Glen Scrivener Profile picture
Sep 19, 2020 5 tweets 1 min read Read on X
Someone's just asked me about projection. Do I believe in God cos I want to? An answer:

The problem of projection is everyone's. Actors think all the world is a stage. Footballers think life is a game of two halves. Atheists can certainly project their desires onto reality too.>
Get this from Thomas Nagel:

"I want atheism to be true and am made uneasy by the fact that some of the most intelligent and well-informed people I know are religious believers. It isn’t just that I don’t believe in God and, naturally, hope that I’m right in my belief. >
"It’s that I hope there is no God! I don’t want there to be a God; I don’t want the universe to be like that.” TN

We all want reality to be a certain way and this leads to all kinds of cognitive biases. It's worth everyone being aware of these—believers and unbelievers alike.
>
But Jesus shows up as a very surprising God. The ignominy of his death was a scandal—to everyone and especially the Jews. The physicality of his resurrection was disgusting to many, especially the Greek mind. Jesus just did not fit the mould, he broke it.
>
Jesus is not, straightforwardly, the fulfilment of our hopes. Instead he disrupts our expectations radically. But stick with the man on the cross. On the far side of the disruption, you find the most unexpected God, who fulfils your longings in the most unexpected ways.

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More from @glenscrivener

Jan 23
"Kidneys and mountains are real. Human rights are not."

Harari is a child of the enlightenment. If you begin with the fact/value distinction, how do you avoid saying nonsense like this? 👇

And if you want to avoid nonsense like this 👆 it'll be important to unpick the enlightenment myth underpinning it.

Secular? Humanist? Choose one.
And the thing is, all my secular friends know which to pick. They pick humanist. They believe in human rights far more than they believe this is a godless universe.

Harari can help. If his views seem 'blasphemous', it's only because he's identified our sacred beliefs.
Read 8 tweets
Jan 19
10 Lessons from the Post Office Scandal:

1. The problem is not faults—it's insisting you're infallible.

Expect errors (in IT as in everything). But the Post Office was so committed to self-justification, it prosecuted innocent people rather than question faulty machines.
2. Technology can lift people up but it also leaves people behind.

The software, Horizon, promised efficiency and delivered exclusion. It became an impenetrable system. Tech can do that, especially in a complex world, with a competency crisis and even more with the advent of AI.
3. Technology oppresses as well as liberates.

80 years ago CS Lewis wrote about the promises and perils of technology: “What we call Man's power over Nature turns out to be a power exercised by some men over other men with Nature as its instrument.” (The Abolition of Man)
Read 11 tweets
Jan 13
Who does Jacob wrestle with? Gen. 32 calls him "a man" and "God". Hos 12:4-5 calls him "The Angel" and "The LORD, the God of Hosts". Add it all up (along with John 1:18 & Col 1:15) who else could it be? God the Son, right?

Two objections are often cited to naming him "Jesus"....
1) People say "Jesus" is particularly the name of the *incarnate* Christ.

Answer: Particularly, yes. Exclusively, no. See Phil. 2:5ff; 2 Cor. 8:9; Jude 5 (ESV, cf v4).

2) People say it detracts from the incarnation to draw attention to Jesus' pre-incarnate appearances.

...
Answer: It is vitally important to safeguard the astonishing singularity of the incarnation. The Son once and for all takes flesh—our flesh!—in order to redeem us. He joins the human family as our Brother, Priest and Head.

There is NO sense in which he does this in the OT.
...
Read 6 tweets
Aug 2, 2023
"Tis Scripture, Tis Scripture," the preacher proclaims,
"Our rule and our guide, Our fount and our frame.
We stand on the Bible, for better, for worse.
But let me give vent to my own bluster first."

1/13
"Tis Scripture, Tis Scripture, so let me digress –
To warn you of others who do not confess,
Our creed guaranteed to produce a revival:
We are the ones who honour the Bible."

2/13
"Tis Scripture, Tis Scripture, though some shun our scheme,
Daring to preach on one verse, or a theme!
I really must warn you about all our rivals,
And then I will ask you to take up your Bibles."

3/13
Read 13 tweets
Jun 2, 2023
How do people tick?

A little thread based on Ephesians.
Our problem:

Our natural selves are corrupted by their deceitful desires. (Eph. 4:22)

IOW: our hearts crave fakes—toxic fakes. We want things that lie to us. And, having been taken in by a mirage, we end up gulping down hot sand. This distorts and damages us at every level. Image
What this does to us:

Our hearts become calloused. Eph. 4:18.

Our hearts get roughed up, pummelled, discarded and broken as we give ourselves to unworthy loves. And because desire determines how we see the world (see below), our thinking is "vanity" and we become blind. Image
Read 7 tweets
May 20, 2023
Thanks be to God for... 8 ways I'm grateful for Tim Keller:

1. Ministries of Mercy.
His 1st book was doing 3rd way before 3rd way was a thing. Here was a /preacher/ calling all-the-body to serve all-the world with the gospel at the centre. A sign of the magnanimity to come. Image
2. Magnanimity.
"3rd way" is often dismissed as a thin veil masking spineless centrism. Others can give justification for the project (eg diagonalisation, subversive fulfilment). No-one can give a better example of the posture. However you see the project: be magnanimous like Tim
3. Marriage sermons.
My gateway drug! In the early 00s the tapes were handed around like contraband, smuggled under tables in brown paper bags. And the secret they unlocked was not 'the marriage code' but a cosmic vision for life with befriending love at the centre. I was hooked.
Read 8 tweets

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