The Best (Christian) Books of All Time?

Over at InterVarsity's Emerging Scholars Blog they're asking for nominations for the best Christian books of all time.  There will be a voting bracket created and a sort of "March Madness" will take place.  There have been nominations for Tolkien's Lord of The Rings series, Augustine's Confessions, C.S. Lewis' Mere Christianity, and so forth.  Your input would be most excellent!

Cure for a deadlier cancer than that of the lungs:

a microscopic image of developing cancer (NPR)

"It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick [...] I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners." -Jesus

I wonder if, when Jesus said this, he made finger quotes around "healthy" and "righteous." It's not the "healthy" who need a doctor. I have not come to call the "righteous," but sinners.  The sinners who know that they're sick. Funny that he's making this statement to the religious elite. The "righteous" ones.

With this doctor nobody is ever too sick, or too late through the doors. But people who think they're healthy don't go inside. Those who are content with the present conditions of the world don't see the point of the cross. If you're sure you don't need Jesus, he didn't come for you. But if, somewhere inside, you know that the sickness is spreading and it's stealing your joy, then also know this: there is this one who can take away the sickness, cynicism, bitterness, loneliness and fear, replacing it with the simple, nearly forgotten joy of your childhood.

To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable. C.S. Lewis

Why Celebrate?

My third post on Lent is up on InterVarsity's Emerging Scholars Blog.  See it here.

Here's an excerpt:
"...That’s 'exodus.'  Moses and Elijah spoke with Jesus about his exodus.  In the Jewish world of the first century, under the oppressive rule of Tiberius Caesar, 'exodus' was charged to the point of buzzing.  Especially in conversations with Moses.  Jesus was headed to Jerusalem to bring the exodus to fulfillment.  To drive the point further, in 9:51 Luke tells us, 'When the time had fully come for his ascension, Jesus firmly set his countenance toward entering Jerusalem.'"

Series on Spiritual Formation and Lent

Over at InterVarsity's "Emerging Scholars Blog" I'm writing a series on Lent and spiritual formation.  My introductory post is here and the first post on Ash Wednesday, here.  I'm writing an article every week, publishing on Wednesday mornings.  Here's the first paragraph from the Ash Wednesday post:

Lent is Church language.  For countless jaded Christians the word implies little more than hypocrisy and self-righteousness.  For others it’s that time of year to give up coffee or baked goods for a few weeks.  When some think of it, this might pop into their heads: “It seems like I remember my sin enough without smudging it on my face and going without my favorite drink for a month and a half.”  I invited a friend to the Ash Wednesday service with a local Catholic congregation and this was his response: “Nah man.  I like my coffee.”  And then he added, chuckling, “When I hear ‘Lent’ I think of my Catholic friends giving up some piddly thing and making a big deal about it on Facebook.”  He has a legitimate critique.  There are, in my experience, a precious few who really get the point of dabbing a bit of ash on their foreheads.  And that is, in part, why I’m writing this series.

All Things Came To Be Through Him

A friend asked me about the Greek verb egeneto (ἐγένετο) in the prologue of the Gospel of John (vv. 1-18).  It is a form of the verb ginomai (γίνομαι), and its presence--it occurs 9 times in the first 18 verses--is obvious and intentional.  Usually translated, "come to be," implying existence and creation, it is the same word used in Genesis 1 in the Septuagint (the Ancient Greek Old Testament) for: "And God said, 'Let there be light.'  And there was light."  More accurately: "And God said, 'Let light come to be,' and light came to be."  An experienced reader, Jew or Greek, wouldn't have missed John's point.

It's the verb of creation, and John's Gospel sings out the proclamation that YHWH's creation is Jesus' creation and YHWH is still in the business of making new things.

Furthermore, forms of that same verb, ginomai, are usually employed in prophetic books when the author says, "And the word of YHWH came to me."  Ezekiel 38:1 is an excellent example of this.  If it isn't stretching the notion too far, when the author tells us that the word of YWHW has arrived, it implies a creative arrival, a new word picture is about to be painted, a new vision cast.

Another intriguing parallel needs to be added here.  John's Gospel begins like this: "In the beginning was the word"  (en arche ein ho logos).  It's the same word that came to the prophets, and the same word that spoke creation into being.  The creative word of YHWH, that which breathed life into the cosmos and appeared with prophetic visions of hope -- that word (logos) was Jesus.

People often say that John was written primarily for the Greeks, because he was drawing on the Pre-Socratic and Platonic idea of the "underlying logos" of all things.  But it seems to me that he was singing polyphonically, in one octave to the Jews and another to the Greeks.  The Jews were not strangers to YHWH's logos ("word"), nor were they strangers to the idea of egeneto ("came to be")-- the coming into being of the cosmos in the case of Genesis and prophesy and vision through God's logos in the case of the prophets.

John is introducing the Creator of the world once again.  He's saying, "Look, Jesus created the stars and the earth and it was Jesus who separated the land from the seas!  And now he's here, setting up, creating again!"

One last thought.  The same verb is used in 2 Corinthians 5:21: "For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God."  A new creation has already happened if you're a believer.  And since the Greek verb is in the present tense here, it implies a process of creation.  God isn't done with us.

Augustine on Religion and Philosophy.

Augustine of Hippo once said that Christians, "believe and teach that, as for salvation, there is not one thing called philosophy, that is, the search for wisdom, and another thing called religion" (de vera religione 5.8; Tr. William Harmless, S.J.).

I tend to agree.

I want you to tell me what's real.

I want to ask a question, and I do want to know what you think.  Please comment.

What is real?  And, if you're feeling extra ambitious, what is required to prove to you that something is real?

I realize that this is a rather ethereal question, but I think having an answer--or at least recognizing it as a question to be worked out--is pretty important.  Today's common unconscious answer seems to be anything which is or can be proven by science.  Since most of us are not scientists, this sort of answer -- Never mind.  I want to hear your thoughts in the comment thread.