xpiDmwAtnrfw's Xanga

O Christ, Let Us Know Thee

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 08:46:42 GMT

Adam knew Eve, and she was with child. But Christ is bodily in heaven and not on earth, and he says we’ll fast for it (Lk 5.33–35). Yet he also tells us,

But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgement: concerning sin, because they do not believe in me; concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see me no longer; concerning judgement, because the ruler of this world is judged. (Jn 16.6–11)

‘It’s better this way’?

Unless the Holy Spirit makes Christ present with us – everyone who loves anyone knows there’s no other way for it to be better that Christ has ascended into heaven. Theologically, unless this is so, the Incarnation by which Christ dwelt among us is of no present use to us, either, having served its purpose upon the Cross, with nothing but an empty reminder today. As it is, through the Holy Spirit, Christ the Son of Man has ascended and lifted us up to the heavenlies to be our Emmanuel still.

Where is the Holy Spirit present, and Christ through him? If the most important answer is a simple ‘everywhere’, our relationship doesn’t exist. Where is the Holy Spirit, then? For we cannot say he’s found where we wish him to be, nor can we say he’s found in our mere thoughts of Jesus our Bridegroom: such answers are sterile, dead, useless, our misdirected faith without God’s works. The revivalists have Christ in their minds (in reason and emotion) and nowhere else, or else they subscribe to superstitions of miracles and tongues making Christ present. But these are all of them effects, not instruments, of God’s presence.

We say, ‘Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world, grant us thy peace,’ but his peace cannot be with us unless he is, because these his gifts come to us not by wire transfer but by relationship. But I’ve heard from Christ himself where we, having been lifted up to heaven, shall find him: ‘This is my Body’; ‘this is the New Covenant in my Blood.’

Lord, I’ll have thee, or I’ll none. ‘Put not your trust in princes, in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation. When his breath departs, he returns to the earth; on that very day his plans perish.’ O Lord, have mercy upon us; have mercy upon us. O Lord, let thy mercy lighten upon us, as our trust is in thee. O Lord, in thee have I trusted: let me never be confounded.

Food and French

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 13:35:18 GMT

Did maybe half of the lunch-making today. I’d better become a faster meat-cutter over time.

Now for some French nostalgia, despite lunch having been Chinese:

Shouldn’t this make men want to learn French? Why are there like fifteen women and four men in my class?

The God of Abraham Praise

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 18:21:55 GMT

Baruch Adonai is all I can say.

Am I a discontent or a malcontent? The iMonk expresses so on-the-dot my dissatisfaction with what the most popular sect of Protestantism has brought us in our time. Yes, a sect, and I mean a sect: what’s easiest to find these days has never been the Protestant mainstream. I want the Church back, and I want my friends to love Christ without shrinking from the major questions. I want a place to call my Port-Royal no matter how many cry ‘heresy!’ in their hearts.

If you think abuses are just in the Church of Rome, you’re wrong. If you think you can just wing it because the things that happen in other places will never happen to you, you’re just damned wrong.

Don’t push me off by telling me that the unmitigated orthodox truth pushes people away. Worship is a serious business, the most solemn but joyful thing the world has known (and trust me, no one ever thought ‘The God of Abraham Praise’ was hip). The point of Bible study is true worship. The point of Sunday school is true worship. The point of all that talk is true worship that falls down before the majesty of the risen and enthroned Lord of Sabaoth between the cherubim. This is the point, the summit of human existence to which Christ has restored us in maturity from our fall in Adam.

If worldly appeal trumps that, or is even compromised with at all, we have a pastiche of worship. This is ultimately where we must be judged by Scripture, and if Scripture cannot penetrate us here to judge what we do, we can only be kidding ourselves when we say YHWH is our God. Blessed, the most holy Name of the Lord.

What You Think Cannot Save You

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 13:34:48 GMT

‘Such are his words, and sick at heart with immense grief he feigns hope in his expression, but hides his pain deep in his heart’ (talia voce refert curisque ingentibus aeger / spem vultu simulat, premit altum corde dolorem, Aeneid 1.208–9, translation given by David O. Ross, Vergil’s Aeneid: A Reader’s Guide [Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 2007], 9).

Your thought is not your authenticity.

Life Happens

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 23:44:49 GMT

Money would be good. Or assets that can generate streams of revenue.

Also. Not a good idea to get sick.

And. I need to find a job job, not just look for some freelancing things, though those could be useful supplements. The best case scenario is that I find something to do in Berkeley so that I have relatively quick access to the UC library. (Still a bit miffed about losing UC Berkeley library proxy access.) Jobs. What real jobs can I get and hold in Berkeley that still leave realistic time for study? No, I’m not a bio major; no, I don’t lift objects well; no, I don’t fancy being a print technician at the same time as I study or prepare to study.

