Religion

God Works Even With the Foolish

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“And behold, the star that they had seen when it rose went before them until it came to rest over the place where the child was.” Matthew 2:9

Star of Bethlehem, Magi - wise men or wise kings travel on camels with entourage across the deserts to find the savior, moon, desert, Holy Bible, Etching, 1885Since Lars is talking Christmas, let me throw out this holiday thought. The star which brought the Magi to Bethlehem to find the newborn king (cf. Matthew 2:1-12) was either a supernatural event or a natural one. If we say it must be an angel or a divine light shone only for the birth of Christ Jesus, then we have nothing more to say. An astronomer who has written a book on the Bethlehem Star notes this view has had credibility from good men over the years. “The great astronomer/astrologer Johannes Kepler,” Mike Molnar writes, “thought the Star was a miracle accompanied by natural phenomena such as a triple conjunction and a supernova similar to what he observed in 1604.”

But if we hope to find a natural explanation, there are many options and a great deal of research to do. I heard an expert on the radio say that new explanations for the Star of Bethlehem are offered almost every year, and Molnar has a whole book on his explanation of a natural occurrence. He gives a good bit away in the FAQs on his site.

Not long ago I told my girls that the star had to be supernatural because the Bible says it moved before the Magi and stopped over Jesus’ location. Now I am second-guessing. My only thought for this post, small and nearly pointless it may be, is that we know the Lord uses even foolish reasoning for his purposes, so it is entirely possible for the Magi, being astrologers, to interpret the Star’s normal behavior in the sky as guiding them in ways we would believe to be crazy if we could have them explained today. These wise men saw Jupiter approaching a part of the sky, and they interpreted as it to mean a king will be born in Judea. Apparently the astrology all works out for regions to have symbols and planets to have meanings. In this way, the Magi believed they had seen heavenly signs of a Judean king, so they went to Jerusalem to ask about him. Herod’s scribes told them Micah’s prophecy, and they went to Bethlehem.

The Magi may have believed the Star was directing them (moving and stopping) in ways we would not agree had we been there to argue about it, and isn’t that the way God works sometimes. He blesses good-hearted people who run with out-of-context verses. He helps those who have bad theology–not often, but often enough to notice. That’s no excuse of laziness in worship or Bible study, but it is a good reason to praise him for his grace and mercy.

Music, Religion

A cut-rate carol from Sears

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Christmas is over for many of us (discounting those who observe the Twelve Days, the Eastern Orthodox, and me [because my family’s gathering this weekend]). So perhaps it would be OK for me to vent a little about a Christmas pet peeve.

As you may have noticed, I’m pretty tolerant of Christmas observances (or so I imagine. Don’t correct me, please). I don’t bemoan the commercialization much, I don’t attack Santa Claus, I don’t denounce the Christmas tree as a heathen shibboleth. When it comes to colored lights I’m essentially a little kid, and it’s pretty easy to make me happy with a Christmas tree and chocolate.

But I have a few gripes, primarily in the music department.

I don’t mean the obvious stuff. I won’t go into that Christmas Shoes song they keep playing on Christian stations (kill me now!). I’ll pass by The Little Drummer Boy, making his racket to keep a new Mother and her Baby awake all night. I won’t even spend time on Santa Baby.

I want to go where a deeper problem is. I want to single out a beautiful, well-written carol which I love, and which seems to me slightly insidious.

The carol is It Came Upon the Midnight Clear, by Edmund Sears: Continue reading A cut-rate carol from Sears →

Writing

Schultz' Writing Notes

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Greg Schultz talks about writing a bit on Ploughshares’ blog.

Craft can be counterproductive. I’ve already registered my suspicions about how-to advice on the craft of writing in a previous post. One problem with the axioms (“show, don’t tell”) and diagrams (Freytag’s triangle, below) of craft is that they turn the act of writing on its head. Freytag’s triangle, for example, is much more effective as a tool of analysis than one of instruction. It can be useful to study a completed story through the lens of the triangle. However, when taken as instruction, Freytag’s triangle, like most craft advice, is more hindrance than help. Like a cookie-cutter, it stamps the uncooked dough. The resulting story, built to satisfy preconceived notions of craft, is likely to have about the same resemblance to real life as a gingerbread man has to a living, breathing person.

Publishing, Reading

Five E-book Trends

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Philip Ruppel, president of McGraw-Hill Professional, notes five trends he says will change the publishing industry.

