Family Time

This week, Grandma and PaPaw came to visit as one of their last stops in the US before returning to Sierra Leone. We all so look forward to these times as they don't come often but are filled with reading books, singing songs, playing cards, and hours of conversation. 

This visit has had the added joy of watching our two daughters interact with their grandparents in new ways. It seems like at this age each week that passes their abilities multiply and they are able to interact in new, different, and joyous ways. 

Some of my favorites memories from this trip have been:

-Olive saying her first words, "Yes Momma" (debatable, but it sure sounded good) followed by the families applause!

-Aspen accusing Grandma of tooting

-Finding handfuls of shark teeth at Onslow Beach and listening to Aspen's cute way of saying "Sharrrk Tooooth"

-Sharing our Sabbath meal and our dream to share it with others, such a blessing to have that meal with three generations. We anxiously await the day we share it with four or even five. 

-Dinner at Mike's farm and wondering where all that food was hiding inside of Olive as it continuously disappeared without slowing down throughout dinner, only to find her belly popping out of her dresses buttons at the end of dinner. Aspen also kept calling our Waitress "Reindeer" anytime she left as she was wearing festive antlers.  

-Mom and I sneaking away in the morning to play a couple matches of Tennis. 

-Every Spades game we played it seems like Meg and I started in the negative and always made a comeback due to the Arnolds conservative bets and accumulation of sandbags. It became a running joke!

-Watching a powerpoint of the work Mom and Bill are doing in Sierra Leone and sharing it with Aspen. I think she could start to understand and make sense of the pictures and videos. 

-There was ALWAYS hot coffee in the pot, and somehow it always seemed to disappear!

-We had a great conversation about us exiting the military and our reasons, reservations, hopes, and fears. I think its the first time Meghan and I have shared all of our thoughts in that regard, and it was great to air them out as well as hear feedback on our decisions from a trusted and respected source in my parents. 

There have been many more memories, but at the time of writing this these are the ones that most readily come to mind. We will have our last full day with the Arnold's today, and as I type, Mom is finishing a breakfast of bacon and biscuits that smell wonderful. I look forward to the day I can return the favor and visit them, but until that day we so enjoy when they are able to spend time in our home and we can watch them love on their grandchildren. 

Your Name - Gardner

Previously I have always written these posts with my children in mind. I have prayed something will be written here that they may learn from later in life as they grow. Up until this point, those children have been daughters only, but this marks the first time that I write with knowledge that a son is on the way. As I sit and type on my keyboard I can feel the weight of that. I know how much I needed the teaching of my father when I was young, and I know how much my son will look to me to define for him things like masculinity, honor, duty, and discipline. This weight is welcome, celebrated in fact, but I do feel it and it is palpable. 

Without further ado, this March we will welcome our first son into this world. Gardner Todd Blansett.

 Gardner you will learn as you grow about my upbringing and my testimony, but it was largely shadowed by a lack of clear definitions/understanding of manhood, and of seeking for it in worldly places. Because of that I wasted time, I ruined friendships, I hurt women by taking from them that which was not mine to take, I reinforced sinful habits, and I betrayed your Mom multiple times. You will get a thorough explanation of all, but for now what I want you to know is that from your birth, you will know what it means to be a man. It is in your name. 

A man is a Gardener. You can tell the stock of a man by looking at the state of his wife, by looking at the state of his children, by looking at his household. Just as deeds are more revealing than words, so a man's personal life, his home life, those who know him best, those he sleeps next to and eats meals with, will reveal much more about him than his outward presentation. Men raise families, Men love their wives, they teach and discipline and grow their children, and they sacrifice all worldly success to see these things through. We see this in the qualifications of an Elder, in that he will be one who manages his household well, for how could one lead the people of God if he cannot lead his own family? It all starts at home, in a man's own garden. 

This is a faithful saying: If a man desires the position of a bishop, he desires a good work. 2A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, temperate, sober-minded, of good behavior, hospitable, able to teach; 3not given to wine, not violent, not greedy for money, but gentle, not quarrelsome, not covetous; 4one who rules his own house well, having his children in submission with all reverence 5(for if a man does not know how to rule his own house, how will he take care of the church of God?); 6not a novice, lest being puffed up with pride he fall into the same condemnation as the devil. 7Moreover he must have a good testimony among those who are outside, lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil. - 1 Timothy 3: 1-7

This is a topic I could write about endlessly as I see its implications and applications through all of scripture and in each day that I walk this Earth, so I will rest here: When a boy begins to cultivate rather than consume, when he is a cultivator and not a consumer, he becomes a Man. The point of boyhood is to reach Manhood. I wait for the day to celebrate with you as you enter into Manhood and as you begin to lead a family of your own. 

