Praise

Advent, Evolution, & Absolution [RE-POST]

/ Paul Burkhart / 1 Comment

Today, I’m re-posting a piece I wrote exactly a year ago for last year‘s Advent series. During this year‘s, we’re seeing how the Advent event affects parts of our lives that we usually don’t associate with it. Today, it’s Advent and Evolution. You can follow the series here.

It’s Advent. A time where we especially orient ourselves towards rejoicing and celebrating the fact that God did not remain far off and merely create a “legal” or “dogmatic” satisfaction for the plight of his creation and creatures. Rather, he broke into it and came into his creation and among his creatures. In this year’s Advent series, we’re exploring how, in this Coming, Jesus took on our creaturely form, care-taking function, comprehensive fallenness, and communal formation.

First, God took physical, human, creaturely form. In the study I did–and subsequent lecture I gave–on Beauty a couple of years ago, I defined “Beauty” as the attribute of something that expressed complexity simply. Is not this God-in-human-flesh (theologically referred to as the Incarnation) the most beautiful of all miracles to take place? The Infinitely Complex God inhabits the simplest of human forms: a child.

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I’m going on a Bloggers Trip to Guatemala with Lemonade Int’l. (happy 8th blog-versary)

/ Paul Burkhart / 10 Comments

lemonade-guatemala-1 BloggersDate

Eight years ago, today, I began this blog as a cathartic response to my frustration at a girl in my dorm. It was a very strange post full of rambling, weird logic, bad grammar, and typos. Not much has changed since then in those respects, but I do want to let you all know about an amazing opportunity that this 8-year endeavor has offered me.

Recently, some old friends of mine (that I happen to have hooked up) got me connected to this amazing non-profit, Lemonade International. LI does great development work in the La Limonada neighborhood of Guatemala, the largest urban slum community in Central America.

LI shares my own convictions that international development work should utilize local resources (instead of bringing in outside talent for everything), empower communities (instead of simply giving them aid), and build long-term relationships (instead of “short-term” “missions” programs) in order to reverse injustice. Here’s a trailer for a documentary about their community and their work:
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Herman Bavinck on the Advent Incarnation

/ Paul Burkhart / 3 Comments

The doctrine of Christ is not the starting point, but it certainly is the central point of the whole system of dogmatics. All other dogmas either prepare for it or are inferred from it. In it, as the heart of dogmatics, pulses the whole of the religious-ethical life of Christianity. It is ‘the mystery of godliness’ (1 Tim. 3:16). From this mystery all Christology has to proceed. If, however, Christ is the incarnate Word, then the incarnation is the central fact of the entire history of the world; then, too, it must have been prepared from before the ages and have its effects throughout eternity…the incarnation is not an incidental decree that emerged later: it was decided and determined from eternity. There was not time when the Son did not exist; there was also no time when the Son did not know he would assume and when he was not prepared to assume the human nature from the fallen race of Adam. The incarnation was prepared from eternity; it does not rest in the essence of God but in the person. It is not a necessity as in pantheism, but neither is it arbitrary or accidental as in Pelagianism.

—Reformed Dogmatics, Vol. 3, pp. 274; 276-277 (found this by way of friend-of-the-blog Austin Ricketts)

Free Advent Mixtape Available Now!

/ Paul Burkhart / 2 Comments

Advent-Mixtape-Cover

Update: I got some inspiration and updated the Mixtape, changing the song selection/order a little bit from when this was originally posted. Sorry for the inconvenience.

A new church season, a new mixtape. You can find this year’s Advent Mixtape above, in the appropriately-named tab, or just click here. It’s free, and you can stream, download, or share it.

It’s very similar to last year’s except with some songs removed, added, and re-ordered. I definitely think this one is better. (Let me know what you think!) Be sure to read my post introducing Advent this year, including ways than you can more intentionally participate in this season. I hope this Mixtape can play some role in your time as well.

Here’s some more info, from the “Advent Mixtape” page:
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Welcome to Advent, 2012.

/ Paul Burkhart / 13 Comments

This Sunday marks the first Sunday of Advent. This is the New Year’s Day of the Christian Church Calendar. It’s the season in which we celebrate and meditate upon the “Advent” (latin for “Coming”) of Jesus into the world in the Incarnation. This season begins this Sunday and lasts until Christmas.

