World War I and me

I am discovering that, though I was born in the 1950s, I have some historical connections to the first world war.

Both grandparents on my mother's side were born during World War I. My grandfather, H. K. Huffman, was born in 1914; and my grandmother was born three years later, in 1917. Strange how I never thought about that before I began preparatory reading for an upcoming class on the Great War.

Another interesting thought is that my paternal grandfather, Eugene Howard, who was born in 1900, may have actually fought in the final year of the war, or at least might have been called to duty, for he was certainly old enough since the war did not end until late in 1918.

Today's Discovery

Today I discovered Google Scholar.

The Importance of the Scriptures to Believers

D'Aubigne's History of the Reformation contains this little gem, showing that in so many ways believers in the sixteenth century were no different from believers today --

"Luther's writings were read in the cities, towns, and even villages; at night by the fireside the schoolmaster would often read them aloud to an attentive audience. Some of the hearers were affected by their perusal; they would take up the scriptures to clear away their doubts. and were struck with surprise at the astonishing contrast between the Christianity of the Bible and their own" (emphasis mine).

What is Christianity?

"Christianity is not a simple development of Judaism. [And] unlike the papacy, it does not aim at confining man again in the close swaddling bands of outward ordinances and human doctrines. Christianity is a new creation; it lays hold of the inner man, and transforms him in the inmost principles of his human nature, so that man no longer requires other men to  impose rules upon him; but, aided by God, he can of himself and by distinguish what is true, and do what is right."

Jean-Henri Merle D'Aubigne

History of the Reformation of the Sixteenth Century

The Love of God

This is an excerpt from a letter to a friend who asked a question of me concerning the love of God.

My friend: -- So if we agree that it is all for God glory and God is the focus. Just one more question?? Why did Jesus have tear for the Jewish nation when they rejected Him as there King (Messiah).  He know who God (maybe himself included, I do not know if it was the Father only) would save the remnant Jew.  was it his human nature or maybe his Godly nature to be sad for the lost???

Me: -- Great question! One that I am not sure I can come even close to answering. However, we have already established that God loved the world. But it is more to the point of your question that he loved the people whom He has chosen out of the world. We might as well begin with Adam and Even. How can we not but imagine that God loved the two of them since he made them? Would He venture to create living creatures that he hated? When Adam fell, this insulted God; it was an act on the part of man that offended against His holiness; but it was through God’s love for man that He had already provided for the means for his reconciliation. In this vein, the Old Testament history unwinds. God chooses out a people for his name; he brings them into a land that flowed with milk and honey; he provided for all their needs; he gave them his law; he revealed himself to them; he loved them, like he loves us, with an everlasting love. Over and over again his people rebelled against him; they slew the prophets sent unto them; they profaned the law of God and his sanctuary; they turned in their hearts to idols and rejected God. Yet he remained true to his own attributes, which meant that he never stopped loving them. In the New Testament, he condescends to come to them his people as a man—the man Christ Jesus. But they received him not. However, some did: Mary, Martha, Lazarus, Nicodemus, and great multitudes. His disciples loved him and there is not higher evidence of Christ’s love for his people than in his high priestly prayer for them in as recorded in John 17. Yes, this love was partly manifested through the human nature he took upon himself; but it began in his divine nature before the world began. It is both a mystery and plain fact that God loves his people. The underlying mystery is that, though his holiness demanded that he destroy this people, his love and his mercy and his wisdom, yea, all his attributes together conceived of a way to redeem his people—through the gospel of his dear son, which all began in the mind of the Father (Romans 1). He made the promise of the gospel in the Old Testament and kept it in the New, where we learn that, on top of so many intimations of in the Old, he had always meant for his gospel to apply to the Gentiles also, not just to the seed of Abraham. I suppose that in the final analysis, the only reason we can give in answer to why Jesus wept and why he so cared and groaned within himself over his people, in the face of all their opposition to Him, was that he loved them.

That will have to do. I would only be repeating myself if I tried to write more. Hope this has been a help. I enjoyed writing it; I hope you gain from reading.