St. Valentine’s Day.

The problem with the feast of St. Valentine, celebrated 14 February, is we don’t know which ancient Christian martyr named Valentinus the day is supposed to honor; and all the stories we have about these multiple Valentinuses (or, if we wanna go with a Latin plural, Valentini) are probably myths.

Here’s what little we know about the three Valentinuses we can name:

St. Valentine’s skull in the Basilica of Santa Maria, Cosmedin, Rome. Eww. The Catholic Telegraph

• VALENTINUS OF ROME. A priest who died in the last half of the 200s, and is buried on the Flaminian Way. Well, mostly; the Basilica of Santa Maria has his skull, and a number of other churches claim to have other bones.
• VALENTINUS OF INTERAMNA. A bishop who died around the year 270, who is likewise buried on the Flaminian Way. St. Julius (whom Catholics call Pope Julius 1; he died in 332) had a basilica built in Terni in his honor.
• VALENTINUS OF… SOMEWHERE. A Christian who suffered in Africa along with a number of companions.

Yes, that’s everything. You thought there was more? That’s because in the absence of actual history, people made up stories about Valentinus. Some of these things might’ve been done by other Christian martyrs, but now St. Valentine’s name is tacked on to them. Some of them might be total fiction. There’s no way of knowing; that’s always the problem with Christian mythology.

Because we really do know nothing about him but myths, the Roman Catholics decided to delete his feast day from their general calendar in 1969. Orthodox Christians have feast days for the first two Valentines on 6 July and 30 July, respectively. As for the Catholics, the calendar marks today as officially Sts. Cyril and Methodus Day. So… happy St. Cyril’s Day! Or St. Methodus’s Day! Or both! Have fun really confusing your date tonight by giving them a St. Methodus’s Day card.

As you likely know already, merchants and restauranteurs have adopted this day as a celebration of romance, and hope you now feel heavily obligated to give something thoughtful to your significant other. Preferably something they sell. That’s pretty much all people know Valentine’s Day as. Which is fine; there’s nothing wrong with appropriately appreciating someone you love. Have fun with that.

It’s gotta be super awkward for the Sts. Valentines though. Especially if they were celibate.

The Lᴏʀᴅ created the land and plants.

Genesis 1.9-13.

The creation story in Genesis 1 follows a logical progression. On day 2, after creating a ceiling of the skies, and dividing the waters of Earth into above-the-ceiling and below-the-ceiling, Ge 1.6-8 God now turns to below-the-ceiling. Everything above the ceiling is now no longer part of the creation story.

And now that I’ve written this, no doubt some of my readers are gonna say, “Well, but we know what’s above the ceiling. There’s the second and third heavens.” Or the nine heavens of Dante’s Divine Comedy, or the seven heavens of the Babylonian Talmud, or the 10 heavens of 2 Enoch. Paul’s “third heaven” 2Co 12.2-4 is one of the 10 heavens, also known as paradise… but we don’t know whether Paul was confirming there literally are 10 heavens, or simply referring to the then-common pop culture idea of where paradise is. Not that Christians don‘t claim they totally know—and that’s just their pride talking. They really don’t.

The writer of Genesis didn’t speculate what was beyond the ceiling, and unless we have actual, biblical revelation of what God built up there, neither should we. Besides, we know better (or, if we have any sense in our brains, should know better): The writer of Genesis isn’t describing our literal universe. And isn’t so much trying to. The point of the creation story is to rebut ancient pagans who claimed other gods conquered and arranged the universe to their liking. They actually didn’t. The LORD didn’t need to seize creation from anyone; he created it.

And what’s beyond the ceiling isn’t for us to know. Now let’s move what’s below the ceiling. God’s gonna create dry ground and put plants on it.

Genesis 1.9-13 KWL

9God said, “Water from under the skies:

Gather to one place.

Dry surface:

Be seen.”

It was so.

10God called the dry surface land.

The gathered water he called seas.

God saw how good it was.

11God said, “Land:

Sprout vegetation.

Plants:

Scatter seed.

Fruit trees:

Make fruit which has seed in it

by species, on the land.”

It was so.

12The earth produced vegetation,

grass scattered seeds by species,

trees produced fruit which had seed in it, by its species.

God saw how good it was.

13It was dusk, then dawn.

Day three.

In the pagan myths, the gods which conquered the already-existing universe were only interested in setting up the world for their personal comfort, and to rule. They really had no interest in land, plants, crops, or even life.

