01.02.10
Christmas at home
It’s been another good, restful and fun Christmas at home this year, and for the first time in my 22 Christmases on this planet, it’s also been a white Christmas! And a white new year, and white ever day in between. In fact it doesn’t look like the snow is leaving Livingston any time soon, and is just getting deeper and deeper. Possibly the start of a mini ice age. However, apart from the occasional driving and having to clear the paths for the fifth and sixth times, it has been a pretty fun time the past few weeks. After opening some great family gifts (Dan Brown’s new book, Harry Potter in ancient greek and some very classy shaving soap to name but a few), we all went for a walk and took some crazy pictures in the snow.
It’s been pretty cool spending time with family again and catching up on everyone’s stories. Both of my beautiful but crazy sisters are at uni in Edinburgh and so some great accusations of bumping into the other while drunk have been flying around, as well as everyone being able to compare various versions of first year university experiences. Also being able to parade a medic student, a vet student and a graduate around at church has given my parents cause to be pretty proud (although less so that the graduate doesn’t have a proper job). Unexpectedly as well it has been a fairly peaceful Christmas, despite the overcrowding in the house that caused so many arguments growing up. Possibly the addition of a dog to the family as a temporary resident (Murphy is our holiday guest for a while) has helped calm things down a bit.
One final picture to finish off. My sister Janie (right) was looking through some old photo albums (and posted a few pictures on facebook). This is probably my favourite of the three of us, back when we didn’t irritate each other so much. Or at least when Becky and I were able to gang up on Janie successfully. Unfortunately now she’s the most brutal and witty of the three of us and we are hopelessly outclassed. I’ll leave you with a brief text debate to demonstrate.
Me: Hey loser, how’s the cutting up dead bodies going?
Janie: You can’t call me a loser and say that I cut up dead bodies, its an oxymoron. How’s the search for a wife going?
… I just don’t know where she gets her ideas from.
12.29.09
Dan Brown’s Lost Symbol – a load of gnonsense
I recently finished reading the latest Dan Brown book, and the third in the series of Robert Langdon, ruggedly handsome yet doggedly single, mild mannered Harvard professor who always solves the mystery, uncovers deep secrets and gets the girl (and in a Bond-esque fashion seems to have lost them by the next book). It’s another one of those ‘ground shaking’ epics of secretive information, lost for centuries but mysteriously found by Dan and subsequently turned into popular fiction.
I know it seems churlish to criticise a work of fiction for its claims, but the philosophical claims of The Lost Symbol were so grating to read for me. It wasn’t just the thinly veiled ad ecclesium attacks on Christianity, the waxing lyrical about experimental proof of spirituality or the poor grasp of ancient languages, it was primarily the complete misunderstanding and misappropriation of the Bible to back up his theories of apotheosis – becoming God. I could rant a bit more about the others, but its the final point I feel I really need to respond to.
The book as a whole served as a really bad Bible study from start to finish, doing the classic mistakes along the way of taking things out of context, mistranslation and poor interpretation. The worst of it comes just before the end, where the Bible is actually proclaimed to be the Word of the Ancient Mysteries, written down over the years to preserve their ‘hidden secrets’ for a future ‘Apocalypse’ (enlightenment – not the end of the world), to be revealed to only a privileged few. The idea is a rather cute sort of neo-Humanism, where, like the Humanists of the Renaissance, the book’s characters believe that humanity has ‘lost its way’ and needs to retrieve the ancient wisdom in order to complete its transformation into perfect enlightenment and become God.
Dan Brown has made two key mistakes in approaching the Bible, both fueled by a rather odd worldview. What seems to be clear from the many many references to ’secret knowledge’ (gnosis), the ’sparks of divine being’ present in all humanity that yearn to be freed and join with the one true god and other hints, is that the book is all about a new Gnosticism. Brown’s first mistake then is to read this philosophy into the Bible, with some rather funny results. He insists that it is all allegory and provides a number of improbable examples. He also insists that the Bible has two levels of meaning, one for the uninitiated to lead them towards enlightenment and one for those of ‘deeper understanding’. The problem though is that this proposed ‘deeper meaning’ says things precisely in opposition to the ‘plain meaning’ of Scripture as Brown sees it. The idea of hidden meaning is entirely an extrabiblical concept, as the God of the Bible is a God of revelation and truth, not of secrets. There is a lot more to say on this subject, but Brown’s overall mistake here can be summed up in his imposing of extrabiblical concepts on his Bible interpretation.The best commentary of the Bible out is by far the Bible itself.
