The Death of Emily So
We prayed for a miracle, we sought the best medical care, we listened to experts and would-be experts, and it could easily have become frantic. But underneath are the everlasting arms (Deut.33:27). God’s determining of our days did not make for fatalism – we wish His will were very different – but did provide comfort that however unsettled and disturbed we were, His purposes would prevail. And His purposes are for good.
The imminent death of little Emily, aged five, has hung like a black cloud over our family ever since her diagnosis with Diffuse Intrinsic Pontine Glioma (DIPG) in late October 2021. The world suddenly shrank, and any sort of equilibrium seemed to have gone. Finally on Tuesday 24 May 2022 Emily breathed her last. Death stalks the land, and no one will escape.
For the past seven or eight months, Emily has dominated my thoughts in a way that l could scarcely have imagined, and that has been true for others in the family, especially Emily’s devoted parents. People have struggled for words in expressing their empathy and sympathy, and I have likewise struggled. In 1758 Jonathan Edwards died after a smallpox vaccination went wrong. His wife, Sarah, wrote to their daughter: ‘What shall I say? A holy and good God has covered us with a dark cloud.’ I have the same question: ‘What shall I say?’
God determines our times here on earth.
Before we were formed in the womb, God had written in His book all of the days that were determined for us even before there were any on them (Ps.139:16). ‘Man who is born of a woman is few of days and full of trouble … [and] his days are determined, and the number of his months is with You, and You have appointed his limits that he cannot pass’ (Job 14:1, 5). Not a sparrow will fall to the ground apart from our Father’s will (Matt.10:29). The Lord gives and the Lord takes away (Job 1:21; see 1 Sam.2:6).
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God’s People Are a Forgetful People
Forgetfulness reflects fallenness; it is a manifestation of our human condition in Adam. Forgetfulness is another way of describing disobedience. Israel and her kings “forget” the Lord their God by disobeying and forsaking him (cf. Jer. 2:29 and Jer. 2:32; 3:21). We forsake because we forget. And we forget because we choose to forget—deliberately, willfully, consciously. We forget our Creator—his character and covenant and commands, his ways and works and words; we forget our Redeemer—his promises and precepts, his redemption and righteousness.
We human beings are forgetful by nature. I do not mean in a finite sense but in a fallen sense. We forget because we choose to forget—at least that is the case when it comes to our response to God’s character and covenant and commands, to his ways and works and words. We forsake our Maker because we choose to forget our Maker.
Biblical history testifies to this truth, especially the Old Testament. In Eden, Adam chooses to forget the goodness of God in giving him the freedom and pleasure to eat from every tree of the garden, bar one (Gen. 2:15–17). After the flood, Noah forgets the righteousness of God that he had preached about prior to the flood: he becomes drunk and is defiled by his son (Gen. 9:20–25). In Canaan, Abraham forgets the promise of God that he would provide him with a son from Sarah’s womb; instead, he takes matters into his own hands with Hagar (Gen. 16:1–6). Israel forgets God’s promise to be with them as he leads them out of Egypt; they complain of his absence in the wilderness (Exod. 17:7). Before entering the land, God warns Israel repeatedly to “take care” lest they “forget” the Lord once they are in the land (Deut. 4:9, 23; 6:12; 8:11, 14, 19; 9:7; 25:19; 26:13). When they enter the Promised Land, they fare no better. Not long after the conquest under Joshua, a generation grows up that does not know the Lord or the work that he has done for Israel (Judg. 2:10); they forget the Lord their God and serve the Baals (Judg. 3:7; cf. 1 Sam. 12:9). Israel’s kings are also forgetful of God and his covenant and commands. Saul forgets to devote the enemy to complete destruction; as a result, the kingdom is stripped from him (1 Sam. 15:10–23). David forgets the commandments of God and steals another man’s wife, committing adultery with her (2 Sam. 11); as a consequence, the son conceived by his affair dies and his family dissolves into bitter and deadly infighting (2 Sam. 13–18). Solomon forgets the fear of the Lord which is the beginning of his wisdom; he exchanges wisdom for folly and is led into idolatry (1 Kings 11:1–8); in so doing, the kingdom splits (1 Kings 11:11–13). During the divided kingdom of Israel and Judah, the prophets spotlight forgetfulness as a besetting sin of God’s people (Isa. 17:10; 51:13; Jer. 2:32; 3:21; 13:25; 18:15; 23:27; Ezek. 22:12; 23:25; Hos. 2:13; 4:6; 8:14; 13:6). In the end, Israel’s forgetfulness leads them into exile where they are made not to forget the judgment of God.
