Truly this doth seem very strange, I do know full well, to the natural man, to him that is yet in his unbelief, because he goeth by beguiled reason; but for my part, I do know it is so, and shall labour also to convince thee of the truth of the same. - John Bunyan, The Doctrine of Law and Grace.

It's been 10 years since the Rodney King riots struck LA. I remember the day well. I had been a bailiff in a military court martial all day. A foolish young man got busted doing and selling drugs at work. He even took his two-year old son in the car to buy drugs one time. At about 9 AM he pled guilty to the charges (there were three if I remember correctly). The judge went over each and every one and explained what it meant and what could happen if he pled guilty. After each one the young man acknowledged his understanding and pled guilty. After that was over (it took an hour or so) the judge recessed to decide if he would accept a guilty plea. After a while the judge returned and announced that he would accept a guilty plea and the trial proceeded to the punishment phase. Lawyers from both sides argued their point about the amount of punishment that would be appropriate. When that was done, the judge gave the panel instructions and sent them off to deliberate. That took a couple of hours and we were back in court. The young man got a pretty stiff penalty I think. When the trial ended it was about 5:30 PM. My head was spinning. I thought when someone pled guilty that was it. I figured we'd be out of the courtroom by lunchtime. The care the court took in punishing this young man really got me thinking about justice. As I left the courthouse I walked past a break room with a TV announcing the Rodney King verdict. I shook my head and thought, "It sure looked like they were using excessive force to me. But if the court found them innocent, then they're innocent."

As I left the base that evening, I was passed by a police convoy hauling weapons down to LA to help in controlling the riots. The image of Reginald Denny being drug from his truck and getting cracked in the head still sticks in my head.

BTW, the book by Iain Duguid I quoted from below has a cover that, if you turn it upsidedown, reminds me of a pint of Guinness. Ummmm. Guinness.

It's official. The site that hosts the comments on my blog is having problems with their ISP. Comments are wacky for now. I'm going to see if there is some software I can down load to host them myself. In the meantime, I guess we'll just have to live with it!

I was just reading John Tombes' Catechism about Baptism. Tombes was an antipoaedobaptist. "After questioning the infants' interest in the covenant while delivering the 1627 catechetical lectures at Magdelan Hall, Oxford, John Tombes pondered his views for 15 years before he finally came to credobaptist convictions." Here are a few highlights:

Q. 16. Did not Baptism come in the room of Circumcision, Col. 2.11,12. and so to be used as it was?

A. The Apostles words import not that our Baptism came in the room of the Jews Circumcision; there is no mention of any bodily Circumcision but Christ's, which our baptism cannot be said to suceed to, as there it is made the cause of Spiritual Circumcision, without arrogating that to it which belongs to Christ alone, and Baptism is mentioned with faith, as the means whereby we are in Christ, and compleat in him.

Q. 20. Had it not been a discomfort to the believing Jews to have their Children unbaptized, and out of the Covenant?

A. The want of Baptism to Infants was never any grievance to Believers in the New Testament, nor were they thereby put out of the Covenant of Grace.

Q. 25. Are not the Sacraments of the Christian Church in their nature, Seals of the Covenant of Grace?

A. The Scripture doth nowhere so call them, nor doth it mention this as their end and use.

Q. 26. Doth not Peter, Acts 2.38.39. exhort the Jews to baptize themselves and their Children, because the promise of Grace is to Believers and their Children?

A. Those he then spake to were not then Believers; and therefore the words, Acts 2.39. Cannot be understood of a promise to Believers and their Children as such, but the promise is to all, Fathers and Children as called of God; nor are any exhorted to Baptism without fore-going repentance: nor is the promise alledged as conferring right to Baptism, but as a motive to encourage them and hope for pardon, though they wished Christs blood to be on them and their Children. Matth. 27.25. In like sort as Joseph did, Gen. 50.19,20,21.

Q. 35. How came Infant-baptism to be common in the Christian Churches?

A. As Infant-communion came from mistake of John 6.53. So Infant-baptism began about the third Age of the Christian Church, from mistake of John 3.5. the opinion of its giving Grace, and the necessity of it to save the Infant dying from perishing, and after Augustin's time became common, which before was not so frequent.

FINIS

Iain Duguid, Living in the Gap Between Promise and Reality: The Gospel According to Abraham:

Praise God that he prepares his people through many difficult circumstances before he calls them to any task! By the way, that's not just a lesson for young people to learn. Moses and Abram were still in their preparation stage long after most people have retired!

