This is the first in a series of posts that I will have as an introduction to Logic. My reference material is based on Isaac Watts book entitled: “Logic: The Right use of Reason In the Inquiry After Truth”.

On the Nature of Ideas

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As in all areas of life it is vital that we define our terms before we begin. Watts defines Perception as:

“Perception is that act of the mind ( or, as some philosophers call it, rather a passion or impression,) whereby the mind becomes conscious of any thing: as when I feel hunger, thirst, or cold, or heat;”

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For our contemporary readers this most often is addressed in the verb “observation” as to what may be observed in any one or all of the five senses that human beings are capable of. This becomes vitally important in logic because of three reasons:

1. When a proposition is being presented there needs to be a consistent mechanism from which to prove the given premise.

2. If I just say I feel that the sky is blue, this of course is subjective to me and it could only be subjective to me so that you would never be able to confirm the premise that the sky is blue.

3. Finally, without having a consistent understanding of perception and the objects and references associated with it, it would be impossible for human beings to communicate at all.

Let’s take the last point in relation to the english alphabet. If I cannot observer through the sense of my vision that the order of the alphabet follows: A, B, C, etc.., but you can how would I ever be able to form words that you would understand? So it is not just perception that needs consistency, but objective perception so ideas can be understood on common ground between persons.

Check back soon as I will cover the “Nature of Ideas” and how to obtain new ones.

Tags: Logic

Found this on the revamped Linux.Com site.

I’m currently in the process of reading Richard Baxter’s, A Christian Directory and I came across 10 things that he outlines in the book that I thought I would share:

(1) That the Holy Ghost, as given since the ascension of Christ, is his agent on earth, or his advocate with men;

(2) This Holy Spirit, so sent, infallibly inspired the holy apostles and evangelists, first to preach, and then to write the doctrine of Christ, contained in the Holy Scriptures.

(3) This same Spirit in them, sealed this holy doctrine, and the testimony of these holy men, by many miracles and wonderful gifts, by the which they did actually convince the unbelieving world, and plant the churches.

(4) The same Spirit(having first by the apostles, given a law or canon to the universal church, constituting its offices and the duty of the officers and the manner of their entrance) doth qualify and dispose men for the stated, ordinary ministerial work, (which is to explain and apply the foresaid Scriptures,) and directeth those that are to ordain and choose them (they being not wanting on their part); and so he apppointeth pastors to the church. Eph iii. 2-4, 8, 13.

(5) The same Spirit assisteth the ministers to teach and apply the holy Scriptures according to tthe necessities of the people, the weight of the matter, and the majesty of the word of God.

(6) The same Spirit doth by this word(heard or read) renew and sanctify the souls of the elect; illuminating their minds, opening and quickening their hearts, prevailing with, changing, and resolving their wills, thus writing God’s word, and imprinting his image by his word upon their hearts, making it powerful to conquer and cast out their stronge st, sweetest, dearest sins, and bringing them to the saving knowledge, love, and obedience of God in Jesus Christ. See Acts xxvi.

(7) The same Holy Spirit assisteth the sanctified in the exercise of this grace, to the increase of it, by blessing and concurring with the means appointed appointed by him to that end: and helpeth them to use those means , perform those duties , conquer temptations, oppositionss and difficulties, and so confirmeth and preserveth them to the end.

(8) The same Spirit helpeth believers, in the exercise of grace, to feel it, and discern the sincerety of it in themselves, in that measure as they are meet for, and in those seasons when it is fittest for them.

(9) The same Spirit helpeth them hereupon to conclude that they are justified and reconciled to God, and have right to all the benefits of his covenant.

(10) Also, he assisteth them actually to rejoice in the discerning of this conclusion. For though reason of itself may do something of itself in these acts, yet so averse is man to all that is holy, and so many are the difficulties and hinderences in the way that to the effectual performance, the help of the Spirit of God is necessary.