Cultivate vs. Consume: I first heard this idea phrased this way by Todd Henry VanVoorst. It is him who your middle name honors. Todd came into my life when I was in dire need of instruction and example. He taught me about these truths written above and he taught me how to pursue them. As I look back on my life it was meeting him that marked my journey to manhood and my love for God's word. It is only right fitting that my first Son be named in honor of him. I pray that as you grow you will know Todd well, I pray that you will learn from him as I continue to learn from him, and I pray that will love God with the fervor in which he Loves God. 

Gardner Todd, I am anxiously awaiting your arrival. Your two older sisters are awaiting your arrival as well, and Aspen regularly reminds your mom that Brother is in her Tummy. Much love awaits you Gardner, and much responsibility awaits you as well. Good thing that's something you're made for. I love you and your mom and I can't wait to meet you. 

Nuclear Family

 The term nuclear was first used to describe the family because the family is the 'nucleus' of all. It forms the center of everything in our society. 

Today when we hear nuclear we think atomic. I think this also fittingly, perhaps even more so, describes the family.

When family is done well and right and when parents die to themselves and mirror Christ, and teach their children how to die to themselves, and when a husband leads - Nuclear power is the result. When done right the family is the equivalent of awesome nuclear energy, with the power to sustain nations and provide peace and prosperity. 

When done wrong, when the dad is not in the home, when the children are sacrificed on the alter of material gain,  there is nuclear fallout that lasts for generations. 

Chinese Proverb

 "If you are planning for a year, grow rice

If you are planning for decades, grow trees

If you are planning for centuries, grow men"

Love this quote! I did a promotion panel with one of my Lance Corporals and we had discussed this quote the day before as a platoon. The following day during the interview panel, I asked him how this quote applied to his job. It was rewarding to see a 19 year old kid grasp the concept that he can only do so much in his lifetime - in the sniper community, in our battalion, in our platoon - however his impact can be felt for generations based on how he leads the guys to his left and his right. How he trains the new members as he grows in the platoon. The other marines are his primary focus, pulling the trigger secondary. 

Birthdays

 Today our family celebrated Aspen's second Birthday. Todd has shared a quote with me in the past by GK Chesterton concerning Birthdays that I love - 

"The first fact about the celebration of a birthday is that it is a way of affirming defiantly, and even flamboyantly, that it is a good thing to be alive."

And affirm it we did! Pink ballons, gifts (baby doll and accessories from mom, and musical instruments from grandpa, now known as PaPo), a trip to an aquarium, ice cream, spaghetti, more icecream, picking strawberries from the garden - and lots of pink - pink shirts, pink hair bows, pink shoes, pink baby stroller. We flamboyantly celebrated two years of life with our little woman in training. 

Not only is a birthday a time to exclaim that life is a good thing, it is also a time to exclaim that birth is a good thing. After all it is in the name. If you listen to spotify long enough however you'll hear a couple of commercials that mention the recent roe v. wade debate and you will find out that many people claim birth is in fact a disease that needs curing. I wonder what those people do on their birthday.. mourn that they weren't cured? Preposterous. 

Aspen Laurelai Blansett, you are a true joy to your mother and I. You are fascinated by the world and by everything around you. We can't quite figure out if you are exteremly brave and adventurous or if you are cautious and timid - you often switch back and forth between the two. Just a couple months ago if I didn't watch you, you would have ran straight into the ocean. This weekend you didn't even want to touch the water. You bravely tell our German Shepherd NO when he tries to lick your food, but the fish in the aquarium had you clinging to your pappa. 

You are already modeling your mother and it is beautiful to see. You love to cook in your little kitchen and clean the dishes when you are finished - the icecream scoops I think are your favorite. Your new baby doll is your pride and joy and you always make sure she is kept happy with her binky or with a bottle, or with the breeze in her hair from her ride in a stroller. Though you are learning to share you are very sweet to your sissy olive - you help her roll on her back and hand her a bottle so she can eat, you often are overcome with love and have to run to her for a hug and kisses, and you are conscious of when she is sleeping and make sure you reiterate it to me and mom "Sissy sleep-ing" 

Each night since you were born we have sung the doxology with you - you are now starting to sing along and the best note you hit is "AAAAmen" I wonder when you will be able to sing it all with us. 

