Twenty-Six Thousand Days

My Cup, It Overflows...

2012-02-03T16:07:00.000-08:00

By the big window that faces West, I sort through a collection of seed packets in a cardboard box. Before me, two dozen little peat pots sit basking in the puddle of sun that filters through the pane, waiting to receive their dormant charges and incubate new life. My fingers tremble as I gently pinch two delicate seeds, making a tiny well in a pot marked Amish Paste Tomatoes, and drop them in. A few moments later a gentle mist causes the soil to glisten and the curtains are opened to invite a wider swath of golden beam to coax germination.

Over the course of weeks, curls of green push through the soil and unfurl as two leaves open timidly to the world around. They soon turn to the sunlight, drinking the light mist and adding to their stature and strength.

I return to the little nursery one evening to close the curtains and turn on the lamp, before removing the miniature greenhouse roof to visit my little green darlings. With satisfaction I survey the sprinklings of life-color contrasting the deep soil and breathe in the earth smell and breathe out a contented sigh. Just as I begin to cover them again, something catches my eye. A small patch of sprouts had been sown too close together and were now in competition for space and attention. A small frown shapes my lips as I lean closer to examine the sad tangle. I know there is only one answer to the dilemma. To allow all of the seedlings to grow in the small pot would cause every single one to struggle and pale and die - leaving the pot destitute of all life, and the sowing without a harvest.

With sorrowful determination, I pinch one of the smallest seedlings and uproot it.

I continue to thin until only the strongest and best placed sprout remains to occupy the pot and grow strong from the nutrients. And I smile because I know that it is the best way.

I'm beginning to understand why the Lord uses agriculture so often in Biblical parables and analogies. My draft archive is filled with unpublished posts concerning spiritual lessons I'd learned when working in my garden.

Life is a lot like a garden. When starting seed indoors, I always drop a couple of extra seeds into each peat pot, smiling as I think of the verse that says whoever sows generously shall also reap generously. I plant so many seeds because I know that some may not take and I know that time is of the essence and it is imperative that at least one does grow.

I sow and pray that the Lord will bless the work and step back to watch the miracle.

Oftentimes, more than one of the seeds that I plant in a single pot will germinate and all will burst forth in life. I cry tears of thankfulness, yet discipline myself to reach in and remove some of the sprouts. There is no curse in so much growth -- indeed, it is a testimony to fertile conditions and God's generous blessing. However, a good gardener must thin out the weak so that that which remains may grow stronger. It's stewardship.

In my life, my cup overflows. Even since January 4th, the Lord has brought so many opportunities to serve my family, my local church and the international body of Christ that I haven't room for it all. It's good. As I said before, there is no curse in so much growth -- indeed, it is a testimony to fertile life conditions and God's generous blessing! However, as a steward of limited time and resources, I must thin out that which is weak so that that which remains may grow stronger.

In life, I am so tempted to create my own personal garden, cultivating everything that pleases and comforts myself. I want my own little life in which to escape with a pretty little picket gate to close to the rest of the imposing world. Yet I struggle with my responsibilities to tend to my family's needs, my friends' hopes, my society's expectations. Therefore I sow in abundance, hoping to plant a little life here and there so that I can expect a harvest in all directions. Then God blesses efforts and my seeds sprout and I am overwhelmed with the abundance that begins to compete for time and resources. So, I thin. By God's grace and according to the council of the wise people the Lord has placed in my life, I uproot those petty selfish seeds I'd sown. They are the weakest now, yet I know that they could eventually outgrow the rest and begin to choke out those plants bearing eternal fruit. I thin the unBiblical demands and expectations from my community and culture, knowing that time is a precious resource that mustn't be wasted on keeping up with the Joneses. The remaining continue to grow and begin to bend against the other's stalk. So I reach in again, my hand hovering between two seedlings. Daddy's list of projects or my blog? I hover and think and pray. I know the answer, deep down, yet I hesitate. Is there a way out? So I call a friend to discuss the matter. She faithfully assures me that I must do that which is in line with my Biblical calling as a helper. I inhale, set my jaw and pull the smaller seedling. Then, relief floods and I smile because I know that it is the best way.

This blog has been a great blessing. Especially in the last few months, I've seen it grow as traffic nearly doubled every month. Many kind people have expressed gratitude for its existence, and I was even informed that a lady who comes from a family that I respect very much was in approval of its message. The post-writing machine in my head has been fueled with an over-abundance of material which could keep my fingers tapping happily across the keys for a lifetime.

However, to everything there is a season.

Although I won't be closing this website for the archive's sake, my season of personal blogging is coming to an end. With the repair-project on our motorhome picking up speed, our desire to be debt-free increasing and several entrepreneurial ventures being pursued and realized, Daddy has been needing more of my undivided attention. McCauley will be graduating soon, which means a new season of more intense acquisition of homemaking skills along with her. Gracey-baby is beginning to talk and wants to learn anything we will teach her - what a wonderful opportunity to bless her life. Jasco is really reaching out in his entrepreneurial endeavors, and I so want to be more helpful to him. Marmy, according to Daddy's direction, has been ordering boxes of amazing materials from Vision Forum and Chalcedon that I just can't wait to get into. The 52 book challenge has begun and I'm a little behind already, but have learned so very much thus far and I am confident now that the books I am reading will provide an excellent education.

God is good and His blessings are abundant. According to His grace and by His strength, I want to be a living sacrifice, shaking from my life all that is temporal and selfish so only that that which is eternal and godly may remain and be given my undivided attention and resources.

Whatever the cost.

Goodbye for now - Soli Deo Gloria,

All I Have is Christ {video}

2012-01-30T08:29:00.000-08:00

The end gets me every time. Wow.

Love & Law

2012-01-12T17:55:00.000-08:00

"It pleased Darius to set over the kingdom an hundred and twenty princes, which should be over the whole kingdom; And over these three presidents; of whom Daniel was first: that the princes might give accounts unto them, and the king should have no damage.

Then this Daniel was preferred above the presidents and princes, because an excellent spirit was in him; and the king thought to set him over the whole realm.

Then the presidents and princes sought to find occasion against Daniel concerning the kingdom; but they could find none occasion nor fault; forasmuch as he was faithful, neither was there any error or fault found in him. Then said these men, We shall not find any occasion against this Daniel, except we find it against him concerning the law of his God.

Then these presidents and princes assembled together to the king, and said thus unto him,

King Darius, live for ever. All the presidents of the kingdom, the governors, and the princes, the counsellors, and the captains, have consulted together to establish a royal statute, and to make a firm decree, that whosoever shall ask a petition of any God or man for thirty days, save of thee, O king, he shall be cast into the den of lions. Now, O king, establish the decree, and sign the writing, that it be not changed, according to the law of the Medes and Persians, which altereth not.

Wherefore king Darius signed the writing and the decree.

Now when Daniel knew that the writing was signed, he went into his house; and his windows being open in his chamber toward Jerusalem, he kneeled upon his knees three times a day, and prayed, and gave thanks before his God, as he did aforetime. Then these men assembled, and found Daniel praying and making supplication before his God.

Then they came near, and spake before the king concerning the king's decree; Hast thou not signed a decree, that every man that shall ask a petition of any God or man within thirty days, save of thee, O king, shall be cast into the den of lions?

The king answered and said, The thing is true, according to the law of the Medes and Persians, which altereth not.

Then answered they and said before the king, That Daniel, which is of the children of the captivity of Judah, regardeth not thee, O king, nor the decree that thou hast signed, but maketh his petition three times a day.

Then the king, when he heard these words, was sore displeased with himself, and set his heart on Daniel to deliver him: and he laboured till the going down of the sun to deliver him."

(( Daniel 6:1-14 ))

"Darius was now bound by his own law to sentence to death his most trusted associate and chief president. His grief and agony are unmistakable, and his position a tragic one. As the voice of law, he could not deny himself without ceasing to be that bond of heaven and earth. His office and power required, whatever vice he might indulge in, this one unswerving allegiance to law.

Thus, Darius' law said death to Daniel, while his love said life, and the two could not be united.

In every non-biblical system of thought, this conflict appears in some form, the irreconcilable and unbridgeable conflict and gulf between law and love.

Let law triumph, and its harshness turns it ultimately

into a cold scheme of organized injustice.

