Optimism

"What is the evil of the man commonly called an optimist? Obviously, it is felt that the optimist, wishing to defend the honour of this world, will defend the indefensible. He is the jingo of the universe; he will say, "My cosmos, right or wrong." He will be less inclined to the reform of things; more inclined to a sort of front-bench official answer to all attacks, soothing every one with assurances. He will not wash the world, but whitewash the world." -G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy

Some friends often accuse me of being something of a cynic. I assume they do so because I occasionally have sardonic sense of humor. I have never been shy about mocking those things which have proven huge disappointments. A long time ago I found this to be a very effective coping mechanism. If your college promises that Spring Formal is the most magical night of your life and the sound system shorts out, is it really so cynical to loudly wonder if a wizard has hexed your dance? (Okay, maybe if you then say that the senior class president who made the comment is an evil wizard setting us all up for failure.)* But I long ago realized that there are times in life when you have to laugh to keep from crying.

We tend to view optimism as a character asset. In fact, we consider pessimism and optimism to be an opposing pair of virtue and vice much as we do Courage and Cowardice or Love and Hate.

Or Bacon and Vegetables

But I wonder if there isn't something to what Chesterton is saying. Having been through a fair share of grief and frustration, I found that the most unhelpful advice came from people simply telling me to buck up and look on the bright side. Most of them were probably at a loss as to what to say. I know their intention was nothing but helpful and noble. I retrospectively appreciate their expression of support though I find their words far from truly supportive.

I think that oftentimes the best thing to do when addressing problems and evil in life is not to downplay them but to accept them in all their dreadful gravity. We might want pithy statements about silver linings when the car won't start or I have a fight with my sister. I don't want to hear about how "things always work out for the best" when my life crumbles under the crushing weight of disease, loneliness, hopelessness, or death. I need someone to tell me that the world sucks and its ruined and broken and the only hope for man exists altogether outside it. The world should be acknowledged by any serious and honest observer as more than merely unjust occasionally; it is an unjust place by nature. But this is the sin of the optimist for he whitewashes the world.

I, like Chesterton, would never consider pessimism to be a virtue either. I will address the issue of pessimism in the coming weeks and the ultimate alternative to both foolish extremes. Still, I want to leave the reader with the very serious possibility that an optimistic view of life is hardly the best. I think it very unlikely that the world can be saved from within. Man has had thousands of years of recorded history to fix injustice and suffering. Maybe progress has been made. After all, we got rid of slavery, right? Why then are people more morose, listless, and suicidal than ever? (Ecclesiastes, anyone?) Maybe they just aren't being optimistic enough... but I think it more likely that they have been sold a falsely positive view of the world and can't cope with the reality. All those cynics are disappointed romantics.

*This was not a true story. It was a hypothetical. I always liked the senior class president.

The Jelly Minds

"And [Jesus] said to him, 'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.'"-Matt. 22:37 (ESV)

I remember my very first college class was Intro to Psychology at 11 AM every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday on the third floor of the Cook Building. It was the class where I sharpened my academic teeth, took my first college exam, got my first C on a test, and learned that college isn't like in the movies where glorious adventures and wild stories await around every corner. The adventures are what you remember, the main thing is the work. This class paled in comparison to work loads I would have later, yet it was uniquely draining since it was a class over which I had expected to more or less gush. Unfulfilled expectations can really punch a hole in motivation.

One concept which always bothered me was the Nature/Nurture debate. It wasn't because I was very strongly in the biological/cognitive or behavioral camp. Rather, it stemmed from how the debate was framed. After all, we had been told on the second day of class that psychology came from the Greek meaning "study of the soul". It was also supposed to be the fusion of philosophy and science. However, the discipline quickly shed any such "pretensions" to the soul or philosophy because the soul is not scientifically demonstrable. Therefore, the only legitimate realm of discussion within psychology was between those two positions. Had there existed a branch of psychology dubbed "philosophical psychology" as there do "cognitive psychology" and "behavioral psychology", perhaps I would not have been so perturbed. After all, what if people aren't just a product of their society nor of their genes? Could not some fundamentally immaterial thing remain which is the true source of what man is? As Aristotle said, "The whole is more than the sum of the parts." "Maybe so," answers the academic psychologist, "but that question is not appropriate for scientific discourse. And what is psychology but a science?"

