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Christian bloggers need help.
We need encouragement, we need information about how to embrace new technologies and make the most of existing ones, we need advice on how to improve our effectiveness and hone our messages. We need the fellowship of other Christian bloggers.
On Nov. 8 and 9, Boundless Line bloggers Steve Watters, Motte Brown and I will travel to Las Vegas to be with our peers -- and our mentors -- wrestling with how best to honor the Lord through our blogging work. The name of the event, open to all, is GodblogCon.
Last year we went, and we loved it. There's nothing like chatting face-to-face with those who inspire you -- Hugh Hewitt, Joe Carter, James Kushiner, La Shawn Barber, Charmaine Yoest and others. This year features Al Mohler, John Mark Reynolds, Mark D. Roberts, Joe Carter, Paul Spears, La Shawn Barber and many others. Session topics include:
- Pioneering the New Media for Christ
- Beginning and Maintaining a Meaningful Blog
- The Pastor As Godblogger
- New Media Ministry to the Myspace- Facebook Generation
- Identifying Impact In Culture for Christians In New Media
- Communicating Biblical Womanhood
- Trafficking in Substance a Blogging Dilemma
- Finding the Platform to Meet Your Needs
- Writing Well in the New Media
- Design Desiderata for the Godblogger
- Developing a Pod & Vidcast Ministry
Last year's GodblogCon was its own event, hosted by Biola University. This year it's part of the larger BlogWorld & New Media Expo, which is offering its own set of sessions. It's really going to be hopping.
We're really excited to go again this year, obviously. So excited that we're helping sponsor the event, and have been asked to be official "live bloggers." If you end up attending, please stop by and say hi to us! We'd love to put a face with a name. Motte might even give you a chocolate bar.
Tonight my dad will be inducted into his high school alma mater's football hall of fame in Union, South Carolina. I was surprised because he never talked about his sports exploits growing up. I remember only occasionally my mom mentioning that he was quite the athlete. And though I've never been considered "quite the athlete" myself, this part of my dad's life says something about me.
Why? Because as professor and author Dr. Leon Kass believes, for a large part of my life I was fully dependent on Mr. Brown, father of four, high school football hall of famer, former middle-management textile mill worker and current antiques dealer. And he, along with Mrs. Nancy Brown, mother of four, talented pianist, former public school teacher and current care giver, gave me my identity and, in significant ways, made me who I am today.
A couple of years ago, Steve, Candice, Ted and I got a chance to sit down for an off-the-record interview with Dr. Kass. We learned some interesting things about the man who wrote "The End of Courtship," published two years ago on Boundless. It's where we first learned that he refers to his college students as Mr. or Miss because he believes it's a person's surname which gives them their identity more than "just Suzie."
Consider this excerpt from Amy A. Kass and Leon R. Kass's, "What's Your Name?": The common name of parent-and-child stands not only for parental responsibilities, but also for the child's security, filial regard, family loyalty, gratitude, and personal pride. We children are not sui generis, neither self-made nor self-reared; we begin as dependents, dependent upon the unmerited attention and care lavished on us by our parents. To carry the family name is a constant reminder of what we owe and to who -- and of the fact that what we owe can never be repaid (except, indirectly, by doing the same for our own children).
Events like the one my dad will participate in tonight help me reflect on my identity within my family and what the Kasses refer to as the "continuity with lives of the past." And though I cannot be there, right now I am full of "filial regard, family loyalty, gratitude and personal pride." Thanks pop, and congratulations.
What about you? What's your name?
I smiled with acknowledgment while reading "The Facebook Commandments" on Slate. Author Reihan Salam discusses the dilemmas and potential pitfalls associated with the social networking site. After admitting that the "Great Facebook Purge of 2007" was a dismal failure -- lowering his friend count from 274 to 258 -- he goes on to discuss how one can manage an account with style and grace. An important skill to learn, considering the tool's popularity. At around 40 million members, from high schoolers to middle managers to old folks, Facebook is now one of the most popular Web tools. Facebook makes it easier to keep in touch with old friends, track your acquaintances' every minuscule movement, and learn that all of your "cool" pals love Grandma's Boy more than life itself. There is a downside to the site's sudden rise to ubiquity. If you've been on Facebook for more than a week, you've probably gotten a friend request from someone you don't know, someone you hate, or someone you don't want snooping around your profile. Before promiscuous friending turns into a full-blown crisis, it's about time we came up with some basic guidelines for social networking etiquette.
Salam offers these tips.
On unwanted friend requests: Assuming there will be no social fallout, just ignore it. They probably won't notice, particularly if we're dealing with a promiscuous friender. (You know, the kind of person who thinks, "I need to break 700 friends so I can rid myself of my crippling sense of shame." Trust me, it won't work.)
On de-friending: Say you've been too generous with your friending policy, and a gaggle of strangers is now hogging your News Feed. You too can launch a Great Facebook Purge. The beauty of this is that no headline or notification pops up in your ex-friend's inbox announcing, "You've suffered a humiliating rejection at the hands of _________." It's all very stealthy, thus making it the perfect way to deal with promiscuous frienders.
On the optimal number of friends to have: While college kids can get away with huge numbers of friends, the geezers among us should be a little more selective. And by "geezers," I mean everyone born before Ronald Reagan's first inauguration. A group of 150 Facebook friends, right around Dunbar's maximum network size, will let you feel comfortable about broadcasting your status, whether it's "Reihan Salam is triumphantly pumping his fists" or "Reihan Salam is slowly dying of dengue fever."
Salam also points out that the average number of friends on one's Facebook page is unrealistic as a maintainable social network. But I think we all knew that. In real life, a group of primary social partners consists of around 12 people. And the maximum network -- real friends plus friends of friends -- is around 150. Twelve. That's familiar. Jesus and His disciples. Online friends are available in abundance, but there is value in investing in a few -- offline.
You've probably heard the term "helicopter parents" in the context of parents constantly hovering over their children in college. Maybe you've seen a few. An article in Thursday's Wall Street Journal describes different types of helicopter parents: The Blackhawk Parent: Among the most damaging types, this parent "comes in with guns blazing," demanding action, says Patricia Somers, an associate professor at the University of Texas, Austin.
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The Toxic Parent: These parents meddle in intrusive ways that imply the student is untrustworthy or ill-equipped. Parents at several schools, Dr. Somers says, obtained their children's log-on information, researched prospective roommates on Facebook, them masqueraded as their children online to request roommate assignments.
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The Consumer Advocate: College officials tend to dislike these parents, who regard higher education as a consumer transaction and negotiate tirelessly for discounts. Educators say providing an education is more than that and doesn't always mean keeping the customer happy.
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The Safety Expert: These anxious parents, more numerous since the Virginia Tech shootings, want to know about security plans and lockdown times.
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The Traffic and Rescue Helicopters: These terms, coined by an official at Saint Joseph's University, Philadelphia, cover parenting types regarded as benign. The Traffic Helicopter gives advice and guidance but leaves decision-making up to the student. The Rescue Helicopter...rushes in to help with supplies and support in a crisis.
Thoughts?
In what may be the Boundless article with the longest title ever, Evangelical Outpost blogger Joe Carter has brought a vivid and convicting light to the corrosive effects of "information technology" overload.
My world is a bleary byteful swirl of e-mail, participating in online forums, reading and writing blogs, deleting a mountain of spam, checking my e-mail, answering my cell phone, investigating a particular IP address, reading the online news, checking my RSS feeds, editing some Mentor Series audio files, reading and writing e-mail, evaluating Google Analytics stats, helping Motte moderate The Line, editing and publishing Boundless articles, configuring my DNS settings, uploading videos to YouTube, adding a friend on ShoutLife and MySpace and FaceBook and Virb, ripping a CD or DVD, downloading the latest podcast to my iPod, checking our Technorati status, and reading my e-mail.
