Renewing Our Mind: Part 2

(Christ Is King)

Alas I cannot speak of transformation without the renewing of our minds nor can I speak of the renewing of the mind without transformation for central to the proposition of transformation is Christ. He is the key ingredient. Additionally, if your mind has been renewed, then you have the Holy Spirit inside of you. Your mind has been reformed to be on the thoughts of God and not of man. What I am saying is that born-again Christians have an acceptance of and are obedient to the Holy Trinity: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Therefore, I am going to explain what every person needs and must do to be transformed and also provide a measure by which whether their minds are truly renewed. 

The Transformational Process 

For there to be a beginning of the renewing of the mind, there must be the beginning of the renewing of the heart. Because “there is not a just man on earth who does good And does not sin” (Ecclesiastes 7:20) all individuals must both repent i.e. confess our sins (1 John 1:9) and turn away from sin (Acts 3:19) by turning toward Jesus Christ for as it says in Romans 8:9-11:

But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His. And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.

Now it is vital for our souls that we hammer out the understanding of Faith and Repentance as they are coequal and cannot be separated from another. 

Christ Is King 

“We can never understand the God of heaven unless we come to know him through his earthly Son” (Batson, 22, Jesus is Lord). In the eternal perspective of things we cannot afford to take salvation lightly. Faith in Christ means understanding, respecting, and accepting Jesus Christ as Lord or Kurios as it is in the Greek. Kurios often translates as master, but in the context of Christ it is understood that He is the Supreme Authority because as all the gospel’s tell us and has been prophesied since the fall of Adam (Genesis 3:14-15) that a Savior would come, fulfill the law, die for the sins of the world, and physically come back from the dead on the third day. Jesus Christ of Nazareth is our Lord; our King who is without sin, and who conquered death. So often we make the death and resurrection of Christ about us, after all, John 3:16 states:

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

But understanding the world did not love God, but rather the world chooses to live in sin. We know this to be true from the Old and New Testaments but consider 1 John 4:10 which states:

Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 

God, by his mercy and grace, chose to love us; His creation. Thankfully, God is a God of promises who keeps His covenants with His people as we see throughout the Old Testament and fulfilled in the New Testament. From Genesis to Revelations we witness the Gospel; the promise and fulfillment of the Good News of Christ our Lord. Nevertheless, this really is not about us, but about His unwillingness to allow sin to pervade over His creation. Take to heart Romans 3:9-18 which again shows man’s choice to follow sin:

What then? Are we better than they? No, in no wise: for we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin; As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. Their throat is an open sepulchre; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips: Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: Their feet are swift to shed blood: Destruction and misery are in their ways: And the way of peace have they not known: There is no fear of God before their eyes.  

Humanity worships the Self rather than Yahweh. Thankfully the Gospel is not about us, but rather it about God’s eternal power, truth, justice, mercy, and grace that overcomes death in every way. To finish out here, the Lordship of Christ means putting him above everything else. Your family, friends, houses, cars, jewelry, favorite foods mean nothing in comparison to God. Our so called “righteousness” are but filthy rags before the King of Kings (Isaiah 64:6) or as King Solomon exclaimed when looking over his works saying it was “all vanity” before God (Ecclesiastes 1:1-11). It is that understanding of who Christ is that leads us to the coequal step in salvation: Repentance. 

All Must Repent

“Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 4:17) said Christ as he began to preach in Galilee. If true faith is upon a believer, repentance is waiting to bring godly sorrow. Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 7:9-11:

Now I rejoice, not that you were made sorry, but that your sorrow led to repentance. For you were made sorry in a godly manner, that you might suffer loss from us in nothing. For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, not to be regretted; but the sorrow of the world produces death. For observe this very thing, that you sorrowed in a godly manner: What diligence it produced in you, what clearing of yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what vehement desire, what zeal, what vindication! In all things you proved yourselves to be clear in this matter.  

Worldly sorrow is when we feel bad because we got caught. Worldly sorrow is feeling sad and maybe even stop watching porn or getting drunk for a little while, but eventually falling back into it without consideration of the eternal perspective. Worldly sorrow is even when you kick a particular sin out of your life for good because you were just sick with the way it made you feel. This form of sorrow is temporal. 

