Dr. Brian Toews’ Blog

Clifford Williams writes, "The point of education, the culture declares, is to better oneself by gaining skills and knowledge that will be useful in the marketplace. Rarely is the idea of learning as a good in itself mentioned." (The Life of the MInd, pp. 28-29) He goes on to call the life of a student as the good life. I concur with Williams thoughts. It is good to purse truth together. There is joy in learning and discovery of new ideas. There is contentment is drawing conclusions and forming convictions about important matters in life. It is exhilirating to be in a place together with others - reading, discussing, debating, explaining everything under the sun. It is enriching for students to live together, share meals, and participate in sports and other activities. The student's life is exceptionally good when you put Christ and His Word at the center of it all. It is for these sorts of reasons that I went to college and never left. It is the good life.

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The title of this blog comes from something Norman Bates says in Alfred Hitchcock's film, Psycho. Over the J-term I taught a course titled "Film, Culture, and Theology." One of the goals of the course is to have a theological dialogue with various films and their message. One of the clear messages in Psycho involves the duality of human nature. Without giving the story and plot away, let me just say that two characters commit crimes that are completely unexpected. For one of the characters it is a total contradiction to their past behavior. The film illustrates something very profound about the presence of sin in our lives. Consider the unexpected behavior of David in 2 Samuel 11 where he commits adultery and murder in the Bathsheba incident. From the slaying of Goliath in 1 Samuel 17 to 2 Samuel 10 David demonstrates that he has a heart after God. Then in 2 Samuel 11 he commits deeds that are evil in the sight of the Lord. Or consider Peter's denial of Jesus three times. Sin can raise its ugly head at any time in anyone's life. Therefore the exhortation from Proverbs 4:23 should be heeded: Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life.

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Christians are often described as "people of the book," because they are a people which is created and sustained by the Bible, the Word of God. At PBU the Bible is the most important and most unique book in the curriculum, because it is the center of all life and learning. It is the book of books. Students read many other texts in the curriculum and they also write their own texts in the papers and assignments they complete. It is a text-centered education. But PBU is also centered on people. A university is a comprised of faculty and students engaged in learning together. Besides the major in Bible, the university offers other degrees that are people-focused: education, social work, business, and music. A PBU education is all about people and text. When you think about it, how much of our lives as human beings is just that?

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Last week I traveled to New Orleans to present a paper at the Evangelical Theological Society. The topic of my paper was "Lamentations as Wisdom." In the paper I considered how the book of Lamentations and the book of Proverbs might be read off of each other in order to discover the wisdom message in Lamentations. My conclusions surprised me and at the same time confirmed truths I already knew. I was surprised to find out that Jerusalem's lamentations did not fully come to grip with her sin. Jerusalem confessed that she sinned and rebelled against the Lord, but at the same time she protested against the severity of the Lord's punishment. This attitude does not take into account that folly leads to death and self-destruction (Prov. 1). What else should Jerusalem have expected? She should have understood that the dead are in the house of folly (Prov. 9). Jerusalem's attitude contrasts with the man's advice in Lamentations 3:25-39 which is to sit silently and accept the punishment from the Lord without complaint. In the end the book of Lamentations draws the reader to focus on the words of the man in chapter 3, not on Jerusalem's. I already knew this and understood in a new way why the center of Lamentations 3 is the most well-known part of the book. The man in Lamentations 3:40 provides a wisdom path for sinners: Let us examine and probe our ways, and let us return to the Lord.

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This past weekend PBU held its annual Worldview Conference. This year's theme was the impact and consequences for Christians living in a technological world, a human-built world. The reoccurring theme in the sessions was how the pervasive presence of technology in our culture has rearranged our lives in such a way that we are bound by it. Think of how many times you have heard people say about a particular technological device, "I don't know how we used to live without it!" Just as you and I are bound to eat, drink, and sleep by virtue of God's creation, so we are bound to live in accord with the human-built world and its technological "laws." Electricity is to this human-built world, what oxygen is to the God-created world. You never really think about it until you don't have it and when you don't, you realize you are in trouble. The question the conference posed was, "Are you aware and do you understand the implications of the technological culture for our lives, particularly as Christians?"
The conference sessions should soon be posted on the PBU website.

