Who’s in charge here? When foreknowledge is dangerous

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Collin Hansen, writing in the Web edition of Christianity Today, explores recent new medical advances that allow for non-invasive testing of pregnant women to determine whether the babies they’re carrying have cystic fibrosis, b-thalassemia, or sickle cell anemia — ailments all caused by a single mutated gene. Like new, expanded testing for Down syndrome, it ominously points to not treatment or education for the parents but an earlier opportunity to abort the child.

As we press forward for further knowledge, it becomes clear that we are less capable of handling that knowledge that we are so eager to have. Hansen puts it this way:

At the root of the quest for foreknowledge is control. Testing children for genetic abnormalities gives concerned parents a measure of control over the situation. But abortion can only negate the pregnancy; it cannot make their children healthy. We have much less control than we want or think we have. And that is the good news, because the God who knows all that was, all that is, and all that will be holds out the promise that by faith we can have peace with all that he brings to pass.

We’re supposed to live and learn …

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Moshe Holtzberg, the 2-year-old orphan of the rabbi and his wife slain in the Mumbai Jewish center, cries during a memorial service at a synagogue in Mumbai, India, Monday, Dec. 1, 2008. Holtzberg will fly to Israel Monday on an Israeli Air Force jet with his parents' remains and the Indian woman who rescued him, an Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman said. (AP Photo)
Moshe Holtzberg, the 2-year-old orphan of the rabbi and his wife slain in the Mumbai Jewish center, cries during a memorial service at a synagogue in Mumbai, India, Monday, Dec. 1, 2008.

The world cries out: Who can hold us? Only one man. Only one man can save us.

Science and religion: John Lennox, the merry warrior for Christ

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John Lennox is an Oxford proffesor of mathematics.
John Lennox is an Oxford professor of mathematics.

John Dickson at the Centre for Public Christianity has posted a series of video interviews with noted Oxford professor of mathematics and Christian apologist John Lennox. Among the topics addressed were:

Who is John Lennox?
Introduction to the Professor

A Good God?
Hope for a mucked up world

Science, Atheism and Belief
Has science buried God?

Face off!
Debating Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens

Science, the Bible and belief in the 21st Century
Do you have to put your brain to one side to read the Bible?

Atheism and morality
Does atheism provide grounds for morality?

The evils of Christendom
Do the evils done in the name of Christ show that Christianity has failed?

Russian adventures
Professor Lennox discusses his experiences in Eastern Europe

Creator or the Multiverse?
Does the fine tuning of the universe point to God or an infinite collection of universes?

Christianity and the tooth fairy
Does science deal with reality and religion with everything else?

HT: Justin Taylor

What makes young Calvinists tick: Collin Hansen interview with The White Horse Inn

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A Journalists Journey With New Calvinists
Young, Restless, Reformed: A Journalist's Journey With New Calvinists

Collin Hansen, editor at large for Christianity Today and author of Young, Restless, and Reformed: A Journalists Journey With New Calvinists,  was interviewed recently by Michael Horton at The White Horse Inn. From the book’s blurb:

From places like John Piper’s den, Al Mohler’s office, and Jonathan Edwards’s college, Christianity Today journalist Collin Hansen investigates what makes today’s young Calvinists tick.

Church-growth strategies and charismatic worship have fueled the bulk of evangelical growth in America for decades. While baby boomers have flocked to churches that did not look or sound like church, it seems these churches do not so broadly capture the passions of today?s twenty-something evangelicals. In fact, a desire for transcendence and tradition among young evangelicals has contributed to a Reformed resurgence.

For nearly two years, Christianity Today journalist Collin Hansen visited the chief schools, churches, and conferences of this growing movement. He sought to describe its members and ask its leading pastors and theologians about the causes and implications of the Calvinist resurgence. The result, Young, Restless, Reformed, shows common threads in their diverse testimonies and suggests what tomorrow’s church might look like when these young evangelicals become pastors or professors.

You can order the book or download the first chapter at Monergismbooks.com

HT: Justin Taylor, whom I am grateful for among many young, restless, reformed men.

Absolutely free: The best deal this season

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I am not a shopper by nature. I love to buy things. I love to go out, find that thing, purchase it and bring it home. But for some, the joy of finding it and finding it a good price almost surpasses the giving. Those are the shoppers. I am related to people like this and I love them.