But Brown has also made another grave error, even a fatal mistake. Jesus would pull him up on it like so:
“I have testimony weightier than that of John. For the very work that the Father has given me to finish, and which I am doing, testifies that the Father has sent me. And the Father who sent me has himself testified concerning me. You have never heard his voice nor seen his form, nor does his word dwell in you, for you do not believe the one he sent. You diligently study the Scriptures because you think that by them you possess eternal life. These are the Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life. John 5:26-40
Brown talks about the Word a lot as being the secret of hidden wisdom, and even quotes from John’s Gospel to show that “in the beginning was the Word”. However he doesn’t seem to read on from that, as he goes on to say in a rather unqualified fashion that the Bible is the Word, ignoring the fact that the Word was God, and the Word became flesh. Clearly John is talking about Jesus, and not an eternal book (there was no Bible in the beginning!), and Jesus’ words above point us to the core reality of what the Bible is all about. The Bible points to Jesus, but not as a great moral teacher or a master of ancient wisdom, but as the One whom God the Father has sent to the World that we may have life! Without him the word ‘does not dwell in us’, so no wonder Brown gets it so wrong.
But here’s the crunch in comparison between Jesus and the philosophy of Brown in his book. It centers around apotheosis, the transformation from mortal to divine, being the goal of humanity, and says this is possible by human enlightenment. God in this view is ‘a mental energy that pervades everything’, something that we must ‘become one with’. Despite being dressed up in lovely lovely language of noble pursuits and pluralistic connotations, this view is so detestably cold, as it shuts out the possibility of real love and relationships. It’s effectively monistic, where at true enlightenment we lose ’self’ to become one entity – e pluribus unum. The Christian view is so different and so much warmer though, as the offer through Scripture and the life, death and resurrection of Jesus is of eternal Relationship with God. God is not one person, God is Father, Son and Spirit existing in purely eternal relationship together. The invitation to become ‘united with Christ’ is not to lose self, diversity and relationship, it is to become part of the Divine Community. This is only possible through Jesus, as he is the Word who reveals the Father to us.
In rough conclusion, although the book is entertaining to read (choosing my words carefully – it’s not much more than that), the philosophical underpinnings of the story are clearly put across as a call to a ‘greater wisdom’ and enlightenment or whatever. However this is completely not the case. The Truth is in Jesus, not scrolls of ancient wisdom. The Truth is for everyone, not just the select ‘initiated’ few. The Truth is a person, and Jesus Christ greatly desires to start a relationship with you today that will last into eternal life.
12.15.09
A graduate’s guide to leaving St Andrews
Well you St Andrews leavers, graduation is a long way off, but you’re probably feeling ready to leave already. Let me give you a quick few points of guidance for when you do:
- World events will make themselves known to you. You can no longer hide from current affairs.
- Nobody will get your jokes for a while.
- Approximately half of all graduates now only exist on facebook. Of the remaining half, approximately a third of those will be in London, a third in Edinburgh and a remaining third scattered around Scotland and the rest of the globe. One in every hundred will remain in St Andrews. Either through postgraduate study or in 4 years they’ve forgotten where the bus station is.
- When someone asks you “Where did you study?” and you say “St Andrews”, the response will never be “Oh is that where World Class minds are made?”. It will probably be “oh”, said in a rather disinterested and disappointing way. St Andrews isn’t as big a deal as we were told it was.
- You will remember being constantly busy for four years, but wont remember anything that you actually did in that time.
- Don’t look back or you’ll turn into a pillar of salt.
- There just aren’t any other beaches worth mentioning.
- You wont constantly see people you know in the street anymore. In fact you might even turn up early for things by accident.
- There are shops. Big shops with nice things and decent prices.
- You’ll still have some awesome friends, but you wont see them every day by accident. You have to make an effort with friendships, but it just makes them more special.
More points of guidance may come soon, hope these help for now!
11.09.09
Impact wedding ‘09
Last night was the latest in a long line of annual events in the Scottish church calendar, the marriage of Ross and Jo Morgan in Cullen. And what a flipping awesome night it was! Sadly as I am now no longer the owner of a digital camera, I shall have to trust others to publish their photos to facebook (but please, please censor those videos!). In its place I shall recount the most fun parts of the day from my own perspective…
Well the first part of my own perspective was from my techie position, directly behind the stage and bridal party. When I first turned up, almost 3 hours before the start of the wedding to set up, I was the only person there and surprised the church caretaker guy. As often happens with me, I seem to have some sort of sign that says ‘complain to me!’ as he brought up several complaints, featuring the volume of tech equipment, the quality of Andy’s parking the night before, our predicted lateness in leaving the building after the wedding and the fact that I wasn’t expected to arrive until much later. Fortunately he had other things to do elsewhere in the town and left me in peace to get on with stuff. But only after managing to jam the bathroom door shut, making me wonder if he’d just locked himself in their instead of leaving (like a cupboard janitor…). The wedding went great though, even if I did feel a bit exposed standing right behind the bridal party (and of course I can’t help but sing really loudly).
