Belle in outdoor attire

Sullivan nailing DFW again...

'He's maybe the only notoriously "difficult" writer who almost never wrote a page that wasn't enjoyable, or at least diverting, to read.' - John Jeremiah Sullivan.

That's exactly how I felt about Infinite Jest: 'crap this is hard' and 'man this is fun' too.

DFW's Impact on Writing

Here's a thing that is hard to imagine: being so inventive a writer that when you die, the language is impoverished. That's what Wallace's suicide did, two and a half years ago. It wasn't just a sad thing, it was a blow. - John Jeremiah Sullivan

Read More

http://www.gq.com/entertainment/books/201105/david-foster-wallace-the-pale-king-john-jeremiah-sullivan#ixzz1hI0Qoq5D

Great Christmas Read or Gift...

One of my favorite Christmas reads in the last few years has been The Narnian, Alan Jacob's brilliant literary-spiritual biography of C. S. Lewis. What makes the book so edifying are Jacob's expositions of the major themes in Lewis' writing. A great Christmas gift for the old or new fan.

Last Advent Sermon: On Feeling Forsaken During the Holidays

Here's the link. It's also podcast at iTunes ('Redeemer Memphis').

Looking at how Christ's cry from the cross ("my God, my God, why have your forsaken me?") is the answer to that very question we ask during our suffering. Christ's cry assures us that God is with us and for us during our darkest times.

Exchange on race

A Sr Editor of The Atlantic responds to a simplistic analysis of American racial inequality:http://bit.ly/tGRut5

(HT: Alan Jacobs at 'More than 95 Theses').

Dignan's 50 Year Plan

Here's a link to Dignan's 50 Year Plan, from the movie Bottle Rocket, that I mentioned in the sermon today (Advent 3: Why is it so Hard to Follow You?).

Advent Sermon (2), Post 1: Topic, Link, Anne Rice.

Advent Series 2: The Questions of God - 'Who are you?'

In this sermon we look at two of the points at which people get stuck in trying to deal with Jesus: the point of initial, casual interest and the point of final decision.

Here's the quote from Anne Rice about moving from mere interest in Jesus to investigation:

I had taken in a lot of fashionable notions about Jesus…that the Gospels were ‘late’ documents, that we really didn’t know anything about him…I’d acquired many books on Jesus…. But the true investigation began in 2002…I put aside everything else and…decided that I would give myself utterly to the task of trying to understand Jesus himself and how Christianity emerged.

Advent Sermon (1), Post 3: God Questions Us.

So, if we all struggle (because of sin) with such bias against God and his truth as seen in the previous post, how do we ever come to any knowledge of God?

Only through God.

The great theologians of the church have always taught this truth based on 1 Corinthians 2: “Only God can reveal God.” The God who reveals himself speaks personally to us, reaching out in love to his furious runaways, and exposing us to his grace and truth.

“We do not reach truth unless we allow ourselves to be exposed to and drawn by a truth which is beyond our present understanding.” – Newbigin, Proper Confidence, 90

“It is as the one who overcomes our alienation from the truth that God reveals the truth…It has become possible for us to know God and to speak confidently of God only because the beloved Son who knows the Father has taken our place in our estrangement from God and has made it possible to come to a true knowledge of God through him. So the revelation of God given to us in him is not a matter of coercive demonstration but of grace, of a love that forgives and invites.” – Ibid., 78.

“Because ultimate reality [God] is personal, God’s address to us is a word conveying his purpose and promise, a word which may be heard or ignored, obeyed or disobeyed. Faith comes by hearing, and unbelief is disobedience.” – Ibid., 14.

This whole sermon series is about us questioning God. But it’s really more about how God questions us; how he often responds to our questions with questions of his own that are his ‘answer’ to us.

God the Father addresses us through Jesus Christ by the Holy Spirit, reforms us through his questions, and leads us to himself.

“That is the truth which we cannot tell ourselves. We can only let it question us and press itself upon us in its majesty and ultimateness for our recognition and worship. That is what takes place still when we are face to face with the Truth of God as it is in Jesus, for through its questioning of us in answer to our questions, it does not hold itself aloof from us, so throwing us back upon ourselves for the verification and the answer we need…” (Torrance, ‘Questioning in Christ,’122). Rather, God lays “hold of us in our blind hostile questioning in the dark to change it into something that brings light and truth.” (Ibid., 125).

“Genuine questioning here leads to the disclosure and recognition of the Truth in its own majesty and sanctity and authority, which cannot be dragged down in order to be controlled by us. It is the prerogative of the ultimate Truth, the Truth of God, that it reigns and is not at our disposal, that it is, and cannot be established by us, Truth that is ultimate in its identity with the Being and Activity of God and cannot be dominated by man, Truth that is known only by pure grace on God’s part and in thankful acknowledgement on our part. In the last resort it is we who are questioned by the Truth, and it is only as we allow ourselves to be questioned by it that it stands forth before us for our recognition and acknowledgement.” (Ibid., 121, slightly paraphrased).