Crap. The university doesn’t have money to spare for me. Well, then. Hey, what if I taught at some school for only two or three days a week? Maybe? And without credential.

Seriously, I still think I can handle book typesetting well enough to produce something more usable than a lot of books on the market. Too bad experience these days needs to be official. Everything needs to look official. And I can’t waste time.

Ok, so I have to try to:

Get Professor Alexander to let me do work for/with her.
Find work to schedule around it, enough to pay for rent, utilities, food, clothing and internet without skimping on korbanoth.

Monkeys.

New Vocab Term from Me

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 10:14:46 GMT

sexegesis: critical explanation or interpretation of the Song of Songs, or of the sexual act according to its biblical depiction.

That must be the most awesomely bad neologism I’ve ever made. Phear the power of my mind.

Taedet Animam Meam Huius Frustrationis

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 18:52:45 GMT

When you really believe in God’s sovereignty, you don’t feel the need to resort to clever methods to get people to church. God doesn’t need us to trick people into coming in, because his word, when we obey it, makes us the city on a hill that Christ our Lord tells us to be. The trick? The trick is to be renewed as a Church by hearing God’s word and being mystically united in Christ through the sacraments and then living the reality God has pronounced on us and realized in us. Christ-centred worship and clear evangelism is enough, because we need not try to peer into the secret counsels of God.

My problem is knowing people enough to show as well the substance as the existence of my faith. Fundamentally, I still tend to be reserved, and my thoughts may remain half-hidden even to myself. Would rather that speaking well came easily to me!

For seldom will anyone come to me and demand that I explain what I believe of divinity. Besides, if the context is conversation and not extended monologue, I find it hard to think about responses any differently than I think about the normal turn-taking of conversational adjacency pairs.

And I seem to have done so little, and I realize I am myself complicit in the Church’s weakness in evangelism. Then I wonder what really hinders me, despite being aware that such spiritual introspection is the road to madness. But what shall I ask for? Desire? I hardly lack desire, for every man that passes before my eyes, from king to pauper, bears the stamp of Adam, and I cannot forget it. Opportunity? I hardly lack opportunity, for I live in the midst of pagan society with no shortage of enemies of God. Knowledge? I hardly lack knowledge any more than the next Christian.

So what shall I say? ‘O Lord, open thou my lips, and my mouth shall shew forth thy praise.’ My soul is weary of this frustration.

A Kyrie for All Saints’ Day

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 07:09:24 GMT

One of the most beautiful Kyries I’ve ever heard, by Tomás Luis de Victoria, from Officium Defunctorum (although the beginning’s been cut, so the first two plainchantings of ‘Kyrie eleison’ are missing). For God to have allowed for sin to mar the world, this must be an adornment to the glory of his redemption.

Now, the day after Reformation Day, I wonder why God purposed for this piece to come out of the Counter-Reformation: perhaps it’s exactly so that greater glory will shine forth when the Church is reformed according to God’s word and once more united. What is fractured will be brought together. God loves his Church.

We remember all our brethren who have tasted death and wait for Christ to return in glory to raise us in the Resurrection of the Body. ‘O almighty God, who hast knit together thine elect in one communion and fellowship, in the mystical body of thy Son Christ our Lord; Grant us grace so to follow thy blessed Saints in all virtuous and godly living, that we may come to those unspeakable joys, which thou hast prepared for them that unfeignedly love thee; through Jesus Christ our Lord.’ We wait, and we long to see what we now know by faith. Come, Lord Jesus!

A Few Notes

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 20:18:41 GMT

Meta-emotion cuts with the edge of a knife. That is to say, a knife accident is a powerful catalyst for meta-emotion that’s already gotten rolling.

I now remember the reason for spic-and-span: vermin for which you put out the foul, blue-green-grey, moldy-coloured poison seed. I saw a dark flash, just a flash, which retreated as soon as I’d seen its shadow.

But I ought to practise poetry writing. And: oh, my goodness, I was not just impressed into NaNo service! Hmph.

I must end on a food note by mentioning the gruyère galette (buckwheat savoury crêpe) I had on Friday. With such foods, who needs ecstasy?

Why Worship Must Edify

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 12:41:15 GMT

‘A liturgy must help to build up the personality of the faithful in Christ, not because this is the main end of the liturgy, but because unless the liturgy does edify or help and lead men to live the life presupposed by the liturgy, it will never fulfil its primary function of being something offered in worship to God.’ — G. W. O. Addleshaw, The High Church Tradition, Chapter 3

The purpose, then, we remember, is still completely, relentlessly, indisputably the glory of YHWH, when we concern ourselves with our godliness and the godliness of others, a glory that we know because of God’s love is our good as well. To concern ourselves with edification and to be half-hearted about the objective reality of God’s most glorious and holy Name, its reality not just in our minds’ intent but in visible form as well (because form circumscribes reality), is to lose our purpose itself.