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Attraction is an unstable and capricious element in relationships. And yet all the singles I know make it their top priority. Michael Lawrence directs "I'm Just Not Attracted to Her, Part 2" (Part 1 is good, too) at men — the more visual of the sexes — but the principles apply to women, too. I've often heard a girlfriend say, "He's a really good guy, but I'm just not attracted to him."
Before I continue, let me make a distinction. Basic attraction is necessary for a romantic relationship. You must be drawn to the person, get along with him or her and feel a sense of connection and affection. If you're trying to force yourself to like the person or have little desire to spend time with him, you may lack necessary attraction. However, our concept of what constitutes physical attraction (e.g. the guy looks like our favorite movie star) can be misleading and may cause us to miss out.
Some women I know rely very heavily on physical attraction — or their instant "crush factor" — when deciding whether to consider or dismiss a particular guy. What causes this initial attraction can range from him fitting her ideal "type" to the way he dresses or how tall he is. The point that Michael makes is that these ingredients of attraction are fed more by our culture than originally thought. He writes: Men you may feel like the passive victim of your own internal sense of attraction, but you're not. Your sense of attraction is skewed. And it's your fault! On the one hand there's your own sin — pride at having a girlfriend others think beautiful; fear of man at being thought inadequate; a controlling commitment to your self-gratification. On the other hand, there's the inadequate and idolatrous definitions of beauty your culture has established. The definitions will vary, but they will have one thing in common — the belief that satisfaction is found by possessing (for men) or attaining (for women) beauty without reference to God. And God holds each of us morally accountable for the misshapen sense of attraction that results.
Misshapen sense of attraction. Ouch. From what I hear, we will all someday be unattractive. The thing that will remain is character and camaraderie. A wise, older woman once told me, "Don't worry too much about physical attraction. After a while, when you've gotten to know the person, you can't imagine anyone else." Wise advice for those of us seeking godly relationships in an attraction-obsessed culture. Be sure to align your ideas of attraction with the One who creates all beautiful things.
It's hard to believe in the midst of a jam-packed school schedule that life could ever be busier than it is in college. But graduates soon find out it is. And one of the first things to go is the social life. One way singles are making time for dating is to multi-task.
In "Dinner and a Powerpoint?" Sue Shellenbarger reports in today's Wall Street Journal on the "working date": Many single people are so busy with careers that they don't have time for a social life. So they're increasingly blending work and romance. For some, the practice has provided a path to lasting love. For others, working dates are one more way to avoid intimacy, or just a major turn-off.
I know a bit about working dates: Steve and I started as friends and business partners before we fell in love. What I don't agree with in Shellenbarger's article is the underlying assumption that men and women work the same way and value work equally.
She says "a matching work ethic is becoming a kind of compatibility test for many career-minded singles." Trouble is, even if two people have similar career demands when they're single, chances are good that if they marry, the appearance of children will alter things dramatically. What happens in a marriage that's built primarily around a priority of work?
Even when Steve and I were launching a website and editing our classmates' papers, I always knew, and sometimes even admitted, that I'd rather be spending time just talking and getting to know him better. For me the work was a good reason to spend more time together. I suspect most single women would share that sentiment. It's hard to imagine a couple so hard-driven that one or the other isn't hoping the work will eventually take a back seat to the relationship.
Even Shellenbarger warns "some people may let work intrude on dates to prevent emotional intimacy."
What about you -- have you ever had a "working date"? If so, how did it work out? If not, would you consider it in the future?
Here's a new article you'll probably want to read: "The Possibility of Platonic Friendship."
We published it today on TrueU, and I think it's pretty interesting. Blake Roeber (who's way into philosophy) talks about more than just guys and girls being friends. He explains the meaning of "Platonic" and, based on that meaning, argues that men and women cannot have Platonic friendships. Blake does a much better job of explaining this, so let's let him do the talking: On the Platonic view, you are not your body. Your body exists in space and time, in the world we can see, smell, taste, touch and hear. The real you — what we'll call your Soul — exists in the world of the Forms.
Platonic friendship, then, is any friendship that isn't mediated by physical bodies. It's friendship between Souls. It's friendship that's supposedly so deep that those involved aren't even aware of (or, at least, aren't at all concerned with) the trivial features of their respective bodies. In particular, it's friendship where those involved aren't at all concerned with their respective sex organs. It's as if the friends involved are asexual.
Blake argues that it's pretty difficult to be in a relationship with a member of the opposite sex and not be aware or concerned with the fact that they are ... a member of the opposite sex. He doesn't deny that guys and girls can be just buddies, but it's a difficult and tricky process: To say that Platonic friendship isn't possible is also to recognize that, even where a guy and a girl do exercise enough caution to be "just friends," the friendship they form will still be one between a guy and a girl, not one between two neuters.
I would encourage you to check out the article so that you fully understand the meaning of "Platonic," and then let me know what you think.
p.s. College students, make sure to sign up for the free TrueU e-newsletter!
I'm a big follower of trends in the church. So I found this article on the top 25 multiplying churches in America interesting. The thing to note is these are not the most highly-attended churches (think Rick Warren's Saddleback at 25,000 attendants). Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York, which ranked No. 1, boasts a modest 4,800 attendants. Since its founding in 1989, Redeemer has swelled to 4,800 worship attendants each week and apportions 15 percent of its budget to church plants. Its pastor, the Rev. Timothy J. Keller, is sought after by pastors around the world who want to pick up on strategies of creating effective churches in cosmopolitan cities like New York and engaging an urban and diverse culture.
Redeemer's Church Planting Center, established in 2000, has helped start more than 50 churches of various faith traditions and denominations in New York along with 17 Presbyterian churches.
"Among churches today, the conversation -– a long overdue one -- is moving from church growth to Kingdom growth," wrote Ed Stetzer, director of LifeWay Research, in Outreach Magazine's July/August 2007 issue.
Church planting appears to be a win/win situation. On a practical level, a very large church can not possibly give its members the personal touch (Although an emphasis on small groups can meet some of these needs). From a biblical standpoint, multiplication is encouraged. Paul writes to Timothy: "And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others," (2 Timothy 2:2). This model also has less of a tendency to rise or fall upon the work, charisma and witness of one man. Not to mention, it calls up those who ordinarily might remain in the pew but who have gifts, ideas and passions to share.
Really, the proof is in the pudding. Instead of reaching 25,000 people within the walls of one church through the work of one man, Redeemer Presbyterian and other similar churches have expanded their influence to hundreds of thousands through the talents and passions of multiple workers. I think Paul would approve. I'm guessing the Lord does, too.
HT: Justin Taylor
About a month ago I asked subscribers to our complimentary e-newsletter what they'd be doing this summer. I'm surprised at how many indicated they'd be serving in short-term missions projects. Here are some of the responses:
- I have been working just as much since finals ended, about thirty hours a week handling administrative duties for a NASA contractor here at Kennedy Space Center. In a week and a half, I will go on a ten day youth mission trip to Costa Rica as a participant/chaperone with 84 other young people and leaders. While there, we will be evangelizing as well as helping with their national convention of the Iglesia de Pentecostal Unida, or United Pentecostal Church International.
- I am unable to give my young children the experience of camping. Thinking the next best thing would be to try a family camp that allows me to have a holiday too as they do all the cooking and clean up. This allows me activity time with my daughters and to still experience campfire at night.
- The Lord has blessed me with a spot on our church's team that is going to Albania to assist a new church there. I've never been able to go on any kind of mission's trip, so I am jazzed!
- College friend from other state coming for a week, Grandparents coming for two days, 1 week of local missions through a camp called M-FUGE, 1 week with a group of teens at a for-fun Christian camp, and 5 days painting and putting up drywall in Gulfport, Mississippi for Katrina victims.
- I'm going to Germany with a team of students where we will get to know Germans! We're going to learn about their lives and share our lives with them as well!! We will also be helping start a new group on the campus we're staying at that will allow people to safely get to know Jesus better!
- I will be leaving in two days for a kayaking trip down the Allegheny River through the mountains of Pennsylvania. It will be me, my older brother, younger sister and two kayaks (one a tandem). We plan on camping on islands in the river and seeing how far we can go in 4 days before our parents come and pick us up. I have another sister who really wanted to come too, but she's currently on a missions trip in Djibouti with the Navigators.
- I'm graduating (next week!) from Fuller Theological Seminary with a Master's in Marriage & Family Therapy, o-leading one of the teams on the Brio Peru mission trip, and traveling to Europe with my family.
- This summer? Well, seeing as I'm from Australia, summer is a long way away. I've got a fairly decent winter break though (4 weeks off!), so I'll tell you what I'm doing this winter... I'm getting married! 30th of June.
- Studying for the bar exam all day, every day, until the end of July. Then hopping to Egypt for a 2 week vacation to relax and be a history dork. Then, for the first time, I'll be a real working adult. I miss college!
- I'll be going to Zambia on a mission trip with my church, as well as going on a cruise. I won't be working this summer because I'm a teacher, so that gives me time to do other things. Awesome, huh?
- I will be spending my summer discipling a large number of 14-17 year old young men in a program called Quest. My goal is that each young man who comes will encounter God and be forever changed. I want them to grasp the seriousness of this life, the significance of eternity and the centrality of Christ. And I'd like to help them on their way to being men of God, impacting the world for His Kingdom.
- I am working full-time at my small Christian college for the Computer Department this summer. I had plans to go on a mission trip, but did not raise enough funds to go this summer, so I am looking at going next summer.
- This summer I will be embarking on a 12 day short term mission trip to Comitan, Mexico with the youth group that two of my male peers and I co-lead. We're really excited because it's only the 2nd year of this youth group's existence at our church and our first mission trip. We will be helping out at a missions education center, interacting with and witnessing to local high school students who are trying to learn English, and leading a 4 day VBS in a Mayan village.