Next on to the reception and a hurried tech changeover between buildings. Champagne and photos soon followed, with me cheerfully pointing out that the statue behind the photographer’s head had one nipple exposed and altering slightly the seriousness of the photo subjects. A meal with Cullen Skink (in Cullen!) was next on the agenda and table 01111 (in binary) had to put up with me (and the wine) talking really loudly for a long time. Was smashing fun catching up with some old pals though, then the speeches were also pretty terrific, with Ross being suitably embarrassed.
Then we were on to the surprise event of the evening. After a very hurried and quite late ceilidh set up the first dance was due to start. However a few moments before the music was due to start, there was an inexplicable power cut to half of the room, the half containing the band and all the lights and PA for the stage. Standing by the sound desk when such an event happens is not an enviable position. Within seconds, hordes of electronic engineering graduates (from Ross’ class) had mounted the stage and were peering in every fuse box they could find, aided by iphone screen backlighting and discussing the cause of the problem. The rest of the room was in comparative brightness, and so encouraged by this sign, Andy Livingstone and a group set off hopefully in search of alternative power for the stage. After a few agonising minutes and much entertainment provided by the fit girls’ choir at the front of the room, led by choirmaster Mrs Morgan, an extension socket appeared triumphantly at the head of the stairs. A desk lamp was hurried down the room to test the current, and an energy-saving glimmer of hope lit the room. Cars were subsequently raided for as much electrical wiring as could possibly be found at a wedding of Christian missionaries (totaling quite a lot of cable – got to be prepared obviously) and a power line was successfully run the entire length of the hall, passed by many helping hands along walls, under tables and taped across small sections of dance floor. As I provided my small contribution of plugging in the final cable, the lights on the amps flickered on and the ceilidh was able to continue! Of course on a smaller than normal PA system and no lights on the stage.
All in all it was a pretty brilliant night, with some amazing dancing all round and a good bit of cheesy disco music. All retired late to a well deserved rest, while a few of us almost made it to the freezing cold beach. Congrats to Ross and Jo, and hopefully catch you guys soon. God bless you as you start your married life together!
Monkey – creating techie disasters at affordable prices
11.04.09
House Party, team days and other chat…
The long silence has been down to lots of hard work, just in case you thought I was slacking! Having now finished my second (!) month of Relay and written my second report, I can look back and actually remember what I was doing this month. And seeing as I have today off I can now find time to write it all down!
As the title suggests, there’s been a few team days and relay training days this month. They’re not strictly the same, but as all the cool Relay folks are present at both, that makes them both pretty awesome. Lots of cool training stuff as well as movie watching, mug decorating and cake judging (which was pretty harsh). Tiramisu in retrospect was probably an unnecessarily divisive choice, and my inexpert attempts didn’t help the matter. Not to worry, I will work on revenge when I judge further cakes…
Was also at House Party this weekend just past with RGU CU down in Arbroath. Was an amazing weekend, good teaching from Dick Dowsett and lots of time to spend with various folks.
Did a seminar on dead theologians (more thoughts on that to come probably) which went really well in the end. Was pretty wary about doing it, partially because I wasn’t so confident about actually doing anything useful, but partially because if it did go OK, I would be very likely to get a little proud of it. Thankfully neither happened! God by various methods kept me from becoming conceited (like a ‘thorn in the flesh’ but less harsh than Paul’s, possibly more a ’stone in the shoe’, or ‘eyelash in the eye’, or ‘burnt on bits of food at the bottom of your non-stick pan of spirituality’. Anyway…), yet used me to help some students think through stuff and understand a bit more of dead writers.
Also led a worship set on the Saturday morning, which is a hilarious concept in itself seeing as I neither own a guitar nor can play it with much reliability, never mind the singing part! Thankfully God blessed that too, and I wasn’t too much of a hindrance to everyone else worshiping. I enjoyed choosing and playing the songs as well, and my band was actually pretty awesome, so all in all it was a great experience.
Of course not everything went swimmingly at House Party, and after totally ruling at the most awesomely epic game of sardines ever at 3am, I slept in the next morning and missed the entire morning session. I was actually one of the first into bed the night before yet the only one not to make it! Total fail there! Really need to keep working on my sleep patterns (like being able to get out of bed at 9am on my day off – why can’t I do that normally?!?).