This world is all too familiar to Joe Carter, as shown in the first paragraphs of "Info-Techno Sabbath: Unplugging the God of Information Technology": During the week I get so busy that I never find the time to be alone with God. So I've decided to dedicate this Sunday afternoon to prayer, solitude and study.
But before I get started I should check my e-mail so that I won't have any unwanted distractions. Thirty-two new messages? My inbox was already overflowing so I should probably reply to at least a few of these right now. Six e-mails — no, wait, I really need to answer that one too — OK, seven e-mails down. Ah, I just got some invitations from Facebook. Those are easy to clear out so let me click through to accept those and I'm, hmm, I didn't realize I had more notifications. Looks like Stacy finally launched a blog; I'll just click through really quickly to check it out. A lot of posts on here already, some great stuff. I really should add her blog to my RSS reader before I forget. I don't know how I ever read blogs before Google Reader came along and, what, "More than 100+ items?" Didn't I just check this yesterday? I know this is prayer time, but I should really whittle these down a bit before it gets worse.
Here I was about to focus on prayer and Bible study and what do I find? My favorite theology-blogger has an excellent post on spiritual disciples. I have to share that with my own blog readers. That's a topic that's really on my heart today — and since I'll be praying and studying in just a few more minutes anyway — I'll go ahead and crank out a quick post. And ... send. There that should be ... hmm, looks like some comments are hung up in my spam filter again. Ah, it's always that same guy — and, oh man, there he goes again misrepresenting what I wrote. Well, I can't let that go unchallenged. Fortunately it will only take a few more minutes to write a rebuttal.
OK, now its time to finally buckle down and practice some solitude. Let me check the time on my Blackberry — no way, it's been four hours? — and who are these voicemails from? I better check them in case my boss is calling, which would be really rude of her since this is Sunday, and I told everyone that I now devote Sunday to church and prayer and Bible Study and — no, it wasn't her, it was my buddy asking if I got his e-mail. All right, that's it. I really need to spend some quality time with the Lord.
But before I get started I should check my e-mail....
Joe goes on to explain how he's instituted a "Sabbath" from such mind-cluttering technologies. This day of rest has given him a break from the "firehose of information," the result being that he's more able to hear "a still small voice sharing the information that truly matters."
I need this Sabbath of which Joe speaks.
Ever think about who's checking out your online footprint? You should. Especially if you're looking for a job.
Today's Wall Street Journal has an article about how employers are checking out a candidate's "references" before the interview. Here's an excerpt, The trend, which started mostly with Web-savvy recruiters in the technology industry, is now spreading to other industries such as human resources and financial services, says Cathy Henesy, talent acquisition leader at appliance maker American Standard Cos. Recruiters typically use networking sites to check on entry-level and midlevel job seekers, she says. But even professionals and CEOs have experienced the practice, often referred to as "informal reference checking."
The article points out that many hiring managers check a candidate's Facebook and MySpace pages to look for mutual connections. One recruiter says he googles the candidate to "check whether the job candidate has written any articles, and make sure the candidate has the degrees listed on the resume."
I did a quick Google search for "motte brown" just to see what a potential employer might find. And if they're looking for a guy who thinks he has something to say about everything, I'm good. Really good.
In a tradition that began in 1990, millions of students gathered together yesterday to pray for those both near and far from them. What started in a small town in Texas by some teenagers has grown into an event observed by students in every state in the United States and in more than 20 countries around the world.
Prayer, needless to say, is a good thing. Time spent communicating with an invisible Being, while in a sense intangible, is not wasted time. It inspires me to think that a handful of "mere" teens initiated something that has such significant and eternal consequences.
I'd be interested to hear if any of you have ever participated in See You at the Pole™. Do you know anyone who went "to the pole" yesterday?
In "The Rise of Raunch," T. Suzanne Eller considers the loss of decency in a generation of young women immersed in a hypersexed culture. She writes: On a recent Oprah Winfrey Show, the popular host spent an entire hour discussing the "culture of raunch," the increasing vulgarity permeating our media, fashion, and celebrity culture. One of her guests was Ariel Levy, author of Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture. Levy, 30, prompted a national debate when she concluded in her book that by exploiting themselves, women have become, in essence, female chauvinists.
"Only 30 years ago, our mothers were supposedly burning their bras and picketing Playboy, and suddenly we were getting breast implants and wearing the bunny logo as symbols of our liberation," Levy wrote in a 2006 op-ed piece published in the Sydney Morning Herald. "How has the culture shifted so drastically in such a short time?"
That's a great question. Today's average 14 to 16 year old is familiar with sexual innuendo and with a woman's body being used to promote an image. She knows what oral sex and STDs are. Her celebrities -- the Paris Hiltons, Britney Spears, and Lindsey Lohans -- flash flesh and cash, and have sex with little or no consequences. On average, she watches 15 hours of television a week, following programs such as Desperate Housewives.
Eller points out that even those in their 30s are prime targets for shows like Grey's Anatomy. "Do we stop to question the message behind the entertainment?" she asks. Not as much as we should, I'm guessing, judging by the number of my Christian friends who can tell me the latest on Meredith and Dr. McDreamy. Television offers an escape from reality in the form of living vicariously through made-up people. When those escapes are marked by sexual escapades and shockingly sleazy behavior, we open our minds and hearts to decidedly anti-biblical values. Eller offers this advice: Whatever the root cause, our response can't be one of fear. Isolating ourselves from our culture isn't reasonable or responsible. Here's our opportunity to assert the view that being raunchy isn't progressive -- that we want to break through glass ceilings in education and in excellence rather than through sexual boundaries.
Turning that tide is a daunting task, but we must do it for the young girls who will soon take our place. If all 20- and 30-something Christian women refused to watch programming that promoted promiscuity, networks would get the message. It's time to say no to sleaze.
I am interested in the discussion related to Tom Neven's post, "A Christian in the Truest Sense of the Word."
I completely agree with Tom about how the word "Christian" has become fairly trite. It is attached to music, magazines, movies -- whatever -- as long as it is wholesome and family friendly.
But unfortunately I know people who profess belief in Christ and His atoning work on the cross, but according to their actions, I just don't see how these beliefs have affected them. Now, I am in no way saying that I am in a position to to say who is a Christian or not. None of us are. Please don't get me wrong.
What I'm getting at is that I think, according to a biblical definition, we have to accept that faith and actions work together. (Again, I am not saying that works save us. Thankfully for all of us, we are saved by the grace of God.) I do believe that we are saved by grace through faith. I just wonder if we've lost some of what the biblical writers meant by faith. I've talked about this on the Line before, so I'll just quote a bit of my previous post, which talked about an article I read about the subject of faith from the Hebrew biblical writers' perspective: To us Westerners, "faith" is mainly what you believe. As the article points out: Once the person has agreed that they believe in Jesus, they are pronounced, "saved." As a result, salvation is viewed as granted to those who agree with a given theological statement or confession of faith. What one believes is more important than what one does.
The Hebrew perspective sees it differently: Yeshua [Jesus] does not say "you will know them by their creeds" but rather "you will know them by their fruit" (Matthew 7:16, 20, emphasis mine). When Yeshua speaks of fruit, He is talking about how one lives -- one's actions. In other words, what one does is the fruit of what one truly believes, and therefore deeds not creeds are the true measure of faith.
The article then goes on to point out that confession of truth is crucial, but if our lives do not conform to that confession, then what's the point?