- As a short-term missionary in Europe, I am thrilled that my summer plans are to travel to the United States to spend some time with my family!
- I'm on a 2 month missions outreach in Puerto Rico and Dominican Republic as staff with Youth With A Mission.
- Lord willing I will be photographing a few weddings followed by three weeks in Washington Hts (Upper Manatthan) New York City leading/facilitating short term mission projects for three youth groups from three different churches in PA and GA and serving a group of about 100 kids in Washington Hts. We help with a summer program that helps develop the kids academic skills as well time of play and worship.
There are still a couple of months left in summer for those in the northern hemisphere. I know, it's winter in such wonderful places as Australia and South Africa (where it recently snowed for the first time in 25 years). Regardless of whether it's cold or warm, go ahead and let us know how you've made the most of June, and what lays in store for the next couple of months.
Apparently, the emerging church isn't the only movement attracting young adults. According to Mark Dever, this demographic is also flocking to reformed doctrine. And on his new blog Church Matters, he attempts to answer why.
In short, Mark says it's because of oft recommended writings of Charles Spurgeon. He continues, "And friends, if you keep being told to buy Spurgeon, eventually you'll probably read Spurgeon. And if you read Spurgeon, you'll never be able to believe the charge that all Calvinists are Hyper-Calvinists, and that Calvinists can't do missions and evangelism."
Mark says that even pastors who wrote books against Calvinism, praised Spurgeon. And he believes "all these young Calvinists" are a direct result from it.
Keep in mind that this is only part one of Mark's 10 part series titled "Where'd All These Calvinists Come From?" For the rest, keep tabs on Mark's newly launched Church Matters from 9 Marks Ministries.
Earlier, I blogged about the breakout hit The Dangerous Book for Boys. In the past few weeks, the book has moved up to number one on Wall Street Journal's nonfiction bestsellers list. This past Sunday, the Washington Post featured an article by Conn Iggulden, one of the book's co-writers.
Titled "In Praise of Skinned Knees and Grubby Faces," the article describes the motivation for a book celebrating a dangerous side of a boy's development that our culture has tried to ignore. Iggulden writes: It's safer to put a boy in front of a PlayStation for a while, but not in the long run. The irony of making boys' lives too safe is that later they take worse risks on their own. You only have to push a baby boy hard on a swing and see his face light up. It's not learned behavior -- he's hardwired to enjoy a little risk. Ask any man for a good memory from childhood and he'll tell you about testing his courage or getting injured. No one wants to see a child get hurt, but we really did think the bumps and scratches were badges of honor, once.
Iggulden is seeing the backlash he expected for writing something so obviously not politically correct, but he's also hearing from numerous people who hope for a return to old-fashioned masculine notions like duty, honor, courage and competence.
He ends his article by saying, "We all care about our sons -- scabby knees, competitive spirits and all. It's about time we let our schools and governments know how much we care. Let the pendulum swing."
I remember thinking when The Nativity Story was released last year, That sounds like a really boring movie. As a matter of fact, the only reason I was tempted to see it was because I didn't want it to bomb. I thought, If I go even though I don't want to, maybe it means other Christians will too.
But I passed. And I can't even bring myself to rent it. Is that wrong?
In this month's Christianity Today, editor David Neff explores Hollywood's new relationship with the "faith-based market" fueled by Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ and how it's spawned a rash of big movie productions such as Amazing Grace and The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. He wonders, however, if the Christian market is big enough to support movies made "just for them." Some in Hollywood feel the church is not responsive enough. Cheryl McKay, a Regent University alum who scripted The Ultimate Gift, was disappointed that Christians did not give her film the box-office support that The Passion of the Christ received. She told CBN news that "Christians could easily blow this golden moment if they don't get into the movie-going habit fast."
I don't know. The go-to-more-family-friendly-movies-even-if-they-stink-so-Hollywood-will-keep-making-them mission field is something I may not be called to.
 Tarver Hannant is finding a creative way to get a leg.
Hit by a falling power line in 1997, Tarver endured the pain of a damaged leg for 10 years before deciding to amputate in May. Then the real fight began.
With his first child on the way, Tarver had to figure out how to pay for a $40,000 prosthetic leg. He discovered that insurance companies pay a very limited amount and prosthetic companies offer no financing, while demanding payment up front. Many amputees mortgage and later fail on the payments.
According to Dr. Garry Friesen, one of Tarver's former professors: Tarver is fighting back with one leg, a crutch and a website. He has started a business to help him get a leg and then go on to help future amputees. If you donate $25, you get a tee shirt that says, "This Shirt Bought Tarver a Leg."
Tarver's organization, Shirts for Limbs, hopes to create a system that can cover the full cost of a prosthetic. According to his Web site, only one other organization helps amputees pay for limbs.
I am impressed by Tarver's ambition, creativity and desire to help others in his same situation. I hope his story inspires you to look for how you might bless those you know in specific, if unusual, ways.
I think I may need a new T-shirt.
A good friend of mine is getting married in a couple of weeks. He and his future wife chose the seventh of July for their wedding. They couldn't pass up the once-in-a-lifetime chance to marry on 07/07/07. Apparently, a lot of couples noticed the same opportunity. One account indicates that around 38,000 couples are getting married that day compared to 12,000 in a typical weekend.
Any Boundless readers getting married on that date? If so, have you run into any trouble booking wedding or honeymoon services alongside others sharing your date?
Ted's post on the misuse of God's name in "Evan Almighty" got quite a discussion going. Then today, I read Tim Challies' review of Grace (Eventually) by Anne LaMott. One of his criticisms of the book (and there are many) is LaMott's use of profanity. Challies writes: Lamott has proven to have wide appeal, writing for Salon, the Los Angeles Times and a variety of other periodicals. It should be exciting to see a professed Christian writing for what is clearly a largely secular audience. Sadly, though, the spiritual insights shared by Lamott are more shocking or embarrassing than exciting and inspiring.
I think what is troubling about Lamott's flippancy with God's name, is that it speaks of a God who is neither worthy of fear (think Moses and the burning bush) nor extravagant love (think Mary pouring perfume on Jesus' feet). This clearly is not the God of the Bible. God tells us His name is to be proclaimed (Exodus 6:3), honored (Exodus 20:24), feared (Malachi 1:14) and revered (Malachi 4:2).
Consider Malachi 2:2: "If you do not listen, and if you do not set your heart to honor my name," says the LORD Almighty, "I will send a curse upon you, and I will curse your blessings. Yes, I have already cursed them, because you have not set your heart to honor me."
If, like me, you're tempted to wonder what the big deal is about uttering a particular word, consider the deeper issue of honor. Does LaMott's book convey proper honor, love and devotion for the God she claims to serve? Does it demonstrate that she has "set her heart to honor" God's name? Based on the passages Challies provides, I don't think it does.
God's name is a big deal. It is inseparable from His person and character. The way believers use God's name communicates to the world who they think He is. It's unfortunate when that message diminishes a God whose name has the power to save (Acts 4:12).
"If you're the first one in in the morning and the last one to leave at night, and you take fewer vacation days and never take a sick day, you will do better than the people who don't do that. It's very simple."
This is New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's advice to college graduates captured in today's Wall Street Journal. This portion of the article especially caught my eye: The mayor also said he's raised two daughters who have turned out very well, "thanks to their mother, no thanks to me." He praised his father, William H. Bloomberg, "who worked seven days a week his entire life until he checked himself into the hospital to die."
Certainly, one way to be successful in business is to never leave the office. But long hours at work can, in some cases, cause burnout, as well as problems at home.
One reader's response to Bloomberg's advice was "What matters is not the amount of time spent in an office but the quality and impact of the contribution."
I often hear and read that today's graduates aren't as interested in working the kinds of hours Bloomberg recommends and are more interested in having balanced lives that leave room for family (something many grads wish their parents had done).
How about you? Are you in a field that demands these kinds of hours? Are you in a profession (or moving towards one) that requires the Bloomberg lifestyle and doesn't see any problem with ignoring Sabbath rest and family investment? Does it really require a high volume of hours to "do better" and if so what kind of "better" does that pace achieve?
Last month Steve introduced the interesting idea that smaller weddings equal healthier marriages. But did you know that it also means a healthier planet?
I read in Parade Magazine over the weekend that "nothing heats the planet like a big wedding." Here's the excerpt: And just in time to upset the last of you June brides, the folks at www.DrivingGreen.com tell us that almost nothing heats the planet like a big wedding: A two-day affair for 250 guests generates 72,000 pounds of CO2.
I know what your thinking: What's an environmentally minded girl with dreams of a big wedding to do? DrivingGreen.com is glad you asked. They have a tool that calculates how much you should donate to them to offset the CO2 your global warming wedding will produce.
So go ahead and have your $25,000 wedding. All you have to do is donate an extra $250 to make you feel better about ruining the environment.
Speaking of Dr. Dobson's comments on Evan Almighty....
Am I the only one who would rather hear someone mutter the "F-word" than to hear someone say, "Oh my G--"?
The former trivializes something sacred to humanity, procreation, while the latter trivializes God Himself. The slightly sanitized "oh my gosh" isn't much better, in my opinion, as it clearly makes reference to the blasphemous phrase that inspired it. What does "oh my gosh" mean, anyway?
I wonder if Christians say this phrase out of thoughtlessness, or if they truly think so little of God that they feel free to use His name so casually. Regardless, I think it reveals how much we've become influenced by our culture, that we'd imitate its pet phrases even when doing so defames our Lord.
 In a summer of sequels, Evan Almighty offers an interesting follow up to the surprise hit Bruce Almighty (read Plugged In review). This time around, director Tom Shadyac turned in a more family-friendly movie and tried to turn up the faith message a little. The studio also ponied up a $200 million budget -- much more than the budget for Bruce Almighty. The film also worked with organizations that stir up interest among the Christians at the grassroots level.
