Last night at our Bible study in the Gospel of Mark, we were discussing Jesus' statements in 9:34-37 (among the rest of the passage); the subject at hand went through my mind much of the night.
"And He summoned the crowd with His disciples, and said to them, 'If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel's will save it. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and forfeit his soul? For what will a man give in exchange for his soul?'" At the end of it, Lauren, one of the younger participants in the class, read one of Paul's quotes from Philippians 3, which knit perfectly with our study. "But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained it or have already become perfect, but I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus.
Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, have this attitude; and if in anything you have a different attitude, God will reveal that also to you; however, let us keep living by that same standard to which we have attained.
Brethren, join in following my example, and observe those who walk according to the pattern you have in us. For many walk, of whom I often told you, and now tell you even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite, and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things.
For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ; who will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory, by the exertion of the power that He has even to subject all things to Himself.
The difference is clear to anyone who has lived long as an unbeliever before coming to Christ. Perhaps the biggest difference is what one dreams of doing with one's life as an unbeliever and as a Christian. Maybe the difference also could be attributed to having been an unbeliever in the younger years, when the dreams are more optimistic and perhaps unrealistic. Still, the unbeliever clings to this life, and as he comes to know Christ, as he gains by increments a hope, an understanding, of the future delight of heaven, he releases his grip on the things of this life, which pale in comparison.
The difference is understandable. For the unbeliever, he will experience nothing better than what he has in this life, and it just makes sense to make the most of it until he has a future hope. You can see that the world is trying to make their earthly experience as heavenly as possible, as if there were any way around the idea that it all will come to an end. For the believer, however, this world is far fuller of trouble and trial and dirt than the future that he realizes is waiting for him, and the best that he experiences here, that which used to be so alluring, grows increasingly meaningless.
Paul knew perhaps best of all humanity what he was living for as a believer; many agree that Paul speaks of himself when in 2 Corinthians 12, he discusses someone who had an experience of being taken up to the "third heaven." Paul lived his life as though understanding just how great his heavenly reward might be. He held nothing back in his service to Christ; he didn't seek to preserve his life, or to pursue worthless and temporal things. It was obvious that whatever he had seen in his heavenly experience, it motivated him to the point that earth and its trappings, and all the learning and acclaim he had so diligently earned in the Sanhedrin, had lost its luster. He now considered it refuse in comparison to knowing Christ.
So in the night, when I was pondering this lesson, I thought of various questions to apply to my life, some of which are convicting to me...
1. What would an outside observer think I was living for, if he could observe my life, based on my behavior?
2. What are my dreams for this life?
3. What upsets me the most?
4. What thoughts consume my idle time?
5. If I were given the opportunity of my dreams, what would it be, and why?
6. When I am disappointed, what thought consoles me?
7. Am I a worrier?
8. Do I hoard things?
9. How big a motivator is money? What is my greatest motivator?
10. How do I hope to be seen by the people around me? How does that affect my behavior?
11. Do I hope that people see Jesus in me, or that they don't?
12. Whose pleasure do I seek?
13. Would I seek to live longer on earth so that I could have some particular dream fulfilled?
14. If I seek fitness, what is my purpose? If I seek a perfectly clean house, what is my purpose? If I seek financial abundance, what is my purpose? In any of my goals that I pursue, whose glory am I pursuing?
15. Do I have an ongoing awareness that God sees my life and knows my heart?
16. How much suffering will I be willing to endure for Christ? Do I think that with His help I can face it?
17. Am I afraid of death? If so, what about it frightens me? Do I feel that I would be ready to face God at any minute?
18. Do I have a true longing for heaven, a feeling that I don't belong here but there as a citizen, a desire to see Jesus face to face? Do I expect heaven to be a relief and a joy? How much do I ponder heaven? Is my longing for heaven more a head-knowledge, or a heart-knowledge?
Our goal should be to have these answers be 180 degrees from where they were before we were believers. I don't suppose any of us can say that we've reached that 180 degrees in this life about any of those questions, even if we come close on some of them. Some of my answers are better than others; some I try justifying somewhat. Probably in any of them, I have to think about how honest I'm being, and since there's always room for improvement, all of them I should pray about, and seek to change my heart.
I can't say that there are many things I hope to do before I die. I don't think I fear death much; in fact, there are times when I long for it (maybe for the wrong reasons!). The main selfish reason I would choose to stay is take part in raising Tim to adulthood; there are other things I would like to do along the way (most of which seem unlikely). Most of them are easy to put aside. I think I look forward to heaven for some of the right reasons. But am I living like Paul lived? No, I know I'm not there; far from it! So I need to change, to improve, to seek His help, because without it that change will never come. I want to live as to say with Paul in Philippians 1:21, "To live is Christ, to die is gain."
New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.
