Friday, June 04, 2021
This Is The Time For Contest And For Fighting
"Let us not then seek relaxation: for Christ promised tribulation to His disciples and Paul says, 'All who will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution.' [2 Timothy 3:12] No noble-spirited wrestler, when in the lists, seeks for baths, and a table full of food and wine. This is not for a wrestler, but for a sluggard. For the wrestler contendeth with dust, with oil, with the heat of the sun's ray, with much sweat, with pressure and constraint. This is the time for contest and for fighting, therefore also for being wounded, and for being bloody and in pain. Hear what the blessed Paul says, 'So fight I, not as one that beateth the air.' [1 Corinthians 9:26] Let us consider that our whole life is in combats, and then we shall never seek rest, we shall never feel it strange when we are afflicted: no more than a boxer feels it strange, when he combats. There is another season for repose. By tribulation we must be made perfect." (John Chrysostom, Homilies On Hebrews, 5:7)
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Today is the 1st year anniversary of Steve's passing. I'd like to recommend people read his fictional work Musica Mundana. He published it in 2005. As he often said you can know a lot about an author by his works. I read the book around 2014 and it was a real blessing.
ReplyDeleteIn a previous blog comment I wrote:
//Steve, I also really enjoyed your work Musica Mundana. It reminded me of all three books of C.S. Lewis' Space Trilogy, along with his Till We Have Faces, Umberto Eco's books Foucault's Pendulum and The Name of the Rose, and John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress. Though, once or twice I got the feeling that a sentence or two was accidentally deleted. The minor typos didn't bother me, but I think it's such a good work of fiction that someone should proofread it. Also, the lack of quotation marks sometimes made it difficult to follow the story. I loved how it included philosophy, theology, psychology, prose, poetry, fantasy, science fiction, mythology, classic literature, the liturgical calendar, Greek, Latin et cetera, yet with a devotional/pastoral flavor.
It has everything I was looking for in Marilynne Robinson's Gilead but better and more. I still haven't finished Gilead. It's so plodding and theologically weak. I don't understand why Calvinists recommend the book. As I understand it, she's more of a liberal Calvinist. In its stead Calvinists should recommend your book Musica Mundana.
Also, I've noticed that something like 5 of your last fiction haven't been posted on your blog "Where Dreams Come True." As well as "But These Things Are Written."//