So what was the result? Well, reviews were mixed and the movie didn't end up opening as strong as Bruce Almighty did. The studio still hopes the movie will pick up some momentum, but that depends on the word-of-mouth it gets. Did you watch the movie? If so, what kind of word-of-mouth would you give it?
For some time now ethicists have warned that the development of real animal-human combinations — known as chimeras — was nearing on the horizon. Now, according to some reports, the future has arrived.
This, from Dr. Al Mohler, weighing in on an article in The Washington Post that details some of the "transgenic animals" scientists at Britain's Academy of Medical Sciences have created. The primary driver behind these experiments is human stem cell research, which must first be tested on animals. Apart from the fact that the results are a little creepy, they raise some ethical and theological questions. Mohler explains: The scariest part of this research is directed at work done in hope of curing or treating diseases of the human brain. Scientists have already produced humanized mice with symptoms of Alzheimer's disease. Now, scientists at Stanford University propose to put human brain cells in mouse brains in order to replace dying neurons. In reality, that would mean a human/mouse brain.
Saletan reports that ethicists at Stanford at first rejected the proposal, but have since come to approve it, allowing the researchers to produce mice with "some aspects of human consciousness or some human cognitive abilities."
Quoting a 2003 article by Dr. Nancy Jones of The Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity, Mohler points out that our most fundamental concern as believers "involves violation of the divinely created order." Genesis makes it clear that God created plants, animals and humans to reproduce after their own kind (Gen 1:11-12, 21). Thus, Mohler concludes: Dr. Jones' assertion that "species integrity is defined by God, rather than by arbitrary or evolutionary forces" is crucial to our understanding of this issue. Any effort to violate species integrity — no matter how noble with respect to medical treatments — must be seen as suspect in this light.
HT: Justin Taylor
Are we slaves to our own attraction? Or is it possible to "cultivate" what we find attractive so that we're drawn to Christ's beauty in other people instead of the shape of their bodies? Michael Lawrence thinks so. And he has a lot to say to guys who allow mere physical preference to keep them from pursuing godly women.
In "I'm Just Not Attracted to Her," Michael acknowledges attraction's powerful pull, saying he's seen men "change churches and rethink their theology for the sake of a woman." So, he says, we need to be careful what we allow to become attractive to us. Michael says, "Cultivate your attraction to Jesus Christ in the gospel. You may just be surprised at how some women you know seem to become more beautiful as you do."
This is a radical notion to those who ascribe to the Woody Allen model of attraction, "The heart wants what it wants." But I don't think we can trust our hearts, not even for what we think we think is beautiful. We can deceive ourselves into thinking our attractions are perfectly normal when they've actually been influenced heavily "by the sexy images of young women on MTV, the Internet and on the runway in televised Victoria's Secret specials."
And before you think Michael's down on physical preferences altogether, he continues: There's nothing wrong with having physical and personality traits on your list of what makes a woman attractive. In fact, you need to be physically and personally attracted to the woman you marry. If you're not, marriage won't provide the kind of protection against sexual sin that Paul speaks of (1 Corinthians 7:1-9).
Indeed. But if this is your highest priority, Michael says your problem isn't with the women around you, it's with God. The more you are in love with the beauty of Jesus Christ, the more you will be attracted to what you see of Him in the woman you're dating and the more important it will be to you. The less you love Him, the more important other things about her will become, things like her figure or style.
So how do we cultivate this godly attraction and guard what Michael calls real beauty? We do it by appreciating women who resemble Christ more than a Vogue model. We do it by encouraging modesty rather than sexiness. We do it by extending grace to imperfect bodies and flawed personalities. We do it by rejecting the worldly values of beauty that lead women to starve themselves or spend a small fortune on clothes.
As I've written previously, if there is a godly young woman you've written off from asking out because she isn't your "ideal," examine yourself or seek the help of other Christians to see if it has anything to do with the world's influence and then determine to get over it.
The American Medical Association may vote next week on making video game addiction an official psychiatric disorder but support for the move is mixed. And not surprisingly, the industry that makes the games that have entrapped many say there's no evidence that video games can be addictive.
According to Lindsey Tanner in the Chicago Tribune,
Michael Gallagher, president of the Entertainment Software Association, said the trade group sides with psychiatrists "who agree that this so-called 'video-game addiction' is not a mental disorder."
"The American Medical Association is making premature conclusions without the benefit of complete and thorough data," Gallagher said.
But not everyone is so cavalier.
Dr. Karen Pierce, a psychiatrist at Chicago's Children's Memorial Hospital, said she sees at least two children a week who play video games excessively.
"I saw somebody this week who hasn't been to bed, hasn't showered ... because of video games," she said. "He is really a mess."
Mom Liz Woolley blames an online game for the death of her son. She created On-Line Gamers Anonymous, a support group with "numerous postings on its Web site from gamers seeking help. ... Woolley, of Harrisburg, Pa., created the site after her 21-year-old son fatally shot himself in 2001 while playing an online game she says destroyed his life."
Tanner reports,
In a February posting, a 13-year-old identified only as Ian told of playing video games for nearly 12 hours straight, said he felt suicidal and wondered if he was addicted.
"I think I need help," the boy said.
This article jumped out at me because I just started reading Olivia and Kurt Bruner's Playstation Nation yesterday. In it they tell of their own son's addiction to video games and how they helped him break free. Whatever the gaming industry says about their products, the stories of real people don't lie.
If you or someone you know is spending huge amounts of time playing games and even more time thinking about them; if they're skipping basic things like showers, eating and spending time with real people, this book offers help and hope.
According to a study commissioned by the Culture and Media Institute, people who watch a lot of television have a different worldview than more moderate consumers -- one that is distinctly more liberal. Here's a portion of their conclusion: According to the survey, the more hours people spend in front of the television, the less likely they are to accept personal responsibility for their own lives and for their obligations to the people around them. They are less likely to conduct themselves honestly, and they are more likely to hold permissive attitudes about moral issues like divorce, extramarital sex, homosexuality and abortion. They are less likely to honor Godly values and religion in public life.
In his commentary on the study, film critic, best-selling author and syndicated radio talk show host Michael Medved wonders whether watching television "pushes" people toward a more liberal view or if it's just that liberals are prone to watching more television. Either way, he says, the correlation of "heavy" viewing and liberalism is undeniable.
Medved gives three possible explanations for why this correlation exists. Here's an excerpt: People who see themselves as alone in the world, with no network of spouses or fellow congregants, frequently turn to government as a source of support and comfort—just as they'd turn to television as a source of phony companionship. It makes sense that loneliness and helplessness and disconnection would breed both liberalism and heavy TV viewing; just as a vibrant family life, and communal participation, would produce less television and more conservative self-reliance.
Medved ended his article by saying that the study isn't about the quality of television but the quantity. He encourages us to be a part of the "connected, clear thinking light viewers, rather than the addled, lonely, and dysfunctional heavy consumers of the pop culture's principal form of mindless and misleading diversion."
"Find your inner Paul Potts," says journalist Tony Maciulis. A week ago I'd never heard of Potts, now he's all over the media for stunning the audience, and especially the judges, with his operatic performances in the "Britain's Got Talent" competition.
When Potts, a mobile phone salesman, first stood awkwardly before the judges and said nervously that he was going to sing opera because it was what he felt he was born to do, I cringed right along with judge Simon Cowell. Uh oh, what's this poor guy doing?! I'm too easily swayed by a book's cover. When Potts started singing, I started tearing up. Stunning. I felt it. The audience felt it. Even Simon felt it. The crowd erupted in applause, giving Paul a well-deserved standing ovation. He went on to win the whole competition. Now he's on to sing for the Queen, produce an album on Simon's label and as he says, to use his winnings to pay off his debts and start a family with his wife of four years.
Maciulis explains Potts' appeal saying, "It's something my high school English teacher called 'the triumph of the human spirit.' ... [Potts] will make you question the most fundamental thing about our day-to-day lives -- the big 'why am I here' conundrum."
He says, "We all have a passion, a secret buried within us. And yes, for the most part, the world will never know our names. But that doesn't mean we haven't made an impact, changed lives for the better, or had a purpose on this planet. Find your inner Paul Potts. Everyone has one."
I think Paul's victory resonates deeply with a lot of people -- over 2.4 million people have viewed his performance on YouTube -- because we were all created by an infinitely creative spirit and He placed in us His image. It's not just our fingerprints that are one-of-a-kind. It's our life script, the "days ordained for us before one of them came to be" (Psalm 139). Paul's turn-of-fortunes hints at it. When someone starts to live the life God had in mind for him before he was born, heaven and earth rejoices.
This past week, I spoke with my pastor after church. I wanted him to meet my sister who was visiting, since she was a fellow Multnomah Bible College grad. While I had his ear, I thanked him for constantly sharing the gospel from the pulpit. He seemed surprised by my praise. "That's what it's all about," was his simple response.
Boundless writer and pastor Thabiti Anyabwile addresses the issue of preaching and "The Mereness of Church" on his blog. We live in an age where some pastors desire to come across as hip entertainers more than ordinary servants of God. I've observed a competition, particularly among those who minister to young adults, to be the one to do the most novel thing that will effect change. The problem isn't the desire to effect change for the kingdom. The problem is in how we attempt to do it. Thabiti writes: Simple and unadorned is best in the pulpit. The Lord has blessed me with the privilege of pastoring the most diverse congregation I've ever been a part of. And many Sundays I leave the pulpit thinking this illustration or this joke simply had no reach. Perhaps a few folks acquainted with a certain genre of music "got it," but the other 90% were lost. It would have been better to be more mere by finding an application less "tailored" or "local" and accessible by my friends from Zaire, Zimbabwe, the Philippines, Australia and Canada.
