Travel Report and then the Pope on the Death Penalty

I just looked over at my Twitter feed and it just popped up a lady smashed the world record for running a marathon with a stroller and it looks like there was a kid in it.

I'm not sure I'd want to try to do that with a kid in the stroller but three hours 10 minutes with a stroller.

Now the question is does both the mom and the kid get the record or just the mom?

Because the kid's in the stroller so is there like a in the stroller record?

I'm really not sure but that's pretty cool. I couldn't run that fast without a stroller.

Maybe somebody could push me in a stroller and I might be able to do that well but that's pretty. Hi I'm feeling weird today.

Having one of those days, a three hour time shift isn't that much but I think sometimes it throws your eating off enough that it affects your blood sugar and it's just one of those days where I'm just not sure how well this is going to go to be honest with you.

Sometimes there are days like that after trips and I've been doing a lot of trips this year. A lot of trips this year though I must admit

I only got one upgrade in three flights and I haven't really figured out how that works yet.

I signed in for my seat as soon as you could and listed myself in the

Hawaiian Yards. I was like sixth in the row and it's like I got the highest status in Hawaiian Yards.

You don't get it. Flying used to be fun and when you had status you'd get upgrades and stuff.

Not anymore. All these mergers there's just not that many airlines left so it's been fun.

But anyways I just got back from being out of state. I was in Fort Worth over the weekend and I'm sorry that we didn't advertise that but that had been agreed to by the church.

They have limited space and we're a little bit afraid of what might happen if they didn't have enough space basically and so we didn't really push it.

It was primarily just for the church but had a great time there in Fort Worth and hope to go back in the future there.

And renewed a lot of old friendships and met folks and it was good. It was a very good time and sort of a much higher liturgical service than I am normally accustomed to but it was really nice.

So I had a good time in Fort Worth but then went straight from Fort Worth to Washington D .C.

Had not been there. I don't remember the last time I was in Washington when we lived back in Pennsylvania.

I think we went twice. I remember once. I shouldn't say this but I'm feeling a little weird today so it's okay.

I remember once my dad just pounding on the steering wheel of the car going whoever designed the roads in this city was on drugs because you can see where you want to go but there aren't any roads to go there.

He was not happy whatsoever with the road system in Washington D .C.

And I do remember very clearly going up the Washington Monument twice. The first time I was so petrified because I'm afraid of heights especially as a kid.

I've gotten over most of that though I still don't like being on top of a ladder but I can ride a bike up Mount Evans so I've gotten over most of it.

The first time I was so petrified I went up the Washington Monument that the doors open and I sort of squeeze out with my back to the wall of the elevator and just you know because I could see these those windows are tiny.

Have you seen those teeny tiny little windows over the top of the Washington Monument? I mean you couldn't get out if you tried.

They're barred and it didn't matter when you're a kid and you're petrified of heights.

Couldn't even get near them. I just stood up there with my back plastered against the wall the whole time we were up there.

And then the second time I was a little older a couple years older and I actually got up to the window but I not like looking out it but you know well there's sky out there.

Wow you know that's that was the best I could that was the best I could do. And so there you go.

So we had gone and I remember some of that stuff and and I remember the

Lincoln Memorial and I don't think we ever got to do anything at the

Capitol as I recall or the White House drove by getting lost back when

I was a kid. So it's been I'd say a good 45 years since I had been there.

And so didn't have much time to be looking around but I did yesterday morning go for a almost 11k run where I just ran the mall.

So ran around the Washington Monument and then down to the

Lincoln Memorial past the World War II Memorial. I never even saw the Vietnam Memorial.

Someone told me later on where it was but I guess I was too far into the mall. It was over farther into the trees somewhere.

I didn't didn't see I saw the Korean War Memorial but I never I really was bummed out that I missed the

Vietnam one. But so I ran down to the uh and everything's closed. I mean

I gotta admit the place looks sort of beat up. I mean the grass was all disheveled and okay it may be the end of the season they're going into the winter season so not really trying anymore but it was sort of beat up.

I mean the the Lincoln Memorial was closed and there was construction stuff around it and the

Washington Monument had a sign said indefinitely closed and it was it was strange.

It really was. But anyway so went went running around and sort of caught all that stuff and we stayed.

The conference I spoke at for Sovereign Nations was at the

Trump International and I don't even know what to say.

I mean I'm just I'm not a chandelier and fancy carpet guy you know.

It's just I mean it's beautiful and it's it is pretty amazing. I mean it's huge.

It's the old post office and you know he talked about that during the campaign as I recall what they were doing with it and all that stuff and I'm not sure what that has to do with national politics.