Forgetfulness. Since the day Adam transgressed the commandment concerning the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, we have been a race prone to forgetfulness. Forgetfulness reflects fallenness; it is a manifestation of our human condition in Adam. Forgetfulness is another way of describing disobedience. Israel and her kings “forget” the Lord their God by disobeying and forsaking him (cf. Jer. 2:29 and Jer. 2:32; 3:21). We forsake because we forget. And we forget because we choose to forget—deliberately, willfully, consciously. We forget our Creator—his character and covenant and commands, his ways and works and words; we forget our Redeemer—his promises and precepts, his redemption and righteousness. Moses captures well Israel’s problem and ours:
You were unmindful of the Rock that bore you, And you forgot the God who gave you birth. (Deut. 32:18)
Given this aspect of our fallen humanity, it is unsurprising to find commands in the Old and New Testaments to “remember” God and what he has done for us. In the Old Testament, we are exhorted to “remember” God as our Creator in the days of our youth (Eccl. 12:1); we are encouraged to “remember” him as our Redeemer and “the wondrous works that he has done, his miracles, and the judgments he uttered” (Ps. 105:5). The psalmist exhorts us, “Bless the Lord . . . and forget not all his benefits” (Ps. 103:2). This kind of remembrance has formal expression in Israel’s weekly observance of the Sabbath and their yearly observance of various festivals.
Most of these festivals point Israel back to events in their past, serving to remind them of what God has done on their behalf, so that they will not forget him. The Sabbath is a weekly reminder of the rest that God entered following his work of creation; it is a reminder to Israel that they too should rest at the end of their working week. In the Passover, Israel remembers their redemption by God from the angel of death and from their enemy, the Egyptians; the victory is further commemorated in the seven-day Feast of Unleavened Bread; in the Feast of Weeks (Pentecost), Israel remembers the giving of the law at Sinai, as well as offering the firstfruits of their wheat harvest to the Lord; on the Day of Atonement, Israel recalls their sins of the past year, repents of them with fasting and prayer, and asks God to forgive them through sacrifices offered by the high priest; in the Feast of Tabernacles, Israel contemplates God’s faithfulness in their forty years of tent dwelling in the wilderness; and in the Feast of Purim, God’s people are reminded of his gracious protection of them through Esther and Mordecai unmasking the evil plot of Haman to annihilate the Jewish people.
For Israel, these festivals serve as weekly and yearly reminders of God’s gracious work in creation and redemption, and as such, they encourage God’s people to remember the Lord and forget not all his benefits.
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Engaging CT’s Piece on “Side B Christians”
There is so much more to this conversation than Mason’s article lets on. There are serious, glaring theological problems with “Side B Christianity,” but Mason doesn’t address them. Rather, she caricatures and straw-man’s the sincere biblical and theological issues raised by those to her right. Nevertheless, these problems with the Side B paradigm endure, and Christians must engage them head-on with biblical discernment.
Christianity Today has published an article by a “Side B Christian” named Bekah Mason. For those unfamiliar with this terminology, so-called “Side A Christians” are those who believe that they can follow Christ while affirming homosexual identity and practice. “Side B Christians” are those who believe that following Christ means affirming gay identity while eschewing gay sexual behavior. Mason’s article is about the plight of “Side B Christians” who feel rejected both by LGBT folks on their left and by “orthodox churches” on their right. Mason argues that “Side B Christians are not a threat but an asset to orthodox churches.”
