Sunspots 697

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Christianity: Christianity Today reports on the shockingly low numbers of refugees, and refugees who have been persecuted for being Christians, that entered the US last year.

A Christianity Today author on the stress of caring for kids at home and for aging parents, at the same time.

Relevant responds to a question about whether giving to Christian charities makes it unnecessary to tithe to one's church.

Relevant also offers an essay on "Five Myths of Christian Political Engagement."


Computing: Gizmo's Freeware on an application that lets you listen to radio stations from all over the world, free.


Health: National Public Radio reports that patients with colds want doctors to prescribe antibiotics, even though such medications aren't effective against viruses, and may contribute to antibiotic resistance.

National Public Radio also reports on using apps to help you go to sleep. Some of them work!
The Scientist reports that abdominal fat can play a role in protecting us. (Too much of it is still bad for us!)

Philosophy: A Scientific American writer argues that science can never solve the mind-body problem. (Here's the Wikipedia article on that problem.)


Science: Listverse tells us about Europa, the most interesting moon of Jupiter.

Earther reports on high-flying (like about 8+ kilometers up) bacteria, and their effect on weather, and maybe on disease transmission.

The graphic used in these posts is from NASA, hence, I believe, it is public domain.
Thanks for looking!

The Art of Divine Contentment: An Exposition of Philippians 4:11 by Thomas Watson. Excerpt 21

I know that, in North America, at least, this is Easter, and He is Risen. But I'll continue the series.

Watson has been writing about excuses for not being contented. He continues:

The third apology is, it is sad with me in my relations: where I should find most comfort, there I have most grief. This apology or objection brancheth itself into two particulars, whereto I shall give a distinct reply.

1st. My child goes on in rebellion; I fear I have brought forth a child for the devil. It is indeed, sad to think, that hell should be paved with the skulls of any of our children; and certainly the pangs of grief which the mother hath in this kind, are worse than her pangs of travail; but though you ought to be humbled, yet not discontented; for, consider, 1. You may pick something out of your child’s undutifulness; the child’s sin is sometimes the parent’s sermon; the undutifulness of children to us, may be a memento to put us in mind of our undutifulness once to God. Time was when we were rebellious children; how long did our heart stand out as garrisons against God? How long did he parley with us and beseech us, ere we would yield? He walked in the tenderness of his heart towards us, but we walked in the frowardness of our hearts towards him; and since grace hath been planted in our souls, how much of the wild olive is still in us? How many motions of the Spirit do we daily resist? How many unkindnesses and affronts have we put upon Christ? Let this open a spring of repentance; look upon your child’s rebellion and mourn for your own rebellion.

2. Though to see him undutiful is your grief, yet not always your sin. Hath a parent given the child, not only the milk of the breast, but “the sincere milk of the word?” hast thou seasoned his tender years with religious education? Thou canst do no more; parents can only work knowledge, God must work grace; they can only lay the wood together, it is God who must make it burn; a parent can only be a guide to show his child the way to heaven, the Spirit of God must be a lodestone  to draw his heart into that way. “Am I in God’s stead,” saith Jacob, “who hath withheld the fruit of the womb?” (Ge. 30. 2) Can I give children? So, is a parent in God’s stead to give grace? who can help it, if a child having the light of conscience, Scripture, education, these three torches in his hand, yet runs wilfully into the deep ponds of sin? Weep for thy child, pray for him; but do not sin for him by discontent. 3. Say not, you have brought forth a child for the devil; God can reduce him; he hath promised “to turn the hearts of the children to their fathers” (Mal. 4. 6) and “to open springs of grace in the desert.” (Is. 35. 6) When thy child is going full sail to the devil, God can blow with a contrary wind of his Spirit and alter his course. When Paul was breathing out persecution against the saints, and was sailing hellward, God turns him another way; before he was going to Damascus, God sends him to Ananias; before a persecutor, now a preacher. Though our children are for the present fallen into the devil’s pond, God can turn them from the power of Satan, and bring them in the twelfth hour. 

Monica was weeping for her son Augustine: at last God gave him in upon prayer, and he became a famous instrument in the church of God.

