Bully's Blog

Steve Kryger, in his article Thank The Porn Industry?, says the sex trade has been the driving force behind innovation on the internet.

Clearly, not all of these innovations have been good (as the article itself concedes). It doesn’t take a particularly web-savvy reader to work out which of these are ‘naughty’ (in the words of the author), and which are ‘nice’:

• Online payment systems
• Spam
• Streaming content
• Malware
• Live chat
• Pop-ups, pop-unders and mousetrapping
• Broadband
• Browser hijacking
• Traffic optimisation
• Domain-name hijacking
• 3G mobile services
• Paris Hilton

Christian ministry makes use of six of these twelve innovations (i.e. all of the ‘nice’ ones!).

He complains about the fact that the world comes up with the ideas (like YouTube) and the church just mimics them (GodTube). I would agree on this when it comes to our worship music and culture. But in a very real sense, this is the way God has worked in history and will always work:

“Enoch and Babylon are the first cities, but Jerusalem is the last. Jubal is the first musician, but David the “last”. The wicked get there first and do much of the work, laying up an inheritance for the just. Because they are not concerned with morality, the wicked can employ slave labour to build their cultures early, while a righteous culture takes longer to build.”1

To clarify my thought, it means we as God’s people will inhabit houses, towns, vineyards and software that we didn’t build.

1 James B. Jordan, Was Job an Edomite King?, BIBLICAL Horizons, No. 131,www.biblicalhorizons.com

“Catholics do not worship idols, it would be a mortal sin if they did.”

Apparently there is a difference between veneration and worship? That is their argument.

I agree that the common argument against it is a bit weak, but James Jordan writes:

“This commandment is often misinterpreted as stating that no picture of God can be made. This is not what it says. What is says is that no image of anything can be set up as an avenue of worship to God and the court of heaven… Thus, the idea is not that of a “graven” image as opposed to a “molten” image or a “painted” image. The idea is that of a manmade graven object versus the God-made graven Word. The opposition is between God’s content-filled graven Words and man’s silentgraven images. The opposition of God’s verbal covenant and man’s graven images is set out in greater detail in Deuteronomy 4:15-31.”

Continue reading

or An answer for those who think modern day Israel has any special place in Bible prophecy.

After the scattering at Babel, the Lord tore the world in two by calling Abram. With the end of this large Division, signified by circumcision, there was no more distinction between the priest nation and the Gentiles. James Jordan writes:

Continue reading

The Bible was designed to be heard, repeatedly. That’s why scholarship is dangerous. That’s why theological seminaries are dangerous. That’s why an academic approach to the Bible is dangerous. Because it’s all silent, and the Bible becomes a thing…

“One of the problems with modern Bible readers is the deep influence of Greek thinking. Until we are able to think like Hebrews, we will not be able to understand the Bible on the level that God intended. Insightful Bible teacher James Jordan sheds light on the comprehensive story of the Scriptures in this six-part series. Jordan will challenge your assumptions, make you think, and will radically change the way you read God’s word. Your understanding of the Bible will never be the same.”

James B. Jordan, Reading the Bible (again) for the First Time (Audio series).

“For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes.”

If, as preterists maintain, Jesus came in AD70, why do you celebrate the Lord’s Supper?

To answer as an orthodox preterist (I’m sorry, but ‘partial’ doesn’t work for me), I would mention that the communion is a covenant memorial that reminds God of the covenant. The covenant is the key.

Continue reading

The difference between the wicked and the righteous is whether
or not we give thanks as we take hold of the world.

–James Jordan, Ritual and Typology. biblicalhorizons.wordpress.com

Evil Empire?

More and more today we hear that America has an empire, is an imperialistic nation, and therefore is increasingly evil. In my line of work I hear this all the time from liberal and neo-evangelical theologians. Empires are by definition evil. This is often linked up with the notion that violence is always evil…

Continue reading

“While he languished in prison, Joseph had no idea what was going on in Pharaoh’s heart. He did not realise that God the Holy Spirit was at work making Pharaoh dissatisfied. He did not know that one night God would bring His Word to Pharaoh and Pharaoh would need someone to interpret it. He did not know that one day his suffering would be rewarded, and he would stand before the king of the earth.

This should encourage us. We pray for our rulers and those in authority over us, but we don’t see them change. We have no way of knowing, however, what God may be doing. Our God is still the “God of Nightmares”! In our secular humanist society, Christians are often “in prison” in various ways. Yet God’s Word is faithful, and the time will come when secular society will turn to God’s people for help.

May we be ready for the day we stand before kings.”

- James B. Jordan, Primeval Saints, p. 140.

One of my school friends ended up studying oceanography. He specialised and specialised until, in his own words, he knew everything about nothing.

Theologians have the tendency to invent abstract theology, divorced from the text and contained merely in their own complicated terminology. Generally, seminaries tie their students up with this stuff instead of just teaching them the Bible, and when they do teach the Bible it’s dissected into mostly disconnected little parcels.

Continue reading

The Biblical doctrine of regeneration is not the same as that used in systematic theology. Theology uses the term “regeneration” to refer to the invisible onetime renewal of the elect, which brings about their faith and salvation. In the Bible, regeneration is a continual work, with peaks and valleys, and applies not only to individuals but also to society and the cosmos as well. Thus, the elect can experience turning points (conversions) or regenerations at a number of crisis points in their lives, in addition to the fact that every day brings with it the need for continual conversion and renewal.

James B. Jordan, The Sociology of the Church, p. 6
Download PDF here.