Martin Luther on Marriage

“He who takes a wife is not idle, for marriage keeps him busy. To remain continent in celibacy confronts one with temptations that are not trivial, as the experienced know. On the other hand, the annoyances of married life are [almost] unbearable to men.

Accordingly Socrates is reported to have given a good answer to a man who was contemplating marriage: Whatever you may do, you’ll regret it. In paradise, where there was no such ardor and raging passion, marriage must have been very pleasant. Flesh and blood were different then.

But we have become so infected with original sin that there’s no kind of life which, once undertaken, isn’t a matter of regret at times. This is the fault of our original sin, which has defiled and deformed all human nature. It seems to me that it is the pleasantest kind of life to have a moderate household, to live with an obedient wife, and to be content with little.” He [Martin Luther] looked up to heaven [and sighed], “Dear God, how art thou to arrange things so as to please us?” — Martin Luther

Piercing Heaven: Prayers of the Puritans

For the Puritans, prayer was neither casual nor dull. Their prayers were passionate affairs, from earnestly pleading for mercy to joyful praise. These rich expressions of deep Christian faith are a shining example of holy living.

The Puritan combination of warm piety and careful intellect have fueled a renaissance of interest in their movement. This combination is on display in Piercing Heaven, a collection of carefully selected prayers from leading Puritans. The language in these prayers has been slightly updated for a modern audience while retaining the elevated tone of the Puritans. With prayers from Richard Baxter, Thomas Brooks, John Owen, and many more, each entry reminds us that heartfelt prayer is central to the Christian life.

Lexham have sent a review copy.  Is it too much to hope that there’s a section on imprecatory prayers???   We’ll see…

How Much Vaccine Will Your County Receive? About 100 Doses…

First, if you live in Tennessee, your County won’t get any of the Pfizer vaccine.  That’s going to some hospitals.  Second, your County will be waiting for the Moderna vaccine.

Moderna vaccine distribution in Tennessee

  • Once approved, Tennessee expects to receive 115,000 doses of the Moderna vaccine.
  • About 5,000 doses, or about 5 percent, will be held in reserve by the state in case vaccines shipped to hospitals and other facilities is damaged.
  • One box, or about 100 doses of the vaccine, will go to each of the state’s 95 county health departments, according to the state’s vaccine distribution plan.
  • The remaining doses will be distributed to county health departments and hospitals that did not receive the Pfizer vaccine.

When more will be distributed is left unknown. So good luck. You’re still going to be on your own, to watch after yourself as best you can, for an undetermined length of time.

Congress Cares Nothing For Americans

It cares only for the wealthy.

The CARES Act Sent You a $1,200 Check but Gave Millionaires and Billionaires Far More

Do you want to see how legislation that was supposed to be a bailout for our economy ended up committing almost as much taxpayer money to help a relative handful of the non-needy as it spent to help tens of millions of people in need? Then let’s step back and revisit parts of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act and look at some of the numbers involved.

The best-known feature of the CARES Act, as it’s known, is the cash grant of up to $1,200 per adult and $500 per child for households whose income was less than $99,000 for single taxpayers and $198,000 for couples. These grants are nontaxable, which makes them even more valuable. Some 159 million stimulus payments have gone out, according to the IRS.

The income limits suggested that the plan benefits the people most in need, those most likely to spend their stimulus payments and thus help the economy. The rhetoric conveyed the same: “The CARES Act Provides Assistance to Workers And Their Families” is how the Treasury’s website puts it. There were no grants to more-fortunate people, who for the most part aren’t in financial distress and are less likely than the less-fortunate to spend any money that Uncle Sam sent them.

But when I began looking at details of the legislation, I realized that several of its provisions quietly provided benefits that were worth much more than $1,200 to some upper-middle-class people who didn’t qualify for stimulus payments. Some other provisions provided vastly bigger benefits to the rich, to corporations and to a relative handful of ultra-rich folks.

So let me show you five provisions of the legislation that benefited the upper middle class (including yours truly); the families of Donald Trump and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner; high-income people who make large charitable donations; and Boeing and other corporations that are showing losses; as well as indirectly benefited people who have substantial investments in U.S. stocks.

Etc. Go read it.

The Plan All Along Was For as Many People as Possible to Become Infected, and Die

Without, of course, any concern at all for the vast numbers that would suffer.

A top Trump appointee repeatedly urged top health officials to adopt a “herd immunity” approach to Covid-19 and allow millions of Americans to be infected by the virus, according to internal emails obtained by the House Oversight Committee and shared with POLITICO.

