Watched bits of House with the wife last night. I'm not glued to it like I am to Heroes, but its interesting.

I liked what the show did with the pregant raped woman, in that they have House, the guy who is crass and insensitive, making all the pro-choice arguments against the girl. Something about that makes me at least hopeful it would make people sit up and think.

I do think, though, that the girl should have cited Godwin's Law when House tried to argue against the sanctity of life by mentioning Hitler.

If the WCF teaches that God expects a certain amount of merit to be accrued in a covenant of works by Jesus keeping of the law, and then that merit is imputed to believers for their justificaion, the WCF does not seem to have a defender in Kline's Kingdom Prologue, at least

Our finding is that under God’s covenant with mankind in Adam attainment of the eschatological kingdom and Sabbath rest was governed by a principle of works. Adam, representative of mankind, was commissioned to fulfill the probationary assignment; he must perform the one meritorious act of righteousness. This act was to have the character of a victory in battle. An encounter with Satan was a critical aspect of the probationary crisis for each of the two Adams. To enter into judicial combat against this enemy of God and to vanquish him in the name of God was the covenantal assignment that must be performed by the servant of the Lord as his “one act of righteousness.” And it was the winning of this victory of righteousness by the one that would be imputed to the many as their act of righteousness and as their claim on the consummated kingdom proferred in the covenant.

But if Jesus won his battle against Satan by dying on the Cross, (and preliminarily, by resisting his temptations) then it is "passive" righteousness that is imputed for our whole justification and

Certainly not "active righteousness" in the sense of a quantity of merit achieved by compliance with a law-code.

S. M. Hutchens of Touchstone has also reviewed Stackhouse's Finally Feminist. With wit, if not charm.

Genesis again is at the root of the controversey, Stackhouse seeming to see Adam as a being created "male and female" at least at first.

Vladimir Putin's Bible

(from inside his gold-plated personal jet).

It doesn't look very used.

I was pleased to note that the Origins Game Convention held around July 4 in Columbus Ohio, has extended it's "Teacher's Hall Pass" free registration to homeschoolers as well. A regular membership is about $70. The site says for proof of your homeschooling status they'll accept

copy of your state or town registration letter, HSLDA receipt or membership card (Homeschool Legal Defense Association), or your local or state homeschool newsletter with an address label that shows your home address.

The deadline for early-bird regular registration ($50) is January 31.

So Adam had to have a certain amount of merit to merit eternal life in the Covenant of Works.

Jesus came and merited that merit by his works. Were his works only of equal value to those demanded of Adam under the CoW? It would seem odd that the works of the Divine Son would only be equal to those of Adam in the garden. But if they were of greater value, then is that greater value imputed to us in justification?

If not, why not? And if so, does that mean that the rest of our imputed merits that exceed those requires by the CoW go into a "treasury" of merits? What happens to the excess.

I think a better area of discussion in applying the bible's perspective to the modern world than questions of a) women's ordination or being in the workforce, or of b) what place slavery had in the Bible or nowadays is labor relations.

Ok, we don't have slaves and masters anymore. But then is Paul a dead letter on that? But I've frequently heard those texts applied to labor relations: we should work hard and treat bosses with respect.

But then, is it permissible for a Christians to go on strike? If not, doesn't *that* kind of message go against the modern grain rather severely? If not, why don't more people know that's the Christian position? We're very quiet about it. If it is permissible, then do the master/slave passages then have little to nothing to say about labor relations?

BTW, my comment provider has taken comments down for a revision. They should be back eventually

I think the best argument against women's ordination or preaching is the liturgical one, which Presbyterians are loathe to make: The minister stands in the place of Jesus as husband to the bride when performing his office in preaching the word and administering the [Marriage] supper. Women can't do this.

So I wonder if Stackhouse deals with those kinds of questions. If its all 'analogy with slavery', I think that's a weak reed. I doubt I'll find out any time soon.

In any case, I think Bauer is totally justified in writing the kind of review she did, because the way the critics of Bauer's "endorsement" of Stackhouse in a web article proceeded. Bauer's account is accurate

This fairly mild pronouncement got highlighted on Gender-News.com, which published a headline story announcing that "many evangelicals may have been blindsided" by my blog entry, and quoted Randy Stinson of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood as saying, "She is undermining biblical authority by holding her current position on the gender issue." On the Reformation 21 blog, a poster wrote that my approving citation of Stackhouse's book shows that I have taken a position "in knowing contradiction to the teaching of the Bible; at that point the earth begins to give way.

