Enduring Beauty

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  “Beauty is the quality which makes to endure. In a house that I know, I have noticed a block of spermaceti lying about closets and mantel-pieces, for twenty years together, simply because the tallow-man gave it the form of a rabbit; and, I suppose, it may continue to be lugged about unchanged for a century. Let an artist scrawl a few lines or figures on the back of a letter, and that scrap of paper is rescued from danger, is put in portfolio, is framed and glazed, and, in proportion to the beauty of the lines drawn, will be kept for centuries. Burns writes a copy of verses, and sends them to a newspaper, and the human race take charge of them that they shall not perish.” —Ralph Waldo Emerson. (1803–1882).   Essays and English Traits.

How To Think of the Incarnation

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"How are we to think of the incarnation? The New Testament does not encourage us to puzzle our heads over the physical and psychological problems that it raises, but to worship God for the love that was shown in it." (J.I Packer, Knowing God)

"The New Testament knows nothing of an incarnation which can be defined apart from its relation to atonement . . . Not Bethlehem, but Calvary, is the focus of the revelation, and any construction of Christianity which ignores or denies this distorts Christianity by putting it out of focus." (James Denny, The Death of Christ)

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