Keep your eyes on your mom as you grow. She is a Woman in every way. You'll see most people don't know how to define that anymore, but they need only to look at your mom. Beauty, Oikodespotes, Assiduity, Faithfulness, Femininity, Love. If I could borrow a line from a country song:

"I hope you look just like your momma

And love her like I do

You'll see close to perfect patience

If you watch her every move

You can always run to daddy

You'll always be my baby

But, look at her, baby girl

And you'll learn

How to be a lady"

I love you Aspen, Happy second Birthday.  

Contabulation

 Contabulation: noun The act of laying with boards, or of flooring; the floor laid.

Came across this word in Webster's 1828 dictionary today as Meghan and I were trying to come up with a better word than 'groove' for our word of the week on our family calendar. In searching, this word does not appear in any other modern dictionary searches, even online. Makes you wonder how many other words have been lost over the years. 

Contabulation is the act of laying flooring essentially. Laying what others will walk on. Laying the footing. Your life will take place on top of what you have contabulated. 

We are laying that flooring for our girls right now, each day. As we plan our weeks we have this in mind. As I think about in a few short weeks leaving for a two month exercise, and next year for a 6 month deployment, I think about the downstreams effects that fatherlessness had on myself and my siblings. Regardless the justification, even be it military service, does not give our family back the time I am away. I pray each day that we lay the footing well for our girls. That it will be firm while I am gone. And I pray for wisdom and clarity as to my military service for I do not see it a sustainable career for our family. Our contabulation window is closing, and I don’t want to come home from the field one day to realize the flooring wasn’t finished and the furniture is already in place. 

Hitler was a good leader?

 If you are scoffing at the title of this blog I want to clear the air. Hitler was NOT a good leader. 

This was a statement that a co-worker made, and his reasoning to make it was understandable. Leadership is defined by uniting a people around a common goal and fueling their motivations to match that of the leader's in order to accomplish the mission the leader has set out to accomplish. In those terms, Hitler 'lead' the Nazi's. 

Now to counter.. Leadership is not only defined by the description above, though that may be true. Leadership is also determined by where people are being led. To say the leader of the AA meeting was an effective leader because he successful led all of the members of his group to get drunk at the bar would be ludicrous. The AA leader is only an effective leader when he leads the group to the stated goal, the stated mission, the stated purpose, which is to rid the members of the group of their addiction to alcohol. He led them somewhere, but it was back to their sin. . Leadership is defined by the destination. If a shepherd leads his sheep to the den of wolves, yes you could say they followed him and that he led them, but you can also say that all of the sheep are dead. A shepherd is a good leader when he leads the flock to safety, not harm. It would not be hard for me to lead college kids into drunkenness. That would not speak to much of my leadership ability, only to my ability to fan the desires that already existed. For me to lead college kids into abstinence however, or to lead them to a regimented schedule which facilitated success in academics, that consists of leading them to sacrifice their natural desires or to die to a part of themselves in order to pursue something else. 

Leading sinners to more sin is not leadership, it's depravity. Leading sinners to die to their sins to pursue righteousness is leadership. 

The destination is of upmost importance. 

Counterfeit Masculinity

 The following is an excerpt from "Future Men" by Douglas Wilson. A worker asked me for some advice today and I was reminded of this section of this book. I hastened to read it this evening in order to share with him tomorrow the principles found within. Authority flows to those who take responsibility. Furthermore, children learn from their parents example not just their rebuke. Parent's making excuses on behalf of their children is doubly harmful. It is reinforced to the child that excuse making is okay and the child is given the green light to not only make excuses to others, but now to his own parents. The parents have lost authority, and they have bolstered excuse making in their child. 

-"Counterfeit masculinity excels at making excuses. Because the "masculinity" is a matter of pride, not humble acceptance of responsibility, then anything which threatens that pride must be rejected. One of the things which always threatens pride is any kind of failure, and the way that insecure males deal with this is through making excuses. True masculinity accepts responsibility, period, while false masculinity will try to accept responsibility only for success. This is a key distinction and is worth pursuing at some length. 