I was so bothered by this that I remember bringing it up with a young psychology major a couple of years later. She was a believer and I thought maybe she could shed light on the deplorable lies of her favored discipline. It was a casual conversation and perhaps I was expecting too much, yet I was even more disappointed by her response than by the original dilemma. She replied that she hadn't much thought about it; she simply disagreed, took the notes, and passed the next test.

The troubling thing about this response is not that she didn't freak out and remember it for years to come like I did. The bothersome fact is that she never dealt seriously with the argument presented to her. Rather than dealing with a potential challenge to her faith, she just ignored it. She blew off all the credibility of her instructor and his ideas--whether or not she agreed with him--simply because she found it unpalatable. It wasn't that she had a reason to disagree; it simply made her faith in Christ uncomfortable.

Unfortunately, a lot of Christians are guilty of having jelly minds. Like a jellyfish, when they encounter some kind of intellectual opposition or challenge, they just drift right past it like no obstruction were there at all. If an answer or resolution to the problem is not immediately forthcoming, they forget about it and drift on with the currents of shallow faith. They don't take it home and wrestle with it. They don't meditate on what a critical impact this might have on their lives as followers of Jesus. They just drift on with their feel-good spirituality. Oddly enough, this isn't how Jesus was.

Jesus found opposition coming from men who had years more experience mastering a subject than He did. In Luke 20:27-40, the Sadducees come to Jesus and try to lay a theological trap. These are men who don't believe the whole Bible, only the Five Books of the Law (Genesis-Deuteronomy). Jesus takes the whole Old Testament (Genesis-Malachi). This means that He disagrees with them on a fundamental level. Particularly in the book of Daniel, there are sections which overtly talk about the afterlife--something the Pharisees didn't believe in at all. Yet Jesus, with little formal education compared to theirs, bests them.

Some will immediately say, "Yeah, but He wrote the thing. And He's God! Of course He knows it better than them. But I'm not God, so how can I be expected to tango with people who know their stuff better?" They're wrong. Jesus is our Christus Exemplar, Latin for "Christ the example" (more or less). That means we're supposed to be like Him. There's huge sections of a decent-sized book of the Bible talking about it (Hebrews). My point is that Jesus didn't do something that we can't do without the Holy Spirit.

So what did Jesus do? First, He met those guys on their level. Rather than quote from Daniel or Psalms or Job or some other book the Sadducees wouldn't agree with, He reasoned from a portion of Scripture that they did believe (that is, Exodus). This is why Christians are wasting plenty of good oxygen by simply pointing at the Bible and saying, "Read this! It has all the answers you need!" If I'm the naturalist arguing that man is just an animal, I'm thinking, "Thanks for ignoring my point. I guess you want me to take and read a book I don't really care about to further convince me how ignorant you are." So don't do that.

Second, He took their charge seriously. He didn't say He'd get to it later. He didn't say that He didn't care. He didn't even say, "Oh well, agree to disagree," without explaining Himself. Instead, He challenged their ideas in a very open-minded yet succinct way. Jesus heard the Sadducees out and then explained why they were wrong. Even though their motives were sinful (since Jesus denounces them just after this), He still addressed their ideas as legitimate.

Finally, Truth can stand up to scrutiny. If you believe that Scripture, right philosophy, and/or just plain common sense teach that man has an eternal soul, then don't retreat! Don't brush aside challenges you shall face in the classroom or in difficult books or from jerkwads on the street with more degrees than intelligence. Because no matter how smart or sophisticated or all-encompassing any explanation of life apart from Truth is, it will fail if it isn't true. Anything that cannot withstand the critical eye isn't Truth at all. Sift through it all and keep what's good.

Like I said when Artery Bloggage started, Truth is personal: the Person Jesus Christ is Truth. A Christian's faith in Him should be steadfast for He shall save us. So don't worry if you're challenged. You might find that you were wrong about something all along. That's what makes learning such a humbling experience and why teachers CRAVE teachable spirits. Be like Jesus; be humbly teachable and eternally dedicated to seeking Truth.