But this is something that is such a great deal that both the shopper and the purchaser can be completely happy with it. Imagine getting something that will make you completely happy and satisfied for the rest of your life. For nothing. And, if you tried to buy it, you couldn’t afford it because it costs too much.

Yet this is precisely what God offers to us through Jesus Christ. It’s salvation. What did it cost God? Only the most precious thing to him, his son Jesus, who he loves more than anything. What did it cost Jesus? Everything. His life, his close relationship with his father. What does it cost you and me? Nothing. But it is ours for accepting it and believing Jesus is who he say he is.

In the Bible, in Romans 5:8, it says that God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. There are no deserving people who receive this gift, only needy people who realize their need. I’m a needy person. And, because I know I got this gift even though I didn’t deserve it, I don’t want to act like I did deserve it. I want you to have this gift, too. I will guarantee you that there is nothing you get this Christmas that will make you as happy or satisfy you as much. Not even close.

Things break, wear out, get old, lose their appeal, become too small, get lost, don’t fit like they used to, get eaten, are spent and need to replaced. The joy is temporary. Salvation in Jesus will save your life (for eternity) and give you a joy that cannot be lost, no matter what happens in this life. I know too many things in this life that make what is supposed to be a happy time an unhappy time for too many people.

This is different. Jesus talked about what he offered and its worth when he said: “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he sells all that he has and buys that field.” (Matthew 13:44) It’s an offer we all have before us. No one is excluded.

What do you say? Do you want to get something really worth having this year?

A Twilight book review: Obsessive love

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Tim Challies has written a helpful review of Twilight.
Tim Challies has written a helpful review of "Twilight."

Like many parents, I imagine, I was left clueless about the whole “Twilight” phenomenon. I was not aware of the books until only recently, and now there is a very popular movie in theaters. Thankfully, one of my most trusted book reviewers, Tim Challies, took some time to read “Twilight” and share his thoughts. For the most part, Challies thought the book (his wife read the rest of the series and will share her thoughts later) was well-written. What I found helpful as a parent were his thoughts about the relationship between the boy and girl:

While the love between the two of them is meant to be real, it also has a strange, unearthly quality to it. It also has an obsessive, idolatrous quality. Perhaps this is true of any love story, but I wonder whether girls are well-served by reading of a young woman who is so utterly consumed with her boyfriend that she seeks and desires and thinks of nothing else. She lies, she disobeys her parents, she does whatever is necessary to be with him. She is convinced that in this boy she will find her all-in-all. All she desires—to the point of wanting him to drink her blood so she, too, can be a vampire—is to be with him forever. She would rather be undead eternally than live without him.

At this point, with the movie out and the books having been around for awhile, it may be too late to consider if you’ve already jumped in. (An admission: My preteen son read the book and devoured it. When pressed, he said he was disappointed because he thought it would be something else.) Still, I would proceed cautiously if I had a young daughter who wanted to read it. Go here to read the full review by Challies. It’s very helpful for the very least in that it gives good discussion points you can have with children about what life values were displayed.

What are they teaching kids these days? Humane killing?

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Wesley J. Smith posted this at Secondhand Smoke, to his credit. Smith got a little hot at the end, but his righteous anger is definitely justified when you consider the outrageous philosophy the administration at Princeton gives support to by their elevation of Peter Singer to an endowed bioethics chair.

Singer is an Australian philosopher who holds views that are, to say the least, appalling. From a 1999 article in the New York Times, Singer said: ”I do not think it is always wrong to kill an innocent human being. Simply killing an infant is never equivalent to killing a person.”

This was nearly 10 years ago, so why the fuss now? Well, because we are constantly facing issues in our society about the weak and defenseless in our society. What was outrageous in 1999 is now a fuzzy memory to some. Worse, people like Singer are now revered professors at treasured institutions, teaching young minds things that were criminal in years past. Those people are leaving those institutions and voting on critical issues. It matters.

Four reasons why premarital sex isn’t worth it

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What would you tell a young man who said he wanted to have sex with his girlfriend? What would you tell the young woman? Pastor John Piper gives four answers (and a fifth, for the girl) in the Ask Pastor John podcast from Desiring God.

Click on the image to see the video
Click on the image to see the video