Truth speaks for itself. This doesn't mean pastors and teachers should curb God-given creativity that arises naturally in their teaching. Recently our pastor told the story of the paralytic man in Mark 2 whose friends lowered him through the roof to be healed by Jesus. As part of the service, we each received a small rope attached to a bookmark. The bookmark contained the words "Who's on Your Rope?" along with four blank spaces. The pastor asked us to write the names of four unbelievers for whom we would commit to pray throughout the summer. This was an effective complement to his message about being committed to bringing friends to Christ.
"Mere church" also does not require that pastors never challenge the intellect of those in their congregations. Thabiti writes: So, mere doesn't mean dumbing down or preaching to the lowest common denominator. But it does mean that the church is to be built upon the pure milk and strong meat of God's Word, which isn't to be confused with the clever philosophy and wisdom of men. And when we do that, we comply with the Lord's purposes for His church, and make the church herself more accessible to more of God's people.
And that's what it comes down to: Who can impact people more? Me? Or Christ? My pastor's messages may not be fancy, but he understands that communicating the gospel to his congregation is "what it's all about." And seeing lives changed by Christ — not me — is the power of mere church.
Jesus believed the creation account presented in Scripture, and not the one presented by Darwin et al.
He believed that God created everything that exists, that he created specific "kinds"** of creatures that each reproduced "according to its kind" (as opposed to having genetically more complex offspring a la evolution), that Adam and Eve were the very first humans and that they were created "from the beginning" (He intentionally created distinct sexes, rather than allowing them to emerge over millennia), and that death only existed after Adam had sinned (rather than death being the violently blessed means whereby humanity evolved from less complex life forms).
How do I know this? Because Jesus believed the Scriptures. He came right out and said that if you believed the words He spoke, you would also believe the words that Moses wrote. Jesus is giving His stamp of approval on all of Genesis, for example, including the creation account.
Jesus trusted as historical fact, and not mere metaphor, those Scriptures that presented themselves as historical. He spoke of Jonah as fact, for example, and not just as a story. He spoke of Noah's flood as a fact, and not merely as a metaphor. The burning bush, according to Jesus, was fact. The destruction of Sodom was fact, according to Jesus. And so on. Jesus showed no distrust for the words of Moses or any other Old Testament writer, no matter how fantastic they seemed.
It's important to remember that Jesus wasn't merely repeating the prevailing theories, or "creation myths," of ancient Israel. He was speaking as one who had personally witnessed creation. And even then, He wasn't a mere observer, but a participant. The truth is, He was there even prior to creation. If the biblical account wasn't identical to what He had personally witnessed, He would not have so affirmed as historically accurate the book of Genesis.
Why is it important that we see the biblical creation account as accurate? Because if we don't see it as accurate, then our understanding and appreciation of the very thing which we are to proclaim most loudly -- Jesus' atoning death on the cross -- becomes skewed.
The entire premise of Jesus' incarnation was to save humanity from sin and death, something introduced by Adam in the Garden of Eden. Sin and death (death being a key element of the hypothetical evolutionary cycle) did not exist prior to Adam's sin, according to Scripture ("sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin"). The creation process was consistently labeled "good" by God, and not something polluted by sin and death.
Scripture is clear that the first human was Adam, and that He was intentionally created as the first by God, Eve then being created second. There were no "proto-humans." Adam had neither parents nor siblings. Eve was given away by God, not by Eve's father, since she had no father, either human or pre-human.
And it was this sin and resulting death that Jesus addressed on the cross: the sin of Adam and of his offspring. Because of Christ's death, we may avoid the consequences of Adam's and our sin, and become reconciled with the creator. While we remain descendents of Adam, we can become adopted into the family of the Second Adam.
And none of this would make sense if there were no literal Adam, no first sin, no biblical consequence for sin. And the cross would lose its relevance.
It may be difficult to retain a trust in Scripture and Jesus' affirmation of it, especially in light of what we're being told by just about everyone around us. It may be tempting to Christianize evolution by saying that perhaps God used evolution to bring "all this" about, that Scripture and evolution are not incompatible.
But it's important for several reasons that we trust Scripture instead. First, God will find no fault in our trusting His Word. In fact, I believe He takes pleasure in our concurring with Jesus in seeing it as true. And second, I believe He's disappointed when we disbelieve His Word. Jesus said, "For whoever is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed...."
As I've acknowledged, His words are difficult, sometimes going against common sense and the prevailing "wisdom." Nevertheless, I believe the biblical account because Jesus believed the biblical account. And if it's good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for me.
I am not ashamed of His words, though they be ridiculed by many of today's "wise men." I pray you are not ashamed of His words either.
(**For more detailed discussion of creationism, including the relevance of "kinds," I encourage you to read "Variation and natural selection versus evolution," written by Jonathan Sarfati of Creation Ministries International.)
This past weekend I saw a PBS documentary about the lives of Billy and Ruth Bell Graham. I was so interested to learn about the amazing life that Ruth had, culminating in her going to be with the Lord last week on June 14.
Mrs. Graham was born in China to missionary parents. She planned to be a missionary to Tibet, and decided not to ever get married. Those plans changed when she met Billy Graham at Wheaton College in Illinois. At the time, neither of them could fathom what was in store for their ministry.
What amazed me about Ruth's story was her dedication to the Lord in the midst of her circumstances. She raised five children -- most of the time completely on her own because her husband was traveling around the world delivering the Gospel. Although I'm not sure it's a marriage I would want -- Billy was gone for seven straight months at one time -- it is a marriage that they both worked hard to keep strong.
I admire the woman I saw in the documentary. She was strong and opinionated, yet gentle. Oftentimes Billy would come home from delivering a sermon and she would tell him what he could have done better. While everyone else was patting him on the back, she would bring him back down to earth.
Throughout her life, Ruth wrote books, raised children, helped with her husband's ministry, cared for those around her and so much more. It seems as though she was someone who loved the Lord with all of her heart -- her husband, children and friends have nothing but good things to say about her.
So, let's keep her family in our prayers as they grieve the loss of Ruth but also rejoice in the fact that she's at home.
If you'd like to learn more, you can visit the website dedicated to her life.
In a day of egalitarian relationships, do women care anymore if a potential husband will be a good provider? Do men care if a potential wife will be a nurturing mother? According to research in The Quarterly Journal of Economics, these "old-fashioned" capabilities still drive mate selection in spite of all the changes feminism has brought.
Researchers at The Howard Institute round up insights from various scholarly journals related to marriage and family trends. In a piece called "Mating Patterns Die Hard," they report on the journals study as follows: Looking at graduate students at Columbia University, where more egalitarian views might be expected, the study found that men expressed preferences for physically attractive women and that women expressed preferences for intelligent men from affluent backgrounds.
They wrap up their summary of this study (and another one from the journal Sex Roles) by saying: Taken together, both studies suggest that the rules of the mating game, rather than reflecting contrived or sexist standards that have been imposed on all by an oppressive society, appear to be deeply rooted in human nature, particularly the desire to procreate and establish families for which men and women respectively provide and care.
These reports imply that the desire for traits of provision and nurture are rooted in human nature -- perhaps below the surface of what men and women realize they are attracted to in another person. How do these findings strike you?
Yesterday I wrote about the unintended consequences of legalized abortion. But there's one I left out. It's the loss of outrage over women who kill their own babies after birth.
Amy Hall of Stand to Reason Blog reports on the story of a 22-year-old University of Southern California student who has been suspected of murdering her two newborn babies. Murder charges against USC student Holly Ashcraft who left her newborn baby's body in a dumpster were dropped this week because of a technicality. This is the second time in the last few years she has been suspected of this kind of murder, though they never found the body of the first baby. She claimed the babies were stillborn.
Hall said the local radio talk show host who tipped her off "made a connection between the lack of outrage in this case (which appalled him) and people's views on abortion." As he pointed out, in order not to tread on abortion rights, we're developing this weird belief as a society that if a mother kills her own child, then that's really not so bad. But ask yourself how the media and the justice system would have reacted had she killed someone else's child, and the ridiculousness of this double standard becomes clear.
Isn't the same double standard true for preborn children? If a woman caused the death of someone else's preborn baby, she would likely be charged with murder. However, if she's wondering whether she should end the life of her own, she's encouraged to and told it's safer than getting your tonsils removed.
In our society, it is the mother who assigns the intrinsic value of the life of her preborn children. So when a mother decides to murder her born children, is it really that outrageous? Apparently not.
South Beach, Atkins, Weight Watchers, Slim Fast. The methods for losing weight are as many as there are excess pounds in our bodies. Still, conventional wisdom says whatever you do to slim down, "no pain, no gain." Deprivation. That's what it's all about.
My problem is that extreme diets and exercise, though able to produce bursts of success, leave me more likely to binge and less likely to maintain any progress they produce. Today's Focus on the Family broadcast gave me new hope that maybe it's possible to slim down and tone up through minor adjustments and lifestyle changes.
John Trent talks about little changes that over time, accumulate to produce dramatic degrees of transformation. He uses an illustration from space to make his point. "Just a two-degree shift in Apollo 13's homeward course would have caused the spacecraft to miss the earth by thousands of miles," he says. Minor course corrections can make a big difference.
His message is primarily about relationships. But one guy who heard him applied the principles to his weight. He started out by skipping seconds on desserts (!). Soon after, he had dessert only every-other night. Then he decided to take his dogs for a walk around the block, at night, so no one would see him. In the end all these little changes lead to more little changes that made a huge difference. He lost over 100 lbs. and ran the Marine Corps Marathon.
That's an approach I can implement. What about you? What areas in your life need improvement? Your waistline, your checkbook, your daily devotions, your media and entertainment choices? What little changes could you make to transform your life?
Did you ever think about what church was like before the hippies took over? I didn't either. Not till today when I read Sally Thomas' "Grooving on Jesus," a review of Preston Shires' book Hippies of the Religious Right.
