Stand firm against Muslim extremists in the power of Almighty God.

Mark Steyn has written a great piece on America's passive, politically correct response to war:

"At what point does a society become simply too genteel to wage war? We're like those apocryphal Victorian matrons who covered up the legs of their pianos. . . . We fight tastefully, too. Last week one of America's unmanned drones could have killed 200 Taliban big shots but they were attending a funeral and we apparently have a policy of not killing anybody near cemeteries out of sensitivity. So even our unmanned drones are obliged to behave with sensitivity. But then, these days the very soundtrack to our society is, so to speak, an unmanned drone."

The whole article is here.

Three thousand years ago, King David of Israel prayed this prayer:

"Everything in the heavens and the earth is Yours, O Lord, and this is Your kingdom. We adore You as being in control of everything.

Riches and honor come from You alone, and You are the Ruler of all mankind; Your hand controls power and might, and it is at Your discretion that men are made great and given strength." I Chronicles 29:11-12

In these few lines we see that:

• God owns everything in the heavens and the earth
• God is in control of everything
• God alone gives riches and honor to people
• God is the ruler of all people
• God controls power and might
• God makes people great and gives them strength

David seems to have all the bases covered. His brief, powerful prayer should encourage us to joyfully bring our adoration, our thanksgiving and our concerns to the one true God, our Creator and Ruler.

Have you ever wondered how our fore-fathers in the faith became such solid rocks in their understanding of God's ways and His Word? Or how they developed such deep personal relationships with Him? Their morning and evening prayers provide an answer.

My GOD, my Father and Preserver, who of Your goodness has watched over me during the past night, and brought me to this day, grant also that I may spend it wholly in the worship and service of Your most holy deity. Let me not think, or say, or do a single thing which tends not to Your service and submission to Your will, that thus all my actions may aim at Your glory and the salvation of my brethren, while they are taught by my example to serve You.

And as You are giving light to this world for the purposes of external life by the rays of the sun, so enlighten my mind by the effulgence of Your Spirit, that He may guide me in the way of Your righteousness. To whatever purpose I apply my mind, may the end which I ever propose to myself be Your honor and service. May I expect all happiness from Your grace and goodness only. Let me not attempt anything whatever that is not pleasing to You.

Grant also, that while I labor for the maintenance of this life, and care for the things which pertain to food and raiment, I may raise my mind above them to the blessed and heavenly life which You have promised to Your children.

Be pleased also, in manifesting Yourself to me as the protector of my soul as well as my body, to strengthen and fortify me against all the assaults of the devil, and deliver me from all the dangers which continually beset us in this life.

But seeing it is a small thing to have begun, unless I also persevere, I therefore entreat of You, O Lord, not only to be my guide and director for this day, but to keep me under Your protection to the very end of life, that thus my whole course may be performed under Your superintendence.

As I ought to make progress, do thou add daily more and more to the gifts of Your grace until I wholly adhere to Your Son Jesus Christ, whom we justly regard as the true Sun, shining constantly in our minds.

In order to my obtaining of You these great and manifold blessings, forget, and out of Your infinite mercy, forgive my offences, as You have promised that You will do to those who call upon You in sincerity.

Grant that I may hear Your voice in the morning since I have hoped in You. Show me the way in which I should walk, since I have lifted up my soul unto You. Deliver me from my enemies, O Lord, I have fled unto You. Teach me to do Your will, for You are my God. Let Your good Spirit conduct me to the land of uprightness.

LORD GOD, who has given man the night for rest, as You have created the day in which he may employ himself in labor, grant, I pray, that my body may so rest during this night that my mind cease not to be awake to You, nor my heart faint or be overcome with torpor, preventing it from adhering steadfastly to the love of You.

While laying aside my cares to relax and relieve my mind, may I not, in the meanwhile, forget You, nor may the remembrance of Your goodness and grace, which ought always to be deeply engraved on my mind, escape my memory.

In like manner, also, as the body rests may my conscience enjoy rest. Grant, moreover, that in taking sleep I may not give indulgence to the flesh, but only allow myself as much as the weakness of this natural state requires, to my being enabled thereafter to be more alert in Your service.

Be pleased to keep me so chaste and unpolluted, not less in mind than in body, and safe from all dangers, that my sleep itself may turn to the glory of Your name. But since this day has not passed away without my having in many ways offended You through my proneness to evil, in like manner as all things are now covered by the darkness of the night, so let every thing that is sinful in me lie buried in Your mercy.

Hear me, O God, Father and Preserver, through Jesus Christ Your Son. AMEN.