Friday, April 17, 2009
Thursday, April 02, 2009
"Crunching" Some Numbers About Genealogy--or, I Looked Some Stuff Up
Okay, I feel some bit silly going on with this genealogy...it is addictive, and the more you find ancestors, the more ancestors there are to find, which means this might never end unless I exercise some self-control (gasp!). Just how much self-control might I need? Well. Late last night I looked up how many ancestors a person is likely to have. Well, of course, from the beginning of time might be too mind-blowing, especially when you consider the numbers at the time of Charlemagne, who seems to be a person around whom genealogy sort of spins.
You know that little mathematical tidbit that adults use on kids, asking them whether they'd rather have $1,000,000 today or a penny the first day, and that amount doubled each day for a month? How many of us would choose $1,000,000? If I hadn't seen the numbers before, I might be opting for it. I cheated and googled it(1) to get the answer because of course I couldn't remember for sure what would come of doubling the amount starting with a penny for a month: $10,737,418.23 (Note: That math website was wrong...finally realizing that it had to end in an even number and was therefore wrong, I tried it the long manual way and it's actually $4,268,882.52. Ha! So, I'm revising my numbers...don't trust everything, maybe anything, on the internet...so a new level of skepticism added...) Math concepts can be amazing. The same concept works on generations and genealogy: each generation back doubles the previous one, so 30 generations brings you the same number as pennies doubled over a month. If there are enough names traced on the internet, I could be busy researching Gary's ancestors, all 426,888,252, forever. Thankfully, I don't think I enjoy it quite that much.
There was a website(2) that approximated how many ancestors a person born in 1975 would have by the time of Charlemagne: (according to their calculations) 1,099,511,627,776. I don't intend to find them all, let me tell you. Another site(3) made the case that while most Europeans are probably descended from Charlemagne, only a very few could truly document it, which casts further aspersions on my research. If you went back to Atilla the Hun (not an ancestor I really cared to find, but it might explain some things), they say you'd have 72,057,594,037,927,940 ancestors--total, not all in one generation (remember to be skeptical!). Which probably exceeds the number of all people of the world since that time, so who knows, we're probably almost all descended from him as well.
At least it gives a perspective of possibility to the idea that most people might find some royalty among their descendants. Royalty was no doubt more likely to track those things than pirates and horse theives might have done, so those lines that are traceable would tend to be the more reputable ones. I have found that there are a number of lines that just can't be tracked past a certain point. Whether there was something to cover up or the people were too busy surviving to keep track of who their grandparents were, or whether no one has expressed enough interest to hunt down the gravestones and church documents and post them on the internet, I have no way of finding out, but what remains "documented" has sparked up my interest in history.
I'm not sure how much I believe in my results, but they're definitely interesting, even though they're on Gary's side, not mine. I've always enjoyed history, especially learning about specific individuals along the way. For example, I've never quite gotten to studying Saxons vs. Normans, and last night I found that one of Gary's purported ancestors, Olaf Sitricsson King of Dublin, Mann & the Isles, died at the hand of Saxons while on a pilgrimage to Rome in 1034. There was another ancestor not so far removed, Aedwine, King of the East Saxons, and they were both great-great-grandparents of sweet little Owain Gwynedd ap Gruffydd (these names are Welsh, just so you know). So all this about Norman conquest over Saxony, you could say, was a family feud...only they didn't know they were to be related until little Odwain was born. How he came to exist? Maybe that stuff that comes along with pillaging...you know. Or maybe it was one of those Romeo and Juliet stories that didn't end up in double suicide. Can you see how interesting it is, and how a person can get hooked even if the actual lineage concept doesn't have so much credibility?
(1) http://mathforum.org/dr.math/faq/faq.doubling.pennies.html "Doubling Pennies"
(2) http://users.anet.com/~jeffb/jabco/ancstrs.htm "How many ancestors do I have?"
(3) http://www.poindexterfamily.org/history/Europe/royal_lines/charlemagne.html "Are we related to Charlemagne?"
You know that little mathematical tidbit that adults use on kids, asking them whether they'd rather have $1,000,000 today or a penny the first day, and that amount doubled each day for a month? How many of us would choose $1,000,000? If I hadn't seen the numbers before, I might be opting for it. I cheated and googled it(1) to get the answer because of course I couldn't remember for sure what would come of doubling the amount starting with a penny for a month: $10,737,418.23 (Note: That math website was wrong...finally realizing that it had to end in an even number and was therefore wrong, I tried it the long manual way and it's actually $4,268,882.52. Ha! So, I'm revising my numbers...don't trust everything, maybe anything, on the internet...so a new level of skepticism added...) Math concepts can be amazing. The same concept works on generations and genealogy: each generation back doubles the previous one, so 30 generations brings you the same number as pennies doubled over a month. If there are enough names traced on the internet, I could be busy researching Gary's ancestors, all 426,888,252, forever. Thankfully, I don't think I enjoy it quite that much.