Suppose a young son is playing left field, and in the course of the game, he drops an easy pop fly. Suppose further that he says he did so because "the sun was in my eyes", "a bee was near me," "the grass was slippery," "a fan yelled and distracted me," and so on. This should be taken with the utmost seriousness by the parents - this boy is in grave spiritual danger. This pattern of fending off a threat of wounded pride through excuse-making is typical of males in sin, and yet is thoroughly unmasculine. A refusal to make excuses is right at the heart of scriptural masculinity. 

Boys need so much practice at this that they should be taught to accept responsibility even when the sun was in their eyes. Unfortunately, many boys are schooled in the techniques of avoiding masculinity by their parents. When a boy does not make excuses it is frequently because he does not need to - mom and dad do it for him. This is particularly the case when there have been consequences for the failure, whatever it is. Suppose the coach substitutes another player, or the boy is dropped from the team because he is on academic probation, or some other fallout occurs. Parents are often ferocious in "explaining" why this shouldn't happen. The son is in the background, taking notes. So when they, the parents, confront him about something, he does to them what he has already learned from them. What he has learned is the practice of refusing to take responsibility. He has learned how to reject masculinity. This can all be done in a loud vice, and with hairy chest, but it is still shirking a duty assigned by God. "-

A Heart for the Nations

 To have a heart for the nations, is to have a heart for your nation. 

To have a heart for children and families, is to have a heart for your children and families.

Why is it that when a youth group plans a mission trip, they tend to leave either their country, their state, or their community? Is it because their school is full of believers? Is it because their county already praises God?

Why do we sneak out of the castle to fight enemies in far away lands when we have a whole army of enemy combatants battering at our gates? Is the war being waged in distant lands more pressing than the one being waged in our own? Perhaps it is less embarrassing or less of a risk if you lose? After all didn't Jesus say in Luke, "Only in his home town and in his own house is a prophet without honor."

But when we were told to go to every nation, we were told Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest parts of the earth. Evangelism starts at home. It starts with where we are right now. 

It may be easier to evangelize someone in a far off place who doesn't know about your history, doesn't know how you spend your Tuesday nights and where your children spend their Tuesday nights. When we go to far off places our lives are under far less scrutiny, and therefore we are held to some extent less accountable for the fruit we bear each and every day. When I witness to my coworker, that time I cussed out my boss for keeping me late on a Friday will come to his mind, and if I was not repentant about that situation, or if that is a regular occurrence, my message will be in contradiction to my life. 

So evangelizing where you are requires your life. Not a few hours of your time. Living our faith is in general one of the great ways to evangelize. Our actions speak much louder than our words. No one wants to hear about serving a God that the message bearer himself doesn't obey 6 days out of the week. 

It starts in the home, it starts with our own children. Then our communities and workplaces, and the overflow both generationally and geographically has no limits. We should not neglect the garden God has placed us in to go and tend to another. No matter how trimmed a garden is, when left alone, will become weeds. Raise up cultivators, raise up gardeners. Raise up son's like Jeremiah who held in their left hand a trowel and in their right a sword. Son's who can both build up and fight away. 

To have a heart for the nations is to have a heart for your own. 

Make the biblical qualifications your compass

Asked to teach our leadership group the topic of making biblical elder qualifications your compass - These are my notes. 

When do you use a compass? If you’re not going anywhere, there is no need for one. If you already knew exactly how to get there you wouldn’t need one. And if you weren’t sure exactly where you wanted to go, and wanted to browse around a bit, a compass would do you no good - you would need a GPS or a Map.. Options.

So what do we know about a Compass? You use one when: 

1. You are going somewhere. 

2. You know where ‘there’ is, and did the map work to find your heading. 

3. You need the compass to hold you accountable in actually getting there/ keeping the heading. 

Again: 

1. Going somewhere 

2. Know where, and did your map work. 

3. Keep the heading. Get there. 

Going Somewhere: 

Where are we going as men? Are we going anywhere? Do we go about each day knowing where our actions are taking us? Where they are taking those we are leading? To lead you do actually have to be going somewhere, its inherent in the language, to follow, you must be moving behind a leader who is going somewhere. 

Find where you want to go. Is it qualified as a biblical Elder? It should be. It is a noble aspiration. 

Where? Map Work?:

Read the word. Deut. 6. Map work, we are doing it right now. 