Godly sorrow is the understanding that we are at enmity with God because of sin and implore for forgiveness from Adonai. Godly sorrow carries a thick air of esteem and contemplation of who we are before the Holy of Holy’s as sinful fools that attempt to taint His purity. The Puritan minister Thomas Watson would write that “Godly sorrow is abiding” (Watson, 25, The Doctrine of Repentance) explaining:  

It is not a few tears shed in a passion that will serve the turn. Some will fall a-weeping at a sermon, but it is like an April shower, soon over, or like a vein opened and presently stopped again. True sorrow must be habitual (Watson, 25, The Doctrine of Repentance). 

In the eternal perspective, godly sorrow is commanding the responses of our mind. In the temporal perspective, worldly sorrow drives the reactions of our heart. Heed my words then and repent with a godly sorrow for Christ is Lord and Christ must be addressed with deference. In doing so, we are then beginning the renewing of our minds through a process unlike any other.  

Trial by Fire: The Measuring Stick of a Renewed Mind 

Christ both justifies and sanctifies believers. In the First Letter to the Corinthians 6: 9-11 Paul explains this point clearly: 

Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.

Quoting from the Christian Apologetics & Research Ministry (CARM), here are a set of definitions of what it means to be justified and sanctified in Christ: 

Justification is the work of God where the righteousness of Jesus is reckoned to the sinner, so the sinner is declared by God as being righteous under the Law. Sanctification is the process of being set apart for God’s work and being conformed to the image of Christ. Where justification is a legal declaration that is instantaneous, sanctification is a process (Slick, CARM, Justification and Sanctification: What is the difference?). 

The renewing of our mind is a sanctification process, one that will continue until we pass-on, and it is what I call a Trial by Fire process as described in 1 Peter 1:6-9: 

In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, receiving the end of your faith—the salvation of your souls.

Walking with Christ will not be easy as there will always be temptations in our lives. Sin waits on every corner. As sons and daughters in Christ we must always remember that we are not at war with our own, but rather at war with the unseen; principalities and darkness above; spiritual forces that our beyond our own fleshly capacity (Ephesians 6:10-12). Paul alerts believers to put on the armor of God in our daily walk with Him which means at all times the Armor of God ought to be equipped so that we can fully honor Him and remain faithful servants to Him in our walk for Him (Ephesians 6:13-20). The description of the armor is as follows (I am paraphrasing some): belt of truth, breastplate of righteousness, shoes of the Gospel and the peace that comes from it, shield of faith, helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit (word of God). But there is more, believers are also called to pray always and always in the Spirit and be ever watchful with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints. This ultimately ties into the final part of this verse. 

Next Part 3: Trial By Fire

Partake In the Sacred Liturgy Today

Click On Link: Christ Is King.

Present Your Bodies as Living Sacrifices: Part 1

(Christ Is King)

By: Edward Kyle Richey

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. Romans 12:1-2 (KJV)

And do not be conformed  

As born-again Christians we are not to be part of this world living in the flesh or by the relative standards of the world. We are to live a life representative of Christ. In an earlier chapter of Romans Paul writes:

For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace (Romans 8:5-6).

The world is living by the flesh; the world is living in sin. And every person ever to be born is born in retched sin. We know this because the collected infallible word of God, the Sacred Scriptures, tell us this to be the case. This understanding begins with the sin of Adam who caused the fall of mankind:

Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned… Romans 5:12

Thusly the world was and remains damned without grace; without the blood of Christ humanity cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. Let me reiterate by providing two examples of men who have indeed sinned and who grasped their eternal position. King David, repenting for all he had done against God after lusting over another man’s wife, taking her for his own, and then murdering her husband, cries out in Psalms 51:4-5: 

Against You, You only, have I sinned, And done this evil in Your sight—That You may be found just when You speak, And blameless when You judge. Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, And in sin my mother conceived me.

David understood his condition. He, as we all do, had a condition that is worse than any cancer or disease. We are all conceived with a terminal illness. In his sermon, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, the great Jonathan Edwards would preach before his congregation a warning to all those who lacked Christ: 

And let every one that is yet out of Christ, and hanging over the Pit of Hell, whether they be old Men and Women, or middle Aged, or young People, or little Children, now hearken to the loud Calls of God’s Word and Providence (Edwards, 1741, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God) 

It must be noted that David did indeed have Christ, for he believed in the promise of the Messiah and it was that promise that brought all believers in the Old Testament to heaven. Now moving on to my second example. 