There was a website(2) that approximated how many ancestors a person born in 1975 would have by the time of Charlemagne: (according to their calculations) 1,099,511,627,776. I don't intend to find them all, let me tell you. Another site(3) made the case that while most Europeans are probably descended from Charlemagne, only a very few could truly document it, which casts further aspersions on my research. If you went back to Atilla the Hun (not an ancestor I really cared to find, but it might explain some things), they say you'd have 72,057,594,037,927,940 ancestors--total, not all in one generation (remember to be skeptical!). Which probably exceeds the number of all people of the world since that time, so who knows, we're probably almost all descended from him as well.
At least it gives a perspective of possibility to the idea that most people might find some royalty among their descendants. Royalty was no doubt more likely to track those things than pirates and horse theives might have done, so those lines that are traceable would tend to be the more reputable ones. I have found that there are a number of lines that just can't be tracked past a certain point. Whether there was something to cover up or the people were too busy surviving to keep track of who their grandparents were, or whether no one has expressed enough interest to hunt down the gravestones and church documents and post them on the internet, I have no way of finding out, but what remains "documented" has sparked up my interest in history.
I'm not sure how much I believe in my results, but they're definitely interesting, even though they're on Gary's side, not mine. I've always enjoyed history, especially learning about specific individuals along the way. For example, I've never quite gotten to studying Saxons vs. Normans, and last night I found that one of Gary's purported ancestors, Olaf Sitricsson King of Dublin, Mann & the Isles, died at the hand of Saxons while on a pilgrimage to Rome in 1034. There was another ancestor not so far removed, Aedwine, King of the East Saxons, and they were both great-great-grandparents of sweet little Owain Gwynedd ap Gruffydd (these names are Welsh, just so you know). So all this about Norman conquest over Saxony, you could say, was a family feud...only they didn't know they were to be related until little Odwain was born. How he came to exist? Maybe that stuff that comes along with pillaging...you know. Or maybe it was one of those Romeo and Juliet stories that didn't end up in double suicide. Can you see how interesting it is, and how a person can get hooked even if the actual lineage concept doesn't have so much credibility?
(1) http://mathforum.org/dr.math/faq/faq.doubling.pennies.html "Doubling Pennies"
(2) http://users.anet.com/~jeffb/jabco/ancstrs.htm "How many ancestors do I have?"
(3) http://www.poindexterfamily.org/history/Europe/royal_lines/charlemagne.html "Are we related to Charlemagne?"
Wednesday, April 01, 2009
If it Were the 1500s, I'd be About Finished...
Today I am 49 years old. I've had forty-nine April Fools birthdays, if you don't count that initial birth-day, and I don't remember not looking a trifle askance upon the fact that it always, invariably happens on April Fool's Day. Even in our Psalm reading, today we will just by God's timing be reading the one that brings some to call April 1 Atheist's Day: Psalm 14. Verse 1 says, "The fool has said in his heart, 'There is no God.' They are corrupt, they have committed abominable deeds; there is no one who does good." All of which makes me look further askance at being born on that particular day. Being called a fool sounds somehow kinder than being called an atheist, because I think of a fool as not having chosen that role--yet Psalm 14:1 makes them one and the same. I'm thankful that being born on April 1 doesn't bind me into such a decision.
I have been doing all of this genealogy on Gary's side, and finding that most lives were fairly short, and I'll bet that 90 percent of them ended in the same town where they started. Very often, I notice, they stayed in the same town, probably the same house, for generations. I can only suppose that most of them never even ventured more than maybe 20 miles from home in their whole lifetimes. I picked a random page of 15 ancestors, and their average age, living in the 1500s and 1600s, was 50 years old. So I could have expected to kick the bucket at just about any time now.
So in comparison, I can appreciate that my life has been very rich. These people, living in one town all their lives and not having access to so many means of communication as we have now, probably knew extremely little about the world around them, about God's creation; they probably knew the same 500 or 1000 people all their lives. They may have stayed in the same church even if they found extreme fault with it, because there wasn't another for miles around.
So I just think of the wonders I'd seen by the time I was seven, when we drove across the country moving from Oregon to Indiana, stopping at various national parks and other scenic stops along the way, and by then I'd already had rich experiences in comparison. The farthest I've been from here in the Northwest is to Tennessee. Since then, I've been as far south as Floritos, Mexico, just south of Tijuana, and as far north as Lake Louise in Alberta. I've seen pictures of the Great Wall of China; just yesterday was sent e-mail pictures of Petra, in Jordan; I've even seen pictures from light years away in outer space. Who could have said that in 1500? Not a soul!
The conveniences we have in our home are things no one from the 1500s could fathom: telephones; electricity; running water; a gas fireplace with a remote (that still blows my mind); a television always armed with movies, news flashes, and obscenities; a computer that connects us to all the world, cds and radio that bring any type of music to please us at any given time; electronic games; a plethora of books; a copy machine/printer; a refrigerator; and a microwave. They may have had wood-burning ovens, but I know none of them had a microwave. Can you imagine bringing one to a king's palace in the 1500s and showing him (supposing electricity was available) how it worked? I think he would have thought it was the work of the devil and sent us to prison!
