Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Quote of the Day: An Ignorant Intelligence
“Education is not the answer, because ignorance is not the problem.” ~ Alistair Begg
With the tragic events of the past weekend, I felt drawn to wrestle with some words that might help me make sense of why we are again faced with mass public murder. Some of you might take issue with these musings and that’s OK. This is something I need to work out in my heart and with my God.
If like me, your mind immediately springs to political machinations when you see these headlines; then we need to check our hearts. Yes, who did it and why is important, but so is the terrible loss of life and shattered families. Communities will take years to recover and some children will grow up without their parents. In a couple of weeks, I won’t even give these events a second thought. But somewhere, there will be families that wake up in mourning for years. That isn’t insignificant. Jesus stood outside a grave knowing what was about to happen – and wept. I think he felt the full weight of sorrow and grief. Compassion needs to be the calling card of Christians.
The reality is that this world is broken – and we are broken too. We think that more government programs will fix it – or fewer. We need more guns – or fewer. We have so many answers. But it’s the questions that change us. Begg, of course, isn’t making the argument against an education. He’s saying that our flaws are too deep to cut out. We can’t think our way out of it and we can’t work our way out of it. There will be another day argue about policies and write blog posts. But today I want to stand in love, repentance, and grace. And look ahead to a day when creation doesn’t groan. It’s good that we remind ourselves of this.
Andrew Peterson ~ Is He Worthy?
Published in Group Writing
1 Corinthians 13
1 Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.
2 And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.
3 And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.
4 Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up,
5 Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil;
6 Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth;
7 Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.
8 Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.
9 For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.
10 But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.
11 When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
12 For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.
13 And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.
This isn’t taught anymore –
I am not a Christian. But I can be taught this. Why can’t others?
The world has always been broken, it’s just that the culture doesn’t help. I’ve seen 1950-1960’s TV shows like The Lone Ranger and Gunsmoke that had plenty of fighting and shooting, but had an overall good vs. evil theme. Since then, the culture elites wish to over-emphasize the ugly side of life, and remove the focus on positive ideals.
Alistair Begg is the Senior Pastor of Cleveland’s Parkside Church, born in 1952 like me. Other Alistair Begg quotes that help in this regard:
The Quote of the Day series is the easiest way to start a fun conversation on Ricochet. There are many dates open on the August Signup Sheet. We even include tips for finding great quotes, so choose your favorite quote and sign up today!
People still hate evil and love good. In spite of our incredibly stupid intellectual currents, the Marvel movies and the fantastical Harry Potter series ceaselessly condemn evil and love what is good.
Quoting Alistair Begg is pretty much an automatic Like from me. I once had the pleasure of seeing him speak in St. Louis. Actually, I was relegated to the overflow seating in the basement, so I saw the speech on a monitor. He was kind enough to come down and shake some hands before the speech, though.
His podcast is on Stitcher, or you may find his radio program on one of your local stations.
Thank you! We truly need to “mourn with those that mourn and comfort those who stand in need of comfort.” Matthew 5 .
I was thinking about this, too.
“Rachmana liba ba’ei” is an Aramaic expression which means
G-d wants the heart.
Perhaps this is the underlying meaning of your quote.
It’s true we live in a broken world – and we (humans) broke it. As a Christian it is obvious that when God cast Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden he wasn’t sugar coating what our existence was going to become. We were going to suffer.
I have come to believe that the test is whether we can maintain our faith in the shadow of so many terrible and tragic events. Last week I had a very close friend unexpectedly lose her 26 year old son to an undiagnosed brain hemorrhage. He died in his sleep and I was with her as the police broke into his house and confirmed everyone’s worst fears.
I think of Abraham having enough faith that he would sacrifice his own son if God had commanded him to or the people from the Charleston church who prayed for Dylan Roof after he killed many of their fellow parishioners.
Those individuals showed a strength of faith that is intimidating to me because I am unsure I could match it and would rather default to fury and hate pulling me farther away from God – essentially becoming what I abhor.
That is beautiful and good advice for these times. I don’t think the world is broken but some of our young men are. They must be fixed.
There are always broken dangerous people and the larger the population the more there will be. Some of our highly urban centers, Chicago, Baltimore etc. are worse than others. Such chaos was created almost totally by liberal democrats over a long period of time. Then there are sick folks, usually kids, who do crazy stuff because of some fantasy in their heads. They’re a tiny minority compared to the urban Democrat run cities and are not always obviously dangerous until they are. Some of these kids could be institutionalized before they murder but we don’t allow that until after they’ve murdered. The sick kid problem, and our inability to deal with it is so complex it has to be simplified, the way most reality must be. You let the folks deal with it, locally. Curiously we don’t allow that but the truth is some local folks will figure it out and lead the way. These human problems can’t be dealt with or solved entirely, but can never be solved nationally in ways compatible with freedom in a country of over 300 million of the most diverse people on earth. Like everything else, the centralizers in both parties are self interested or at their best merely wrong. The center has a role to play, research, demonstration projects, etc. but they should never run or control matters because they can’t.
Twice you mention “democrats”, once lowercase and once uppercase. Observe it should be lowercase because it is not the political party but the ideas and actions, the worldview, that is wrong and therefore leads to bad results. I think we could agree that members of both political parties are guilty.