Scriptures inform us that this man persecuted the Church, he was set on imprisoning and killing Christians and yet, God had another purpose for him. This man’s name was Saul. He who would become the Apostle Paul was a man who had been bound by the shackles of sin; the very shackles that the world says are acceptable because they are “natural” but the world fails to realize that nature is the very nature that damns all to an eternal damnation away from God. What then is sin? In Galatians 5:19-21 Paul describes this sin of man:

Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

It is important that we breakdown the nature of sin. God brought the laws to man in the Old Testament not because he believed the Jews could obey the laws perfectly, but rather to make humanity aware of their sinful nature (Romans 3:20; 5:20; 7:7-8). Sin has not disappeared and it never will until the return of Christ. To make sin more relative, consider that mass consumerism is sin when material goods overtake the providence of God. Every time I disrespect my parents, lust after another woman, curse, or cause ungodly dissension I am being anti-God; I am living on the wages of sin rather than the spirit of Christ. Romans 8:7-8 warns us of the dangers of worldly standards and man’s conformity to them: 

Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

Enmity, do you know what that means? Enmity is “the state or feeling of being actively opposed or hostile to someone or something.” Every time we please the flesh in opposition to God, we are being therefore hostile toward God. Displeasuring God for our own selfish desires ought to bring fear to our hearts. During a sermon on the phrase “enmity against God”, the “Prince of Preachers” Charles Spurgeon would bellow out this fair warning:      

It does not charge manhood with an aversion merely to the dominion, laws, or doctrines of Jehovah; but it strikes a deeper and surer blow. It does not strike man upon the head; it penetrates into his heart; it lays the axe at the root of the tree, and pronounces him “enmity against God,” against the person of the Godhead, against the Deity, against the mighty Maker of this world; not at enmity against his Bible or against his gospel, though that were true, but against God himself, against his essence, his existence, and his person (Spurgeon, 1855, The Carnal Mind Enmity Against God). 

Sin is the opposite nature of God. God and sin never mix just as oil and water. This is why we must be transformed for transformation allows us to go before the Holy God of the universe. 

David understood his condition. He, as we all do, had a condition that is worse than any cancer or disease.

But be ye transformed 

Humanity cannot save itself from death. We learn this throughout the Bible, but take to heart these two verses: 

For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast (Ephesians 2:8-9).

Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; (Titus 3:5)

Transformation, in the context of this verse, is equivalent to a “permanent state to which a change takes place”; a metamorphoses that can never be retracted once it occurs. This should both excite and frighten us. True believers in Christ should be shouting in joy for they are eternally secured (John 6:37; John 10:27-29; Romans 6:23; Romans 8:38-39; Romans 11:29; 2 Timothy 2:19). To be clear, to burrow a popular phrase, “once saved, always saved” is a doctrine I believe to be biblically sound. However, do not be quick to rejoice. Pastor and author of the book, Crazy Love, Francis Chan in a chapter titled, “Profile Of The Lukewarm” warns people who call themselves “Christian” to check themselves and to “not assume you are good soil” (Chan, 67, Crazy Love) a phrase used to insinuate the parable of the sower spoken by Christ. Therefore, let us turn to the book of Luke 8:4-8 which reads as thus: 

And when a great multitude had gathered, and they had come to Him from every city, He spoke by a parable: “A sower went out to sow his seed. And as he sowed, some fell by the wayside; and it was trampled down, and the birds of the air devoured it. Some fell on rock; and as soon as it sprang up, it withered away because it lacked moisture. And some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up with it and choked it. But others fell on good ground, sprang up, and yielded a crop a hundredfold.” When He had said these things He cried, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear!”

In response to this parable Francis Chan wrote the following: 

I think most American churchgoers are the soil that chokes the seed because of all the thorns. Thorns are anything that distracts us from God. When we want God and a bunch of other stuff then that means we have thorns in our soil. A relationship with God simply cannot grow when money, sins, activities, favorite sports teams, addictions, or commitments are piled on top of it (Chan, 67, Crazy Love). 

Chan later asks an important set of questions in his book, “Has your relationship with God actually changed the way you live? Do you see evidence of God’s kingdom in your life? Or are you choking it out slowly by spending too much time, energy, money, and thought on the things of this world” (Chan, 67, Crazy Love)? The Bible tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:17 that: 

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.