Well just in case this becomes a boringly long post, I’ll stop there. Got a few more things to write about but I’ll save them until my next day off (next week) and hopefully put it all in writing then.
Catch you all soon and God bless!
10.15.09
The latest from Relay!
A post on a more practical note now: What on earth have I been up to? (see the post category)
So those sharp-eyed enough to spot the other Relay-related posts on here, there’s a brief description of what I’m doing for the year there. Thought I’d give you all a little update on what actual things I’ve actually been doing recently as well.
Studying
Part of the Relay program involves self-directed study on some core Christian beliefs. The first part of the study module has been on ‘The nature of God in Trinity’. I’ve written a long, waffling study response for this which is a little too wordy to put up here, but a slightly better summary of it is done by Mike Reeves if you’re interested (and you should be! Its amazing stuff!). It’s been pretty awesome studying it as well, as even though its sometimes seen as the technical reserve of very boring people (’socially constipated monks’ – Reeves), and the book we’re reading on it is also quite in depth, Trinity is actually a really fascinating thing to look at, and has really deep implications for our relationship with God and our christian lives.
The second thing I’ve been looking at in the study is Historical Theology, or ‘What did dead people think about God?’ It seems pointless but it’s also been really interesting (and I love CS Lewis so much I’m going to link to him again on the subject.)
Another thing I do as a relay worker is meet with students one-to-one for coffee and Bible-study. In fact one of them has just arrived, so I’ll finish my summary of my life some other time. Catch you soon!
10.09.09
Feeling bruise-y
A short post…
Just been reading a bit of ‘The bruised reed’ by Richard Sibbes. Have a look here. It’s a proper Christian classic from the Puritans, but don’t let slander put you off reading it. It’s quite long but really worth it. Haven’t finished it yet but have been reflecting on it a bit.
“Here is my servant, whom I uphold,
my chosen one in whom I delight;
I will put my Spirit on him
and he will bring justice to the nations.He will not shout or cry out,
or raise his voice in the streets.A bruised reed he will not break,
and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out.
In faithfulness he will bring forth justice”Isaiah 42:1-3
In Matthew 12 these words are said to be fulfilled in Jesus, and Sibbes unfolds the meaning of these passages, that Jesus will use our hurts and bruises, even bruising us himself, to bring us to him, but will not break us.
Another linked passage for me with this has been the book of Jonah. It’s been stalking me for a few weeks now, having to prepare Bible studies, hearing talks and sermons on it, and realising more and more of its meaning.
But Jonah was greatly displeased and became angry. He prayed to the LORD, “O LORD, is this not what I said when I was still at home? That is why I was so quick to flee to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity. Now, O LORD, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live.”But the LORD replied, “Have you any right to be angry?”
Jonah went out and sat down at a place east of the city. There he made himself a shelter, sat in its shade and waited to see what would happen to the city. Then the LORD God provided a vine and made it grow up over Jonah to give shade for his head to ease his discomfort, and Jonah was very happy about the vine. But at dawn the next day God provided a worm, which chewed the vine so that it withered. When the sun rose, God provided a scorching east wind, and the sun blazed on Jonah’s head so that he grew faint. He wanted to die, and said, “It would be better for me to die than to live.”
But God said to Jonah, “Do you have a right to be angry about the vine?”
“I do,” he said. “I am angry enough to die.”But the LORD said, “You have been concerned about this vine, though you did not tend it or make it grow. It sprang up overnight and died overnight. But Nineveh has more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left, and many cattle as well. Should I not be concerned about that great city?”
Jonah 4
It’s a pretty awesome book about God’s sovereignty in salvation and the painstaking care and attention he gives to undeserving people (it’s not just a book about big fish). It has some tricky points, contrast chapters 2 and 4 for example. Jonah prays from the fish and praises God’s great mercy, then later he laments it in God’s response to the Ninevites. It challenges our evangelism and our heart attitudes towards God’s grace. I think Jonah also gives great encouragement to us that God disciplines those he loves (Proverbs 3:11, 12).
When Jonah first legs it from God’s mission for him, God pursues him and ‘hurls’ (ESV) a wind at him and a huge storm that batters Jonah into submission. When in verse 9 he owns up and starts preaching as he was told to, you sense it’s only because he’s been caught. He then prays his prayer from the fish, noting that it was God who ‘hurled me into the deep’ (2:3 – the ‘bruising’) then saved him (not breaking him).
