Steadfast

The English Bible is certainly overwhelmed with translations. And while many will get up in arms about which one is the "best," the reality is that each one has its issues and they are all quite far from the original text. One must read the Bible this way.

I use the English Standard Version (ESV) for the most part, but I'm not here to fight about it.

I'm writing to talk about the word, "steadfast." Each of my mornings as a now married man of routine begin this way: make coffee, shower, get coffee and a bite to eat and sit down to read my Bible. I once heard someone say, "Seek the face of God before you seek the face of man," and I liked that.

In my daily reading of the Christian Scriptures, I gravitate toward the Psalms. Along with the Epistles, these holy songs were meant to be read and sung over and over again. They were written with a heart for them to last generations, that many people would sing and read these words for a long time. I like to start my day with a Psalm and something else that I've been reading in the Scirptures.

In the ESV translation of the Psalms, the scholars use this English word, "steadfast," constantly. In a quick word study, I found that for most of its uses, it is inserted in order to modify the word, "love," when describing God's capacity for love.

Honestly, this was an issue for me when I first started reading the ESV about 4 years ago. However, in studying the Hebrew and the Greek and even the English word itself, I've begin to wait for that word in the Psalms.
Resolute. Loyal. Constant. Dependable. Dutifully firm. Determined. Solid. Unwavering.

The Hebrew word can be separated into two words: "sure/enduring" and "statute."

It's probably best to read the Scriptures with a solid English vocabulary. Most ancient languages worked like this: use as little amount of words to say as much as possible. That's why we have so many issues with translating ancient documents. One word could mean so many things.

If you approach repetitive words with a better understanding of that particular word, you understand that God's love is not just steadfast. It is Resolute, Constant, Dutifully firm, and Unwavering. It is a determined type of love, fixed in perfection for eternity.

Singing Groomsmen

As my bride walked down the aisle, she was walking to the harmonious sound of my best friends singing a capella. Here's a video of the boys warming up before the ceremony.

A Capella Groomsmen, A Boy's Choir from Chris Nye on Vimeo.

Conquered Words: August

This is my monthly post where I tell you what I have read and (ever so briefly) what I thought about each work. If you haven't read these books, then read this blog and pretend that you did!

Well I'm a month plus into marriage and I couldn't be happier. A little less reading this month, but enough has been conquered to write home about.

1) Sag Harbor by Colson Whitehead (Anchor, 352 pages). I did NOT finish this book, mainly because after high hopes and 63 pages I discovered it was very tough to read. Not like, "I can't read your language little boy!" unreadability, but more like, "I don't get your voice because it is at times inconsistent" type of thing going on. Whitehead comes highly recognized and recommended, but I'm afraid the voice and slow moving plot was simply not enough to keep me. It's probably because I'm not civilized enough to get it. It's not you, Whitehead, it's me.

2) Revival by Dr. D. Martin Lloyd-Jones (Crossway Books, 316 pages). Simply called, "The Doctor," Lloyd-Jones is one of my intellectual mentors. He was perhaps the most influential preachers in all of Europe in the 50s and 60s and he held the Westminster Chapel in England for most of his life as a minister. Before stepping into preaching, the Doctor was exactly that, a physician. His writing and preaching is some of the best and he has such a unique way of describing the things and commands of God I am consistently astonished. I had already read part of this work, a study on revival (duh), in previous years, but only have recently picked it up in order to understand more fully what God does when he works immediately and deeply at the same time. Finishing his series and closing the last chapter, the Doctor is profound in his charge to his church: "Seek him, stir yourself up to call upon his name. Take hold upon him, plead with him as your Father, as your Maker, as your Potter, as your Guide, as your God. Plead his own promises. Cry unto him and say, "Oh that thou wouldest rend the heavens, that thou wouldest come down!" He was a true man of God and a true scholar, one of the few people I can safely call a passionate genius.

3) Selected Stories by Andre Dubus (Vintage, 496 pages). Ali and I are both reading the short stories of the great Andre Dubus and we're both floored. You might have heard of his more famous novel, In The Bedroom. These stories in Selected are simply phenomenal. They have a strange calming madness to them, where the emptiness of sin is astonishingly prevalent. Dubus has a pen for the lonely. I've never read anyone who can capture as much emotion as he can is such few words and, at times, such simple prose. It certainly has to do with his own experience, Dubus was diagnosed with multiple psychological disorders including deep clinical depression from an accident that left him unable to walk. He was assisting some disabled people on the side of the road, trying to help them to safety, when an oncoming car hit him and one of the disabled persons. The disabled man was killed and Dubus lost the use of his legs. The woman was saved because Dubus pushed her out of the way. His own story and mind tend to bleed through the pages of his short prose work and it's humbling. I'll be reading his novels in the future.