In this time, we stare deeply into the reality that the Creator God of the universe came into human form by way of human birth.

The season is marked (as with every Church season) with a profound tension. We meditate on the darkness into which Christ entered the world, as well as the light he brought in his Coming. Advent is a time that we sit in the tension of past, present, and future, and see how this most-differentiating belief of Christianity has profound implications on these places in time, and indeed, the whole of human life and experience.

This is why, for this year’s Advent, I’ll be doing a series meditating on how Advent affects seemingly unrelated parts of human life: art, politics, sexuality, singleness, women’s ordination, social justice, Evolution, suffering, humor, the city, and more.

There are several other ways you can engage in this season:
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A Prayer for Thanksgiving

/ Paul Burkhart / 1 Comment

Father in Heaven, Creator of all and source of all goodness and love, please look kindly upon us on this Thanksgiving and receive our heartfelt gratitude in this time of giving thanks:

We thank you for the splendor of the whole creation, for the beauty of this world, for the wonder of life, and for the mystery of love.

We thank you for the blessing of family and friends, and for the loving care which surrounds us on every side.

We thank you for setting us at tasks which demand our best efforts, and for leading us to accomplishments which satisfy and delight us.

We thank you also for those disappointments and failures that lead us to acknowledge our dependence on you alone.

We thank you for all the graces and blessings you have bestowed upon us, both spiritual and temporal: our faith and religious heritage, our food and shelter, our health, the loves we have for one another, our family and friends.

Above all, we thank you for your Son Jesus Christ; for the truth of his Word and the example of his life; for his steadfast obedience, by which he overcame temptation; for his dying, through which he overcame death; and for his rising to life again, in which we are raised to the life of your kingdom.

Grant us the gift of your Spirit, that we may know him and make him known; and through him, at all times and in all places, may give thanks to you in all things.

Dear Father, in Your infinite generosity, please grant us continued graces and blessing throughout the coming year.

Amen.

(modified from The Book of Common Prayer)

Christianity: paradox & Paradise, fall & Fall

/ Paul Burkhart / 10 Comments

I had the privilege of spending a long weekend these past few days in western Pennsylvania under the kindness and hospitality of my girlfriend and her family. It’s a place that is hard to describe without falling into cliches of big sky, clear air, and bright stars. It’s near the area that Johann Jacob Burkhardt, my first ancestor in America, settled in 1754 after sailing from Germany and landing in Philadelphia exactly a week ago today. I made almost the exact same trek as Johann and his family, from the rivers of Philly to the rural countryside of unsettled Pennsylvania.

Strangely, in the rest of Pennsylvania that I have seen, the trees are still mostly green and just starting to turn for the Fall. But here, this weekend marked the peak of that beautiful transition. The pictures above and below should testify to this (click them for larger versions). They were taken only a couple of days ago–with my phone (fun fact: the picture directly above this text was taken from Mt. David, the highest point in Pennsylvania).

I can’t express to you the beauty my eyes and soul were able to behold.
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Awash | {story10}

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This is an original fiction piece written for StoryADay September. Read more & follow here.
________________________________

The plates shift in the sink, startling her out of her daydream. Her thoughts had lingered away into thoughts of autumns gone by. She resumes her circular repetition, her hands enjoying the warmth of the water as a cold body enjoys the comfort of bed. The suds feel like velvet across her skin, and as she scratches an itch on her face, it leaves a little tuft of bubbles on her cheek. She feels the pops and tingles, causing her to leave them there for a moment longer than she normally would.

The tomato sauce wipes cleanly from the plate, making this an act of leisure and not a chore. The morning stresses of dressing kids follow the tomato sauce down the drain, leaving only a porcelain plate in porcelain hands. She imagines her heart as porcelain as well.

Porcelain? Yes. Broken? No.
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Here I am leading a Port Wine tasting with Fluffer-Nutter Sandwiches [VIDEO]

/ Paul Burkhart / 1 Comment

Last night, some of my best friends threw a wine-tasting and food pairing party. Some of the people closest to me presented wine and food pairings that blew my mind. I had no idea that wine could do all of that. It was the perfect way to end a very busy summer.