Well, except for one of them, the fertility god. In the case of the weather and fertility god 𐎅𐎄/Hadád, whom the Canaanites and Hebrews referred to by his title בַּעַל/Baäl, he wound up overthrowing the other gods and becoming the high god himself. Me, I gotta wonder whether the Canaanites decided Hadád was the high god only after they noticed how the LORD was both high God, and the weather and fertility God. (And the God of everything else.) In pagan myths, the fertility god would be the only one of ’em interested in creating and cultivating life. In our creation story, our God is the only deity in the story, and it’s the same God who creates every important thing in the universe. These aren’t the tasks of individual gods; nothing’s delegated to subordinate gods. There’s only the One God, and he effortlessly does everything by himself.

The “Help me have faith” prayer.

Jesus was once presented a demonized boy, whose father kinda saw Jesus as their last hope. Mark tells his story thisaway:

Mark 9.21-24 GNT

21“How long has he been like this?” Jesus asked the father.

“Ever since he was a child,” he replied. 22“Many times the evil spirit has tried to kill him by throwing him in the fire and into water. Have pity on us and help us, if you possibly can!”

23“Yes,” said Jesus, “if you yourself can! Everything is possible for the person who has faith.”

24The father at once cried out, “I do have faith, but not enough. Help me have more!”

Jesus’s response was to throw the evil spirit out of the boy, and cure him—and tell his students nothing but prayer could throw out this sort of evil spirit, which merits a whole other article on that subject. But today I wanna focus on the boy’s father’s desperate cry to Jesus: Πιστεύω, βοήθει μου τῇ ἀπιστίᾳ/pistévo, voïthei mu ti apistía, “I believe, [but] help my unbelief.” The way the Good News Translation puts it is closer to what this father meant by it: He had enough faith in Jesus to come to him and beg for help, but man alive did he need more.

And that’s always a good thing to pray. It’s humble; it recognizes we’re deficient in just how much we trust God. We gotta put more faith in him! Often we turn to him for help as a last resort—we’ve tried every other way out of our jam, but they haven’t got us anywhere, and finally we figure, “Well, there’s prayer. If nothing else, we can try prayer.” God should’ve been our first resort, but we don’t trust him enough. Sorta like Jesus should’ve been this guy’s first resort, but he figured he’d try Jesus’s saints first, and see if St. James the Less and St. Jude and St. Thomas and the other saints in the Twelve might answer his prayers instead, Mk 9.18 ’cause Jesus was busy with other stuff. (Being transfigured, actually.) Unfortunately Jesus’s students weren’t yet up to the challenge. They had their own faith deficiencies.

But since we already know we oughta be praying in faith, when we know our faith in God simply isn’t gonna be good enough, “Help my unbelief,” or “Help my unfaith,” or “Help my doubts,” or every similar cry of “Help!” is the right thing to pray. We need some of that mustard-seed-size faith which can get trees to uproot themselves and jump in the ocean. Lk 17.6 We’re not gonna pretend we totally have it when of course we don’t. Even those of us with amazing testimonies of God-experiences in which we saw for ourselves as he did miraculous things, can get wobbly in our faith sometimes. By all means we should ask for more.

Is Jesus your motive for what you believe?

Romans 14.5-9

Hopefully I’ve made it clear, in my articles for TXAB, that our religion oughta be Jesus; that if our practices, rituals, and beliefs don’t lead to a closer relationship with Christ Jesus, they gotta go. If they don’t encourage us in that direction, if we’re doing ’em because it’s our custom, or it’s what every other Christian claims they’re doing (although they might not really, ’cause they’re hypocrites), then our practices are dead religion. Again, they gotta go! But if they do help us follow Jesus, they’re living religion. Do ’em as long as they help. Drop them when they no longer help.

Not every Christian shares this mindset, which is why they don’t drop these practices once they stop working for them. They think the practices are their religion. Not Jesus. Not that Jesus isn’t there in their religion… somewhere. And they’ll insist Jesus is central to the religion. But the fact their religion includes, and requires, all these other things, means these things can take precedence over Jesus—and often do. And never should.

Paul of Tarsus makes this clear in today’s passage, using the examples of Christians who refuse to eat meat sacrificed to idols, and Christians who observe special days. To make it obvious what kind of day he’s writing about, I inserted the word holy where appropriate. “Holiday” for short, but no, he doesn’t mean vacation days—they’re for worship.