“There is no other way, we need to establish herd, and it only comes about allowing the non-high risk groups expose themselves to the virus. PERIOD,” then-science adviser Paul Alexander wrote on July 4 to his boss, Health and Human Services assistant secretary for public affairs Michael Caputo, and six other senior officials.

These people need to be put on trial for crimes against humanity.

“Infants, kids, teens, young people, young adults, middle aged with no conditions etc. have zero to little risk….so we use them to develop herd…we want them infected…” Alexander added.

“[I]t may be that it will be best if we open up and flood the zone and let the kids and young folk get infected” in order to get “natural immunity…natural exposure,” Alexander wrote on July 24 to Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Stephen Hahn, Caputo and eight other senior officials. Caputo subsequently asked Alexander to research the idea, according to emails obtained by the House Oversight Committee’s select subcommittee on coronavirus.

Alexander also argued that colleges should stay open to allow Covid-19 infections to spread, lamenting in a July 27 email to Centers for Disease Control Director Robert Redfield that “we essentially took off the battlefield the most potent weapon we had…younger healthy people, children, teens, young people who we needed to fastly [sic] infect themselves, spread it around, develop immunity, and help stop the spread.”

Servants of Satan.

52 Days of the Heidelberg Catechism: Day 30

Lord’s Day 30

Q. What difference is there between the Lord’s supper and the popish mass?

A. The Lord’s supper testifies to us, that we have a full pardon of all sin by the only sacrifice of Jesus Christ, which he himself has once accomplished on the cross; and, that we by the Holy Ghost are ingrafted into Christ, who, according to his human nature is now not on earth, but in heaven, at the right hand of God his Father, and will there be worshipped by us. But the mass teaches, that the living and dead have not the pardon of sins through the sufferings of Christ, unless Christ is also daily offered for them by the priests; and further, that Christ is bodily under the form of bread and wine, and therefore is to be worshipped in them; so that the mass, at bottom, is nothing else than a denial of the one sacrifice and sufferings of Jesus Christ, and an accursed idolatry.

Q. For whom is the Lord’s supper instituted?

A. For those who are truly sorrowful for their sins, and yet trust that these are forgiven them for the sake of Christ; and that their remaining infirmities are covered by his passion and death; and who also earnestly desire to have their faith more and more strengthened, and their lives more holy; but hypocrites, and such as turn not to God with sincere hearts, eat and drink judgment to themselves.

Q. Are they also to be admitted to this supper, who, by confession and life, declare themselves unbelieving and ungodly?

A. No; for by this, the covenant of God would be profaned, and his wrath kindled against the whole congregation; therefore it is the duty of the christian church, according to the appointment of Christ and his apostles, to exclude such persons, by the keys of the kingdom of heaven, till they show amendment of life.

Jeremiah’s No Good, Very Bad Day

As a well keeps its water fresh so [Jerusalem] keeps her wickedness fresh. Violence and ruin are what you hear in her, wounds and blows always forced on my attention.  Reform, Jerusalem, or I shall turn my attention away from you and reduce you to a desert, a land without people.’  (Jer. 6:7-8)

It really is quite a thing to consider all the judgment passages in the prophetic literature.  Unrelenting rage…  It’s quite a thing.  And so perfectly understandable.

Fun Facts From Church History: Calvin was No Coward

[Calvin] himself in 1547 confronted the Council of Two Hundred. Feeling had then been running high about the laws for the enforcement of public morals. The Council itself was sharply divided. Calvin, of course, was fiercely abused by those who were opposed to his policy. The Council met on December 16. Word was brought to him that sharp contention had arisen at the meeting, and that threats of violence had been uttered. The streets were filled with excited throngs. He said that he would himself attend the Council. His friends remonstrated, but in vain. He passed through the streets to the council chamber, at the doors of which, as he tells us in his letter to Viret, a tumultuous assembly was gathered.

‘Fearful,’ he says, ‘was the sight. I cast myself into the thickest of the crowd. I was pulled to and fro by those who wished to save me from harm. I called God to witness that I was come to offer myself to their swords, if they thirsted for blood.’

In his farewell words to the ministers of Geneva, just before his death, he refers to this incident, and says that when he entered the Council they said to him, ‘Sir, withdraw, it is not with you we have to do;’ and that he answered, ‘No, I shall not! Go on, rascals, kill me, and my blood will witness against you, and even these benches shall require it.’ He indeed could truly say, ‘The Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?’*

__________________
*C. H. Irwin, John Calvin: The Man and His Work (Bellingham, WA: The Religious Tract Society, 1909), 114–116.