I believe Jürgen Clive may have taken being named after a German theologian and an English religious thinker to heart a little too much. The photo above shows what he did to my copy of Fleming Rutledge’s work “The Crucifixion” when I left it as “low-hanging fruit” in my suitcase from my last trip. Since hardcover copies of the book are presently selling for $289 on Amazon I don’t think I will be replacing this any time soon.
I’m all for Clive devouring theology (especially good theology, because Dr. Rutledge’s book is excellent) but I wish he would do so a little less literally.
Dr. Rutledge, Clive liked your book so much he drooled a lot. Of course, he drools over everything, but I am sure this was special drool because of your book.
So according to Eric, my friend and the guy who lets me hunt on his property, I am the worst hunter. This wasn’t the first time I have received such a title. Yesterday it was because i allowed Eric’s dog, Gretchen, to accompany me to the tree stand I was going to be sitting in.
I figure she would just walk a little distance with me and then head back to the house. I continued to think this until I was about a tenth of a mile away from the tree stand. That is when Gretchen scared up a deer and I figured i wasn’t going to be able to get rid of her. I walked to the tree stand and sat while she ran through the woods. I kind of hoped that she might scare something over to me, instead of away from me. Nope that wasn’t going to happen.
Yeah, I’m worst hunter.
After she ran around for awhile she then came, grabbed a stick, and sat down around 15 yards away from my stand to chew on the stick. Eric drove his four-wheeler out to get her after I sent him a photo of her sitting by me, but he didn’t have to. I was fine with Gretchen being there. The good news was that I had C.S. Lewis’s “Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer“with me and I like dogs, including Gretchen. All together it was a pretty enjoyable afternoon sitting in the woods reading and watching a dog run around.
I can’t always control my circumstances but I can control my response to them. Viktor Frankl writes about this in his classic book “Man’s Search for Meaning“. Frankl writes the following:
Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.
Frankl was dealing with the horror of the Holocaust and I am definitely not comparing dealing with Gretchen to the Holocaust. She can be a pain but she’s still a sweet dog. I just like to quote Frankl whenever possible. If you haven’t read “Man’s Search for Meaning”, you should. Like right now.
Anyhow, while I do enjoy actually getting to harvest a deer every now and then (right now I average 1 every other year, which is better than the Wisconsin average. Last I heard 1 in 3 Wisconsin hunters get a deer each year. I’m ahead of that ratio.) the real reason that I hunt deer, especially bow hunt, is how loud the forest becomes when you deer hunt. The forest seems real quite till you sit in it for a while. Then you notice how noisy it is.
Squirrels and mice are the ADHD teens of the woods. These little creatures are constantly making noise. I can hear them all around me when I am sitting in a tree stand. Chatter, chatter. Rustle, rustle. Hide a nut here. Nope let’s move it over here. I believe my favorite thing is hearing geese fly over me, just above the forest canopy. I’m not talking about their honking, though I like that too. Nope I love the sound of their wings cutting through the air. When you sit in a tree stand long enough for them not to know you are there you can hear the act of them flying. It is very cool. Then, of course, every now and then you get to hear a deer come close … though it usually turns out to be a squirrel instead. Those stupid, little rodents are really loud.
I’m sure there is some greater point to sitting quietly enough to loudly hear all the small noises, but I’ll leave the development of that point up to you.
Just read this quote from Frederick Douglass and loved it.
“Between the Christianity of this land and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible difference—so wide, that to receive the one as good, pure and holy is of necessity to reject the other as bad, corrupt and wicked.”
Frederick Douglass
In addition I found the passage in the appendix of Douglass’s work “Life of an American Slave”.
I find, since reading over the foregoing Narrative, that I have, in several instances, spoken in such a tone and manner, respecting religion, as may possibly lead those unacquainted with my religious views to suppose me an opponent of all religion. To remove the liability of such misapprehension, I deem it proper to append the following brief explanation. What I have said respecting and against religion, I mean strictly to apply to the slaveholding religion of this land, and with no possible reference to Christianity proper; for, between the Christianity of this land, and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible difference — so wide, that to receive the one as good, pure, and holy, is of necessity to reject the other as bad, corrupt, and wicked. To be the friend of the one, is of necessity to be the enemy of the other. I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land. Indeed, I can see no reason, but the most deceitful one, for calling the religion of this land Christianity. I look upon it as the climax of all misnomers, the boldest of all frauds, and the grossest of all libels. Never was there a clearer case of “stealing the livery of the court of heaven to serve the devil in.” I am filled with unutterable loathing when I contemplate the religious pomp and show, together with the horrible inconsistencies, which every where surround me.
Reading From Margaret Atwood’s book The Handmaid’s Tale right now and was struck last night by the following quote from it.
