Life and Ice

This is not theology so much as it is just appreciating something about the life God has given me. Maybe it is theology in that way. I was playing hockey on monday night as I usually do with the guys from church. It was really cool because my good friend Rob Wiebe was playing too. He hadn't played in years and was excited to come out and try his legs. Because of him our wives came to watch and I could feel the adrenalin rushing through me to impress our inflated crowd. We usually don't have a crowd. Extra special was the unique fact that my brother Murray was playing goal for us. Our regular goalie was in Mexico on a holiday (where are the priorities). I called Murray to see if he wanted to play for us, just like the Tim Horton's commercial. He hadn't played in 15 years and is presently 50 years old himself. I was worried he might die of a heart attack, but hey, why not die doing what you love?

What I really enjoyed that night will sound strange compared to all these good things I just mentioned. I loved hearing my skates scrape across the ice. When the blade would dip down and graze the surface you could hear metal grabbing frozen water. It was so cool. When I first got onto the ice I glided out and literally, yes, glided. Then taking sharp turns to warm up, I felt like I was a superstar. Now I know I am a poor excuse for a hockey player, but so what? It was like I was a different person all suited up. Wearing that armor and skating with the boys brings out the warrior in me. That Eldridge guy who wrote Wild at Heart would understand this. Men all have a warrior in us and we need to express that wild nature in some form. My expression is hockey and it makes a world of difference between playing it on PS2 and doing it for real. The blades of my skates scraping the ice was a beautiful sound...the sound of power, the sound of battle, the sound of action. I just love hockey. And I believe God created hockey for guys who need to do battle without killing each other. Well some guys. So I praise God for hockey. Nuff said.

Fredrick Douglass

The biography of Charles Spurgeon was amazing and I hope to read another one about him. This time around I turned to another 19th century figure by the name of Fredrick Douglass. Reading biographies like this helps us to see so many things about our world that we just don't get from TV or movies. Biographies teach us about the past and yet give us an insight into our world today and about ourselves. We think that we are learning new things but some of these discoveries were learned by others long ago. I encourage everyone to read biographies of great people. You will find that great people started out where we are.

Douglass was born in the early 1800s, the child of a slave mother and rumored to be fathered by his master. His coloring was said to be golden as a result. If you want to have a good look at the life of slaves in early America you can read "Uncle Tom's Cabin" or you can read this story about Douglass. It is not a pretty picture. What is most disturbing is that many so-called good Christians who were pious on Sunday were horrible masters, beating their slaves, selling them into greater hardships if they disobeyed, separating families and killing them, which was fully in their rights to do so.

One of the great ironies of the time was the hypocrisy of the church in the South. Blacks were not allowed to learn to read and therefore the Bible was kept from them. Punishment was dished out on those who taught slaves to read; it was said that teaching them to read would make them crave freedom and try to run away. Yet at the same time the Church supported missions and missionaries to go out into the foreign lands and bring the gospel to the heathens. They sent money to translate the Bible into the foreign languages of a variety of "colored" folks. But at home they preferred their slaves to live in sin and drunkeness, immorality and licentiousness. Douglass could not believe the utter irony and hypocrisy of this mentality.

Fredrick Douglass eventually escaped his masters' bondage and headed North to New York where he met people of the underground railroad. He was set up in Massachusets, taught a trade and eventually got married to his sweetheart from the slave state of Maryland. But his destiny was to become a powerful speaker on the abolitionist circuit. He told his slave story to thousands and inspired a nation to consider that God created all men equal, that anyone who followed Christ would not keep slaves but would give a man his liberty. It is fascinating stuff.

I still have some chapters to read but I am inspired by this man's tenacity and faithfulness to God.

a theology of colds

Why doesn't the Bible ever mention anybody having a cold?

And verily David didst turn his head upon his pillow and it ranneth forth upon the pillow. Nathan saith unto David, "Thy nose doth runneth over. Didst thy mother never teach thee to blow?" Then David smiteth Nathan upon the jaw with yon slippery palm for it wast wet with snot. Thereupon Nathan was not fully hit upon the jaw because David slippethest.

Okay, but no one ever had a cold in the Bible. Jesus would have lineups for divine septoplasty. I am tired of sounding 2 octaves lower than normal. I am tired of a dry throat in the morning. I am tired of slippery roads (that's another story).

Middle East and the Bible

I have a solid dislike for the Left Behind series. Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins have led a lot of people down the Pre-Millenial path and filled their heads with a lot of mumbo-jumbo about the End Times. People will more easily read a popular novel than study the Scriptures to see for themselves what God has said about the conclusion of history. So the material is taken as gospel truth even though it is based on a Hal Lindsey-ish premise. Unfortunately readers will assume what they are reading is possible.

Maybe it is. Not in the way LaHaye and Jenkins say it, but perhaps I have ignored, together with other theological thinkers, the possibility of real-time Middle East prophecy coming true. I have been reading Joel Rosenberg's "Epicenter" and I would say he fits in with the Left Behind stuff for the most part. The difference is that he bases more of what he says on careful research and an understanding of the Israeli-Palestine-Russia scenario. He is Jewish and has ties to Russia.

Based on Ezekiel 38-39, Rosenberg paints an all too real and believable picture of the political turmoil surrounding Israel. I had no idea that Russia (Soviet Union) had such an incredible distaste for Israel and has supported the Arab countries surrounding them to attack Israel. Now there is an agreement in the works between Russia and Iran to develop nuclear power for the purpose of energy consumption in Iran. The president of Iran, Ahminejad, hates Jews and has publicly sworn to destroy Israel with the bomb when he gets his hands on it. This is not over folks. If you thought Israel was done having to fight wars against overwhelming enemies you thought wrong.

Where Ezekiel comes in is the interpretation Rosenberg makes of Gog and Magog. He carefully argues that Russia is Magog and Gog is some sort of leader of Magog. Persia is easy since that is the ancient name for Iran. The other countries make sense too in the historical overlay. In short I have come to believe in the prophecy concerning Israel's role in the Final days. I was a skeptic because of Hal Lindsey; I am intrigued because of Rosenberg. We will have to watch the Middle East crisis more carefully from now on. Although I will continue to be discerning about End Times prophecy I will look with more fascination at the developing events. I guess God's not done with Israel after all. What do you think?