Readers would do well to reckon not only with the article’s argument but also with its problems. For example, Mason treats “Side B Christianity” as if its theological framework were uncontroversial. On her account, Side B Christians are simply people who are trying to be faithful to Christ in the face of “acerbic” conservatives who won’t let them be. But that is a caricature of the debate that has unfolded over the last 8 years or so.
“Side B Christians” treat homosexual orientation not as sin to be lamented but as an identity to be affirmed. Yes, they agree with Christians to their right that homosexual behavior is sinful and fallen, but they nevertheless don’t want to consign homosexual identity to a similar category. From Wes Hill arguing that being gay is “sanctifiable” to Grant Hartley‘s “Redeeming Queer Culture” to Gregory Coles‘ suggestion that gay orientation may be an aspect of God’s original creation design, it is clear that “Side B” folks aim to convince Christians that at least part of homosexuality ought to be redeemed rather than repented of. I don’t believe that Mason’s article is forthrightly dealing with these problems. Rather, she writes as if the debate is mainly due to the irrational rigidity of conservatives.
Mason also caricatures those to her right by claiming, “From conservative commenters, we hear that any acknowledgment of same-sex attraction is sinful.” I am one of the primary drafters of The Nashville Statement, and I know personally all of the other primary drafters. I can’t think of a single one who would agree with that statement. No responsible pastor would ever make such an asinine claim. The truth is that those of us who affirm Nashville believe that Christians should acknowledge and confess their sin no matter what it is. They should be honest about and face their own temptations and find help and strength from Christ to be faithful in the struggle. No one that I know of has argued anywhere that “any acknowledgement of same-sex attraction is sinful.” That claim simply isn’t true of any of the major parties to this conversation.
What we have argued is that same-sex sexual desire is sinful and that faithful Christians should repent of those desires whenever they experience them. They should not found an identity on such desires as though they were to be affirmed or commended. If gay orientation is any part of human identity, it would simply be an expression of the flesh. But the flesh is nothing to affirm or to celebrate. On the contrary, it is something daily to be put to death. The remnants of our sinful nature will be eradicated at the new creation, and that is why we must mortify our flesh even now (Romans 8:13).
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“Contextualization” Is a Bad Idea
As we translate the words and concepts of Scripture, we must make sure that the target words and expressions faithfully capture the original meaning and sense of Scripture, rejecting the notion of cultural neutrality, and seeking always to reshape our lives and language according to Scripture, not the other way around.
It seems most Christians today assume that Christians have always “contextualized” the gospel, but this is simply not the case.
Like the idea of culture itself, the term “contextualization” is a relatively recent development. David Hesselgrave and Edward Rommen provide a helpful survey of contextualization’s history in Contextualization: Meanings, Methods, and Models.1
The idea of contextualization is rooted in the missions debates of the Division on World Missions and Evangelism (DWME) of the World Council of Churches (WCC). Influenced by a secularist, anthropological understanding of culture and thus concerned that each civilization develop its own theology and method of church ministry in its own cultural context, the DWME began to condemn the “theological imperialism” of the church in the West. Its 1972–73 Bangkok Conference argued that non-Western churches should develop their own ideas “in a theology, a liturgy, a praxis, a form of community, rooted in their own culture.”2 This desire for each church to be indigenized within its culture, clearly influenced by a belief in cultural neutrality, became known as “contextualization.” Hesselgrave and Rommen explain how this new concept differed from previous ways of thinking:
Contextualization is a new word—a technical neologism. It may also signal a new (or renewed) sensitivity to the need for adaptation to cultural context. To its originators it involved a new point of departure and a new approach to theologizing and to theological education: namely, praxis or involvement in the struggle for justice within the existential situation in which men and women find themselves today. As such it goes well beyond the concept of indigenization which Henry Venn, Rufus Anderson, and their successors defined in terms of an autonomous (self-supporting, self-governing, and self-propagating) church.3
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