"Victory in Jesus: The Bright Hope of Postmillennialism"

Bahnsen's short book (it's more along the lines of a treatise) captures the content, scope, and biblical justifiability of postmillennialism. In Chapter One he looks at the Book of Revelation, advocating that it's not as difficult to understand as we think. Certainly God didn't give us Revelation to confuse us. Bahnsen emphasizes that the major prophecies of Revelation are historically rooted within the generation of those to whom the letter was written, since at both the beginning and end of the book, it is said that "these things must occur soon" (or some variant of that phrase); cf. Rev 1.1-3; 22.6, 10. He divides Revelation into three sections: (1) the things that John has seen, (2) the things that are, and (3) the things that will be. When these divisions are given in the Revelation text, John has already seen Christ present, victorious and sovereign, with his church. The things that are involves the need for the churches to repent of their errors and strengthen their good qualities and to overcome persecution and oppression. The things "that will be" begin in Revelation 4. These future events are further divided into two prophecies: there's the scroll with seven seals prophesying God's judgment on faithless and rebellious Jerusalem, and there's the little book prophesying God's judgment on pagan Rome. Revelation 12 gives a "behind the scenes" look at the judgment on Jerusalem, and Revelation 19 serves as the capping of Rome's judgment as Christ goes forth and conquers the nations not by a sword in his hand (as dispensational premillennialists teach) but by the sword coming from his mouth (the preaching of the gospel). Revelation 20 gives a "behind the scenes" look at Christ conquering the nations from the perspective of heaven, and Revelation 21-22 serves as a postscript to the entire book: the gospel will be victorious, Christ will be triumphant, and the new heavens and new earth will come to bear on the world. Revelation is thus all about the triumph of the gospel, of Christ's victory over the pagan nations, of Christ's subduing of his enemies and putting them under his feet.

Chapter Two hones in on Revelation 20.1-6, which really is the crux of the matter when it comes to various millennial positions. The text reads (ESV): Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, and threw him into the pit, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended. After that he must be released for a little while. Then I saw thrones, and seated on them were those to whom the authority to judge was committed. Also I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years. The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection! Over such the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for a thousand years.

The above text is the only text in scripture that refers directly to “The Millennium.” Those who believe that Jesus will return prior to the Millennium are premillennialists. Those who believe that Jesus will return after the Millennium are postmillennialists. Those are the only two positions (amillennialism is a spin on postmillennialism; while classic postmillennialists see the Millennium as an era of ever-increasing prosperity for the gospel throughout the world, amillennialists see no such “kingdom growth” warranted, believing that the gospel’s progress will be paralleled by the progress of evil or that the gospel’s progress will be lacking while evil’s progress will increase). Premillennialists fall into one of two camps: there are historical premillennialists, who believe that Jesus will come before the Millennium, and the Millennium will be characterized by unfettered progress for the gospel after Jesus’ return; and dispensational premillennialists believe that the Millennium following Jesus’ return will be characterized by a renewed Jewish state and Jesus overcoming the pagan nations by military might.

Bahnsen advocates the classic postmillennial approach to the Millennium. Revelation 20 states that “the devil and Satan” is bound, and this binding isn’t a future reality but a present one. In Matthew 12.28-29, Jesus says to the Pharisees, ‘But if it is by the Spirit of God that I cast out demons, then the Kingdom of God has come upon you. Or how can someone enter a strong man’s house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man? Then indeed you may plunder his house. Jesus says that (a) the Kingdom of God has come (something he declares quite often, contrary to premillennialists who state that the “real” kingdom of God won’t come until after Jesus’ return) and that (b) Jesus’ casting out of demons is indicative of the devil being bound, and thus his house can be plundered. Thus the binding of Satan spoken of in Revelation 20 happened at Jesus’ advent. This binding doesn’t render Satan wholly inactive; it renders him unable to exercise the same amount of influence and sway he exercised prior to Christ. Jude 6 declares, And the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, God has kept in chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day… Demonic spirits remain active, but at the same time they are chained; though we may not know precisely how much they've been restrained in the present time, especially with the advent of Christ, I’m sure we’ll see just how much power they have at the end of the Millennium when they are unbound.

Regarding the “first resurrection” spoken of in Revelation 20, Bahnsen advocates that this refers to the believers’ regeneration in Christ rather than bodily resurrection. Jesus says in John 5.24-25, Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life. Truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear it will live. Jesus is talking about regeneration, being “born again,” the “first resurrection” of Revelation 20. The Apostle Paul writes in Ephesians 2.4-6, God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus… This precisely echoes Revelation 20: those who are in Christ are regenerated, made alive in Christ (the first resurrection), and in the present, in some strange way, we are raised up with Christ and seated with him in the heavenly places.

The “second resurrection” of Revelation 20 refers not to our “spiritual rebirth” but our future, promised bodily resurrection. In John 5.28-29, Jesus says, ‘[An] hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear [the voice of the Son of Man] and come out, those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment.’ In the very next chapter, Jesus says, ‘And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. (vv. 39-40) He adds in verse 44, ‘No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day.’ Jesus says in Matthew 25.31-32 and 46, ‘When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats… And [the goats] will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous unto eternal life. Jesus says that on the “last day,” at the Great Judgment, the dead will be resurrected; both the wicked and the righteous will be resurrected, given physical bodies, but only the righteous will be glorified, partaking in the “second resurrection” which follows the template of Christ’s own resurrection. The Apostle Paul writes in 1 Thessalonians 4.16-19, For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. This is no “secret rapture” as dispensational premillennialists claim; it is a loud, catastrophic, world-shattering event. When will this take place? According to Paul in 1 Corinthians 15.20-28, But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father AFTER DESTROYING EVERY RULE AND EVERY AUTHORITY AND EVERY POWER. FOR HE MUST REIGN UNTIL HE HAS PUT ALL HIS ENEMIES UNDER HIS FEET. THE LAST ENEMY TO BE DESTROYED IS DEATH. For ‘God has put all things in subjection under him.’ But when it says, ‘all things are put in subjection,’ it is plain that he is excepted who put all things in subjection under him. When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all. (all caps mine)

Bahnsen’s approach to Revelation 20 makes sense of the binding of Satan, the first and second resurrection, and his postmillennial (rather than amillennial) slant makes sense of the biblical promise that before Christ returns to raise the dead and consummate the kingdom, he will have put under his feet every rule and every authority and every power. This biblical timeline lies at the heart of postmillennialism: scripture says that the Christ’s kingdom will grow to fill the whole earth, and postmillennialists believe scripture. Scripture says the “last day” (the resurrection of the dead and Great Judgment) will come only after Christ has subdued all his enemies. Postmillennialists affirm this. Bahnsen’s reading of Revelation 20 makes sense of the text in accordance with the wider body of scripture, which is the subject of Chapter Three.

