Metábasis eis állo génos
Richard Bledsoe writes of New York City as a Babylon. I identify the Babylon of Revelation with Jerusalem rather than Rome; i.e., a false church rather than outright paganism. Interestingly, Bledsoe sees the modern city as being built on a kind of Christian heresy. What good is salt that has lost its savor?
I am reading The Gulag Archipelago:
Duane Garner points out that “Jesus is the heart of flesh; the law is the heart of stone.”
Looks like the Bee beat me to the punch. They are on quite a roll lately.
Doug Wilson is also on a roll. And it isn’t even November! These ten–year–old theses on the kindness of Christ from Wilson’s church are well done.
John Barach has me listening to the Tallest Man on Earth. I’m actually taller than he is, so I must be the tallest man in the galaxy.
Anthony Bradley is also on a roll talking about fatherhood lately.
I’m generally not wearing a mask, although it felt deliciously transgressive to wear one into the ABC store. It seems to me the argument for masks doesn’t adequately account for the entire landscape of qualifications and tradeoffs. Taleb and many others are still carrying the banner for masks as a kind of “fat tail” circuit breaker, and I respect that as long as it remains a personal choice. It is safer to drive 25mph, and I realize that we still don’t have a good understanding of the possibilities of asymptomatic transmission. But government mandates for masks, as well as community policing (#wearadamnmask) seem sinister. The CDC continues to consider your risk negligible until you have spent fifteen minutes within six feet of someone who is symptomatic or pre-symptomatic. Of course, that guidance could change tomorrow just like so much else has.
In my last post I recommended some articles from James Jordan. Among those articles, he summarized what he later came to call his “laws of psalmody.” Recovering the Psalms is important because they are a great means of spiritual warfare. They are also a great means of spiritual formation. We often forget that we can bring our tears to God; that we can pray for judgment–justice as well as for mercy, which means that we not only pray for but even delight in the destruction of God’s enemies; and that God has been savingly at work in the hearts of our children since before they were born.
I worked my way through the James Jordan complete audio collection over the course of five years, and it is some of the best money I have ever spent. Let me know if this interests you and I will see what I can do to whet your appetite. And if your appetite is whetted, I have an agreement to redistribute it at a discount.
My family has been blessed to learn many Psalms from Jamie Soles. He is one of several artists, ministries, and projects that I support. This list also includes:
- Hand of Hope Pregnancy Resource Center
- The Theopolis Institute
- Mark Horne’s ministry Solomon Says
- The Theology Pugcast
- Aaron Renn’s newsletter The Masculinist
- It’s Good to be a Man
My brother-in-law wrote a book! Another brother-in-law is taller than me, so he might possibly be the tallest man in the universe.
Lisa: “What’s going to happen to New York City?”
Me: “It’s going to bring the gospel to Tim Keller.”
I gotta have my orange juice. 
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