Christ tells us in Luke 9:23-24 that: 

For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it. 

These are not words that speak of a people that have conformed to the world, but have been transformed with their minds renewed.

Next, Part 2: The Renewing of the Mind

Clausis Oculis, Caelo Late Patente

(Christ Is King)

By: Edward Kyle Richey

This is the reading of the LORD,

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths. Be not wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord, and turn away from evil. It will be healing to your flesh and refreshment to your bones (Proverbs 3: 5-8).

Worldly wiseman, from John Bunyan’s Pilgrims Progress, informs the Christian that he need no longer burden himself with that “book” (the Bible) for he has a much more appropriate way to remove that pesky burden off of Christian’s back, “Why, in yonder village (the village is named Morality), there dwells a gentleman whose name is Legality, a very wise man, and a man of very good name, that has skill to help men off with such burdens as thine is from their shoulders;.” Indeed, there is mighty good to be found in the village of morality from whom Mr. Legality lives. Should any man or woman who praises virtue as a pillar to be built upon the foundations of eternality ought to admit, yes, there is goodness in work. Who are we without work? A dead faith according to St. James (James 2:17).

Neither the righteous seeking Christian or the virtuous practicing Pagan would argue against the value of feeding the hungry, healing the sick, clothing the homeless, or assisting the poor. Though today there are those who find that even the value of life, that of the person, is a deficit when compared to animals, plants, and other life outside of the human-being. Those blind and broken souls deny the Imago Dei. Absent from all three of these views, however different, are the wisdom of trust established in Proverbs. Doing good is never enough. Faith in the one true God can only save, heal, and progress the good man or the good woman.

We are called to not lean on our own understanding. That phrase to lean is sha`an in the Hebrew שָׁעַן which carried over into the English as a forewarning to not rest fully, to not support, to not rely on ourselves, but rather put all of our understanding, to invest all of our trust, in God.

It cannot mean we are never to rely on our understanding in the sense that I must doubt all that I think and do; that is an absolutist attitude of skepticism which the Scriptures are not advocating. If they were, we could not even rely on our own understanding of what the Bible is telling us. That would be foolish, rather the Proverbs are instructing us, as that is the literal meaning of Proverbs i.e. instruction. Solomon through the Wisdom of God is instructing believers to put their full and final faith in God, and for Christians’ in Christ the King, and never themselves.

Our world dictates to trust the Self, to value billionaires such as Warren Buffet or famous actors or a political leader. Trust thyself is the motto. Yes, there is plenty we can learn from such rich and powerful men like Buffett. Let there never be any doubt that Buffett knows how to invest money. But money and power will only last as long as the body is alive. Then shall all fade away from thy hands. No more, we are naked again, yet alive regardless of whether one believes in the Almighty or not. At that moment, their wisdom will be put to the test. God shall judge. And judge us all He shall.

Turning to the Lord requires a holy acknowledgement that only can be ignited by God in the midst of our pitch black, darkness of the night soul searching. Fumbling and bumbling we shall walk, but walk we must toward the light. Running from evil and calling out to the Lord are means to an eternal end, a life that is His alone. Once one is captured by the grace of Christ they are tied to the bosom of the Church by which Christ is King. Headship over heaven and earth; dominion over all that is and was and shall ever be. That is the wisdom that covers the believer. Do not fear the world, fear the Lord.

Like Noah, take cover in the Ark; let God seal the doors from the crashing waves in the rising floods. End will always be near whether it comes from war, famine, accident, or natural causes. Until the moment your eyes are shut once again, it is better to build a life that seeks the goodness of God than empires of gold, iron, and feast for they shall rot or rust. The world may be decadent today. But tomorrow is never guaranteed let alone a better tomorrow can always turn to worse. Only the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are eternal and always good.

Seek Him, Seek Christ Alone.

Substack Chronicles

(Letter From The Editor)

By E. Kyle Richey

Thirteen days ago I started a Substack account. Free of charge readers can enjoy a daily report from me about culture, books, art, faith, emotions, and just about anything that does not directly fit within TIF. EKR Report, my Substack page, like Truth In Focus is a new project; a source for Christians and Conservatives like myself to share new, but more likely old ideas for a newer audience.

Christianity is a two-thousans year old faith in Jesus Christ of Nazareth that goes even further back into it’s Eastern Judaic roots making it one of the oldest monotheistic faith’s in the world.

