“Knowledge is power!” was the promise of the Enlightenment. Yes, in a thousand ways, and the great universities of the modern world have birthed that reality And yet, even as it was coming into being there were those who saw knowledge differently. The poet Byron lamented that “those who know the most mourn the deepest.” More recently the Librarian of Congress has wondered if our unprecedented access to information has made us wiser as a people. Why is knowing the world so full of promise and peril at the very same time? What is it about knowing people and places that more often than not leads to cynicism or stoicism? Different responses as they are, both are ways to protect ourselves from the implications of what we know, both allow us to say, “Yes, I know but….” Is it possible to honestly know the world, and to still love it? Only if our vision of vocation—of what we do and why we do it –is rooted in the reality of common grace for the common good.

The Complex Tears of God

The great Jewish scholar Abraham Heschel maintained that Stoicism was the cultural context that made sense of the prophets. The equally great Christian theologian Benjamin Warfield argued the same for the gospels. What is it about Stoicism—in both its philosophical and sociological forms –that is such a challenge to people of biblical faith, living in the ruins of a wounded world as we do? And is there a word from God that guides us?

The 9:00am and 10:45am services are combined worship of Bethel Grove Bible Church and New Life Presbyterian Church.

The Institute of Biblical Studies is co-sponsored by Chesterton House, Bethel Grove Bible Church, and New Life Presbyterian Church.