Category: theology

Posted in theology

Fragments of Grace: Thoughts That Stayed With Me

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

This is not a one-thought essay on one topic. These are just some tidbits that moved me or stayed in my mind as I’ve studied this past month.

The Apostle Paul’s self-description progressed toward greater humility as he aged, moving from “least of the apostles” (1 Cor 15:9, c. AD 55) to “very least of all the saints” (Eph 3:8, c. AD 60), and finally to “foremost/chief of sinners” (1 Tim 1:15, c. AD 62-64), reflecting deep gratitude for grace. Source Jerry Bridges Blessing of Humility

Spurgeon on Humility “Micah’s Message for Today”, “I believe that when a man goes back he gets proud, and I am persuaded that when a man advances he gets humbler, and that it is a part of the advance to walk more and more and more humbly.”

Spurgeon ibid, on our progress toward humility: “Remember how Abraham, when he communed with God, and pleaded with him for Sodom, said, “I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord, which am but dust and ashes;” “dust” — that set forth the frailty of his nature, “ashes” — as if he was like the refuse of the altar, which could not be burnt up, which God would not have. He felt himself to be, by sin, like the sweeping of a furnace, the ashes, refuse of no value whatsoever; and that was not because he was away from God, but because he was near to God. You can get to be as big as you like if you get away from God; but coming near to the Lord you rightly sing,” —

“The more thy glories strike mine eyes,
The humbler I shall lie.” Isaac Watts.

The “Son of man” was Jesus’ favorite term for Himself. It is used 14X in the New Testament. We first read it in Daniel 7,

The Son of Man Presented

“I kept looking in the night visions,
And behold, with the clouds of heaven
One like a son of man was coming,
And He came up to the Ancient of Days
And was presented before Him.”

The request of James and John to sit at Jesus’ right and left in the kingdom, is astounding. What they were really saying is that they should be exalted even higher than Elijah, Moses, or Joseph, for example. Even in their own thinking that they had ‘earned’ a spot of exaltation, even at that, James and John had only been serving and following Jesus for three years, whereas Moses dedicated his life to God. Joseph had been through something horrific, and Elijah was a diligent prophet all his life. Their request reminds me of the Pharisees who ‘loved the chief seats’. Obviously, the pride in their hearts nor the thinking in their heads had been smoothed out yet.

We first meet Barnabas in Acts 4, just before the dramatic slaying of Ananias and Sapphira. The verse gives us a succinct bio of the man: “Thus Joseph, who was also called by the apostles Barnabas (which means son of encouragement), a Levite, a native of Cyprus”... Did you remember that Barnabas was a nickname and not his actual name? The Bible shows us this quite often, people’s names are changed by God, or they have nicknames they are better known by.

Saul/Paul, Simon/Peter/nickname Cephas, Levi/Matthew, Priscilla/Prisca, Silvanus/Silas, Naomi/Mara, Jacob/Israel plus there are many more in the Bible I didn’t mention.

We will be receiving a new name when we get to heaven!

The one who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who overcomes, I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, and a new name written on the stone which no one knows except the one who receives it. (Revelation 2:17).

Oh what a day that will be!

Posted in theology

Provision Beyond the Ordinary

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

Your clothing did not wear out on you, nor did your foot swell these forty years. (Deuteronomy 8:4).

Did you ever think through the details of that little nugget of a scene? With all the wandering they did day after day for an entire generation, ‘their foot did not swell’. In other words, they did not have foot trouble. No blisters. No turned ankles. He made it so they could walk. This underscores His minute attention to their individual and personal care, which is a glorious aspect of the Lord’s miraculous preservation of His people.

Biblehub topical lexicon: “Swelling of tissue results from fluid imbalance and venous stress—an inevitable reality in a grueling march. By preventing it, the Lord demonstrated authority over ordinary biological functions, reinforcing His supremacy over creation (Psalm 103:19)”.

