Yesterday, Debbie Chavez interviewed me live on her radio show about Unpacking Forgiveness. The interview begins at about the 5:30 mark. Listen here.
Monthly Archive for April, 2010
After I read this post by Patrick Deneen, I went to my shelf and took down a copy of Our Town for summer reading. It’s worth comparing the “Friends” culture with Grover’s Corner.
. . . The juxtaposition of Grover’s Corner and New York captures the essence of two different worldviews. In the one, the challenge of human life is to reconcile our capacious longings with our need for home, belonging and fellowship, and the scales are tilted decisively in favor of the latter. Mrs. Gibbs speaks longingly in the first Act of her desire to visit Paris before her death, but we discover at the end of the play that she gives her "legacy" – which was to fund her journey – to her daughter and her new husband so that they can make some repairs on their farm. The play’s end shows us that our ultimate orientation toward Eternity throws into relief the insignificance of the affairs of daily life, yet that the modest daily acts of cooking, cleaning, discussing the day’s events, are suffused with a kind of beauty and significance that too easily escapes us when we fail to notice the fact of living. The fellowship of those with whom we pass our lives, and with whom we ultimately lay in burial, connects the diurnal to the eternal.
In the other worldview – there again all around me as I exited the play into the Village bar scene in full swing – institutionalizes discontent, reinforces restlessness, and fosters and endless and intense suspicion that something better lies around the corner, reducing any commitment we might have to the "given" in favor of the "not yet." "Belonging" is understood to be complacency; limits are seen as unacceptable oppressions; imperfection is a condition needing cure, solution, repair – and barring those, escape. Both conditions generate regret, because we are creatures of belonging and longing.
HT: Rod Dreher
I met this afternoon for an hour with a group of eight eighth graders. It was one of the most enjoyable meetings I have ever had as a pastor. They had thoughtful and honest questions about what the Bible teaches:
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How old will we be physically on the New Earth?
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Why doesn’t Jesus come back now and top the suffering?
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Will we have pets on the New Earth?
I can’t imagine a greater blessing than to sit and talk honestly with young people about those sorts of questions.
A USA Today article makes observations about the new generation of young adults. What a great opportunity to point young people to Truth:
Many Millennials are religiously adrift — vaguely Christian in belief and barely Christian in practice, a new survey finds. So it’s no surprise that those one in six or seven who are active and committed to faith might be feeling a little isolated.
Rebecca McKinsey, a 19-year-old journalism student at Ohio University, is active in an evangelical fellowship on her campus in Athens and in a local church.
Inside those settings, there’s love, joy and reinforcement. "We’re pretty passionate Christians in my church family," she says. But outside, she often feels alone among her peers.
HT: The Resurgence for the USA Today link
Okay – -this has no redemptive value . . .
but if you’re a Cowboy fan, it may be as painful to watch this as it was to watch Dwight Clark’s catch in the end zone.
http://www.dallascowboys.com/farewell/Texas_Stadium_Implosion.cfm
Or – - you could watch the Clark catch
Brian McLaughlin has recently posted a thoughtful series on prayer, including this post which speaks to the question, “Why pray?”
Prayer is essential. Prayer is difficult. These two things all Christians accept. But why pray anyway? What’s the big deal?
I think one of the reasons that prayer is so difficult for so many people is that we don’t truly understand what it is or what it is intended to accomplish. It is not uncommon to hear someone say that prayer is important “because Jesus commanded it.” Yes, the Bible does encourage us to pray, but that doesn’t represent an understanding of why. Furthermore, it often has the effect that my wife has when she keeps “reminding” me to take out the trash; it simply isn’t very motivating.
So let’s spend a little time thinking about some basics of prayer beginning with, what is prayer?
So often I find that theologian Wayne Grudem provides some nice, succinct definitions. He defines prayer as “personal communication with God” [this resembles Dallas Willard's definition of prayer as being an "ongoing conversation with God"]. Grudem continues to explain that this includes “prayers of request for ourselves or for others (sometimes called prayers of petition or intercession), confession of sin, adoration, praise and thanksgiving, and also God communicating to us indications of his response.”
Al Mohler interacts with an unfolding situation in Texas where students want “in the year of our Lord” removed from their diplomas.
Ironically, the debate takes place at “Trinity” university. You would think they if they were going to be offended that they would have started with the name of the university.
A group of students at Trinity University in San Antonio is petitioning the administration to remove the words “in the year of our Lord” from the school’s diplomas. Senior Sidra Qureshi said she started the petition in order to assure the school’s commitment to diversity. A Muslim student who presides over the “Trinity Diversity Connection,” Miss Qureshi told the media: “A diploma is a very personal item, and people want to proudly display it in their offices and homes. . . . By having the phrase ‘in the year of our Lord,’ it is directly referencing Jesus Christ, and not everyone believes in Jesus Christ.”
According to some accounts, the issue was first raised by Issac Medina, a convert to Islam who graduated in December of 2009. He told the San Antonio Express-News that he was offended by the language he found on his diploma, calling himself “a victim of a bait and switch” because he had been assured that the school no longer held to a Christian identity.
The school’s administration has sent mixed signals of its intention, but a decision by the university’s president and Board of Trustees is expected soon. Sharon Jones Schweitzer, assistant vice president for university communications told The Washington Times that the school will probably remove the phrase from all diplomas. The university’s president, Dennis Ahlburg, defended the wording as “unobtrusive.”
Many of the school’s alumni have protested the proposal, but momentum toward the change appears to be growing on the campus.
Would you pray for the preaching of the Word in your church tomorrow?
The efficacious empowerment of the Spirit of God is indispensable to the ministry of proclamation. Arturo Azurdia
When we eat right, good food tastes better. There is a spiritual lesson here. When we cram our hearts and minds with cultural sugar, we have little appetite for a feast of God’s Word
As mentioned previously (see here), one of my sabbatical goals is to be more disciplined in terms of diet and exercise. To that end, I have made a real effort to remove junk food from my diet (especially carbs/sugar).
While the overall aim is not so much to lose weight as it is to be a better steward of my health, I am, so far a loser.
To this point, I have noticed two benefits:
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I feel better. According to what I am reading, this is because I am not giving my sugar levels a roller coaster ride where I suddenly raise my levels, and then because insulin kicks in, plunge it below even a fasting level.
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Good food tastes better. I ate an orange today at lunch time; it was delicious.
Have you noticed the same thing? When you are eating right, do vegetables and salad taste far better?
Are you disciplining yourself to get the right nutrition for your soul?
Like a city whose walls are broken down is a man who lacks self-control (Proverbs 25:28).