Let love triumph over law, and again injustice holds

sway as antinomianism infects every bulwark of order.

The tension between law and love is thus a continuing tension that works to the dissolution of one civilization after another and is today basic to much contemporary tension, as humanitarian impulses seek to override the requirements of strict justice and the dictates of its law.

The tension is by no means limited to the political order but is endemic to the family, society, school, and every other order.

Only in the biblical revelation is the tension between law and love resolved, with vast social and historical implications, in the person and work of Jesus Christ.

By His perfect righteousness and His vicarious atonement, the strictest requirements of law and justice were fully met and fulfilled, and the statutes of God observed in every jot and tittle, and yet, at one and the same time, the love of God unto salvation was manifested in and through Him.

The cross thus is the symbol of the unity of law and love in Jesus Christ and of the full requirement and mutual integrity of both.

The radical injustice of every order apart from Christ is overcome by this synthesis, and the historical realization of an order founded on this unity, as yet unrealized, is opened up.

The attempts of men to create an equitable and livable order apart from the atonement have been doomed to radical collapse, as witness Julius Ceaser's attempt to supplant the failing law with his graceless clementia. Love or forgiveness which is unable to regenerate man becomes only a licence to and subsidy of evil, and law itself is equally incapable of any creative role or regenerating function."

(( Rushdoony, Thy Kingdom Come, pg. 43 ))

How do we resolve this tug-of-war between law and love?

This issue is of paramount importance to the Christian.

You must be able to understand and articulate the answer.

Step one to doing so?

Listen to the following sermon, preached by Tony Konvalin:

Soli Deo Gloria,

New Year, New Season, New Thoughts...

2012-01-04T09:16:00.000-08:00

What the Lord has done.

-contented sigh-

He truly takes care of His children.

My life has changed radically over the past few years.

Praise be to God.

2011 held a great many of those experiences.

Our cup of blessing truly overflows.

One of the greatest blessings has been our new Church fellowship.

We drive about an hour and a half every Sunday on the Houston toll roads

to meet with a small body of believers just north of the Big City.

Can I even express what a wonderful blessing it has been?

-blows breath-

Now I come to the hard part of my post.

The Lord has really been transforming my heart over the past few months.

I've been convicted about my firm grip on this pagan individualism that I have adopted from my apostate culture.

I don't truly want to identify with my family.

I don't truly want to be led by my father.

I don't truly desire to lose my life and have it replaced with that Sacred Foreign Life.

Or, at least I don't naturally.

But God's life-giving grace goes against human nature.

He's made me a new creation; I must learn to walk in the Light of His Word, forsaking the darkness of my original humanity.

What should I be doing with this slight vapor of life (a unique collection of time, resources and opportunities) which has been entrusted unto me by the Sovereign Hand of God?

How can I most effectively use it to serve King Jesus? To further His Kingdom - His reign over my life, my home, my Church, my community, my nation, my planet... my generation?!

This blog is good and lawful - but is it the best, the most expedient?

My gardening is lawful - but is it expedient?

My choice studies are lawful - but are they expedient?

My New Years Resolutions are lawful - but are they expedient?

My hobbies are lawful - but are they expedient?

My schedule is lawful - but is it expedient?

These are merely questions - not a declaration of judgement.

Yet, I know that I do need to evaluate these things thoroughly so I can declare a judgement on each of these areas.

Most of this blog is the product of deep reflection on

the widely unnoticed miracle that took place on July 9th of 2011.

The more aware I am becoming of the state of the world in which I live, the grip of necessity tightens on my conscience. We Christians have the life-giving answers this dying world so desperately needs. We are called to take dominion, to disciple the nations. Yet I choose to fritter away my time on me, sitting down in the middle of the battlefield so that I can browse my collection of tea party pictures I have saved on my iPhone app for the fifth time because, after all, "I haven't anything better to do", and, "at least I'm not watching Lady GaGa music videos like those girls."

It's as though I'm locked in a self-made chamber of mirrors and cannot see this war of worldviews raging around me.

I know the enemy likes me there - so that light cannot shine and work cannot be done to set the captives to humanism and paganism free.

And I blow a raspberry at the enemy and smugly return to my Jane Austen novels because, ha! ha!, he hasn't been able to seduce me to consume the likes of Stephanie Meyer.

And he doesn't bother with this immobilized soldier, who he's successfully intimidated into silence with elixirs with such labels as THE FEAR OF PUBLIC OPINION and THE PRIDE OF BEING MORALLY SUPERIOR.

God, forgive me.

Is this a farewell to my blog?

Possibly.

And yet, maybe not.

I will be taking a bit of time in Scripture, in prayer, and with the multitude of counselors that God has put in my life to evaluate and renovate my projects and goals in light of my duties as a Blood-bought child of God, a member of my father's family, a member of the local Church, a member of my community, a citizen of Texas, a citizen of America, a sister of Christians domestic and foreign, and a fellow-heir who is by nature and commandment to help take dominion of this world.

God help me.

Give me grace to live solely and unreservedly for You.

Whatever the cost.

Deep in thought,

The 52 Book Challenge

2011-12-08T19:26:00.001-08:00

I was visiting the blog of one of my dearest friends today, and I noticed that she was joining her sister and brother in what she called the 52 Book Challenge.

Apparently, Doug Philips challenged his Church to read 52 books in the year of 2012.

That's one book a week - for the entire year.

Sounds fun.

So, I'm joinin' up with my Bama friends on the challenge.

Now, I'm an avid reader: 52 books really doesn't sound like much. That many books pass through my hands in a month's time.

The only problem is that I'm a bit of a taste tester. I know I'll eventually finish the book - I can't help it - but it may not be that month... or even that year.

Which can have its perks. I can reference and speed read 'til the cows come home. However, I really learn the most when I discipline myself to pick up a book and read it (as I have the time) and start another only once I've finished the epilogue.

This can be quite difficult for me, because I'm a bit ADD when it comes to interests. I get excited about anything from organic gardening to theonomy to film making to knitting to eschatology to water-saving plumbing to civil war history to parenting to nutrition to web design. Which means that my study can often be jumbled and incomplete. I hope this challenge will help me to be a better steward of my time and resources so that my study can be more useful and complete for the Kingdom.

So, without further ado, here is my 2012 booklist! (Will I read them in order? Yeah, right. ;)

{Thanks so much Mrs. Amy for letting me borrow some of these! Oh, and thanks in advance to my Bama friends about the books y'all are going to let me borrow, too! I knew you'd understand... ;}

One

If you are interested in pleasing God by living a godly life and knowing what God’s will is for women and mothers, then the Power of Motherhood study manual will be the most challenging message you’ll ever read.This manual is a guide to bring you through God’s Word – to help you explore what God says in His Word about the role of women, mothers, and marriage. The contents of this manual are sound biblical doctrine and truthful teachings taken directly from God’s Word.

Two

The Little Boy Down the Road is a collection of humorous and thought-provoking short stories and essays on family and fatherhood that reveal the beauty of the Christian household. It is a book about the nobility of the commonplace events in life and the special epiphanies of parenthood—the moments of supreme clarity where parents realize, as if coming out of a slumber—the inexpressible preciousness of the Christian family and the unbounding love of Christ to shower sinful men with such earthly joys.

Doug Philips, 2008

Three

Imagine grocery shopping once a week or less, eating healthier, and having more free time — all while saving money. Sound too good to be true? “America’s cheapest family” takes one grocery trip per month — and spends only $350 for their family of seven! For the Economides family it’s a reality, and it can be yours too. What could the average family do with an extra $3,000 a year? “America’s Cheapest Family” shows you how to use strategies, tips, tools, and tricks in Cut Your Grocery Bill in Half so that you, too, can achieve huge savings year after year. It’s a fact, the Economides say: saving money on groceries is one of the quickest ways to start making a positive difference in your family’s financial future.
Steve & Annette Economides, 2010

Four

A fledgling colony on the shores of the James River struggles desperately to survive and earn the good will of the King of England as Spanish dons, ruthless pirates, and lurking Indians plot to destroy Jamestown and its handful of colonists. Within this world, a simple, godly soldier braves all odds to defend his honor and his duty to uphold God’s sacred laws, all the while fighting to win the love of his new wife.To Have and to Hold brings to life the exciting beginnings of America, weaving a story of adventure, intrigue and romance with providence and perseverance in colonial Jamestown. This exciting story makes a wonderful family read-aloud, as well as a “can’t put down” book for the individual reader, capturing the imaginations of young and old, men and women alike.
Mary Johnston, 1907

Five

"This is a readable and happy account of Calvinism in history."