A Hebrew saw faith as ones actions that flow out of ones beliefs. You know what someone believes by how they act, by what they do, by their desire to follow the commands of their rabbi. This description of faith is quite similar to what we see from Jesus. You will know true followers by their fruits. John talks about obeying God's commands and loving those around us if we truly love Jesus and want to be His disciples. James talks about faith, not accompanied by action, being dead.
So, someone can probably live a "Christian" life and not be a true believer. But someone can also profess all of the right things, but not have a heart that's truly devoted to the Lord. Neither one works on its own.
I think what Denise and the Focus on the Family Institute students are doing today is courageous. The use of public displays of aborted fetuses is controversial even among pro-lifers -- with some saying it plays right into the hands of pro-abortioners who claim we're only interested in shocking women, not helping them.
Should such criticisms be considered? Not according to author and pro-life advocate Randy Alcorn. He writes, The question we should ask is not, "Why are pro-life people showing these pictures?" but "Why would anyone defend what's shown in these pictures?" The real concern about pictures of unborn babies isn't that they're gory, but that they prove the accuracy of the pro-life position.
Denise uses an appropriate illustration when comparing these displays to images of the Holocaust. Alcorn makes the same comparison, The Holocaust was so evil that words alone couldn't describe it. Descriptions of Nazi death camps had long been published in American newspapers, but when these papers started printing the pictures of slaughtered people, the American public finally woke up. If not for the pictures, even today most of us wouldn't understand or believe the Holocaust.
The question is, even when they see the horror of abortion, will a complacent America ever wake up to the plight of the pre-born? Certainly on an individual level these pictures have proven effective. It happened to me. But now that I'm on the other side of it, the shocking thing about these photos is not that they're gory, it's that they are often met with indifference.
Most people know it's a baby, they just don't care enough to be outraged. So much so it makes me wonder whether Americans would have the same reaction if the Holocaust happened today as they did 63 years ago.
Did you hear the story about the Bosnian couple who met online -- only to be repulsed when they met in person? It wasn't that they found each other unattractive. Apparently they were attracted enough to marry each other at one point. But they were looking for someone else when they each went online under fake names and had an "affair" with each other -- each complaining about their miserable marriage and thinking they had finally found their soul mate.
Realizing they had only found the person who had disappointed them in marriage, they decided to get a divorce -- claiming marital unfaithfulness.
There's a lot you could say about this story, but here's the question I'm perplexed by: How can a man simultaneously show love and disdain to the same woman -- and vice versa?
Consider what the couple was quoted saying about each other: I thought I had found the love of my life. The way this Prince of Joy spoke to me, the things he wrote, the tenderness in every expression was something I had never had in my marriage.
To be honest I still find it hard to believe that the person, Sweetie, who wrote such wonderful things to me on the Internet, is actually the same woman I married and who has not said a nice word to me for years.
This story reminded me of one the writer Ethan Watters told in his book Urban Tribes. He described how strange it was to have a woman find him to be a good confidant in which to share a story about some jerk who offended a friend of a friend of a friend of hers. He found it strange that he could be simultaneously perceived as a confidant to this woman and also be that jerk she was describing.
I suspect it takes a lot of compartmentalization of our thoughts and words to pull off these kinds of tricks. While you may not have seen any examples quite this dramatic, have you seen compartmentalization in relationships where someone can come across substantially different based on the setting? What do you think causes that?
Over the weekend I read a newspaper article about retirement. It said lots of couples don't talk about it either because they make assumptions about how it will all work out or they don't think about it or they try to avoid it. I saved the story because I know, being just 37, that retirement feels like it's too far into the future to even think about, let alone plan for.
The article made me rethink this. I was waiting for a quiet time that Steve and I could at least consider what we might want our post-work years to look like.
Then I read Corrie ten Boom. At 73 years of age, she finally took a break from "20 years of wandering the world as a tramp for the Lord," as she described it. She was ill and needed time to recover. She took a year off, which for her meant living in the same place, sleeping in the same bed and speaking only two or three times a week. It was a wonderful year that included one bed. For her, sleeping in the same bed, night after night, was a pronounced luxury. She wrote, The greatest pleasure was to sleep every night in the same bed. During the last twenty years I had slept in more than a thousand different beds, always living out of my suitcases. This year I rested. I put my clothes in a drawer, hung my dresses in a closet, and best of all, each night I laid my head on the same pillow.
It was so good in fact, that when her Sabbath Year was over, she wanted to extend it, indefinitely. But God had other plans. At first she resisted, making plans of her own. But as was characteristic of her life, she submitted her will to His, repenting for her sin. She wrote, I had lost my first love. Twenty years before I had come out of a concentration camp -- starved, weak, -- but in my heart there was a burning love: a love for the Lord who had carried me through so faithfully -- a love for the people around me -- a burning desire to tell them that Jesus is a reality, that He lives, that He is victor. ... And now? Now I was interested in my bed.
And so she repented and accepted God's forgiveness. And she went back to work. She said, What a great joy it was to experience the love of God, who gave me rivers of living waters for the thirsty world of Africa, America, and Eastern Europe. Of course, it might be the will of God that some old people retire from their work. In great thankfulness to the Lord they can then enjoy their pensions. But for me, the way of obedience was to travel on, even more so than before.
Her example, of approaching retirement not by asking how much money she'll need to maintain her lifestyle (one of the key discussions that article recommended having), but by asking God what His will is stands is such sharp contrast.
Scripture says, Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul. Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us (1 Peter 2:11-12).
I needed that reminder today. That we're supposed to be misfits in this world. That our relationship with Christ is the organizing principle that should affect everything we do, including how we spend our old age and even where we lay our heads to sleep.
I will be out of the office on Wednesday as I head up to Greeley, CO to participate in an on-campus abortion exhibit with the Focus on the Family Institute students.
The exhibit, which is run by an organization called Justice for All, travels to campuses and sets up an extremely graphic abortion exhibit on campus squares. Although they set up signs warning people of the graphic pictures ahead, most people are shocked by what they see when the photos come into view. The pictures include aborted fetuses at different stages. The tiny bodies are bloody, torn apart and mutilated. They are also real.
Needless to say, a day with Justice for All is quite an experience. College students gather around the exhibit for discussion. Many debate with us. Quite often, people begin to yell. Many are offended. Pro-choice groups set up protests.
I first went on this trip when I was an Institute student three years ago. At first I was quite hesitant. I didn't know what I thought of using such offensive pictures. Is it necessary? Is it useful? I didn't know if I felt prepared to talk with people about abortion. Does a woman have a right to choose? What if she was raped? How would I answer these questions?
What I took away from the event is that, even though the pictures are difficult to deal with, they are a reality of abortion. We see pictures of piles of bodies from the Jewish Holocaust, and although they are graphic, they help us to understand the horror of what the Nazis did. I feel that the same thing applies to this situation. Many people are unaware of the realities of abortion -- of the development of a fetus within the first trimester when most abortions occur.
I also learned that the best way to talk with people about abortion is to listen and to ask questions. If you start the conversation combatively, then you will get a combative response. If you listen, ask questions, and use logic, you are much more likely to end up with someone who will be willing to listen to you as well. (If you're interested in learning more about how to talk with someone about abortion, I would definitely recommend this book.)
I am expecting my time at Greeley to be challenging. But I am hopeful that in the end, everyone who comes in contact with this exhibit (including me) will learn something and come away thinking about the realities of life, death, choices and rights.
I appreciated the discussion generated by Collin Hansen's profile of pastor Mark Driscoll. Some of you wholeheartedly supported his methods of inviting unbelievers into the fold. Others pointed out that he might be compromising by dabbling in worldly practices.