The best thing about these times, better than the access to travel, to information, and to conveniences and luxuries, is the fact that we are interconnected with so many more people. Maybe at times in a more disposable way, a shallower way, and that may be for the worse; yet if we are in unworkable circumstances, I think we have more opportunity to improve on them because of the way that our society is structured. Because we know more people than we otherwise would, we can share joys and sorrows, struggles and prayer requests more readily, and bear one another's burdens and rejoice with one another so well.
I remember turning about 28, being a working new mom with extreme anemia, and wondering how in the world my grandmother had ever lived to be 90. How in the world! I still wonder at it--she'd nearly died a few times, because of thyroid problems, and a wrong blood type transfusion, and being born a preemie in 1899. She was a survivor. And I have outlived the age at which my father died, by 8 years; the year I turned 41 I remember feeling very mortal, as if it were impossible to pass that age by and live on. I may have faltered along the way, but these days I'm feeling the potential to live a pretty full agespan.
Do I need to live much longer? Not if God wants me to leave. I can be content with the life that I have been given. I hope that if He leaves me here until I'm 90, that He strengthens my frame for it and provides financially; I don't see that I'm up to that otherwise. But life has been so amazing, especially when I compare it with those ancestors who lived in the 1500s. God is great, and we are blessed!
But I have trusted in Your lovingkindness; My heart shall rejoice in Your salvation. I will sing to the LORD, because He has dealt bountifully with me. Psalm 13:5-6
New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.
I have been doing all of this genealogy on Gary's side, and finding that most lives were fairly short, and I'll bet that 90 percent of them ended in the same town where they started. Very often, I notice, they stayed in the same town, probably the same house, for generations. I can only suppose that most of them never even ventured more than maybe 20 miles from home in their whole lifetimes. I picked a random page of 15 ancestors, and their average age, living in the 1500s and 1600s, was 50 years old. So I could have expected to kick the bucket at just about any time now.
So in comparison, I can appreciate that my life has been very rich. These people, living in one town all their lives and not having access to so many means of communication as we have now, probably knew extremely little about the world around them, about God's creation; they probably knew the same 500 or 1000 people all their lives. They may have stayed in the same church even if they found extreme fault with it, because there wasn't another for miles around.
So I just think of the wonders I'd seen by the time I was seven, when we drove across the country moving from Oregon to Indiana, stopping at various national parks and other scenic stops along the way, and by then I'd already had rich experiences in comparison. The farthest I've been from here in the Northwest is to Tennessee. Since then, I've been as far south as Floritos, Mexico, just south of Tijuana, and as far north as Lake Louise in Alberta. I've seen pictures of the Great Wall of China; just yesterday was sent e-mail pictures of Petra, in Jordan; I've even seen pictures from light years away in outer space. Who could have said that in 1500? Not a soul!
The conveniences we have in our home are things no one from the 1500s could fathom: telephones; electricity; running water; a gas fireplace with a remote (that still blows my mind); a television always armed with movies, news flashes, and obscenities; a computer that connects us to all the world, cds and radio that bring any type of music to please us at any given time; electronic games; a plethora of books; a copy machine/printer; a refrigerator; and a microwave. They may have had wood-burning ovens, but I know none of them had a microwave. Can you imagine bringing one to a king's palace in the 1500s and showing him (supposing electricity was available) how it worked? I think he would have thought it was the work of the devil and sent us to prison!
The best thing about these times, better than the access to travel, to information, and to conveniences and luxuries, is the fact that we are interconnected with so many more people. Maybe at times in a more disposable way, a shallower way, and that may be for the worse; yet if we are in unworkable circumstances, I think we have more opportunity to improve on them because of the way that our society is structured. Because we know more people than we otherwise would, we can share joys and sorrows, struggles and prayer requests more readily, and bear one another's burdens and rejoice with one another so well.
I remember turning about 28, being a working new mom with extreme anemia, and wondering how in the world my grandmother had ever lived to be 90. How in the world! I still wonder at it--she'd nearly died a few times, because of thyroid problems, and a wrong blood type transfusion, and being born a preemie in 1899. She was a survivor. And I have outlived the age at which my father died, by 8 years; the year I turned 41 I remember feeling very mortal, as if it were impossible to pass that age by and live on. I may have faltered along the way, but these days I'm feeling the potential to live a pretty full agespan.
Do I need to live much longer? Not if God wants me to leave. I can be content with the life that I have been given. I hope that if He leaves me here until I'm 90, that He strengthens my frame for it and provides financially; I don't see that I'm up to that otherwise. But life has been so amazing, especially when I compare it with those ancestors who lived in the 1500s. God is great, and we are blessed!
