The Sinful Serpents Twisted Around My Soul
At times I am ready to hope the gloomy territories of the grave are almost ready for me, that I may lay down this body of sin upon the block for everlasting execution. O! when shall these clogs and fetters be knocked off, and the dark and gloomy walks of this valley of tears, be turned into bright and peaceful realms!
I sometimes hope at the closing hour, when I shall exchange worlds, that Jesus will help me to lay hold of every sinful serpent that has long twisted around my soul, and keeps me company all my pilgrimage; and enable me, by the hand of faith, to hold them up, crying out: Behold the heads of traitors, which shall never come to life again! Oh! What a joyful shout I shall give when I shall feel these vermin drop off!
At times I am ready to hope the gloomy territories of the grave are almost ready for me, that I may lay down this body of sin upon the block for everlasting execution. O! when shall these clogs and fetters be knocked off, and the dark and gloomy walks of this valley of tears, be turned into bright and peaceful realms!
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RUF Announces Resignation of Will Huss
Over the last six years, Will Huss has served as the National Coordinator for RUF leading the ministry through a number of substantial organizational initiatives including growing to over 190 ministries, developing a new recruiting model for future ministry staff, securing the cooperative ministry agreements, as well as celebrating the 50th anniversary of the ministry.
The permanent committee of Reformed University Fellowship met today and issued the following statement:
At the most recent meeting of the Permanent Committee for Reformed University Fellowship on August 19, 2024, Mr. Will Huss announced his intention to step down from his position as National Coordinator in the upcoming year. Mr. Huss’ resignation will be effective June 27, 2025, following the regularly scheduled meeting of the General Assembly. The Permanent Committee is grateful for the ministry and impact of Will Huss. The Lord has graciously used him and his leadership to help RUF mature in organizational health, financial stability, ecclesiastical connection, and ministry development all toward our goal of reaching students for Christ and equipping them to serve. We celebrate his ministry among us and look forward to his service to RUF and the PCA over the next 10 months.
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Dating is Broken
Purpose does not guarantee success, of course, but it can define a life of faithfulness and meaning, whatever our place in life and whatever obstacles we face. Like everything else, all of our human relationships are touched by the Fall. But our purpose as human beings, given by God in creation, remains. Christ’s redemptive work stretches as wide as creation to all of our relationships.
According to Michal Leibowitz in an opinion piece for The New York Times, “Dating is broken.”
When Pew Research surveyed those in the dating scene, 67% of respondents answered that their dating life was not going well. Though 25% percent said it was easy to find a date, the rest reported finding it either very or somewhat difficult. And, those are just the results among those who are actively dating. About half of single Americans, by contrast, have stopped looking.
Meanwhile, the number of single people in the U.S. is at an all-time high, with nearly 1 in 3 U.S. households representing someone living alone. Though many gladly opt for the single life, others feel trapped by social trends they didn’t invent, either caught in a cycle of short-term relationships or starved for options in a world that doesn’t seem to share their values.
Technology is a major factor behind the significant changes in all human relationships. After Tinder turned 10 years old this year, journalist Catherine Pearson offered what she called, “a moment of collective reflection about how apps have reshaped not just dating culture, but also the emotional lives of longtime users.” One young woman told Pearson that she’s “over it all: the swiping, the monotonous getting-to-know-you conversations and the self-doubt that creeps in when [matches fizzle].” (That’s leaving aside issues of harassment and abuse, something more than 60% of women say they’ve experienced on a dating site.)
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Why Teachers are Fleeing Public Schools
Public schools have betrayed public trust by compromising academic and ethical standards to increase graduation rates, all while concealing from parents how little students are actually learning. These compromises not only affect academic achievement, but they also inculcate immoral habits in the next generation of citizens.
In 2007 I turned down a high-paying job in engineering to become a public school science teacher. I believed that making a difference in the lives of kids and maintaining the tradition of Western civilization would give my life meaning and value that money couldn’t measure. But I soon discovered that my ideals were often at odds with the school administration’s priorities. I wanted to teach; my administrators wanted to get the maximum number of students a diploma with the least amount of friction.
The conflict between the bureaucratic, managerial priorities of school administrators and the moral ideals of teachers has characterized my seventeen-year teaching career. It is also a major reason why teachers are fleeing public schools. The public school accountability system, by relying solely on quantitative metrics like graduation rates to gauge educational quality and to evaluate administrators, frustrates teachers’ ability to truly teach and care for their students and look out for their long-term well-being.
The first shock to me was the “make-up work” policy. My school let students skip assignments and miss deadlines until the end of the semester, then let them do the work at the last minute to avoid a failing grade. When I objected, stressing the importance of personal responsibility, the assistant principal replied, “Is it your job to teach chemistry or to teach responsibility?” She didn’t care to hear my answer: “Both.”
Next came the “curving” practice, which dictated that I convert a raw score on a test by multiplying the square root of it by ten. Hence, a score of forty-nine, an F, would be “curved” to seventy, a C minus. When I refused to curve grades, the principal had my department chair make the changes covertly. When I found out, I objected once again, and the principal rebuked me for “denying these children the opportunities all of us had.”
These were both cases of what Michael Polanyi calls “moral inversion”: a presumed moral duty to do immoral actions. This tacit duty to the immoral means that teachers who exercise integrity by refusing to go along with these policies are perceived as the bad guys. Never would an administrator acknowledge the bureaucratic purpose of these policies, which was to keep the wheels turning and money flowing. A failing student is a wrench in the system. He lowers the graduation rate, and the school looks bad. The bureaucracy rationalizes that the students will be better off with a diploma. But if they aren’t learning, their futures are being compromised.
My next moral conflict with administrators put me in a position to blow the whistle on a practice called “online credit recovery” (OCR). I was teaching the two-year Theory of Knowledge course in the International Baccalaureate program, a kind of honors school-within-a-school. Top students in the school could enroll, and so could students from nearby schools who wanted vigorous college prep.
This created a different kind of bureaucratic incentive. The more quality students who enrolled from other schools, the better our school’s state ratings looked. “Come to us and we will get your kids college-ready,” was the call.
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