For me, this brings up a related issue: What should be the church's response to unbelievers living in sin? To what extent should we welcome them into our congregations and ministries? Have you ever had that uncomfortable feeling when an unbelieving friend acts...unredeemed? Once I was driving a couple of friends to church. My unbelieving friend started talking about a horror movie. I tried to redirect the unedifying conversation, but the damage was done. My Christian friend and I felt that our morning worship had been tainted.
When it comes to associating with sinners, Paul is pretty clear. We must offer accountability to those who claim to be followers of Jesus; but we exert no authority over those who are, as of yet, unaccountable to God's commands. Consider 1 Corinthians 5:9-13: I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people—not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat. What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. "Expel the wicked man from among you."
Paul is emphatic that he is not discouraging association with immoral people who have no relationship with Jesus Christ. And yet, sadly, I've seen Christians circle up and exclude these very people. We may say it is for the sake of "unity," but the real issue seems to be comfort. It is a sacrifice to run the risk of hearing an inappropriate anecdote on the way to church...or have someone's smoke in your face at Bible study. "What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church?" Paul says. This doesn't condone joining them in their sinful activities, but it does seem like we have freedom to associate with those whose lifestyles don't reflect Christ without passing judgment. Our judgment should be reserved for the Christian brother.
Have you experienced discomfort in knowing how to relate to the immoral? What does it look like to withhold judgment of those outside the Body of Christ? Judging those within the church is a blog for another day, but the flip-side offers plenty to think about.
I just had lunch with a friend who has been praying boldly, for husbands for her single friends and for herself, since January 2006. God is faithful. She beamed with joy and love while she talked, her left hand sparkling with her engagement ring, not yet a week old. In listening to her tell the story of her romance, including all the ways God blessed her with answered prayers, I was reminded again that He wants Christian men and women to marry and form Christian families. Few things are as basic, and as valuable, in the eternal realm as that.
Her story included the unadorned moment of engagement. He was doing laundry. She was helping to fold clothes. And suddenly, he was telling her all the reasons he wants her to be his wife; all the ways he wants to serve and love her for the rest of his life as together, they serve Jesus.
He had planned an elaborate proposal-day, weeks into the future. But there, in the midst of everyday chores, he was overcome with the sense that God's timing was now. So he acted.
Contrast that with an email I saw last week. In it, the guy writing told of his own engagement; of all the things he had done to lead up to the big question, including the His-N-Her massages -- can you say TMI?
I wonder, what will he do for an encore? If just getting her to agree to be his wife required cartwheels through hoops ablaze with fire, all the while clutching a carat solitaire attached to the rose between his teeth, how will he celebrate their first anniversary? Or their 10th?
In his defense, he's consistent with the trends. Lots of guys go to extreme lengths when proposing. It's like the newest claim to bragging rights. There are even websites where you can post your story, along with pictures and video footage to prove you're not exaggerating.
I'll take the simple and sincere over the showy any day.
Ted and I attended LeadNow+Fusion conference in Dallas last week for 20-&-30-something leaders. Donald Miller was one of the keynote speakers and workshop leaders. I've only read a little from Miller but having heard so much about him and his popularity, I was eager to hear him speak (and if I'm honest, I was primed for criticism).
He opened the conference with a talk on marketing Jesus. It was good. Though there were parts that made me shift in my seat, his denunciation of the way modern evangelical churches market Jesus and reduce the Gospel to self-help tips rang true. It reminded me of a Boundless Mentor Series with Charlie Jarvis who said, If you don't have a theology of grandeur, what you're going to be looking for in life are practical hints and techniques. You're going to look for what is typical of America, which is a theology of technology in which techniques bring happiness and order to your life. I'm not saying that technology and techniques in life aren't important. I'm just saying what people do is they replace the theology of glory with the theology of techniques and technology. That is, you have three steps to get a person to Christ, you have five steps to become a happy person, or you have 10 steps to get rid of whatever is plaguing you emotionally.
Miller used a similar illustration of technology -- three steps to a better marriage. He pointed out that there are millions of steps and that the steps change depending on what time of year it is-like, for example, football season (which got a big laugh).
Though Miller's and Jarvis's critiques of the state of the modern evangelical church are complementary, they make different claims about how it got there. Miller didn't connect the church's adoption of a "theology of technology" with a loss of grandeur. Instead, he said the church began marketing Jesus after the industrial revolution when it began looking like a corporate America board room.
Whatever the cause, Miller has touched a nerve with 20-somethings because the church doesn't feel real to them anymore. And research shows that the most marketed generation in the history of the world doesn't want to be marketed to. Especially when the Man of Sorrows is marketed as a man of many wishes who exists only to make your life better.
Miller has his critics. Some say he elevates personal experience over absolute Truth. Others criticize his irreverent style. And I question his political affiliations-linking to ACLU, Greenpeace, MoveOn.org and other left-wing organizations on his website. But I'm not going to get in to all that because I like Donald Miller. 'Cause he's the real article. What you see is what you get. And it seems he wants nothing less from the church.
I woke up at 5 a.m. this morning, fully intending to pray, write and then faithfully run on the treadmill. Two out of three ain't bad, right? I just didn't feel up to the run. Too tired. Still a little run down from last week's flu bug. So I spent extra time on the other two. And then Steve told me about a review in the Wall Street Journal that says exercise may not be as useful for weight loss as I thought.
Reporting on an article in New York magazine, the review, titled, "Workout-Weight Loss Link May Rest on Thin Evidence," made me think skipping my run wasn't such a catastrophe after all.
"The idea that exercise produces weight loss is seldom questioned in workout-mad America," I read, "but Gary Taubes says evidence for this belief is, well, thin."
More media myth than scientifically-proven fact, the imperative to exercise for weight loss is, according to Taubes, a relatively recent one. "Until the 1960s," the article says "clinicians dismissed the notion exercise could help shed pounds as naive because light exercise burns so few calories and vigorous workouts stoke hearty appetites."
"Taubes ... suggests that what really determines how fat or lean a person is has more to do with the body's internal programming. He suggests a 'homeostatic' view of the relationship between weight and workouts, one that sees lean people as those 'whose bodies are programmed to send the calories they consume to the muscles to be burned rather than to the fat tissues to be stored.'"
Nuts. Even if I had run, the brownies would be out. For all the health benefits of a vigorous cardio workout, if dropping a dress size is what I'm after, I guess it's back to calorie counting.
I was recently reading a series of tributes written by teens for their youth pastors. One girl described all the great things her youth leader was doing and finished the accolade by saying, "He's a Christian in the truest sense of the word."
And that gave me pause.
Based on all the admittedly praiseworthy actions of this pastor, the girl judged him to be a Christian of some higher order, apparently more "Christian" than others who don't do these things.
But can one be "more" Christian or "less" Christian? Isn't being a Christian kind of like being pregnant: either you are or you aren't?
This girl's statement, well-intended though it might be, highlights a disturbing trend I've seen among young people -- and not-so-young people -- in our churches today. The judgment that one is a Christian is based increasingly on a person's actions and not on his beliefs. In fact, I heard another well-meaning woman describe a certain magazine as "secular Christian." She meant that it featured clean-cut images and wholesome content, which made it "Christian," but nothing explicitly religious, which made it secular. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry.
To be sure, Christians are expected to behave in certain ways, but does behaving in those certain ways make one a Christian? More important, if a person fails to live up to those certain behaviors, does that somehow make him not a Christian? Or a "lesser" Christian, not a Christian "in the truest sense of the word"?
