CRCM-UWO

Tonight at the Connection, we welcomed Dr. Dale Laird, professor of Anatomy and Cell Biology to lead us in discussing science and religion (you know, evolution and creation). It was a stimulating time as we explored what the stumbling blocks are to the Christian faith and how to not add unnecessary ones.

The Connection began this evening with a presentation by Tim Dam about his work with the Christian Reformed World Relief Committee in Uganda.

for Wednesday’s Connection discussion on humourby Peter Schuurman“Do not be afraid, I have good news for you: there is great joy coming to the whole people.” (NEB) Luke 2:10A girl and her father were visiting a farm one day, and the daughter looked intently at the horse in the barn. “He’s all ready to go to church,” she said.Father was confused. “What do you mean?”“Well, he’s already got a long face,” she replied.Some Christians give joy of the Lord a pretty sour face. John Calvin, for example, has never been known for his giddy sense of humour. In fact, he suffered from tremendous anxiety. Evaluating his Institutes of the Christian Religion, some have said that it has “a petulant and irritable tone, occasionally verging on the cantankerous.” Now does that sound like some people you know? How about yourself?The angels that appeared to the shepherds promised a great joy: God with us in the form of a baby. That same baby echoes the angels by saying to his disciples much later: “I came that my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete.” Well, what has happened to that joy?Sometimes we grow up too quickly. We become serious, if not cynical, and call it the weight of experience. The joy was beaten out of us by time and neglect, and we sing “Joy to the World” with bowed heads. Its not that we have lost faith, but somehow, our cup of joy is half-full. Or more appropriately, half-empty.How do we grow in joy? One day the disciples wanted to remove the children from around Jesus so the serious spiritual stuff could begin. Jesus told them to just wait a minute. He embraced the kids and said that disciples must become like little children if they wanted to enter the kingdom of God. Become like kids: what does that mean?Well, there is no secret recipe here. Joy comes mysteriously, most often when you don’t make it an object of pursuit. It creeps up on you when you put your questions aside and live fully in the experience of life—fully in the experience of receiving and trusting God in Jesus by the Holy Spirit. Receiving and loving infants does that to you, and Jesus Christ is the supreme child, our greatest expectation. Infants proclaim that miracles are the stuff of the universe, and that new life is as real as their babbles and coos. In the presence of such newness, we are surprised by joy.A student majoring in math ran in my office on campus one day and exclaimed: “Calvin saved me!” After some conversation, I realized what he meant was that by reading Calvin’s Institutes in-between math classes, he had come to a deeper understanding of the grace of God. He now recognized that God’s favour did not rest on his good behaviour or even his cheerfulness, but that God’s grace always comes first. He only needed to receive it with open arms! It was a cause for great joy!Blaise Pascal was another mathematician, the powerful mind behind the invention of calculus. Grace came to him without any additions, however. He wrote in his diary upon his conversion: “I met him… not the God of the scientists, but the God of Abraham, Moses and Jacob. Joy, joy, joy! Fire, fire fire! Joy, fire. Joy, fire. Joy, fire. Unspeakable joy, oh, the ecstasy of the joy of the Lord!”Pascal, mature in mind and serious about math, came to receive Jesus like a little child. John Calvin, sophisticated theologian and preacher, demonstrated in his emphasis on God’s sovereign grace, that he knew in his frail person that his comfort in life and in death rested in Christ alone. We all come with empty hands to God.The Westminster Confession, an extrapolation on the writings of Calvin, has the following as its first question and answer: “What is the chief purpose of humanity? To glorify and enjoy God forever.” Its simple, but true, and in that lies the beautiful heart of discipleship.Questions:1. Has your church experience been one of a “culture of joy”? If so, in what ways?2. Joy is not the same as perpetual giddiness. How would you distinguish lasting joy from constant happiness?3. What sort of things rob you of your joy? “Pride cannot rise to levity or levitation. Pride is the downward drag of all things into an easy solemnity… Seriousness is not a virtue… For solemnity flows out of men naturally; but laughter is a leap. It is easy to be heavy: hard to be light. Satan fell by the force of gravity.”- G. K. Chesterton Orthodoxy