- R.J. Rushdoony

"It is with great pleasure that I recommend Calivinism in History. It is a fine introduction to Calvinism as a worldview which effects all facets of society. It will assist the reader in seeing how theological ideas have had practical consequences in history. It reminds us of the all-encompassing nature of truth, the majesty of God, the sinfulness of man, and the glory of the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ."

- Richard Barcellos, Pastor of Palmdale Reformed Baptist Church, CA

Nathaniel S. McFetridge, 1882

Six

Sir Knight of the Splendid Way is a captivating allegory—a rich literary masterpiece that will encourage any weary traveler. This beautifully-bound work depicts life as a journey, reaching toward a beacon of hope in the City of the Great King. Beckoned by the King to travel the Splendid Way, the young knight must keep his armor on at all costs. All along the way he is tempted to take off his armor. Many try to convince him that the battle is not worth the fight. But only those who keep their armor on can see the real battle that rages, and only those with pure hearts will see the King.

I remember Marmy reading this to me as a girl. It was captivating and life changing, then. I can't wait to read it again now with more light than I had as a sleepy-eyed child.

W.E. Cule, 1899

Seven

The Christian and Civil Government, by [my!] Pastor John Weaver, is a theological treatise on Romans 13. It explains the Christian's responsibility and relationship to civil government. It sets forth civil government as it has been ordained by God. Likewise it exposes corrupt, unbiblical and ungodly civil government. The book emphasizes obedience to God in the realm of civil government.

Pastor John Weaver, 1991

Eight

Little Faith is the story of a young orphan girl taken in by a Christian family. When Faith's adoptive mother dies, a grandmother moves in to help the poor, grief-stricken father care for the children. However, the grandmother is cruel and repeatedly tries to send Faith away, claiming that she does not deserve the little bit of food that the father is able to provide for the family. Despite her father's love, Faith is distraught by the grandmother's constant abuse and leaves the home in an attempt to find work to help support herself and her family. However, no one seems interested in hiring such a young girl with now experience. Finally, in a church, Faith discovers the help she needs. But, upon returning to the toy stall where her father works, she finds that he has disappeared. Will she ever see her father and family again? Join little Faith on her adventure of love, trust, courage, and faith.
Mrs. O. F. Walton, (1849 - 1939)

Nine

Since its first publication in 1995, Shepherding A Child's Heart has become one of the best-selling books on child training in the home school community. The message of this book is that the key to successful parenting is knowing how to reach the heart of your child. Brimming with biblical wisdom, Tripp clearly communicates the mission of the family shepherd.
In this revised edition of Shepherding a Child’s Heart, Dr. Tedd Tripp not only draws on his thirty years experience as a pastor, counselor school administrator, and father, but he also shares insights gained in ten years of teaching this material in conferences worldwide, providing more valuable help for parents.Dr. Tedd Tripp, 2005

Ten

Discover the story of early nineteenth-century Algiers, an internationally accepted nest of pirates and raiders who were the scourge of the Mediterranean Sea. When Francisco Ramini and his two sons, Lucien and Mariano, are captured by pirates and taken as slaves to Algiers, they struggle to survive the harsh conditions and escape from their cruel masters. Will they escape, or does God have other plans? Enter a story of blood, cruelty, and redemption with a cast of honorable heroes, dastardly villains, and hilarious sidekicks in The Pirate City.

R.M. Ballantyne, 1874

Eleven

The Church is being destroyed by sacred cows. A “sacred cow” is an untouchable subject that we are not supposed to discuss. To do so impinges upon another’s “Christian liberty.” Certainly, there are few sacred cows quite as sacred as the right of modern Christians to dress however they please. But in this groundbreaking work, Christian Modesty and the Public Undressing of America, Jeff Pollard challenges us to embrace God’s standard and to understand the historical roots of the rise of nudity and immodesty in modern culture. His perspective is thoughtful and balanced. Most importantly, he accomplishes what few authors on this subject have achieved: a treatise that avoids both license and legalism. A courageous booklet.

Jeff Pollard, 2003

Twelve

Beloved Bride - He called her “my beloved esposa” because Anna was his dearest love on this earth. Ironically, while the great military exploits of General Stonewall Jackson are studied in military schools the world over and his iron will and stern self-discipline have become legendary, little is said about his remarkable marriage. The real Thomas J. Jackson was a humble Christian and loving husband and father. The tender and instructive letters he wrote to his wife Anna are a model of godly leadership and covenantal faithfulness. From their courtship to their final days together, trace the true story of this remarkable couple through the letters of General Jackson to his bride. Even in the midst of the most arduous military campaigns, Stonewall took the time to send home extensive letters of love and devotion.
Bill Potter, 2002 / Stonewall Jackson, 1857 - 1863

Thirteen

Formerly published under the title Home-Making, The Family is an uncompromising vision statement for the domestic bliss and cultural dominion of the Christian family. The message of The Family is powerful: “Sisters, Brothers, Husbands, Wives—home life is meant to be beautiful, ennobling, and victorious!” God intends for each person—from parent to child—to play a role in family life, the ultimate goal of which is the transformation of the individual, the home, and the society for the glory of God.
Miller writes truth that we need to hear, but are usually afraid to say. He carefully addresses each member of the family, managing to find the perfect balance between inspiration and exhortation.
J.R. Miller, 1882

Fourteen

Does the Bible address the question of child prevention? Is cutting off the godly seed ever an act of “good stewardship?” Are economic considerations a valid biblical ground for closing the womb? What about “natural” family planning? What about families that cannot have children? Is the widespread use by Christians of the “pill,” a child prevention device with abortifacient potential, bringing judgment on the Church? Be Fruitful and Multiply answers these questions and makes the case that Christians should do more than just “trust God” for children, we should cry out to the Lord to bless the fruit of the womb.

Fifteen & Sixteen

A Word in Season 1 & 2 - These daily messages on the faith for all of life are unlike any compilation of Christian “devotional” ever published. In these pages, you won’t find the overly introspective musings of a Christian pietist; what you'll discover are the hard-hitting convictions of a man whose sole commitment was faithfulness to God’s law-word and representing that binding Word to his readers.
Although Dr. Rushdoony is most known for his scholarly works on theology, history, philosophy, economics, education, and statecraft, A Word in Season reveals the intense, but simple, approach to applying one's faith to every area of life and thought. This is all done in a format of bite-sized readings on the uncompromising faith.
R.J. Rushdoony, (1966 - 1991)

Seventeen

In Large Family Logistics, Kim outlines practical solutions she has learned to effectively manage a busy household. This how-to manual is filled with step-by-step procedures, easy-to- understand organizational advice, and a myriad of tips and hints for managing a bustling home with greater efficiency in a way that honors God and builds up family relationships.Like many wives and mothers, author Kim Brenneman didn’t start out with all of the answers. She struggled to figure out: What do I do next? What’s the best way to actually do the many things that need to be done? And how do I get everything accomplished in a 24-hour day and keep my sanity?
Kim Brenneman, 2010

Eighteen, Nineteen & Twenty

The Institutes of Biblical Law Volume I Biblical Law is a plan for dominion under God, whereas its rejection is to claim dominion on man's terms. The general principles (commandments) of the law are discussed as well as their specific applications (case law) in Scripture. Many consider this to be the author's most important work.
Volume II, Law and Society The relationship of Biblical Law to communion and community, the sociology of the Sabbath, the family and inheritance, and much more are covered in the second volume. Contains an appendix by Herbert Titus.
Volume III, The Intent of the Law God's law is much more than a legal code; it is a covenantal law. It establishes a personal relationship between God and man. The first section summarizes the case laws. The author tenderly illustrates how the law is for our good, and makes clear the difference between the sacrificial laws and those that apply today. The second section vividly shows the practical implications of the law. The examples catch the reader's attention; the author clearly has had much experience discussing God's law. The third section shows that would-be challengers to God's law claim to express God's covenant grace in helping us.