    • Enhanced E-Books Are Coming and Will Only Get Better
      The Device War Is Nearly Over
      The $9.99 E-Book Won’t Last Forever
      The Contextual Upsell Will be a Business Model to Watch
      Publisher Editing and Design Will Be More Important Than Ever
    • Reviews

    DVD Review: Arn: The Knight Templar

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    Arn: The Knight Templar
    Who’d have imagined that the best knights and armor movie since Braveheart (discounting The Lord of the Rings trilogy, a fantasy) would come out of Sweden, of all places?
    Arn: The Knight Templar (available on DVD and Blue Ray) is an adaptation (much truncated, I understand) of a Swedish television miniseries based on a trilogy of novels by Jan Guillou. The hero is Arn Magnusson (Joakim Nätterkvist), a young man who was raised in a monastery, but trained in arms by a monk who was once a Knight Templar. Returning to his family, he falls in love with a neighbor’s daughter, Cecilia (Sofia Helin). Unfortunately her father’s political obligations make their match impossible. But the two young people manage to get together long enough to conceive a child. The ensuing scandal results in her being confined to a nunnery, and him being sent to join the Knights Templar on crusade in the Holy Land.
    The storytelling requirements of fitting all this into the 133 minute run time make for a lot of intercutting and flashbacks (you do have to pay attention), but we follow their separate trials and and struggles for the next twenty years. The focus is on Arn, who becomes a legendary fighter in the Holy Land, one whom the Muslim armies recognize, fear, and respect. He even becomes a friend of Saladin, a circumstance which saves his life (what would fictional crusaders ever do without Saladin to pull their escutcheons out of the fire?). After their time of punishment is complete, Arn and Cecilia are reunited and married, but one final challenge remains for his warrior skills. Continue reading DVD Review: Arn: The Knight Templar →

    Music, Religion

    "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing"

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    Sissel wishes you a blessed Christmas.

    (You’ll note that they use the original “Born to raise the sons of earth” line, rather than a PC revision. That’s like a Christmas present right there.)

    Religion

    Platt on Rebelling Against the American Dream

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    Pastor and author David Platt writes:

    We American Christians have a way of taking the Jesus of the Bible and twisting him into a version of Jesus that we are more comfortable with.

    A nice middle-class American Jesus. A Jesus who doesn’t mind materialism and would never call us to give away everything we have. A Jesus who is fine with nominal devotion that does not infringe on our comforts.

    Platt has written the bestselling book Radical: Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream (via Christian Fiction Daily)

    Poetry, Religion

    "The House of Christmas"

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    The Nativity, Barocci

    The Nativity, by Federico Barocci, c. 1597

    By: G. K. Chesterton

    There fared a mother driven forth

    Out of an inn to roam;

    In the place where she was homeless

    All men are at home.

    The crazy stable close at hand,

    With shaking timber and shifting sand,

    Grew a stronger thing to abide and stand

    Than the square stones of Rome.

    For men are homesick in their homes,

    And strangers under the sun,

    And they lay on their heads in a foreign land

    Whenever the day is done.

    Here we have battle and blazing eyes,

    And chance and honour and high surprise,

    But our homes are under miraculous skies

    Where the yule tale was begun.

    A Child in a foul stable,

    Where the beasts feed and foam;

    Only where He was homeless

    Are you and I at home;

    We have hands that fashion and heads that know,

    But our hearts we lost – how long ago!

    In a place no chart nor ship can show

    Under the sky’s dome.

    This world is wild as an old wives’ tale,

    And strange the plain things are,

    The earth is enough and the air is enough

    For our wonder and our war;

    But our rest is as far as the fire-drake swings

    And our peace is put in impossible things

    Where clashed and thundered unthinkable wings

    Round an incredible star.

    To an open house in the evening

    Home shall men come,

    To an older place than Eden

    And a taller town than Rome.

    To the end of the way of the wandering star,

    To the things that cannot be and that are,

    To the place where God was homeless

    And all men are at home.

    Music

    "Nå tennes tusen julelys"

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    Here’s one of my favorite songs from Sissel’s Kyrkjebø’s first Christmas album, the one that made her a superstar in Norway. The title means “Now a thousand Christmas lights are being lit.” I was looking for a live performance video, but the only one I could find is half talk (in Norwegian). So you’ll just have to look at her face on the album cover, which seems to me no chore. Below is an original translation of the lyrics, done by me at this keyboard at this very moment:

    Around this darkened world tonight,

    A thousand candles glow,

    And all God’s stars above shine down

    To cheer our night below.

    And over towns and over fields

    The joyful carols sing

    The news that in a manger bed

    We find our God and King.

    O Star that shone o’er Bethlehem,

    To hail the holy birth,

    Bring to our hearts the angels’ song

    Of love and peace on earth.

    So every wand’ring heart shall see

    A beacon in their sky,

    To light their path through this dark world

    To Christmas home on high.

    (For the record, this picture of Sissel on the “Glade Jul” album was the inspiration for the appearance of the character Halla in The Year of the Warrior.)