This is good new to a guy who will start seminary at the age of 40. :)

It appears my comments are on the fritz. With some posts, no matter if someone left comments or not, it says "no comments". Hum. I don't think I dorked with it. I'll tinker later.

Oh yea, and the dietary law thingy is up.

I just finished writing a paper on the end of the dietary laws. I'm pretty pleased with it too. I'll probably post it to my Theology page tonight when I get home.

Its a miracle! My website has been healed! I hope the new look is more appealing and easier to navigate. Graphics coming soon. Drop me a comment and let me know what you think or to offer any constructive criticism.

I think I want the Job action figure. Light skin version please. Wonder if he comes with detatchable boils?

Two quick thoughts. First, it is very warm in my office. Are my human rights being violated? Second, my wife pointed out that you cannot spell ByFartherSteps without spelling 'fart'. Thank you Lisa.

This is where voter apathy can lead. Let it serve as a warning.

Speaking of the Far West Region Annual Meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society at Talbot Seminary, there was an excellent parallel session give by Erik Thoennes of Talbot on the Impassibility of God. During the great presentation, he showed a long quote from the Wesylean hymn "Amazing Love". At the end of the session, he displayed it again and had us all stand and sing then he closed in prayer. This is fantastic because it is where theology should lead: worship. If our theology doesn't lead us to worship God better, it is a waste of time. Thank you Dr. Thoennes!

Hey, check it out, Tristan Immanuel has posted Part 3, "How do you know baptism replaces circumcision?" of his two part brief on baptism. This is not his response to my critique but it is a beginning of an answer. I like the way it starts:

In response to my latest series on infant baptism, one critic wrote, “In your articles you state that the New Testament doesn't argue against infant baptism, so the practice of infant baptism hasn't changed since Old Testament times. But you never cite a verse in the Old Testament that indicates that infant baptism was ever practiced. If it was never practiced, why should it be continued?”

Cute. Very cute. But it misses the mark completely.

I think this is a hoot! Can't wait to see where it all goes.

Friday I was at the Far West Region Annual Meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society at Talbot Seminary. The plenary speaker was Dr. Mark Seifrid, Professor of New Testament at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. I really liked on thing he said:

We need to think of ourselves as 'Reforming Christians' first and only secondarily as Protestants.

I think this is great since I really believe we need to get over the Reformation and press on. Rome chose her path and we've clung to the biblical truth. Let's stop worrying about Rome and focus on the work of the Kingdom. We can deal with Rome when they get in the way but we don't need to go pick fights. She doesn't have the political power to burn Reformers at the stake any more.

It appears that the Mosaic dietary laws didn't just disappear over night. I was reading Herman Witsius' The Economy of the Covenants Between God and Man on "the abrogation of the old testament" (I assume he means covenant). Witsius makes an interesting observation:

But this liberty was for some time not sufficiently known, even to the apostles themselves; till Peter was instructed therein by a heavenly vision, Acts x.11. 5thly. Then, by a solemn decree of a synod of the apostles, under presidence of the Holy Spirit, it was ordained, that a yoke was not to be put on the neck of the disciples besides those few things necessary for that time; namely, to abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled; to which was subjoined, though of a different kind, fornication, Acts xv. 10, 28, 29. 6thly afterwards Paul preached freedom from these things also, excepting fornication, that being contrary to the moral law, 1 Cor viii. 4, 8 and x. 25-29.

Back then they used italics in strange places. I left them here. Oh well, back to studying for Sunday School. Next class is on the civil laws of the Mosaic Covenant.

By the way, I hate The Who. Roger Daultry's voice drives me nuts.

Here's one that's bugged me for a while. There's a CLARINEX commercial I've been hearing on the radio. It starts out with the Overture to Tommy playing and then some dude comes on and says something like:

Every day millions of people in the United States wake up to billions of allergens.
Introducing CLARINEX brand of desloratadine tablets.
One tiny blue pill.
CLARINEX provides receptor protection to help block histamine.

First, so what if people wake up to billions of allergens? Many of those millions in the US don't have a problem fighting those allergens. Second, CLARINEX is one tiny blue pill. AND? I think where they're going is to get you to think "one tiny blue pill will help you fight those allergens" without saying it. Finally, why would you want to block histamine? From their website here's what histamine is supposed to do:

Histamine, in turn, makes your tissues secrete fluids and become irritated. The result is a runny nose, nasal congestion, sneezing, watery eyes, and itching of the nose, ears, and throat. Your body is trying to expel the pollen you breathed in.