Hardly anything true conservatives center their ideas around comes from ten, fifty, hundred, or two hundred years ago, rather they source from principles that are thousands of years old.

TIF is founded on that understanding and application. Yes, we cover current events but often we look to the past for answers; for eternal truths to ground ourselves no matter the frame of time.

My Substack carries the same principles, yet the posts are more personal. An insiders view of yours truly. I have been posting daily since November 6, yesterdays post was titled, Biopic Memories of Cadence Past: Great Balls of Fire. There is a reasoning to my madness with yesterdays post. When I entered my first master’s program, there was an understanding that postmodern thinking had distorted academia. While true it had since morphed into identity politics along with Critical Race Theory, Queer Theory, Feminism, cultural Marxism, et cetera all the while containing a postmodern milieu. Well last night after a wonderful conversation with my dear friend Thomas Doane concerning postmodernist/poststructuralist “incredulity towards metanarratives” I wanted to poke a little fun at their arguments by making a metanarrative out of several stories from my day. I do hope you enjoy.

There are various reasons why authors and journalists start a Substack account. You can make a living from it if you are good enough and consistent with your work. After leaving The Intercept, Glenn Greenwald went straight for a place where he could have journalistic freedom, a wide audience, and an ability to make a living without much overhead. Substack was an obvious solution.

So far I find it to be a curiosity. There appears to be a good number of people on the network. Yet I find it difficult to traverse. Sure I follow Greenwald and Dreher but I could not tell you who these top twenty-five Substackers are except Andrew Sullivan being one.

As for small fries like myself perhaps it is a good place to just write freely yet it will take more to build an audience let alone make a living. However there is always a good chance that with enough time and effort, as TIF grows along with All Things Veritas and more freelancing that I can gain such a position. Is that why I do Substack? Not exactly. Rather I am more interested in trying to gain an audience in order to dialogue, however, making a livelihood is eventually the goal.

Dialogue seems to be something lacking even on TIF. Granted it has taken me time to learn how WordPress works. I have found WordPress to be less friendly to writers than I’d hoped but I am grateful nevertheless.

Substack is very friendly to writers but it will take a lot more work to build an audience.

Then you have freelance networks like Medium. Neither are like Medium. At Medium you can write an article for thousands if not millions to read and critique and truly gain an audience while while possibly making a profit from each article. I have not jumped onto Medium, yet. To be honest I have a been a bit hesitant. All of these sources feel a bit like an echo chamber. I do not like the idea of an echo chamber. It is vitally important that we have sources of information that can be open to everyone beyond ideological or philosophical or theological differences. That is why I’m spending so much time trying to build a network of Christians for example who are Catholic, Protestant like myself, Eastern Orthodox, Lutheran, and Anglican. Surely we must come together on the same foundational beliefs, but we can vary over issues deemed non-essential. Same applies to conservative thinkers. Over the years I’ve discovered that we conservatives can be a bit more conservative than others while some can be a bit more liberal or even hold what may be seen as progressive views, but principally be philosophically conservative at heart.

Truth In Focus is such a site. While it remains an entity by which I can share my ideas I never wanted it to remain just about me. So I am thankful for the writers and audience who have already joined in this journey. There’s much to be done and much more to be said.

Substack tact’s on another role by which to make a connection with readers who share similar values as myself. We do not need to be ashamed of our Christian faith nor afraid to include a non-ideologically driven idea into a society drowning in ideologies. Family, Faith, Tradition these are not poor relics of the past; they are treasures beyond modern enrichment necessary to the continuation of human existence.

I hope to be announcing here soon more editor’s and future goals for TIF. Thank you for being patient. I promise there’s more thorough content coming your way. Nothing comes easy without working hard, an eternal value, and that includes great content.

Looking forward to growing with you. In the meantime keep commenting, join our Facebook Truth In Focus, and listen to our podcast on All Things Veritas which you can see and hear on YouTube. And take a look at my Substack. All of this talk of making America Great Again when really what we need to be doing is making an effort to improve our lives and help others. That my friend’s is how we make everything better again.