ChristianityToday.com has published their Top 10 Reasons to Read Christian History. (HT Jolly Blogger)  Two reasons caught my eye:

#2 Because it liberates you from the tyranny of the present. C.S. Lewis "compared the reader of history to the man who has lived in many places. This man 'is not likely to be deceived by the local errors of his native village; the scholar has lived in many times and is therefore in some degree immune from the great cataract of nonsense that pours from the press and the microphone of his own age.'"

#4 Because whatever question is on your mind, someone smarter than you has already seen it clearer, thought about it longer, and expressed it better. Why reinvent the wheel?

I remember the time when a young man came to me and said he was reading John Calvin's "Institutes." I encouraged him and said that Calvin was a great Christian thinker and teacher. The young man mentioned that he had found a web site whose author was listing all of Calvin's errors and misconceptions. I said that I had no idea about the critic's specific issues, but predicted that as he kept reading the "Institutes" he would find that Calvin had anticipated and answered all of the critic's concerns. Three weeks later, the young man reported that Calvin had indeed anticipated and clearly answered the web critic. Be assurred,"whatever question is on your mind, someone smarter than you has already seen it clearer, thought about it longer, and expressed it better."

Read the Christianity Today article here.

If you've not read Thomas Sowell's Point of No Return?, you really must do so. Here are his opening words:

"It is hard to think of a time when a nation -- and a whole civilization -- has drifted more futilely toward a bigger catastrophe than that looming over the United States and western civilization today.

Nuclear weapons in the hands of Iran and North Korea mean that it is only a matter of time before there are nuclear weapons in the hands of international terrorist organizations. North Korea needs money and Iran has brazenly stated its aim as the destruction of Israel -- and both its actions and its rhetoric suggest aims that extend even beyond a second Holocaust.

Send not to know for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for thee."

The comments sections is also interesting and instructive.

I have heard retired American military talking heads bemoaning the fact that terrorists don’t fight the way we in the West do. Terrorists hide in holes and pop up without warning to shoot IDF troopers. Terrorists don’t attack in common military formations --- they don’t follow military rules of engagement. Terrorists use civilians as shields. Terrorists blow up their own people in markets and in mosques. Terrorists include six-month old babies in their airline bombing plans.

I can’t believe this whining. Since when have “defenders” not popped up out of holes? Since when have those with a firepower disadvantage chosen to stand out in the open and be destroyed? Terrorists do what they do.

The West has a simple choice. We either learn how to fight and kill terrorists and to utterly destroy terrorist military organizations that break all of the Western rules --- or we die and our civilization dies. Christians and Jews must fight together or they will die together.

Today, John Podhoretz raises the following question:

"WHAT if liberal democracies have now evolved to a point where they can no longer wage war effectively because they have achieved a level of humanitarian concern for others that dwarfs any really cold-eyed pursuit of their own national interests?"  See Too Nice to Win for the complete discussion.

What is a society that values the individual above all else to do in the face of barbaric opponents who dare us to match them in barbarity and know that we will fail?

I would argue that the problem is with valuing the individual "above all else." Do we value the individual more than justice? Do we value the individual more than the destruction of a whole city in Israel?

The valuing of the individual above all else is idolatry. It is evidence that our society has slipped off its Jewish / Christian foundation.

The state does not wield the sword for nothing. Justice must be done. Evil must be resisted (and if possible, destroyed.) Citizens must be protected from barbarians who would murder them in their beds.

My father's generation knew how to respond to such challenges. The Axis was destroyed --- root and branch. But we have lost our grip. We have become feminized warriors. When faced with 100,000 soldiers who  are committed to fight and die to the last man, rather than kill them all, as the Army and Marine Corps did, we hesitate, we try to find a kinder, gentler solution.

Is there hope for us? Only if Red State values predominate. Only if we return to the Jewish / Christian foundation that has served us so well for several thousand years.

Richard Baxter (1615-1691) offers some reasons for avoiding marriage conflict: 

1. The duty of your marriage ­union requires unity. Can you not agree with your own flesh?

2. Division with your spouse will pain and upset your whole life ... Just as you do not wish to hurt your own self and are quick to care for your own wounds; so you should take notice of any break in the peace of your marriage and quickly seek to heal it.

3. Fighting chills love, fighting makes your spouse undesirable to you in your mind. Wounding is separating; to be tied together through marital bonds while your hearts are estranged is to be tormented. To be inwardly adversaries, while outwardly husband and wife turns your home and delight into a prison.

4. Dissension between the husband and the wife disrupts the whole family life; they are like oxen unequally yoked, no work can be accomplished for all the striving with one another.

5. It greatly makes you unfit for the worship of God; you are not able to pray together nor to discuss heavenly things together, nor can you be mutual helpers to each other's souls.

6. Dissension makes it impossible to manage your family properly.

7. Your dissension will expose you to the malice of Satan, and give him advantage for many, many temptations.

Extracted and modernized by Scott Andersen. Complete article is here.