But anyway it was uh you know it's beautiful.

The problem is a a glass of orange juice is eight bucks and we're not talking a glass of orange juice.

We're talking a we're talking a tumbler of orange juice you know. I mean it's like whoa okay all right.

Diet time. Diet time at the Trump International. But you know and the room was nice.

It was very comfortable and fancy schmancy and all that stuff.

But I'm that's just not me you know. I mean when I was in Fort Worth I had stayed at a

Hilton Garden Inn and at some point they were having some problems their computer so whenever you go into the little cubby hole where you can get you know chips and some candy bars or a little thing of milk or something like that.

Twice I went in there and I go up to the counter and said our system's down. Go ahead take it. It's like yeah that's that's better than an eight dollar glass of orange juice you know.

So you know cool you know. So anyway but I spoke on reformation issues and I was only supposed to speak once.

I ended up speaking twice. I spoke on justification from Romans chapter 3 during one of the dinners which is you know it's it's a little challenging to speak during a dinner you know because you're hearing people cutting food and you're hearing the tinkling of you know it's just sort of like is anybody listening to me you know.

But they were they were and it went well. I spoke in Romans 3 and spoke on justification and it went pretty well.

But I had spoken on the two luthers that morning and in my preparation had come across even more information that I haven't shared with you all yet and I will

I will try to do so in the future because I did not know that well

I don't want to go into it right now but let's just say the amount of wild -eyed scandalously false uber absurd material that you can gather written by ostensibly

Christian people whether Roman Catholic or Protestant against the Jewish people all the way up sadly through the

Reformation obviously if you're talking about Protestants you're talking through the Reformation is just astounding it just really is.

Well remember Johann Eck we've talked about Eck before we'll be talking about Eck when we do more of the church history stuff.

He was one of the sharpest minds that opposed Luther. He heard Luther speaking at the in was that April of 1518

I think and that's where Martin Butzer also heard Luther for the first time became a disciple.

Eck heard him and immediately knew this guy's dangerous long before Rome goes bad man

Johann Eck was going bad bad bad bad bad warning warning look out look out and history proved him right as least as far as Roman Catholicism is concerned.

Well you just don't you don't hear about this stuff in a balanced way or at all in seminary but the 1540s saw the production of some just reprehensible material and about the only guy who gets remembered for it is

Luther and Luther wrote some stuff and preached sermons especially in the 1540s against the

Jews that were just horrific but his book

The Jews and Their Lies came out in 1543 and he repeated some of that material in the last sermons he preached in Iceland right before his death he had four heart attacks and in the midst of some of those the last two sermons he preached had some of the same material in it against the

Jews and everybody talks about that because of course that was picked up by the Nazis and used as propaganda and so on and so forth in World War II.

Well it's almost made like to sound like Luther was alone in this he was not and in fact he wasn't particularly novel or unusual at all doesn't excuse it but it it puts it in the context even

Martin Bucer a few years earlier had written things that you just read today and go oh and Martin Bucer is known as the irenic you know he and Melanchthon are sort of the irenic peaceful get -along type guys amongst the reformers but not in regards to the

Jews not in regards to Jews there were some Protestants Osiander, Andreas Osiander was one,

Philip of Hesse who were shall we say progressive

I hate to use that term anymore it's been stolen but who were going the right directions and it was

Osiander who wrote something that Johann Eck saw and just went ballistic and wrote this huge book that that far outstrips

Luther in its attacks upon the Jews the blood libel stuff the idea that Jews take

Christian boys and drink their blood and make matzah out of it and all the all this kind of stuff that sadly was believed by people and promoted by people and just the level of stuff and I think it was

I think Expo came out in 1540 if I recall correctly anyway I had been reading some of this stuff and in fact had downloaded a the internet's a wonderful thing if you want to learn stuff if you really want to put a little effort into it

I've got certain goals I want to get to by the end of the year running riding rowing stuff like that and I've I've got a race coming up the beginning of next year and it's running so I need to be getting my miles back up and so I want

I wanted to I wanted to do the longest run I've done so far this year I haven't done very many long runs this year and so in downtown

Fort Worth there's a beautiful beautiful trail not even a trail

I mean it's it you can either run on cement or sort of like packed earth type thing if you like prefer that along the river and it's gorgeous it really is really nicely done and so I decided to do a 12k run uh along there so six out in the back and it was so cool just to be able to throw into uh iTunes you know the topic

I wanted to cover and found a really good um series of lectures on um sort of the development of sacralism it was very very relevant uh and the view of the jews all the way up to the time of the reformation have some background stuff that's what

