The Enduring Francis Schaeffer

The Christian is the real radical of our generation, for he stands against the monolithic, modern concept of truth as relative.  But too often, instead of being the radical, standing against the shifting sands of relativism, he subsides into merely maintaining the status quo.  If it is true that evil is evil, that God hates it to the point of the cross, and that there is a moral law fixed in what God is in Himself, then Christians should be the first into the field against what is wrong--including man's inhumanity to man.

Mature Christians, and Christians in places of responsibility, must summon the courage to distinguish, under the Holy Spirit, between unchangeable biblical truth and the things which have merely become comfortable for us.

from The God Who Is There, contained in Francis A. Schaeffer Trilogy, published by Crossway Books.

One of my reading goals for the past year and this one is to read or re-read the works of Francis Schaeffer.  In January, we will be celebrating the 100th anniversary of his birth.  Much of Schaeffer's work needs to be read with a historical consciousness of the cultural upheavals of the 1960s and 1970s, the theological truth decay growing out of decades of the influence of the higher critical movement and theological liberalism, and the flight of evangelical Christianity from social action.  Even without grasping the cultural milieu of Schaeffer's time, Christians can still profit from reading him.  Schaeffer's work carried on the legacy of Abraham Kuyper's Lectures on Calvinism and J. Gresham Machen's Christianity and Liberalism. 

The writings of R.J. Rushdoony were more grounded in Calvinistic theology and more heavily footnoted.  The ideas of Herman Dooyeweerd were more deeply philosophical and far ranging in implications.  The books by Greg Singer (a Presbyterian) and Christopher Dawson (a Roman Catholic) were better historically grounded.  But Schaeffer was gifted in being able to address a broader audience.  He was, primarily, a preacher and evangelist, rather than an apologist or philosopher.  He realized his gifts and mazimized their uses.  His followers have filled whole bookcases with their outworking of the basic ideas that Schaeffer taught in his books, lectures, and gatherings at L'Abri.

I am hoping we will be able to have a Schaeffer100 seminar in January 2012.

Thoughts on Think



Recent book by John Piper

"Thinking is indispensable on the path to passion for God.  Thinking is not an end in itself. Nothing but God himself is finally an end in itself. Thinking is not the goal of life. Thinking, like non-thinking, can be the ground for boasting. Thinking, without prayer, without the Holy Spirit, without obedience, without love, will puff up and destroy (I Cor. 8:1). But thinking under the mighty hand of God, thinking soaked in prayer, thinking carried by the Holy Spirit, thinking tethered to the Bible, thinking in pursuit of more reasons to praise and proclaim the glories of God, thinking in the service of love--such thinking is indispensable in a life of fullest praise to God."
from Think: The Life of the Mind and the Love of God by John Piper
Published by Crossway Books

Workshop Outline for the ACCS Conference on June 16



Anticipated audience interaction with my talk

Here is the outline for my upcoming talk at the Conference for the Association of Classical Christian Schools in Atlanta, Georgia this coming Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.

A History Teacher’s Toolbox: Historians, Poets, Films, and Facts

“The truth escapes us not because we do not know enough facts,
but because the relationships of the facts are so complicated.”
E. Harrison Harbison, Historian

Upon this gifted age, in its dark hour,
Rains from the sky a meteoric shower
Of facts…they lie unquestioned, uncombined.
Wisdom enough to leech us of our ill
Is daily spun; but there exists no loom
To weave it into fabric.
Edna St. Vincent Millay, Poet

I. The Defining Dilemma: History Through the Omnibus or Advanced Placement

a. The Case for an Integrated Approach:
i. The Omnibus Program
ii. The Humanities Approach
iii. Net Result: Seeing the God’s World as a Whole

b. The Case for a Specialized Approach
i. Traditional History Classes
ii. Advanced Placement History Classes
iii. Net Result: A Focus on History as History

II. Historians: Accountants for the Facts and Story Tellers

a. The Unhappy Role of the Textbook

b. Accountants for the Facts: Analytical History

c. Story Tellers: Narrative History

d. The Well Tempered Teacher’s Bookshelf

e. Thomas Bailey (An American Pageant) or Paul Johnson (A History of the American People)

III. Romancing History

a. The Place for Literature in the History Classroom
i. The Iliad by Homer
ii. “The Charge of the Light Brigade” by Alfred Lord Tennyson
iii. The Unvanquished by William Faulkner

b. The Place for Artwork

c. The Place for Films
i. Gettysburg (the film) and The Killer Angels (the book)
ii. Documentaries

d. Enhancing True Love, Rescuing Facts

A Stimulus Package That Works

Our nation has been reeling under an economic breakdown for several years now. Almost everything that our leaders in Washington have done has been either ineffective or more harmful. Many of us are suffering personally from the rough economic times in which we live.  I might be better off if I had four jobs and one child instead of four children and one job.