Modern folk are often surprised by the wisdom and clarity of Puritan thought. I had a graduate student once, who, upon completing an assignment to read and summarize three of Jonathan Edwards' sermons, exclaimed "How can something that is so old be so great?"

The following is some sage advice from Richard Baxter (1615-1691) on How to Avoid Marriage Conflict.

1. Keep alive your love for one another. Love your spouse dearly and fervently. Love will suppress wrath; you cannot be bitter over little things with someone you dearly love; much less will you descend to harsh words, aloofness, or any form of abuse.

2. Both husband and wife must mortify their pride and strong self­ centered feelings. These are the feelings which cause intolerance and insensitivity. You must pray and labour for a humble, meek, and quiet spirit. A proud heart is troubled and provoked by every word that seems to assault your self­esteem.

3. Do not forget that you are both diseased persons, full of infirmities; and therefore expect the fruit of those infirmities in each other; and do not act surprised about it, as if you had never known of it before. Decide to be patient with one another; remembering that you took one another as sinful, frail, imperfect persons, and not as angels, or as blameless and perfect.

4. Remember still that your are one flesh; and therefore be no more offended with the words or failings of each other, than you would be if they were your own. Be angry with your wife for her faults no more than you are angry with yourself for your own.

5. Agree together beforehand, that when one of you is sinfully angry and upset the other shall silently and gently bear it until you have come to your sanity.

6. Have an eye to the future and remember that you must live together until death, and must be the companions of each other's lives, and the comforts of each other's lives, and then you will see how absurd it is for you to disagree and upset each other.

7. As far as you are able, avoid all occasions of wrath and quarreling, about the matters of your families.

8. If you are so angry that you cannot calm yourself at least control your tongue and do not speak hurtful and taunting words.

9. Let the calm and rational spouse speak carefully and compellingly reason with the other.  Usually a few sober, grave admonitions, will prove as water to the boiling pot.

10. When you have sinfully acted towards your spouse confess to one another; and ask for forgiveness of each other, and join in prayer to God for pardon; and this will act as a preventative in you the next time: you will surely be ashamed to do that which you have confessed and asked forgiveness for of God and man.

Extracted and modernized by Scott Andersen. Complete article is here.

For an important, brief description of the huge disconnect between Western war planning and Muslim tribal warrior cultures, see The Tribal Way of War.

In "Strategic Confusion," published today at Real Clear Politics, Tony Blankley underlines the importance of "formulating and executing a successful strategy for war against worldwide radical Islamist military and cultural aggression."

"And yet, listening to and participating in war debate this last week, I am struck by how few politicians, pundits and journalists even now accept the proposition that the West (and India, Africa and Asia) is facing such a remorseless threat."

I would suggest that the Evangelical Church needs to pay attention to this "remorseless threat" as it invests in the growth and development of churches around the world.

Tony Blankley suggests another economic and cultural shift that should be of interest to Evangelicals ---

"As Thomas Friedman has observed regarding economic activity, "cheap, ubiquitous telecommunications have obliterated impediments to international economic competition," causing the world to be economically "flat." Well, for similar reasons the world is flat for terrorist military and cultural aggression as well. The impediments to asymmetrical terrorist war have been obliterated by telecommunications and new compact dangerous weapons."

"It is curious that so many "experts" and commentators who have comprehended the reality and significance of globalism in the economic realm (even though it is not a vertically commanded process -- indeed precisely because it is not vertically commanded) are so obtuse in seeing the same phenomenon expressed in the realm of terror and cultural aggression."

If the world has become economically "flat," and "flat" in the realm of terror and cultural aggression, surely Evangelicals can exploit that flatness to expedite world-wide church growth and development.

Read the whole article.

 

Thomas Watson (1620-1686) was one of the most popular preachers in London during the Puritan era. His teaching is clear and spiritually rich.

This is especially evident in his helpful exposition of the Shorter Catechism --- A Body of Divinity, The Ten Commandments and The Lord's Prayer.

In The Lord's Prayer, Watson analyses in detail the Preface to the prayer and the six petitions which it contains.

Pray like this.

Our Lord Jesus, in these words, gave to his disciples and to us a directory for prayer.

The Ten Commandments are the rule of our life, the Creed is the sum of our faith, and the Lord's Prayer is the pattern of our prayer.

Let this be the rule and model according to which you frame your prayers. [We ought to examine our prayers by this rule.  J. Calvin]

As the moral law was written with the finger of God, so this prayer was dropped from the lips of the Son of God. . . . Never was a prayer so admirably and curiously composed as this. As Solomon's Song, for its excellence is called the "Song of songs," so may this be well called the "Prayer of prayers."

[Ed. Note: Do you pray like this? Why not give it a shot today?]