Ben Zornes

Living and Dying to Show the Preciousness of Christ

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The God Who Came Down

The God Who Came Down

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And it came to pass in those days, when Moses was grown, that he went out unto his brethren, and looked on their burdens: and he spied an Egyptian smiting an Hebrew, one of his brethren. And he looked this way and that way, and when he saw that there was no man, he slew the Egyptian, and hid him in the sand.

—— Exodus 2:11-12——

As humans we seem to be fixated with fixing. We want to find solutions to the problems, answers to the moses slays egyptianriddles. While the instinct to fix things surely derives from our longing to return to Eden, we, as Christians, must avoid the danger of healing this earth’s troubles via the strength and might of man.

We read (in Ex. 2:11-12) that Moses assesses the problem and discerns the injustice accurately. Tyranny, government overreach, racial tensions, and high taxes were all in play here. However, his solution was built on the sandy soil of humanism; he endeavored to accomplish God’s purposes using the devil’s tools. [Read more…] about The God Who Came Down

One Word at a Time

One Word at a Time

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I was digging through some old files and found this, and realized I never have released these on my blog. This is close to four years old now, but it is essentially a reflection on a few verses from Psalm 36, taking it word by word, phrase by phrase. Hopefully, you find it edifying…

Psalms 36:5-7 KJV

Thy mercy, O LORD, is in the heavens; and thy faithfulness reacheth unto the clouds. Thy righteousness mountains-ben-zornesis like the great mountains; thy judgments are a great deep: O LORD, thou preservest man and beast. How excellent is thy lovingkindness, O God! therefore the children of men put their trust under the shadow of thy wings.

Thy– We begin this meditation zeroing in on a pronoun which designates a person outside of me, and it is a possessive pronoun, meaning, this other individual possesses something. The posture of this text is focused on something outside of “me.”

Mercy– Webster defines mercy as, “That benevolence, mildness or tenderness of heart which disposes a person to overlook injuries, or to treat an offender better than he deserves; the disposition that tempers justice, and induces an injured person to forgive trespasses and injuries, and to forbear punishment, or inflict less than law or justice will warrant. In this sense, there is perhaps no word in our language precisely synonymous with mercy. That which comes nearest to it is grace. It implies benevolence, tenderness, mildness, pity or compassion, and clemency, but exercised only towards offenders. Mercy is a distinguishing attribute of the Supreme Being.” While our earthly understanding of mercy is that it is the overlooking of offense, and choosing to inflict less punishment upon a guilt party, the biblical word here designates a zealous passion and ardor to not just overlook offense, but to give, impart and bestow most tender love and goodness. Let’s simply connect these first two words, and observe that this mercy–which overlooks our utter lack of merit and deserving–is what belongs to this party outside of ourselves. Meaning, Someone other than us has a deep, and passionate lovingkindness which they possess and zealously long to give.

[Read more…] about One Word at a Time

Asking the Fox to Babysit

Asking the Fox to Babysit

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In one of my recent posts I discussed some of the issues which the primary season has raised. I was askedfox-ben-zornes about a few aspects of it, and wanted to flesh some of this out. I think one of the most wonderful aspects of politics is that we get to hear what people running for office say, then we can compare that with what they have done, and then we get to see how many people were fooled after the polls close.

In essence, we get to hear a great deal of opinions and the point of an election is that we then vote for who best represents us. Unfortunately, the reality of living in a representative government is lost on much of our citizenry, and that is largely why we are in the state we are. We entrusted the fox with the chore of collecting the eggs from the chicken coop, and are shocked when we awake in the morning to find, through groggy eyes, that the chickens are gone, and ask the fox if he can watch the baby while we go look for the chickens.

When you vote, you are choosing someone to represent you. This means that their vote, is your vote; their abstaining, is your abstaining; they’re declaration of war is yours; their executive overreach is what you chose! [Read more…] about Asking the Fox to Babysit

Like Dad Jokes, Only Better

Like Dad Jokes, Only Better

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I am currently reading through “The Treasury of David“ by CH Spurgeon (yes all 7 volumes, yes I’m not doing much else), for one of my Greyfriars Hall classes. It is all really wonderful, and only as Spurgeon can do wonderful. Psalm 25 grabbed my attention and so I thought I would share some of the excerpts. It was one of those sections of a book where you just keep highlighting and don’t know when to stop, sort of like your dad gets when he starts telling lame jokes when your friends are around! Like that. Only better…

I couldn't help myself...I am a dad after all!
I couldn’t help myself…I am a dad after all!