But I have trusted in Your lovingkindness; My heart shall rejoice in Your salvation. I will sing to the LORD, because He has dealt bountifully with me. Psalm 13:5-6
New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Genealogy Brings a Heap of Information, and a Lot of Doubt
I've been spending some time doing something I thought I would never do: I've been looking up our family's genealogy online. Not that I think it has a whole lot of usefulness; I realize that in Bible times, they kept genealogies to prove what kind of tribe they belonged to and whether or not their ancestry could match the prophecies regarding the coming Messiah. But when the Messiah had come, it was no longer useful; even for those who had rejected Him, the temple was destroyed and genealogical records no longer existed. So usefulness is a done deal for the most part in that regard.
Nevertheless, I've been wondering about my genealogy. Not having enough information to go on for my side so far, I've been researching Gary's. I'm amazed at just how much information I can find on the internet. I can sit here and get an amazing amount of information just at the click of a button, when not too many years ago, it would have taken traveling overseas, looking in church yards, church records, courthouses, and all sorts of frail old documents or dark and misty microfiche. The information available so readily today is because of so many who did that very thing.
I expected (especially when I someday do our family's side) to find any variety of crazy and colorful characters, criminals, pirates, who-knows what. I expected to find maybe a third cousin of a president or statesman. But the first one that I uncovered, so to speak, was very much a surprise, perhaps because he was one of those I would have sought to be related to. (Remember this is not my genealogy, but Gary's.) I found in one of the first days I was researching that my kids are supposedly descended from Martin Luther. Well. I looked at what information I could find on his daughter who supposedly married one of our ancestors, but there was only one place where there's any indication that they were married. I highly suspect it to be a faulty link. The other funny thing about it before I looked at that was that this line of ancestry came through my mother-in-law...who I never really got along with. So it occurred to me that I could expect that any of us could have been descended from someone like Martin Luther, but somehow it was the oddest twist to think that it would have been my mother-in-law. That at least showed that I hadn't made up that story, because if I had, it wouldn't have wound up that way.
The other thing I find strange with this genealogy is that there are no questionable characters...no horse thieves, no pirates, nothing with a glint of mischief. It was kind of disappointing, to tell the truth. Not only no questionable characters, but I'm wondering if everyone is descended from a whole lot of knights, lords, barons. Is that true, or is Gary just a very regal type of guy? I know he's a nice guy, and why I would think he would be descended from at least some mischief makers, or that he wouldn't have so many really high-level players, I don't know. I think we're pretty average people, both of us.
I wonder about the reality of these genealogies. I suppose they're a good place to start. They might even be a pretty nice inspiration to bring the study of medieval times to life, with the thought that we had some knights weighted down with armor riding around on horses, and all of that...it does make history a bit more intriguing. And it gives a name to start with, to see whether there's actually any documentation behind it. A person doesn't have to be such a detective to even come up with the initial clues of ancestry. But I have far more names from doing this in my spare time at home in the last couple of weeks than I could have come up with on my own in a lifetime of travel, if I had done this 20 years ago. It's a nice set of documentation for casual family interest, but not reliable enough to point to and share with everyone (though I have a funny story to tell about finding Luther in it...ha! As soon as I mentioned to Tim that it appeared we were descended from Luther, he immediately called Katie, who immediately put it up as her facebook status. Now it looks less credible...ha...and more credible, I might add, that Gary, Katie and Tim have fairly recent ancestors in common with no less than Hillary Clinton. Talk about the swing of a pendulum! Ha! And please remember, I so far have escaped such a notable affiliation!).
So what is it that makes everyone feel that they have to be related to someone "important"? We are someone important, each one of us, in and of ourselves. Jesus died on the cross for all of us. Being related to a president, a theologian, a knight, a duke, a lord, a king...what would it matter? Who cares? It doesn't make us one whit more important than we were before I researched it. Our importance is all in Christ. What we do with Him is what matters most of all, whether we accept His gift of salvation, or we don't. Whether we tell others about Him, or keep Him to ourselves. Whether we live in obedience to Him, or go our own way. Who cares if we had some genes like those of someone who made it big 1,000 years ago? I have brothers and cousins and aunts and uncles who've made it a lot bigger than I ever have in the world. I've "made it bigger" than any of them, though, in heaven, you might say. So I don't envy them, I don't resent them, I don't need everyone to know I'm related to them. I want to drag them along with me to heaven when I go, if only I knew how! It's a matter of prayer.
What prompted me to do this then? I think I wanted to know the nationalities, the history of my children, and I kind of hoped that some of the glint of the mischief in their eyes came from Gary's side as much as mine. Who knows, maybe it did, and someone has just done a very big job of cleaning it up. What a shame! It might have made it quite a bit more interesting...and convincing...to leave it in.
Nevertheless, I've been wondering about my genealogy. Not having enough information to go on for my side so far, I've been researching Gary's. I'm amazed at just how much information I can find on the internet. I can sit here and get an amazing amount of information just at the click of a button, when not too many years ago, it would have taken traveling overseas, looking in church yards, church records, courthouses, and all sorts of frail old documents or dark and misty microfiche. The information available so readily today is because of so many who did that very thing.