Twenty-One

In this age of rocketing healthcare costs and the federal government’s intrusion into personal health decisions, caring for our bodies is at the forefront of our minds as never before. In her new book, Health for Godly Generations: A Reformational Perspective, author Renée DeGroot examines preventative healthcare from a Christian perspective, identifying the biblical foundations for eating well to the glory of God, and the real physical rewards that come from sound food choices. Discover practical, everyday suggestions for attaining and preserving good health, as well as lasting biblical principles that apply to our modern consumer habits.

Twenty-Two

Helping Them to Choose - The process of getting and staying married is severely malfunctioning in our land. With the divorce in the church statistically indistinguishable from the unbelieving world, it would not be considered hyperbole to say that today’s marriages in the church are a moral disaster. As we have slowly adopted the ways of the world in nearly every area of life in order to maintain our respectability, at the same time, we have lost our ability to properly join our children in marriage. Our children have been left with unworkable methods in a broken, godless system. However, in 1859 a pastor wrote a book on home life that included instructions to Christian parents on how to help their children marry. The Reverend Samuel Philips brings his counsel to us from 1859 as a timely reminder of the wisdom of God for all family life. This book contains that sage godly counsel from another century.

Twenty-Three

In past generations, the role of wife and mother was viewed as a sacred calling. The committed homemaker was seen as strong, capable, intelligent, and irreplaceable. She was regarded not only as a crucial part of the home, but as a foundational bulwark of society. She was considered worthy of great honor, appreciation, and respect. Though in recent years feminists have sought to demean this glorious calling, the Bible’s hopeful vision of noble womanhood is one worth reclaiming. Queen of the Home seeks to cast that vision afresh through godly encouragements from writers past and present. This inspiring collection of essays, poetry, and poignant vignettes paints a beautiful picture of what it means for a wife to be a crown to her husband, the monarch of the cradle, and queen of the home, and calls upon daughters to embrace their rewarding role and sacred calling as regal women of God.

Twenty-Four through Twenty-Seven

Godly Woman's Adornment Collection - This accessible and hard hitting series addresses four Biblical fruits which are not some fleeting ideal, but a reality that God enables women to live out daily. Perfect to meditate upon throughout the day, each short devotional looks to Scripture for words of encouragement, correction, wisdom, and guidance to help direct women toward a true, enduring satisfaction in Christ.

Twenty-Eight

Very few books on relationships have stood the test of time like Passion and Purity. Using her own life as an example, beloved author and speaker Elisabeth Elliot guides singles of both genders and any age on how to put their love lives under the authority of Jesus Christ.

Twenty-Nine through Thirty-Two

Don't roll your eyes at me! It's important to read to your baby sister! ^.^ (That's my excuse, and I'm stickin' to it.)

The Beautiful Girlhood Series - In times like these, there is a desperate need to communicate to our daughters the ancient and biblical truths of femininity, courage, and virtue. Until recently, it was difficult to find books that would inspire our daughters to embrace such values. That is why homeschool graduate Tracy Leininger applied her talents to her love of history and produced these delightful volumes for girls.

These four hardback books, with full-color illustrations, tell the true providential history of God’s faithfulness and working through the lives of these young ladies. Each heroine’s story points to the love of God, and the way He can use ordinary people to accomplish great things when they are faithfully walking in their calling as wife, mother, or daughter. Enjoy hearing of First Lady Dolley Madison’s open hospitality, and kindness; explore how a persevering woman of character, Sacagawea, served with her husband in the wilderness; journey with Priscilla Mullins on board the Mayflower as a young lady, serving and caring for others; and hear how Nan Harper on the fateful voyage of the R.M.S. Titanic with her father, heralded his Gospel testimony.

Thirty-Three

Produce all the food you need on just a quarter acre!

Enjoy fresher, organic, better-tasting food all the time. The solution is as close as your own backyard. Grow the vegetables and fruits your family loves; keep bees; raise chickens, goats, or even a cow. The Backyard Homestead shows you how it’s done. And when the harvest is in, you’ll learn how to cook, preserve, cure, brew, or pickle the fruits of your labor.

Thirty-Four

Saving the landscape, rebuilding entrepreneurial rural families, and protecting nutritious food are the themes of this timeless treatise-hence the word "testament." Delving into the soul of the Salatin family's nationally acclaimed Polyface Farm, author Joel Salatin offers Family Friendly Farming as the key to dealing with resource issues, food policy, and social fabric.
With humor and personal stories, he opens his family and farm convictions for all to see, share, and enjoy. Written from his unabashed "Christian libertarian environmentalist capitalist" perspective, his ideas are guaranteed to encourage and challenge virtually every "ism" in the culture. It will captivate anyone passionate about healing the land, healing families, and healing the food supply.
For several decades young people have been leaving the family farm. The ones left behind are now responsible for society's greatest resources: clean land and clean food. Anyone dedicated to preserving these resources will find in these pages a nongovernmental, self-empowerment approach to environmentalism and food safety.
The heart of this book is aimed toward parents tired of their Dilbert cubicle at the end of the expressway who want to reconnect with their children through a pastoral lifestyle. It's written for anyone who yearns to grow old working with and being adored by value-sharing grandchildren and honored by passionate, productive adult children. Family Friendly Farming can make any family business more viable and any family more functional.
The ten-chapter section on how to get the kids to love the farm is an invaluable addition to any collection of child-rearing manuals. Salatin moves from the family team-building section into a practical discussion on how to increase income per acre and create new, white-collar salaries without buying more land, equipment, or buildings. He deals with the unique and thorny issues surrounding any family business by using his own multi-generational family farm experience as his base for insight and wisdom.

Thirty-Five

Seed to Seed is a complete seed-saving guide that describes specific techniques for saving the seeds of 160 different vegetables. This book contains detailed information about each vegetable, including its botanical classification, flower structure and means of pollination, required population size, isolation distance, techniques for caging or hand-pollination, and also the proper methods for harvesting, drying, cleaning, and storing the seeds.
Seed to Seed is widely acknowledged as the best guide available for home gardeners to learn effective ways to produce and store seeds on a small scale. The author has grown seed crops of every vegetable featured in the book, and has thoroughly researched and tested all of the techniques she recommends for the home garden.

Thirty-Six

Sharing from her own struggles and triumphs, homeschooler Sarah Bryant encourages young ladies to become vital cornerstones in their father’s home, while preparing for godly womanhood.Addressing topics ranging from honoring parents, to serving others, to investing in our walk with Christ, to being a light to the world: each chapter includes encouragement and real-life examples of how girls can apply Biblical principles in their daily life. Sarah shares the things she wishes older girls had told her when she was younger, what she would have done differently, and the lessons she has learned. Personal testimonies by many other Christian young ladies are sprinkled throughout the book as well. Are you a daughter who desires to embrace your family life, but just don't know where to begin? In The Family Daughter, you will find refreshing inspiration on how to do just that, written by another daughter at home.

Thirty-Seven

The Heavens Declare - While vacationing in the mountains of Northern Arizona, a homeschooling family explores facts about the planets, and learns of God's goodness and to trust Him with their hopes, plans, and days.

To review for Gracey-baby. =)

Thirty-Eight

Light of the World - Why do tomatoes look red? Why must Danielle call for an ambulance? What does "refraction" mean? Why is elderly Mr. Simmons so gruff, and what does the Edwards family know that will finally bring joy to his life? Find out in this warm, uplifting living science book. Join the Edwards family as they investigate the amazing properties of light and spread the light of the gospel in their neighborhood. Don't miss this story full of fun, science, and mystery!

To review for Gracey-baby. =) =) =)

Thirty-Eight

Without a vision for femininity and virtue, Christian womanhood will not survive the twenty-first century. The time has come to sing the praises of motherhood, to extol the blessings of beautiful girlhood, and to cast a vision for hearth and home. Poetry and prose are crucial components in this mission of vision communication.From the beginning, poetry and the beauty of language have always been a part of God’s revealed program for instilling perspective and purpose in the minds and hearts of women. In fact, the first words of love communicated of woman by man were poetic words of appreciation and understanding. Drawing upon the beauty of parallelism in expression, Adam declared of Eve: “This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh.”