I was doing some research the other day on the history of the Puritans and ran across this site. You’ll need iTunes to download all of the MP3’s, but it’s well worth it. Don’t worry you don’t need to own an IPod, you can listen to the MP3’s directly on your PC or MAC.

http://itunes.rts.edu/

I’m kind of into the Puritans. I have been studying a lot on them recently and has indeed been a blessing. One thing I have noticed with them that I think can be applied to the 21st century Christian is a technical term I’m going to use that references a method for preventing bad things from happening with software. In computer programming there’s concept known as a “Buffer Overflow”. What this basically means is that if a computer program was expecting to get 1 quart of water and someone supplied 2 or more quarts the computer memory essentially gets overwritten and bad stuff can happen. Trust me.

So how does this relate to Christianity? Well think of Christianity as a computer program. Don’t call me a heretic, but it is a system that we are convicted of as being true. Nevertheless, you as a Christian(if you are one) are fed with various inputs such as: Material wealth, power, lust, greed, gluttony, and wrath. Isn’t it funny how all of these are promoted if you turn on your T.V.? I’m going to narrow my scope to these items to keep this post short. Well what happens when you receive those inputs? Bad stuff. The Puritans spoke about something called the “Ordered Life”. They basically planned ahead of time what they were going to do throughout a given day or week. Part of this included excluding elements that were contrary to the fruit of the Spirit described in Galatians 5:22-23: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”

So bottom line, check your inputs Christians and if they’re not compliant with the Word of God, remove that object as a future input. Better to go to heaven lame, then for your whole body to be delivered to hell.

“The healthy Christian knows his frailty and suspects and distrusts himself, lest sin and Satan should be ensnaring him unawares; therefore he regularly grills himself before God, scrutinising his deeds and motives and ruthlessly condemning himself when he finds within himself moral deficiency and dishonesty… The healthy Christian is not necessarily the extrovert, ebullient Christian, but the Christian who has a sense of God’s presence stamped deep on his soul, who trembles at God’s Word, who lets it dwell richly in him by constant meditation upon it, and who tests and reforms his life daily in response to it…

Does not this emphasis on constant self-suspicion and self-examination actually weaken faith, by diverting our gaze from Christ in his fullness to ourselves in our emptiness, so leading us to spiritual despondency and depression? No doubt it would if it were made an end in itself; but, of course, it never was. The Puritans ripped up consciences in the pulpit [particularly applying the law and exposing the pride of the human heart] and urged self-trial in the closet only in order to drive sinners to Christ and to teach them to live by faith in him.”

J. I. Packer, A Quest for Godliness – the Puritan View of the Christian Life, pp. 116 & 117

I stumbled across this today and thought it was simple and cut-throat as is typical and great about the Puritans.

Christian Challenge: Make it your goal for the next month to take an inventory based on the 10 items below to see where you fall on the spectrum. I think this would be good to do at least on a monthly basis to ensure your not slipping.

The Ten Marks of a Flesh-Pleaser

by Richard Baxter

The signs of a flesh-pleaser or sensualist are these:

1. When a man in his desire to please his appetite, does not do it with a view to a higher end, that is to say to the preparing himself for the service of God; but does it only for the delight itself. (Of course no one does every action conciously with a view to the service of God. Nevertheless, the general manner or habit of a life spent in the service of God is absent for the flesh-pleaser.)

2. When he looks more eagerly and industriously after the prosperity of his body than of his soul.

3. When he will not refrain from his pleasures, when God forbids them, or when they hurt his soul, or when the necessities of his soul call him away from them. But he must have his delight whatever it costs him, and is so set upon it, that he cannot deny it to himself.

4. When the pleasures of his flesh exceed his delights in God, and his holy word and ways, and the expectations of endless pleasure. And this not only in the passion, but in the estimation, choice, and action. When he had rather be at a play, or feast, or other entertainment, or getting good bargains or profits in the world, than to live in the life of faith and love, which would be a holy and heavenly way of living.

5. When men set their minds to scheme and study to make provision for the pleasures of the flesh; and this is first and sweetest in their thoughts.