I expected (especially when I someday do our family's side) to find any variety of crazy and colorful characters, criminals, pirates, who-knows what. I expected to find maybe a third cousin of a president or statesman. But the first one that I uncovered, so to speak, was very much a surprise, perhaps because he was one of those I would have sought to be related to. (Remember this is not my genealogy, but Gary's.) I found in one of the first days I was researching that my kids are supposedly descended from Martin Luther. Well. I looked at what information I could find on his daughter who supposedly married one of our ancestors, but there was only one place where there's any indication that they were married. I highly suspect it to be a faulty link. The other funny thing about it before I looked at that was that this line of ancestry came through my mother-in-law...who I never really got along with. So it occurred to me that I could expect that any of us could have been descended from someone like Martin Luther, but somehow it was the oddest twist to think that it would have been my mother-in-law. That at least showed that I hadn't made up that story, because if I had, it wouldn't have wound up that way.
The other thing I find strange with this genealogy is that there are no questionable characters...no horse thieves, no pirates, nothing with a glint of mischief. It was kind of disappointing, to tell the truth. Not only no questionable characters, but I'm wondering if everyone is descended from a whole lot of knights, lords, barons. Is that true, or is Gary just a very regal type of guy? I know he's a nice guy, and why I would think he would be descended from at least some mischief makers, or that he wouldn't have so many really high-level players, I don't know. I think we're pretty average people, both of us.
I wonder about the reality of these genealogies. I suppose they're a good place to start. They might even be a pretty nice inspiration to bring the study of medieval times to life, with the thought that we had some knights weighted down with armor riding around on horses, and all of that...it does make history a bit more intriguing. And it gives a name to start with, to see whether there's actually any documentation behind it. A person doesn't have to be such a detective to even come up with the initial clues of ancestry. But I have far more names from doing this in my spare time at home in the last couple of weeks than I could have come up with on my own in a lifetime of travel, if I had done this 20 years ago. It's a nice set of documentation for casual family interest, but not reliable enough to point to and share with everyone (though I have a funny story to tell about finding Luther in it...ha! As soon as I mentioned to Tim that it appeared we were descended from Luther, he immediately called Katie, who immediately put it up as her facebook status. Now it looks less credible...ha...and more credible, I might add, that Gary, Katie and Tim have fairly recent ancestors in common with no less than Hillary Clinton. Talk about the swing of a pendulum! Ha! And please remember, I so far have escaped such a notable affiliation!).
So what is it that makes everyone feel that they have to be related to someone "important"? We are someone important, each one of us, in and of ourselves. Jesus died on the cross for all of us. Being related to a president, a theologian, a knight, a duke, a lord, a king...what would it matter? Who cares? It doesn't make us one whit more important than we were before I researched it. Our importance is all in Christ. What we do with Him is what matters most of all, whether we accept His gift of salvation, or we don't. Whether we tell others about Him, or keep Him to ourselves. Whether we live in obedience to Him, or go our own way. Who cares if we had some genes like those of someone who made it big 1,000 years ago? I have brothers and cousins and aunts and uncles who've made it a lot bigger than I ever have in the world. I've "made it bigger" than any of them, though, in heaven, you might say. So I don't envy them, I don't resent them, I don't need everyone to know I'm related to them. I want to drag them along with me to heaven when I go, if only I knew how! It's a matter of prayer.
What prompted me to do this then? I think I wanted to know the nationalities, the history of my children, and I kind of hoped that some of the glint of the mischief in their eyes came from Gary's side as much as mine. Who knows, maybe it did, and someone has just done a very big job of cleaning it up. What a shame! It might have made it quite a bit more interesting...and convincing...to leave it in.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Why do Others Want us to Join in their Legalism?
A few weeks ago, when Katie was home for Spring Break (while it was yet winter, and snowed twice that week), our Pastor Ken and his wife Kit visited for dinner. It turned out that he had questions for Katie. He'd been lent a dvd made by Vision Forum, in which they present how vital they think it is for daughters to stay at home under the protection of their father, helping with the father's work and learning from him. We had seen the dvd, which had been lent to us a few months previously. A girl going to college was said more than once to have selfish motives in doing so, and they made no allowances for a girl to attend college for any reason.
Katie and I believe that the makers of the dvd hold to a legalistic view, presenting Christianity as being bound up in what you do, rather than what you believe. There was little actual Scripture in the presentation, and they twisted Proverbs 31:10-31 to defend their view, which seems entirely contradictory to its true meaning. They put living for family purposes above the Scriptures, yet refer very vaguely to the Scriptures as the foundation of why they believe as they do. I think that they take what may work for their family, and assume that it must therefore work for everyone else in the same way, with the same benefit. They don't even touch on various aspects that could make the scenario unworkable for others: If the father doesn't have his own business, and/or can't take the daughter along with him to work; if the father is not a Christian, and might be, in some ways, more of a hindrance to the daughter's spiritual growth than a help; or if the father has died or left or is otherwise not able or willing to have her participate in his work. One of these scenarios might very well apply to most Christian girls, but there is no explanation or provision regarding what a girl should do in that case.