And so it goes throughout all the Scriptures. From the Psalms of David, to the poetry of Isaiah, to the verses of Deborah, to the songs of Solomon, and even the divinely inspired prose of John foretelling the return of the bridegroom, our Lord uses the beauty of language to motivate and to inspire. These are God’s verses of virtue, and they served as the inspiration for untold hundreds of books and poems dedicated to a Christian vision for motherhood and home which once defined the landscape of American family life.
Beall Phillips seeks to revive this vision. In Verses of Virtue she draws from some of the most heart-warming and inspirational verses from Scripture, America’s illustrious past, and even antiquity to provide women with a volume brimming with encouragement. Compiled and Edited by Elizabeth Beall Phillips.

Thirty-Nine

When asking believers, “What part of the Christian walk do you struggle with the most?” the answer is usually “prayer.” As Elisabeth Elliot once said, “Prayer is irksome. We are reluctant to start and delighted to end.”

With the Master On Our Knees is an exciting in-depth study which promises to equip Christian ladies for a deeper and more meaningful life of prayer. It will challenge you to pursue more meaningful prayer with the Master, and show by example how the Old and New Testament saints prayed. This expository Bible study includes homework questions at the end of each chapter for further learning. It is for individuals who desire a more intimate prayer life. It is the author’s hope that when you have finished this book, you will be delighted to start and reluctant to end your praying.

Forty

The Basket of Flowers - This first book of the Lamplighter Rare Collector Series continues to be a best-seller. James, the king's gardener, teaches his 15-year-old daughter Mary all the principles of godliness through his flowers. She is falsely accused of stealing, and the penalty is death. Mary remembers her father had taught her: that it is better to die for the truth than to live for a lie, and that the worst pillow to sleep on is the pillow of a guilty conscience! This story will change your life forever!

Forty-One

The Sovereignty of God - Pink answers a host of questions that have remained unresolved in the minds of many Christians. In language that any layperson can understand, he takes up the profoundest questions, searches the Scriptures, and provides Biblical answers that satisfy the inquiring mind.

Forty-Two

Men, though, see law as a limitation on their liberty, and Christianity is held to be the most restrictive with its emphasis upon Biblical law as the foundation for morality and liberty. Humanistic man wants total liberty, but he does not realize that total liberty leads only to total anarchy, and that leads to the death of law and liberty. Unless every man's liberty is limited by law, no liberty is possible for any one.

In Law and Liberty, R. J. Rushdoony expounds on the central themes of the application of Biblical law to every area of life. This book is a great starting point to understanding Rushdoony's larger expositions on Biblical law.

Forty-Three

An entire generation of victory-minded Christians, spurred by the victorious postmillennial vision of Chalcedon, has emerged to press what the Puritan Fathers called "the Crown Rights of Christ the King" in all areas of modern life. Central to that optimistic generation is Rousas John Rushdoony's jewel of a study, God's Plan for Victory (originally published in 1977). The founder of the Christian Reconstruction movement set forth in potent, cogent terms the older Puritan vision of the irrepressible advancement of Christ's kingdom by his faithful saints employing the entire law-word of God as the program for earthly victory.

Forty-Four

Is the World Running Down? - What would you say if someone were to tell you that fundamentalist author Dave Hunt has adopted the humanists' view of the world's future? What would you say if someone told you that the most conservative Christians of all, scientists who are members of the Creation Science movement, have adopted as their number-one defense of creationism a humanist doctrine that mankind has no legitimate hope in the world's future? What would you say if he told you that because of this compromise, America's best-selling New Age writer has shown that if you accept modern fundamentalism, you also have to accept the conclusion that capitalism is doomed?

Forty-Five

When The Genesis Flood first appeared reviewers predicted it would be quoted, referred to, and widely discussed in the years ahead. Carefully written and well-documented, the book has since become a classic apologetic for Biblical creationism and the universality of the Flood described in the Book of Genesis.

The authors, each a recognized scholar in his field, frankly and unabashedly affirm their belief in the verbal inspiration of Scripture and its inerrancy and infallibility. They delineate the inadequacies of uniformitarianism and evolution and proceed to present a Biblically based system of creationism and catastrophism. They stress the philosophic and scientific necessity of a “creation apparent age,” as well as the importance of geologic and hydrologic catastrophes, especially that of the great Deluge during the days of Noah. Replete with scientific data from the disciplines of hydrology, geology, and archaeology, The Genesis Flood asks the reader to consider the reorientation of pertinent scientific data within the framework for Biblical creationism and catastrophism. Many illustrations, charts, and diagrams, along with extensive indices, aid the reader in the quest for harmonization of the Biblical record and scientific data. Opposing viewpoints are given careful and courteous treatment.

Forty-Six

God's Kingdom covers all things in its scope, and its immediate ministry includes, according to Scripture, the ministry of grace (the church), instruction (the Christian and homeschool), help to the needy (the diaconate), and many other things. God's appointed means for financing His Kingdom activities is centrally the tithe. This work affirms that the Biblical requirement of tithing is a continuing aspect of God's law-word and cannot be neglected. Tithing and Dominion is "must reading" as Christians work to take dominion in the Lord's name.

Forty-Seven

Ten P's in a Pod - Future historians may look back on the Arnold Pent family and describe them as the “first modern home school family.” Long before there were any state home schooling organizations or curriculum fairs, Arnold Pent declared his independence from government education and his dependence on Jesus Christ in the training of his children.

Forty-Eight

The Messianic Character of American Education - Rushdoony's study asks an important question of American history: Exactly what has public education been trying to accomplish? Before the 1830s and Horace Mann, no schools in the U.S. were state supported or state controlled. They were local, parent-teacher enterprises, supported without taxes, and taking care of all children. They were remarkably high in standard and were Christian.

However, from Mann to the present, the state has used education to socialize the child. The school's basic purpose, according to its own philosophers, is not education in the traditional sense of the 3 R's. Instead, it is to promote "democracy" and "equality," not in their legal or civic sense, but in terms of the engineering of a socialized citizenry. Public education became the means of creating a social order of the educators' design. Such men saw themselves and the school in messianic terms.

This book explores the philosophical premises of government education as completely anti-Christian and anti-Biblical as to be a very real threat to the survival of Christianity in America. As the title signifies, educators, imbued with behavioral psychology and evolution, not only reject Christ as Messiah, but pretend to be themselves messiahs offering their own seductive and poisonous brand of salvation through the institution of secular humanist education. It is hoped that this book will permit more Americans to understand why public education has failed and why it must be replaced by Christian schools and home schools that will restore literacy, morality, and reverence for the Creator of all men.

Forty-Nine

Bob Schultz’s previous book, Boyhood and Beyond, addresses essential issues related to godly character as boys transition into manhood. In Created for Work he applies his engaging homespun wisdom with stories from real life to teach young men (and boys) what it means to be good workers.

Modern culture seems to be addicted to ease and entertainment. It has produced a generation of dishonest, unproductive, and weak-willed men. In Created for Work, Bob Schultz inspires boys to act differently — to get their hands dirty, follow directions, think creatively, and respect authority. It inspires young men and offers the tools and encouragement they need to embrace God’s ways and always give an honest day’s work.

Fifty

How God Wants Us to Worship Him - When it comes to worship, the sad truth is that most Christians have traded their New Testament heritage for the hip and trendy, dispensing with the simplicity and beauty of New Testament worship. In this well-reasoned and exegetically sound treatise, Dr. Morecraft offers a principled defense for the Bible as the only guide for worship in the meeting of the church. In a day when the Sunday worship of evangelical churches is too often dominated by performers and youth culture, it is increasingly rare to find churches that take seriously the doctrine of sola scriptura and regulative worship. By Dr. Joe Morecraft III.

Fifty-One

The Hospitality Commands - As a young Christian in my teens, I spent hundreds of hours in the home of a beloved pastor observing his devotion to his wife and seven children. Family hospitality has changed my life. In this fine booklet, Strauch demonstrates that hospitality is a non-optional biblical command designed to build strong Christian communities and win souls. By Alexander Strauch.

Fifty-Two

Young Lady's Guide to the Harmonious Development of Christian Character - Originally penned in 1839 for the author's sister, this old-tradition compendium is filled with godly wisdom for modern young women. Believing that "true religion is progressive," Newcomb advises readers on Christian growth in matters of doctrine, charity, Bible study, prayer, temptation, worship, health, mental cultivation, dress, marriage, submission, and self-examination.