For all the positive changes brought about by a counter-cultural embrace of the New Testament communal-style worship, there were casualties: ... the unconverted hippie was not so much an unbeliever as a pre-believer. He was already living the essence of Christianity, man: It's all about, like, compassion and justice and stuff. All he needs is Jesus. As Shires puts it, hippie converts sought a "primitive Christianity . . . as lived out in the pages of Scripture . . . bare-boned, authentic, sharing." The meaning of these words is, of course, highly subjective. While some counterculture converts interpreted "authentic" and "primitive" Christian community to mean house churches, a majority integrated themselves into established local churches. Either way, the impulse was toward imitation of what people imagined might have been first-century Christian practice.
Not surprisingly, this imagined practice was light on bishops and heavy on extemporaneous prayer, direct interventions of the Holy Spirit, and beanbag chairs. Given a certain orientation toward an emotive, experiential, eschatological, not to say hallucinogenic flavor of Christianity, heavy on baptisms in the Spirit, speaking in tongues, and anticipating the imminent Rapture, the majority of those who did integrate into churches gravitated toward churches with a greater degree of innate ecclesial fluidity: Pentecostal, charismatic, and evangelical. But wherever they went in those heady days, they remade the Church in their image.
I realized I'm as much a product of historical illiteracy as the next Xer, first when I "discovered" Sunday services weren't always as free-form as what I'm used to and second when Thomas raised the possibility that maybe what used to be wasn't all bad.
Though Shires claims impartiality, his bias comes through, says Thomas. "Shires represents the process by which hippie culture infiltrated the Church as an unqualified good, which seems rather a simplification of things."
"The Jesus Movement had begun in evangelizing the street, but it ended in evangelizing the Church. This was a process of conversion via sit-in, a neo-Puritan stripping of altars. The reformation was, in some places, a deliberate act of forced religious-cultural amnesia, on a level with the smashing of stone saints in English cathedrals under Cromwell." says Thomas.
What the hippies did for the church in the '60s wasn't all bad, as Thomas readily admits. "This positive legacy of the countercultural impulse is undeniable and, as a homeschooling mother myself, I have every reason to be grateful for the ways in which the activist spirit has played out." But she doesn't stop there. "At the same time, I can't help wondering how longtime parishioners in our former Episcopal church felt, several years back, when the first gay wedding ceremony was performed there."
I'm thankful for writers with a broader knowledge and memory of what the world was like before the cultural revolution of the 1960s. It's a narrow view, and a dangerous one, to be convinced that things always were the way they are. Or worse, that everything that went before, was inferior.
I remember being introduced to postmodernism as an English major at a Christian college in the early 1990s. It was in the context of learning deconstruction as a method of literary criticism. I remember having a hard time wrapping my mind around it at first, but then actually finding it intriguing as it seemed much easier to "deconstruct" literature -- to find all its hidden messages and agendas -- than to do the hard work of traditional literary criticism. I thought I had seen the last of postmodernism after I graduated from college, but I was surprised to see it showing up in more and more places until it came to be considered the dominant mindset of our day.
For anyone who has heard the term thrown around, but never felt like you had a firm grasp on all it implies -- and also for anyone who wonders if postmodernism actually brings with it new ministry opportunities -- I want to recommend an online piece Dr. Al Mohler has written for The Henry Institute about the postmodern challenge.
Here's an excerpt that sets up the material he presents: Actually, postmodernism may not be a movement or methodology at all. We might best describe postmodernism as a mood which sets itself apart from the certainties of the modern age. This mood is the heart of the postmodern challenge.
What are the contours of this postmodern mood? Is this new movement helpful in our proclamation of the Gospel? Or, will the postmodern age bring a great retreat from Christian truth? A look at the basic features of postmodernism may be helpful.
What does it mean to you to live in -- and try to share your faith in -- a postmodern world?
You probably didn't notice Scott Peterson in church this past Sunday. But he was there. Somewhere in the third pew from the back, or perhaps in the children's Sunday-school choir.
This is the intriguing opening of an article by Russell D. Moore, that considers how inaccurate views of women, children, sex and marriage are feeding the hatred that leads a person to become a predator of the ones he is called to protect.
Guys I know are always asking how they can attract a godly woman. My list includes respect, kindness, accountability and a willingness to risk. Dr. Moore goes a step further to exhort pastors, the church and Christian men of all walks of life to overhaul worldly attitudes about women and children. He writes: First, pastors, stop telling jokes (especially from the pulpit) about the "old ball and chain" or how "when mama's not happy, nobody's happy." Model for your congregation what it means to revel in the joy of loving and caring for your wife and children. Make sure your people know that you wouldn't trade one moment with your wife for any Internet-generated pornographic picture or Friday-night fling with a movie star.
Make sure your people know that you would rather be in the backyard with your children than on a golf course with your buddies—or in front of the television with a bucket of chicken and a diet Coke. Keep before your people the joys of marriage and fatherhood—and the joyful responsibilities to protect and to lead that come along with them.
No doubt, the women reading this are letting out a little sigh. We resonate with this idea. A man who delights in the prospect (or reality) of family life is a refreshing departure from the norm. Recovering a biblical vision of manhood, Dr. Moore concludes, will require accountability and a change of heart: Sometimes it means telling young married men it is time to take off the baseball caps, to stop playing video games, and to grow up. Sometimes it means gently telling a young man that he needs to work two jobs so his stressed-out wife can stay home and care for their children. Above all, it means keeping before all of our men—young and old—the transformative power of the gospel and the sanctifying power of the Word of God.
And transformation is the thing Christian women will respond to. Because, the fact is, most of us are just looking for a good man.
Whenever we dare envision the prospect of banning abortion, many (primarily those on the left) raise the counter-argument that doing so will only produce more "unwanted" children -- you know, "Every Child a Wanted Child." But as John R. Lott Jr. points out in today's Opinion Journal, it's not enough to be wanted.
In "It's Not Enough to be 'Wanted,'" Lott says there are social cost "trade-offs" to legalized abortion that have long been neglected. These include:
- A sharp increase in pre-marital sex.
- A sharp rise in out-of-wedlock births.
- A drop in the number of children placed for adoption.
- An increase in single-parent families.
I can understand the increase in pre-marital sex, but wasn't abortion supposed to decrease out-of-wedlock births? And if they're more out-of-wedlock births, shouldn't there be more children placed for adoption?
Lott explains this seemingly contradictory data: Many men, feeling tricked into unwanted fatherhood, will likely wash their hands of the affair altogether, thinking, "I never wanted a baby. It's her choice, so let her raise the baby herself." What is expected of men in this position has changed dramatically in the last four decades. The evidence shows that the greater availability of abortion largely ended "shotgun" marriages, where men felt obligated to marrying the woman.
What has happened to these babies of reluctant fathers? The mothers often end up raising the child on their own. Even as abortion has led to more out-of-wedlock births, it has also dramatically reduced adoptions of children born in America by two-parent families. Before Roe, when abortion was much more difficult, women who would have chosen an abortion but were unable to get one turned to adoption as their backup. After Roe, women who turned down an abortion were also the type who wanted to keep the child.
Lott says that the liberalization of abortion has hit the minority community the hardest. Out-of-wedlock births among blacks soared from 35% to 62% in the two decades after Roe. And it's these children who "have suffered a series of problems from problems at school to more crime."
You can't help but wonder what our culture, and the black community, would look like today if abortion had never been legalized.
I love to travel. I love being immersed in a foreign place, experiencing the peculiar range of a society's "cultural artifacts" -- their food, their language, their architecture, their landscapes, their way of thinking, their parks and markets, their entertainment, and so on. I cherish having been able to spend months in Mexico and Colombia, and weeks in Singapore, Germany, Italy, France, England, Wales, Canada and other places. I think my travels have enriched my life and help me better relate to a variety of people from a variety of cultures and subcultures.
While I advocate travel for the sake of growing in wonder and appreciation of the breadth of God's creativity, one of the most overlooked benefits is to be able to return home with new eyes. G. K. Chesterton said, "The whole object of travel is not to set foot on foreign land; it is at last to set foot on one's own land as a foreign land." T. S. Elliot expressed something similar when he said, "We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we first started, and to know that place for the first time."
Acquiring an awe of God's creation and renewing an appreciation of one's own culture are but two benefits of travel. But travel can also affect people in negative ways.
Some who travel take on a subtle arrogance. As though flying across 1,000 miles of water somehow makes them more of an expert on "matters of significance." Others may speak highly of their having done a week-long overseas missions trip, and how that has been so impactful to the natives and to themselves. Sometimes it is, of course -- my week in Mexico during my early 20s did in fact change my life. But sometimes a week in another country only gives someone a skin-deep excuse to feel culturally relevant.
It can be argued that the most culturally relevant person ever to have lived was Jesus. And Jesus wasn't much of a world traveler, having never gone more than a few dozen miles from his town of birth. His life demonstrates that ultimately how much you travel is irrelevant to how effective your ministry can be and how rich your life can be.
That said, if you've got the opportunity to travel for either a short period or for a semester or more, I'd strongly encourage you to go while you have the flexibility to do so. It will enrich your life tremendously. Just be sure to use your experiences to bless others, and not to puff yourself up.
If you're simply not able to go yourself, I'd urge you to consider experiencing other cultures vicariously through good books or documentaries. While munching on something from your local ethnic restaurant, of course.
I'm not a big fan of pop psychology, but I have found Gary Chapman's "The Five Love Languages" helpful as I think how to love my wife and as I think about what makes me feel loved. For those of you who generally stick to Spurgeon and Edwards and à Kempis, Dr. Chapman describes the five "languages" on his website.
I found an online test that may help you narrow down which of your "love languages" is dominant. I took the test. Here are my results:
- Quality Time: 8
- Words of Affirmation: 7
- Physical Touch: 7
- Acts of Service: 6
- Receiving Gifts: 2
It's either "balanced" or "boring," depending on how you look at the results. I suppose the telling result is that I don't get much out of receiving gifts, so maybe save your money and instead spend time on Boundless and send me an e-mail letting me know how much you appreciate my work.