Keep the heading:

Pastor Description Megachurch in chicago:

1. Man or Woman

2. Provide leadership and vision

3. Ensure vision/strategy and position of strength

4. Ability to dream and cast vision

5. Demonstrate spiritual leadership, authentic walk with Jesus, balance work and life (as if the two are somehow different things, you stop your life to go to work and resume it when you pull into the driveway)

6. Proven leader of leaders

Pastor description Sixth century from Gregory the Great:

1. BE the model for everyone

2. Devoted to the example of good living

3. Dead to passions of flesh

4. Live a spiritual life

5. No regard for worldly posterity

6. Never cower in the face of adversity

7. Desire the internal life only

8. Intentions not thwarted by frailty of body, or spiritual trials

9. Not lust for others possessions

10. Quick to forgive

11. Never so far removed from righteousness as to forgive indiscriminately. 

12. Deplore evil acts in others, commit none of his own.

13. Suffer others afflictions, rejoice in their fortune

14. Student of right living, to water the arid hearts of his neighbors with streams of doctrinal teaching

15. Prayer life 

Paul’s list:

1. Above reproach

2. Husband of one wife

3. Sober-minded

4. Self-controlled

5. Respectable

6. Hospitable

7. Able to teach

8. Not a drunkard

9. Not violent but gentle

10. Not quarrelsome

11. Not a lover of money

12. Manage his own household well

13. With dignity keep his own children submissive

14. Not a recent convert

15. Well thought of by outsiders

16. Faithful children

17. Not violent

18. Lover of good

19. Disciplined

20. Hold firm to the word

1. To teach in sound doctrine

2. To rebuke those who contradict the truth. 

Above Reproach: 

free of obvious inconsistency - discredit your character

One woman man: 

Sexual fidelity- only have eyes for one woman?

Self control and other fruits of the spirit: 

sober minded, respectable, gentle, not drunkard, hospitable.

Not ensnared by the devil: 

To be ensnared you must be tricked, going down a route you didn’t think would lead where it eventually led. Not a recent convert and respected by outsiders - Key is consistency. Would anyone in your workplace be surprised to find out you were a leader at church?

Manage your own household, 

if someone cannot manage his own household how will he manage the church? - Must an elder’s children be believers?

Must an elder have children? We are called to contend for the faith, put on the breastplate of righteousness, … to fight. Children are a blessing from the lord psalms 127 blessed is he whose quiver is full of them, he will not be ashamed when he speaks with his enemies at the gates. If you want to be an elder and do not have children, you have neglected the use of a deadly weapon, and arguably are not committed to the fight ahead of you. 

Must your children be believers? - 

Preacher kid stereotype.  Neglected Qualification. 

John 3:8 only the spirit gives new birth. We do not save, christ does. 

Holds a man responsible for what he is responsible for. 

Not belief but behaviour . Fathering and eldering extensively overlap. So if the goal in our church is to have beleivers then looking at the home we should want to see that as well. Our goal at church is not simply to have obedience.. Obedience to what! Obedience to christ yes, to the world no. Therefore why would you say obedience alone is what is meant by faithful children? 

Nehemia 4:14 - fight for your sons, daughters, houses.

Because it is a long war it crosses generations. 

This means that we begin by fighting for our children, but we must end by fighting by means of them. We bust do two things simultaneously - we must fight today’s battles, and we must recruit and train tomorrow’s warriors. 

We have a tendency to always be looking out at the next thing on the horizon, and forget it is where we are right now that qualifies us for the next thing. That thing will come wether we do anything or not, so we should focus on preparing, not getting to it. 

Capable teacher of God’s word. 

Tell people what God’s word means and what they need to do about it. 

Boils down to three

1. Elder must be an exemplary christian. What should be true of all christians must be true of him

2. Able to lead others, first place to validate this is to look at the family. To guage successful leadership, is did the people you were leading end up where they were supposed to be, did they follow you, are they at the finish line with you now? If they took a different path then did you lead them? 

3. Capable teacher of God’s word. 

Greatest tools are example and teaching. Not go this way, but come on this way. 

What we should do about it. 

Be strategic: 

“ a tactical player only sees the next move; strategy reads the board.” “Amateurs study tactics, professionals study intelligence.” “Sun Tzu: Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.”