You Only Think I'm Kidding Chapter 2

"CUTE" IS A WORSE CURSE WORD THAN ****

(Insert your favorite four-letter word in those stars.)

I am a linguistic relativist who thinks that words aren't in and of themselves offensive. There's nothing about the construction of "shhh" and "it" in the mouthing or vocalizing of it which violates the bounds of morality. I think it has more to do with the message transmitted and the perception of that message than anything inherent in the word itself. I can think of perfectly appropriate uses of words politely considered "inappropriate" or "cuss words". Similarly, I can think of a few words that, while not taboo in any circles, are so repugnant that no human being should ever inflict it upon another except in stinging barbs when goading someone into vandalizing your mother's grave.

"Cute" is the best example.

This accursed word has absolutely no positive connotations when someone uses it to your face (with one or two exceptions which I'll note later). I think the best way to break down the meanings of this word are by gender; it's a unique word in that the sexes use this intolerable utterance in different ways. I will start with the men because I can vouch for all of that usage personally.

When a man uses the word "cute" he can mean two different things by it. 1) To describe a woman as physically attractive. It is very common to hear guys talking about a girl as being cute, but usually not in the presence of that cute girl. A guy may call a girl cute to her face, but usually it's only when he's hitting on her. It's also the word he's most likely to use in talking about one girl to another because girls often get offended when a guy says another girl is "hot". Guys will never describe their sisters or mothers as cute. This is a cardinal sin. 2) As a patronizing insult to another man. "Aw, Shaun, you look so cute with your little beard." "Gee, Justin, it's cute when you get all clingy to me... like a lonely puppy." Any other way this word might be used--for instance, to describe how precious or adorable something is--can rightfully result in a beating*. Men are wont to describe anything as adorable.

I think that women use "cute" in three ways. 1) To describe adorable things. This is similar to the second way men use "cute", except it isn't meant to be derogatory. Little siblings, kids trying to wear grown-up clothes, toddlers dressed like flowers, chocolate cake smeared about after a four-year-old birthday party, or every dad-blasted photo plastered on the projector for Baby Dedication Sunday; these all elicit a wave of "Aaaaw"s from the fairer sex, a living definition of this first meaning of "cute". 2) To describe physically attractive men. It's a word they're just as likely to use as "hot" in talking about one guy to another person because girls rarely get offended when someone says a guy is "hot" (least of all if gay men say it). Yet the third way women use "cute" is the most baffling of all. 3) To describe tiny things. Gingerbread houses, small socks for babies, and formal table settings for mice are all called cute. I remember when Chicken Minis debuted at Chick-fil-a that several women I knew at the time described them as cute. I still fail to see what is cute about having less food.

By this count, that makes four different definitions for "cute": "physically attractive" and "less of a man" for men, "adorable", "physically attractive", and "whimsically small" for women. Some of these definitions are positive, some outright negative. But I want to capitalize on something by tying all those definitions together.

It is never good for a man to be called "cute" to his face, except by his girlfriend/wife (or maybe his mom when in private).

If a man calls another man cute, it's always an insult. If a girl calls a man cute, she might mean he's adorable. This is awful. This would be like saying he reminds her of her little brother, never a thing men want to hear from an attractive woman. She might mean he's physically attractive, but that is a rarity. Most women, as far as I have observed, don't like to be that overt about their attraction to a guy unless he's dropped more hints than she has. If they're already an item or married, then being open about it isn't weird. If they aren't, she won't let on by coming right out and saying it. She might finally mean that he is whimsically small. Do I really need to explain why that one is an insult?

So remember, lady readers, not to call the men in your life cute. That is, unless you mean for him to be compared with a puppy, a little brother, or a gingerbread man.

*Exception: Daughters don't count. They're always cute in Daddy's eyes; woe to the man who would say otherwise.