There we have it. Phew, that's a good stack right there. 52 sounds smaller than it is. Lord willin', I'll have the books listed above read by this time 2012. Want to join the challenge? Link-up your booklist!

Soli Deo Gloria,

Linking up @ Raising Homemakers

You know what I love...?

2011-12-05T12:09:00.001-08:00

...I love my brother...

929 :: Jasco's love of all things boy - like weapons and fishing and ninjas.

930 :: Jasco's need of a new pair of glasses with the coming of every new year because of his rough-and-tumbleness.

931 :: Jasco's protectiveness. He prefers to walk closer to the street than I and won't stand for me going to the store in the evening alone.

932 :: My brother's willingness to wrap his arm around my shoulder when we're out in public.

933 :: Jasco's fun loving spirit.

934 :: My brother's preference of soft, melodic music - such as celtic.

935 :: Jasco's skillful ingenuity.

936 :: Jasco's genuine generosity. He's such a giving person.

937 :: When my "little" brother's voice cracks, promising manhood.

938 :: All this new talk about shaving.

939 :: His willingness to turn me in a Virginia Reel when I ask him.

940 :: Jasco's desire to get my opinion on his endeavors - "Hey, come look at this, Shel!"

941 :: God sending Jasco, the only son in our family, older brothers and best friends. {Thanks for everything Ben, James and Philip!}

942 :: Jasco's readiness to reconcile any argument.

943 :: The beautiful music that my guitarist brother makes with ten fingers and six strings.

944 :: Gracey's eyes when she sees her "Biggo" come into the room with an offer to play.

945 :: My buddy's cheesecake dance and frequent assurance that he does, indeed, love me more than Dr. Pepper {a high compliment, let me assure you!}

946 :: Having Jasco patiently teach me how to shoot a new rifle. He doesn't laugh when I don't understand a lick of his gun lingo. Thanks, bud.

947 :: Jasco's random spattering of telling interesting facts about chemistry and wildlife throughout the day.

948 :: Sharing Chinese food {chopsticks, orange chicken and general tso with piles of rice!} with my brother at the food court before our occasional movie dates.

949 :: My brother's habit of either telling me 'your beautiful!', or planting a kiss on my forehead, every time he walks through the room.

950 :: God's marvelous grace in protecting Jasco through his chest operations with no complications and much less painful recovery period the second time around! Thank you, Lord, for your tender mercies.

I love you my most wonderful brother...

You're such a blessing from God!

Giving thanks,

Linking up @ A Holy Experience

There is No Secular Defense for Freedom

2011-12-04T14:13:00.001-08:00

Living in America, I've heard a lot of arguments in favor of good old fashioned free-market capitalism.

Namely: Capitalism equals freedom, period.

I've always accepted this to be a self-evident truth to the human race.

Well, until I started reading and hearing all kinds of other arguments. Does this free-market system have a leash? What if it destroys this planet's most precious resources? What if it decides to harvest defenseless human life for monetary gain? What if it annihilates the lowest classes?

All of these "what ifs" introduce into the equation an important factor: morality.

Is there a leash, a set of guidelines, a Law?

Who or what creates this universal Law? Is it a collective effort, based on a common goal? Who organizes this effort? And how can we possibly know that the mob's desires are actually good and not based on selfish greed? Is selfish greed truly bad? In fact, who's to say that the rich shouldn't take over the world? Clearly they are the fittest - they control the most resources and can effectively employ them to gain control of more resources. Aren't these the kind of skills that help a society to be progressive? For that matter - what is progress, exactly? Is it greater financial wealth? Is it greater knowledge? Is it greater unity? Is it greater morality? Is it a drop in crime rates? What if you could completely eradicate crime from a society? Is this a good goal? Doesn't crime provide jobs, though? If a society was completely without crime, departments at every level would shut down - millions would be unemployed. Which is more beneficial for a society: millions of jobs or the absence of crime? Isn't this the philosophy of war? Wartime does wonders for a society's economy. Does this mean that warmongering is actually a good, beneficial practice?

It can be a little intimidating to answer all of these questions from reason. Of course, as a Christian, Scripture bells are going off all over the place.

"Of course selfish greed is bad!" I retort. "Scripture says..."

"Scripture?! No. You cannot force your morality on me." They cry.

I stop and remember that my opponent is an agnostic Taoist, dabbling into Hinduism, whose ethical rule is pragmatism and who sees the ultimate "good" to be world peace. Or she's an individualist who doesn't care about historical influence or politics or poverty in Ethiopia so long as these things do not impede her from achieving her own personal goals. Or she's a homosexual atheist who "just wants to be happy" and will stop at nothing to have every American citizen and their cat to view her lifestyle as equal to theirs. Or she's a _fill in the blank_.

With millions of different worldviews out there, how can I possibly apply "my personal relationship with Jesus Christ" and the moral code that comes with it to the universal systems of man?

Well - when you come at it from that humanistic perspective, you can't.

This is what has crippled the Church. This is why social activists who have the audacity to judge matters according to their faith are promptly labeled Bible-banging homophobic bigots.

And, this is why "good old-fashioned" capitalism in America is struggling to survive.

Donning my Captain Obvious supersuit, I'm here to announce that there is a war of worldviews going on here.

Christian - what do you believe? Upon which system do you stand? When you get caught in the crossfire, what do you have in your arsenal? Your heritage? Patriotic cliches? Pragmatic arguments? If so, you've lost already.

However, I understand the frustration. If we appeal to Scripture, we are immediately labeled as intolerant. Too many times, I've played by the opponent's rules, saying, "Well, even if the Bible isn't true, ____________ is still bad, and I can prove it."

Increasingly, the Bible is being dismissed from the discussion.

Humanism is becoming known as the religion of reason.

The argument is this: if you want to stay a backwards slave to outdated and erroneous tradition, fine, stay a Bible believing Christian. However, if you desire to be a rational, caring, open-minded human being - humanism is for you.

So, let us assume, for a moment, that this basic American equation is true:

Freedom = Good

The problem is this - there is no secular defense for freedom!

Gary North explains this very well in The Dominion Covenant: Genesis.

"As I have begun to demonstrate in this book... the Bible establishes as a social norm a system of civil government and personal responsibility which leads to the formation of a free market economy. ... Predictably, those who argue that the Bible does not establish foundations that lead toward capitalism tend also to reject the logic of free market economics. They wind up citing secular economists who favor Keyensian intervention by the civil government into economic affairs, or they cite even more radical secular economists. But both sides rely heavily on the conclusions of the warring camps of humanistic economists.

"If I have rejected environmental determinism, evolutionism, and humanism in general, how can I legitimately use the arguments of environmental determinists, evolutionists, and humanists to support my case for a free market social order? Can I evade the accusation of the 'Christian socialists' and 'liberation theologians' that what I propose is simply a disguised version of secular capitalism, a baptized version of anarchism? The only way I can legitimately evade this criticism is to show that I do not accept Darwinian evolution as the scientific foundation of Christian economics, and then demonstrate to the extent that the defenders of the free market accept such a foundation, they wind up without a logical position to defend. ... [T]he demise of nineteenth-century Classical liberal economics was assured from the start, precisely because Darwinism really does not believe in the 'survival of the fittest' and 'evolution through natural selection,' once man, the rational planner, appears in history. In other words, to paraphrase Cornelius Van Til, the humanistic economists have borrowed their accurate conclusions from Christianity. They cannot tell us why human minds agree, or why such minds can interpret the universe, or why the universe is coherent (since it has origins in randomness or chaos), or why there is human freedom in a deterministic universe, or why the noumenal realm of ethics (outside of determined realm of scientific law) can determine affairs in the external, cause-determined world of matter. Yet they say they can make all kinds of statements about economic events. How can they do this? They do not say.

"The Christian economist can say. He points to a sovereign God who is the Creator. He points to a record of the creation in Genesis, chapter 1. He points to man, who is made in the image of God. He points to God's assignment to man in Genesis 1:28 to subdue the earth. He points to man's ability to name the animals. All of these facts of the Genesis account provide the foundation of Christian thought in general and Christian economics in particular. The orderly creation reflects and orderly, sovereign God. Man has been made in God's image, so he can understand the external world, for which he is responsible before God as a steward. Nature and man are not chance-determined, for how can anything be determined in a chance universe? Nor are nature and man determined by a law-chained system of impersonal, freedom-denying cause and effect. God is sovereign, man is responsible, and nature is orderly. The Christian announces this in confidence. The humanistic economists deny the first assertion, so they have found no logical, universally acceptable arguments to affirm the second and third. They are intellectually defenseless.