Anyhow…enjoy:

  • [David’s] sorrows remind him of his sins, and his sorrow for sin drives him to his God.
  • Why should not all the wit and ingenuity of man be sanctified to noblest ends by being laid upon the altar of God?
  • It is but a mockery to uplift the hands and the eyes unless we also bring our souls into our devotions. True prayer may be described as the soul rising from earth to have fellowship with heaven; it is taking a journey upon Jacob’s ladder, leaving our cares and fears at the foot, and meeting with a covenant God at the top. Very often the soul cannot rise, she has lost her wings, and is heavy and earth bound; more like a burrowing mole than a soaring eagle. At such dull seasons we must not give over prayer, but must, by God’s assistance, exert all our powers to lift up our hearts. Let faith be the lever and grace be the arm, and the dead lump will yet be stirred. But what a lift it has sometimes proved! With all our tugging and straining we have been utterly defeated, until the heavenly loadstone of our Saviour’s love has displayed its omnipotent attractions, and then our hearts have gone up to our Beloved like mounting flames of fire.
  • Faith is the cable which binds our boat to the shore, and by pulling at it we draw ourselves to the land; faith unites us to God, and then draws us near to him.
  • We must see to it that our faith is sound and strong, for otherwise prayer cannot prevail with God.
  • We ought to be grateful for occasional griefs if they preserve us from chronic hardheartedness.
  • [Men] sin because they will sin, not because it is either profitable or reasonable to do so.
  • It were well for many professors if instead of following their own devices, and cutting out new paths of thought for themselves, they would enquire for the good old ways of God’s own truth, and beseech the Holy Ghost to give them sanctified understandings and teachable spirits.
  • We shall not grow weary of waiting upon God if we remember how long and how graciously he once waited for us.
  • The world winks at the sins of younger men, and yet they are none so little after all; the bones of our youthful feastings at Satan’s table will stick painfully in our throats when we are old men. He who presumes upon his youth is poisoning his old age.
  • A painful sense of any one sin provokes the believer to repentance for the whole mass of his iniquities.
  • God is good to those that be good.
  • Gracious souls, by faith resting upon the finished work of the Lord Jesus, keep the covenant of the Lord, and, being sanctified by the Holy Spirit, they walk in his testimonies; these will find all things working together for their good, but to the sinner there is no such promise. Keepers of the covenant shall be kept by the covenant; those who follow the Lord’s commandments shall find the Lord’s mercy following them.

Note: Read more of my blog posts about or quoting Charles Spurgeon, which thing I am wont to do, as the King James might say it!

A Cold Shower of Truth

A Cold Shower of Truth

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Using the Scriptures as a guide, our culture is rapidly growing in decadence, and gaining momentum in lightstock_253310_xsmall_user_5740715outdoing itself in its decadence. Lust, of any variety, will never have enough, and will always be demanding “give, give” (Pro. 30:15). Thus, in order to live godly in an age where the gravitation pull of the black hole of sexual dalliance we are going to need a stiff drink of what scripture calls self-control/temperance (Gal. 5:23).

Christians must be prepared to take a stand, even when the allure of the “world’s wares” seem reasonable, normal, common. It is a dire thing when a culture comes to view sins as respectable. William Perkins once said “The special danger of the magistrate’s and minister’s calling [is] that generally the sins of their people are theirs too.” Like Isaiah, we live in the midst of an unclean people (Isa. 6), and thus we must cry, “Woe is me!” Not just “woe is them” but “woe is me”.  [Read more…] about A Cold Shower of Truth

Waxing Autobiographical

Waxing Autobiographical

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Let me wax autobiographical for a moment and share some personal developments in my life. I now have edwin-elsje-ben-zornestwo children, my second being born about 3 weeks ago. He’s a healthy, chubby, little boy named Edwin Oliver and has already proven to be a great baseball player, and is clearly the most intelligent little boy born this century. As you can tell, I am overjoyed at the blessing of this son.

These last few weeks have been short on sleep, full of ironing out the wrinkles that come with the addition of a new family member (especially helping a lovely little 2 year old understand and navigate all this), and all around wonderful as my wife and I get to look at each other and see how our love is blooming all around us. The blooming involves dirty diapers, messes with spaghetti noodles, and moments when our children prove they’ve inherited the Ben Zornes knack for an abnormally loud volume level.

It has been fantastic.

Hard.

Chaotic.

Joyful.

Good ol’ fashioned fun! [Read more…] about Waxing Autobiographical

The Natural Habitat of Charlatans

The Natural Habitat of Charlatans

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It’s been a while since I’ve chimed in on what is going on in the political world, and I think it is high time to

Monument to the Forefathers
Monument to the Forefathers

do so. If you haven’t been paying attention, there is no shortage of material to deal with here. Let me provide some color commentary on all the action.

First off, as Christians our affirmation that “Jesus Christ is King” is not merely something that happens to fit nicely in a toe-tapping song, it is a socio-political statement that has bearing on every last aspect of human existence and experience. The political cycle in front of us is not about leaving all our gods at home, it is actually about which god we, as a nation, will worship. [Read more…] about The Natural Habitat of Charlatans

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