God Bless,

EKR

Thy Week, Thus Far: Trump Vs Biden Vs God

(Podcast)

Links to all articles mentioned:

Policies, Persons, and Paths to Ruin by John Piper https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/…

John Piper, Me, and the Cool Shame Election by Doug Wilson https://dougwils.com/books-and-cultur…

Christians, Conscience, and the Looming 2020 Election by Al Mohler https://albertmohler.com/2020/10/26/c…

Christian Witness Demands That We Defend Truth—and Reject Donald Trump by O. ALAN NOBLE https://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/20…

For Whom Should a Christian Vote: Moral Reasoning and the 2020 Election https://theopolisinstitute.com/for-wh…

TIF Podcast: Ep 1: Live Not By Lies By Rod Dreher

Episode One of the new TIF podcast is out! See it at All Things Veritas linked here: https://youtu.be/Z8ill_1ttgs

Principles Over Politics: Integrity

(Special Series)

(Part 5: Final)

Whoever walks in integrity walks securely, but he who makes his ways crooked will be found out. – Proverbs 10:9

The truth is, wrote Kent Hughes, “American culture is in big trouble. The colossal slide of integrity (especially masculine ethics) has grim spiritual, domestic, and political implications which threaten the survival of life as we know it” (Hughes 2001, p. 125, Discipline of a Godly Man). Integrity is an issue of structure, a consistency that holds the entire weight of the framework or the system or the person in question. Corruption is not integral. Lying and cheating are not integral. Threats, injustice, harm, and murder are not integral. All are corrosive elements to the whole of nature. Inwardly Christians acknowledge original sin—that inner corrupted nature which the Enlightenment set out to deny. However, Christ is the Soul Changer. And under true conviction we do not ignore the faulty broken nature, our purest impure identity as humans. Rather we embrace the healer that condemned the sin that dooms us all. We seek to rise to each occasion though flawed. None are flawless. Integrity is always battling erosion. Maintaining institutions and ourselves are paramount practices to keep falsity and brokenness at bay. To walk securely means to bind one self to ideals outside the self and toward God and surrounding ourselves with people of integrity. Nothing lasts forever but we can build lasting impressions into the imprint of time. Preserving life by preventing evil. Speaking against divorce and sexual immorality. Helping the poor. Creating equal opportunity especially for the downtrodden. Standing up as truth-sayers when our own lie, cheat, steal, and abuse others. In the end, our actions will be judged along with our faith. The Gospel must always come first. Yet we can never ignore the least amongst us. Stand TALL. Stand for TRUTH. Build on the rock, not the sand.

Truth eternal, wise Creator, Fallen man’s illuminator! Light of reason, hope, ambition, Fire of love and true contrition… – W.S. Vale 1935, Cowley (Hymn)

Principles Over Politics: Fidelity

(Special Series)

(Part 3)

[T]here are moral as well as practical consequences to intertemporal commitments. Gratitude, as well as loyalty and patriotism, for example, are all essentially commitments to behave differently in the future, toward individuals or societies, than one would behave on an impartial assessment of circumstances as they might exist at some future time, if those individuals and societies were encountered for the first time – Thomas Sowell

A Conflict of Visions

Fidelity is commitment; a place of assurance; bindings of loyalty; and a practice of faithfulness to a spouse, a friend, a job, or to God. It is the absolute expectation of those who profess, an oath, to their wives and husbands; God and Church; community and county; and resolute to helping their fellow man. Fidelity is the bonding of the soul to something greater than yourself.

What you have inherited from your forefathers, earn it, that you might own it. – Sir Roger Scruton

England and the Need for Nations

Foundations: What We Stand On

(A Declaration)

Preamble

Truth In Focus started as a blog to share ideas, peer into American culture, and establish principles by which to follow in life that look beyond the mere political lines of left versus right but established on Christianity first and Conservatism secondly; a place for faith and principles; theology and philosophy. That commitment not only remains, it is emboldened at a time when the world “does what is right in their own eyes” (Judges 17:6, ESV). Faith has always been important, however, our faith could never be more important at time when political leaders, multinational corporations, billionaire globalists, and radicals of either leftist or right political persuasion who seek to topple goodness and faithfulness and righteousness for their own sake. History does repeat itself and it does so through a single source, human-nature.

Man may proclaim they are above and beyond pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, and sloth; however human nature and human history demonstrate an entirely different story. Today injustice and irrationality thrusts the United States of America and the Western World into a spiral, yet based on whose justice and which rationality, as Alasdair MacIntyre titled his 1988 book.