Romans 14.5-9 KWL

5Someone reckons a day as holy,

apart from the other days,

and another one reckons every day the same.

Each of you: Be fully convinced

in your own mind.

6One who observes a holy day

observes it for Master Jesus,

and one who eats everything

eats it for Master Jesus.

For they¹ give thanks to God.

And one who’s not eating everything,

doesn’t eat it for Master Jesus,

and also gives thanks to God.

7For none of you² live for yourself,¹

and no one dies by themselves.¹

8For when we live, we live for the Master,

and when we die, we die for the Master.

Whether we live and whether we die,

we exist for Master Jesus.

9This is why Christ Jesus dies and lives:

So he might rule over the dead and the living.

In the context of Christians who are weak in faith, Ro 14.1-4 it’s the weak in faith who need to practice veganism, who need special holy days as a reminder to follow Jesus. Once they’re more spiritually mature, they’re no longer gonna need these training wheels. Meanwhile, do as Paul advises: If you’re vegan, don’t denounce the omnivore; if you’re an omnivore, don’t mock the vegans. Love one another, dangit.

The Dinner Party for the Poor Story.

Luke 14.12-15.

Because Jesus tells his Dinner Party Story right after this story, in which the host of the story does this, lots of Christians tend to not preach specifically on the Dinner Party for the Poor Story. They lump it together with the Humble Guest Story, call them collectively the Parable fo the Guests, and again skip its points unless they’re gonna dive right into the Dinner Party Story. Or they’ll use it as a preamble for the Dinner Party Story—“First Jesus tells us we oughta invite people who can’t repay us, then here’s a story where a guy does exactly that.”

Well today I’m only writing about the Dinner Party for the Poor Story. Here’s the passage.

Luke 14.12-15 KWL

12Jesus also tells the one who invited him,

“When you¹ host a brunch or dinner,

don’t invite your¹ friends.

Nor your¹ siblings, nor your relatives,

nor your wealthy neighbors.

Otherwise they might also invite you,¹

and that becomes your¹ repayment.

13Instead, when you¹ host a dinner party,

invite the poor, disabled, impaired, and blind.

14You’ll¹ be awesome,

because they have no way to repay you.¹

For you’ll¹ be repaid

in the resurrection of the just.”

15Someone reclining at dinner with Jesus,

hearing this, tells him, “How awesome

for whoever will eat bread in God’s kingdom!”

This gets called a parable because it’s inbetween two parables. It’s not straight-up called a parable like the Humble Guest Story, Lk 14.7 but it’s considered one… and unfortunately because parables are analogies which describe God’s kingdom, we get plenty of Christians who never do anything like this. Never invite the poor, needy, and disabled to their celebrations. NEVER.

Never even think to. Because this is a parable; it’s not advice or instruction from Jesus; it’s only describing God’s kingdom, to which everyone is invited. It doesn’t mean we have to demonstrate this. No no no; we can continue hosting soirées in which we only ever invite friends, relatives, and the rich and popular. Relax; we can keep doing as the world does, and keep conforming to it, not God’s kingdom.

Y’know, someone who’s actually striving to follow Jesus is also gonna follow the heroes of his parables. Not because we’re taking the parables literally; we should know better than that. But we should also recognize that the good Samaritan is a role model; the generous vineyard owner is a role model; the obedient son is a role model; even the shrewd butler is a role model. If God’s kingdom is like these guys, be like these guys.

The Lᴏʀᴅ created the skies. Not some other god.

Genesis 1.6-8.

The creation stories in Genesis were written to rebut pagan creation stories. Young-earth creationists repurpose them to rebut science. Not only was that not the author’s intent, but young-earthers aren’t even consistent with Genesis 1 when they use their theories to describe creation.

Lemme demonstrate. I’ll start with the biblical description of how God created the skies.

Genesis 1.6-8 KWL

6God said, “Be, ceiling in the middle of the waters.

Be, division between waters and waters.”

7God made the ceiling.

He divided between the waters which are under the ceiling,

and between the waters which are over the ceiling.

It was so.

8God called the ceiling skies.

It was dusk, then dawn.

Day two.

