New Podcast

Recently I began a new venture in the world of podcasting. I've been hesitant for a while, asking myself if we really need another person talking in cyberspace. But I think there is a need for yet one more podcast. 

We are all submerged in the modern world to some extent. We can't and shouldn't try to abandon the world in which we live. Jesus did die for it, after all. If He immersed Himself in the daily matters that surrounded Him, ushering in God's kingdom, we should do likewise. 

Slavery has always been a temptation. We understand how selling others into slavery is sin, but we don't understand the problem of giving yourself over to slavery. That's the wisdom of the doctrine of man's natural depravity. Not the straw-man version of depravity, but the realistic teaching that man naturally desires to rule himself rather than submit to God's rule. Ever since Adam and Eve, the serpent has presented the false-story of God-as-tyrant and ____?____-as-deliverer. These potential deliverers can all lead to slavery, whether bad things (drugs, ideology, communist dictators) or good things, e.g. technology, money, etc. A good life is about learning to walk free from the slavery of sin and become a faithful member of God's kingdom.

In this podcast we'll talk to people who understand different aspects of living a good life, whether it's becoming more like Christ, loving our neighbors, growing in wisdom, or being a good steward of the gifts God has given. We will talk about what it means to live free from the oppression of the world and be an agent of God's new creation.  

If you're interested, go here...https://mattcarpenter.podbean.com/

History of American Education

 

We are bombarded with stories of government overreach into education. We hear about progressive propaganda disguised as curriculum, or parents in a California school district who are not allowed withdraw their children from the LGBT curriculum. You probably did not hear about the instance in Massachusetts where the state militia arrived at several homes of families who didn’t want their children to attend the local school. Under threat of force the militia escorted children from their homes and to the local school. The reason you probably never heard about it – it happened in 1852. Government overreach and mandatory education go together like Communism and gulags.

I won’t retread the vast array of problems in modern education. No one argues that the American education system is sound. But I will argue that the fruit of our current system is not the result of a good tree that’s diseased; it is the result of a poor seed planted in thorny ground and left untended.

The first instruction regarding education was given by the prophet Moses in the Torah, the first five books of the Bible. These books represent the first recorded history and culture manual for a nation. He says that parents were to teach their children to love God at all times of the day. At a time when parents would spend all day with their children, this was easily done. Education for the ancients included knowledge, worship, skills, community-wide activities, and celebrations. Yet we know Israel was not faithful to that work. When they were captive in Babylon, the synagogues were created. These were places for worship and instruction in what it meant to be Jewish.

Skipping ahead a few civilizations, the people known as “the Greeks” were not one synonymous group, but several city-states who differed in what they valued and emphasized. The most notable difference was Sparta, who valued military service and Athens, who valued leisure and intellectual pursuits. Their most famous philosophers: Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, were similar to Hebrew prophets, calling the people to live in a humane way and reject pragmatism (focus on what works, not what’s best) and decadence. They were, like the prophet John the Baptist, voices crying in the wilderness who were mostly rejected by their own people.

Critiquing the world by loving it

The Presence of the Kingdom by Jacques Ellul
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This book is hard to qualify. It's a work of social criticism, but from a theological angle. The premise is that the Church has lost her savor because she has adopted the elements and ideologies of the world, or been lured into joining them. The answer is to develop an alternate way of life based on the Incarnation and eschaton that both critiques and embraces the world through loving our neighbors (via our daily work, service, prayer etc.) in the power of the Holy Spirit.

It has some of the best insights to the modern situation I've ever read, although it was written over 70 years ago. It is the introductory work of Jacques Ellul and I was left wanting to read more, although it is quite dense. If you read this, do not fail to read the conclusion; it brings together many of the strands that were left dangling in earlier chapters.

Learning From Our Elders

 

A Review of Live Not By Lies, Rod Dreher, Sentinel Press, 2020

No one would argue that being a Christian in the United States is easier than almost anywhere else. One of our founding pillars was the freedom to practice our religion as we see fit and people have migrated for centuries to enjoy that freedom. Nevertheless, there are changes afoot. Basic moral codes, understand in the West for thousands of years, are not only being questioned but mocked and vilified. Under our current legislation, speaking plainly about what Scripture calls sin can lead to accusation of hate crime. Big businesses, once protectors of the moral status quo (whether for the right reasons or not is another matter), now enforce an actively libertine agenda through their profits and their “training” sessions. Any state who dares to oppose this risks losing the tax dollars that come from those successful businesses.