Our Christian Faith

Here at Truth In Focus that answer begins and ends with Scripture by support of the Universal Christian Church and Philosophy as her handmaiden. While there may be no perfect answers to every cause or issue, there are a plethora of sources that Christians and Conservatives can obtain in working towards a better and brighter future with people of all races and backgrounds. A sacred place of common ground. For Christians, such a common ground begins and ends with Jesus Christ alone at the center.

There can be no compromise in terms of Jesus Christ as established by the Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed:

The Apostles Creed

I believe in God, the Father almighty,
      creator of heaven and earth.

I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,
      who was conceived by the Holy Spirit
      and born of the virgin Mary.
      He suffered under Pontius Pilate,
      was crucified, died, and was buried;
      he descended to hell.
      The third day he rose again from the dead.
      He ascended to heaven
      and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty.
      From there he will come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,
      the holy catholic church,
      the communion of saints,
      the forgiveness of sins,
      the resurrection of the body,
      and the life everlasting. Amen.

The Nicene Creed

We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.

We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father,
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
of one Being with the Father.
Through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven:
by the power of the Holy Spirit
he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary,
and was made man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
he suffered death and was buried.
On the third day he rose again
in accordance with the Scriptures;
he ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.

He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and his kingdom will have no end.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father and the Son.
With the Father and the Son he is worshiped and glorified.
He has spoken through the Prophets.
We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church.
We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
We look for the resurrection of the dead,
and the life of the world to come. Amen

Indeed there are a great many creeds, confessions, and statements that make Christianity and Christian History rich in study and practice. Learning the The Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion (1571), The Westminster Confession (1646), or the London Baptist Confession of Faith (1689) demonstrate our similarities and differences. This is not a weak advocating that all Christian churches are the same because they are not. Simplistically, accounting for great doctrinal differences without deep detail, the Christian faith can be described in one essence as Catholic, Orthodox, Lutheran, Reformed, Arminian, or Anglican. While these historical differences exist and cannot go ignored, there is a real sense that Christianity must be a faith as Christ intended His Church to always be: a Sacred Body with Christ as the Head, that stands on dogmas and doctrines, working through our differences, proclaiming Christ Alone through His Grace Alone by means of faith and repentance, upholding eternal biblical truths, and critiquing the culture by ultimately pointing to Jesus Christ.

As they relate to each other in coequal First Principles of the Christian Faith: Affirming the death, resurrection, ascension, and return of Jesus Christ; that Christ died for the sins of the world and only through Him can a person be saved through faith/repentance to enter the Kingdom of Heaven; and affirming the truth of the Triunity of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Without these affirmations there is no Christianity. Christ is Lord or there is no faith, church, or a foundation to build upon as Christians (1 Corinthians 15: 12-34).

Our Conservative Philosophy

Either there is a philosophy established on truth, reality, and virtue or there is nothing. Anchors therefore are discovered and maintained to build such a structure. Conservatism is that philosophy under the context of what I call Primitive Conservatism:

A form of conservative thought detached from a particular time or place, but rather seeking to incarnate eternal principles discovered throughout all human history. It values the rights of individuals through the understanding that liberty and freedom are not detached from principles that uphold their stability. In order to maintain individual rights there are required responsibilities and encouraged responsibilities laid upon citizens, institutions, and governments alike. No society on earth lacks responsibilities rather fewer societies openly acknowledge the necessity of holding society toward standards choosing instead a lesser form of liberty. Primitive Conservatism seeks to frame and structure responsibilities into laws, norms, and mores. Virtue is its primal source. Liberty is a living structure that requires constant care. Specifically, primitive conservatism is concerned with three areas pertaining to the survival of liberty at large: Morality, Justice, and Dignity.

Under no circumstances does philosophy triumph faith rather it assists to construct where Scripture and Theology are silent, unclear, or in need of further structuring . The Christian faith pronounces the underlying determinations of morality, justice, and dignity; it structures virtue versus vices. Nothing can come without God.

