Tuesday, May 06, 2008

• An adopted little sister of mine gave me this article by John Piper from World Magazine this weekend. It is really good and I thought I would share it with you all. I read it aloud to another adopted sister nearby [we were all together at sleep over on Sunday night. Well, it was more like a "stay over" as one of my friend's fathers likes to say: "I don't know why girls call them sleepovers because there always seems to be very little sleep happening at them." ] and as I was reading I kept making remarks like: "Wow, this guy is an incredible writer!" "What an amazing statement!" etc. Then I happened to glance at the top of the page and noticed the author, John Piper and I was not surprised. Over the years I have been blessed and really challenged by the ministry of Mr. Piper. He shares the truth in love yet with boldness that is amazing.

   

     “One of the most important discoveries I have ever made is this truth: God is most glorified in me when I am most satisfied in him.” -John Piper

   

  "Don't waste your life trying to look good. Spend your life making God look good. That's why you were made." -John Piper

   

  I've been thinking a lot lately. About many different things. Mostly about life and decisions I have or have not made and what role they play in what God's will is for me. It is rather convicting to evaluate one's decisions based on what one feels God has called them to do and whether or not they measure up to the standard of helping or hurting that vision to which they were called. I was challenged last night at bible study as we were studying the crucifixion of Jesus. There was a Bible Principle during lecture time that really encouraged my heart: "God's plan will always be fulfilled, no matter how definite the defeat appears to be."

  The Pharisees thought they had won, they set a guard and sealed the tomb so no one could get in, or out... so they thought. But really all their webs of deceit just made God's miracle all the more amazing! They were adding to the astonishment. Supporting the surprise and contributing to the celebration of a resurrected Savior! God's plans will never fail no matter what man plans or how things seem to get in the way of His plan!

   

  Meanwhile I am sick. Nasty headcold-combined-with-sore-throat-cough-and-headache. The combination of which has lead to almost complete exhaustion and almost no motivation to do the several imperative things that need to be accomplished this week. Sigh... [I am thankful though, cause I haven't been sick in a long while.] So I am armed with lots and lots of Vitamin C, hot tea, Mom's-amazing-chicken-soup and of course lots of rest in between trying to be motivated. Its rather shocking how draining a "simple" head-cold can be!

   

  Thus I am going to lay low and slowly but surely work at my list-of-things-to-do and probably spend some time reading. I have read three books in the last month and that makes me oh-so-happy! Yay for reading! [I remembered yesterday that I have a 15% off your entire purchase coupon for 1/2 Price Bookstore during the month of May... *wheee*] My tea needs to be warmed up so I am off to take a nap, I think...

   

  He is beautiful.

  -KM

  Combat and cowardice

  Men were not wired to follow women into danger | John Piper

  If I were the last man on the planet to think so, I would want the honor of saying that no woman should go before me into combat to defend my country. A man who endorses women in combat is not pro-woman; he's a wimp. He should be ashamed. For most of history, in most cultures, he would have been utterly scorned as a coward to promote such an idea. Part of the meaning of manhood as God created us is the sense of responsibility for the safety and welfare of our women.

  Back in the '70s, when I taught in college, feminism was new and cool. So my ideas on manhood were viewed as the social construct of a dying chauvinistic era. I had not yet been enlightened that competencies, not divine wiring, governed the roles we assume. Unfazed, I said no.

  Suppose, I said, a couple of you students, Jason and Sarah were walking to McDonald's after dark. And suppose a man with a knifed jumped out of the bushes and threatened you. And suppose Jason knows that Sarah has a black belt in karate and could probably disarm the assailant better than he could. Should he step back and tell her to do it? No. He should step in front of her and be ready to lay down his life to protect her, irrespective of competency. It is written on his soul. That is what manhood does.

  And collectively that is what society does- unless the men have all been emasculated by the suicidal songs of egalitarian folly. God created man first in order to say that man bears a primary burden for protection, provision and leadership. And when man and women rebeled against God's ways, God came to the garden and said, Adam where are you? [Genesis 3:9], not Eve, where are you? And when the apostle described the implications of being created male and female, the pattern he celebrate is: Save her, nourish her, cherish her, give her life [Ephesians 5:25-29].

  God wrote manhood and womanhood on our hearts. Sin ruins the imprint without totally defacing it. It tells men to be heavy-handed oafs or passive wimps. It tells women to be coquettes or controllers. That is not God's imprint. Deeper down, men and women know it.

  When God is not in the picture, the truth crops up in strange forms. For example, Kingsley Browne, law professor at Wayne State University in Michigan, has written a new book called Co-Ed Combat: The New Evidence That Women Shouldn’t Fight the Nation’s Wars. In an interview with Newsweek, he said, "The evidence comes from the field of evolutionary psychology... Men don’t say, ‘This is a person I would follow through the gates of hell.’ Men aren’t hardwired to follow women into danger."

  If you leave God out, the perceived "hard wiring" appears to be "evolutionary psychology." If God is in the picture, it has other names. We call it "the work of the law written on their hearts" [Romans 2:15]. We call it true manhood as God meant it to be.

  As usual, the truth that comes in the alien form of "evolutionary psychology" gets distorted. It is true that "men aren’t hard-wired to follow women into danger. " But that’s misleading. The issue is not that men are being led into danger. The issue is that they are being led in combat by women. It won’t work. Men are hard-wired to get in front of their women– between them and the bullets. They are hard-wired to lead their women out of danger and into safety. And women, at their deepest and most honest selves, give profound assent to this noble impulse in good men. That is why co-ed combat situations compromise men and women at their core, and corrupt, even further, the foolhardy culture that put them there.

  Consider where we have come. One promotion for Browne’s book states, "More than 155,000 female troops have been deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan since 2002. And more than 70 of those women have died....Those deaths exceed the number of military women who died in Korea, Vietnam and the Gulf war combined."

  Who do we thank for this collapse of chivalry? Browne suggests: "There are a lot of military people who think women in combat is a horrible idea, but its career suicide to say it." In other words, let the women die. I still have my carrer. May God restore sanity and courage once again to our national leaders and defenders. And may He give you a voice.

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