Postmillennialists have a wealth of scriptures throughout the Old Testament to support the conviction that God’s kingdom will spread throughout the entire world and be successful prior to the return of Christ. The Abrahamic Covenant is all about God working through Abraham’s descendants to bring healing to the world; the Davidic Covenant is all about God establishing a king (whom Christians understand to be Jesus) who will rule over the world with justice, righteousness, and peace. Bahnsen focuses on several “messianic” texts promoting the concept of a victorious gospel. Psalm 22.27-28 reads, All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord, and all the families of the nations shall worship before you. For kingship belongs to the Lord, and he rules over the nations. Psalm 2.7-9 reads, The Lord said to me, ‘You are my Son; today I have begotten you. Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel. Isaiah prophecies in Isaiah 2.2-4, It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be lifted up above the hills… In Isaiah’s day, pagan shrines were centered on hilltops; this imagery implies that pagan religions will be overshadowed by the true religion of God; Isaiah continues, making the point that all the nations will embrace devotion to God: …And all the nations shall flow to [the mountain of the house of the Lord], and many peoples shall come, and say, ‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways, and that we may walk in his paths.’ For out of Zion shall go the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He shall judge between the nations, and shall decide disputes for many peoples; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore. Premillennialists identify this prosperity of the worship of God to come after Jesus’ coming; but because the biblical timeline doesn’t allow the premillennial scheme of things to be true, one is left with either declaring that these prophecies only refer to a vague spiritualism of Christ’s people (amillennialists) or that these prophecies will come true (postmillennialists). Isaiah 9.6-7 reads, For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this. These prophecies will come true not because man is inherently good or that humanistic ideals of progress will be realized; they will come true because God intends that they do, and He will make it happen. Isaiah proclaims in 11.9 that the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. The gospel will spread throughout the world, converting entire nations to worship and devotion to Christ, and a “golden age” in world history under the lordship of Christ from heaven will dawn. Isaiah 65 hints at this coming age in church history: No more shall there be in [the earth] an infant who lives but a few days, or an old man who does not fill out his days, for the young man shall die a hundred years old, and the sinner a hundred years old shall be accursed… The wolf and the lamb shall graze together; the lion shall eat straw like the ox, and dust shall be the serpent’s food. (Isa 65.20, 25)

King Nebuchadnezzar had a famous dream, which the prophet Daniel recounts to him in Daniel 2.32-35: The head of [the image] was of fine gold, its chest and arms of silver, its middle and thighs of bronze, its legs of iron, its feet partly of iron and partly of clay. As you looked, a stone was cut out by no human hand, and it struck the image on its feet of iron and clay, and broke them in pieces. Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver, and the gold, all together were broken in pieces, and became like the chaff of the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away, so that not a trace of them could be found. But the stone that struck the image became a great mountain and filled the whole earth. God gave Daniel the meaning of the dream, and Daniel identified the statue and all its metals as representing the empires leading up to the birth of God’s kingdom. He says in 2.44-45, And in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever, just as you saw that a stone was cut from a mountain by no human hand, and that it broke in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold. A great God has made known to the king what shall be after this. The dream is certain, and its interpretation sure. And postmillennialists say, “Amen!”

Jesus spoke of the Kingdom of God’s gradual growth in the parables of the mustard seed and leaven: [Jesus] put another parable before them, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his field. It is the smallest of all seeds, but when it has grown it is larger than all the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches. (Matt 13.31-32) It has been pointed out that “birds of prey” were often used to symbolize wicked, pagan nations; Jesus could be saying that the kingdom of God will grow so large through the earth that even the worst pagan nations are dwarfed by its stature; he could also be saying, even the wretched pagans—even the barbarians and Scythians!—could find a place in God’s kingdom. He told them another parable. ‘The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, that a woman took and hid in three measures of flour, till it was all leavened.’ (v. 33) Leaven slowly spreads throughout the loaf; the growth is slow, and gradual, but the end result is that ‘it was all leavened.’ Jesus affirmed in Matthew 16.18b, I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

While premillennialism advocates a timeline for Jesus’ return that is foreign to scripture, both amillennialism and postmillennialism embrace a timeline of Jesus’ return that is faithful to scripture. While amillennialism seeks to “spiritualize” all the Old Testament and New Testament texts about the advance of God’s kingdom through the earth, postmillennialism accepts that God meant what He said and that He will bring it to pass. Why, then, is postmillennialism no longer in vogue? That is the substance of Chapter Four. Bahnsen shows how postmillennialism was an orthodox (if not the orthodox) millennial view of the church for hundreds and hundreds of years. From John Calvin to the Puritans and to 18^th and 19^th century theologians, postmillennialism held sway. Postmillennial expectations laid the groundwork for major evangelism and modern missions. Bahnsen quotes De Jong on page 107: “Prior to 1810… simple chiliasm [i.e., postmillennialism], with its strong emphasis on the gradual arrival of the promised kingdom through preaching and conversion, was in vogue… Simple chiliasm had become universal in Anglo-American churches by this period.” The decline of postmillennialism is rather recent (within the century or so!), and western Christians have such little understanding of the “history of theology” that we believe that our current beliefs are indicative of Christianity’s historical beliefs. For instance, the conviction that Jesus’ return is imminent, that there will be a rapture followed by a Great Tribulation, and that there will come a Jewish state in the Millennium preceded by advancing lawlessness are all relatively recent ideas in the history of Christianity, yet they are trumpeted as absolutely certain while orthodox Christian beliefs that have become outdated (such as postmillennialism) are decried as unbiblical simply because they don’t fit into the new framework for understanding the End Times. The decline of postmillennialism and the rise of dispensational premillennialism are attributed by Bahnsen to three factors: “[The] three factors of liberalism, evolutionary progressivism, and dispensationalism came to exert simultaneous pressure on Christendom in the early twentieth century, resulting in the unpopularity of biblical postmillennialism. People were now inclined to distrust progressive hopes (if they were fundamentalist) or discount biblical predictions for history (if they were liberals). Furthermore, believers and unbelievers alike had been trained to interpret the Bible in terms of extrabiblical considerations (secular scholarship for the modernists, world events for the dispensationalists). The combined outcome was a definite skepticism about the church’s progress on earth prior to the second coming of Christ in glory…” (58) Bahnsen adds on page 116, “The recent decline of adherence to postmillennialism does not stem from advances in Bible scholarship or a strong textual refutation of it, but rather from the incursions of autonomous rationalism, secularization, failing faith, new interpretations (based on a faulty hermeneutic at best, a new ‘vision’ at worst), and newspaper exegesis. Contemporary accusations against postmillennialism have rested on misinterpretations of it, and the arguments urged against it have been nontelling… [Further], postmillennialism has been wrongly rejected on the basis of unfounded or premature allegations. All and all, no good reason has been offered in recent years for laying aside postmillennial belief.” (116)