Well, that's what's happening.

Keep reading, my friends.

God Don't Need No Camp

If you're unfamiliar with current evangelical church ministry, let me bring you in for a second.

For the most part, a youth ministry's great crescendo is summer camp. We work all year to disciple and build up students, but we get a huge surge of energy and momentum when we all go to camp. Camp is just awesome and things really happen there. In fact, it's normal that the most movement we see in students' lives happens over our time at summer camp.

Because of our change in leadership at Willamette Christian Church's high school ministry, we ended up not going to camp. A huge bummer. I was getting married and wasn't really in full leadership capacity when planning needed to happen. It sucked.

But what has been refreshing about this summer, is that I learned that God can move when he wants. He doesn't need a camp. In fact, he doesn't even need any person in particular.

During this summer, I have been continually amazed at what this God has done. I know many of you who read this blog do not know this God personally or closely, and so my desire in this post is to point you over to our ministry's blog to show you that God does change lives and renew communities and families.

If you so desire, take the time to look over here at what my God has done amidst his kids this summer. Without camp.

Russell D. Moore, You Gentlemanly Scholar!

Dr. Russell D. Moore is a one of a kind Christian scholar. For the most part, I've tried to get through his books and his lectures, but they're just too boring. I've often had trouble with current Christian scholarship and Dr. Moore is no exception.

EXCEPT FOR HIS AMAZING BLOGGY.

That guy is an ace. When Moore needs to be concise (or as he puts it, "Moore to the Point." Hilarious!), he is a dream to read. For all of the blog posts and sermons that helped the church recognize how to think about 9/11, Moore was there to put it into words so perfectly. When we were confused by the earthquake in Haiti, Moore was helpful in dismissing the thoughts of Pat Robertson and elevating the God of the Bible.

Here, yet again, Moore respectfully and profoundly dismisses the political church of America: both the Left and the Right.

His post, "God, the Gospel, and Glenn Beck," is suuuuuuch a goooooood read. Why are so many Christians following Beck? Do we blame Beck like so many on the Left do?

Ahem:

Beck isn’t the problem. He’s an entrepreneur, he’s brilliant, and, hats off to him, he knows his market. Latter-day Saints have every right to speak, with full religious liberty, in the public square. I’m quite willing to work with Mormons on various issues, as citizens working for the common good. What concerns me here is not what this says about Beck or the “Tea Party” or any other entertainment or political figure. What concerns me is about what this says about the Christian churches in the United States.

It’s taken us a long time to get here, in this plummet from Francis Schaeffer to Glenn Beck. In order to be this gullible, American Christians have had to endure years of vacuous talk about undefined “revival” and “turning America back to God” that was less about anything uniquely Christian than about, at best, a generically theistic civil religion and, at worst, some partisan political movement.

I honestly have no idea how else to say what Moore says here. Let's have another, shall we?

Rather than cultivating a Christian vision of justice and the common good (which would have, by necessity, been nuanced enough to put us sometimes at odds with our political allies), we’ve relied on populist God-and-country sloganeering and outrage-generating talking heads. We’ve tolerated heresy and buffoonery in our leadership as long as with it there is sufficient political “conservatism” and a sufficient commercial venue to sell our books and products.

Too often, and for too long, American “Christianity” has been a political agenda in search of a gospel useful enough to accommodate it.

Glenn Beck is a brilliant entrepreneur, but he is in no way a representation of what it means to live life in the Kingdom of God. In his message that is filled with vague rhetoric of "restoring America" and "restoring honor," I hear nothing of the gospel. So why are there so many Christians following him?

Where there is no gospel, something else will fill the void: therapy, consumerism, racial or class resentment, utopian politics, crazy conspiracy theories of the left, crazy conspiracy theories of the right; anything will do.

It’s sad to see so many Christians confusing Mormon politics or American nationalism with the gospel of Jesus Christ. But, don’t get me wrong, I’m not pessimistic. Jesus will build his church, and he will build it on the gospel. He doesn’t need American Christianity to do it. Vibrant, loving, orthodox Christianity will flourish, perhaps among the poor of Haiti or the persecuted of Sudan or the outlawed of China, but it will flourish.

And there will be a new generation, in America and elsewhere, who will be ready for a gospel that is more than just Fox News at prayer.

Read the whole thing here.