As for their clothes… as we read the we picture the people in linen type togas. Adults. But…children grow! When the Wandering began a child might have been 1 year old but when about when they were 6 or 9 or 12? How did God make it so “their clothes did not wear out”?

BibleHub Topical Lexicon:

By contrast, three wilderness texts celebrate a divine suspension of the normal process:

  • “Your clothing did not wear out and your feet did not swell during these forty years” (Deuteronomy 8:4; cf. 29:5).
  • “For forty years You sustained them in the desert; … their clothes did not wear out” (Nehemiah 9:21).

Israel’s garments should have fallen apart, yet the Lord sovereignly checked. The same Lord who ordains natural decay can overrule it to keep covenant promises.

Matthew Henry has some ideas. In one potential answer, he said the people could have traded clothes. As one person outgrew clothes, they gave them to another who would fit them. Makes sense. We donate and swap clothes today. But that doesn’t answer how God made it so that no matter which boy wore it, a boys’ size 4 stayed in good enough condition to wear for 40 years?!

Here is Matthew Henry’s Commentary on it:

By the method God took of providing food and raiment for them [1.] He humbled them. It was a mortification to them to be tied for forty years together to the same meat, without any varieties, and to the same clothes, in the same fashion. Thus he taught them that the good things he designed for them were figures of better things, and that the happiness of man consists not in being clothed in purple or fine linen, and in faring sumptuously every day, but in being taken into covenant and communion with God, and in learning his righteous judgements. God’s law, which was given to Israel in the wilderness, must be to them instead of food and raiment.

[2.] He proved them, whether they could trust him to provide for them when means and second causes failed. Thus he taught them to live in a dependence upon Providence, and not to perplex themselves with care what they should eat and drink, and wherewithal they should be clothed. Christ would have his disciples learn the same lesson (Mt. 6:25),

Henry, M. (1994). Matthew Henry’s commentary on the whole Bible: complete and unabridged in one volume (p. 247). Hendrickson.

You trust God with your soul, which is eternal, so do trust Him to provide the temporary things, like clothes. He is faithful!

“For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is life not more than food, and the body more than clothing? (Matthew 6:25)

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Posted in theology

Dying to self doesn’t mean obliteration

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

We are told to love the Lord with all our heart, mind, strength and soul. We are told to serve with gusto, and not just when the boss is around, but all the time. We are told to die to self.

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But how do we balance serving and dying to self, and avoiding burnout so we can keep serving? I mean, should we even avoid burnout? We must serve with excellence, but does that mean serve to the point of exhaustion, even death? Paul did. Charles Spurgeon did. Paul even said he is poured out like a drink offering, signaling his willingness to serve to the death of a martyr, Philippians 2:17, 2 Timothy 4:6.

Christian self-sacrifice does not mean burnout, nor does it require a continuous state of emotional, physical, or spiritual depletion. At most times, busy-ness does not even mean efficiency, productivity, or effectiveness. Exhaustion is NOT next to godliness.

It’s true that Christian love is sacrificial and modeled on Christ’s self-giving, but the Bible does not equate self-sacrifice with self-obliteration or a state of exhaustion that makes you unable to continue serving. Your energy levels are finite. Even Jesus’s was, He removed Himself frequently to pray or rest. He was tired in Samaria and sat down by the well to rest. (John 4:6). He enjoyed fellowship and dinners with Mary/Martha/Lazarus, or Zacchaeus, or Matthew (Levi), or the wedding at Cana. Everything He did was intentional but some of those times it was for fellowship or to simply celebrate (like Levi’s banquet to celebrate his conversion).

We need to find that sweet spot of serving sacrificially yet preserving enough energy so we can continue ministering. We need not obliterate ourselves. The key is to develop sustainable sacrifice, with boundaries. But HOW?

