Psalm 127:5 in the ESV and "What He Must Be..."

I've been reading "What He Must Be... If He Wants to Marry My Daughter" by Voddie Baucham, and really enjoying this title. So much of this instruction is directly relevant to my own situation of not only preparing and direction my own children spiritually for their future spouses, but also in terms of cultivating an understanding of what to be looking for in future sutors.  I will likely have more to post about this book later.

We attended Voddie's church in Houston a couple years ago, and other than a few minor doctrinal issues I think he's a fantastic teacher, and what he covers in this book will definitely be considered controversial by many, both in and out of the church.  Not many people like to hear someone defend and encourage the principle that a potential son-in-law, other than just being an upright individual with a genuine Christian faith, must also be a man who loves and craves having children.  In a day and age where some evangelicals like to dismiss the creation mandate, I love reading from the occasional pastor who defends (and encourages) believers to have large families.

Especially interesting to me was Voddie's elaboration on Psalm 127:5 (the "quiver" passage) from the ESV.  As he states in the book (pg. 123-124) there are many translations of the Bible that render this passage, speaking of the blessing of children, as "blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them".  But the ESV picks up a missed nuance, "Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them!"  Voddie points out the crucial distinction: "this rendering paints the picture of a man who desires children, who seeks children.  What a scathing rebuke to those in our culture who do not value children."

Psalm 139:23-24

Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: and see if there be any wicked way in me."

Reasoning from the Scriptures with Catholics

At Oak Ridge we've recently started a series on Reasoning from the Scriptures with Catholics by Ray Rhodes.  It's a fairly interesting book, and I'm about half-way through it so far.  The book is a well-written overview of some of the principle Catholic beliefs and why these often do not jive with Scripture, and while it can be read straight through it also serves as a nice reference resource when you need to look up certain topics like the Apocrypha and so on.

The only thing notable absent from the book, that I would have liked to have seen more information about, is the topic of birth control and family size, but I have a feeling that Rhodes deliberately avoided this topic simply because it is such a massive can o' worms.  The dichotomy seems to be one of: most Protestants settle for "two kids and a vasectomy", while most Catholics find curious loop-holes like NFP (or just blatant disregard of papal teaching on birth control), and in both scenarios the Biblical mandates to be "fruitful and multiply" are more or less dismissed as contextual (or inconvenient.)  I would have liked to have seen this issue covered more.  My own observation is that in recent history there was a trend of seeing "large Catholic families", but I think this practice was based more on papal-writ on avoiding birth control as "evil", and not as much on the Biblical blessing of a full quiver (Psalm 127.)

Yet to me, when I consider Roman Catholicism, although I consider such a tremendous amount of their teaching so heretical and contradictory to Scripture, I do admire their strong pro-life position, which often feels more vocally powerful than that of the protestants.  I also respect how Catholics often seem to have stronger grasp on Church history and the writings of the early church fathers, a study that it would do many Protestants good to investigate further.  But beside this, there can never really be true ecumenical union with Protestants and Catholics because at the core of true Biblical Christianity is one key, consistently backed by Scripture: Salvation by faith alone, in Christ alone, by God's grace alone, according to Scripture alone, for the glory of God alone.

I Corinthians 15:22

Our trip to the children's doctor last week brought to mind some ideas for this post.  We had a long discussion with the doctor about the vaccine/autism controversy, and our doctor, while very cautious in the administration of vaccines to small kids, mentioned that in her own research, the rapid rise of autism shouldn't be blamed entirely on vaccines, but instead that there are a number of environmental factors that play a part: toxins in food, water, the air, our clothing, etc.
As we discussed this, it really brought home to me the reminder that we do live in a fallen world, and as, part of the punishment and curse of sin is the effects we experience from the fallen world.

“For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:22)

There can be a temptation in our lives to think that, if we feel good, we have things and stuff and have no problems, that we are in a way indestructible. But the reality is that we are under the taint and curse of Adam, and as such, the world that we live in is equally fallen, leaving us prone to sickness and illness from our environment and other factors. No matter how clean we scrub the earth and sky, and how well we take care of our bodies, all of us are under sin's curse, of which the outcome for all of us is death.

But praise God for the gift of Jesus Christ, and his free gift of grace, shared for us on the cross of Calvary! While our mortal bodies are still prone to the ravages of sin and death, we have hope in the resurrection of our Savior!

Now while we live by faith and know that there is life everlasting beyond our mortal bodies, at the same time, this assurance of grace and salvation should not make us cynical to the responsibility to be good stewards of our health and the planet. The body...

“...is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God” (I Cor. 1:19)

and the earth...

“...is the LORD's, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it” (Psalm 24:1)

We have a responsibility to care for both, not under legalistic obligation, but rather doing so to give God the glory and honor. We should be mindful of caring for the bodies he's given to us, and also do what we can to take care of the earth, while being cautious not to fall into the trap of worshiping self or the earth.

We have remarkable designed bodies, and the world around us is beautiful and wonderfully made. We should continuously give praise and glory to the God who gives us our lives and a world to love Him in, all the while looking forward to the return of our Savior and the new life to come.

Psalm 139

Some quick sermon notes from a few months ago:

In Psalm 139 David is praising God for the omni-aspects of his nature:

• Omnipresent
• Omnipotent
  
• Omniscient

David acknowledges that he is unable to hide (in a negative sense), yet at the same time the positive aspect remains that he is never away from God's presence.

All of human life, even that of the unborn, is a miracle. In Psalm 139 David, contemplating the fetus in the womb, responds by giving thanks to God.