Couldn't Help Noticing

Greeting cards for sinners

It was my wife's birthday a short time ago and in my quest to express my affection, I went to the greeting card section at the Post Office. In line with a personal tradition to never buy a birthday card that's the actual age of the recipient, I bought a birthday card for a 3 year old; I wrote a 2 before the “3” in “Happy 3rd Birthday”, drew a moustache on the Rugrats character, and wrote my message inside.

What I'm very glad that I didn't find was the new range reported in this article: a range of greeting cards for adulterers.

Cathy Gallagher, the inventor of the cards, is quoted as saying, “Look at how many people on soap operas are having affairs. That's real. And I think that's why this is so scary—these cards are real, and for a lot of people it hits very close to home.”

While I won't comment on the somewhat disturbing thought that “soap operas” might be “real”, I will comment on the message of the cards themselves. For example:

My soul has been searching for you since I came into this world.
All my life I have had this emptiness inside, like a part of me was missing and I was incomplete—
And now I can't imagine my life without you—
Even if I have to share you.

or

Let's live our lives together and finally be one.
I can't imagine not having you in my life.
Let's start living our lives for ‘us.’

In the end, my response isn't an anger at Gallagher, who seems to be merely an opportunist, but about the deeper message being promoted. The message of the cards is one of utter selfishness: the importance of ‘you’ and of the ‘love’ that you can find (or imagine you can find) with someone else.

It's a message that carefully turns a blind eye to the sanctity and holiness that is in embedded in the promise of marriage. A promise that's ripped apart in the act of adultery, and that no amount of greeting cards could put back together.

US Supreme Court

In the USA at the moment there is significant debate about the next appointment to the Supreme Court, to replace Justice Sandra Day O'Connor.

Robert H. Bork, a former judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals (D.C. Circuit), has described in the Wall Street Journal how the fight over the makeup of the Supreme Court is “not just about law” but about “the future of our culture”.

Once the justices depart, as most of them have, from the original understanding of the principles of the Constitution, they lack any guidance other than their own attempts at moral philosophy, a task for which they have not even minimal skills. Yet when it rules in the name of the Constitution, whether it rules truly or not, the court is the most powerful branch of government in domestic policy. The combination of absolute power, disdain for the historic Constitution, and philosophical incompetence is lethal.

The court's philosophy reflects, or rather embodies and advances, the liberationist spirit of our times. In moral matters, each man is a separate sovereignty. In its insistence on radical personal autonomy, the court assaults what remains of our stock of common moral beliefs. That is all the more insidious because the public and the media take these spurious constitutional rulings as not merely legal conclusions but moral teachings supposedly incarnate in our most sacred civic document.

The moral and philosophical influence of the USA is considerable in our world, and, as Mr Bork says, the moral and philosophical influence of the US Supreme Court in the USA is considerable. Let's pray that the Supreme Court will be made up of men and women who will make legal decisions with great wisdom (Job 28:20-28).

Wise up

If you're looking for some useful and impressive resources for children's ministry, it's worth taking a look at www.kidswise.com.au. The site contains almost 100 children's talks on a massive variety of passages and subjects, along with programme ideas and other resources.

Sandy Galea, who ministers with her husband Ray in Western Sydney, is the kids ministry expert behind Kidswise. Judging by the high quality of the few samples I dipped into, this site will be a boon for pastors, children's workers and Sunday School teachers.

Better than angels

In a good study the other night on Hebrews 1:1-4, we spent a good while talking about the many facets that are packed into those verses. To wrap up discussion, we answered the question: “How does the way the world perceives Jesus differ from the image of Jesus in this passage?”

Here's the list that we came up with:

• Where our world quite likes the idea of angels, it's much more apprehensive about the idea of Jesus. (Which brooked an interesting side-point into how much even the world's image of angels (human, white-robed, winged, handsome, helpful) is different from some of the biblical pictures we see, in passages like Ezekiel 1 (fearsome, strange, animalistic, holy).
• When the world does admit Jesus, it prefers the idea of Jesus the man. The picture presented in Hebrews is far different, it presents the idea of Jesus who is God—“the exact representation of his being”.
• Where the world believes in self-sufficiency and autonomy, the Jesus of Hebrews 1 is the one who actually holds all things together—“sustaining all things by his powerful word”.
• Where the world would use his name as a swear word, even the name that he has inherited is better than angels.

Any others that we missed?

London prayer

These thoughts from the Dean of St Andrew's Cathedral in Sydney, Phillip Jensen:

This week's terrible expression of hatred should not surprise Christian people. It is to be expected that humans will be evil. But it should move us to prayer. We should obviously follow our heart's compassion and pray for the victims and their families. But we should also pray for the perpetrators—for our Lord taught us to pray for our enemies. Pray that God will regenerate their hearts—moving them from hatred to love, from taking life to giving it. And we should pray for governments, that under God “we may lead a peaceful and quiet life”. However, our real prayer is for the coming of God's Kingdom when God's name will be hallowed and his will done on earth as it is in heaven.