Back in the Saddle

It's been just over 9 weeks since I last wrote anything.  Coincidently, it has also been just over 9 weeks since Eli was born.  Nothing can prepare you for adding a child to your family when none existed before...no story or piece of advice comes close to conveying the reality of what it feels like to begin the process of shepherding a soul you helped create.  Now, I have made it a goal of mine to never write unless I have something purposeful to say, and in an effort to abide by that standard, I'll end this little blurb now.

It Was the Best of Times...It Was the Worst of Times.

In the first paragraph of his work, "A Tale of Two Cities," author Charles Dickens sets the tone for what will be a famous tale of the plights of Paris and London, both before and after the French Revolution.  This first paragraph, famous for its quotable contrasts, reads as follows:

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way - in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only."

Anna, who teaches a series of lectures on this book to her students ( and who, for obvious reasons, serves as my primary source for literary criticism), observes of this paragraph that its relevance to all periods of time and all circumstances sets it apart from other classic works.  Indeed, Dickens isn't the only example we see in history of a man who wishes to draw attention to the cultural duplicity in which we live.  St. Augustine's famous work, "The City of God," paints a vivid picture of the two realities in which man perpetually exists and is forced to grapple with: the City of God and the City of Man.  These two realities should not surprise the thoughtful Christian.  When God renews His covenant with the children of Israel at Moab, He presents them with the consequences of their obedience/disobedience:

"See, I have set before you today life and good, death and evil. If you obey the commandments of the LORD your God that I command you today, by loving the LORD your God, by walking in his ways, and by keeping his commandments and his statutes and his rules, then you shall live and multiply, and the LORD your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to take possession of it. But if your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away to worship other gods and serve them, I declare to you today, that you shall surely perish. You shall not live long in the land that you are going over the Jordan to enter and possess. I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live..." (Deuteronomy 30:15-19)

When Christ says that He is (and believers are) not of the world, it did not mean that He (and we) are not in the world.  Obviously, to assert such a thing would be illogical.  Christ draws attention to the reality that the world is full of wheat and tares, that God's people live perpetually with the reprobate.

It is into this two-city world that my son is soon to be born.  Indeed, the circumstances around my family could only be described as both the best and worst of times.  As long as it pleases the Lord for His people to dwell with the enemies of God on earth, Christians will be forced to grapple with the imperfections we wrought in the Garden of Eden.  My and Anna's prayer is that our son will know much of the City of God, and with that knowledge be able to discern the City of Man.  If he is able to do this, though he will live in an age of foolishness, we are confident that the Lord will guide his mind into an age of wisdom.

Praise & Somersaults

When you are the husband of a pregnant wife, much of the bonding time you experience with your future child comes in the form of feeling his movements inside mom's tummy.  For about a month now, feeling my son turn somersaults in the womb has been a fairly regular occurrance.  Two nights ago, as Anna and I were relaxing in bed and Elijah was performing for us, I thought of this particular passage in the book of Luke 1:

In those days Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country, to a town in Judah, and she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the baby leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, and she exclaimed with a loud cry, "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! And why is this granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord."

I like to think that Elijah moves when he hears my voice, but the Bible tells us that the very presence of Christ inside Mary's womb caused John to give praise through turning somersaults!

My prayer for Elijah is that his joy for the Lord will be like John's.  John did not have the cognitive ability to reason through whose presence he was in, nor did he need it.  God's blessing was on John before he was old enough to verbally confess Jesus as Christ, and as a member of God's covenant with believers, Elijah has been blessed similarly.  I pray that he would begin to "glorify God and enjoy Him forever" long before he is able to profess that joy with his mouth.

Luke 18:15-17
 Now they were bringing even infants to him that he might touch them. And when the disciples saw it, they rebuked them. 16But Jesus called them to him, saying, "Let the children come to me, and(AB) do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God. Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it."

Charles Spurgeon said of this passage:

Our Lord tells us that the way of entering the kingdom is by receiving. "Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child shall in no wise enter therein." We do not enter into the kingdom of God by working out some deep problem and arriving at its solution; not by fetching something out of ourselves, but by receiving a secret something into us. We come into the kingdom by the kingdom's coming into us: it receives us by our receiving it. Now, if this entrance into the kingdom depended upon something to be fetched out of the human mind by study and deep thought, then very few children could ever enter it; but it depends upon something to be received, and therefore children may enter. 

The Beginning.

And so it begins.  Another blog has been birthed out of the informationally-overcrowded-over-utilized-and-generally-unreliable-unnecessary-evil that is internet social networking.  In an internet realm full of opportunities for cyber-self-expression, I am happy to say that I do not "poke" my friends on Facebook, nor have I ever "Tweeted" any random thoughts that have popped into my head that weren't intelligent enough to be spoken, but were nonetheless good enough to post for the world to see.  Lest you begin to view me as a pot who's out searching for kettles, allow me the benefit of your time to explain why I have dealved into the blogging cybersphere.

At this point in time, my wonderful wife (Anna) and I have been married for almost three years.  We have submitted ourselves to the many activities common of newly-weds: living in a quaint apartment, buying our first home, getting a dog, and most recently, starting a family.  Anna is graciously bearing our son Elijah, who is scheduled to make his official entrance into the world in late November.  Anna has had her share of frustrations throughout her pregnancy thus far, but through the whole process she has continued to be an outstanding wife, daughter, sister and daughter-in-law.

As we prepare to add a new member to our family, Anna and I have both begun to think through the kinds of choices that don't even pop up on the single person's radar.  I can't remember too many times in college when I got excited about the versatility of a stroller or about finding a deal on a Baby Bjorn.  While it is true that I am ecstatic about my Baby Bjorn, Anna and I have both been faced with the reality that the Lord has presented us with the most important task the family could be given: to raise a child in the nurture and admonition of the Lord; to extend His covenant to the next generation.

My reasons for establishing this blog are twofold: first, I recognize that in my attempts to be like Christ I continue to maintain a permeating sinful nature.  While I keep in much better contact with my family than I did as a teen and in college, I often fail to share with them the many details of what's happening in my life.  A helpless baby boy who needs constant care will not free up much of my time, so I hope that, through these writings, I may allow my parents and siblings to share a greater part of my life than I can communicate through phone calls and occasional visits.  Secondly, my wife and I are of the belief that parenthood has become more of a judgement than a privilege in our society.  In an effort to glorify ourselves in the present, our culture has begun to demonize the eternal work of child rearing.  Like most couples who have begun families relative early in our marriage, Anna and I have broken the "5 years of marriage before babies" rule and the "establish your career before you establish your family" rule.  Yes, we recognize that life would likely be simpler if we had no debts, were living lives free of worry about incomes and paying the occassional exorbitant electric bill (I don't take hot weather well), but we firmly believe that if God has chosen to bless us with Elijah, he will certainly provide for our safekeeping.

There are no greater privileges on earth than for men and women to be husbands, wifes, fathers and mothers.  The writings that will be contained in this blog will be my modest attempts to explain to others why that statement is true.  Through seeing how God uses Anna and I in the life of Elijah (and perhaps others in the future), I hope to contribute to the revival of the family in my community and beyond (I know it sounds a little Buzz-Lightyear-esque).  I hope you benefit from and are edified by my musings and stories as the "Pater Familias".