Unfortunately, trend is nothing new. In his preface to Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis decried the watering down of the word's meaning and the tendency to define Christian by certain behavior: The word gentleman originally meant something recognizable; one who had a coat of arms and some landed property. When you called someone a "gentleman" you were not paying him a compliment, but merely stating a fact. If you said he was not a "gentleman" you were not insulting him, but giving information. There was no contradiction in saying that John was a liar and a gentleman. ... But then came people who said-so rightly, charitably, spiritually, sensitively, so anything but usefully-"Ah, but surely the important thing about a gentleman is not the coat of arms and the land, but the behavior? Surely he is the true gentleman who behaves as a gentleman should? ... When a word ceases to be a term of description and becomes merely a term of praise, it no longer tells you facts about the object; it only tells you about the speaker's attitude to that object. ... As a result, gentleman is now a useless word.
I'm afraid Christian is also in danger of becoming a useless word-first and foremost among those who claim the name. Remember, the name Christian was first given at Antioch Acts 11:26 to "the disciples," those who accepted the teaching of the apostles. It said nothing about the way they behaved.
One is a Christian because of a professed belief and trust in Christ's redeeming work on the Cross. In this biblical sense of the word, it is no contradiction to say Joe is a Christian and a sinner. Indeed, if anyone would be honest with himself, he would know it true of himself.
The New Testament does not sacrifice behavior for belief. We are called in Scripture to live godly lives, but first we must believe (John 1:12; Romans 10:9-10; Ephesians 2:8-9). Christ-like living is a fruit of salvation, not the cause. We mix up the two at our peril.
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to follow every rule in the Bible? A.J. Jacobs did. The self-proclaimed agnostic (who, through the experiment, became a "reverent agnostic"), spent one year doing his best to follow 700 rules he identified in the Bible. He did it for his book The Year of Living Biblically, which will be released next month. (Jacobs previously wrote The Know-It-All, a book recounting his year reading Encyclopaedia Britannica.) He grew a beard (a serious beard!), curbed bad language and asked strangers for permission to stone them for adultery.
An article in Newsweek reports the highlights of Jacobs' experience. When asked what rules he will continue to follow, Jacobs answered: There’s a lot about gratefulness in the Bible, and I would say I’m more thankful. I focus on the hundred little things that go right in a day, instead of the three or four things that go wrong. And I love the Sabbath. There’s something I really like about a forced day of rest....
One thing I learned is that the outside affects the inside, your behavior shapes your thoughts. I also really liked what one of my spiritual advisers said, which was that you can view life as a series of rights and entitlements, or a series of responsibilities. I like seeing my life as a series of responsibilities. It’s sort of, "Ask not what God can do for you, ask what you can do for God."
That observation is interesting because it sums up the spirit of the law. What, in my religiosity, can I do for God? Without reading the book, it seems that Jacobs omits the concept of grace and that God did, in fact, do a great thing for us in offering His Son as the propitiatory sacrifice for sin. As Jesus claimed: Apart from Him, we can do nothing.
Jacobs' book will be intriguing and no doubt an easy sell. But judging by his early observations, it appears he's missed the point.
As an English major, my favorite poem was T.S. Eliot's "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" and my favorite line was this: "There will be time, there will be time to prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet."
I thought of that line as I read one of the best reflections I've seen written to date on the rapid adaptation of online social networking. Writing in The New Atlantis, Christine Rosen raises great questions about lives shaped increasingly by virtual friendship. Rosen opens her (long) article talking about how painted portraits, especially self-portraits can tell us a lot about the culture in which they were created. Then she transitions: Today, our self-portraits are democratic and digital; they are crafted from pixels rather than paints. On social networking websites like MySpace and Facebook, our modern self-portraits feature background music, carefully manipulated photographs, stream-of-consciousness musings, and lists of our hobbies and friends. They are interactive, inviting viewers not merely to look at, but also to respond to, the life portrayed online. We create them to find friendship, love, and that ambiguous modern thing called connection. Like painters constantly retouching their work, we alter, update, and tweak our online self-portraits; but as digital objects they are far more ephemeral than oil on canvas....
Unlike a portrait, which, once finished and framed, hung tamely on the wall signaling one’s status, maintaining status on MySpace or Facebook requires constant vigilance. As one 24-year-old wrote in a New York Times essay, “I am obsessed with testimonials and solicit them incessantly. They are the ultimate social currency, public declarations of the intimacy status of a relationship.... Every profile is a carefully planned media campaign.”
What are the implications of what we do to prepare our faces to meet the faces that we'll meet? This is the kind of question Rosen wrestles with in her thorough review of the virtual networking landscape. What deep thoughts have you had about the impact of social networking?
First Christianity Today associate editor Collin Hansen brought us "Young, Restless and Reformed," and now he examines a controversial proponent of the movement, Mark Driscoll. Driscoll, 36, is the pastor of the 6,000-member Mars Hill Church in Seattle, Wash. Hansen looks at why conservatives and liberals alike won't accept him. Driscoll now uses Sunday services to equip church members to be missionaries in Seattle. The approach requires a high degree of cultural assimilation, a trait he shares with other emerging leaders. For instance, Mars Hill has made contact with many Seattle residents through the Paradox, a concert venue owned by the church that hosts bands with no Christian ties. And an early, outdoor Bible study that Driscoll used to grow the church allowed smoking.
In Mars Hill's early days, Driscoll struggled to find the right balance between unchanging orthodox theology and flexible methods of outreach.
"I also did not explain in written form that we were theologically conservative and culturally liberal, which caused great confusion because half of the church was angry that the other half was smoking, while the other half was angry that I taught from the Bible," Driscoll writes in Confessions of a Reformission Rev.
Reading the article, you gain respect for what Driscoll is attempting to do: reach an unchurched city by speaking their language, while at the same time avoiding a compromise on truth. I particularly appreciated his perspective on fundamentalism: "Fundamentalism is really losing the war, and I think it is in part responsible for the rise of what we know as the more liberal end of the emerging church," Driscoll says. "Because a lot of what is fueling the left end of the emerging church is fatigue with hardcore fundamentalism that throws rocks at culture. But culture is the house that people live in, and it just seems really mean to keep throwing rocks at somebody's house."
I don't know about you, but if someone was throwing rocks at my house, I probably wouldn't open the door. How many of the "vulgar aspects of contemporary society," as Reformed expositor John MacArthur calls them, do we indulge in for the sake of evangelism? I believe it takes extreme wisdom and humility, and Driscoll seems to be seeking both. It's a balancing act that affords few friends.
You may have heard about the challenge married couples often face seven years into their vows. A German politician named Gabriele Pauli made a dramatic suggestion this week for those couples: The Seven Year Itch, argues Germany’s most glamorous politician, could be cured by making marriage vows valid for only seven years, thus legislating away what is regarded as the most unstable phase of a relationship.
Interestingly, Pauli is someone who left her first marriage at the seven year mark.
The article about this in The Times also mentions other difficult seasons of marriage, such as: ... the Two Year Bloat (when complacent husbands start to put on weight), the Fourth Year Slip (when office co-workers start to look more attractive than one’s partner) and any year after the birth of a child as being as perilous to marriage as the seven-year restlessness.
Look, marriage has more challenges than this. You could come up with creative names for all kinds of seasons of marital disappointment. But it's in those seasons that committed marriages develop depth.
Our consumer-driven culture has little appetite for vows that include better and worse, sickness and health, etc. Only an arrangement committed to those promises, however, can push through to the kind of peace, security and hope that most people marry to find in the first place.
The individual who will commit to marriage only while the skies are blue will never experience the rewards of enduring commitment.
It's an un-hip thing to talk about. We're naturally resistant to the thought that there are people in our lives who hold a degree of authority over us. Some even suggest that the New Testament downplays the relevance of authority.
Throughout the Bible, though, we do find references to various types of legitimate authority. Jesus affirmed a man who recognized his being both in and under authority, for example. Other Scriptures validate civil authority, parental authority, husbandly authority, and even pastoral authority.