Saying ‘no’ is hard to do…

1.Learn to say ‘no’. For example, if you’ve agreed to serve at Sunday School, it is OK to preserve some time during the week set apart for study, preparation, and prayer, even it it means saying no to something good that would intrude on that time. You serve at work, plus you have responsibilities to an employer there, so it is OK to say no and guard some time to faithfully complete work tasks. Saying no to something, or deciding not to go somewhere or help someone during the times you’ve set apart, isn’t selfish. It just means you are striving for excellence in the ministrations where you ARE serving already.

Christopher Ash wrote a short book called Zeal without Burnout. Here is Ash with a short article at Challies’ site with some background and introductory explanations about how to be zealous for God without burning out-

The Difference Between Costly Sacrifice and Needless Burnout

Ash explains ‘sustainable sacrifice’, and what a ‘living sacrifice’ means. Here he is expounding in a video at his former church as a guest lecturing from his book if you don’t want to get the book.

His speech covers the following themes:

17:19, God Never Goes to Sleep
19:14, Allow Yourself Time for Sleep
20:01, How To Wind Down before Going to Sleep
25:43, The Sabbath Principle
26:49, We Need Friends

People-pleasing is easy to do

2.Are you a ‘people pleaser’? To some extent, we all are. We are told to love our neighbor as ourselves. However, if the motivation for our constant movement in serving is that you are aiming to please a person but Jesus doesn’t figure into your decision making, it’s the wrong motivation. There is a difference between mindful self-sacrifice as a duty to Jesus, and people-pleasing.

Here is an article from TGC on people-pleasing, which sometimes is the background of someone’s people-pleasing service if that applies to you. 

Freedom from the Burden of People Pleasing–
Jesus came to give us life and life to the full (John 10:10). When we carry the burden of trying to keep everyone happy, that fullness starts to dissipate. We end up carrying a cross that is not ours to carry. We become embittered because, instead of glorifying God, we seek the world’s acceptance—a fickle and transient way to find significance.

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As this Facebook random lady said, “You don’t have to set yourself on fire to keep everyone else warm.” Boundaries are not selfish, they are necessary tools for stewardship. Here is an article from Desiring God, “Die to Yourself Without Losing Yourself“-

Self-sacrifice can be exhausting. It can be painful, arduous, and largely thankless. Moreover, no shortage of people stand ready to take advantage of our willingness to serve. Nonetheless, few messages are more consistent in the New Testament than Christians being known for our sacrificial spirit (Romans 12:10).

A lot of ‘dying to self’ doesn’t mean DOING in the dying. It means mortifying ego, selfish ambition, wayward guilt, pride, and more. It’s working to choose forgiveness over a grudge, serving others without recognition and foregoing ego, managing anger, yielding our will to God’s purpose…etc. A lot of dying to self isn’t in visible external service to others, it is personal work on one’s own sin nature; it’s personal and internal. We are dying to our sin nature.

The gift of sleep

3. Spurgeon said, “Sleep is the gift of God, and not a man would close his eyes, did not God put his fingers on his eyelids”

I lay down and slept;
I awoke, for the Lord sustains me. (Proverbs 3:5)

When you lie down, you will not be afraid;
When you lie down, your sleep will be sweet. (Proverbs 3:24)

I know, I know, moms especially have a very hard time finding enough time to sleep. Little ones wake up in the night and what can you do? Except get up and tend to them. But if you can sleep when you can, without guilt, then prayerful, refreshing sleep prayed for and graciously given, we know it IS a gift.

Sleep and rest is God’s reminder to be humble.

There is no hard and fast ‘how-to’ in finding that balance. It’s personal and unique to every individual. As we grow, we tread a path of finding the sweet spot. It’s like any principle in life we discern from the Bible and apply to our lives as we go. As you learn to set boundaries, keep praying for the Spirit to help you realize if laziness or sloth is setting in, or alternately if you are still on a path to burnout. But remember, dying to self means our own work on sanctifying our holy nature and obliterating our sin nature.

