Did Galileo Pray?

Hey Everyone,

I am amazed at how God often times keeps things hidden for a long time, perhaps a better phrase would be he keeps them hidden until the right time. Out of a conversation I had last week with a long time friend I found a new book to read. I’m pretty picky about my reading. Though I write fiction I don’t read much because, well, there’s not too much that keeps my attention. And when it comes to non-fiction, well the truth is, I don’t read much except theology. What did Solomon say? Oh yeah, to the writing of books there is no end and the excessive devotion to books is wearying to the body.

I hadn’t devoured a new book in a long time. I’ve tried several. I have John Frame’s newest book to endanger the forests of the world, Christian Ethics. But though I’ve had it for over a year, and even though I was looking forward to its release with much anticipation, I haven’t made it past the third chapter. (This is as opposed to the first two in his Lordship series which I devoured in about a week each).

I am working my way slowly through R.J. Rushdoony’s Roots of Reconstruction, and I am enjoying it and learning tons but it’s not really a single book it’s more a collection of short Chalcedon articles so I’m reading it more like a devotion book; an article or two a night before I go to bed.

And then this week I printed off H. Evan Runner’s book: The Relation of the Bible to Learning and I can’t put it down. It is filling in gaps in my thinking and speaking my language, or a language that I can understand. Lights are going off (and that’s a good thing for me anyway).

You see I led and lead a pretty sheltered life theologically. In my younger days, I was too afraid of being contaminated by liberalism and ended up embracing fundamentalism and its disdain for intellectual pursuits. So I was 25 before I’d ever heard of Rushdoony and 30 before I knew what the reformed faith was. I was 47 before I pushed the reformed faith farther than it wanted to go and ended back at the Baptist Church ( a very unusual Baptist Church by the way – they wanted me to be their pastor). These things were hidden from me for some reason.

But when I found these things I ate them up because they were like life to me. They filled in gaps that my isolation had left me with. They tore down structures that weren’t built on the foundation of scripture. They also got me into a lot of trouble. I’m not sure why believing scripture to really be the word of God and then trying to apply it faithfully gets a person in trouble in the church but it does. And in fact, if God ever does allow us to really begin to think Christianly again I fear the backlash from the church more than I do the humanists. (Don’t ever forget the Pharisees were the church leaders of their day).

God took me down a lot of preparatory roads of learning before he let me read the words I’ve been reading this week. He prepared my heart to receive and my brain to comprehend. It is as if the road has made a sharp turn and I find myself more focused on my destination than ever before. Things are coming together, in my head at least, that may very well help me flesh out the thoughts that have been bouncing around without a home for a long time.

I don’t usually get this taken by a new author but as I read the words of H. Evan Runner I find a kindred spirit, a man who believes the word of God is powerful, that it is deeper and more meaningful than the words on the pages of the bible and unless you have an encounter with powerful word of God you will never understand the words in the book that we hold dear. Here is a man who understood that if the word of God is true then anything that contradicts it, in any field of study is a lie. He is well aware that we live in a world that is based upon a lie and his call is for us to be people of the word of power and truth. Unless we do that we can never truly learn anything in any area of knowledge because our learning will be based on false information.

Those are ideas that will either empower Christianity to conquer the world or get those who really believe them crucified. The jury’s still out on how that will work its way out in our time.

In the process of finding Runner, I ran across this website that has begun to put out of print books into PDF format. The site is

http://www.reformationalpublishingproject.com/rpp/index.asp

It is amazing. They have all of Herman Dooeyweerd’s books there, as well as, many others that I haven’t heard of. This discovery has left me with several dilemmas. Do I print these off (some of them are 1200 page books) or do I get an I pad or a kindle? The next is: I wonder how difficult it is to learn to read Dutch?

A foundation of true truth is more important than anything. Are we willing to embrace it regardless of the consequences to our own lives? I am reminded of another Ellis Paul song (it’s in my player this week) this one called: Did Galileo Pray?

When he looked Into a starry sky upon Jupiter,
With it's cold moons Making their weary rounds.
Did he know that the Pope
Would claim that he ran with Lucifer
And a prison cell Would be where he'd lay his head down?

Was he wearing a thorny crown?
When he plotted the motion of planets, Was Mercury in retrograde?
But he found the truth when a lie was what was demanded.
When the judges asked him pointedly
He was a' trembling that day.

Did Galileo pray?

And he said, Tell Ptolemy, tell Copernicus,
That the Sun is at the core of us
The Church, the Pope Can't deny the Milky Way
And every flower that follows the sun,
Has known all along What God has done
They whisper truth As the seasons each give way.

Don't shoot the messenger, The postman delivers Truth today.
And Truth will march in Birmingham
It will block the tanks in Tiananmen.
Put the judges on the witness stand
Let's see what they all say. I
n the heavens you'll see it As God has conceived it.

Oh, believe it. Oh, what have you got to do to believe?



------- What do we have to do to believe? It is time to put synthesis aside, the blending of truth and lie into something we can all live with. It’s time to believe the truth alone.

Even as we pump water and shovel mud from our houses.

Eyes to see and ears to hear for you all,
Brad