This רָקִיעַ/raqíya gets translated “firmament” in the KJV, which is pretty much the way the ancient Hebrews would’ve understood it: A solid wall above us, holding back the waters above, lest they flood and drown the earth. Since firmament isn’t a familiar word nowadays, I went with ceiling to accurately describe the way the ancients imagined the cosmos: The skies have a ceiling. When you look up, whether day or night, you’re looking right at it.

Now, humanity has been to space. We’ve had astronauts and cosmonauts on the International Space Station continuously since 2 November 2000. We launch satellites and probes up there all the time, and use ’em to watch our weather, or map the ground below. We know there’s not a solid wall up there; we’d’ve slammed into it thousands of times.

So if reality obviously isn’t as the bible describes it, how do we then deal with this massive bible difficulty? Well, one of two ways. The less common way is to join the flat-earthers, insist there totally is a firmament, and every space program and satellite service is actually part of a long-term global conspiracy to discredit the bible. (Well, not “global,” ’cause you know, they insist the earth’s flat. “International” would be a better adjective.) Antarctica isn’t real, ’cause that’s where they imagine the base of the firmament is located. And every “space traveler” is a dirty liar; every “space launch” is a dirty trick; every celebrity and millionaire who rode on Jeff Bezos’s rockets was conned. The flat-earther direction is too bonkers for most of us, though they’re gaining in popularity.

The more common way, which you’ll see in a number of present-day bible translations, is to insist raqíya means space, not firmament. The NLT and NLV will straight-up use “space.” More popular is “expanse,” as used by the Amplified Bible, the CSB, ESV, MEV, NASB, and NET. The ICB and NCV use “air,” the Living Bible and Message use “sky.” The NIV went with “vault,” which could be solid or not, depending on the way a preacher cares to spin the word; it’s certainly a useful way for the NIV’s translators to sit on the fence.

The rest of the translators figure, as I do, if raqíya means a solid barrier, that’s the only proper way to translate it. Hence the CEB, GNT, NAB, and NRSV have “dome,” and the NCB and NKJV stuck to “firmament.” Yet even with these translations, you’ll find preachers try to fudge them, and claim the firmament’s not really a solid object. The dome of the skies only appears to be a ceiling, but isn’t really.

Thing is, raqíya’s word-root is the verb רָקַע/raqá, “to pound [the earth], to beat out [metal].” It implies something solid, hammered into shape. God spoke ’em into existence, rather than hammering them up there, but we’re meant to get the sense that they’re a solid, firm object: The skies aren’t going to fall, even though we get rain from time to time.

Young-earth creationists try to weasel around this bible difficulty… instead of matter-of-factly stating the truth: The ancients thought the sky was a solid wall. And the Holy Spirit was informing the people of that day, not ours. He dealt with the cosmos the ancients “knew,” not the cosmos we know. We are meant to recognize the anachronism, and work around it. Not embrace it, and play a game of “Look what ridiculous things I can make myself believe!” chicken with other misguided zealots.

Don’t conform to this world. [Ro 12.2]

Romans 12.2 KJV

And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

Paul of Tarsus spent the first part of Romans explaining salvation and how it works. Once done, he encouraged the Romans to live a proper Christian lifestyle. This verse is part of his advice.

Christians love to quote it. Not always for good reason.

A number of Christians presume we already are transformed. Our minds were renewed when we came to Jesus, and we have the mind of Christ now. Don’t need to persue the good, acceptable, perfect will of God anymore; we already have it. We think like he does! Or, he thinks like we do—it’s all the same. They quote this verse to remind one another: “We’re different!”

Other Christians, namely in the United States, love to imagine ourselves as countercultural. Even though our country is predominantly, overtly Christian. But they love to imagine themselves as an oppressed minority, because it makes ’em feel like the martyrs of Roman times; it makes ’em feel righteous. For them, they’re definitely not conformed to this world—it’s out to get them, and their children, and make them “woke” or something. So they quote this verse to remind one another: “Be different.”

Then there’s the Christians who recognize they’re not an oppressed minority; who recognize we’re not countercultural at all—we are the culture. And annoyingly, the worst parts of Christianity prevail; the hypocritical parts, where everybody’s pretending to be devout and righteous and good, but our crime rates and internet browser histories prove we’re statistically no different than pagans. So they try to stand apart from the crowd of Christianists, and be Christ-followers: The world may be going to hell, but they follow Jesus. As best they can, anyway. And also quote this verse to remind one another, “Be different.”

So which sort are you? Because all three of these groups are wrong in a number of ways, and still need to renew their minds.