THIS is dying to self- Galatians 5:24, Now those who belong to Christ Jesus crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

Posted in puritans, theology

The Glory of Quiet Work: Lessons from Puritan Women

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

SYNOPSIS: In this essay I explore Puritan migration, beliefs, and society, highlighting overlooked women whose literacy, labor, and faith sustained households, shaped children, and quietly influenced early American development despite historical invisibility and significant hardship.

Continue reading “The Glory of Quiet Work: Lessons from Puritan Women” →
Posted in theology

Today is Titanic sinking day

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

One hundred-and-fourteen years ago, the world awoke this day to the tragic and shocking news that the world’s most luxurious, biggest, and ‘unsinkable’ passenger ocean liner on its maiden voyage, had foundered, taking with it 1500 people down to the icy waters of the North Atlantic.

Initially, it was widely reported that all were safe. It was thought that the passengers and crew had been put off to other ships.

But that was soon to be corrected, with the enormity of the disaster soon impacting the world- and all the lives associated with the ship.

Here is the New York Times’ article:

The entire history surrounding Titanic is rich with lore, history, and melancholy, from its building, to the launch, to the rich appointments aboard, to its treatment of steerage passengers (good and bad), to its final plunge. The inquest itself was a massive part of its history, and also the results- changes in maritime safety which stand to this day.

There are many individual stories told which have been verified and remain carved into the memory of their families and Titanic-history- the Macy’s founders choosing to die together. Isidor refusing to get into a lifeboat and his wife Ida refusing to leave his side, saying, “Where you go, I go.” Benjamin Guggenheim famously chose to face the Titanic sinking with all the refinements of his class, in dignity, changing into evening wear and declaring, “We’ve dressed up in our best and are prepared to go down like gentlemen.” He was seen aiding women into the lifeboats, and in the end, drinking brandy with his valet in the first class smoking room.

Yet there is one man who stands out above the rest whose story is not as well known. He was a Scottish evangelist named John Harper. He ensured his daughter a spot on a lifeboat, then vigorously evangelized to those remaining on board as the ship went down. He is known to have said “Let the women, children, and the unsaved into the lifeboats!” Harper took seriously the verse that commanded our lives be dedicated to the Lord, putting others before self, and valuing souls above things. His life is recounted in the book “The Titanic’s Last Hero” which I own and plan to read this summer.

There have been many other maritime disasters, such as the famed ‘ship of gold’ USS Central America, sunk in a hurricane in 1857 taking with it 425 people and the loss of so much gold it sparked an economic panic in the US. The Lusitania, a British British luxury passenger liner torpedoed by a German U-boat in WWI taking with it nearly 1200 passengers, and more recently the Tall Ship HMS Bounty replica sinking off Cape Hatteras.

But the romanticism surrounding Titanic is still the number one capture for our attention and remembrance in maritime history. And for me, remembering John Harper. He was so famous as a speaker and evangelist he had been invited to preach at Moody Church in 1910. He was in fact, returning to Moody to peach again, this time with his sister and 6-year-old daughter. When knowledge of his last breath’s efforts became known, Moody Church memorialized him by naming one of the church rooms Harper Hall. Upon the occasion of the 100 year anniversary of Titanic’s sinking, in 2012 Erwin Lutzer wrote about “John Harper’s Last Convert“:

One report says Harper, knowing he could not survive long in the icy water, took off his life jacket and threw it to another person with the words, “You need this more than I do!” Moments later, Harper disappeared beneath the water. Four years later, when there was a reunion of the survivors of the Titanic, the man to whom Harper had witnessed told the story of his rescue and gave a testimony of his conversion recorded in a tract, I was John Harper’s Last Convert. …

This past April, Rebecca and I were invited to help commemorate the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic with the congregation at the Harper Memorial Baptist Church in Glasgow. To our delight we discovered that this church, founded by Harper, is still preaching the same Gospel that he preached on the Titanic a hundred years ago. We also learned that his daughter later married a pastor. She died in 1986, but her daughter and grandchildren were with us for the celebrations! A reminder that there is no substitute for the torch of faith being passed from one generation to another through the influence of godly families.