So what does this look like in modern times? Do certain people have absolute authority to control our every decision? Are we wrong to reject a pastor's input on the design of our china pattern? Must we submit to a police officer's request to purchase a PC rather than a Mac?
An article we published this week by Thabiti Anyabwile, "Question Authority," takes a good hard look at this issue, identifying six types of authority and then going on to explain how that authority may be rightly exercised. Thabiti considers right submission to authority to extremely beneficial: The fact that something can be abused doesn't mean we discard it wholesale. Many people abuse pain killers. But there can be little doubt of their value when properly used in medical surgery, for example. We are to resist the injustice and evil that sometimes corrupts authority in a fallen world, while simultaneously recognizing the God-intended benefits of authority itself.
He goes on to explain that appropriate submission to valid authority inspires a sense of freedom, offers us a degree of protection, facilitates humility, and results in spiritual blessing.
After you've read the article, please tell how you've wrestled with the concept of authority, and how you've found, when it's rightly practiced, it's been a blessing in your life.
Have you noticed the news seems more and more like a tabloid? Consider today's most read articles on Fox News: Seven Disabled People, Including 5 Children, Imprisoned in Pa. Horror House; Woman Claims Doctor 'Spilled' Cancerous Tissue into Stomach; Bin Laden Declares War on Musharraf in New Audiotape; Man Bit By Rattlesnake After Putting It in His Mouth to Impress Ex-Girlfriend.
OK, admittedly, that last one sounds entertaining. But this is news?
In his column "Listening for the Whisper," Mark Galli considers our fascination with spectacle and how it's creeping into our churches and spirituality. The problem with spectacle, especially religious spectacle, is that the steady, repeated, raucous noise will eventually make us hard of hearing. And that will make it impossible to hear God's normal tone of voice. He is not usually found in earthquake, wind, and fire, but in the small whisper, heard only by those who enter with Elijah into the dark cave.
This whisper is difficult to hear in the din of our culture and religious life. It is also frightening to even to try to listen for it, because to do so we must, like Elijah, enter the dark cave from whence the whisper emerges. That means stepping into mystery.
Stepping into this "mystery" is uncomfortable. It will cause you to realize how much you have been depending on spectacle to know God. The "signs" that you are doing the right thing. The emotional high of corporate worship. The effect of a dramatic presentation on stage. The still, small voice is bland, and even elusive, in comparison. Galli asks: Why does God come in the whisper, in the darkness, through a wayward Middle Eastern nation, in the vulnerability of a Bethlehem baby, and the lonely groan of a crucified rabbi?
So that we will abandon all our preconceived notions of divinity, so that we will be left possessing nothing but our ignorance, so that we won't confuse God with cultural idols, so that we will be ready to meet the true God.
We all have need of the spectacle moments of faith -- moments where we realize the power and might of our God. But don't underestimate the whisper. It's worth listening for.
Last year, Paul Washer (an itinerant preacher and the General Director for HeartCry Missionary Society) stunned the audience of a youth event in Alabama with a piercing message about sin among Christians and our need for true repentance. The hour-long version of that message, labeled "Paul Washer-Shocking Message (full length)" has been viewed over 175,000 times on YouTube. Various excerpts and mashup versions of that message as well as a related interview with Kirk Cameron have been viewed by thousands more.
What continues to attract people to one of the most unseeker sensitive message floating around in Christian media today? I suspect it's the desire to be free from the sin that continues to entangle us as Christians. The mashup version I just watched today spotlights at one point the phrase "...they are set free to seek Christ in His Glory and follow Him and follow hard after Him."
The freedom offered through faith in God is almost always framed in the Bible as exchanging bondage to sin with a sold-out commitment to Christ. Romans 6 is perhaps the most specific, containing this passage: 15vWhat then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! 16 Don't you know that when you offer yourselves to someone to obey him as slaves, you are slaves to the one whom you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? 17 But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. 18 You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness (NIV).
Many who have watched the Paul Washer message have come to realize that they weren't truly free from the bondage to sin and weren't truly following hard after Christ.
Have you engaged with this message?
Hi, my name is Tom, and I'm an addict.
I don't have a problem with the bottle or with any kind of pharmaceutical product, legal or illegal. No, my problem is with games. I'm addicted to them.
When in high school I was obsessed with bowling, to the point where if I saw a group of people standing around, I automatically calculated where I'd need to aim the bowling ball in order to knock them all over. I was a pinball junkie (if not a wizard), and then there was Pac-Man, Centipede and Galaxian. Many a quarter vanished into their maws as I sought a game fix. I then discovered computer solitaire, and I came to rue the day I put that first red "2" over a black ace.
And it's not just me. Perhaps you've read people who have died after gaming binges. It seems certain people are wired to become addicted to the unique stimuli provided by games, particularly video games. I suspect, without any real scientific proof, that this is much more a problem for guys than girls. In their book Playstation Nation, Kurt and Olivia Bruner estimate that as much as 35 percent of the population is prone. They provide a checklist of traits that should raise concern if parents see them in yourself or a friend:
- Do you play almost every day?
- Do you often play for long periods (over three to four hours at a time)?
- Do you play for excitement?
- Do you get restless and irritable if you can't play?
- Do you sacrifice social and sporting activities to play?
- Do you play instead of doing other things you should be doing-say, housework or studying?
- Do you seem to be losing interest in real-life activities?
My particular "poison" these days is computer Scrabble. I play a game or two every day upon getting home from work, and if for some reason I can't I feel a bit agitated. In a previous generation I'd be the dad who comes home from work and pours himself a stiff drink. (I'm glad that looking for the ultimate triple-word score carries fewer potential problems than alcohol does.)
But this raises an important point: A lot of people think the only potential problem with video gaming is the content of the games themselves. Sex. Violence. Language. That certainly isn't a problem in Scrabble. You might not be aware that the very process of playing a perfectly "safe" game may be setting you up for future problems. There are far too many marriages in trouble because one partner -- almost always the husband -- has cleaved more to his Xbox than to his wife. (And c'mon, guys, how many of you are salivating over the upcoming release of Halo 3?)
Some of these scorned women have set up an online message board called Everquest Widows, where they discuss how that multiple-player online game has become a home-wrecker.
Ivan Spielberg, a contributor to The Psychology of Combating Stress, Depression and Addiction, explained, "Like any compulsive behavior, playing video games proves and escape from a reality that is often too painful to deal with. It is these issues that must be addressed in anyone who is suffering from an addiction."
What begins as a harmless pastime can become an escape. That escape becomes an emotional coping mechanism that, in turn, evolves into a full-blown addiction. And while the American Psychological Association has not yet taken a position on the addictiveness of video games, some in Europe have and moved to treat it. Last year Europe's first detox clinic for video gamers opened in Holland. Hyke van der Heijden, 28, a graduate of the Amsterdam program, started playing video games 20 years ago. By the time he was in college he was gaming about 14 hours a day and using drugs to play longer. "For me, one joint would never be enough, or five minutes of gaming would never be enough," he said. "I would just keep going until I crashed out."
So how about you? If you suspect you might be just a bit too fond of your video games, check out Online Gamers Anonymous. As with any addiction, admitting that you have a problem is the first step.
As for me and my electronic Scrabble jones, I can quit anytime I want. Really.
Research reported in USA Today shows a GPA drop among college students who play video games: First-year students whose roommates brought a video game player to college studied 40 minutes less each day on average, according to a new study from the National Bureau of Economic Research. Those 40 minutes of lost study time translated into first-semester grades that were 0.241 points lower on the 4.0 grade scale.
