Calvin on being a good minster of the Word of God and Scholarship

"None will ever be a good minister of the word of God, unless he is first of all a scholar." -- John Calvin

How My Mind Has Changed in This Decade: Part Two by Karl Barth

Read more....."The positive factor in the new development was this: in these years I had to learn that Christian doctrine, if it is to merit its name and if it is to build up the Christian church in the world as she must needs be built up. has to be exclusively and conclusively the doctrine of Jesus Christ -- of Jesus Christ as the living Word of God spoken to us men.....I should like to call it a christological concentration -- I have been led to a critical (in a better sense of the word) discussion of church tradition, and as well of the Reformers, and especially of Calvin." 

Hillsong United - Hosanna

Comparable to a hymn it's Hillsong United's song Hosanna. 

Double Predestination: The Elected Ones and the Crowd of the Condemned By Jürgen Moltmann

Here is an interesting essay by Jergen Moltmann commenting on Karl Barth and his reworking of Calvin's doctrine of Double Predestination. 

“The doctrine of election is the sum of the Gospel because of all words that can be said or heard it is the best: that God elects man; that God is for man too the One who loves in freedom,” said Karl Barth in § 32 of his Church Dogmatics (trans. is from Bromiley ed.). Why is this so? Because “God took upon himself the condemnation of sinful men with all consequences, and elected man to participate in his eternal glory (§ 33).” Is Barth teaching “double predestination?” Yes! But in a new dialectical form: God took the condemnation upon himself in order to embrace all in his election of grace. This is the new dialectical form of the old doctrine of “double predestination.” 

He goes on further and address what some say is Barth's Universalism. 

"Another question is whether universalism is the result of this reformulation. The answer is “No,” because we are witnesses of the Gospel not judges in the final judgment of God. Whether God will in the end embrace all with his transforming grace is His sake, ours is the witness of the Gospel to everybody."

Read more... 

Batman - Year One Animantion

If you haven't watched it yet, Batman-Year One is out on Animation by DC Animations and it's fabulous. It tells the story leading up to Dark Knight. 

A Moka Pot

My wife and I are going shopping today and one of the items that we are looking to purchase is a Moka Pot. The unit is found in most traditional italian homes and produces a coffee similar to espresso and not to far from a Turkish coffee.

My taste buds have changed more European in the last 4 years from living abroad, because I've been exposed to all the richness of the European products that make Singapore a former colony.

So cheers,

Ken

Was Calvin a Calvinist? Or, Did Calvin (or Anyone Else in the Early Modern Era) Plant the “TULIP”? Richard A. Muller

I've read most of this and will finish it up later today, but the ending of the article is tantalizing enough to read it more. 

"By way of conclusion, we return to the initial question, “Was Calvin a Calvinist?” The answer is certainly a negative. Calvin was not a “Calvinist” — but then again, neither were the “Calvinists.” They were all contributors to the Reformed tradition. The moral of the story, perhaps, is to recognize the common ground on which Calvin, the various Reformed confessions, and the so-called “Calvinists” of the later sixteenth and seventeenth centuries stand, and if you must, “gather ye rosebuds while ye may,” but don’t plant TULIP in your Reformed garden." 

Read more...

Ken