It is reported that only 6 people were rescued from the water alive, and one of those was George Henry Cavell, the last man to whom Harper spoke. God makes a way.

Perhaps I am captured by the Titanic because it took so long to sink, thus we have these testimonies from survivors that show us the tableau of responses to looming death. Some cried, some became paralyzed by fear, some became raving maniacs, some stood stoically…but John Harper was about his Father’s business, concerned for souls above his own life.

Only God knows how I would react if I was trapped in a situation where death is almost sure. I’d be praying, I know, but would I be praying for myself, or others? Let me pray now that the Lord would instill in me a concern for others that rises above my own doings.

Philippians 2:3-4, Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility consider one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others.

Romans 12:10, Be devoted to one another in brotherly love; give preference to one another in honor,

1 Corinthians 10:24, No one is to seek his own advantage, but rather that of his neighbor.

Galatians 5:26, Let’s not become boastful, challenging one another, envying one another.

Further Reading

This Day in History: Titanic Sinks

Posted in theology

“Well behaved women seldom make history”

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

“Well-behaved women seldom make history.”

This was a bumper sticker adorning the car ahead of me at a red light. A long light. I had time to read it and think about it and then get steamed about it. Of course next to that bumper sticker there was a ‘coexist’ bumper sticker. How can those two be reconciled? If a women isn’t being well-behaved, she is being rebellious. And if she is being rebellious, she is not co-existing peacefully with those around her, is she? Illogical.

In any case, I thought that the bumper sticker’s premise was that for women to be recorded in history, they must have had to do something daring or against societal expectations, or had done something ‘out there’ in some way. This, I had mused, is illogical too, because there are plenty of women in history who were simply good at what they did, and that was why they got into the history books. Louisa May Alcott, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Marie Curie, Queen Elizabeth II, Sally Ride… Would NASA have chosen a rebellious upstart to be part of their space program? Of course not.

Curious now, I looked into the origins behind the bumper sticker and I was surprised by what I found.

The phrase comes from Harvard Professor Laurel Thatcher Ulrich. Ulrich identifies herself both as a feminist and a Mormon. It was her 1976 little-known academic paper published in American Quarterly called “Vertuous Women Found: New England Ministerial Literature, 1668-1735” where the now famous bumper sticker phrase was first seen.

Massachusetts, where Harvard is located, was populated in the 1600s by deeply religions Puritans who had emigrated from England and the Netherlands to worship God freely, something they could not do on the Continent.

Ulrich looked into the lives of ‘ordinary’ Puritan women, especially midwives, through their own diaries. The ordinary, the mundane, the repetitive nature of the life, consisting of hard work mainly at home, drew Ulrich’s attention. She expanded her paper into into a 1990 book called, “A Midwife’s Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, Based on Her Diary, 1785-1812.” The staying power and viral nature of the adage she had coined back in 1976 led to Ulrich eventually write a book in 2007 called by the very phrase she had coined: “Well-Behaved Women Seldom Make History.” Here is an excerpt from the 1976 paper:

Cotton Mather called them “The Hidden Ones.” They never preached or sat in a deacon’s bench. Nor did they vote or attend Harvard. Neither, because they were virtuous women, did they question God or the magistrates. They prayed secretly, read the Bible through at least once a year, and went to hear the minister preach even when it snowed. Hoping for an eternal crown, they never asked to be remembered on earth. And they haven’t been. Well-behaved women seldom make history; against Antinomians and witches, these pious matrons have had little chance at all.

It turns out, that Ulrich wanted to simply promote the lives of the Puritan and the 1800s women which history had forgot.

Ulrich noted that though women were nearly invisible in society, only recording when they were born, married, or died, their standing in spiritual realms was highly elevated.

