May the God of love and peace be with you today.

Logos users, the annual 12 Days of Logos sale has begun and is offering some good deals.
Today’s Kindle deals include a few good books.
(Yesterday on the blog: The Great Challenge of Every Marriage)
When the Soul Feels its Worth
“Under snow-frosted trees, with visible breath I ask it. Perhaps you’ve asked it too. Rinsing the dish I’ve rinsed a thousand times before, I wonder. Maybe you’ve wondered too. Do I matter? Am I seen?”
Can We Really Give God More or Less Glory?
Is it really possible to give God more glory or less glory? John Piper answers here.
Against an elder receive not an accusation
Denny Burk considers some of what’s wrapped up in the biblical admonition to not receive an accusation against an elder except on the evidence of two or three witnesses (and how this applies not only to elders but to all Christians).
Take Risks for Your Days Are Numbered
“By and large, we live in a world that discourages risk-taking. Many of us, knowingly or unknowingly, have been conditioned to take the safe route through life’s twists and turns. I sometimes wonder how many people have been dissuaded from doing risky, world-changing things simply because it wasn’t ‘realistic’ or in line with ‘the way the world works.’”
God with us
I think you’ll enjoy this reflection on “God with us.”
A Message to Conservative Bible Thumping Christians
Todd Friel has a message to you/us.
Flashback: Jesus Isn’t Threatened by Your Christmas Gifts
We don’t threaten the wonder of the incarnation when we give nice gifts to the ones we love and when we look forward to receiving them.

We must carefully distinguish between self-denial as a matter of show and self-denial in doing God’s will and in the service of love. It is not the act itself that is beautiful but the love that is in the act. —J.R. Miller

Euthanasia makes a lot of sense. At least in our culture at this time, it makes intuitive sense that those who are ill without hope for a cure or those who are in pain without likelihood of relief ought to be able to choose to end their own lives. Our culture assumes there are few higher virtues than autonomy and that an individual’s right to self-government should extend even to matters of life and death. Hence we see the rising acceptance and legalization of euthanasia throughout the West, though it comes in the form of several variations and euphemisms—physician-assisted death, physician assisted-suicide, medical assistance in dying (MAiD), and so on.
Christians, of course, have grave concerns with euthanasia. While we sympathize deeply with those who are ill without hope for a cure and those who are in pain without likelihood of relief, we do not believe that humans have the right to take life—even if that life is their own. It is God alone who has the right to number our days, God alone who has jurisdiction over life and death.

How Should We Then Die

Because euthanasia is on the rise—and an especially precipitous rise here in Canada—we need distinctly Christian responses to it. Ewan Goligher has provided an excellent one in How Should We Then Die?: A Christian Response to Physician-Assisted Suicide. Goligher is an assistant professor of medicine at the University of Toronto and a physician who practices critical-care medicine, specializing in mechanical ventilation. He is, in other words, a man who faces issues of death on a daily basis.

Should doctors help patients end their own life? Is it right and good to cause death (to kill) out of mercy for suffering? Over the last decades, Western society has seen a marked rise in interest and support for the idea that doctors should be allowed (even expected) to facilitate suicide or cause death for their patients under certain conditions. This shift in social values, together with an aging population, means that all of us, whether or not we work in healthcare, will be forced to face this question. Every one of us will eventually face illness, suffering, and death at some point, and we will have to decide whether we would consider seeking and obtaining assistance from a doctor to end our life.