Karx Marx and his many followers have emphasized that economics is the key to understanding history, politics, and society.  Certainly, there are insights to borrow from a Marxian outlook, but it is wiser to see economics as A key factor, but not THE key factor.

Man's fall in the Garden was not primarily economic, although it has led to all sorts of economic results, mostly bad.  Man's fall was moral and spiritual.  Likewise, our economic problems are only shadows of the moral and theological crisis of our times. 

Reformation, not revolution, is needed in this day.  A stimulus package that will truly work will come when men bow before God and serve Him.  To have faith in either Democrats or Republicans is idolatry. 

For many decades, Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, also known as P & R Publishing, has been publishing solid Christian material.  The first Calvinistic books I ever got and read were P & R books.  Many of the defining, life-changing books I ever read were from this publisher. 

Some of the emphases and most of the cover designs have changed since the 1970s.  But P&R continues to put out great books.  I am looking forward to diving in to the two recent publications shown below:

Philip Graham Ryken's new commentary of I Kings

Several years ago, I taught a Sunday school class through I Kings.  I was surprised at how few resources were available, such as commentaries, on I Kings.  It is a great book with lots of political and theological issues.  I am excited that a serious commentary has been written by the current president of Wheaton College.

This book divides 1 Kings into three parts.  First, there is the reign of Solomon, which is characterized by money, sex, and power.  That alone reminds us that the content of Scripture is foundational for understanding the daily news and our own hearts.  Second, there is the divided kingdom.  Sin, especially idolatry, creates havoc and misery for the people of God.  We don't tend toward the same kinds of idoloatry as the ancients, but as Herbert Schlossberg's book Idols for Destruction showed years ago, idolatry is alive and well among us, as are divisions.  The third part of the study is about the life and ministry of Elijah.

This commentary is part of the Reformed Expository Commentary series.  These commentaries are written with four fundamental commitments.  First, they seek to have expository biblical content.  Some commentaries are highly technical with a focus on grammar and verse-by-verse details.  These commentaries focus more on the broader passages.  Second, these commentaries are doctrinal and reflect the authors' commitment to the Westminster Confession of Faith.  Third, the commentaries are redemptive-historical, meaning that they assume the unity of the whole Bible and the central message of salvation. Fourth, the commentaries are practical and applicable to contemporary issues.



The fourth and last installment in John Frame's monumental Theology of Lordship series

Many years ago, I read the first volume of John Frame's Theology of Lordship series, The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God.  It was a profoundly mind altering book.  There are now four volumes in this series. 
The middle volumes are The Doctrine of God and The Doctrine of the Christian Life.  The set is now complete with The Doctrine of the Word of God.  It is safe to assume that if a person were stranded on a really pleasant island, with adequate supplies of food, sunscreen, and shelter, and only John Frame's four volumes, that person would be downcast to see the rescue team arrive.

Quoting from Frame from the dustjacket:

God speaks so that we can understand him and respond appropriately. Appropriate responses are of many kinds: belief, obedience, affection, repentance, luaghter, pain, sadness, and so on. God's speech is often propositional: God's conveying information to us.  But it is far more than that. It includes all the features, functions, beauty, and richness of language that we see in human communication, and more....My thesis is that God's word, in all its qualities and aspects, is a personal communication from him to us.

Let Washington and Wall Street do what they will, our help will be found in our rediscovery of God's Word and the application of it to all areas of life.

How Many Punic Wars Were There?

The answer is 3.  But when the question concerns how many copies of Punic Wars and Culture Wars are there, the answer for me personally is "Too many."  It is self-flattering to point to a heavily filled book case and say, "Not only have I read all these books, I wrote them all."  But when they are all the same title, that boast rings hollow.

So, read and consider the offer below:

I never liked when someone complimented a history teacher by saying, “He or she made history interesting.” History in and of itself is interesting, and even more, it is exciting and thrilling. History teachers just need to point at the past and say, “Wow! Look at that.”