Chapter Five is an excellent chapter on demonology, the nature of Satan and his binding, and his activities in the world and against God’s people. Bahnsen shows how the conviction that Satan’s kingdom is either growing (premillennialism) or in parallel with Christ’s kingdom (amillennialism) doesn’t hold up to scripture. That Satan is the “prince of this age” indicates that he is the ruler over “the sons of disobedience,” but his hold on people is broken so that they can be converted to Christ.

“Victory in Jesus: The Bright Hope of Postmillennialism” is an excellent little introduction to the tenets of postmillennialism over against those of premillennialism and amillennialism, and Bahnsen makes a solid case for its biblical support, shows how it has been predominant throughout history, and highlights how its decline comes not because of biblical interpretation but because of various schools of thought rising to prominence following two world wars and the publication of the Scofield Reference Bible in the early twentieth century. What better way to close a “book review” on postmillennialism than with a hymn celebrating the victorious advance of the gospel? Behold William Shrubsole’s 1795 hymn:

Arm of the Lord, Awake, awake!

Put on thy strength, the nations shake,

And let the world, adoring, see

Triumphs of mercy wrought by thee.

Say to the heathen from thy throne:

“I am Jehovah, God alone.”

Thy voice their idols shall confound,

And cast their altars to the ground.

Let Zion’s time of favor come;

O bring the tribes of Israel home:

And let our wond’ring eyes behold

Gentiles and Jew in Jesus’ fold.

Almighty God, thy grace proclaim

In every clime of every name;

Let adverse pow’rs before thee fall,

And crown the Saviour Lord of all. 

[sunday meditations]

1 PETER 1.20-21

He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you, who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God.

What we find here isn’t so much  a Christological declaration but a tie-in with all that has come before. Don’t imagine Peter is being pulled off-course, derailed from his train-of-thought up to this point, suddenly writing about Jesus just because he mentioned him in the previous verse (and, well, we all know that throwing Jesus into something makes it that much better). What St. Peter does here is similar to what he did earlier in his letter with his mention of the prophets: the echo itself is to focus the hopes of the Asia Minor Christians on God and their future in him. Whereas the prophets pointed forward to Christ, Christ himself points even further forward to the consummation.

The connection between Christ and believers rests here on two hinges: first, being foreknown. As Christ was foreknown, so Christians are foreknown (1.2). Secondly, as Christ suffered (and died), so the Christians in Asia Minor are suffering (2.21). Peter locates Christians on the same map of Jesus, putting them in the same situation.

The Christians in Asia Minor may have found themselves in their own versions of Gethsemane, sharing in Jesus’ anxiety, dreaded anticipation, and fear in the garden. With Nero’s maniacal persecution looming, Gethsemane wouldn’t be a shot in the dark. But Peter doesn’t just say “Christ suffered, you’re suffering, too.” No, he points beyond the suffering to the glory. Christians, suffering like Messiah, and being conformed to Messiah in that way, will be further conformed to Messiah not only in suffering but also in glory.

God raised Jesus from the dead, the firstfruits of the resurrection of all God’s people. Christians, although perhaps suffering now, have the hope of sharing in Christ’s resurrection when God raises them bodily from the dead.

As God raised Christ, so he will raise believers.

As God exalted Christ, so he will exalt believers.

As God vindicated Christ, so he will vindicate believers.

As God glorified Christ, so he will glorify all those who belong to him.

Thus both the Christian’s faith and hope is in God. The person who professes allegiance to Christ professes allegiance to God; and come what may, the loyal person—the faithful person, the one characterized by the badge of faith—will persevere, with hope in focus.

The hopes of worldly people are centered upon many things: their own abilities and skills, the riddles of fame and fortune, the tantalizing appeal of sexual fetishes and pleasurable fantasies. All these hopes, however, are marked by death and decay, and lead only in that direction. The Christian’s hope, however, is in God, in the hope that what God did for Christ—resurrection and glorification—he will do for all his people. And this hope, though not yet fulfilled, is a hope that is promised, a hope that is sure, a hope that will come to pass. It’s already happened once with Christ, in the middle of time; and at the end of this present evil age, it will happen again to all Christ’s people. As Peter opened in 1.3, so now he closes in 1.21, and the classic refrain holds everything together, serving as an inclusio, an old writing technique whereby one sandwiches sections of text between what’s super important. And, as we see in 1.3 and 1.21, what’s important, so critically crucial, is HOPE!

Once again, the ultimate question: WHERE IS YOUR HOPE?

            Is your hope in the passing pleasures of this current life?

            Is your hope focused on the fleeting phantoms of this not-so-golden age?

            Or is your hope in the God who resurrects and glorifies?