The Bible is kept locked up, the way people once kept tea locked up, so the servants wouldn’t steal it. It is an incendiary device: who knows what we’d make of it, if we ever got our hands on it? We can be read to from it, by him, but we cannot read.
Reminds me that the word of God in the hands of the oppressed has often a thing feared by those in power. This book that so many have but few seem to read contains the word of the freedom giving God. The powerful often try to us the Lord’s words as a means of control but His truth always seeps through their control and that truth ultimately will make people free (john 8:32). He sets the captives free and that is something their captors dread.
Pam and the boys gave me quite possibly the best gift ever. Last year Pam and I wee walking through a Barnes & Noble when I saw a display of soft leather cover classic books. I mentioned to her that I wish I could find such a copy of any of several C.S. Lewis books that I could carry around with me to read when I had a spare moment. I specifically mentioned finding “Till We Have Faces”. There are many books that I love and have read many times, but the two books that I reread the most are the Bible and Till We Have Faces. I don’t know how many times I have reread TWHF but I believe it is around 10 times.
Pam listened, remembered, and the boys joined in our her conspiracy.
They ordered a 1st English edition (I already have a 1st American edition) and then snuck it to a professional binder who converted it from original hardcover into a soft, supple leather cover. It is pure perfection. I absolutely love it. It will be in my possible the vast majority of time.
I’m presently reading “The Answer to Our Cry” by Rick McKinley. McKinley is the pastor of Imago Dei church in Portland (a church that I respect greatly) and one of the people who started Advent Conspiracy (an organization that I also respect greatly). I really connect with McKinley’s consistency concerning bringing everything back to the Trinity and the Image of God (Imago Dei).
I just read this quote from McKinley connecting Jesus’ desire for His followers to practice justice based on humans bearing the Image of God.
We don’t simply use labels for those we see on the evening news, however. We use them for the people across the street, down the road, or across town. We label our neighbors who are gay, Muslim, or divorced. We label the neighborhood a few blocks away from us with all the Russian immigrants.
We don’t see people who are made in the image of the God who sets us free to love them, because we separate ourselves from them through our differences. When we do that, we take away their light as image bearers of God and create separation that robs us of the possibility of knowing them.
That is why Jesus confronts injustice not by calling our attention to the greatest offenders of shalom but by calling us to love our neighbor as ourselves. We like the idea that we are made in the image of God, but do we like the idea that our neighbors are too?
Rick McKinley, The Answer to our Cry, p. 115-6.
I love that last line. “We like the idea that we are made in the image of God, but do we like the idea that our neighbors are too?” Very tru e and very challenging.
As I have mentioned before I may be a lousy deer hunter but I am an excellent deer hunting reader. Today’s adventure in bad deer hunting is brought to you by “The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate” by John H. Walton. It is pretty good thus far. As for the deer, well they stayed well hidden.
I was able to go out deer hunting for a little while this afternoon and thought I would report on how it was. The reading was great. 🙂 Today I started N.T. Wright’s “Evil & the Justice of God” and, at least, the first third of it is very good. The deer hunting? Well, I at least saw a deer in the field I was hunting today. Unfortunately it was 150ish yards away and either I spooked it when I was trying to look at it through my scope or something else did, because it ever so gingerly jumped back into the woods. It didn’t bolt away, so I waited hoping it would come back. Unfortunately it didn’t come back out for the remaining 10 minutes of shooting time.
Like I have written previously, I’m a terrible deer hunter, but I am an excellent deer hunting reader. Still the reading was really good. 🙂
Short post here because I haven’t had a shot at a deer yet this season. I went yesterday morning for 5 hours, yesterday afternoon for an hour and a half, and then two hours this afternoon. The first question that is usually asked is “have you had any luck?” Well luck is the tough part of that question. As I wrote earlier I haven’t had a shot at a deer yet, but I did get close enough to hit four deer with a rock if I had wanted too. Yesterday afternoon when I was driving back to the Glaze abode (where I am mostly hunting this year). When I hit their driveway there were 3 does and a nice 6-8 point buck standing there right in between me and the house, which meant I couldn’t shoot even if I had been ready. ARGH! They eventually ran around the house and Eric saw them but he didn’t have a shot either. Not sure if that is really lucky or not. I assume seeing deer really close and not being able to shoot isn’t lucky, at least for me, maybe it is for the deer. Personally I don’t really care about the deer being lucky.
Anyhow on the good side I did finish my first deer hunting read today. I like to read while I am deer hunting. It is part of the fun. According to Eric this makes me a terrible deer hunter. I, on the other hand, like to think that it makes me an excellent deer hunting reader. Anyhow the first book was Neil Gaiman’s “The Ocean at the End of the Lane.” It was excellent.