His book is written to help Christians think well about this question. In other words, his book is written to help Christians think distinctly Christianly about whether doctors should help patients end their lives.
He begins by explaining why physician-assisted death has become such a prominent issue and one that is so widely accepted. Having done that, he carefully shows how advocates of euthanasia diminish the intrinsic and innate value of human beings by insisting there are situations in which it is better for people to cease to exist than to continue to exist. “When we say that people matter, we are also saying that it is good that they exist. If people have intrinsic value, then it is always good that they exist. And if we insist that they really matter—that they have deep intrinsic, inherent value—then the cessation of their existence (their death) must always be regarded as a terrible tragedy.” He shows that the acceptance of physician-assisted death depends on a completely different understanding of human life and human worth than any the West has known.
He also shows how euthanasia is an act of secular faith. Euthanasia tends to be offered or accepted where there is the belief that remaining alive is a fate worse than death, and that death is nothing but the absence of life. These claims are said to be grounded in science, yet science cannot prove them, for what comes beyond death is beyond science’s jurisdiction. Hence, lives are ended with faith—secular faith—that what comes beyond death is better than what precedes it. Science may insist that humans have no souls, that we are material and nothing more. But it cannot prove this and therefore cannot prove that souls do not remain when bodies die—a possibility that has terrifying consequences for those whose souls are not prepared for what comes next.
As the book heads toward its close, Goligher addresses the despair of being critically ill and provides a Christian response to it, for he says that Christians “must have something better to offer than death.” And what we can offer is meaning—the kind of meaning that says suffering is not purposeless and not hopeless, but rather a means through which God works his inscrutable will. It is through faith in God that we can pass through suffering with endurance and even with joy. It is through faith that we can escape the despair that so often leads to the conviction that it would be better to just end it all.
For those of us who live in the West, and perhaps especially for those of us who live in Canada (which is leading the charge when it comes to euthanasia), it is becoming increasingly common to know people who have opted to end their own lives. It is also increasingly common for pastors to have to counsel their elderly parishioners away from it and for children to have to plead with their elderly parents not to opt for it. It is widespread and becoming more common, it is accepted and becoming more acceptable. As Christians, we need to be prepared and we need to be able to offer a response. How Should We Then Die? does exactly that and does it well. It prepares and equips us for what is sure to prove one of the defining issues of our time.

I once had a friend who was only ever confident he understood something when he had taken it down to its component parts. If he bought a new tool or device, he would take it from its box and begin to pull it apart, eager to know how it worked before ever actually using it. If his wife brought flowers into the home, you might find him dismantling one on the kitchen table, separating stamen from petals and leaves from stems until each piece was laying by itself and he understood how all the parts made up the whole. Endlessly curious and endlessly analytical, he couldn’t help himself—he just had to know.

His wife, though, was of a very different personality type. She tolerated his habit well enough, but didn’t really understand or appreciate it. She was content to leave the flowers unmolested and intact, to enjoy them as whole objects in their natural state. She was content to take devices from their packaging and to put them straight to work without first pulling them to bits.
I think of them often as I consider the wonderful discipline of theology. In theology we make a study of God—of his works and of his ways. With Scripture as our guide—with God’s revelation of himself as our starting point—we gaze deeply into matters almost too wonderful to behold. And as we study our God we find there is blessing in the macro and the micro, in the whole and in the parts.
We come to see that God is triune, that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are distinct persons, yet one God. We can go deeper and deeper into the Scriptures, we can apply reason and logic, and over time arrive at a more confident and developed doctrine of the Trinity. We can ponder how the Father relates to the Son in ways that are distinct from the ways he relates to the Spirit; we can ponder the ways each was present and active in the great work of creation; we can ponder how each plays a key role in our redemption. This is good and such study is rewarding. Yet it is also good to simply enjoy the Trinity on the most basic and assembled level, to simply acknowledge, “God is one and God is three and to me this is a great mystery.” There is blessing in the whole as much as in the parts.
The same is true when we consider the doctrine of salvation. We can map out a whole ordo salutis, a logical sequence of events that took place to draw us from darkness to light. We can debate the exact order of the steps; we can refine our terminology; we can do our best to reconcile the sovereignty of God with the responsibility of man. All of this is a good and spiritually-rewarding study. Yet sometimes we also do well to step back and simply say, “God is sovereign. Man is responsible. And for today I am content to simply affirm those two statements as friends rather than enemies.” There is beauty in the most basic whole as much as in the most advanced parts.
There are some who are like my friend and are only content when they have gone as deep as they can, when they have taken a doctrine apart and put it back together. There are some like my friend’s wife who are content to take a doctrine at face value and not invest substantial effort in going endlessly deeper. Both approaches are good, both approaches are right, and both approaches are rewarding in their own way. For both reveal God’s beauty and glory.