These questions are critically important. Where we place our hopes, and who we hope in, guides our lives like fly-by-wire missiles. The wrong hopes and the wrong hoping will find you stranded while you sleep, but the right hopes and the right hoping will lead you not just through some clean-&-polished pearly-white gates but to a fully-flourishing human life in a recreated cosmos.

of parks & paradise

Mitchell Memorial Forest

On Sunday afternoons or Monday mornings I've been making it a point to leave the smoggy city behind and lose myself in nature. Monday mornings tend to work out best, since there's hardly ever anyone on the trails with me. On these walks (and sometimes runs) I bathe in creation, walk about in prayer, listening for God's voice and laying my burdens and concerns before Him. More often than not He speaks, and I'm ever thankful for those moments. As I walk through these woodlands with spring blossoming, I can't help but look forward to the day when all creation is renewed, purged of its infection with evil, and I can't help but yearn to explore the world anew in a new physical body free of the constraints of death and decay (and those anxieties spawned by death and decay). It may sound like science fiction, but it's downright biblical. On many of these walks my mind drifts to "the present heaven," or "paradise," where God's people go when they die to relax, rule with Christ, and await their future and final bodily resurrection. Here's something on "paradise" that I've pulled from an essay I wrote many months ago:

* * *

What happens when a Christian dies before Jesus’ appearing? Where do they go? Are they conscious? Do they exist in some sort of soul sleep, time passing absent their awareness? When it comes to the concept of “heaven”, and here I mean it as the place where God’s people go when they die, the Bible is surprisingly quiet. This place is mentioned in only a handful of New Testament texts: 2 Corinthians 5.8, Philippians 1.23, Revelation 6.9-11, and Luke 23.43. The latter text is where we find Jesus hanging on the cross and telling the penitent criminal beside him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.” I capitalize the letter of that last word not because it’s a noun but because it’s a proper noun: Jesus is talking about a very specific and concrete place cemented in Jewish minds.

The word “paradise” comes from the Persian word pairidaeza, meaning “a walled park” or “an enclosed garden.” This word was used to describe the great walled gardens of the Persian King Cyrus, not least the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. Many Jews believed that God would restore Eden. The word paradise came to describe the eternal state of the righteous and, to a lesser extent, the nature of the present heaven. “Paradise” wasn’t invoked as mere allegory, with some strange metaphorical or spiritual meaning that we have to decipher. In Jewish thought it was a real place, be it physical or spiritual, where God and his people lived together, bathing in beauty and enjoying much pleasure and happiness.

So what, then, is Paradise? It is, as Jesus says in Luke 23, the place where the saints go when they die. And here’s the kicker: it could actually be the real-life, physical Garden of Eden. In Revelation 2.7, we find the tree of life in “the Paradise of God.” The same tree is seen later in the New Jerusalem on the New Earth (22.2). Remember: after the Fall in Genesis 3, God banished mankind from the Garden and made it unreachable for them (Genesis 3.24). It may very well be the case that Eden didn’t dissolve or disappear but, in a sense, was relocated. As a physical place, it very well may not have been destroyed. There’s no notion of Eden being torn of its physicality and stripped down into a mere “spiritual” reality. The tree of life, found in the Garden of Eden in Genesis 2.9, shows up in Revelation 22.2 and then becomes a hallmark of the New Jerusalem. One can make the argument that the Garden of Eden is the Paradise of God, that physical place of beauty and rest, a place where the saints go and relax following their lives on earth, a place from which (as some texts seem to imply) they can rule presently over the world with Christ. Following the Great Judgment, Paradise/Eden will not be discarded or done away with: in the portrait of new creation in Revelation 21-22, the tree of life is smack-dab in the middle of it all.  Come the appearance of Christ and the Judgment, Eden will take its place in the center of New Jerusalem; but until then, I believe, it remains dislocated from us, and those who die in Christ spend their time there, resting and ruling with Christ, until the day Christ makes his triumphal entry to finally put all the universe to rights. 

Caldwell Nature Preserve

4.25.14

I'm looking forward to starry Wisconsin nights.

I've started watching the HBO series "John Adams", and I'm loving it. The United States as we know it today was created not as a democracy but as a republic. A republic protects the minority groups with a constitution or Bill of Rights, whereas a democracy gives all its power to the people, which means that minority groups will have no protection against the desires of the majority. Classical Rome was a republic, and ancient Greece was a democracy. Some speculate that the United States has become an oligarchy or plutocracy within the constraints of a republican system, and I think they may be onto something.

Yesterday afternoon I took Ben and Jason thrifting.

I went primarily to find some cheap oil lanterns.

Instead I walked out with a nice pair of boots suitable to lots of snow.

(I'm gearing up for Wisconsin)

Mandy's vacationing in Mexico. She's lucky I'm not there, or we'd be spending an inordinate amount of time visiting relics of the Triple Alliance (the Aztecs). 

I've been trying to eat a lot better.

Fruits, vegetables, rice, lean meats.

I've even been running and getting back into weight training.

My body feels so much better. Processed foods and GMOs are no bueno.

I wish I had more to write about.

I've been working a lot and sleeping even less.

I miss talking with the Wisconsinite every night.

September can't come fast enough!

[Salvation: A "Now But Not Yet" Rescue]

Here's yet another non-colonial essay. This essay looks at the present and future aspects of salvation and locates the salvation of human beings within the context of the wider salvation of the entire cosmos.

Salvation: A "Now But Not Yet" Rescue by Anthony Barnhart

"The Way" (VI)

Have only a few private devotions, but be constant in them.

Don’t forget your childhood prayers, learned perhaps from your mother’s lips. Say them each day with simplicity, as you did then.

Let us be slow to judge. Each one sees things from his own point of view and with his own mind, with all its limitations, through eyes that are often dimmed and clouded by passion. Moreover, like so many of those modern artists, some people have an outlook which is so subjective and so unhealthy that they make a few random strokes and assure us that these represent our portrait, our conduct. Of what little worth are the judgments of men! Don’t judge without sifting your judgment in prayer.

Force yourself, if necessary, always to forgive those who offend you, from the very first moment. For the greatest injury or offense you can suffer from them is nothing compared to what God has forgiven you.

Sorrow of love—because he is good; because he is your friend, who gave his life for you; because everything good you have is his, because you have offended him so much,… because he has forgiven you. He? Forgiven you! Weep, my son, with sorrow of love.

To criticize, to destroy, is not difficult; the clumsiest laborer knows how to drive his pick into the noble and finely-hewn stone of a cathedral. To construct—that is what requires the skill of a master.

Charity consists not so much in giving as in understanding. That’s why you should seek an excuse for your neighbor—there are always excuses—if yours is the duty to judge.

Serve your God straightforwardly; be faithful to him, and don’t worry about anything else. For it’s a great truth that if you “seek first the kingdom of God and his justice, all other things”—material things, the means—“will be given you besides.” He will provide them for you.