Above, you will find a video of me presenting my wine and pairing. I led a tasting of a Tawny Port wine and paired it with Fluffer-Nutter sandwiches (my new obsession). I hope you enjoy it and learn some things.

You can see the videos of the other wine-presenters, as well as other highlights of our evening here.

Thanks go to Paul and Natanya Ma for hosting us, and specifically to Paul for taking and posting these videos.
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Using the Bible to Meet with God

/ Paul Burkhart / 6 Comments

Last week, I asked a bunch of you how you go about using the Bible and the study of its contents to actually nourish your soul and meet with God. I got some great responses both here and on Facebook. This week, I wanted to put up how I ended up approaching this during the class I taught at my church. It’s super short, not very deep, and much more can/should/will be said. For what it is, I hope it’s genuinely helpful and speaks to how we might meet God through the Scriptures.

How do we move from the Facts of the Bible to the God of the Bible? From knowing the Bible, to knowing the Person? From Scripture being informational to formational?

The Meeting Place of God

As I said in the first class I taught, the Bible is not the passive “Revelation of God”. It is the place through which the Holy Spirit actively “reveals God” to us. When it comes to the Bible, we should start thinking more in verbs, not nouns. The Bible is “simply” a meeting place for God and his people, where he might meet them as he desires, by His Spirit.

When we meet God in Scripture, its the convergence of four things: Us and our faith, God and His Spirit.
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the order of the cosmos; the chaos of our souls [QUOTE]

/ Paul Burkhart / 1 Comment

We have been to the moon, we have charted the depths of the ocean and the heart of the atoms, but we have a fear of looking inward to ourselves because we sense that is where all the contradictions flow together.

— Terence McKenna

This is why, I feel, that Order had to take on Disorder, and order it within Himself: so that all things, though still in chaos, might find their rest in Him.

a homosexuality post-script & conclusion

/ Paul Burkhart / 4 Comments

Most of last week on this blog was spent discussing some recent “conversations” about the Evangelical church’s relationship with the homosexual community. I first addressed conservatives, and then progressives (as well as some thoughts on the “willful persistence in sin” comment I hear from conservatives a lot). This week, we move on. But not yet. In response to some of the ways people have responded to these posts, I felt I needed to write this.

In conclusion to it all…

These posts I’ve written got a lot of circulation around the web (and to those who commented/posted links, I thank you), and so for anyone that runs across them, I want to make something clear:

It might seem odd that I’ve typed far more words and dripped more sarcasm in attacking the more conservative side of this issue, all while ultimately agreeing more with them at the end of the day. In the end, even with all of my many theological and social disagreements, I cast my lot with them, even though I know most of them would not have me.

These posts, hopefully, have been written in the same spirit as Mark Noll’s blistering attack on Evangelical anti-intellectualism, The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind, which he calls “an epistle from a wounded lover”.
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Philly Beer Lovers: get very, very excited.

/ Paul Burkhart / 3 Comments

From the article “Pennsylvania debates new beer flow” in today’s Philadelphia Inquirer:

States have adopted various strategies in the 79-year effort to prevent pre-Prohibition alcohol abuses, but Pennsylvania has been particularly idiosyncratic, said Eric Shepard, longtime editor of Beer Marketer’s Insights in Suffern, N.Y.

“Pennsylvania is unique,” he said. “You are by far the weirdest state.”

The bill under consideration, introduced by state House Majority Leader Mike Turzai (R., Allegheny) with Gov. Corbett’s backing, is just the latest effort to get the state out of the liquor business. But Turzai’s new twist would permit beer distributors and other businesses that could afford a license to sell beer in any quantity, along with wine and liquor.

In short, one-stop shopping for alcohol buyers, a la New Jersey.

Read more…

Also, be sure to contact your local representative to support this bill.

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The New York Times finally calls out Obama.

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The NYTimes, the paper of record in America, finally just called out Obama on his civil liberties abuses! Satan just bought a parka.

A unilateral campaign of death is untenable. To provide real assurance, President Obama should publish clear guidelines for targeting to be carried out by nonpoliticians, making assassination truly a last resort, and allow an outside court to review the evidence before placing Americans on a kill list. And it should release the legal briefs upon which the targeted killing was based.

Read more.

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