6. When they had rather talk, or hear, or read of fleshly pleasures, than of spiritual and heavenly delights.

7. When they love the company of merry sensualists, better than the communion of saints, in which they may be exercised in the praises of their Maker.

8. When they consider that the best place to live and work is where they have the pleasure of the flesh. They would rather be where they have things easy, and lack nothing for the body, rather than where they have far better help and provision for the soul, though the flesh be pinched for it.

9. When he will be more eager to spend money to please his flesh than to please God.

10. When he will believe or like no doctrine but “easy-believism,” and hate mortification as too strict “legalism.” By these, and similar signs, sensuality may easily be known; indeed, by the main bent of the life.

I just finished reading Thomas Watsons’ “Taking Heaven by Storm” and I must say it was a great book. I felt as though Watson pierced my heart with his words. What I wanted to do is to share some notes I took from the book with commentary where I felt inspired.

“Truth is the best flower in the churches crown” This quote made me stop and reflect on what this really means. In our culture all truth is considered relative with no absolute truth that can be expounded. The truth is not some novel concept, but it is a person and that person is Jesus Christ!

Holy Violence
Holy violence implies 3 things:
(1) Resolution of the will – Encounter the way to heaven as a resolute commander who charges through the whole body of the army. Where there is this resolution, danger must be despised, difficulties trampled down, and terrors condemned.

(2) Vigor of affections – The affections are on fire in passionate longings for heaven.

(3) Strength of endeavor – This violence implies strength of endeavor. We must put all of our strength and call in the help of heaven to this work.

Reading and Hearing of the Word
We must provoke ourselves to the reading of the Word. Below are nine maxims for accomplishing this task:

(1) Read the Word as a book made by God Himself.

(2) Read the Word as a perfect rule of faith.

(3) When you read the Word look on it as a soul enriching treasury.

(4) Read the Word as a book of evidences.

(5) Look upon the Word as a spiritual magazine, out of which you fetch all your weapons to fight against sin and Satan.

(6) Look upon the Word as a spiritual glass to dress yourselves by.

(7) Look upon the Word as a book of spiritual remedies.

(8) Read the Word as the last will and testament of Jesus Christ.

(9) Read the Word as a book by which you must be judged.

Meditations

(1) Meditate seriously upon the corruption of your own nature.

(2) Meditate seriously upon the death and passion of Christ.

(3) Meditate on your evidences for heaven.

(4) Meditate upon the uncertainty of all sublunary comforts.

(5) Meditate on God’s severity against sin.

(6) Meditate on eternal life.

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I’m currently engaged in bible study on the book of Romans. The subject of election came up and the question arose that if God predestines those who will come to saving knowledge of Christ, why is there a need to evangelize? I mean if Christians do believe that God is sovereign over all then there really should not be a need for us to preach the gospel, is there?

This view is known as Hyper-Calvinism and the view in my opinion is unbiblical and I will work to expound why I think this is so.

I. As our two introductory verses show, God does predestine and elect his saints to salvation to a saving knowledge of his Son. This by implication means that he chooses some and passes over others. The Apostle Paul shows the folly of this view in Romans 10:14:

“How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher?”

The fact of the matter is that even the elect in the visible church do not know who the elect are or will be. Sure there may be some strong evidences in the fruit that believers do and should produce, but only the Holy, Immutable will of God knows who in the end who will be elected.

II. God uses the means of human beings preaching the Gospel to other human beings to bring the elect into the sheepfold. I strongly this is why Paul warns about tolerating any other gospel than the one preached as he warned the Galatians who were already backsliding:

Galatians 1:8: “But even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed!”

So in this verse we see a grave warning even to the situation with the gospel in America in the 21st century; To pervert the gospel of Christ in anyway is to join ranks with the devil to undermine and scatter the sowing of Christ into the hearts of men, woman, and children. To do this to bring the wrath of God down upon the souls engaged in a most abhorrent procedure.

Let the christian reader beware and guard the gospel of Christ with great care.