Cast away that despair produced by the realization of your weakness. It’s true: financially you are a zero, and socially another zero, and another in virtues, and another in talent… But to the left of these zeros is Christ… And what an immeasurable figure it turns out to be!

You realize you are weak. And so, indeed, you are. In spite of all that—rather, because of it—God has sought you. He always uses inadequate instruments so that the work may be seen to be his. From you he asks only docility.

[books i've been reading]

In this "artful, informative, and delightful" (William H. McNeill, New York Review of Books) book, Jared Diamond convincingly argues that geographical and environmental factors shaped the modern world. Societies that had had a head start in food production advanced beyond the hunter-gatherer stage, and then developed religion --as well as nasty germs and potent weapons of war --and adventured on sea and land to conquer and decimate preliterate cultures. A major advance in our understanding of human societies, Guns, Germs, and Steel chronicles the way that the modern world came to be and stunningly dismantles racially based theories of human history. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the Phi Beta Kappa Award in Science, the Rhone-Poulenc Prize, and the Commonwealth club of California's Gold Medal. (Amazon.com review)

Easter 2014

It's that time of year again: Easter! (or, for this year specifically, the 239th anniversary of the British licking their wounds in Boston and colonial militias gathering around the peninsula town at the beginning of what would be a very long siege). I've never been head-over-heels for Easter (probably because of a recurrent nightmare from my childhood that involved the Easter bunny sucking the blood from my neck in a dark and misty gymnasium), but I've been so inundated with "Easter-esque" traditions over social media that I've felt prompted to suspend the usual "sunday meditations" and sketch out a few thoughts:

This time of the season is marked by two things: Easter-bashing and "new takes on the resurrection of Jesus and what it means for us today." NPR (with whom I'm in a sort of radio love affair) has been flooded with material praising skepticism, pondering the evolution of religion, and questioning every aspect of the Easter story (funny how they tend not to do this for Islamic or Jewish holy days). That kind of material sells well about this time of year, a sort of drug for those whose nerves bristle against Christianity. I find such discussions interesting and thought-provoking, but I don't fear a "shaking of my faith," nor do I find my own nerves bristling at such talk. My nerves bristle when those who are so hostile to anything related to religion have done no real, hard thinking about the matter; my nerves bristle when people soak in whatever teaching suits their fancy and then wear it like a badge of maturity; my nerves bristle at the western messiah complex elevating a brand of naturalistic, materialistic philosophy as the be-all and end-all of sane and rational thought. 

What I find most comical is how Instagram and Facebook are flooded with declarations about Easter originally being a pagan holiday celebrating Ishtar, the Assyrian and Babylonian goddess of sex and fertility. Or was it a Germanic celebration of the goddess Ostara? Or was it a celebration of the goddess of sex and fertility, in whatever outfit she wore? Probably the latter. Early Christians didn't have a set day for the celebration of Easter; the earliest church shows no signs of celebrating an "official Easter:. By the time of the First Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D. (from whom we received The Nicene Creed), Christians had started celebrating Easter. Note that it'd been two hundred years since the birth of the early church, roughly the same amount of time that's passed since the end of the War of 1812, and who nowadays even remembers that world war? Early Christian practice evolved over that time, and many Christians had somewhere and at some time started celebrating the "Christian Easter" according to the Jewish calendar. The First Council of Nicaea sought to break from the Jewish calendar because of technical difficulties, and the Council chose a certain date for Easter to be universally celebrated by Christians. By pointing out (quite correctly) that Easter (with all the trimmings of bunnies and eggs that we have now) was originally celebrated by pagans, it's assumed that Constantine was seeking to bend one knee to pagan religion and another knee to Christianity. We may question Constantine's devotion, but we have the facts, too: the Council of Nicaea chose the date to overcome hurdles with a defunct Jewish calendar and to streamline Christian celebrations of the death and resurrection of Jesus. There is nothing whatsoever in this decision that is bending the knee to paganism. One can argue that the Christians sought to "de-paganize" pagan festivities to make Christianity more suitable to those who didn't want to abandon tradition. I'm a firm believer that Christ makes all things new, and he redeems everything, pagan festivals included. Those who use this tidbit of history against Christianity make the logical fallacy of taking a correlation between Christian Easter and a pagan holiday as a causation of belief, which falls flat on its face because (a) correlation simply does not have any bearing on causation, and (b) how would a two-century-old belief be generated by an Easter holiday officialized two hundred years after its inception? Let's not forget the assumption that any of this whatsoever has any bearing on the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus. The thought seems to go, "Easter was a pagan holiday! Jesus never rose from the dead!" It just doesn't make sense. It proves nothing. All it does is shed a little historical light on something we experience today; and an avid fan of history, I love that.

You see the same thing in all those "ancient gospels" that somehow seem to pop up around Easter or Christmas. This Easter's gospel is the "Gospel of Jesus' Wife" papyrus from Egypt, purportedly written sometime between 300 and 600 A.D. This fragment has a line that reads Jesus said to them, My wife... she is able to be my disciple. The big question is, "Did Jesus have a wife?" and "Is this a forgery?" Christians, of course, are quick to call it a forgery, despite any knowledge pertaining to how one would ascertain such confidence in a document of this nature, simply because we don't like it. If it's a forgery, no surprise there: there's lots of them going around. If it's the "real deal," why do we automatically assume its statement is true? I'm the "real deal," but I'm so full of shit all the time. "Authenticity" means nothing. If it's real, all it tells us is that some ancient Egyptians wrote a document suggesting Jesus was married. It doesn't tell us why the piece was written, if the writers were even Christian, or if people really believed this. At the least, the document is 270 years removed from the events it's retelling, and 230 years removed from the writing of the canonical gospels, which were well circulating by the time this Egyptian papyrus claims to have originated. It's both sad and funny when people seek to discredit four intact gospel narratives written very near the reported events in light of a miniscule fragment of a document that could either be a forgery or close to three centuries removed from the "life and times of Christ." Again: it just doesn't make sense. More historical validity is presented to documents that fail to meet the most secular criterion for "historical authenticity" than the gospels, even though the gospels meet each and every secular criterion, and do so with colors flying and drums beating. But because Christian-bashing and religion-whacking are so in vogue, the logical validity of an argument is more of a guideline than a requirement.