…this circumscribed social position was not reflected in the spiritual sphere, that New England’s ministers continued to uphold the oneness of men and women before God, that in their understanding of the marriage relationship they moved far toward equality, that in all their writings they stressed the dignity, intelligence, strength, and rationality of women even as they acknowledged the physical limitations imposed by their reproductive role. …  Source 1976 paper, “Vertuous Women Found”

Huh. Go figure. A Mormon Harvard feminist professor who got it right. As for the popularity of the phrase I’d seen on the bumper sticker, Ulrich said that its ambiguity (when taken out of its context) accounts for its appeal. In other words, you can interpret it any way you want. Which is exactly what I had done at the red light when I first read it.

My objective when I wrote those words was not to lament their oppression but to give them a history. … [T]he ambiguity of the slogan surely accounts for its appeal. To the public-spirited, it is a provocation to action, a less pedantic way of saying that if you want to make a difference in the world, you can’t worry too much about what people think. To a few it might say “Good girls get no credit.” To a lot more, “Bad girls have more fun.” … Source: “Well-Behaved Women Seldom Make History” (Knopf, September 2007)

Well there you go.

There’s one more thing. The premise that ‘well behaved women seldom make history’ is supposed to spark a knee-jerk reaction that it’s a bad thing not to make history. Like, “Hey! I wanna get into history! Why can’t I be in the history books?! The biblical worldview would have a response to this in several respects. First, woman already are in the only history book that matters, the Bible. Well-behaved and rebellious women are both recorded throughout the pages of that holy Book. From Jezebel to Esther, from Mary to the Woman at the Well, women are recorded in biblical history doing what they do as humans.

Secondly, women already are recorded…in the Lamb’s Book of Life. There is NO OTHER book than that precious book one should aspire to have our names written.

And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Then another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, according to what they had done. (Revelation 20:12).

Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life. (Revelation 21:27).

If you have repented and believed in the risen Christ, then us well behaved women are all set with names written in the Lamb’s book. All other books will fade away. But not Jesus’ words, those are the only words and the only history that matters.

Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. (Matthew 24:35).

well behaved

Posted in theology

Prata Potpourri: Women, 9Marks, Discernment sans cynicism, Emma Lion, More

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

It’s Friday of Spring Break week off from school, and that means I’m on the downward slide toward resumption of work on Monday. I enjoy the Spring here in GA, before pollen and before humidity that is. Even with those two factors, it’s beautiful here. I love the greens of the fresh grass and buds. I love seeing the birds come back (though the trees are never totally silent as some birds winter-over here in north Georgia).

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I’ve had time to read, hang out at home, do little chores and jobs, and watch TV/listen to music. It makes me eager for eventual retirement, though I know myself and would have to watch out for sloth.

I haven’t published a Prata Potpourri in a while. This is the type of essay where I gather links to present to you. It seems like it would only take a short time to publish an essay like that but it’s one essay that takes me the longest. I need to vet each link and I abandon many as unsuitable before coming to rest on the ones I eventually pick. With more and more ministries falling under reproach, it takes even longer nowadays.

But take heart! As many ministries that go woke, turn progressive, or just become unpalatable, there are many more hidden gems. Jesus never leaves us without a remnant! Here are a few you might enjoy:

Dave Jenkins at Servants of Grace presents a podcast teaching How to Discern False Teachers Without Becoming Cynical,

In this episode of Contending for the Word, Dave Jenkins explains how Christians can practice biblical discernment without becoming cynical, suspicious, or hardened in heart. After being burned by doctrinal drift or unbiblical teaching, many believers swing between gullibility and distrust. Scripture calls us to something steadier, discernment shaped by the Word of God, grounded in love, and practiced with humility and spiritual stability.

Many people have noticed a wobble in the trajectory of the parachurch ministry IX Marks (or 9 Marks). Here in this substack Jon Harris lays out The Problem with IX Marks (And Their Social Justice Compromises). Buckle in, it’s a long one but a good one.