I listened to when I did a 12k run on uh over the weekend while I was at uh

Jeff Neal's church in uh in uh Fort Worth so that was really helpful to get get some background and and stuff like that but um we'll get to it we'll we'll we'll look at that stuff we'll we'll we'll deal with it but it was uh

I don't know we have we have a lot to think about when it comes to the um the relationship that the history of the christian church and and the jews goes all the way back goes all the way back there's uh you know so we've got more to talk about along those lines more to talk about along those lines um someone on on Twitter do you think

Barnabas would have blocked Paul if they had Twitter I'm not sure it has anything to do with what

I'm saying but yeah you're right yeah

Barnabas would not have blocked Paul but Paul would have blocked Barnabas that's right yeah yeah I think

I think so I think you're exactly right yeah apostolic

Twitter wars yeah that's that's why the lord made sure that that stuff did not develop until later on so anyway so I did a my presentation at the uh at the conference at the

Trump International Hotel there in in uh downtown Washington DC I mean right near Alda I mean it's right there uh quite interesting area was um was on the two luthers and I was primarily focused upon uh the fact that you can read the earlier luther prior to the peasants revolt of 1525 and he has a very different perspective on the jews and you know

I had some lutheran saying well you know he was just disappointed there are so views so many jews few jews converting well maybe but it seems pretty obvious to me that 1525 is the watershed where luther confirms a oh hello confirms a a sacralist perspective um and really commits himself to it and and becomes consistent in his uh in his perspective and so I was comparing and contrasting the two luthers not that there were two luthers there weren't two luthers but there were two stages and there was a there was a younger hopeful luther who himself was under siege who didn't want to see force used to enforce theological consistency um but that changes and why did that change what is sacralism what is the magisterial reformation what is a free church these are all issues that most of us have never spent much time focused upon or thinking about but they're pretty important they really they're very very important and so that's what we we talked about at the um at the conference and so I spoke in the morning then there was lunch and then uh then in the afternoon um

I had uh no mica the two luthers martin luther and luther vandross no that was not what

I was talking about I think I think we lost mica uh mica must be on pain meds for the for the kidney stones so um that's how he heard what he heard anyway um that afternoon

I'll be perfectly honest with you I was perfectly calm uh in making my presentations and stuff you know

I mean this was a subject that I have dealt with many times before and so no no problem

I was more nervous in the afternoon and I was nervous in the afternoon because someone else was speaking in the afternoon that someone else was my daughter summer and she's not done this before and so you know

I think it's acceptable for dad to be a little nervous about that and and I knew she'd do fine but she was using uh you know uh sort of new technology for her notes she hadn't used before that's always dangerous you know it can work perfectly 20 times in a row while you're practicing as soon as you start that's when everything goes wrong and and everything else and um she has uh

I guess sometime about a year or so ago I linked to something by Jordan Peterson the

Canadian professor who you know is is way to our left he's in Canada I mean it's that's sort of necessary in Canada um but he's the guy that Google shut him down it shut down his

YouTube shut down his Gmail that stuff and he had enough of a platform to be able to scream and and got his stuff back but he's the guy that won't use gendered pronouns you know and says it's pure insanity and and uh but he's he's not a

Christian he's he's secular and yet he has good common sense

I would say image of God uh insights into this stuff and so he

I shared something well she started following him and she's been listening to all of his stuff and um so lo and behold only a couple weeks ago

Michael Fallon who was putting on this uh this conference in Washington manages to snag him and schedules him right after summer so summer speaks and Jordan Peterson speaks and Jordan Peterson walks in right and sits down right at the beginning right right as summer is getting ready to start and so I'm I was a little worried about that you know it's like okay how's this gonna go well it went great and uh of course you know her material was great uh she she's a very very good writer and you're gonna see books by uh the new summer

Jaeger uh in in the future I I can assure you of that um uh but it she got a standing ovation it was really really well done it was very clear very understandable uh it was it was wonderful so I was uh

I was one proud papa in the back I can I can assure you that because I learned lots of stuff it was uh uh it's not my area

I'm not you know she's talking about intersectionality and and feminism and and she's done a lot of reading that's you know just come

I'm I'm studying p45 folks I mean I am up to my eyeballs in the coherence -based genealogical method right now and no

I'm not I am in no condition to even attempt to explain the coherence -based genealogical method right now

I've got a uh a dissertation on the subject coming should be arriving fairly soon if I recall uh probably tomorrow or something