What is more strategic then success 100 years from now? How do you ensure the fight is taken to the enemy long after you are gone? Your children. Their children. Their children. Example of Jonathan Edwards. Example of Abraham. 

You spend your life fighting for your children, while you can have an impact. Strategy is the opposite of short sightedness: “ Far too many parents struggle with short sightedness. Bringing up children - training and educating them - is like pouring concrete. Time is a key element, and after that time has passed, the thing is done. While god is gracious, most studies demonstrate that what a young person beleives upon graduating from college will often be what he believes the rest of his life. Therefore, we need to redeem the time and use it wisely. 

Strategic in the use of every day, and our understanding about neutrality in this world. Excerpt from Excused absence. “For or against him.” - there is no neutrality. Opposite of love is not hate, but apathy. Saying something can be neutral. Like public education, like music, movies, stories, policy, etc… Need to study these things and figure out where they are on the spectrum. Sin is everywhere, you cannot escape its presence but you should be able to identify what is for God and what is not for God. 

Nehemia 4:14 - fight for your sons, daughters, houses.

Because it is a long war it crosses generations. 

This means that we begin by fighting for our children, but we must end by fighting by means of them. We bust do two things simultaneously - we must fight today’s battles, and we must recruit and train tomorrow’s warriors. 

So a short sighted strategic man throws himeslef into ministry, neglecting his family in order to do so, is not just demonstrating that he desont understand his wife and kids, but that he doesn’t understand the nature of true ministry. 

How strategic is it to be of good character? Very strategic, when your children follow your example, and their children, and their children. And all the others who follow you as you follow christ. 

The heading doesn’t change with your job, position, opportunities. Regardless the hill or the valley, a heading is a heading. 

Pursue godliness more that you pursue others’ recognition of your godliness. 

How do you make these your compass?

• Memorize them. 

• Meditate on them.

• Pray through them. 

• Make a list of the qualifications 

and write down ways you can grow in them. 

 “Not quick tempered” - “I’m just competitive.”

• Ask others who know you well how they would grade you on the qualifications. Follow the example of the elders infront of you. 

Making these qualifications puts pressure on your character where it belongs, and takes it off of your circumstances where it does not. 

Keep checking your compass, if you get a little to the left or right, look at your compass (read the qualifications, memorize them, pray over them) and get back on the right heading. 

I like that he didn’t say make the qualifications your destination, but make them your compass. There is no end in sight. A current elder has not ‘made it’ and no longer uses a compass. You will until you die, need to look down at your compass, and stay on the right heading. 

1. Going somewhere - Where are you heading? 

2. Know where, and did your map work. - Read the word, know the qualifications, decide as a man to aspire to them. Know how they manifest practically in your life.

3. Keep the heading. Get there. - Memorize, meditate, pray. Ask others for feedback. Constantly measure yourself against the standards. 

Frankenstein

 Canon Press puts out Worldview guides to several classic works of literature. We were gifted a box set of 32 Worldview guides and today I read the first - Frankenstein. 

The author of Frankenstein, Mary Shelley, was the daughter of Revolutionists Mary Wollstonecraft (widely considered the mother of the modern Feminist movement) and William Goodwin. Both were radicals who firmly supported the French Revolution. Mary became enticed with a married man, Percy Shelley, who left his pregnant wife to be with Mary. Percy's wife would later commit suicide; however, in the name of revolutionizing the moral order particularly in sexual norms, their 'love' could not be chained be previous marital commitments. 

Frankenstein illuminates how Mary began to come to grips with her life's choices and it is written through the pages a point about the frightening judgement of cumulative transgressions. Perhaps sexual freedom doesn't end in liberty of consciousness, but of never-ending guilt. This is a story about the horror of your past growing legs and catching up to you. 

Mary and her Husband both viewed constraints of any passion to be a form of slavery. Percy wrote "Love withers under constraint: its very essence is liberty... How long then out the sexual connection to last....? A husband and wife ought to continue so long united as they love each other: any law which should bind them to cohabitation for one moment after the decay of their affection, would be a most intolerable tyranny, and the most unworthy y of toleration." And also he wrote, "A system could not well have been devised more studiously hostile to human happiness than marriage." - A belief Mary, once having held herself, would lament after being left alone with her two children while Percy pursued sexual liberty elsewhere. She had made her intellectual bed and found it very uncomfortable. 