Why I Am Reformed Part 1

One of the goals of Artery Bloggage is to show how theology permeates everything we do and how we live. It isn't just a heady thing to be done with a wall of Bible commentaries four feet tall around your laptop in the library. How you view God determines just about everything else of who you are and what you do. That goal in mind, I want to preface by saying that the issue of predestination/free will is one of the most controversial in history. It's been even hotter lately with the so-called "Reformed Resurgence" or "New Calvinism", a movement with which I don't mind associating. Far better exegetical and academic explanations have given by others than I could ever give; my favorite is Wayne Grudem's Systematic Theology. I think Wayne Grudem may be some kind of wizard, since this book often answers questions you have as you read almost as soon as your brain can ask them. Anything I would argue about being Reformed would be a plagiarism of him.

Instead, I want to tell the story of how I came from one very strong view of the Bible and salvation to another. I am not seeking to persuade anybody so much as tell a story that deeply connects a view of God with life experiences. I wouldn't even call Calvinism and Arminianism opposites because of how much the two perspectives share in common. Both are solidly Protestant, believe in a perfect God and His inerrant word, teach the absolute sovereignty of God and the personal responsibility of every man, and glorify God through personal evangelism and caring for the poor and oppressed. I think the reason this debate gets so virulent is ironically because it is one within the family between two groups with a lot of resemblance. I am but one in very big family. So read on and see how a debate which has raged for thousands of years impacts the life of one regular guy even today.

In January 1995, I was sitting in the office of Doctor Edwin Jenkins, pastor of Hilldale Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. I was here because I was curious about baptism, what it was and why we did it. Baptism takes a particular form in a Baptist church. Baptists only baptize by immersion, meaning children or adults are fully dunked into the water (infants need not apply). At almost-seven-years-old, I wondered why Dr. Jenkins periodically dipped people into a pool in front of the whole church. My curiosity had gotten me here.

The silence was now getting awkward. Our conversation up until this point had been very easy and free-flowing. Dr. Jenkins had talked to me about how we believed in Jesus and how He died on the cross. This was all stuff I'd covered in Sunday School and believed. But now he held in his hand a plastic glove which was printed with the plan of salvation. He said it was a gift for me and asked what I had to do.

Hence the awkward silence; I didn't really know how to answer. After all, he said the glove was mine. Why didn't he give it to me? He just sat there from behind his desk holding it in his hand. He said it was mine. What did he want me to do? He said it was mine. I almost wondered if maybe I had given him the wrong answer somehow. He said it was mine. He reiterated the question, scrutinizing me to see if I understood all that he'd said. But he said it was mine! What could possibly end this? Pressure! Pressure!

Finally, I timidly reached out and took it from him.

"Yes, that's right. You have to accept it," he said.

I was pretty miffed about the whole scenario, though I dared not show it to a grown-up (and the pastor no less). After all, he had said it was mine. The glove had been declared mine by the authority of the giver. That made it mine whether or not I did the right thing and snatched it from his hand. The thing belonged to me by his word. Withholding it from me just so that I would snatch it from him didn't seem quite fair. However, I forgot about my irritated feelings pretty soon as kids do often and adults do rarely.

The thoughts and feelings from that day crawled into hibernation in some deep cavern of the mind. They wouldn't awaken for more than a decade when some very strong passions and tough challenges reignited them. I would return to that desk and the burning tension and the prayer I prayed in 1995 in ten years' time. While I never suspected it in that decade, an unsettled dissatisfaction with the situation lurked. It was no fault of Doctor Jenkins or the example he used, but from the theological perspective underlying the encounter. It was my first experience with soteriology--the theology or teaching of salvation--but it would not be my last.

You Only Think I'm Kidding Chapter 1

CHAPTER I: THE FOUNDATION OF ALL RELATIONSHIPS IS LIES

("You Only Think I'm Kidding" is a random collection of hopefully-comedic rants about our social lives and norms. It stems from a series of jokes I made with friends in college. Most got the joke and laughed, or at least pretended to think it was funny to get me to shut up. Either way, someone suggested I should write a book on relationships because several ended up being relationship-themed. Credit to Hether Scheel for the title; it's a perfect fit even though the series really is a joke. Maybe.)

Am I allowed to say that I hate first dates? If I ever want to get married I oughtn't, but I will anyway.