That's what you have on Easter on one side of the coin. On the other you have "new revelations about Jesus' resurrection." There's always some new take on the resurrection, and that's not surprising. Preachers have a lot of weight on their shoulders to get the Sunday message right: not only is this THE Christian holiday (besides Christmas) when non-believers flock to churches, but you'd better make the resurrection palatable and enticing to woo the nonbelievers back and make sure the committed congregation is appeased, since they expect so much out of you that day. There's a fear that if we aren't original in our preaching, original in our takes on scripture, original in the way we present the gospel, we're not doing our job. Creativity rather than content becomes the goal. Our capitalistic culture thrives on originality and entrepreneurship, and those tendencies sink into the church. We're taught in bible college that originality is what makes good churches, what makes good sermons, and what makes good preachers. I'm all about looking at scripture from different angles, reinvesting doctrine with a keen eye on the text, and presenting the gospel in such a manner that people really can see what Easter is all about. I just tend to fall on the side of orthodoxy, I think. I'm "old school", and this worship of "originality" concerns me for many reasons, not least because (a) "the faith once for all entrusted to the saints" isn't to be upgraded, revised, and redone in order to palate the masses of our culture (have we forgotten that our culture, like every culture, is godless?), and (b) originality is so often driven by a desire to appease. Originality helps a product prosper, and when we subject the gospel and Christian teachings to "originality" not because the text demands it but because our culture demands it, we are turning Christianity into a product to be sold in a fashion more suitable to our target audience. So often we're bothered by the obvious friction between the demands of the gospel and the atmosphere of our culture. Such friction is to be expected in the declaration of God's words to a godless society that seeks to suppress the truth of God and make man nothing more than an animal. Such friction has been the necessary norm since 33 A.D.; we in the western world have become so inebriated by popular philosophy and the ideals of relativism and postmodernism that we let culture infect our reading of scripture rather than seeking to redeem culture through Christ. 

Around this time of year you also start hearing from the ultra-fundamentalists who declare any Christian who celebrates Easter is being seduced by Satan and is really worshipping pagan gods without knowing it. This is no less a knee-jerk reaction than those who discover Easter's pagan origins and declare that the resurrection MUST therefore be nothing less than a myth. Culture is to be redeemed by the gospel, and those who celebrate Easter as a day commemorating Jesus' resurrection and meditating on all that he accomplished are doing precisely that. Now, if only we could do away with compartmentalizing the resurrection of Jesus and start living each day as if it were Easter, since each day really is Easter. Christ is risen. A new era has dawned. The age of grace, mercy, and irresistible forgiveness has broken forth. As Christ is risen, so we can raise with him in part in the present, and we can look forward to the day when we receive resurrection bodies like his when God makes all things new. 

Tomorrow I'll be celebrating Easter with my family in New Carlisle.

Grilling out, playing volleyball in the lawn, and catching up. 

I'll probably eat a lot of cream-filled chocolates in the shapes of bunnies.

I'll probably eat some hollow ones, too!

(they're kind of a rip-off, but they're really in vogue this time of year)

#resurrectionchocolates #exorbantpriceforahollowpieceofchocolate #marketing

Happy Lexington & Concord Day!

A British dash for rebel supplies held in Concord is thwarted by express riders carrying news of the march. Thousands of militiamen and unattached volunteers stream in from the surrounding counties to converge on the British troops. A panicked skirmish at Lexington turns into a concentrated volley on Concord's North Bridge, and the sixteen-mile-long march back to Boston becomes a bloody gauntlet. By the time the British reach safety on the Charlestown peninsula at sundown, the orderly troops that had marched out of Boston the night before resemble nothing short of a panicked and bloodstained mob collapsing on the slopes of Bunker Hill.

What better way to celebrate this anniversary than with drinking a few beers from Battle Road Brewing Company? These two beers--Barrett's Farmhouse Ale and 1775--are named after events/locations of that day:

I haven't tried these out, but when I make it down to Boston (yes, Mandy, we're going to walk the Freedom Trail and drink beers in the oldest taverns), it'll be a priority.

Good Friday

"[The cross] was a Divine conflict and victory; Christ—Christus victor—fights against and triumphs over the evil powers of the world, the ‘tyrants’ under which mankind is in bondage and suffering, and in Him God reconciles the world to Himself.” (Swedish theologian Gustaf Aulén) The cross is indeed God’s wrath pouring out on Jesus so we who stake ourselves to Christ won’t have to bear it; but it is so much more than that. At the cross Jesus faced-off with evil in all its grotesque wretchedness. Evil, personified by sin and death, by the principalities and powers, sought to lead Jesus to the cross but soon discovered that Jesus had been leading evil to its own defeat. Jesus’ resurrection dismantled evil’s foothold over creation. At the least, Christ’s resurrection from the dead reveals that evil has indeed been defeated, since the ultimate consequence of evil (death) couldn't hold down the One who defeated it.

Jesus disarmed those who once ruled over us--those who had overpowered us. Like captives of war, he put them on display to the world to show his victory over them by means of the cross.

(Colossians 2.15, The Voice)

"Postmillennialism: An Eschatology of Hope"

Keith Mathison's little book serves an introduction to eschatology. In the opening chapters he defines the major millennial views before looking at a "history of eschatology" from early church history all the way to the Enlightenment (his historical presentation is quite biased towards postmillennialism, but that's to be expected). The bulk of the book examines postmillennialism's support throughout the Old and New Testaments, and he devotes the last few chapters to establish what postmillennialism is not (over against its caricatures in misrepresentations in evangelicalism) and to answer some of the biggest objections posed to those who hold postmillennial views. He includes two appendices, one examining and dismantling "Full Preterism" and the other looking at the "Man of Lawlessness" and eschatology in 1 and 2 Thessalonians. This book is a great introduction to postmillennialism, it's pretty short, and it covers most of the objections I've heard lodged against postmillennialists.

The most common objections are rooted in two different approaches to a variety of New Testament texts. Postmillennialism has a preterist interpretation of many texts that (a) agrees with the convictions of the early church, (b) makes historical, cultural, and theological sense, (c) would make sense to the original readers/hearers, and (d) fits with the wider "programme" of Christ's mission as prophesied in the Old Testament--namely, to make the nations his inheritance and spread his dominion from east to west. Premillennialism has a futurist reading of the texts texts, an interpretation that (a) is relatively recent, (b) wouldn't make a lick of sense to the original readers/hearers, (c) has been widely spread despite much incredulity from New Testament scholarship, and (c) creates conflict with the wider body of scripture.