In chapter 4 however we see that though Jonah did what he was told, and God did a HUGE work of grace through it to save the Ninevites, Jonah’s heart is still not in the right place, and he decries the salvation of his enemies. God’s response to Jonah here is amazing! Not only does he give Jonah a third chance, he ‘appoints’ (ESV) first a vine, then a worm then a scorching wind to ‘bruise’ him again, all so that He might reform Jonah’s heart. Presumably Jonah came round by this point (or maybe on his 4th or 5th chances?) as he wrote this book to record what had happened to him.
Isn’t that encouraging though? To know how God works in us, pursuing and changing us in all things, not being content with obedience from a sense of duty, fear or guilt, but desiring ‘truth in the inner parts’, creating a ‘pure heart’ (Psalm 51: 6, 10).
That’s awesome to know!
10.01.09
First prayer letter out!
Thats my first prayer letter done, please let me know if you would like to receive it and I haven’t sent it to you already. Also if you want it by post let me know your address and I’d be happy to oblige.
Been looking a bit at the book of Jonah recently, just seems to keep coming up. Give it a read and at some point I’ll post my personal reflections, especially on chapter 4.
For now though, my posts are regrettably short, as we don’t have internet in the flat yet. Expect more regular postings in due course!
09.14.09
Moving and shaking
Well now I’m here in Aberdeen having moved up yesterday. Not yet unpacked but have already got stuck in and been pretty busy today. My diary is filling up nicely (yes I bought one!)
To fill you all in, this year i am doing a program called Relay, a volunteer year working with students in Aberdeen and Robert Gordon University Christian Unions. It’s year of ‘discipleship training in a student context’. In English, that means that I’m being training as a disciple of Jesus, how to live my life Biblically and how to love, serve and minister to people, using students as unwitting guinea pigs to practice on.
For this year I’ll need some serious prayer. I need to rely on God to provide money to keep me going. He’s been awesomely faithful so far! My home church very generously gave me a gift of £1000 which goes a long way to supporting me for the year, and I trust that He’ll surprise me in other ways with money when I need it. I also need prayer for the work I’m doing, that I can really encourage and bless the students that I meet, and that I can live and conduct myself honourably and compassionately this year. If you want to receive my monthly prayer letter, let me know and I can email or post it to you (go for the postal option, its more exciting to receive!).
On this subject of this blog then, I will be using it for a proper mix of things. The 4 part sermon I started posting will hopefully be completed soon, although I lost the last part (2 parts in the original, might streamline that), so will have to compose it all over again. Will do that when I have time. Other interesting things that God is teaching me will come in too. Feel free to comment or contact me about anything I’ve written, and encouragements and promises of prayer for anything are really awesome.
Anyway, have fun reading and I’ll update you all soon enough!
love Andy
09.12.09
A very rude awakening
God gave me a rather hard slap on the wrists recently, bringing to light a well hidden sin in my life. The wake up call hurt like nothing else on earth, and I’m still very much reeling from it. But thank God for it, it was obviously needed.
To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable: “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’ “But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’
“I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”
When I was in St Andrews, I grew steadily as a Christian. My confidence in the cross and not in the flesh helped me to grow and mature, and to be useful to the CU and other Christian societies, mainly by being a techie, but by other means as well. Slowly though, as I became more useful and more mature, I started to put confidence in this instead, knowing that because I was a good servant, led Bible studies for link group and was generally well respected for being a good Christian that I could in some way earn status, even merit before God. I was a pretty good Pharisee.
It started unraveling in Sicily though, where I wasn’t actually very good at most things, and certainly wasn’t terribly useful. I suppose my response to this was to retreat into ascribing it only temporary status, not thinking my uselessness would last much beyond Sicily. Partially it spurred on my evangelism a bit, as I was determined to do something at least to make myself more respectable as a Christian.
Taiwan was the biggest blow however. Less than a week in I discovered that I was actually fundamentally useless at everything I was there to do. I contributed very little to the trip apart from a big mouth, complaints and some stressful times. Along with my usefulness my self-constructed maturity faded, and I no longer had any stability in stressful situations, or any wisdom to correct my behaviour with. I didn’t act with full love and sensibility towards my friends, and towards one in particular, I acted very unfairly and unwisely, putting a treasured friendship at risk.
Here’s the painful admissions. Where I thought I had grown, I was shown to be an infant. Where I had confidence, it was overturned. Where I had wisdom, it was proved foolishness. The things I enjoyed others admiring in me were turned into detestable vices and repulsive mannerisms.
In the end I was crushed and humbled in a very painful way. I have nothing to offer to atone for my mistakes, and I can’t undo the consequences. However I know that by His wondrous cross, Jesus Christ the Son of God will have mercy on me, a sinner.
Lord forgive me. Thank you that you do not give up, but pursue us and perfect us for your glory.
