strengthened politically simply with the possibility of election to a subsequent term. In that case, lame-duck status would not begin until after a decision not to run again, or a subsequent lost election. It would also change the stature of former presidents who, like Grover Cleveland (who won) and Theodore Roosevelt (who lost) would always be potential future presidents as well.

A second reason is more philosophical. With the exceptions of the native-born citizen rule and the age requirement (35 years), both of which are in the Constitution, we the people can elect whomever we please as chief executive. Oops, except for someone who has filled two terms already. In effect, one generation has bound the decisions of future ones about who can or cannot be chosen to lead the country. Such is in my view a fundamentally misbegotten idea.

Third, I believe that the world today is much more like the world of FDR than the world of George Washington in two significant ways. We are engaged in ongoing global crisis intervention to a much greater degree, and requiring a much greater acumen (presumably to be gained by experience in office) than in GW's time. Also, we live, on average, much longer and in better health than in Washington's time -- or indeed, than even in the days of Franklin and Harry. It seems silly to limit the use to which the experience of an incumbent, or former president, can be put.

We have examples of world leaders around us who have served long and well. Britain's case is perhaps the most instructive, with Margaret Thatcher (Conservative) and Tony Blair (Labor) both doing well with long tenures, longer in both cases than any American president could serve (11.5 years for Thatcher, 10 years and a month for Blair). Francois Mitterand served 14 years, or two consecutive seven-year terms as president of France, also effectively and with distinction.

We might ask, how might history have been different had there been no 22nd? The presidents affected would have been those from Eisenhower to the present (so far). Eisenhower's age and health would likely have prevented his seeking a third term. Kennedy was assassinated. Johnson chose not to seek the second full term that he could have sought because of unpopularity stemming from the Vietnam War. Nixon resigned during his second term. Ford was defeated at his one attempt to be elected President in his own right, and Carter served for one term only. Reagan probably could not have been re-elected for a third term, given his age and the Alzheimer's Disease which was beginning to become apparent and to which he would eventually succumb -- though he certainly enjoyed sufficient popularity to stand again. George Bush (41) was defeated on his re-election bid. Clinton probably could have, and would have, been re-elected. George W. Bush (43) would likely not have stood, and would likely not have won. It is too early to tell about President Obama.

Thus in the history of the United States since Truman, there is only one person who likely could have run and been re-elected. Though I am not a huge fan of Mr. Bill, it is worth pausing to think about how he might have handled, say, 9-11-2001. One could argue that our national foreign and security policies up to that time contributed to the attack's success. And certainly it is hard to imagine President Clinton reacting with the same quick decisiveness that won accolades and respect for Bush soon after 9/11. But Clinton also enjoyed a kind of respect and cooperative relationship around the world that we have not seen since those early post-9/11 days, and it's quite possible he might have avoided some of the mistakes made in Iraq and Afghanistan under his successors. In other words, we could have done worse than re-electing Bill Clinton. And arguably, have.

The Framers were not omniscient. Parts of the Constitution have at times desperately cried out for amendment, such as those concerning human servitude and the election of senators. Oversights have needed to be corrected, injustices righted, and things that just didn't work, fixed. But in most ways Mr. Madison and his peers got it amazingly right. And to my mind, these two, the Electoral College and the absence of a term limit for the President of the United States, are among them.

So let's keep the College, and ditch the 22nd.


Prince Frederick, Maryland (Providence)


"I Thank Him"

THE COMPELLING APPOINTMENT: 1 Timothy 1:12
I thank him who has given me strength, Christ Jesus our Lord, because he judged me faithful appointing me to his service.

Having wrapped up his discussion on the danger of false teaching, Paul moves on to the matter of his own calling and credentials for writing, giving both positive and negative examples and points for his protege, Timothy.

[He] who has given me strength. The task is too much for the Apostle alone, as it is for any of us. On the other hand, God does not call and deploy without giving the means to do the job, whether of internal or external resources. This is absolutely necessary. In my father's office for many years there has hung a framed prayer for ministry, imploring the guidance and protection of God lest the one making the prayer make a mess of everything. Anyone who has sought to fulfill a spiritual calling knows well the aptness of this prayer, and the dangers which lurk close by. But God is faithful to lend the strength necessary to the occasion. What is required from us is faith: not in the sense of some kind of herculean spiritual effort that we have to work up to, but like the simple turning of a tap to open the way for God's resourcing to flow, saying "yes, I will trust" to God's offer of all things needful. Faith is our assent, yours and mine, to the abundant provision of God.

To faith, then, God adds not just ability and skill but stamina, too, to continue. To stamina God adds anointing. To anointing, God adds wisdom. To wisdom, God adds compassion. And to compassion, love. This is the strength which God imparts to us.

He judged me faithful. Paul (as he will soon aver) was a persecutor of the church! He would have seemed the last man to be trusted -- as his first experience at Damascus and Jerusalem proved. Yet God had other plans. In what sense then is this true?

Paul had faith. He trusted God, and knew God's power, even if it was at first wrongly applied.

Paul was devoted. He gave 125% of his effort (as we say) to the "cause", whether it was his misguided cause (opposing God's work by persecuting "the Way" of Christ) or his later, holy one. The energy was there and focused in intensity -- it just needed to be focused in the right direction. Many of the Church's greatest leaders over the years were persons who had great flaws or who had been at one time great persecutors of the faith, but whom God turned in a different direction.

Paul was faithful in his work. Starting from the beginning (see Acts 9), he persevered against all odds and under all circumstances, to the end.

Appointed to His service. Jesus said, "Many are called, but few are chosen." Paul could not keep the message to himself. The call is a sacred one, and the Holy Spirit opened the doors for the Apostle to fulfill it.


Lord Jesus Christ, you have given me strength to do Your work. Grant that I may live fully-charged and fully-engaged in the work to which You call me, as You have been to me. Appoint me each day to my allotted tasks for You, but let me ever fulfill them in loving service to You. In Your holy Name I pray, Lord Christ. Amen.


Prince Frederick, Maryland (Providence)