Yes, I am. The past several days have included quite a lot of travel for me, an unexpected few days in the hospital with an ailing (but fully-recovered) child, and just a busy schedule of late. But I appreciate your patience with me as this blog may feel at times like a ride in a Manhattan taxi—lurching in a capricious rhythm of acceleration and brake.

I’ve been waiting for a moment to write because two weekends ago I traveled to New Orleans. It was my first trip to the city. And time allowed for a drive through the Lower Ninth Ward, an impoverished neighborhood that took a hurricane Katrina flood surge blow to the jaw. It remains a gloomy scene of destruction even three years later. Where the floodwaters broke through the concrete flood barriers, homes were completely washed away. The area now looks like a road-gridded field of tall weeds and the remains of a few concrete stones that once held a home a foot off the ground to keep it dry. Away from the direct target of the rushing water there sit rows of destroyed homes.

In the Lower Ninth Ward a number of homes are gone and many more are gutted and boarded up. Practically all of the houses that remain standing have been vacated. Each remaining house bears a white “x” on the front of the house, a government-sanctioned graffiti mark for the findings of an emergency crew that surveyed the home after Katrina. The “x” is a grid to document information like the date the home was searched, the search team ID, and the number of fatalities in the home. These white “x” marks, painted by crews in anticipation of what destruction was awaiting them on the inside of the home, are now faded, but visible on nearly all the remaining homes.

The drive was sobering. It was as if the floodwaters of Katrina had just dried and a large vacuum descended from the sky to suck away all the loose debris. The big debris remains. Homes are falling down, windows are busted out, front doors are gone, roofs are collapsing, weeds are growing.

The area is largely abandoned, but the entry doors to several homes are gone–the only factor that gives the neighborhood a feeling of neighborly welcome. But these open doors work only to reveal an unobstructed view to the stripped studs on the inside. What was a low-income neighborhood is now a largely abandoned ghost town. A few homes have been rebuilt, but most have not, and it appears the Lower Ninth Ward is now most used as a large and quiet park for gawking tourists to view the destructive remains of Katrina.

Had I only toured the Ninth Ward, it would have been a depressing trip.

But the highlight was a celebration with a local church the grand opening of their new building after their last one was destroyed in the hurricane. The trip was a sober reminder of death and destruction contrasted with new life and restoration. The gospel is advancing and this local church is filled with hope.

So I’m back. And it is really great to be back.

BTW, did you read Tom Brouwer’s question on the last post? It’s a good one. And while I’m not an expert on these things, I’m planning to write a post in response to share what I have learned along the way. That’s for next time. Anyway, it’s great to be home.

“That one main end of the Word of God,
and preaching,
is to discover this deceitful heart.
It’s to make us know ourselves;
compared therefore to a glass,
that will show a deformed man all his unloveliness,
and this is a glass,
not to the face but the heart;
all those hidden and unknown lusts may there be brought to light.
And the Ministry that is compared to light;
as the sunbeams discover those many thousands of motes in the air,
which the darkness concealed;
thus the Ministry,
in a powerful and soul-saving way dispensed,
will make thee see thyself to be that beast,
that devil,
yea to have that dunghill,
that hell in thy heart,
thou didst not perceive:
look then for this benefit by preaching,
not what may fit thy ear,
may please thy fancy,
but what may discover the dark corners of thy soul,
what may bring glorious light into thy breast;
that thou mayest cry out;
O Lord, how long have I lived and did not know myself!
I thought all was well,
everything was in quiet;
but now I am like the Syrian army,
that being by the Prophet stricken blind,
and thought they were guided to their own camp,
as soon as ever they had their eyes opened,
they found themselves in the midst of the enemy’s camp:
Thus thy eyes being opened,
thou seest thyself to be in the power of all thy sins,
all thy enemies and the curses of God.”

–Anthony Burgess [d. 1664]
Spiritual Refining, Part II: A Treatise of Sin, pp. 19-20

[One note of clarification–I think the one main end of the Word of God is the application of the perfect work of Christ to sinners, not merely in discovering the depth of sin. Showing people sin is the easy part. Showing people the grace of God is not so easy. So I’m not agreeing with Burgess on all points here.]

——–

Painting by Raphael. “St. Paul Preaching in Athens” (1515, London, Victoria and Albert Museum)

This week I stumbled across an online photo collection taken at a recent body piercing expo. And it was nasty!

I’ve never seen so many people together piercing all regions of their head with all types of metal. I’m a bit bummed I didn’t note the url but I’m not about to attempt a Google search for “body piercing expo photos.” So let me describe what I saw.

One photo captured a man who pierced his cheeks with two full-sized, glistening swords. Dribbles of blood were still running down his cheeks when the photo was taken and I guess the swords were now the jewelry. Literally it looked like a crisscrossed sword display transplanted from a wall into a man’s face, each sword entering through one of the man’s cheeks and then out his mouth. Another man appeared to have a game of pick-up-sticks embedded into his facial tissue. Eight-inch bamboo sticks were running through his nose, lips or cheeks in all directions. This collection was the most bizarre assortment of pictures I’ve seen on the web (which says a bit). Behold the power of futility under peer pressure.

I fill your minds with disgusting piercing stories for a purpose. Because when I think of jabbing a bamboo stick through my nose two things come to mind. First, how hard do you need to push to get it through? Yowza. And secondly, I think about money.

As you’ve noticed, we have entered a period of economic ‘uncertainty.’ But as far as I can tell, the state of the economy is fairly certain: dismal. Clearly recession has hit and I’m thankful for the economic smart guys putting Humpty together again. I know enough about economics to know the The Dow Jones index should not be plummeting like it is. But more importantly, this means the average American is financially struggling to some degree or other. Struggling to pay for gas, struggling to refinance, struggling to pay for groceries, even struggling to find work. Like no other time in my short life experiences, money is on the minds of us all.

And in times like this it’s good to be reminded of Paul’s words in 1 Timothy 6:6-10:

Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.

This is one of the clearest, most tangible, and universally relevant passages in Scripture on contentment. From the day Paul wrote these words until now—some 711,000 days later—humans have been daily pursuing food and clothing. And with these, Scripture says, we can learn to be content and remain content.

The promise of contentment, and how to find it, is simple and clear. And so is the opposite. Contrary to joyful contentment is a love of money, a betrothal to wealth. And money makes for an unfaithful spouse. Because when money (in the form of equity, stocks, retirement) begins disappearing, the love of money pierces hard. Like jabbing a bamboo stick through our nostrils.

See, Paul’s contrast in this passage is clear. I either pierce the love of money or I pierce myself. Which means the pain we feel while watching the value of our assets bomb may not simply be the pain inflicted by big banks and Wall Street. It may be self-inflicted.

Our only hope in times like these will be contentment—hearts satisfied with the riches of grace, hearts thankful for what Christ has accomplished on the cross, and hearts hopeful for the greater promises to be fulfilled in the future when our food will be in the form of a feast and our clothes will include a crown. Until then, we have food, and clothes, and the One who was pierced for our transgressions. We have enough to be daily joyful.

———-

pic by aaron dieppa

Recently Calvin Seminary hosted the A Pearl and A Leaven: Herman Bavinck for the Twenty-First Century conference (September 18-20, 2008). Some of the sessions are very good. The audio recordings are now available via stream: