TheDeSocios.com

Q: What does Steve Jobs and Johannes Gutenberg have to do with following Jesus?

First give me a moment to explain where this question is coming from. I’m reading The Walk by Stephen Smallman, and so far its seems to be a good introduction to what it means to be a disciple of Jesus.In his section of the important of reading the Bible and Prayer he make as small but very important remark:

“If you can read, don’t take for granted what a gift you have been given.”

Smallman is right reading is a gift that most of us don’t appreciate. Just imagine how different the world would be if you could never send a letter or write a note or email someone. Most people aren’t even aware of how much they read on a daily basis. We read and write all the time, just think about how so many people have moved from phones to texting as the quickest mode of communication.Yet, there does seem to be a shift in the way we do read. Christians have the opportunity to have not one but many Bibles in their home–something unheard of even 100 years ago.

Last year WIRED published an article examining the shift in literacy in our technological age, but the suprising conclusion was that people are reading and writing more than even.

“I think we’re in the midst of a literacy revolution the likes of which we haven’t seen since Greek civilization,” she says. For Lunsford, technology isn’t killing our ability to write. It’s reviving it—and pushing our literacy in bold new directions.

This weekend Apple will release the iPad, and if Walt Mossberg, and the folks at WIRED(different article) are correct it could forever change the way we read and interact with content. Tablet computing will change the way that we read and write. We have already seen small steps in this direction with things like the Kindle and even smart phones, like the iPhone, and Droid.

So what! How does any of this answer the opening question?

Specifically for Christians this means that the manor in which we read the Bible is also shifting. Of course some people will lament this shift and worry about what will happen, but we should remember that Christianity has actually undergone many similar shifts in the pasts. Early Christians began to use codexes (the ancient ancestor of todays books) instead of big and clumsy scrolls. When than happened it made it easier for books written in one area to be transported to another area, it also meant that you could reference a middle section of the text without having to unravel the whole things, and potentially damage the expensive object. For most Christians the way they read the Bible was to hear it read aloud.

When Gutenberg first perfected a movable type system which allowed for faster and cheaper publishing, it ushered in another major shift in the way Christians interacted with God’s word. This printing revolution meant that Bibles could be produced at lower cost which meant that owning a copy because feasible for a much larger section of society. Families could actually have their own copy of the Bible which they could be read at home. This meant that individuals who could read could study the Bible for themselves.

Today we are at the cusp of another great shift, digital reading is becoming untethered. Tablets(sometimes called e-readers) like the ipad (and the many more that will follow) mean that soon it will be easy for a Pastor to bring a digital copy of the Bible into the pulpit.

While I know some people will freak out–let me remind everyone: its still the word of God if it’s read from animal skin, papyrus, paper or a digital display. The tech that is involved in reading has changed before and its changing now. I think what we will discover soon that we new technologies will allow Christians to study the Bible in ways that The important part for people who consider themselves disciples of Christ is that if you have the ability to read the word you take every opportunity to do so.

On March 2nd Mark Driscoll preached the last sermon in his Ask Anything series.

After listening to the sermon and reading the blog post found here, I decided to send the church a message, via their Mission and Vision blog. I’ve posted the whole message below. If you’ve listen to or read the post on voxpop and agree or disagree I’d love to hear some feedback on what I said.

I know this comment is worth as much as one of those 90′s camel bucks, but I was disappointed in lasts week sermon. I felt that you didn’t give most regulative principle guys much credit.

In Christ your Bro,
Sam DeSocio
Pastoral Intern
City Reformed Church

After about a month of not finishing this article I finally took some time to sit down and complete my thoughts on this issue.

The percentage of “churched” Americans has continued to rise over the last 100 years. Yet at the same time there is a sense that especially since the 1960′s there has been a dramatic change in the cultural influence the church has in American society. How are we to take these two seemingly contradictory notions.

Here is what I think might be happening in the last 50 or more years.
the evangelical church in general came into existence of of the fighting over modernism vs fundamentalism. The American Evangelical church can be seen as a fighting church, it fought to maintain the infallibility of Scripture, what some would call the battle for the Bible. Christians no matter what their denomination, theology, or church practices, were in agreement when it came to defending the authority of the Scripture. In reality, American Evangelicals, had won the biggest fight in their time, they had defended the reliability of the Bible. Once that battle had been fought, the church maintain a mentality of fighting. I think it is fair to say that the church lost its focus. This proper ecumenicism among different branches of the vine began to fade.