The entire thing, if I may speculate on motives, smacked of an attempt to hit Bauer in the pocketbook, by suddenly trashing her reputation among evangelical homeschoolers. "Watch out, ultra-conservatives you have a fifth columnist hiding in a blue jumper"

Mayor Street attributes part of the cause of increased violence in Philadelphia to Iraq

I believe the fact that we are a country at war has something to do with the attitude of people in the streets. Let me tell you, it's not just this city. I have seen it everywhere and I've talked to people a lot about it

But also note:

Street said an administration goal this year is to train 1,000 clergy members in conflict-resolution techniques and then get them talking with young people on the streets, in churches and in schools.

1) Can he do that?

2) Will that be effective?

Peter Leithart:

Anti-sacramental, anti-ritual evangelicalism emphasizes a personal relationship with God, but tends to encourage what Anthony Giddens calls "pure relationship," a relationship that is not tacked down with external anchors and supports. A live-in relationship, without benefit of the rites and legalities of marriage, is a pure relationship. Evangelicalism tends to encourage a live-in relationship with Jesus.

This may also lend more weight to an as yet unexamined (?) apostasy passage, 2 Corinthians 11:2

I feel a divine jealousy for you, for I betrothed you to one husband, to present you as a pure virgin to Christ. 3But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ. 4For if someone comes and proclaims another Jesus than the one we proclaimed, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or if you accept a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it readily enough.

What's going on here? The Corinthians ARE betrothed (past tense) to Christ by Paul. And they have innocent sincere, and pure devotion, now, that Paul fears that will be led astray, in such a way as the very Fall itself. The Corinthians are tolerating people who proclaim another gospel. They are receiving a different spirit than the one they ALREADY received.

1. They are in innocence, and might fall.
2. They have sincere and pure devotion now, but can be led astray
3. They are substituting one spirit for the Holy Spirit.
4. They are united to Christ in betrothal, but he may end up breaking the betrothal.

Those common operations are looking pretty close to salvific to me....All they'd have to do is maintain the benefits they have, but are in jeopardy of losing. Since they could loose them, they have to be 'common operations', but...

"Rodney Trotter" (I think its Karl "Marx" Trueman), at Ref21, turns up the humor in the debate over paedocommunion by sardonically writing up fake news about giving communion ot kids in utero.

Of course, it would be funnier if he recalled that Jordan argued that kids already get communion in utero through the mom; since Samson's mom had to abstain to keep her kid a pure nazirite. The theology seems to be that for sacrmaento-symbolico purposes, the mom transmitts significant food to the blastocysts inside her.

Trotter was pretty funny. He should try to inject more levity into the discussion.

Tim Gallant replies to R Scott Clark on 1 Corinthians 11.

Interesting stuff. It seems easy to forget that there is an irreducably "horizontal" relationship between us and Jesus Christ, which is the foundation of any vertical one. That's the point of the incarnation and federal headship of Christ, and consistent with Calvin's insistence that we communed with the human nature of Christ in the eucharist.

If we want to honor the intentions of the founder of an institution, we need to respect the members of the institution even when he's not there.

Sometimes theology gets straneg when you try to encompass angels in it.

That relization dawned when I tried to consider if the angles were under a covenant of works or not.

But do angels know who is elect or not?

On the one hand, maybe they do. We're not told anything explicit.

1 Peter 1:12 does indicate that angels have an intent interest in some of god's plans which they are not fully aware of. Maybe that means they wouldn't know who was elect either. Election has the place of the ur-mystery of reformed theology, it would be odd if the angels knew all about it, but lesser mysteries (which ones) were the ones they were concerned about. The secret things belong to the Lord, so why would angels get to know.

But what if then, they don't? God administers the world through angels. God tells one to do something and he does it.

Jesus seems to indicate (John 1:51) that angels are employed by God in some way for the benefit of his people. If God seeks to benefit an elect person, it may very well be through the secondary cause of an angel (God can do it directly as well).