Again, I tend not to put much faith in popular faddish psychological self-help books. But I do see some value in understanding what "fills your love tank" and what makes your significant other feel loved. Maybe take the test and share your results with us (and with your boyfriend/girlfriend/spouse). And let me know how you find this assessment helpful.
I was driving home from the mall tonight with my wife and two baby daughters. As we were approaching our home, I noticed that the yard a few homes down was finally completed. After about a year of landscaping, the sod had finally been laid, and the end result looked beautiful.
As I passed, I noticed the owner in his garage. I stopped, put the van in reverse, rolled down the window, and yelled to him, "Your yard looks great!"
The man walked over. I'd never met him, but had seen him in his yard from time to time over the past year. As he approached the van he said, "My wife died last month."
Um.
Turns out his wife of 12 years had had cancer, and then an automobile accident, something that left her unable to keep either water or food down. As my daughters slept in the back of the van, my wife in the seat next to me, motor running, the man went on to tell me that his wife had died at home less than a month ago. Less than a month ago, just two houses over from us, this man lay in his bed weeping, holding his wife's hand as she exhaled her last breath. Her last breath.
Now he's wondering if he'll have to move, since he doesn't have the extra income his wife had been bringing in to cover the mortgage. On the brighter side, his family is in town, and they've been a great help and comfort. And he's part of a fine church just down the road, so there's help and comfort coming from there as well.
I'm left pondering a lot of things as a result of tonight's 10-minute encounter. I'm thinking of the pain that this man will always have with him. I'm thinking of what role the Lord might have me play in this man's life, and whether I have time to spare. I'm thinking of the life insurance that his wife didn't have. I'm thinking of the children they didn't have. I'm thinking of the providential encounter, something that happened because the Lord has been working on me to overcome the "fear of man" and because I therefore wasn't afraid to go out of my way to commend him on his beautiful yard. I'm thinking of the incomprehensible pain this poor man is experiencing. And I'm thinking that, as I type this, he may very well be alone in his McMansion a couple of houses over, shedding tears into the pillow that received his wife's last breath not one month ago.
Please pray for my neighbor Mike and the wife of his that has gone to be with the Lord, Lucinda.
The best article in today's Wall Street Journal isn't about stocks or bonds and it doesn't even mention money. In my opinion, today's top article is a little sleeper by columnist and blogger Tony Woodlief. In "Boys to Men," he admits his own shortcomings as an ill-prepared dad to three rowdy, rambunctious, energetic boys. Not deluded into thinking this Sunday will be a day of rest or relaxation, he's gearing up for a Father's Day full of creepy, crawly things, wrestling and celebrating in the way only little boys can.
"There's more than a little irony in the fact that I have three sons, writes Woodlief. I'm not what you'd call a master of the manly arts.... I'm allergic to most danger. I get a stomach-ache at the thought of confrontations. I'm grouchy and self-centered," he says. Still, he bemoans the fact that "many academics would consider my lack of manliness a good things." He finds it worrisome that those same academicians view "boys as thugs-in-training, caught up in a patriarchal society that demeans women" and now believe the solution is to "forget math, science and throwing a ball ... what your boy most needs to learn is emotional literacy."
Not my boys, thank you very much. And not Woodlief's boys, either. He's a man on a mission:
I can't shake the sense that boys are supposed to become manly. Rather than neutering their aggression, confidence and desire for danger, we should channel these instincts into honor, gentlemanliness and courage. Instead of inculcating timidity in our sons, it seems wiser to train them to face down bullies, which by necessity mean teaching them how to throw a good uppercut.
His mission, however, finds him ill-prepared. He is the son of divorce; a man called upon to be a dad with little personal history with his own dad to draw from. So he writes,
The trick is not to squash the essence of boys, but to channel their natural wildness into manliness. And this is what keeps me awake at night, because it's going to take a miracle for someone like me, who grew up without meaningful male influence, who would be an embarrassment to Teddy Roosevelt, to raise three men. What I'm discovering is that as I try to guide these ornery, wild-hearted little boys toward manhood, they are helping me become a better man, too.... As I stumble and sometimes fail, as I feign an interest in camping and construction and bugs, I become something better than I was.
Woodlief's solution is refreshingly unconventional. He's going to figure it out and stick it out because he knows how devastating the alternative is. He is a model of hope for all the twentysomething men whose own fathers walked out on them and who wonder if they should even try to get married and have kids. It's true that without a role model, it's hard to imagine being a successful dad. But Woodlief shows that it's possible. And it's one of the most rewarded efforts a man will ever make.
To all the young fathers who read Boundless, thank you for the job you're doing. Happy Father's Day!
The criticisms of the book I recommended in my last post got me thinking. Some of you didn't like Redeeming Love -- or at least were cautious about recommending it -- because of some of the sexual content. While I would still argue that there's nothing overtly graphic about the book, I can understand that it might not be something everyone is used to or comfortable with. And for those who have experienced any kind of abuse, I can obviously see why it would be difficult to read.
Overall, though, all of this got me thinking about the Bible. As far as books go, it has everything plus more of what was objected to in Rivers' book.
There's a story of a woman sleeping with her father-in-law in order to get pregnant (Genesis 38). We read of God telling His people to kill everyone -- men, women and children -- once they enter the land He's given to them (Deuteronomy 7). The sweet little children's story about the animals going into a big boat two-by-two ends with the destruction of all humanity, save for eight people (Genesis 6-8). King Saul commits suicide and then the Philistines cut off his head (1 Samuel 31). There's adultery (1 Samuel 11), rape and incest (1 Samuel 13), polygamy (too many passages to name) murder (again, just too many), sexually suggestive language (Song of Songs), a dad offering his daughters to be raped (Genesis 19) -- honestly folks, you know that I could go on and on and on....
So, what's the difference in the way we approach Scripture? Are we just so used to hearing Bible stories that we don't pay attention to the fact that these things happened to real people? That much of what happened (and is commanded) in the Bible would be horrific to the modern Evangelical? I mean, honestly, it took me awhile to realize that the biblical Esther wasn't just beautiful -- she went through treatments for a year in preparation for her opportunity to "please the king." Chances are, she wasn't just baking him bread or reading him stories.
I think many people (myself included) would be offended by much of what's in the Bible if we didn't know it to be the Word of God. Now I am not, in any way, trying to be casual with the Scripture -- I am simply acknowledging what's there.
What do you all think? Why don't these Bible stories seem to bother us? I do believe there is an inherent difference between a work of fiction and the infallible Word of God. But what, exactly, is that difference? What makes one acceptable and the other unacceptable to some?
I was meandering around ShoutLife, a "fresh approach to social networking," and found myself on CBNmusic's profile page. (At the cost of sounding like co-blogger Denise Morris, "A quick shout-out to Jennifer E. Jones!")
Anyway, their most recent blog headline caught my eye, and so I clicked on the link and then on to their Web site to read the story on BarlowGirl.
Turns out that BarlowGirl is releasing their latest album, "How Can We Be Silent," on July 24. I was happily surprised to see that "One More Round," one of Rebecca Barlow's favorites on the album, was "inspired by a teaching on a Focus on the Family radio broadcast."
I'm heartened that a group as hip as BarlowGirl recognizes the relevance of the Focus on the Family radio broadcast to 20-somethings. I know that I benefited from the program through my 20s and 30s, often listening to it during my lunch hour. How have you been inspired by something you've heard on the broadcast?
One of my favorite points by the speakers here at the LEAD conference was the one made by Glenn Packiam about balancing relevance with ministry to 20somethings. He said that even while churches try to be more relevant to new believers, they shouldn't be embarrassed by the presence of God. "That's like walking into a hospital sick and having the nurses hide the medicine," he said. Each speaker has reminded this group of leaders that it doesn't matter how cool they come across if they can't direct people to God. Another speaker, David Perkins, added that a community of people who are growing as on-fire disciples will grow a 20something ministry better than any coffee you offer, hip t-shirts or expensive jeans you wear, or being cool by "growing your hair over your ears."
It's the fourth session of the day and The Mill worship leader Glenn Packiam is speaking about how God uses people, ordinary people, to accomplish his will. He's using the story of Nehemiah rebuilding the wall in Jerusalem as an illustration.
Glenn highlights three lessons from the Book of Nehemiah: do small things well, act where you are, and stay on the scene.
In chapter 2:5, we see Nehemiah leveraging his "favor" as cupbearer to appeal to King Artaxerxes for the sake of Judah. It's something that could be easily overlooked in the text. But this favor is exactly how God moved a king to reverse his own order regarding the rebuilding of Jerusalem's wall. And this isn't about God needing Nehemiah. He just proved to be the means God used because he was faithful in the small things.
Glenn says that one of the reasons we forsake the small things is because we're tempted to think that God is only in the spectacular. And that we long to do something spectacular for God. But we need to remember that God is also in the ordinary. That He has called us to do small things well, to act where we are, and not to be anxious to leave where He has placed us.
God has great expectations for His own Glory that can only be found in what we would call the mundane. But that's only because we can't see the big picture. If we could, we would see God's great purposes in our own faithful insignificance.
Steve and I are out of the office today manning the Boundless booth at the LEAD conference here in Colorado Springs. Its purpose is "to equip pastors and campus leaders to reach and disciple college students/20-somethings with purpose and passion." Aaron Stern, pastor of The Mill and conference leader, just finished praying and the Desperation Band is kicking off the worship.
The Mill is New Life Church's community for college students and 20-somethings, "one of the largest ministries of its kind in the country." Their vision is to make disciples, to go deep in the few years that this transient generation is a part of their community. And they want to share the passion and authenticity they've witnessed among this demographic with others.