The study's authors, Todd Stinebrickner, an associate professor of economics at the University of Western Ontario, and his father, Ralph Stinebrickner, a professor of mathematics and computer science at Berea College in Kentucky, were not trying to prove anything about video games. The study sought to determine how much of an effect study efforts have on grades.
The article ends by saying the researchers weren't necessarily saying students had to give up playing video games: He added that he does not think these findings mean students should give up distractions such as video games. In fact, happiness also can be a factor in how well a student does in school.
But the findings could help counselors educate students on the importance and impact of studying.
I didn't play video games in college, but I do remember a season of playing FreeCell in graduate school that definitely cut into my study time. FreeCell is nowhere as compelling as today's video games, but it is more compelling than some of the thick material I was supposed to be studying. Thinking back to some of my studies as an undergrad, I'm pretty sure I would have chosen video games over reading assignments in subjects such as Victorian Literature.
How about you? If you're currently a student who plays video games, would you objectively rate your gaming as 1) making you a less diligent student, 2) having no effect on you as a student or 3) making you a better student?
There's a good chance you've seen the video of the college student whose disruptive exchange with Senator John Kerry yesterday led him to be tasered and handcuffed. In case you haven't, you can view a version of it here; please note that this version of the video has been intentionally edited so as to remove the events that led up to the young man's being arrested.
Because of what I'll call inquisitiveness, I've found myself watching four different videos of the incident, and then going on to read first-hand accounts and commentary.
My personal opinion: It was a publicity stunt -- Andrew Meyers and perhaps some of his friends set out through his combative diatribe to cause a commotion that might result in his making a lot of money in a possible legal settlement.
Michelle Malkin has been documenting the unfolding of this case since it hit the news. Among other things, she has published first-hand accounts from students who were in the room when the fracas broke out.
From an eyewitness account:
There were twomicrophones placed on each side of the aisle. One on my side and the other on Andrew Meyer’s side. Senator Kerry began answering the student’s questions from each aisle. Eventually it was announced that there would only be a few more questions answered. Since Meyer and I were both in the back of each line, it did not seem likely that our questions would be answered.
However, while Senator Kerry was responding to a student’s question, all of a sudden Meyer rushed to the microphone with cops in pursuit. At that point no one knew what was going on. Could he have a gun, a bomb? Immediately, Meyer began yelling into the microphone that he had been waiting in line forever and that Senator Kerry should “spend time to answer everyone’s questions!” Senator Kerry tried to calm the student down by telling him that he would “stay here as long as it takes to get the questions answered.” The police approached Meyer who began taunting them by saying “what! are you going to taser me? are you going to arrest me?!” The police grabbed Meyer, but Senator Kerry asked the police to let him go and that he would answer his question. Senator Kerry finished answering the other student’s question and then proceeded with Meyer. (*This entire scene is not in any video I can find so far. This is why 2 cops are seen right behind Meyer at the start of some videos*).
Meyer rambles for a while, after which Kerry asks him to pose his question. Meyer becomes more agitated, gesturing wildly, and then poses his first question. During his second question, he utters a vulgarity, and so one of the police officers motions for the microphone to be cut. The microphone is cut off during his third question, at which point Meyer grows hostile. The police attempt to restrain Meyer. Meyer fights them off, again taunting them about tasering him. After continued resistance to the police, they in fact did appear to taser him. He left the room in handcuffs.
So why am I making such a big deal out of this? I'm making such a big deal out of this because I've read so many comments from people who don't know the context of the altercation. They're quick to pass judgment on the police officers for "police brutality," not understanding how Meyer had escalated the situation by breaking forum rules, behaving erratically and disruptively, and provoking the police.
Here are some questions I'm left with:
- What did you first think when you saw the video?
- Did you think that a passionate young man was hauled away merely because of his provocative questions, thus infringing on his First Amendment rights?
- And now that you know more of the story, do you think that Meyer intentionally brought this upon himself?
- Is Meyer's outrageous attitude and behavior common on the college campus?
- Why is it that we tend to sympathize with those who are resisting authority?
- And what about the manipulative effect showing a video out of context can have?
- Can you think of any other examples of how taking something out of context can leave you with an impression that's in odds with reality?
- Finally, if you were a police officer present, how would you have brought about civility in the face of escalating incivility?
In my unrelenting quest to bring you the latest on footwear safety, I submit to you a new danger: first flip-flops, now Crocs. I have to admit, I have a personal vendetta against the awkward-looking shoes (sorry if you love them). But according to Fox News, Crocs are the common denominator in a rash of adults and kids getting their toes stuck in escalators. One of the nation's largest subway systems -- the Washington Metro -- has even posted ads warning riders about wearing such shoes on its moving stairways. The ads feature a photo of a crocodile, though they don't mention Crocs by name.
Four-year-old Rory McDermott got a Croc-clad foot caught in an escalator last month at a mall in northern Virginia. His mother managed to yank him free, but the nail on his big toe was almost completely ripped off, causing heavy bleeding.
Rory's mom discovered Crocs as the culprit when she did an Internet search. Countries as far from the U.S. as Singapore and Japan have reported similar incidents. Most of these accidents involve children as young as 2. The Washington subway is one clear example: During the past two years, so-called "shoe entrapments" in the Washington subway have gone from being relatively rare to happening four or five times a week in the summer, though none has caused serious injuries, said Dave Lacosse, who oversees the subway's 588 escalators, the most of any U.S. transit system.
If you must wear them -- and I recommend you don't -- keep this in mind: Washington Metro's Lacosse and other escalator experts say the best way to prevent shoe entrapments is to face the direction the stairs are moving, keep feet away from the sides and step over the teeth at the end.
Lacosse, of the Washington subway system, said he is personally skittish of Crocs and other soft-soled shoes.
"Would I wear them? No," he said. "And I tell my children not to wear them either."
That's a sentiment I fully support.
I've heard it said my entire Christian life, "Hate the sin. Love the sinner. " Is it biblical?
Today Justin Taylor explores an article written over 60 years ago by John McKenzie who said we must hate the sinner as well as the sin.
Here's why: There is a lawful hatred of the sinner; and indeed there must be, since such a hatred is the obverse of the love of God. The love of God hates all that is opposed to God; and sinners -- not merely sin -- are opposed to God. And if such a sentiment is lawful, its expression is lawful; and one may desire that the evil in another receive its corresponding evil -- provided that this hatred is restrained within the limits of that which is lawful.
The limits include,
- Hatred must be directed toward the evil quality, not the person
- Hatred must not be motivated by revenge
- Hatred can be harbored only if the sinner remains unrepentant
- Hatred must be accompanied by a desire for the supreme good of all men
The last point means (I think) that though we hate him and what he does, we must desire his eternal good.
There are several good quotes found in the comments section from Justin's post. My favorite was from John Piper which may help explain this doctrine of just hate, There was a time when the mountain of granite was not under me but over me, ready to fall and crush me. It was the mountain of God's wrath against my sin. God hated me in my sin. Yes, I think we need to go the full Biblical length and say that God hates unrepentant sinners. If I were to soften it, as we so often do, and say that God hates sin, most of you would immediately translate that to mean: he hates sin but loves the sinner. But Psalm 5:5 says, "The boastful may not stand before thy eyes; thou hatest all evildoers." And Psalm 11:5 says, "The Lord tests the righteous and the wicked, and his soul hates him that loves violence."
What are your reflections on just hate?