The dvd's message assumes that a girl in college is going after completely selfish gain, and doesn't take into account the possibility that she might be attending a Christian college, or a secular college with God's direction and a goal of being better able to serve Christ with an equipping that might not be available by participating in her earthly father's work. A girl also can't necessarily assume that she'll be married and supported by a husband all her life; maybe God puts it in her to learn to support herself because she might never marry or because she may become widowed, or to not only serve her family, but to serve the community, whether in the work world, in volunteer work, or as a missionary. In condemning the possibility of college when that's where God might be directing her, they risk causing her to stumble in disobedience to Him, in an attempt to seem righteous before them instead.
Pastor Ken asked Katie something to the effect of "What do you think is their motivation in presenting this approach? Why do they want others to live this way?" And I think it's a good question about legalism in whatever form it takes.
In our study of the Gospel of Mark, we've been seeing time and again how the Pharisees could not understand why Jesus insisted on remaining totally unencumbered by the traditions that they held to so tenaciously. They had so lost sight of living according to the Scriptures that His scriptural teachings only angered and threatened them. I think such is true of the modern-day legalist, as well. He holds tightly to outward trappings that he thinks make him more righteous, more holy, more acceptable to God, even though there's nothing in the Scriptures that would say he must embrace those ways. Not only does he do so, but he tries to gather others to do the same thing as well. If others do so, it affirms him. He gets the feeling that if he has their approval, maybe he has God's as well; it adds to his earthly security, which he mistakes for security in Christ. Legalism takes as many forms as there are individuals who try to please God in their own way; it takes the form of other religions, and of variations on scriptural teaching. I know I've tended toward it, and I would be surprised if most people don't have to struggle against trying to make themselves right with God by merely human means, or as a "Jesus-Plus" approach--not just Jesus, but Jesus and human works of outward righteousness. It's the human way, and the American way: Don't leave it in its simple form; that can't be good enough. Supersize it.
So it's important for the believer to examine himself. 2 Corinthians 13:5 says "Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you--unless indeed you fail the test?" What would the test be? Romans 8:9 says, "However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him." How do you tell whether a person has the Spirit of God? Galatians 5:22-23 says, "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law." If this type of fruit isn't showing much in a person's life, chances are, if he has the Spirit of God, he hasn't learned to let Him reign like he should in his life. There is another possibility too, especially if these things are never really showing: Maybe he doesn't have the Spirit of God at all. Then he may exhibit more the fruit of the flesh; Galatians 5:19-20 describes them this way: Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. And yet, I feel that these lists, Scripture though they be, could lull a person into falsely believing that he is saved even if he is not. There are also so many warnings in 1 John along the tone of 4:20: "If someone says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen." There are the uppermost commandments about loving God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and loving your neighbor as yourself. We can assure ourselves that we do, and yet I warrant it's more than any earthly lifetime getting these things really right. So we can examine ourselves, and honestly admit dissatisfaction with our assessment based on any of these and other Scriptures, but all we can really do in response is confess our lack to Christ and be assured that He is able to forgive us, and make us right with God. Nothing we add in works can fill the gap of anything wanting in us.
I don't think being legalistic is a sign that you definitely don't have Christ, but it might be a warning regarding what you know of salvation. How are you good enough for heaven? Is it by anything that you have ever done, or thought, or said? Not by anything you'll find in the Scriptures! All the goodness that gets us into heaven belongs to Christ; it's from Christ, and it's in spite of ourselves that He has seen fit to save us, not because we ever earned it! I like Romans 4:2-3: "For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the Scripture say? 'Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.'" We can try telling people, or showing them by what we do, that we're good enough, but it doesn't fool God. It's trusting in Jesus Christ alone that is adequate to make us right for heaven. Here is what Jesus did: Colossians 2:13-14 says, "When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross." I don't know about you, but that description points out to me that it was entirely out of my realm of ability to cancel out any of my sins by anything I could do. If it wasn't, don't you think He would have told me how I could do it on my own, rather than surrender His life on my behalf? Don't trust in your earthly ability to please God as a way to cancel out your sins and get to heaven. Don't try to get others to join you in some non-scriptural means of righteousness. Just place your trust on Jesus Christ, who alone is adequate to the task of making you right before God.
New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.