"F.A. Hayek won the Nobel Prize in economics in 1974... Hayek's award was made specifically for his early work in economics... much of Hayek's early writings on trade cycles and capital theory was dependent upon the pioneering work of Ludwig von Mises. [Remember him? The graphic at the beginning of this post quotes Mises.] ...Mises had established himself as one of the world's most eloquent defenders of free market economics - a post-Kantian rationalist who was unwilling to adopt the modern Darwinian view of Man, the sovereign central planner. [1]"

"...Hayek's defense of the free market social order rests on his concept of human knowledge. He argues for the division of labor in knowledge. Men are not omniscient. Each individual knows his own talents and weaknesses, challenges and successes, better than anyone else. ... Men need to learn from their mistakes. They also need to imitate successful strategies. Only by decentralizing the decision-making process, Hayek argues, can mankind call forth its greatest reserves in order to achieve . . . . what? Each individual's highest personal goals. Hayek is an individualist. He believes that we begin our social analysis with the individual decision-maker, and the social order should permit him to pay to achieve his goals. Through allowing each person to achieve his goals by whatever voluntary and non-coercive approach he decides is best-fitted to his skills and capital, we create a social order which allows each of us to prosper. What is best for a majority of economic actors is best for the society as a whole. Out of individual competition comes collective prosperity. This is the essence of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, and it is still the essence of modern free market social theory. Hayek defends the whole idea.

"This social philosophy requires faith. It is not self-evident. Men must believe that the voluntaristic exchange system is, in fact, a system. They must believe that beneficial results stem from individual decisions to truck and barter. Out of the voluntary, self-centered decisions of many will come a social order beneficial to the one of human society. This is the religion which Hayek offers to us. Very few post-Darwin intellectuals believe in this eighteenth-century religion.

"...This is the heart of Hayek's defense of human freedom: the better use of that most precious of scarce resources, knowledge. 'It is therefore no argument against individual freedom that it is frequently abused. Freedom necessarily means that many things will be done which we do not like. Our faith in freedom does not rest on the forseeable results in particular circumstances but on the belief that it will, on balance, release more forces for the good than for the bad.'

"Here is an undefendable faith indeed. 'Our faith in freedom' rests on our 'belief' that freedom will 'on balance' produce more good than bad. ... 'The benefits of this system, on balance, are greater than the costs.' On what balance? Evaluated by whom? Hayek appeals to something he knows is irrational and inconsistent with the very foundations of modern subjectivist economics. He appeals to an aggregate that by definition cannot possibly exist, if we accept the logic of subjectivism. In short, he cannot logically defend the free market's benefits.

"The socialists and interventionists do not take Hayek's faith seriously. They see it as irrational. How can we possibly believe that an unplanned, undesigned, individualistic economic system is beneficial, when we know some participants get hurt, or lose money? Why not allow the greater vision of central planners to intervene and remove all evils, while leaving the benefits?

"...Hayek's system rests on the idea that undesigned human institutional arrangements are reliable. The socialist wants us to believe that man-designed, centrally administered human institutions are reliable. Hayek wants species man, the purposeful planners. The socialist want scientific elites who plan for benefit of species man. The implicit and even explicit humanism of both camps should be obvious. Neither side is willing to appeal to fixed standards of ethics, economics, or civil government in the Bible. Neither side wants to consider the balance as being in the hand of an omniscient God. Men or Man, individuals or planning elites, must be understood to possess the balance. They can see good or evil in the aggregate. God is an irrelevant hypothesis for both camps. They both agree: man is the starting point for economic and political analysis. [2]"

"...How can Hayek expect to win the battle for men's minds with this kind of a defense of the market? It is initially repulsive morally (selfishness), until we consider the sophisticated arguments that undergird it. Yet even these arguments ultimately fail, for he cannot demonstrate the benefits scientifically (no interpersonal comparisons of subjective utility), and he cannot demonstrate that the moral and legal rules of the game should not be changed in some future social - or even in today's social order, which is no longer the environment of the late nineteenth century, let alone Scotland in the mid-eighteenth century. ... How can any decentralist version of evolution win men's minds, in an era in which the second stage of evolutionism, in infamous 'sleight of hand' - elitist planners as the source of future evolution for the benefit of species man - has become the reigning faith?

"Men must believe in some authority. They must obey that authority if they are to survive. It may be the market economy, or the civil government, or the Bible, but men need a source of reliable authority to commit themselves to. There can be no division of labor without such subordination. Men necessarily obey someone. Hayek fully understands this principle of human action. He calls men to obey the laws and conventions of the undesigned free market order. They are to exercise faith in the benefits and reliability of this order. They are to believe that it is, in fact, a true order, and not a capricious, random, and destructive anti-system. Hayek does not minimize the individual's obligation to obey: '. . . the individual, in participating in the social processes, must be ready and wiling to adjust himself to changes and to submit to conventions which are not the result of intelligent design, whose justification in the particular instance may not be recognizable, and which to him will often appear unintelligible and irrational.' Men must, in short, exercise blind faith. They must subordinate themselves faithfully to social processes that they do not understand, and that even appear irrational to them. They must do this if the free market order is to survive.

"If survival is the criterion of success, then the free market order in the twentieth century has begun to resemble a social dodo bird, headed for extinction. If success in the open marketplace of ideas is the criterion, then the free market's undesigned structure has not produced the intellectual defesnses that might insure its survival. Perhaps someday people will believe in the market as fervently as Hayek wants men to believe - a blind faith in an undesigned order - but throughout the twentieth century, such faith has been shrinking. Men are far more ready to believe in a designed social order - a social order in conformity to the second stage of the Darwinian sleight of hand, with scientific planners taking control of the forces of evolution, in order to secure man's place in the cosmos as provider of cosmic personalism.

"How do we know that the market order still works? How do we avoid Marx's argument that capitalism was far more productive than feudal production methods, but its day has come at last, now that proletarians are about to bring in a new world order? Hayek cannot tell us. How do we know that our capitalist tools still are performing better than socialist tools? [3]"

Can you see where we are today?

When you remove God and His Word from the equation,

you have absolutely no logical defense for freedom.

This is why America is headed for socialism.

So, what is the solution? North answers this question in his conclusion:

"The dualisms of post-Kantian thought are inescapable. To evaluate change, you need a fixed standard. ... The logic of humanistic economics is hopeless.

"Christian economics is the only answer. We have a source of rationality. We have a guarantee of economic laws. We have confidence that the market order is fully conformable to the needs of individuals, and also to the needs of mankind as a whole. We know that we do not need perfect knowledge (omniscience) in order to have reliable knowledge. We know that the logic of our minds, despite its limitations when pushed, is a reliable device for interpreting and moulding external reality. We know that the market is transcendentally the product of God's design. The dominion covenant offers us all these needed intellectual requirements. It makes economic thought possible. Without the presupposition of the dominion covenant, and the revelation of God's design for economic institutions and relationships, there can be no logical, consistent, reliable, self-attesting science of economics, whether deductivist or inductivist (logical or empirical). Any economics based on evolutionism must fail; its own internal contradictions cannot support it. ... If we are to have a reliable concept of economics, we need reliable concepts of God, man and law. Humanism provides us with unreliable concepts of God, man and law. It is time to abandon humanism as the foundation of economic analysis.

"The free market's advocates are united in their belief that there is an inherent rationality in the market order, yet can[not] explain why such rationality can exist in a world of flux and irrationality. ... They write as though they were living in a world of cosmic personalism, yet they explicitly deny the existence of any such universe. They want the fruits of a Christian world-and-life view, but not the roots. We cannot enjoy forever the fruits of Christian civilization, including the free market social order, without the roots: the biblical doctrines of God, creation, providence, law, the image of God and the dominion covenant. We must abandon the evolutionists' defenses of the market if we are successfully to defend the market from the evolutionistic opponents of the market. [4]"

What in the world does all of this

have to do with virtuous womanhood?!

Girls, we are inheriting this nation - along side the young men in our generation.