WSJ online ran an article last week on Christians dating non-Christians. It begins by pointing out an obvious disconnect: In an episode of "Seinfeld" that lays bare the characters' secular sensibilities, Elaine is shocked to learn that her on-again, off-again boyfriend, Puddy, is a believing Christian. "So is it a problem that I'm not really religious?" she asks him upon realizing their differing worldviews. "Not for me," he answers. "I'm not the one going to hell." Though Elaine herself acknowledges that she doesn't believe in an afterlife, she becomes increasingly angry with Puddy for not caring more about her eternal damnation. Finally, she explodes: "You should be trying to save me!"
However unlikely, the "Seinfeld" writers seem to have nailed one of the essential problems of evangelical Christians dating outside their faith community -- what some jokingly refer to as "missionary dating." Lisa Ann Cockrel, the managing editor of Brazos Press, a Christian publisher, writes in an email that "hell is a good barometer for what a Christian will think about missionary dating." In other words, if Puddy really thought Elaine was going to experience such a fate, could he really date her, let alone marry her, without trying to save her?
I've wondered about this myself. In the end, how could a person be at peace in a relationship where he or she fears for his or her partner's eternal soul? So what is driving our tendency to even consider dating outside the fold? The article identifies one of the reasons -- desperation: For evangelicals who want to pair up with others of the same faith but don't manage to do so in their early 20s, trouble lies ahead, particularly for women. Evangelical churches now typically have a 60-40 split between women and men, which means that there are many more single evangelical women out there than their male counterparts. As Ms. Cockrel explains, "I have friends who wanted to marry a Christian guy, are still single, and are more and more open to dating non-Christians as they get older. They're tired of waiting."
I'm sure more than a few single women out there can relate. And yet, such relationships fall way short of God's best. In her recent article "Same-Lord Relationships," Carolyn McCulley considers the temptation to date those who don't share your faith -- and how it can get you way off-track. She offers this warning: The moral of the story is never underestimate the negative influence of an unbelieving spouse. God is infinitely wiser than we are and His command to only marry (and by inference, only date) other believers is for both our benefit and His glory.
Whether portrayed on a sitcom or served up in Scripture as a cautionary tale, dating an unbeliever just doesn't make sense.
HT: Justin Taylor
 "Don't be stupid. It's only blood."
That's how obstetrician-gynecologist and abortionist Sheldon Turkish allegedly answered Rose Acuna when she asked if there was a "baby in there" after six to eight weeks of pregnancy. Apparently, Acuna wanted to make an informed decision before going through with an abortion. But Turkish wanted to decide for her by referring the life growing inside of her as "just blood" and making her feel like an idiot for even asking.
And according to the New Jersey Supreme Court, that's perfectly acceptable.
Last week the court dismissed the lawsuit Acuna filed against Turkish claiming he lied to her about the development of her baby. You see, she began her own research into fetal development after her abortion when she had complications and was told by a nurse that "the doctor had left parts of the baby inside of you."
National Review Online's (NRO) Walter Weber describes the events this way, Baby? What baby? Didn't the doctor say "just blood" (or "just tissue")?
Acuna started looking for answers. What she found out about the medical realities of human development and abortion was emotionally devastating. Now, she would carry a burden of guilt and grief for the rest of her life.
Rose Acuna sued the doctor, saying she'd been lied to and misled. The case wound its way through the New Jersey legal system until, on September 12, the state supreme court ordered her case dismissed.
The court determined that since Acuna knew she was pregnant, then she knew she would give birth to a child in 7 months if she didn't have a miscarriage. So they said it doesn't matter that the abortionist misinformed her about its development.
Again, NRO's Weber clarifies it for us, In other words, so long as the woman is told she's pregnant, the would-be abortionist can feed her the most preposterous nonsense about what's actually going on in her womb. And if that nonsense induces the woman to abort the baby in ignorance, too bad.
Looking at the enclosed photo of a 7 week old pre-born baby and recalling the words of the abortionist Sheldon Turkish and subsequent decision from the New Jersey Supreme Court, I'm reminded of this passage in Romans about God's just wrath against mankind. Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Although they know God's righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.
I believe this is true for these justices. They approve of those who murder pre-born babies. And in this case, by any means necessary.
Anthony Kronman is a professor of Law at Yale who sees both a longing for meaning among today's students and a failure by schools to provide it. Writing in the Boston Globe over the weekend, he observed: In a shift of historic importance, America's colleges and universities have largely abandoned the idea that life's most important question is an appropriate subject for the classroom. In doing so, they have betrayed their students by depriving them of the chance to explore it in an organized way, before they are caught up in their careers and preoccupied with the urgent business of living itself.
Later Kronman explains how America's institutions of higher learning were often founded with a Biblical context for meaning, but then jettisoned that context over the years. So does Kronman recommend bringing that context back? No. Instead, he writes: Our culture may be spiritually impoverished, but what it needs is not more religion. What it needs is an alternative to religion, for colleges and universities to become again the places they once were -- spiritually serious but non-dogmatic, concerned with the soul but agnostic about God.
Reading the article, I was amazed by how Kronman could be so objective about the search for meaning among students and yet so harsh about students finding that meaning through faith in God. The following passage was another example of how Kronman wanted schools to have the spiritual energy of that old time religion without having, well...that old-time religion: Most importantly, perhaps, the great upsurge of religious fundamentalism outside our colleges and universities is a sign of the growing appetite for spiritual direction. These movements can be a source of danger and division, and intellectuals may mock and despise them, but teachers also ought to see in them the energy that will drive the restoration of the question of life's meaning -- and, with that, of the humanities themselves - to a central place in our colleges and universities. The fundamentalists have the wrong answers, but they've got the right questions. We need to learn to ask them again in school.
If you're a student, do you see this on your campus? Do you see evidence of student's seeking meaning? Do you also see professor's trying to provide meaning while also being hostile to religious faith?
HT: Al Mohler
Reading Motte's recent blog, God Wanted You to Read This ,touched on something that has bugged me for some time, but not precisely for the reason Motte blogged.
Quoting Tim Challies, Motte speaks about the tendency of some preachers and writers to claim that you are listening to or reading said person at that precise moment because God willed it. "Bludgeoning with providence" (Challies' term) is certainly a good name for it, but I have a different one: taking God's name in vain.
Now I realize this isn't the standard definition of taking God's name in vain. Most if not all people generally consider the use of God in anything other than a reverent or descriptive way as taking His name in vain. Even my capitalizing of the pronoun His, which is Focus on the Family policy, is an attempt to avoid using God's name in vain. (Never mind that most Bible translations, including the NIV and KJV, do not capitalize pronouns in most cases.) Combine an irreverent or flippant use of God's name with a certain word that begins with d and you've really done it.
In fact, some people mistakenly think the d part of that epithet is the bad word. R.C. Sproul tells a funny story in which he was having lunch with a non-churchgoing man, who let slip a G**d***. Knowing that Sproul was a preacher, the man quickly apologized. "Sorry," he said, "I meant God darn."
But really, now, is this usage what is being referred to in Exodus 20:7? "You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name."
Let's look at the context of God's commands in Exodus, Deuteronomy and Leviticus. Many were intended to set His people apart from the pagan culture they'd just left and the pagan cultures they were heading into. Those polytheistic societies had gods for this and gods for that and many priests speaking on behalf of those false gods.
I believe the command not to "misuse the name of the LORD your God" (take the name in vain, according to the KJV) is, first and foremost, a command against falsely ascribing to God something that is not His.
Think about it: Any time someone tells you that God told him to tell you something or God caused something to happen, do you automatically believe that to be the case, or do you, like me, attribute it to just a bit of hyperbole? How about someone telling you that God wants you to be rich? Or successful? Or maybe just that God wanted you to have that particular parking spot? Is God capable of all these things? Of course. But to credit God with everything that happens, down to the minutest detail, is, I believe, taking God's name in vain, because it's based on a misunderstanding of God's will. As Challies |