"The world Mary Shelley made is a world in which a man came under the servitude of a wicked impulse that gave birth to a monster, and its consequences were sin, and ultimately, death. Frankenstein is a world where debts unpaid are paid in full with the blood of the debtors. No other blood will do. There is no cross. There is no atonement. There is no salvation. Just you and the sum of your life's choices. And that is utterly terrifying."

Mary, being left to raise their children alone after Percy galavanted away with another woman, ultimately experienced the loss of all three of her children. She would come to wonder what sin of hers could have merited such punishment. She naturally began to wonder if Harriet Shelley's (Percy's former pregnant wife) death lay at her door. 

The parallels between Mary's own internal struggle with the thought of divine retribution, and Victor Frankenstein's experience of exactly that are quite evident. Frankenstein is not a story about a mistreated, misunderstood minority monster who could have adjusted to society if only given a proper chance and some empathy. As if Grendel too would have behaved had he only been given a cup of mead of his own. It's a story about laying in the bed that you have made, and the frightening judgement of cumulative transgressions - except in this story there is no cross, and therefore it is truly horrifying. 

Politics

Before I write on this topic I will start by saying that I am young, I have never preached from the pulpit, I have never been in church leadership. This is from the perspective of one who is on the receiving end. 

 The question of politics from the pulpit. Something I have often been challenged with. If Christians are only ever taught what the Bible says, and it never manifests in their lives via fruit, then I think it's safe to say we are missing the mark. And if you bear fruit in this modern age, that fruit will in some way be growing to a political end. When the State became strictly secular, our lives as Christians became political. 

How does a Christian bear fruit in a world in which politics has infiltrated every public space without being 'political'? In a time when Man and Woman, Sympathy and Empathy, Privilege (Which is simply another word for a blessing from God), Creation, etc. are political fighting grounds, Christians will slide into nominalism.. and then to secularism if we are not to some extent guided. When I say guided I mean these are topics that need to be discussed with our brothers and sisters in Christ, and those appointed Overseers should have a lot to say. 

What I have found is that many do not have a lot to say. Politics is a private matter.  

When did 'Christian' come to mean 'Niceness'? If truth is not kind to someone should we suppress it for their sake? 

I find it quite telling that Christ was not drug to the cross and crucified because he was so 'nice'. He was not killed by the people because he strode around telling everyone to love each-other. He was killed because he told them 'How' to do it. He was a troublemaker. He was killed because he was political. The God of the age was Caesar. The Gospel message was that Caesar was not king. Ergo, that man you are bowing down to is a phony. That thing you are serving is empty. That truth you have come to believe is not truth. 

Douglas Wilson addressed this topic well in his book 'Empires of Dirt' that Todd and I just wrapped up reading. He spends a chapter addressing questions about what a Christendom might look like, and he addresses the conundrum that some find themselves in on this topic of politics and the pulpit. 

To this extent, blaming public Christians for being "too political" is like blaming Noah's ark for being "too wet". Abortion and Sodomy were sins long before they were constitutional rights. If a minister preached against them a thousand years ago, he was preaching against moral failings, and he was not being political. He was being public, but not political. When I do it, I am preaching against moral failings too, but I am also being political. What changed? It wasn't the Decalogue. It wasn't the history of the Church or the history of preaching. It wasn't the nature of the gospel. It wasn't me. Rather, it was the nature of the idol being challenged--and this idol aspires to omnipresence. 

We are told, ad nauseam, to keep our morality out of politics. It would be more to the point to tell the idol-mongers to keep their politics out of morality. Public morality need not be political in the sense we are discussing. Public morality need not be a matter that concerns the legislature. But if the legislature concerns itself with everything, then any faithful Christian expression will immediately be concerned with the political.  

The legislature surely concerns itself with everything, and therefore we should be concerned. 

There are sheep who are indeed wandering and lost, not sure wether to wear this flag, or say that pronoun, or vote for that birthing person, and the Christian faith has something to say about that - Christian pastors should also have something to say about that.  

To go hand in hand with what was said above, the goal is not to create enemies of anyone who disagrees with the Christian faith by being 'political'. The truth will do that without needing our help. We should be more concerned with 'opening eyes' then providing light. We in fact cannot be the source of any light, for that only comes from above, we can however live in such a way, such a truly loving way, as to open the eyes of those who have them shut in a dark world. For when eyes are opened in the dark, they yearn for light.