I hope but um maybe Monday I'm yes it's you know

I could be here tomorrow anyways yeah great um but um anyways uh uh

I was just you know proud papa and then uh and and then

Dr. Pearson gets up I didn't hear all of his his presentation he sort of started off sort of slow but by the time

I got back he was on a roll and um he just sort of does a stream of consciousness type thing really is and uh he he's he's really the quintessential professor type guy you know uh just sort of I'm not sure how to describe him but he was an interesting fellow and I'll be honest with you he wasn't as easy to follow as Summer was but I could be biased but I don't think

I was none of that um but it was fascinating it was it was interesting and like I said the next day

I got to go out and run around downtown run around the mall there um and uh that was uh that was quite enjoyable and it was cooler back there than it is here though it's finally finally cooled off here yay excuse me your air conditioning was still rattling well yeah that's true that's true but it'll it'll stop eventually so oh so Red Goatee is uh it's his birthday today huh he's 42 uh okay

I mentioned the travel fund before we were out what oh oh well that's next year yeah oh okay so I have been asked to remind everyone that uh those those big trips well

I haven't even told anybody about what the next trips we're doing we're planning a around the world trip uh probably in May of next year and uh that's that ain't that ain't gonna be cheap and we're talking uh we're talking

London I was talking uh with Peter D Williams on Twitter today he was talking about indulgences plenary indulgences and I I said all the more reason for the reformation and I suggested a debate topic and he said let's do it and so we'd have a we'd have a great debate in London so London to Joburg to Zambia uh probably to Perth uh and definitely

Wellington or or a couple places in New Zealand and back in so it would be global it would be around the world and uh clearly we're going to need help to be able to put all that together um sort of the the baseline time period is late

May so probably start mid -May and get done early June's minimum three weeks minimum three weeks or something like that and that's a lot of air travel a lot of air travel so we could we could we should probably start getting those funds lined up now uh to make sure that we've got everything covered on on that one and then uh you know hopefully later on in September sure would like to do uh the

Swiss Reformation uh that's that's certainly my hope but I I've got to limit I've got to limit my travel next year because uh got to get this uh gotta get a lion's lion's share of work done on that uh doctoral program down at in Pachis room and uh you know right now the key issue is exactly how to pursue the study of p45 in light of the emergence of the coherence -based genealogical method that's probably going to end up being what

I focus on can cbgm give us an idea of the different sources that um that were drawn upon by p45 and part of that would be dependent upon whether when they get the john volume done

I'm not sure when that's going to be um that's all going to be changing because you'd have to have

Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Axe all done in the ECM anyways I'm babbling about other things

I apologize but yes we have a lot of traveling coming up to be doing and we'll need your assistance in in getting there so with all of that um with all of that said um fascinating stuff that took place now um one thing that I wanted to get to and I haven't we've just always had stuff going on there's stuff going on right now on social media just disgusting insanity

I'm going to try to hold off on saying anything about it right now uh I wrote a big long post uh again in response to all the absurdities flowing my direction from uh the usual subs suspects but in particular

Steve Camp, Janet Mefford, as it makes us sad as you know former compatriots uh and things like that but um there's stuff to be dealing with but before that what has sort of kept this from getting mentioned earlier um

I forget how long ago it was it's been it's been a good month now um when you look at Roman Catholicism today a lot of people find it extremely confusing and I've said over and over again as we are forced into a smaller and smaller um portion of the society as secularism restricts the area of our free speech and our activity we are going to be pushed closer and closer into proximity with Roman Catholicism and um last night on live with Jeff Durbin he had a conversation uh with Robert Jeffress about the

Sean Hannity stuff for example and what what brings all that up well what brings all that up and now there's controversy even over that I haven't had a chance to watch all of that or read everything as of this point in time um what brings it all up is of course we have you know didn't we just have a anniversary oh yeah 500th anniversary of the beginning of the

Reformation everybody's already forgotten about not for me I mean this is just the beginning for me

I've been I've been encouraging folks look that was the start that was the start now we need to be looking at you know the next thing would be the

Heidelberg disputation next April uh we need to look at at Leipzig uh the run -up to the

Diet of Worms we should be we should put together a calendar for when

Luther's major works came out during this time period uh it would be great to read some stuff from some of these things like the

Babylonian captivity of the church and uh you know the Christian man and you know stuff like that it it if anyone's going out well phew glad we're done with that that's that's just shouldn't be the way it is it's sort of like it's sort of like how the

Christmas festival started on December 25th but ended on January 6th it was it was a lengthy period of time and we we moderns are so shallow with our commemorations that okay we did one day that's enough let's move you know our attention spans and that's how

