What You'll Be

"What you do when you don’t have to, determines what you will be when you can no longer help it." Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936)

Great Nations

"The strength and glory of a land does not depend upon its wealth, its defenses, its great houses, its powerful armaments; but on the number of its gracious, serious, kind, and wise citizens." Martin Luther (1483-1546)

Tiny Pushes

"I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish humble tasks as though they were great and noble. The world is moved along not by the mighty shoves of its heroes, but by the aggregate of the tiny pushes of each honest worker." Helen Keller (1880-1968)

A Basketful of "Rubbish"

It was only after years of tenacity and longsuffering that Konstantin von Tischendorf was able to discover one of the oldest complete copies of the New Testament and thus transform Biblical scholarship for the modern era. Born in Saxony on January 18, 1815 he became a Bible scholar who decided to search for old Bible manuscripts so he could produce an edition of the Bible which was as close to the original manuscripts as possible.

In 1843, he visited Italy looking for Bible manuscripts, and in 1844 he traveled throughout Egypt, Sinai, Palestine, and the Middle East. In May of 1844 he was staying in the monastery of St. Catherine on Mt. Sinai, which had been founded by the Emperor Justinian in the 6th century. He noticed in the hall of the monastery a large basket filled with old and tattered parchments. The librarian said they were to be burned as rubbish and two other similar basketfuls had already been burned. Tischendorf looked through the basket and found 129 leaves of a manuscript of the Old Testament in Greek. He enthusiasm was visibly stirred, for this manuscript was the oldest Biblical text he had ever seen, probably dating from the 4th century.

The monks became very suspicious and began carefully guarding the fragments. Tischendorf was not able to see the manuscripts again until he revisited the monastery in 1859. On this day—the last day of his visit—the steward pulled down an old manuscript of the Greek New Testament from a shelf filled with old coffee cups. It was like the pages once seen in the trash bin. Tischendorf persuaded the monastery to give the manuscript to the Tsar of Russia, the sponsor of Tischendorf's travels and a former benefactor of the monastery.

The ancient book became known as Codex Sinaiticus. It includes a large section of the Old Testament and the earliest complete manuscript of the New Testament. When the Communists took over Russia in 1917, they had no interest in the manuscript so it was sold to the British Museum on Christmas Day, 1933.

The Parenting Paradox

Edward, Duke of Windsor, once said, "The thing that impresses me the most about America is the way parents obey their children." Of course, he had no children himself.

Salem Witch Trials

Though the Puritan clergy of Massachusetts had unanimously opposed the Salem witch trials, the episode was seen by them all as a terrible example of misdirected zeal. Thus, in December, 1696, they resolved among themselves to call for a general fast day to be held on January 15, 1697, "That so all of God's people may offer up fervent supplications unto him, that all iniquity may be put away, which hath stirred God's holy jealousy against this land; that He would show us what we know not, and help us, wherein we have done amiss, to do so no more." Judge Samuel Sewell and the jury of the trials all confessed their error and implored God's forgiveness and further direction. Though modern skeptics love to point to the Salem witch trials as a special blight on the church's character, rarely is the end of the story told in full.

Religious Freedom Day

President Bush has asked Americans to observe "Religious Freedom Day" tomorrow, January 16. It was on this day in 1786 that the Virginia legislature passed the Ordinance of Religious Freedom, which disestablished the Anglican Church as the state church--but it simultaneously guaranteed that no person would be discriminated against or molested for his or her religious beliefs. The law gave Virginia complete religious freedom and was the model for the guarantees of religious freedom written into the U.S. Constitution's Bill of Rights.

The law was largely the fruit of the labors of Thomas Jefferson--he had worked for seven years to get the Virginia legislature to pass it. In the process, he often allied himself with Baptists and Presbyterians, who had endured much hardship from the lack of religious freedom in colonial Virginia. Jefferson was very proud of his role in this piece of legislation. Indeed, the three accomplishments he wanted carved on his tombstone were "Author of the Declaration of Independence, Founder of the University of Virginia, and Author of the Statue of Virginia for Religious Freedom."

Lewis on Courage

"Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point, which means, at the point of highest reality. A chastity or honesty or mercy which yields to danger will be chaste or honest or merciful only on conditions. Pilate was merciful until it became risky." C.S. Lewis

Real Valor

Edmund Burke, the British statesman, philosopher, and father of modern Conservatism was born on this day in 1729. His strong defense of liberty, including the right of American colonists to throw off the shackles of Parliament, was epitomized in his resounding call to action, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." It was of Burke that Sir Walter Scott made his famous observation, "Real valor consists not in being insensible to danger, but in being prompt to confront and disarm it."

Sola Cultura

John Yates is the faithful and courageous Rector of Falls Church, one of the prominent and historic congregations that separated from the Episcopal Chruch this past month. In an article co-written with Os Guiness for the Washington Post, he offered this rather remarkable observations:

"The sola scriptura (by the Scriptures alone) doctrine of the Reformation Church has been abandoned for the sola cultura (by the culture alone) way of the Modern Church. No longer under authority, the Episcopal Church today is either its own authority or finds its authority in the shifting winds of intellectual and social fashion--which is to say it has no authority."

That is so apt, so true, so tragic--and so repeatable.