Among the Scoffers...

Evangelical Christianity has a pretty popular song that they sing in worship services and, if I remember correctly, it was introduced to me by my high school youth pastor, Scott Priest. It is called "How Deep the Father's Love for Us." It sponsors a standard conservative Evangelical doctrine of Penal Substitutionary Atonement and, that disagreement aside, I was reminded of the song and a line today in mass:

Ashamed, I hear my mocking voice call out among the scoffers.

Central to any discussion of the Passion, Holy Week, and Atonement, is the recognition that - whatever we mean by it - I am complicit in and guilty for the suffering of Christ on the Cross. The Lenten journey is a time of repentance and penance. We join Christ in his sufferings so that we might be glorified with him and share in a resurrection like his (Romans 8:17).

Baptism

I cannot seem to get away from this topic, so I'm going to embrace it and write a bit on it, here. This is my attempt to seriously begin blogging again. Why not make it about something I'm passionate about?

I was reading a blog post by a friend who blogs and whose blog I've gotten a little involved in. I guess I hope that as iron sharpens iron, maybe a rock could sharpen iron, too. Who knows.

Anyways, HERE is his post on Baptism.
Also - HERE is a defense of Infant Baptism by an old professor of mine, Dr. Mark Quanstrom.
And - HERE is a defense of Infant Dedication over against Baptism from another professor of mine - Dr. Carl Leth.

I've not held back, in many places, about defending both Infant Baptism as well as Baptism as the "normative means of God's saving and regenerating Grace." So, I thought maybe I should give an argument for it, and provide you, the reader, with the resources for understanding why the Church has practiced the way it has for nearly 2,000 years.

John 14:6 and Exclusivism: Confessional Language

Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. - John 14:6

Anyone who has had a conversation about "who goes to heaven" knows John 14:6. It comes up over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and, well... you get the point.

However, could it be that this text is not simply what it appears on the surface? Is there a God who is free to move beneath the mere surface and appearances of the text and move a people to a place of inclusive hope that bubbles up out of this text? This text of all texts?!

New Home

Some of you may have followed me on my old blog, most of you probably didn't. I've included a page with a link to all of my Chicken & Cigarettes blog entries from before. Go check those out if you get a chance and you haven't before. Hopefully I'll get the first post rolling here in the next 10 hours or so.