More progressive, liberal, and libertarian minded individuals may find themselves conservative under these circumstances once they grasp the value of its philosophical though surely imperfect discourse. Humility is the first of many virtues, nothing good is gained from pride for “[o]nly by pride cometh contention: but with the well advised is wisdom” (Proverbs 13:10, KJV). Even Warren Buffett quotes the Book of Proverbs in his Buffet reports (annuals and letters). Why? Because Lady Wisdom has a source. Another acknowledgement, there are no “races” but the human race (Acts 17:26), an ideal Darwin himself sought to confirm through Evolution in respect of persons, yet neither Darwin nor Christianity ignore the trials and tribulations of different cultures or ethnicities or races. A Primitive Conservative holds to that same standard of belief. We can reject differences without rejecting the human-being, for example, a person may freely reject all religious beliefs (an Atheist) without necessarily rejecting the entirety of personhood. No one will always believe equally but they can be held to an equal respect as a human life created by God. Granted nothing comes easy from such discourse as it requires hard thinking and real restitution. Hence the value and principles of Justice, Morality, and Dignity. Liberty must be watered by virtue. True philosophy demands thinking hard and faith in Christ requires holiness from imperfect beings. A mystery worthy of embrace.

Tradition, Faith, Imagination, and Reason are pillars of conservative minds yet hardly the only institutions of established belief. Since the time of Plato (and prior but one has to start somewhere) questions concerning justice and morality have been considered essential to a societies livelihood. Over the centuries the question of justice has been centralized or trivialized; Thomas Sowell wrote, The Quest for Cosmic Justice (1996), argues that attempts to achieve justice too often results in injustice. Perplexing and a reminder that no perfect justice can be achieved on this side of heaven. At best humanity can consider the deep complexity of matters at hand while holding firm to proven methods of easing concerns.

Dignity has entered the modern lexicon as a central theme by legal thinkers and political activism at the turn of the 20th century out of reaction to horrific events. Modernity forewarned internal dilemmas of freedom and totalitarianism as Nazi Germany and Stalin’s Communist Russia arose to power threatening the entire globe, clear distinctions now but saviors at their insurrection points. Yet today totalitarian desire remains as Hannah Arendt (Philosopher) analyzed:

The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced Communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction (i.e., the reality of experience) and the distinction between true and false (i.e., the standards of thought) no longer exist (The Origins of Totalitarianism 1976, p. 172).

Modern American culture suffers these preset delusions as the lines of reality blur further and further into nonexistence. Distinctions turn extinct at the risk of unraveling all that is human, nature, and God. Technology and science are purported in late modernity as saviors for a Secular Age. Mammon is worshiped at the altar of the global economy served ferociously with hopes of maintaining a decaying decadence while people suffer, reality distorts, and the environment both the natural world and cultures decline. Meaning and purpose are in shambles.

Our Promise, Our Purpose

In light of human events the only right recourse is to build a set of institutions that seek truth over lies, reality instead of irreality, and virtue rather than the unvirtuous life. That is where Truth In Focus (TIR) comes in. A statement of principle that purposes itself on a foundation of truth; a voice for the voiceless and a defense of the defenseless based on the Christian Faith and Conservative philosophical principles. Nothing could be more important at this time.

TIR Stands On Five Pillars:

1. We are obligated to the truth regardless of the individual or institution in question. Truth stationed in the Christian Faith and Conservative Principles.
2. We support principles over politics; people over profits; and the practical over the utopian.
3. Society is at the mercy of Multinational Corporations, Powerful Institutions, Big Pharma, and Big Government who serve at the seat of Crony Capitalism and Woke Socialism; TIR serves neither and seeks to bring the powerful into the light regardless of their political leanings.
4. Rebuilding the Community is essential but under the understanding of a Republic; a nation and a people who respects a virtueous individualism rooted in God, Family, and Country. TIR supports Federalism (the Rights of States), the Rule of Law, the Constitution, and a Living Liberty ingrained in virtue.
5. Knowledge, Meaning, Purpose, and Reality are at risk; TIR serves to be a place that inquires facts over emotions to establish real meaning and purpose in the lives of our readers. Presently the globalized world is captured by a hyperreality of biased journalism, deep fakes, unsubstantiated science, and technological sedation. Therefore, we seek to break these trends for the sake of rebuilding the Good Life.

Future articles will be using these principles as guides for our readers; Food Politics, Black America, Rights to Privacy, Constitutional Issues, Corporatism, Christ & Culture; Theology; Women & Society, Men & Society; Indigenous Groups; and The Family are only a few topics that will be Our Focus at Truth In Focus.

So the question is now on you, the reader, will you join us? If so, sign-up to our email list, share TIR, like our articles, and join our groups.

Sincerely,

EKR