The always honorable and wise Chris Hohnholtz writes defending women who discourse about theological things in public. Despite the biblical examples of many women speaking of theology in public (not preaching, just conversing, evangelizing, or discussing), many men online are less than enthused about this fact. Chris rebuts it:

“One such example, especially within biblically conservative Christian camps, is the twisting of Scripture by some men to silence any woman who dares to engage in public discourse about the things of God.” More here, “Can Women Speak On the Things of God?“

Speaking of women, in his substack, David Ziffer asks the question: What is Radicalizing Our Women? It is good to remember that satan went after Eve first. Ever since then, women have always been vulnerable to satan’s attacks, since he thinks women are susceptible to deception. It worked then, it works now. If you doubt this, look at women’s ministries. They are rife with false teacers and false teaching.

In this essay, Ziffer notes that modern literature, including novels, that are aimed at women is glutted with radical feminism. Worse, female romans genres are basically soft-core pornography, and worst of all, men don’t know this. Ziffer only became aware because he set up his wife’s Kindle and scanned the titles that were “suggested” for her. He did a deeper study and found

Women’s romance fiction is an addictive form of pornography that outsells every other book category. It’s sprinkled with Marxist ideology that preaches…

Check out his essay at the link above.

Here is Tim Challies with a poetic-styled encouragement. Winter’s Cold and Heaven’s Joy

On the cultural side of things, the movie Project Hail Mary is being praised by secular people and Christians like. Fairly clean, great production values, super acting, and a heartwarming, virtuous storyline is the consensus. Read World’s review here. I had read the book last summer and enjoyed it.

As far as books go, I am enjoying The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion by Beth Brower. There are 8 volumes of these witty fiction novellas. Each book in this unfolding saga is so well written I felt bereft after I finished #5 and didn’t immediately have #6 to turn to. She creates characters and a setting that are so atmospheric, so alive with well-drawn characters and a sense of place and time, that it virtually felt like I was there. Set in London in 1883, Emma is an unforgettable lady you will definitely want to meet.

So that is the Potpourri for this time, thanks for reading and enjoy your day!

Posted in theology

The Covenant Seasoned with Salt

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

In 2 Peter 3:15-16, Peter wrote that there are some things Paul wrote that are hard to understand. The unstable distort those things. Perhaps the Holy Spirit did that on purpose so that it would weed out who truly sought understanding and who likes to find a chink and crowbar it further apart in order to insert their own wrong interpretation (so as to lead followers astray). This is my speculation. After all, He sends false teachers in order to test us (2 John 9-11, Deuteronomy 13:3, etc.).

But the Holy Spirit’s inspiration of God’s word through the minds and personalities of the Bible writers is remarkable for so many reasons, but for my purposes today, for its honesty.

There are hard things to understand in the Bible. The following phrase is one of them: “covenant of salt”. It is mentioned a few times in the Old Testament.

GotQuestions has some ideas, also giving a historical context as to the importance of salt. Phrases we use even today harken back to the days when salt was a precious commodity. For example, GotQuestions wrote-

There is more to salt than meets the taste buds. Salt has been used in many cultures as a valuable commodity. The word salary comes from an ancient word meaning “salt-money,” referring to a Roman soldier’s allowance for the purchase of salt. Someone who earns his pay is still said to be “worth his salt.” 

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Salt was used in that culture as part of a legally binding contract. That notion was carried forward into the Old Testament Law. King Abijah mentioned it in 2 Chronicles 13:5,

Do you not know that the LORD God of Israel gave the rule over Israel forever to David and his sons by a covenant of salt?

The Israelites were commanded to use salt as part of the grain offering and reminded not to forget that part of the offering, ever-

Every grain offering of yours, moreover, you shall season with salt, so that the salt of the covenant of your God will not be lacking from your grain offering; with all your offerings you shall offer salt. (Leviticus 2:13).

Matthew Henry on Leviticus 2:13, “Salt is required in all their offerings, v. 13. The altar was the table of the Lord; and therefore, salt being always set on our tables, God would have it always used at his. It is called the salt of the covenant, because, as men confirmed their covenants with each other by eating and drinking together, at all which collations salt was used, so God, by accepting his people’s gifts and feasting them upon his sacrifices, supping with them and they with him (Rev. 3:20), did confirm his covenant with them.”