At the time of this writing Kristi Noem, governor of South Dakota and favorite of social conservatives, just vetoed a bill passed by the South Dakota legislature that would protect women’s sports to only women. She admits it was for fear of the NCAA’s potentially negative response to the bill. This even though the NCAA had yet to address the bill in any form. Just the thought that South Dakota might face collegiate consequences was enough to derail a bill Lyndon Johnson would have thought common sense. But Governor Noem is not alone. Many other red-state, supposedly reliable conservative governors have capitulated to the woke crowd. As the late columnist Joe Sobran said, “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me three times, I'm a Republican.”

Yet Christians are still free to practice their beliefs without fear, aren’t they? Yes, but with increasing limitations. States drunk with power during the COVID crisis shut down churches because of the health risk while allowing other institutions and rioting activities to proceed with few precautions. The state of Christian freedom in the U.S. is not what is used to be. That leads me to the excellent book by Rod Dreher, Live Not By Lies.

More than a Christian Veneer

 

In the 1990’s Marvin Olasky, editor at World Magazine, began editing a series of books on Christian worldview. These books included All God’s Children and Blue Suede Shoes, by Ken Meyers, and State of the Arts, by Gene Edward Veith (both of which are excellent). Each book in the series approached a  topic from a specifically Christian perspective. When I read Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning by Douglas Wilson in 2010, it was one of those "light bulb" moments. Revisiting that book recently, I was reminded why.  

I read the book having taught history in a government school for six years. I knew public education was mostly a farce but could not give a thorough explanation as to what should be done in response. Certainly I had ideas which I would usually discuss with my carpool companion as we rode to and from work. But they were essentially to restore rigor and discipline to the classroom. There was no cohesive philosophy of Christian education, just tweaks to the current system with plenty of Bible added.

Reading Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning was an oasis for me. The author, Douglas Wilson, not only had ideas of what Christian education should be, he put those ideas into practice. Wilson, longtime pastor of Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho, helped to start Logos School in Moscow. He wanted to start a school that would be more than public education with a Christian veneer. He and the men of the church wanted an education that would nurture the soul. This is best expressed in the words of English poet John Milton. “The end then of learning is to repair the ruins of our first parents by regaining to know God aright, and out of that knowledge to love him, to imitate him, to be like him, as we may the nearest by possessing our souls of true virtue, which being united to the heavenly grace of faith makes up the highest perfection.” That quote summarizes the message of this book.

Growing Virtue Through Education

 

a Review of Norms and Nobility by David V. Hicks

One of the lesser-known cries of the Protestant Reformers was, “Ad fontes,” which means “back to the sources.” They were calling upon people to return to the writings of the Church Fathers when studying theology. The fathers were guides for many who were leading the Reformation at the time. Recently I decided to go back to a source that, while not ancient, was instrumental in the rise of the modern classical education movement: Norms and Nobility (1981), by David Hicks.

Some books allow for a quick reading and yield their insights without much effort. Not so with Norms and Nobility. Although short, it packs enough wisdom to require multiple, slow readings. Mr. Hicks’ thesis is simple: education will produce some kind of person. Whereas modern education produces utilitarian, empty souls; classical, Christian education aids the formation of virtuous souls. He believes the latter should be the intention of education, as it was in classical Greece, Rome, and the early Christian era. But modern education has abdicated that role in exchange for the diminished role of job preparation. In doing so we have failed the rising generation.

Theology of Leaven

 

Theology of Leaven

Matthew 13:33 “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.”

Many people read Rod Dreher’s The Benedict Option and discussed it afterwards. Many more didn’t read it but criticized it anyway. The most prominent critique was that he was calling for people to “head for the hills,” or become Amish. Of course removing yourself and your family from a bad situation is not always a bad idea, especially if you live in a place where you will be persecuted for your faith (see Acts 8). But Christians should not be known as people who only retreat.

That said, retreat is not what Dreher calls for. He calls for strategic training and redeployment. Now that may sound like a mere euphemism for retreat, but in reality it’s a separate plan.