Thomas Watson lived from 1620-1686, in England. He wrote several books which survive. This blog, God willing, will post excerpts from his The Art of Divine Contentment: An Exposition of Philippians 4:11, over a number of weeks, on Sundays.
 
My source for the text is here, and I thank the Christian Classics Ethereal Library for making this text (and many others) available. The previous excerpt is here.
 
Philippians 4:11 Not that I speak because of lack, for I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content in it. (World English Bible, public domain.)

Sunspots 342

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

Humor: (sort of) National Public Radio reports on the growing parenting advice industry -- parenting advice for parents with offspring 20 or more years old, that is.

Science: National Public Radio also reports that cultures that learned to rely on agriculture for most of their food have developed differently shaped jaws than hunter-gathering societies have.

Politics:  (or Humor) I'm getting a lot from NPR this week. Here's an article on which candidate's T-shirts are selling best. (And on other political merchandise.)

Image source (public domain)

Foster fatherhood -- and stepfatherhood

I don't believe that I had a foster father or a stepfather, although there is, I suppose, such a possibility. I share some characteristics with my father, and I never heard anything to suggest that he wasn't my "real," (meaning biological) father.

The Free Dictionary has this for its first entry for "father:"
1. A man who begets or raises or nurtures a child.

So, to the dictionary, a father is not only a biological father, but, possibly, a stepfather or foster father who has helped to raise or nurture a child, or, perhaps, even done it himself, with little or no help.

As far as I am aware, there is only one example of foster father- or stepfatherhood in the Bible, but it is a very important one, namely Joseph, Mary's husband, and the earthly father of Jesus.

Joseph did a remarkable thing. He married Mary, even though he knew she was pregnant, and he also knew that he wasn't the biological father of the baby she would bear. (See Matthew 1, which describes the manner in which Joseph discovered this fact.) As the Wikipedia puts it, Joseph is not mentioned much in the gospels, "in which he never speaks." Mary speaks, Jesus speaks to his parents, Joseph is given visions, but the Wikipedia is correct -- he never speaks. We have to infer his reaction.

God entrusted Joseph with important aspects of the care of His own Son. Matthew 2 tells us that it was Joseph, not Mary, who was divinely warned to flee to Egypt, and was told to return from Egypt.

Joseph is a great example of an apparently humble man, who did what he needed to do for his foster son, even, apparently, not telling others that Jesus wasn't his son. (Luke 3:23)

In this day and time, a lot of stepfathers, and foster fathers, have stepped up, as it were. They are doing a good, humble, patient job of raising and nurturing daughters and sons that aren't their biological offspring. God bless them, and help them.

Sunspots: A Google search for the words wicked stepmother returns about 169,000 web pages. A similar search for the words wicked stepfather returns less than 92,000. I can't think of a single fairy tale that has a wicked stepfather as a character, but there are several with wicked stepmothers. Why? I don't really know.

I work a little with elementary school children. I ran into a case in which a boy, about 10 years of age, was downright obsessive about his biological father. He told me that his stepfather was a good father, good to him. From what I could gather, his biological father was not -- he had not contacted the boy for months, including at Christmas and his birthday. Yet he was somehow longing for his "real" father, almost all the time. God help him, and others like him, and help fathers (and mothers) to be better at carrying out their responsibilities.

The Wikipedia article on Joseph says that the word τεκτων (Anglicized as tekton, which is probably related to the modern technician.) is used to describe his occupation. (Matthew 13:55). This word, it says, "cannot be translated narrowly; it evokes an artisan with wood in general, or an artisan in iron or stone." That same word is used to describe Jesus, Himself, in Mark 6:3.

Thanks for reading. If any fathers read this, be a good father, God helping you (and me). If any children of stepfathers or foster fathers read this, be sure to let them know how much you appreciate them.

2 comments:

Keetha Broyles said...

Greg was the inventor of our improvised grill and he said to tell you it was amazing - - - we were just sitting around and that grill evolved all by itself!!!

;-)

June 15, 2009

Martin LaBar said...

No intelligent design?

Note: This post got published, by mistake, on June 15th. I deleted it, and re-published, including a comment, and my response, this time, I hope, on the 21st, Father's Day.