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Last week I participated in a chapel with Dr. Fred Putnam and Mr. Chris Palladino. Each of us presented thoughts on the image of God. Because the image of God is not explicitly defined in Scripture, it allows for good biblical discussion and dialogue, which we had during the chapel session. I considered the relationship between image, rule, and subdue in Genesis 1:26-28. I presented the life of David as way to understand these three interrelated ideas. David was a man who had a heart like God's. He was a king who ruled Israel as the Lord's representative and he subdued the enemies of the Lord. In all this the Lord was with David and helped David. For David the battle is the Lord's. David imaged the Lord in that God's life was lived through David's. The attitude behind a genuine image-bearer is that of humility and obedience. This is perfectly embodied in the life of Christ who took the form of a bond-servant and humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross (Philippians 2:7-8). Being made in the image and likeness means that humanity was created as God's servant.

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I have been reading on focal living for my Worldview Conference seminar. One of the interesting ideas I came across was how risk is an important part of our engagement with the creation. Think about the risk involved in playing sports virtually. There is none. But playing sports on a field or court involves all kinds of risk for bodily injury. How much does the technological world bar us from the risks that come with living? How does this impact the development of important virtues like courage and faith? Serving Christ is not safe nor is it intended to be safe. We do not know what awaits us - love or hatred, life or death, mourning or dancing. In Ecclesiastes the Preacher tells us that anything can lie before us as we walk in this world. The most frequent exhortation in Scripture is "Do not fear." Don't try to escape a world full of risk; live in it. Fear not and take refuge in the Lord.

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In chapel on Monday we sang a hymn titled, "O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go." One of the lines that remained with me is from the third verse, "O Joy that seekest me through pain." I have thought a lot about how David in the book of Psalms presents his life of suffering and pain. Yet within the psalm he will go on and declare the praise of the Lord or rejoice in his goodness. The words of this hymn helped me to think about these psalms. It seems that in the midst of our suffering and pain God seeks us, wanting to show his power and goodness through the pain. Christians, walking in faith, hope, and love, can live in the joy of the Lord. Paul's letter to the Philippians is a New Testament letter with this message. Paul, while suffering in prison and perhaps expecting to die, repeatedly calls for the church to rejoice in the Lord. Look for the joy of the Lord seeking you in the difficult times of life.

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Last week I spoke in chapel about the university as a house of wisdom. I chose to consider the life of Solomon as the proto-typical university student. Solomon not only sought to understand the creation which the Lord had made (1 Kings 4:32-34), but he also demonstrated that he was able to wisely apply his knowledge and understanding to difficult issues. This is illustrated in the account from 1 Kings 3 where two prostitutes come to Solomon for justice. These texts underscore the importance of the fear of the Lord as the beginning of wisdom. A biblical university is a house wisdom; knowledge and instruction are the building blocks of the structure. But a biblical view of knowledge is such that it proceeds to wisdom and insight. Such wisdom and insight is key to unraveling the riddles of life, whether they be in the home, school, work, or play.

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I just finished reading The Martian Chronicles written by Ray Bradbury and published in 1950. It is a collection of episodes about human colonization of Mars. Instead of creating a utopia, the human colonists destroy the Martian culture and civilization while back home earth is destroyed in a nuclear holocaust. The books ends with a reflection on how humanity turned out so wrong. This is definitely a biblical theme, especially demonstrated in how the Lord gave Israel the land, a king, a temple, and peace, but in the end all was lost. Unlike the end of The Martian Chronicles which sets up a repeat of the same story, the Old Testament looks forward to a second "Adam" who will not repeat humanity's sin and self-destruction. On the contrary, this second Adam will solve humanity's penchant for self-destruction by taking on sin and conquering death. So we wait in hope unlike so much of the world which has no such hope.

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