Ah, so since I wake to billions of allergens, I want to take one tiny blue pill to make my body stop producing histamine so that it can't expel the pollen. So CLARINEX wants me to go to my doctor to get a perscription for a drug that will shut down my body's natural defense against those allergens. Got it. I think I'll pass.
This kind of market-driven logic is one reason why my family practices homeopathy.

AMD knows what horse their wagon is hitched to.
[Added at 10:13] And AMD responds like a good lap dog.

Global Music Sales Down Summary: Global music sales fell by 5% last year

Comment: The music industry is blaming piracy, download services and copying (which I think they think are all the same thing.) The recording labels have even started putting copy protection on some CDs. That protection has gone so far as to crash computers and dork up CD-ROM drives. Fortunately for me, that protection so far has been limited to bands that make me gag like Celine Dion and 'N Sync so it hasn't hit home yet. Here's a quote that leads me to my summary:

"We have the right to protect our exisitng business, and we have a moral duty to protect our artists and songwriters," said Mr Jorgen Larsen, chief executive of Universal Music International.

Right. To translate that, technology is changing and they can't keep up. Dinosaurs are facing extinction and they're not happy. I like iTunes and wish I had an iPod. When cassettes and vinyl records were all we had, I used to love to mix tapes. That's all I'm interested in and have a legal right to. Napster has been shut down for, what, two years now? I don't think the music industry can point to copying and piracy as the problem alone. There has always been piracy and always will be. Perhaps, and I'm really going out on a limb here, perhaps $20 for a CD is just too much?

Sometimes art is just weird Summary: A painting of a black square was dropped from a Russian auction because it was "too precious to sell."
Comment: Avant garde is one thing but for goodness sake, this is a black square! How much vision does that take? My kids have created that before but we didn't put it in a frame. Wow, I mean it was predicted the painting would sell for between $2 million and $10 million! For a black square! Reminds me of the old song by Dire Straits, In The Gallery from their self-titled first album:

And then you get an artist says he doesn't want to paint at all
He takes an empty canvas and sticks it on the wall
The birds of feather all the phonies and all of the fakes
While the dealers they get together
And they decide who gets the breaks
And who's going to be in the gallery

There is good news even in a recession Summary: Penthouse is facing bankruptcy! Yipee!
Comment: While I don't think for a moment America and no less the world in general is getting any smarter about making a buck off of lust nor exploiting young women, I still welcome this news. Maybe its a trend since web porno searches are down too. On second thought, maybe this isn't good news, what else is everyone up to? Oh yea, they're just watching it for free on Fox. Nevermind.

Argue Not With Master Obi-Wan, Young Padawan Summary: Ewan McGregor didn't much like Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, said it was flat, and I agree.
Comment: I loved Star Wars. I liked The Empire Strikes Back. I gagged at Return of the Jedi. But Phantom Menace was too much. I thought Tatooine was supposed to the farthest point from a bright spot in the galaxy? Turns out it was quite the center of attention. When Darth Vader turned out to be Luke's father, that was bad. When he turned out to be Leia's father also, that was too much. Now he's C3PO's dad too? Yikes. Lucas has collapsed what could have been an excellent, galaxy-spanning story into AnakinSkywalker: Most Important Person in the Universe. The name Attack of the Clones is bad enough, but if we find out in the next two movies that Anakin built the Millennium Falcon, introduced Han Solo to Chewbacca, and sketched out the plans for the Death Star on a foe's back with his light saber during a duel, I'm going to barf.

"I was listening to Saint-Saens while sipping a fine Cabernet Sauvignon on a lazy Saturday afternoon." You know, there are some things that, no matter how excellent they are, just cannot be said without sounding like a snot. Sadly, this is one of them.

No wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. - 2Co 11:14

Don't follow the first link if you don't want some serious spoilers on the next Star Wars movie! The dude who runs Ain't It Cool News claims to have gotten a sneak peek at Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones. Without giving away what he says, let me just say that it renews my hope in the Star Wars saga. Also, take a look at Star Wars meets Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Great (or is it g-r-a-t-e?) stuff! Warning, some of the language and content on those site is not very nice.

All your base are belong to us. Really. No kidding, they are.