I feel my attention span is right now but that's for other reasons um the physical reasons rather than anything else um so because of all that you know

I think we really need to be thinking about putting together a calendar of the developments during the reformation and trying to become more historically minded people well with all that said um when we talk about Roman Catholicism we are under tremendous pressure tremendous pressure to just get along you know just just bury all that stuff and let's just let's just get along and if you hesitate at that point you're looked at as as basically being pig -headed a stick in the mud you've got the wrong priorities and look at there are a lot of people who look at me today and go he's become a flaming liberal and he's he's you know lost the lost the the program and blah blah blah because he won't attack this person he won't attack them and so basically what people say is if you if you don't just go along with Roman Catholicism then you know you're you're just like the fundamentalists well obviously on the one hand you have the the the funny mentalist uh who can't get along with anybody because they they make every single thing the test of orthodoxy so if you don't agree with them on every little thing you're just not their brother in Christ you know the kind of person you've met them and on the other hand you've got the wild -eyed liberal and they're also you don't really uh don't find the resurrection to be uh compelling well that's okay you know we're still brothers and sisters in Christ you know

I love my Mormon polytheist brothers and uh you know

I do some uh Buddhist stuff that kind of stuff and there's obviously a huge spectrum in between and we all are on that spectrum someplace and the question is where is the biblical balance to be found and there is a range of biblical balance because look it's obvious to me if you're in the church at Ephesus you didn't have the exact same focus as the church at Corinth it's not they're both founded by the apostle

Paul there are certain things that defined absolutely both of them for them to be churches but it's pretty obvious that the church at Ephesus was a better grounded church than the church at Corinth.

The church at Corinth had problems not only during Paul's day but man according to uh Clement's letter continued having problems for decades thereafter so um you know when there's this there's a spectrum and we have to find the biblical the biblical balance and so there's gonna be there's a tremendous amount of pressure and there's gonna be an increasing amount of pressure for us to abandon um having a biblical balance and just giving in and saying yeah you know our differences with Rome just aren't all that important well obviously

I can't go there and the question is going to be eventually to each one of us why not and that's what requires us to think through the issues of the gospel itself and one of the things that immediately comes to mind in that context is just how much

Rome has changed and is changing and Pope Francis is the clearest example of that you know we we love the

Lutheran videos about Pope Frankie but the reason that they're funny is because there is truth to them

I mean Francis is I mean I have to wonder

I've not taken time to think it through but can you imagine a stronger contrast between two popes than Ratzinger and then

Francis I'm sorry Benedict and then Francis you know uh

I can't imagine two more different people as far as their theology goes and so it's a it was a sudden hard turn and you know if you jerk a car real hard one direction you can pull that baby up onto two wheels it almost feels like Rome is still doing the two -wheeled wheelie uh wondering which direction it's going with Francis and I imagine some of Rome's apologists feel exactly the same way and so when we when we think about this relationship we have with Rome in an ever secularizing society we really have to think through what's definitional what isn't and I am concerned very concerned listening to for example the

Robert Jeffress interview with Sean Hannity and then last night with Jeff Durbin uh

I didn't hear a lot from Robert Jeffress that indicates a solid understanding of the issues of the reformation as being definitional in regards to who is and who is not a

Christian today and I fully understand wanting to have as as broad a desire that God has a people who have a simple faith in Jesus Christ uh even within the bounds of Roman Catholicism yeah

I understand that but the fact of the matter is that as Peter D Williams and I agree on this um

Rome's gospel from my perspective brings about the anathema of Galatians 1 and vice versa from his and I don't think his pope would say that and that's his problem um but we have to you know what if you're going to pull the um anathema of Galatians 1 out you better be really accurate in your application

I I think there's a lot of people that just love condemning other people for the fun of it and I think they're gonna they're gonna pay for that someday you'll be held accountable for that um when we look at the current pope you may have heard the story that and I have a

I have a number of this is back from okay it was October 11th um

Pope Francis on Wednesday said the death penalty quote is in itself contrary to the gospel because it it is voluntarily decided to suppress a human life which is always sacred in the eyes of the creator and of which

God only in the final analysis is a true judge and guarantor end quote the pawn of said capital punishment quote is an inhumane measure that humiliates in any way it is pursued human dignity end quote now obviously there was the death penalty numerous times in the old testament scriptures there there has to be some kind of a um thing going on uh some kind of a development concept going on and so you might say well it's an old covenant new covenant thing well

I'm sure there are entire books on this subject but if you trace a traditional view of capital punishment it is a pretty modern thing