First dates are the worst invention since the Iron Maiden. I actually prefer the Iron Maiden because I learned in college that it was never really used as a form of execution. Sadly, the first date is all too real and future generations will no doubt watch laser-holograms of our 21st-century courtship rituals and balk that we were ever so backward. Put aside all the stupid drug-store novels and over-idealized nonsense and remember first dates for what they really are.

Interviews.

"That's just the bad ones," some may say, but hear me out. You spend most of your time wondering if there's anything there or if there could ever be anything there. There's a great deal of introspection going on. Any misplaced word or gesture may signal true love or immanent disaster. Every twitch of body language could be the deeper implication of a potential problem or the makings of a timeless romance. And who will draw first blood? When is the right time to step up--to make that ever-so-risky declaration of, "This was fun. I want to see you again" or "I sure do wish we would spend more time together"?

When we recognize this worrying, we gloss over it by saying, "Calm down! Just be yourself. Relax and be confident in who you are." But let's get real... Who is ever really himself on the first date? And I mean really, really himself? Let me throw this assertion out there: Everyone is a bit crazy in some form or fashion. For myself, I'm a recovering nerd trying to drown out the inner Trekkie with college football and attempts at witty social commentary. Yet no matter how much I learn to have friends and skip on Buffy: The Vampire Slayer marathons, I will never stop being a huge geek. So let me be myself--and really myself--on this example first date:

Pretty Lady: "So, tell me about yourself." *bats eyelashes*

Me: "I can identify every episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation based solely on the cold open (that is, the first five minutes before the credits roll). I can give you the season, a rough plot synopsis, and usually the name of the episode."

Pretty Lady: "I'm walking home."

This example is flawed I confess; a woman would never ask a man about himself on the first date. But do you see my larger point?

We cover up our crazy because, let's face it, any normal person would run away screaming if they knew what our malfunction was. We never go into "full-crazy" mode right out the gate. That happens over the course of several weeks as we let on more and more of our flaws, insecurities, or cripplingly-nerdy hobbies. We gloss and smooth over all our rough edges like Accutane on a pimply teenager. Our very best may be on display on that first awkward afternoon at the Starbucks, but our worst comes out later. We are the plastic, Barbie-and-Ken versions of ourselves on the first date. We're on our best behavior, all the while hoping to behave well enough to make it Date #2, relax, and let some blemishes show. Isn't that really the goal of Date #1; to get to Date #2? Sure is. Hence, Date #1 is usually a performance.

Now, I have no solution to the problem of the first date. It simply has to happen. Much like day-timers, laundry, and weight-loss programs, they are an established fact of living in a world polluted by sin. God never intended any of these things to be. He loves us and would never make us go through this grueling process in His perfect world just in order to be married. Yet just like day-timers, laundry, and weight-loss, there are people out there who actually delight in first dates. We call them "Satanists".

Christianity and Comedy: Monty Python and the Holy Grail

Monty Python and the Holy Grail is one of the funniest movies ever filmed. I hope that after the bombs have fallen and the survivors of mankind must war against the super-intelligent cockroaches, someone finds this movie in a vault. It will give our descendants an 89-minute release from the horrors of post-nuclear life. It should be a part of our cultural legacy for centuries. Those of you who haven't seen it are probably annoyed with those who have because we quote the movie all the time. That's on purpose; if we tick you off enough, you'll just break down and watch it. Then you will join us. Join us. Join us.

However, the Christian viewer ought to stop and think about its depiction of God. God is shown to be annoyed at the overly-pious response of the faithful Arthur and his knights. He is frustrated that their apparently sincere reverence is keeping Him from His important business. He has arrived simply to give Arthur his mission to find the Holy Grail. An excerpt from the exchange:

GOD: And don't apologize. Every time I try to talk to someone it's "sorry this" and "forgive me that" and "I'm not worthy". What are you doing now!?

ARTHUR: I'm averting my eyes, oh Lord.

GOD: Well, don't. It's like those miserable Psalms-- they're so depressing. Now knock it off!

What has Scripture to say? God the Father tells Moses that man shall not see God and live. In the New Testament, the Apostle John twice tells us that no one has ever seen God the Father. Paul speaks of the unapproachable glory of God in his encouragement to Timothy. So is Arthur's reaction really so ridiculous?