I'm looking forward to their line-up of speakers which includes author of Twentysomething and Organic God Margaret Feinberg. Our goal is to give away Grapplebricks of Boundless Grappledecks so that the attendees leave with a good idea of the Boundless messaging.
Aaron finished his talk in the first session by saying that 20-something ministry doesn't have to be hard or confusing. We just need to lead them to Jesus, lead them to passion, lead them to community. That's about right.
I noticed that Francine Rivers' book, Redeeming Love, is on the summer reading list for a few of you. Here's the deal: If it's not on your list, add it immediately.
Redeeming Love is a beautiful book -- and I believe it's one that everyone (men and women) can, should and will enjoy. And no worries, folks. Although it is a religious novel, it is not corny and predictable like much of Christian fiction.
The story is set in California during the gold rush and tells of Michael Hosea (a strong, godly man) and Angel (a young lady who was sold into child prostitution). Their struggle is with one another and with God, and Rivers' excellent writing draws you in immediately.
The most wonderful thing about the book is that it is a retelling of the biblical book of Hosea, in which God commands His prophet to marry a prostitute. It is a beautiful and heart-wrenching picture of God's love for Israel -- how she continues to turn away from Him and prostitute herself, and He faithfully brings her back to Himself. Through Hosea, we see God's commitment to His promise -- His unending loyalty to the covenant He made: I will betroth you to me forever; I will betroth you in righteousness and justice, in love and compassion. I will betroth you in faithfulness, and you will acknowledge the LORD. (Hosea 2:19-20
Seriously, people. It's way cool. I know guys who have enjoyed the book as well, so don't be afraid, you manly men. If you've already read it -- do it again. If you haven't -- why are you still reading this post? Pick up a copy right now.
My friend Will recently shared a puzzling tale with me. For the past few years, Will has been attracted to Lynette. Although, he has expressed interest in pursuing her at least twice, she has declined his offer insisting she'd rather be friends (See "You're a Great Guy, but...). Still, Lynette seems eager to spend time with Will, and he has been the one to establish boundaries as to how much time they spend together. Here's where the story gets weird.
Recently, Will and Lynette went to see a movie together (as friends). During an intense moment of the film, Lynette grabbed Will's hand, interlocking her fingers with his. After a minute or so, Will drew his hand away but Lynette continued to grasp his arm. Later, Lynette apologized for getting "caught up in the moment" but expressed no change of heart.
In his article, "Physical Intimacy and the Single Man," Matt Schmucker exhorts men with 1 Thessalonians 4:3-6: It is God's will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality; that each of you should learn to control his own body in a way that is holy and honorable, not in passionate lust like the heathen, who do not know God; and that in this matter no one should wrong his brother or take advantage of him.
He calls this wronging of a brother (or sister) "defrauding." Simply put, a man defrauds a woman when, by his words or actions, he promises the benefits of marriage to a woman he either has no intention of marrying or if he does, has no way of finally knowing that he will.
But just as a man has the potential to defraud a woman in a relationship, the reverse is also true. I believe we women are at our worst when we indulge in the affection of a man we have no intention of dating. I addressed this in my recent article: If you feel your heart leaning toward someone who has pursued you in the past — someone you rejected — commit a serious period of time to prayer for the relationship. Perhaps God is changing your heart. But if you discover that your feelings have not changed, resist the urge to abuse the attraction the guy has toward you. Philippians 2:3 reminds us: "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves." Grasping for romantic attention does not seek the guy's best interest.
By indulging in a romantic gesture, Lynette was not seeking Will's best interest. Her actions promised something she was not intending to deliver. Her example may seem extreme because it is physical. More often, a lust for romance drives women to indulge in the compliments, emotional support and companionship of rejected potential suitors. In my opinion, this type of behavior is unacceptable for a Christian woman. Women need to bring these passions under the Spirit's control, and treat their brothers in a way that is holy and honorable.
Looking for some good books to read this summer? Check out these recommendations from Dr. Albert Mohler. I have my eye on two of them: Presidential Courage: Brave Leaders and How They Changed America and Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East.
Though Mohler's recommendations aren't gender specific, I do believe these offerings appeal more to guys. For more book suggestions, check out Tim Challies's newly redesigned Discerning Reader. It's "a place where you can keep up with what is new and exciting in the world of Christians books."
What books are on your summer reading list?
Today's top story on Fox News made my heart sick. The article reports that infanticide and abortion are responsible for 60 million girls missing in Asia. These missing girls — primarily in China and India — are creating a gender imbalance that is contributing to a social crisis. A normal sex ratio at birth (SRB) is between 103 and 105 males per 100 females; in China, make that 130 males to 100 females. "Twenty-five million men in China currently can't find brides because there is a shortage of women," said Steven Mosher, president of the Population Research Institute in Washington, D.C. "The young men emigrate overseas to find brides."
The imbalances are also giving rise to a commercial sex trade; the 2005 report states that up to 800,000 people being trafficked across borders each year, and as many as 80 percent are women and girls, most of whom are exploited.
Mosher blames the problem on China's one-child policy, instituted in 1979. The policy encourages late marrying and late childbearing, and it limits the majority of urban couples to having one child and most of those living in rural areas to two. Female infanticide was the result, he said.
"Historically infanticide was something that was practiced in poor places in China," Mosher said. "But when the one-child policy came into effect we began to see in the wealthy areas of China, what had never been done before in history — the killing of little girls."
Is your stomach turning? Mine too. What I find interesting is the response to this "prejudicial abortion." The United States sponsored a resolution at the U.N.'s Commission on the Status of Women that called for eliminating infanticide and gender selection (the resolution was withdrawn because of opposition). And Indian state governments have launched "Save the Girl Child" and other similar campaigns. These initiatives recognize that Asia's abortion problem displays a deep and egregious prejudice against women.
Because the situation in Asia is becoming a critical social problem (which it's interesting to note is leading to other grievous evils, such as an increase in the sex trade), prejudicial abortion is being brought to light as evil. Of course it's evil to kill 60 million little girls! The thing is, abortion is always prejudicial. Randy Alcorn refers to it as "ageism" and "sizeism." No matter the sex of the child, or its abilities/disabilities, abortion is a crime of prejudice against a human being. The headline "60 Million Missing Girls" simply shows the consequences of a rampant social and spiritual problem that is present in every culture.
China has resolved to keep its one-child policy in place until 2050. "The implications are potentially disastrous," Mosher said.
Things do not end well for societies that kill their children. We should all take heed.
It's clear from the rag tag comments on Motte's post about Bridal Gift Registries that the Boundless Line readers would benefit from reading Miss Manners on Painfully Proper Weddings, by Judith Martin.
Contrary to the title, this book is a painless and quite entertaining read. More importantly, it's a needed reminder that etiquette is more than a set of stuffy old rules. It's the means by which we may interact with other people in a way that has their interests at heart. It's a more formalized version of the second greatest commandment, if you will. It's the Golden Rule applied to specific social settings.
What it isn't, is a hodge-podge of personal opinions about what seems like the right or logical way to proceed in certain settings (see the comments on Motte's post to see what that looks like). If we were left to our inclinations alone, it's not hard to imagine weddings devolving into chaotic get-togethers.
In case you're not inclined to read the whole book, here are a few snippets:
1. Registering for anything and everything is crass, as is including little "we are registered at" cards in the wedding invitations. (If you register, keep it to yourself until and unless someone asks you if you have and where.)
2. Wedding gifts are given at the discretion of the guests -- it's their way of saying, "we want to help the young couple get off on the right start"
3. Wedding gifts are not the price of admission to the ceremony or reception, nor are gifts expected to cost a certain amount or cover what the bride and groom spent on dinner.
4. It is never appropriate to ask for cash, nor offer the "option" of guests paying for certain elements of the wedding or honeymoon, nor even to suggest "in lieu of gifts, please donate to our favorite charity" (for more, see point 2.)
Just because you think something is done out of respect for etiquette doesn't mean it is. Many of the customs we Americans have adopted around weddings are in fact directly opposite of what's required. In many cases, one bride goofed, or misunderstood a tradition, and all her friends copied her, thinking she knew what she was doing. And before long, everyone was doing it.
My favorite example, from Martin's book, is that rectangular piece of tissue paper that accompanies all invitations these days. It's original purpose was to separate engraved invitations from one another, in order to prevent the ink from smearing during their transport from the print shop. As soon as the ink was dry, the tissue was discarded -- before the invitations were sent. Not only do most brides no longer engrave their invitations (too expensive), they keep that tissue in place for mailing (too funny). But alas, I did. I thought that was what etiquette required.
When in doubt, check.
This is just a taste of all the good and essential detail Martin covers in the book. I loved it so much -- even though it forced me to reckon with the many mistakes I made in my own wedding -- that it's my new favorite gift to give recently-engaged brides.
Whenever I express an opinion about some minute detail of home decor, my wife sighs and says, "Just like my bridal registry." It's true. I have lots of opinions about things I probably shouldn't. I can't help it. I'm just into practicality and feng shui. So when I ran across this article on the essentials of bridal registry, I could really relate.
Sara Dickerman, food and dining editor for "Seattle Magazine," preaches modesty when given the "chance to receive pretty much everything you want." Here's why: The truth is, space, at least easily accessible space, will always be an issue, even in a dream kitchen. Don't plan for the unlikely eventualities -- the huge buffet that calls for chafing dishes. Instead, look at the realities of your life in your near future. Kitchenware stores are endlessly tempting with their hyper-specific appliances (like this margarita maker), but in most cases, something else more all-purpose -- in this case, a blender -- can do the job perfectly well. Value and versatility should be the ultimate litmus test for whether something belongs in your kitchen. If for some reason you suddenly find yourself in need of your own meat slicer, invest in it then.