Among the ancients salt was a symbol of friendship. The salt for the sacrifice was not brought by the offerers, but was provided at the public charge, as the wood was, Ezra 7:20–22. And there was a chamber in the court of the temple called the chamber of salt, in which they laid it up. Can that which is unsavoury be eaten without salt? God would hereby intimate to them that their sacrifices in themselves were unsavoury.

The saints, who are living sacrifices to God, must have salt in themselves, for every sacrifice must be salted with salt (Mk. 9:49, 50), and our speech must be always with grace (Col. 4:6), so must all our religious performances be seasoned with that salt. Christianity is the salt of the earth.

Henry, M. (1994). Matthew Henry’s commentary on the whole Bible: complete and unabridged in one volume (p. 153). Hendrickson.

Again the salt covenant is mentioned in Numbers-

Numbers 18:19, “All the offerings of the holy gifts, which the sons of Israel offer to the LORD, I have given to you and your sons and your daughters with you, as a permanent allotment. It is a permanent covenant of salt before the LORD to you and your descendants with you.“

JFB commentary on Numbers 18:19, “it is a covenant of salt—that is, a perpetual ordinance. This figurative form of expression was evidently founded on the conservative property of salt, which keeps meat from corruption; and hence it became an emblem of inviolability and permanence. It is a common phrase among Oriental people, who consider the eating of salt a pledge of fidelity, binding them in a covenant of friendship. Hence the partaking of the altar meats, which were appropriated to the priests on condition of their services and of which salt formed a necessary accompaniment, was naturally called “a covenant of salt” (Lev 2:13).

Jamieson, R., Fausset, A. R., & Brown, D. (1997). Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (Vol. 1, pp. 108–109). Logos Research Systems, Inc.

Here are a few resources on the fascinating topic of salt in the Bible!

TableTalk: Salt

There is a book of the history of salt by Mark Kurlansky. I thought was pretty interesting: Salt: A World History.

Finally, Mark 9:50 says,

“Salt is good; but if the salt becomes unsalty, with what will you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.”

Posted in theology

…As far as East is from the West…

Posted on by elizabethprata

By Elizabeth Prata

Resurrection Sunday has just passed. I celebrated the monumental work of our Lord in His redemption of us to the Father. He will present a spotless bride thanks to Him living a sinless life, becoming sin for us, dying on the cross after exhausting God’s wrath for those sins. He paid the penalty we were due.

that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless.(Ephesians 5:27).

But now He has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy, unblemished, and blameless in His presence— (Colossians 1:22).

The resurrection is a gateway to eternal life! And now our sins are as far away as the east is from the west!

As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our wrongdoings from us. (Psalm 103:2).

The Bible is so perfect in every way, so detailed and complex, but so clear a child could understand it, that there is a reason it is written ‘east from the west’ and not as far as the north is from the south. There is a difference between those cardinal directions.

You can travel north to the Pole. But once passing the North Pole you are now traveling south. However, if you travel east, there is never a time when you are now traveling west. It is endless. You always travel east and never get to the west. It is a measureless distance. It is an infinite distance.

Because the earth is a globe, a sphere, the lines of latitude circle endlessly. North and south lead to specific, finite points—the North and South Poles and you can’t go any further in that direction before it stops and becomes another direction.

Source SkyLights.org, https://sky-lights.org/2021/02/22/qa-why-there-are-no-east-or-west-poles

Jesus’s love for us is such that He not only bore the wrath for our sins but He removed them from us to an immeasurable infinity. When we repent, our sins are gone, boundlessly extinct. God’s immeasurable love is never distant from us though. Our sins are thrown to a point as far as the east is from the west, but God is Immanuel: God with us!

“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.” Isaiah 7:14.

Praise the Lord who was born, lived sinlessly taught, died, and rose again! Our sins are now taken care of, if we repent and believe.