Many churches turned their focus from defending the core of their faith, to lamenting the changing face of American Spirituality. Rather than prophetically speaking into a culture that was rejecting even the notion of a knowable God, many churches decided circled the wagons and began to attack certain cultural trends that bothered their established membership. So the church lamented–over Longer hair and beards, guitars in worship, the lost of Hymns for choruses, the use of technology, and many other issues that should not have taken up their focus. Churches that forbid their members from dancing, were more faithful than those who didn’t. Churches that introduced guitars were more obedient to the great commission than those who still used the piano. The churches that I grew up observing were divided along style choices, that claimed to be based on major doctrinal significance. We have splintered, we have spent our energy fighting each other and fighting against every minor cultural taste.

The church has spent much of its resources on peripheral issues. We now find ourselves running on the cultural fumes of yester-year. Put another way, we have been yelling about secondary issues for so long, that we are finding it difficult to speak to more crucial issues because our prophetic voice has become hoarse.

Christians need to reorient their ways of thinking. We must repent of any, and all cultural corruptions, either from the modern or post-modern, the right or the left, the red or the blue. We must shake off all the cultural baggage that has hindered our fulfillment of the Great Commandment and the Great Commission. Most Christians have accepted that their flavor of Christianity is the one true faithful flavor left, and we must call on the Spirit to remove out pride.

We must use the resources that the Lord has entrusted to us with, to Love the Lord Our God with all our heart soul mind and strength, to Love our neighbor as ourselves, and to help every other brother and sister do the same. All with confidence that Grace will extend to more and more people, with the result being more thanksgiving all to the Glory God.

This cnn article is very interesting, here is a quote:
” Albert Snyder of York, Pennsylvania., sued the Westboro Baptist Church for unspecified damages after members demonstrated at the March 2006 funeral of his son, Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder, who was killed in Iraq.

The jury first awarded $2.9 million in compensatory damages. It returned later in the afternoon with its decision to award $6 million in punitive damages for invasion of privacy and $2 million for causing emotional distress.”

I’ll be honest this is an issue that is close to home. Churches should not be nationalistic nor should they be anarchistic.

What do you think of this church?

Here is my take, they are the final stage of a “voice-crying-in-the-wilderness” mentality. This church thinks that they are it, no one else has any truth. It is horrendous, that they would claim Christ and act the way that they do. This is not a victory, its a shame.

This is a very short reflection that I wrote on Romans 13 in response to James Willson.

It is significant to remember that the first section of is preceded by the Paul’s encouragement to live at peace with all men, Roman 12:18. This seems to be tied to our interaction with the governing authorities.
It is this focus on our lives with other non Christians which is the motivation for Paul’s examination about dealing with the civil authorities.
On Verse 4.
This is a passage which some might take as an ordination of the civil magistrate. I think that this would be a mistake. Ordination after all comes from the church, unless in one verse Paul is bringing some NT understanding of Deutoronomy to bear. Additionally, challenges arising with the national covenanters if they say that a government is illegitimate if it does not claim Christ, for its authority. Paul in this text is saying that no matter what the civil government position on Christ, Christ has placed them in their position and we are to obey the law. I would suggest that this is simply a fleshing out of the principle applied in 12:18 Calvin says that the magistrate is to rule with the intention of the public good. Again I think it is less helpful to divide 13:1-7 from its context in the book of Romans. Paul speaks to persecution in 12, and in both 12 and 13 the main focus seems to be love, not Paul’s ideal government, but the churches actual response to the government that they are living under, just as Revelation was written for the early church not 20th century dispensational movement, so Romans is written primarily for the church living in the capital city of the known world, and not the 16th kirk.

For he is God’s minister for good, etc. Magistrates may hence learn what their vocation is, for they are not to rule for their own interest, but for the public good -John Calvin

If you haven’t checked out De Regno Christi before, now is a good time to check it out. Its a group blog by guys in the Reformed and Presbyterian Circles, they have a good mix of differing opinions on most issues.
Darryl Hart is a regular, so is Peter Leithart, and they have recently ask Doug Wilson, seen by many as the Brian Mclaren of the Federal Vision (Kinda the spokesman kinda not). Because of this recent discussion the blog has just taken off 2000 visits in one day.

On the subject of the Federal Vision Dr. Hart recently had a post that would seem to suggest the Frame’s understanding of biblicism is some how tied to the Federal Vision movement.

Here is my reply to Dr Harts comments on the issue:

Dr. Hart you said ““Scripture” properly means the interpretation of Scripture; that is, the contents of Scripture as reached by human investigation and exegesis.”

You did cite WCF 31.2, but what about WCF 31.4 “All synods or councils, since the Apostles’ times, whether general or particular, may err; and many have erred. Therefore they are not to be made the rule of faith or practice; but
to be used as a help in both.” Isn’t this the definitive complement to 1.10?

Hart’s Original post can be found here: Frame’s Creative Children