God talk

  In dogmatics it is God’s love for us but in ethics it is our love for God.   There is a reciprocity of love on the vertical planes and on the horizontal planes.   It is no surprise that in the essence of the spiritual life he writes: “Because love for God is its foundation, spiritual life itself consists of fellowship with God, with Christ, and with fellow believers. Love strives after and is fellowship, a fellowship that is only possible through and in love. Hatred separates; love binds.” (From Reformed Ethics; Herman Bavinck; page 248; edited by John Bolt; Translator John Vriend; Baker Academic) A flower from the garden   We have already seen in past discussions the importance of love.   It is also interesting that when we looked at the fruit of the spirit: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. Galatians 5:22-23 NASB” These thin...

  Bavinck reminds us that the foundational principle of the spiritual life flows from God.   (End of page 246) I took this photo recently.  I liked the golden glow   Let us look at a paragraph of Bavincks: “There is only One whose life absolutely arises from himself, who has life in himself, who is absolutely the beginning, a beginning not provided by anything outside himself, who is the life-force itself, absolutely free and conscious, life and source of life at the same time. This is the Triune God.   All creaturely life is derived, not original; only God has life in the full sense of the word. “For with you is the fountain of life; in your light do we see light” (Ps. 36:9). The life of creation comes from God and is mediated by the Logos (“In him was life, and the life was the light of men,” John 1:4), who has life in himself: “For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself” (John 5:26).” (From page 247) ...

  Last time we looked at the state of the spiritual life within Scripture.   We got great encouragement from the importance of being set free from the slavery of sin.   Some religions such as Hinduism and Buddhism do not have the tradition of sin.   They have karma, cause and effect and the belief in an eternity of being born and reborn before being liberated from this body.   The body is seen as a prison, and it is important to break out of this prison to be one with Brahman again.   It is interesting also that Brahma the first person (god) of the Trimurti has only a couple of temples in India given to his name! As the creator god obviously, he was the one who caused this prison in the first place.  In Christ there is hope, we can also remember Noah and think about our responsibilities to this creation as human beings.   Having said that the individual is still responsible for her own actions good and bad.   Although bad actions are not ...