Wednesday, June 24, 2009

A quick, personal note

This morning’s run on the beach was quite interesting for a couple of reasons, first, it was the lowest tide of the year—a minus 2.2 ! When the tide is this low, our 28 miles long beach is well over 200 yards wide; the numerous exposed sandbars and tide-pools are quite a sight. And second, on one of the sandbars, there was a bald-headed eagle, feasting on his/her recent catch (though I have seen as many as 3 on one of my runs).

Anyway, just wanted to share…


Grace and peace,

The Beachbum

7 comments:

Christopher Smith said...

I'm jealous!

David Waltz said...

Hey Chris,

On the flipside, we average almost 70 inches of rain a year (hence my webbed-feet)...

Paul Hoffer said...

My family and I spent my father's day at Magee Marsh on the shores of beautiful Lake Erie bald eagle and bird-watching ourselves. We got to see bald eagle parents kettling with their kid for about a half hour before they soared off. God's creation is truly wondrous!

Anonymous said...

Hey Dave,

Are you sure you get 70 inches? We only get 35 to 40. It seems like every time I call you its cloudy here and you are basking in the sun!

Roars

David Waltz said...

Hi Paul,

Sounds like you had a great weekend. And yes, “God's creation is truly wondrous!”

God bless,

David

David Waltz said...

Hey Rory,

Longtime no chat! Hope all is well with you and yours (especially Vince).

You posted:

>> Are you sure you get 70 inches? We only get 35 to 40. It seems like every time I call you its cloudy here and you are basking in the sun!>>

Between 69 and 70 is the average. The difference between the coast and the valley is that when it rains here, it really rains! We also get a lot more ‘fronts’—in a single day it can rain 3-4 times, and yet get 45-60 min. breaks of sun 3-4 times—just enough time for this Beachbum to get a run in…


God bless,

David

P.S. Me thinks Federer is going to get his 15th grand-slam very soon…

Ken said...

Bringing this main point forward, to your top of the page blog post; because the discussion got off on Islam with Chris, and football teams with Randy.

Hope you can get back to my main point with your article.

David,
Getting back to the issue of your post; Irenaeus 3:5:1 shows the meaning of 3:4:1, they are connected and in context. It is the same for us today, since we have the written Scriptural proof of what the tradition was in the churches (even those that did not possess the full canon yet, yet like Barbarian Germanic tribes, they had the "rule of faith" which we agree is all fully compatble with the apostles creed and Nicene creed and Protestantism and Matthew 28:19, etc.; so today, also; we must "resort to the Scriptural proof" to see what the "rule of faith was". This, Irenaeus affirms essentially, "Sola Scriptura". Also, with these other 3 points that Irenaeus makes, he affirms a basic form of Sola Scriptura at that time:


Irenaeus asserts that the Gnostics:
a. gather their knowledge from other sources other than the Scriptures. (Against Heresies, 1:8:1)
b. claim that the Jesus gave the apostles a secret, oral tradition. (3:2:1)
c. accuse the Scriptures of being unclear and ambiguous. (3:2:1)

David quoted Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 3:4:1

If you keep reading, following his argument, all the way down to
3:5:1, you get the ancillary view. By itself, 3:4:1 seems like the coincidence view; but when he fleshes his thinking all the way out; he says, "since we do have the faith in the churches, let us resort to that Scriptural proof, which the apostles wrote down for us":

1. Since, therefore, the tradition from the apostles does thus exist in the Church, and is permanent among us, let us revert to the Scriptural proof furnished by those apostles who did also write the Gospel, in which they recorded the doctrine regarding God, pointing out that our Lord Jesus Christ is the truth, (John xiv. 6. ) and that no lie is in Him. As also David says, prophesying His birth from a virgin, and the resurrection from the dead, “Truth has sprung out of the earth.” (Ps. lxxxv. 11.) The apostles, likewise, being disciples of the truth, are above all falsehood; for a lie has no fellowship with the truth, just as darkness has none with light, but the presence of the one shuts out that of the other. Our Lord, therefore, being the truth, did not speak lies; and whom He knew to have taken origin from a defect, He never would have acknowledged as God, even the God of all, the Supreme King, too, and His own Father, an imperfect being as a perfect one, an animal one as a spiritual, Him who was without the Pleroma as Him who was within it. 418 Neither did His disciples make mention of any other God, or term any other Lord, except Him, who was truly the God and Lord of all, as these most vain sophists affirm that the apostles did with hypocrisy frame their doctrine according to the capacity of their hearers, and gave answers after the opinions of their questioners,—fabling blind things for the blind, according to their blindness; for the dull according to their dulness; for those in error according to their error. And to those who imagined that the Demiurge alone was God, they preached him; but to those who are capable of comprehending the unnameable Father, they did declare the unspeakable mystery through parables and enigmas: so that the Lord and the apostles exercised the office of teacher not to further the cause of truth, but even in hypocrisy, and as each individual was able to receive it!"

Ireaeus, Against Heresies, 3:5:1

This shows that the Gnostics were wrong about their interpretation of the Scriptures, and their claim to have secret knowledge to secret oral tradition left by the apostles (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 1:8:1 ) This is the method the RCC apologists employ claiming that the apostles taught orally on Mary and transubstantiation, but it did not come out until centuries later; it was secret and oral, but not written down in the Scriptures. No evidence or proof of any such thing."