Tag Archives: invention

Live Move Be

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The words in the title of this week’s post are found in Oprah’s favorite bible verse:

She says these are words to live by. The verse in its entirety is:

For

   “‘In him we live and move and have our being’;[a]

as even some of your own poets have said,

   “‘For we are indeed his offspring.’”[b]

Footnotes: a. Probably from Epimenides of Crete; b. From Aratus’s poem “Phainomena”

Acts 17:28 English Standard Version (ESV)

Calvin comments:

For in him. …We have our being in him, inasmuch as by His Spirit he keeps us in life, and upholds us. For the power of the Spirit is spread abroad throughout all parts of the world, that it may preserve them in their state; that He may minister unto the heaven and earth that force and vigor which we see, and motion to all living creatures.

Then Calvin corrects a possible misinterpretation:

Not as brain-sick men do trifle, that all things are full of gods, yea, that stones are gods; but because God does, by the wonderful power and inspiration of His Spirit, preserve those things which He hath created of nothing…

He explains why the Apostle Paul would use such non-biblical sources:

Certain of your poets. [Paul] cites half a verse out of Aratus, not so much for authority’s sake, as that he may make the men of Athens ashamed; for such sayings of the poets came from no other fountain save only from nature and common reason.

Neither is it any marvel if Paul, who spoke unto men who were infidels and ignorant of true godliness, [did] use the testimony of a poet, wherein was [present] a confession of that knowledge which is naturally engraved in men’s minds…

Focusing on the meaning of the poetry itself, Calvin says:

…It may be that Aratus did imagine that there was some parcel of the divinity in men’s minds, as the [Manicheans] did say, that the souls of men are of the nature of God…

But this invention ought not to have hindered Paul from retaining a true maxim, though it were corrupt with men’s fables, that men are the generation of God, because by the excellency of nature they resemble some divine thing.

Finally, Calvin relates the poetical expressions to that which God explains throughout scripture:

This is that which the Scripture teaches, that we are created after the image and similitude of God, (Genesis 1:27.)

The same Scripture teaches also, in many places, that we be made the sons of God by faith and free adoption when we are engrafted into the body of Christ, and being regenerate by the Spirit, we begin to be new creatures, (Galatians 3:26.)

And certainly, God’s scriptures are words to live by.

Rule of Law – Bradon Wilchej

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So you are willing to compromise?

Not capitulate.

So you want your way?

Our way.

Whatever do you mean?

Might does not make right. These laws we speak about are already ‘there’ to for us to discover and obey.

So you are a natural law proponent?

In that nature’s God has established them, yes.

There you go again, bringing up subjective superstitions.

My turn; does that mean you don’t believe in gravity and quantum mechanics?

What nonsense; every educated person believes in science.

Believes in ‘science’ or ‘truth’? ‘Science’ is a process of discovering the existent truth last time I checked.

Semantics, there is nothing else.

One can believe in the truth but there are many processes to discover it.

Really? I suppose you will bring up your pesky notion of religion.

Actually, I was going to bring up interpersonal conversation. We use it to discover all sorts of things: new friends during a conference, guilt or innocence in a court of law and where the nearest coffee bar is located; among other uses.

I bet you’ll say poetry and art are means of discovery as well? Not simply human invention to pass the time while we refrain from assaulting our neighbors.

I’d never accuse you of that, and yes, they are means of discovery. Not all truth is amenable to scientific process.

Any modern progressive human being knows better.

I don’t think you are right in what you say.

I’ll go so far as to say that your kinds’ time is over; we have surmounted the reaches of the north, to use your own poetry.

You can’t say that…

Sure I can; I can say anything I want, when I want and contradict myself to my heart’s content.

When you subject others to your pronouncements, it ceases to be whimsy and becomes tyranny.

There are no consequences, ultimately.

The townsfolk outside with the pitchforks beg to disagree.

Ah, but I said ultimately.

So you believe you are extinguished at death, do you?

Of course, and you believe in hellfire; what a quaint superstitious notion.

You may discover elsewise, I’m afraid.

Scare tactics, nothing more. Just to assert your control over me, but I’ll have none of that.

I think not; I just mean to communicate the truth. It is you who will have to deal with the consequences.