It would also be serious if this Monty Python scene is an attempt to make a joke of God. Paul elsewhere tells us that God is not mocked. We are told that mocking God and His prophets is what caused God to lead Judah into exile and lose the Promised Land. The Third Commandment given to Moses forbids God's chosen to use His name vainly. This is proven serious some time later when a guy is actually stoned to death for cursing another in God's name.

So how do those of us who love God and take Him seriously and adore Him above all else take away from all this? I think the very first thing is to not make too light of this subject. God is to be held in reverence. There can be nothing held higher than Him in our hearts or on our lips; to do so would be idolatry. Second, we should sift through this treatment of God critically and recognize it for what it is--an author who does not know God as He really is.

I don't mean to sound like a wacky fundamentalist or a killjoy. Those guys are the worst. They can't laugh at anything, either because they are too literally-minded or because they take lots of other things that aren't God and hold them in a similar position to God. You know the type. 'You mustn't listen to rock music because somehow voodoo African rhythms hypnotize you into smoking pot." "You can't watch movies with 'grown-up' language because you'll get desensitized to it and next thing you know you'll be cursing your parents' graves and fornicating with a streetwalker." But honestly, some things ought not be taken lightly. The big two are God Himself and the suffering of innocent victims; those two subjects aren't funny at all because they make a farce out of something very serious.

I still love The Holy Grail. The truth is that God still comes out of the movie looking very competent, which isn't really true of anyone else. I also considered the possibility that the creators were mocking people's idea of God and not Yahweh Himself--an idea which would have been fine. However, the point of the joke is that people must get on God's nerves by being constantly afraid of Him. Yet the Bible says three different times that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. So keep the good of Holy Grail because it is very clever; endure this scene because you must.

...And because the nuclear cockroaches have no laughter.

The Transcendent Meets the Immanent

A thoughtful consideration of every potential introduction to this new project—including a very basic overview of just what this weblog is attempting to be—seemed ill-conceived the more I reflected on its foundation. I've never been a fan of mission statements or written guidelines. I would prefer things to take a more organic approach. I see abundant, rigid structure as all a part of our human tendency to obey rules rather than to do what's best; we tend to follow the letter rather than the spirit of the law. In fact, if I had to choose a single recurring behavior in other men which has plagued me from the pacifier and I fear shall unto the grave, it would be the remarkably oafish practice of following regulations to irrational precision. That trait is the source of multiple facebook statuses reading, "Take that, Res Life!" Having a rule against guns on an airplane makes sense because bullets flying in an enclosed space is a recipe for ricochets, blood, death, and that black powder smell all over your Armani business suit. Having a rule against toasters in a dorm room is stupid because no one can remember the last time fifty frat guys died in a fiery explosion of sheet rock and Pop Tarts. Some RAs understood it, but to many it seemed I was pulling my finger from the dyke of orderly society.

But I digress. Organic approach, remember?

Yet before I delve too far into the bottomless well of inspiration, I need to reiterate a point I preached from the pulpit not long ago—all men somehow know that they need Truth. The depressing thing is that most people reach some little truth and decide that they must have found the "big 'T' Truth". They go into all kinds of little truths and make them their banner. Activism is a good example. Folks go six-ways-to-Sunday out of their minds for some particular cause or injustice to fight. But when a truth becomes their Truth, it consumes them. Others figure out that they are consumed by their little truth, but they don't continue to seek after Truth. Instead, they conclude that there is no Truth. In a funny and ironic sort of way, the truth that there is no Truth becomes their identity. In the end, all of us find truth rather than Truth. We are dead in our transgressions, Scripture tells us in Ephesians 2. Elsewhere we are told, “The LORD looks down from heaven on the children of man, to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God. They have all turned aside; together they have become corrupt; there is none who does good, not even one" (Psalm 14:2-3 ESV).