The same God that designed the Biblical free-market system designed another social order. He explicitly created women to be helpers. It is in our very make-up. The question is not "are we going to help?", but "who are we going to help?"

Most women marry and bear children. It is the norm of a Christian society. The best battle position a woman can take in this war of worldviews - the best way she can fight to redeem our nation to Covenantal Faithfulness to the King of Kings - is as a helpmeet and keeper of the home.

How can I possibly say that?

If we want to enjoy the fruits of a Christian government and market system - we must also embrace a Christian family structure. Without an explicitly Biblical family structure, there are no sturdy building blocks for a Christian society and all Christian social order crumbles. You simply cannot pick and choose the systems that God created, keeping the ones that suit your fancy and ignoring those that don't fit into your life plans. To bring His Word to the bar of your human judgement is to overthrow the Throne of God in your heart, and to crown yourself Lord. This is wicked, idolatrous blasphemy - this is humanism.

It's making the same mistake that the generations before us made - removing our practical lives from the dominion of God and His Word, while still claiming to be 'spiritual' people. This is the same reason why America is headed toward Socialism - we believe that God is not the God of economics.

"They profess that they know God;

but in works they deny Him,

being abominable, and disobedient,

and unto every good work reprobate."

(Titus 1:16)

Therefore we must ask if there is a legitimate way that a woman can wage war against social Darwinist and his social systems within her sphere of dominion: the home.

I submit to you that the answer is YES.

The Home is the Kingdom's Department of Hospitality

"Then shall the righteous answer him, saying,

Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee?

or thirsty, and gave thee drink?

When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in?

or naked, and clothed thee?

Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?

And the King shall answer and say unto them,

Verily I say unto you,

Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these

my brethren, ye have done it unto me."

(Matthew 25:37-40)

"And when Jesus was come into Peter's house,

he saw his wife's mother laid, and sick of a fever.

And he touched her hand, and the fever left her:

and she arose, and ministered unto them."

(Matthew 8:14-15)

One of the things on my "list" is that the man I will marry must be "a lover of hospitality". This means, Lord willing, I will one day be the mistress of a home with a "revolving door".

This is exciting to me - but it also means that I have to potential to influence many people to seek either the glorious Kingdom of God or for the rebellious kingdom of man.

Every word I speak which falls upon their ears will either be theocentric or anthropocentric. This is a sobering reality for the hostess.

Even now, in my father's home, I am influencing visitors.

Am I striving to only open my mouth in wisdom? If I want to speak wise words, mustn't I first seek to know wisdom?

How seriously am I taking the ministry in which God has placed me now?

The Home is the Kingdom's Armory

"Lo, children are an heritage of the LORD:

and the fruit of the womb is his reward.

As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man;

so are children of the youth.

Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them:

they shall not be ashamed,

but they shall speak

with the enemies in the gate."

(Psalm 127:3-5)

Oh, what influence we ladies have over the children in our home! Maidens, even we have great influence over our siblings - over the little ones who pass through the corridors of our dwelling. We should also prepare to be mothers who teach right things.

The Home is the Kingdom's Seat of Education

"And these words,

which I command thee this day,

shall be in thine heart:

And thou shalt teach them

diligently unto thy children,

and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house,

and when thou walkest by the way,

and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up."

(Deuteronomy 6:6-7)

Have you experienced the rich spiritual, educational and practical benefits of homeschooling? Have you a vision that is greater than that possessed by most of the government schooled youth your age? Have you given thought to what education your future children will receive?

If you are a firm believer in homeschooling, sister, you will be the teacher someday.

What will you teach your children? White washed humanism? Or are you laboring to grow in your knowledge of the Scripture and your understanding of how it applies to every aspect of life?

Do you know how to defend the free market system from Scripture, for example? Do you understand the Social Darwinist movement and the effects it has had on our society? Is your worldview purged of all such godless presuppositions?

(If you are interested in learning more about Biblical economics, you can download Gary North's The Dominion Covenant: Genesis for free by clicking here.)

We have the responsibility to shape the minds of the next generation for the glory of God and the furtherance of His Kingdom! Are we going to waste that opportunity?!

Are we going to provide such an education that leaves room for a child to believe that the state is god, and that God is dead?

Your Father's Home is Your Classroom
Even while we are not possessing the gates ourselves, we ladies still have monumental sway over our society.

Therefore, in our youth we must seek knowledge, wisdom and understanding. God will use us to shape the next generation's view of God and man - of the Kingdom and of the systems of this world.

This is why I believe, in our preparatory years, we maidens must strive for a good education. The education which I advocate comes first from a serious study of Scripture. It comes from gleaning the wisdom of our parents and Church elders. It comes from much reading. It comes from not shying away from books that require having a dictionary on hand. This kind of an education will not likely be served to us nice and neat on a platter - we're going to have to work for it.

However, when we view the kind of world over which we'll soon be taking command - I venture to say that the hard work will not only be worth it - it'll be imperative to the preservation of Christianity in Western civilization.

What kind of a heritage are

we preparing to leave for our children?

Soli Deo Gloria,

Bibliography:
[1] Gary North, The Dominion Covenant: Genesis (1987), pp. 324-326. The emphasis in is bold is mine, while the emphasis in italics is North's.

[2] Ibid., pp. 330-332. The emphasis in is bold is mine, while the emphasis in italics is North's.

[3] Ibid., pp. 336-339. The emphasis in is bold is mine, while the emphasis in italics is North's.

[4] Ibid., pp. 354-356. The emphasis in is bold is mine, while the emphasis in italics is North's.

Linking up @ Raising Homemakers

Linking Up @ A Wise Woman Builds Her Home

Another Give-away...

2011-12-03T18:22:00.001-08:00

Brother Konvalin at For His Glory is hosting a give-away.

Click here to enter.

I'm eager to enter, for I am collecting Rushdoony literature.

DESCRIPTION

All law is based upon morality, and morality is itself based upon religion. Therefore, when the religion of a people is weakened, so also is its morality undermined. The result is a progressive collapse of law and order, and the breakdown of society.
Men, though, see law as a limitation on their liberty, and Christianity is held to be the most restrictive with its emphasis upon Biblical law as the foundation for morality and liberty. Humanistic man wants total liberty, but he does not realize that total liberty leads only to total anarchy, and that leads to the death of law and liberty. Unless every man's liberty is limited by law, no liberty is possible for any one.
In this concise volume, R. J. Rushdoony expounds on the central themes of the application of Biblical law to every area of life. This book is a great starting point to understanding Rushdoony's larger expositions on Biblical law.

I've specifically been interested in this title, for it is described as a "great starting point to understanding Rushdoony's larger expositions on Biblical law."

This is fantastic, because as soon as I finish...

The Christian School represents a break with humanistic education, but, too often, in leaving the state school, the Christian educator has carried the state's humanism with him.
A curriculum is not neutral: it is either a course in humanism or training in a God-centered faith and life. The liberal arts curriculum means literally that course which trains students in the arts of freedom. This raises the key question: is freedom in and of man or Christ? The Christian art of freedom, that is, the Christian liberal arts curriculum, is emphatically not the same as the humanistic one. It is urgently necessary for Christian educators to rethink the meaning and nature of the curriculum.
In this study Rousas John Rushdoony develops the philosophy of the Christian curriculum.
It is the pioneering study in this field, and it is important reading for all Christian educators.

...I was planning on starting the following series:

The Institute of Biblical Law, Volume I: Biblical Law is a plan for dominion under God, whereas its rejection is to claim dominion on man's terms. The general principles (commandments) of the law are discussed as well as their specific applications (case law) in Scripture. Many consider this to be the author's most important work.

Volume II: Law and Society The relationship of Biblical Law to communion and community, the sociology of the Sabbath, the family and inheritance, and much more are covered in the second volume. Contains an appendix by Herbert Titus.

Volume III: The Intent of the Law God's law is much more than a legal code; it is a covenantal law. It establishes a personal relationship between God and man. The first section summarizes the case laws. The author tenderly illustrates how the law is for our good, and makes clear the difference between the sacrificial laws and those that apply today. The second section vividly shows the practical implications of the law. The examples catch the reader's attention; the author clearly has had much experience discussing God's law. The third section shows that would-be challengers to God's law claim to express God's covenant grace in helping us.

What Rushdoony books are you reading?

Soli Deo Gloria,