But if angels don't know who is elect or not, then either they find out because God only tells them to benefit elect persons or they don't find out because God directs them to do things that are inscrutable to the angels themselves. They administer only common curse and common grace, and don't have warrant to conclude anything about the elect status of any of the people they act twoards.

Of course, God wants his people to serve him as well. There is covenantal grace. An elect pastor can tell the gospel or baptize an elect recipient and God intends that as a work of special grace to the person. A reprobate minister can declare the gospel or baptize a reprobate and God intends it as a work of merely covenantal grace to the person. The ministers will never know in this life which it was.

The interesting thing about angels is the reference in John 1:51 though, since it seems to mean, if anything, that the atonement of Jesus, lifted up on the cross, is how angels are now mediated to people. If angels ascend and descend for our benefit, it is through the Son of Man. Either the work of angels mediated through the son of man only mediate common curse and common grace and don't the status of those they intract with, or they only mediate special grace and thereby known the status of their charges.

Phil Ryken says

One of the most important questions we ask prospective pastoral interns at Tenth Church is: "How do people grow spiritually?" The answer quickly reveals whether or not candidates are grace-oriented in their discipleship

I wonder what happens if someone answers

Since the law's promises show me God's approbation of obedience, and what blessings I may expect upon performance, that I therefore do good, and refrain from evil, because the law encourages to the one and deters from the other

I suppose that that would be acceptable, but maybe not to the point about how people "grow".

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Not true!

Cornelius is a believer in God.

When Peter tells him the message about Jesus, the Holy Spirit comes on cornelius as it had come on Peter. This lets Peter know that Cornelius qualifies to be a member of the church just like Peter.

Does it mean that Cornelius has been effectually called? Could Cornelius look back to that event and take assurance from it?

Did anyone on whom the Holy Spirit came in such a visible way ever apostasise?

Peter later says at the Jerusalem Council that he takes the extraordinary visible manifestation of the Spirit as a sign that God, who knows the heart showed he was accepting the Gentiles by giving them the outward manifestation. Does Peter have a theology where some outward sign provides infallible, determinative evidence of God's effectual calling?

Acts 15:12 indicates that the entirety of the convincing evidence of the effectual calling of the gentiles were miraculous signs and wonders.

Apparently the Washington Post, in reporting on the excellent news about the Falls Church's stand for truth in the Episcopal Church, decides to highlight their charsimatic tendencies.

Parishioners say it happens quietly, unobtrusively: As the sick make their way to the altar, some worshipers begin speaking in tongues. Occasionally, one is "arrested in the spirit," falling unconscious into the arms of a fellow congregant.

The special faith-healing services, held one Sunday night a month at The Falls Church in Fairfax, are a rarity in the Episcopal Church. But members of The Falls Church have long felt at odds with fellow Episcopalians, who they believe have been drifting theologically in an ever more liberal direction.

It seemed pretty normal to me the two times I visited. One regular attender didn't like the WaPo's take

When I read the lede, I had to check to make sure he was talking about my church, so far off was it from my own experiences. If anything, the congregation at The Falls Church is achingly normal, with its merino wool V-neck sweaters, and Vera Bradley diaper bags, and 2.5 children per family-- shaggy-haired, flip-flopped teenaged boys and dirty-blonde pre-teen girls flipping their first sets of highlights.

There's also an interesting complaint from her: "The writers of this article refer to the Episcopalians as the "frozen chosen," but that's a common nickname for Presbyterians."

Actually, I've heard of it on both sides, and my ex-episco wife can attest.

My favorite variant is when the fire breaks out in the church, the charismatic shouts "fire! fire!", the baptist shouts "water! Water!" and the presbyterian/anglican shouts "order! order!".

If you "slice into their lives" at one particular moment, who had a stronger relationship with God? Or whose "faith" was being exercised more effectively? David while he was sinning with Bathsheba and Uriah, or Ahab while he was repenting?

Even God seems impressed with Ahab's repentance in 1 Kings 21:28-29

Then the word of the LORD came to Elijah the Tishbite: "Have you noticed how Ahab has humbled himself before me? Because he has humbled himself, I will not bring this disaster in his day, but I will bring it on his house in the days of his son."

I'm quite enjoying Peter Leithart's new commentary on Kings, and his emphasis on how "scandalously" tolerant God is of the sins of Israel and her kings.