A preterist reading of many of the "apocalyptic texts" of Jesus (such as Mark 13 and their Synoptic parallels; perhaps even Revelation as John's own version, since he lacks it in his gospel) may look something like this: Jesus preached a message of coming judgment on the Jews who rejected him and thus rejected God. This judgment would take place soon, when Jesus' contemporaries were still alive. Jesus condemned outlying Jewish towns for their unbelief in him, naming them Sidon, Tyre, and Sodom; and when he came to Jerusalem, he alluded to her as Babylon. His teachings and warnings of coming judgment echoed Old Testament stories of God judging the rebellion of His own people by means of pagan armies trampling Israel and Jerusalem to the ground. The language we find in Mark 13 and its parallels (and we see this same language throughout the gospels) would've indicated to Jesus' original Jewish hearers that he was talking about a socio-political event of cataclysmic proportions that would occur and occur SOON on God's rebellious people. He urged the people to abhor violence rather than embrace it. Those who determined to live by the sword would die by the sword. Those who refused the way of peace would be judged by God. A powerful Pharisaical sect urged revolution in the name of God, and Jesus' explicit warnings of judgment and calls to repent of violence or suffer God's wrath would've been good incentive for these Pharisees to get rid of him. The destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 vindicated Jesus' messiahship and was the means by which God judged those Jews who had rejected his Son.

A lot of evangelicals don't like this approach, and for a lot of reasons. There's the issue of interpretation: preterism, I believe, makes more sense and is valid, but that isn't to say that futurist readings of the text are invalid on their own. Because they're futuristic, such interpretations are relieved of "the burden of proof." Let's not forget that many of our cherished doctrines (such as an end-times eschatology based on Mark 13 and its parallels) are dependent upon a futurist interpretation; sometimes we grow so fond of certain doctrines that we will refuse to hear any approach other than our own. I'm guilty of this just as much as anyone. I also think that we often have difficulty imagining Jesus as being "rooted in history," so-to-speak. We like to approach his teachings and parables as "timeless treasures" that carry as much (if not the same!) meaning to us today as they did to Jesus' original followers. But if Jesus was indeed God in the midst of the "real world" of 2nd-Temple Palestinian Judaism on the verge of rebellion against Rome, why would Jesus not address it? Is God so removed that he would have absolutely nothing to say on the matter? Warnings of impending judgment in the absence of repentance are seen AGAIN and AGAIN throughout the Old Testament prophets. Isaiah and Jeremiah preached "Repent or be judged!" and it's no surprise that most Jews identified Jesus as a prophet in the same manner as Isaiah and Jeremiah. If Jesus is indeed "rooted in history," if he did indeed address not us in the 21st century but those Jewish people who were playing with the idea of rebellion if not thinking it outrightly, if he is the sort of God who gets his hands dirty and addresses the direct, cultural, and political concerns of the day, tell me: Does this make him any less divine? Does this make him any less worthy of love, of worship, of devotion? Are we to think less of him if he actually got involved in the affairs of the world around him rather than contenting himself to traveling around the countryside preaching timeless truth?

Such preterist readings of scripture often get two responses. The conservative evangelicals will tell you that you're trying to get out from under the rug of the Second Coming, or that you're changing scripture to fit some sort of agenda to make Jesus' coming "less real." The liberal skeptics will tell you that you're giving Jesus too much authority and making him too credible! Do I, with my preterist reading of certain New Testament texts, believe in the 2nd Coming of Jesus? I sure do! I just don't think it's talked about in all the places we might think. I'm not trying to get out from under the rug of anything, and I believe Jesus is authoritative and credible. Many of peoples' biggest hangups when it comes to postmillennialism would be whisked away by a simple and patient examination of some more historical approaches to the text. 

[books i've been reading]

Bruce Lancaster, who's better known for his historical fiction, put together a marvelous little piece on the history of the American War for Independence (the War of Independence is a subset or consequence of the American Revolution, at least in John Adams' eyes). While his book focuses mostly on the battles and campaigns, he devotes chapters to such keynote events as the Declaration of Independence and the drama behind winning an alliance with France. His chapter on the much-forgotten "frontier war" in modern-day Indiana and the war against the Iroquoi in upper New York brings a muddled campaign to crystal clarity, and for anyone interested in Iroquoian history, I recommend it. This book's short, which is nice, and I have to say, it's one of the better brief histories of the War of Independence I've read. His experience writing fiction and crafting stories can be seen in the way that he makes the events come alive in their fluidity. 

of libraries and justin bieber

Ben wanted to go to the library, so after fifteen minutes of convincing Jason to tag along, we set out! Jay was adamant that he didn't want a coat, so of course halfway to the library he said he was cold and needed to go back and get his jacket. I lent him my Guinness sweatshirt and we continued our journey. By the time we got to the library, chocked full of people, my nipples were hard as razor blades and all but cutting through my tight-fitting t-shirt. Ben went straight for the CDs and Jason wandered to the DVDs, where he started yelling my name at the top of his lungs. I hurried over and told him we were in a library, that he needed to talk softly, and he showed me a DVD and begged me to buy it for him. I informed him we were at a library and could borrow it, and then we went to the CD section where Ben had picked up a folk CD and was hunting for one more. I tried hooking him onto The Black Keys, but he adamantly wanted a Justin Bieber CD instead. I told him that was a poor choice, but he wouldn't listen. When we got to the checkout, he'd forgotten his wallet, didn't know his information, so we had to get a new library card issued. Then we hurried back through the cold, my pale skin spotting orange and purple. Now Jason's watching his new DVD and Justin Bieber is playing loud in the basement. This is my job.

[homo incurvatus in se]

Here's an essay I've been working on. It's NOT on anything related to colonial America. *GASP* The essay principally focuses on humankind's enslavement to sin as seen in Romans 1-3, Romans 7, and Genesis 3-11. 

The Human Predicament by Anthony Barnhart

Devou Park

This afternoon I checked out a local park here in Covington. Devou Park boasts 700 acres with winding nature trails, a golf course, several playgrounds, a lake, and a pretty decent lookout over the city. I remember coming here in early 2009, during my first days living in the Lehman House. I walked over the spot where I stood looking out over the city, thinking about Mandy and how she'd just left Cincinnati, wondering what would become of us and our friendship. Nearly five years later, I'm so thankful that she's still a part of my life, and not just "a" part but THE part. 