So what most academic disciplines, worldly-wise sayings, politicians, philosophical or theological systems, and idiots opining on a soap boxes fail to recognize is that their every effort to attain unto Truth shall inevitably fail because human reason and human experience are limited in their ability to perceive. We tend not to think so; we tend to think that through just the right combination of education and willpower we can make ourselves into something better. The sad reality is that we can't. Man wishes to define and redefine himself, for that is true power. His desire is deluded though, because Truth cannot be reshaped. Rather, Truth shapes all things.

Behold our desperate state; we cannot attain unto Truth by ourselves, only little-"T" truths. And we cannot deny Truth or bend it to ourselves because we are slaves to our own nature—the truth of who we are. In order for us to really know Truth—the infinite, the transcendent, the abstract, the eternal—Truth must come for us.

John's gospel tells us in chapter 1 that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Elsewhere, in chapter 8, Jesus tells the Jews that before Abraham was, "I AM". He here claims to be the eternal and unchanging YHWH; this was not lost in His audience because they immediately pick up rocks to stone him.

Saying you were going to "get stoned" was not as popular then as it is today.

The papa bear of all these Truth verses is John 14:6 where Jesus declares that He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. With that simple statement, Greek philosophy and Hebrew Old Testament estrangement from Truth is torn down. We realize what no philosopher, scientist, priest, king, or blogger could ever have conceived on his own. Truth is personal. The transcendent became immanent, limited, finite, and tangible. "Incarnation" comes from the Latin meaning "in meat"; Jesus incarnating means He is "Truth in flesh".

Don't you see? Truth is not an it; Truth is a He.

He is the center of all our efforts to attain unto God. The scandal is that God came to us. God found us; we never found God. All our anxiety about finding out what is true came crashing down. "Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery" (Hebrews 2:14-15 ESV). We realize then that all things which are true are only true because they resemble Jesus. Jesus declares, "I am." That "which is" is the truth because it looks like and reminds us of Jesus Who is.

What does all that have to do with Artery Bloggage? Well, the reason that Truth being personal is so important is because the dichotomy between the Head and the Heart must be discarded as false. We tend to relegate truth and rationality to the Head while leaving love and emotion unto the Heart. What a goofy thing to do if we conclude that Truth is Jesus. Truth isn't something that coldly deals with facts, statistics, and logic; Truth loves you. This doesn't mean that Truth isn't sometimes hard to understand or difficult to stomach or even dense and mentally frustrating. It does mean that there's a Person with real human feelings, sentiments, emotions, and desires at the center of it. Plato and Aristotle never mention that Beauty or Justice must love us; at best they say that we must love these impersonal Forms existing in the metaphysical and live our lives pursuing them. But try gazing out on the sunrise and thinking that perhaps a great cosmic painter painted it for you. Consider the great victory of Justice when a rapist must face his victim in the shame of broad daylight or when the cruel slaver is punished and his slaves liberated; think of these things not as some moral code being satisfied but of the righteous wrath of a loving God Who shall not tolerate sin against His image-bearers. Suddenly the thought that we are disjointed beings with Heads of rational facts and Hearts of gushing-but-directionless zeal dissipates.

That is what I want Artery Bloggage to be. I want to show how the heady and academic stuff is important to our everyday lives. I want to show how the abstract and cerebral stuff is really some of the most immanent and relevant. I want to show that higher learning isn't just for college-folk; it's hugely significant for everyone! Most of all, I want it to be something that ultimately glorifies and exalts Jesus. I don't mean to sound preachy, but He changed my heart and I want to make a big deal of that.

Along the way, expect plenty of sarcasm and tongue-in-cheek humor. That's who I am. I want it to be equal parts accessible/funny and smart/serious, but that's a best-case scenario and given who's writing this thing, it will probably end up being equal parts lame/unfunny and stupid/self-important. Like a gay marriage between Carlos Mencia and Sean Penn.

One more thing: unlike many blogs which are essentially online diaries (nothing wrong with that), Artery Bloggage is for the readers! That means that I want feedback. I want suggestions for topics. I want to know what jokes worked and which didn't. I want to know what you think about my writing. I want to know if the Holy Spirit used it to provoke thought, convict of sin, or just plain encourage you. I don't want to get into stupid internet bickering over things that don't matter, but I don't mind civil discourse. The readers will help this to succeed or fail, whatever it ends up being.