Avery > Recent Status Updates

"Haste is a poor counsellor"

Using Lizzy Bennett and Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice to discuss portfolio risk management and the capital asset pricing model. Unexpected and interesting!

" ... all these structural connections suggest that there is a grand unity not only between the Old Testament and the New Testament, but also within the New Testament itself. Although the the skeptic may quickly dismiss such unity as coincidental or irrelevant, it is, nevertheless, precisely what we would expect from a divine book." (pg. 215)

Kruger quotes J. I. Packer: "The Church no more gave us the New Testament canon than Sir Isaac Newton gave us the force of gravity. God gave us gravity ... Newton did not create gravity but recognized it." (Packer, God Has Spoken pg.109)

"Congregationalism, in other words, requires the members to take ownership of the ministry of the church, which means it calls for greater activity, less complacency, less temptation to passive nominalism, and more opportunity to grow in grace and wisdom." (page 152)

"To hand final rule of the church over to the elders fires Christians from the work that the Holy Spirit has equipped them to do and that Jesus has authorized them to do with the keys of the kingdom."

"The office of priest-king given to the federal head or Everyman Adam, which involved working and watching over the place where God dwelled, was further specified in the life of Israel, fulfilled in Christ, and has now been re-conferred on every member of the church. In the new covenant era that means that every member of the church possesses this same office as mediated through Christ."

"Connectivity has undermined connection."

"Links don't just point us to related or supplemental works; they propel us towards them. They encourage us to dip in and out of a series of texts rather than devote sustained attention to any one of them. Hyperlinks are designed to grab our attention. Their value as navigational tools is inextricable from the distraction they cause." (Carr, Shallows, 90)

"The preacher gives his hearers a chance at life only insofar as he succeeds in faithfully reproducing what God has already said. So focus on that!" (page 102)

"God's Word, working through God's Spirit, is God's primary instrument for growing God's church." pg. 19

"If we allow our study of the Bible to wait upon our finding solutions to every problem that it's contents raise, we shall never get started at all ... It is idle to expect to find the answer to everything while we are in this world. What matters is that we should all actually be engaged in searching the Scriptures by the light of right principles and so daily learning of God, about our sin, and about his Son." p151

"Pleasure-seeking, as we learn by experience, is a barren business; happiness is never found till we have the grace to stop looking for it, and to give our attention to persons and matters external to ourselves. In this case, Bible study will only give enjoyment if conforming to our Creator in belief and behavior, through trust and obedience, is its goal." pg. 21

Packer addressed weaknesses in Wesley's perfectionism and Keswick holiness teaching.

"Being 'led by the Spirit of God' is not passivity. Paul's meaning is not that we should do nothing till celestial promptings pop into our minds, but that we should resolutely labor by prayer and effort to obey the law of Christ and mortify sin (Gal. 5:14-6:10, Rom. 8:5-13)." pg. 188

A chapter on holiness.

"Credible opposition to secular ideologies can be shown by speaking and writing, but credible opposition to unholiness can only be shown by holy living."

Packer quotes Richard Baxter:

"Christ leads me through no darker rooms
Than he went through before."

More scholarly than I expected. First few chapters were pretty dry, but finally starting to piece together many cool themes in the last couple chapters.