Punic Wars and Culture Wars: Christian Essays on History and Teaching is a romance book, a story of a love affair. It is the love of history and books and of the God who rules over all history and books.

This book will serve as a useful supplement for students using the Omnibus program or an integrated Humanities program. Teachers, not just those who teach history, will also enjoy the book. It can be used for in-service training, for promotion of a classical Christian school’s mission, or just for fun reading.

I promise you that the book will introduce you to other books and authors that will be both a help and a delight to you.  Just the bibliography alone--35 pages of books and brief notes)--will send you scurrying to the book store or your favorite Internet book sites.

This hardback book retails for $25. Individual copies will be available at the upcoming Association of Classical Christian Schools conference in Atlanta for $20 each. However, we are offering a special on purchases of Punic Wars by the box. Each box contains 18 copies of the book and will be available for $140.   That amounts to less than $8 a copy. We can ship a box to you for an additional $20 in postage and handling, or we can deliver a box to you at the conference.

We also hope to have the book available at the Arx Axiom Conference in Franklin, Tennesee in July.

Checks can be made payable to me (Ben House) or to Covenanter Book Service.

Contact me through our cell number 903-244-0241 or  email me at Veritas@cableone.net.

Nicholas Graduates

Grace and Nick back in April in Greece.  Unfortunately, the building they went to see seems to have been quite run down.

This post is at least a week late.  Last week, my oldest son, Nicholas, graduated from Veritas Academy.  He tied with another classmate, Grace Hornok, for the honor of being the valedictorian.  These two bright and enjoyable students make up the entire graduating class of Veritas Academy.

I never thought I would be teaching in a small school with only 2 graduates.  But what we lack in quantity, we make up for in quality.  Both Grace and Nick are musicians and literary students.  (And both have taken calculus and physics during their senior year.) Both are Christians with a real zeal for sound doctrine and dedicated application.

I am jealous of them.  Both are going to Wheaton College.  There, they will be close to a great host of Lewis and Inklings artifacts.  They will be on one of the major Christian campuses in America.  We three studied lots of books together, ranging from James Fenimore Cooper to William Faulkner, from Homer to Dostoevsky.  I don't think it fair that they have such a foundation at so young an age and they get to devote the next four years to learning.  Meanwhile, I am getting notices from AARP that I am elgible to join.  (No thanks, AARP supports too many liberal causes for me.)

I am thrilled and saddened by Nick's graduating.  He has been the right hand man in my classes.  Whenever I cannot remember a quote or I confuse a fact, he usually knows the answer.  He is an amazing student of history and literature, with a breadth of knowledge of music that astounds me.  I will be a lonely old man roaming the halls next year with a vacant look on my face.  Thankfully, I have three other kids in school with me and, hopefully, a whole new group yearning to learn of Homer and Dostoevsky and Faulkner and Melville and Paul Johnson and Abraham Kuyper.


Nick doesn't always maintain this style. He was dressed for a concert with the Texarkana Regionale Chorale.


This poem was written years ago:


Nicholas Goes To School

Today, my son, you shall begin learning to find answers,
Solve equations, write letters and numbers, decipher words,
To shade hills and rabbits in different colors, to join
With your books in hand in circles reading with the bluebirds.

I long for and dread the great journeys: the epic travails
When Zeus wills Achilleus’ rage and God wills Adam’s fall
With page upon page of Homer and Milton burrowing
Into your transfixed thoughts and your heart pounds hearing the call.

When Jackson’s long circuitous route sent forth with Lee’s prayer
Crumples a flank before the night volley hits the Stonewall,
And while your left arms aches in expected amputation,
From your desk at Chancellorsville; you weep, seeing the fall.

There are so many hills and roads I want you to travel,
On some I’ve long waited for you to join me on the way.
But others you’ll take while I stand behind waving you on,
Anxious for your tales of what you saw you’ll report someday.

You will learn the surgical precision of mathematics,
Music’s metered sound, the trampling of the pagan sciences
By dinosaurs to extinction, and the glorious defeat
By the Church militant of hate-filled clay alliances.

You will learn that each tall mountain peak reveals one higher;
Each river discovered bends to the sound of falls below;
You’ll grow ravenously hungry without hope of filling
As you, we pray, in the light of God’s grace and knowledge grow.