Katie and I believe that the makers of the dvd hold to a legalistic view, presenting Christianity as being bound up in what you do, rather than what you believe. There was little actual Scripture in the presentation, and they twisted Proverbs 31:10-31 to defend their view, which seems entirely contradictory to its true meaning. They put living for family purposes above the Scriptures, yet refer very vaguely to the Scriptures as the foundation of why they believe as they do. I think that they take what may work for their family, and assume that it must therefore work for everyone else in the same way, with the same benefit. They don't even touch on various aspects that could make the scenario unworkable for others: If the father doesn't have his own business, and/or can't take the daughter along with him to work; if the father is not a Christian, and might be, in some ways, more of a hindrance to the daughter's spiritual growth than a help; or if the father has died or left or is otherwise not able or willing to have her participate in his work. One of these scenarios might very well apply to most Christian girls, but there is no explanation or provision regarding what a girl should do in that case.
The dvd's message assumes that a girl in college is going after completely selfish gain, and doesn't take into account the possibility that she might be attending a Christian college, or a secular college with God's direction and a goal of being better able to serve Christ with an equipping that might not be available by participating in her earthly father's work. A girl also can't necessarily assume that she'll be married and supported by a husband all her life; maybe God puts it in her to learn to support herself because she might never marry or because she may become widowed, or to not only serve her family, but to serve the community, whether in the work world, in volunteer work, or as a missionary. In condemning the possibility of college when that's where God might be directing her, they risk causing her to stumble in disobedience to Him, in an attempt to seem righteous before them instead.
Pastor Ken asked Katie something to the effect of "What do you think is their motivation in presenting this approach? Why do they want others to live this way?" And I think it's a good question about legalism in whatever form it takes.
In our study of the Gospel of Mark, we've been seeing time and again how the Pharisees could not understand why Jesus insisted on remaining totally unencumbered by the traditions that they held to so tenaciously. They had so lost sight of living according to the Scriptures that His scriptural teachings only angered and threatened them. I think such is true of the modern-day legalist, as well. He holds tightly to outward trappings that he thinks make him more righteous, more holy, more acceptable to God, even though there's nothing in the Scriptures that would say he must embrace those ways. Not only does he do so, but he tries to gather others to do the same thing as well. If others do so, it affirms him. He gets the feeling that if he has their approval, maybe he has God's as well; it adds to his earthly security, which he mistakes for security in Christ. Legalism takes as many forms as there are individuals who try to please God in their own way; it takes the form of other religions, and of variations on scriptural teaching. I know I've tended toward it, and I would be surprised if most people don't have to struggle against trying to make themselves right with God by merely human means, or as a "Jesus-Plus" approach--not just Jesus, but Jesus and human works of outward righteousness. It's the human way, and the American way: Don't leave it in its simple form; that can't be good enough. Supersize it.
So it's important for the believer to examine himself. 2 Corinthians 13:5 says "Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you--unless indeed you fail the test?" What would the test be? Romans 8:9 says, "However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him." How do you tell whether a person has the Spirit of God? Galatians 5:22-23 says, "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law." If this type of fruit isn't showing much in a person's life, chances are, if he has the Spirit of God, he hasn't learned to let Him reign like he should in his life. There is another possibility too, especially if these things are never really showing: Maybe he doesn't have the Spirit of God at all. Then he may exhibit more the fruit of the flesh; Galatians 5:19-20 describes them this way: Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. And yet, I feel that these lists, Scripture though they be, could lull a person into falsely believing that he is saved even if he is not. There are also so many warnings in 1 John along the tone of 4:20: "If someone says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen." There are the uppermost commandments about loving God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and loving your neighbor as yourself. We can assure ourselves that we do, and yet I warrant it's more than any earthly lifetime getting these things really right. So we can examine ourselves, and honestly admit dissatisfaction with our assessment based on any of these and other Scriptures, but all we can really do in response is confess our lack to Christ and be assured that He is able to forgive us, and make us right with God. Nothing we add in works can fill the gap of anything wanting in us.
I don't think being legalistic is a sign that you definitely don't have Christ, but it might be a warning regarding what you know of salvation. How are you good enough for heaven? Is it by anything that you have ever done, or thought, or said? Not by anything you'll find in the Scriptures! All the goodness that gets us into heaven belongs to Christ; it's from Christ, and it's in spite of ourselves that He has seen fit to save us, not because we ever earned it! I like Romans 4:2-3: "For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the Scripture say? 'Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.'" We can try telling people, or showing them by what we do, that we're good enough, but it doesn't fool God. It's trusting in Jesus Christ alone that is adequate to make us right for heaven. Here is what Jesus did: Colossians 2:13-14 says, "When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross." I don't know about you, but that description points out to me that it was entirely out of my realm of ability to cancel out any of my sins by anything I could do. If it wasn't, don't you think He would have told me how I could do it on my own, rather than surrender His life on my behalf? Don't trust in your earthly ability to please God as a way to cancel out your sins and get to heaven. Don't try to get others to join you in some non-scriptural means of righteousness. Just place your trust on Jesus Christ, who alone is adequate to the task of making you right before God.
New American Standard Bible (NASB) Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.
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