I walked down one of the nature trails and diverged into the woods, seeking a spot where I could sit on a fallen log and read scripture and pray. During my college days Mount Echo offered such a sanctuary, and after my Old Testament History class with Dan Dyke, I would go to a secret spot in the woods and drink Ale-8, smoke a cigar, and meditate over what we learned in class. I cherish those moments at Mount Echo, and once I found a decent log and "popped a squat" so-to-speak, the joy of those moments returned. I opened my Bible to the psalms and prayed through Psalm 42, bearing my hopes and fears and anxieties before God. 

Why am I so overwrought?

Why am I so disturbed?

Why can't I just hope in God?

Despite all my emotions, I will believe and praise the One 

who saves me and is my life.

(Psalm 42.5, The Voice)

We all have our weaknesses and struggles. I don't like to wear mine on my sleeve. I try to hide my anxieties from those around me, sharing such struggles only with those closest to me. I am not that way with God. He knows the anxieties that tear through me at times, that sap the joy out of the day, that pierce my heart and turn my blood cold as arctic snow. He knows the way my heart begins to accelerate, how the anxiety makes me feel sick and heavy. He isn't the only one who knows such things; those unseen entities that assail themselves against God, against His people, against creation, these entities know the chinks in my armor, and they aim their claw-tipped arrows where they know it'll hurt the worst. As I come before God bearing a fear-riddled heart, I find that God has come to me ever before I even thought of coming to Him. He reminds me that I am utterly and irrevocably dependent on Him, and He reminds me that not only does He love me, He actually likes me, and He delights in me and cherishes me as a father cherishes a son. He reminds me that He has a plan for me, and not just a plan for me, but a plan for me and Mandy. He hints at that plan without revealing any of the details, and He calls me not to figure everything out but simply to hope in Him, trust in Him, in His providence and power. God is my hope, my rock, my shield, and my help. Just as He meets the psalmist in his own fears and struggles, so He meets me in mine--and He carries me through them. 

Mandy knows my stress, my anxieties. I am vulnerable with her, showing her my weakness. And she comes beside me, helping me in the midst of it all. Her affection, her care, her tenderness, her understanding, her adamance that we are a team, that we will figure it out, that we need to trust God and follow His leading, all of that makes me all the more grateful to be with her. She really is a blessing, and just talking with her about these things, I can see Jesus in her. And I hope that I can be just as supportive, just as helpful, just as comforting to her when she needs it, despite me being a dumb brute of a man. In all my prayers I thank God for her, and not just for her, but for all that she is in and through Him. 

I know I'm moving to Wisconsin. I don't know how it'll all work itself out. I want to figure out every little detail. I want to save up so much money that I'll have no problems getting up there and settling down. I want to find an amazing job that's fulfilling and rewarding. I want everything to work out perfectly, and I agonize over making that happen. God tells me to trust in Him, to trust in His providence; He will provide. And He will. I don't know how He will provide, I don't know what it'll all look like. That's what bothers me. Oftentimes God provides for us in ways that we don't expect, and we shouldn't equate His providence with having an easy going of things. This move will be hard. It will probably be hard financially. It will definitely be hard emotionally. If I don't get the kind of job that I want, if I don't make the amount of money that I want to make, it'll cut at my pride. I'll be saying goodbye to many dear friendships, leaving a community that has sustained me and brought me joy over the past five years. I'll become the "new guy", and though I'm eager to become a part of Mandy's friend group and community, I know enough about how human beings work to know a "new guy" inserting himself into a new group isn't embraced by all. It'll take lots of time and hard work (especially for an introverted guy such as myself) to find and experience the kind of community I have here. I'm excited about moving up to Wisconsin to be with Mandy (more eager than I've ever been to do anything!), but that doesn't mean I'm naive. I know there will be great difficulties, and I'm thankful again that I'll have Mandy at my side through it all.

This won't be easy. It'll be hard. But it will be good. It will be amazing. The word of God cuts through the anxieties, meeting me in my moment of need. He tells me that He has a plan for me, a plan for us, and this is the beginning of that journey. He has intended our union, and He has brought us both to where we need to be for this, for us, to work; and not just "work" in the sense that we can get along and love one another, but "work" in the sense that we, as a man and woman united in Him, can serve Him and advance His kingdom in all the ways He has planned for us. This call to trust in Him when I don't know the outcome, when I know the difficulty that lies ahead, is no different than the call both of us will need to embrace as we seek out His will for us and our family in the coming years. My move to Wisconsin is another step into what He intends for us, and it isn't the final step. There will be a subsequent step, and a step after that, and then another step. Mandy and I don't need to figure everything out right now. That's an impossible task. We simply need to trust God and keep following His leading, His prompting, and go where He calls us to go, knowing that He'll provide the ways and means for each and every step. 

It's my inner instinct to kick against the very idea that God has "a plan" for me, "a plan" for us. But despite my theological doubts, that's precisely what He's telling me--and it's what He's been telling me for years. There have been moments in my life when I've so clearly heard the voice of God, when He's spoken to me and shown me things. I mention these things to others only in ambiguous terms, because all along I haven't known whether or not to trust them. I'm a cynic, after all, and so when there are episodes in my life where I hear God's voice, when He gives me a vision, and if I can't shake them despite the turning of the years, then there must be something to them. When there's a consistent thread running through each, all pointing to this, to us, and when God tells me quite plainly, "I have a plan for you, a plan for the two of you, and I'll bring it to pass," what can I do but trust Him? Sometimes you need to shelve doubts in the light of God's plain speech. Five months ago I never expected God to bring us this far, even though I prayed for Him to do so with clenched fists and passionate pleas. He has already worked wonders, and He will continue to do so. 

In early November of last year, as I was driving to a wedding and feeling pretty glum about how life was shaping up, God spoke to me: "Hope in Me. Trust in Me. Wait on Me--and watch what I will do!" Those words return to me time and time again. God continually calls me to do precisely that, and He has proven faithful and true, and in ways far beyond what I ever expected. 

Trust Yahweh from the bottom of your heart;

don't try to figure out everything on your own.

Listen for God's voice in everything you do, everywhere you go;

He's the one who will make your path straight.

(Proverbs 3.5-6)