Sara then goes into great detail about her list of "crucial items worth investing a little money in -- yours or somebody else's." My favorite? The bar mop dishcloths. After nine years of cleaning spills and counters with fancy linens that absorb about as well as construction paper, I could really use some of those.
The Associated Press reports that a series of studies conducted over the past six years claim that the death penalty saves lives. One study found that each execution deters an average of 18 murders (Other studies have estimated the deterred murders per execution at three, five and 14). "Science does really draw a conclusion. It did. There is no question about it," said Naci Mocan, an economics professor at the University of Colorado at Denver. "The conclusion there is a deterrent effect."
A 2003 study he co-authored, and a 2006 study that re-examined the data, found that each execution results in five fewer homicides, and commuting a death sentence means five more homicides. "The results are robust, they don't really go away," he said. "I oppose the death penalty. But my results show that the death penalty (deters) — what am I going to do, hide them?"
Additionally, one of the studies found the the time between convictions and executions also affected the homicide rate. For every 2.75 years cut from time spent on death row, one murder would be prevented.
The studies have their share of dissenters: Some claim that the pro-deterrent studies made profound mistakes in their methodology, so their results are untrustworthy. Another critic argues that the studies wrongly count all homicides, rather than just those homicides where a conviction could bring the death penalty. And several argue that there are simply too few executions each year in the United States to make a judgment.
Still, there is a logical piece to the death penalty acting as a deterrent to crime. Statistics seem to indicate that when the cost is too high, people will change their behavior. God established this same deterrent in early history (Genesis 9:6). Capital punishment is a heated topic, even among Christians. Still, if dispensing punishment appropriate to the crime will save innocent lives, it's each person's duty to take a closer look.
 I am a big fan of Boundless writer Carolyn McCulley. I am a regular visitor to her blog, and I enjoy reading her perspectives on Boundless. This past weekend, I had the opportunity to spend a few days with her in the D.C. area. This picture was taken after we ate dinner at a great Lebanese restaurant.
Carolyn, who writes on topics ranging from being gracious to men to exercising hospitality, practices what she preaches. She not only helped me figure out details for my itinerary, but she gave me a ride to the Metro station, wrote down directions and stayed up late just to chat. (She even let me sneak a peek at her next Boundless article, which deals with the issue of dating unbelievers.)
I had a great time connecting with a fellow writer and blogger and swapping thoughts, stories and ideas. Be sure to check out Carolyn's next article — it's a good one!
The book I'm reading, King of the Jews by D. Thomas Lancaster, has a chapter devoted to the idea that, theologically speaking, Jesus was most likely a Pharisee. What?!
As the book points out, we usually think of Pharisees as super bad dudes. The term "Pharisaical" was even brought up (negatively) in a response to Motte's post about budgeting. In general, being associated with the Pharisees is not a good thing. But, says Lancaster, perhaps we have misunderstood exactly what was going on with Jesus and the Pharisees: Gospel scholars have recently come to the shocking conclusion that not all Pharisees were hypocrites. In fact, the majority of them seemed to be pretty decent fellows! ... The simple point is that Yeshua (not to mention His brother James and His apostle Paul) was, for all practical purposes, a Pharisee. His theology, His hermeneutic, His parables, His argumentation, His conclusions and even His dinner invitations were Pharisaic in origin. While we cannot be overly dogmatic that Yeshua was a Pharisee, there is no other sect or form of faith in all of human history with which He shared a closer affinity. He conducted Himself as if He were one.
The book goes on to point out that the Pharisees are often with Jesus -- in more ways than one: The Pharisees themselves were never far from Yeshua theologically or geographically. He was often a dinner guest in their homes, and they were often critics of His ministry. At times, some Pharisees vehemently opposed Him. On other occasions, they cheered Him on while He thwarted the Sadducees or nailed home a point of Torah. On another occasion, the Pharisees are depicted trying to rescue Him from Herod (Luke 13:31).
Now, we do know that some of the Pharisees are critical of Jesus, but sometimes the questions they ask are simply that -- questions. They are not always trying to trap Him -- they are truly seeking to know Jesus' theology.
And, according to this book and other scholars I've heard, much of what we see Jesus do throughout the Gospels is in line with the Pharisaic tradition of the time. Jesus commends the Pharisees for tithing mint, dill and cumin -- something that was not part of biblical law, but was part of Pharisaic tradition. Many of the parables of Jesus are actually old Pharisaic stories -- sometimes with different endings. Much of Jesus' thoughts on issues were in line with the teachings of the Rabbi Hillel -- a Pharisee.
Now, Jesus does call the Pharisees out quite often. But Lancaster posits that the times Jesus gets angry with the Pharisees is when they elevate tradition above the Scripture. And although Jesus seemed to follow many of the Pharisaic customs, He obviously held the Word of God above the traditions of men. Lancaster notes that while Jesus may have theologically lined up with many of the teachings of the Pharisees, He never did so to the detriment of the Truth. Unlike the Pharisees, He did not allow Jewish tradition to be elevated to the same level as Scripture. He was quick to discard any traditions that contradicted the Word of God. He placed compassion above the stringencies of tradition, and He rebuked hypocrisy and pretense whenever He saw it. But He did all of this from within traditional Judaism and as a part of traditional Judaism.
Anyway, I found all of this to be quite interesting (sorry for wasting your time if you didn't :-). Although I haven't quite formed an opinion yet, I'm interested to hear yours. What do you think of the idea that Jesus was a Pharisee?
In high school I spent days working on mathematical proofs that everyone knew were impossible. I was confident that if anyone could break through, it would be me. I consistently earned the highest grades in math and science, earning an A+ in Geometry and acing the Physics final (though in an act of retro cockiness I used a slide rule rather than a calculator like everyone else).
I was a Slater, the son of a renown physician, and we were different. Better.
In college I'd spend my time reading Kierkegaard and Unamuno and Tillich and Bloch and Heidegger and Kant and Wittgenstein and Emerson and Thoreau and Lewis and Schaeffer and Chesterton and McDowell ... and others. I was driven to master Truth, and wouldn't settle for what everyone around me believed. I became a regular columnist for the university student newspaper. I was told that sometimes when a column of mine was published whole class periods would be spent discussing what I'd written.
Of course. I was a Slater.
At the end of one of my courses in grad school, one of my professors called me an "overachiever." I wasn't surprised. I earned straight A's in grad school, graduating with two master's degrees. Straight A's except for one class. I was indignant when I received an A- in a short story writing class, and I challenged the grade in writing. Slaters don't get A minuses.
Except that I did.
About that time, as my academic years came to a close and I found myself spending more time with friends who didn't have advanced degrees, the Lord began a new work on my heart. He started showing me (primarily through church, not that A-) that there are some things more important than intellectual accomplishment. He was showing me that such things as relationship and godliness and heart and obedience and humility were more important than what I'd been pursuing. He was showing me that it's more important to engage in a church service, for example, than to evaluate it. That participating in Christian community is more important than criticizing the Church. That it's more important to put into practice the kindness of Jesus and to pursue Him than to master theology.
He was teaching me that Slaters are really not all that special. I'm not all that exceptional, other than that it's taken me a bit longer to learn the importance of something more significant than knowledge.
I still find myself struggling to be superior, of course. While it's not a bad thing to want to honor the Lord with the "talents" He's given me, it is a sin to see myself as somehow "special." A sin.
So now, when I'm tempted to think of myself as "the exception," I remind myself that it's probably more accurate to describe myself as a simple sinner. A human in need of grace just like the next guy. And together we make up a body for whom Christ will lovingly return some day.
Yeah, I'm a Slater. An ordinary Slater in need of the Lord's extraordinary love.
Over the weekend, my pastor Matt Heard, told the story of a creative experiment the Washington Post conducted this past January. Here are some highlights from their story about it: It was 7:51 a.m. on Friday, January 12, the middle of the morning rush hour. In the next 43 minutes, as the violinist performed six classical pieces, 1,097 people passed by.
...Each passerby had a quick choice to make, one familiar to commuters in any urban area where the occasional street performer is part of the cityscape: Do you stop and listen? Do you hurry past with a blend of guilt and irritation, aware of your cupidity but annoyed by the unbidden demand on your time and your wallet? Do you throw in a buck, just to be polite? Does your decision change if he's really bad? What if he's really good? Do you have time for beauty? Shouldn't you? What's the moral mathematics of the moment?
On that Friday in January, those private questions would be answered in an unusually public way. No one knew it, but the fiddler standing against a bare wall outside the Metro in an indoor arcade at the top of the escalators was one of the finest classical musicians in the world, playing some of the most elegant music ever written on one of the most valuable violins ever made. His performance was arranged by The Washington Post as an experiment in context, perception and priorities -- as well as an unblinking assessment of public taste: In a banal setting at an inconvenient time, would beauty transcend?
Reading the masterfully crafted account (titled "Pearls Before Breakfast"), you find that beauty barely transcended -- even though the musician was the world famous Joshua Bell playing a $3.5 million instrument.
My pastor pointed out that even while a thousand plus people can pass by oblivious to the musical wealth before them, God notices not only Joshua Bell, but us. Even though God made us different from Mr. Bell, He has crafted His handiwork in each of us and knows us even in a world where no one else seems to. To support that, my pastor read from another famous musician -- King David: Psalm 139
For the director of music. Of David. A psalm.
1 O LORD, you have searched me and you know me.
2 You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar.
3 You discern my going out and my lying down;you are familiar with all my ways.
4 Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O LORD.
5 You hem me in—behind and before; you have laid your hand upon me.
6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain.
7 Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?
8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea,
10 even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.
11 If I say, "Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,"
12 even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.
13 For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
16 your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.
Seeing our lives from God's perspective, we can see that everyday is a "world famous musician in a subway" kind of day. No one is ever going to find us in the crowd and then see and appreciate the potential in us the way God does. And that's a great reminder not only of our incredible worth, but why we should always seek to perform for "an audience of one."
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