Thursday, December 13, 2007

At Christmas

This past Sunday evening, our youth and children (with the help of some strategic adults) put on a Christmas program. It was great. There were some pictures on our youth group site, 90°.

Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Philip Pullman's Fools-gold Compass

"The fool has said in his heart, 'There is no God.'" Psalm 53:1

Dr. Albert Mohler has written a good review of Philip Pullmans trilogy of books, called His Dark Materials, and of the first book The Golden Compass, coming out very soon as a major motion picture.

Every parent should read this review. These books, and this motion picture are a direct challenge to the Christian faith. Though it is a very atractive movie, and the books are very well written, and aimed at children and youth, they are dangerous.

Dr. Mohler makes the case. Please read it.

Wednesday, November 21, 2007

Power Line: Editor, edit thyself.

Power Line blog has two very good articles by William Katz. Mr Katz focuses on what the MSM (Main Stream Media) must do to regain the respect of the average American news consumer. He is dead on (at least as far as he goes). Part 1. Part 2.

Sunday, November 18, 2007

Security on the Home Front

This article by James Carafano is a clear reminder that vigilance is the price of freedom. Dr. Carafano's piece does not really set out to be political, so it does not mention the administration that has held the line against terrorism, or the half of congress that seems dead set on knocking down the walls that are currently protecting freedom here and elsewhere.

Dr. Carafano's piece is an eye-opener. I think I have heard of each of these, but the consistent drone of "what have you done for us lately" coming from the left seems to drown out the truth and purge the memory. This is a needed reminder.

Saturday, November 17, 2007

Godly Parents or World-like Churches

A recent post on Boundlessline caught my attention. Steve Watters references Dr. Christian Smith in an article in Books and Culture on the widening gap between teens leaving churches and returning when they start having children.

As I read some of Dr. Smith's article I sensed that the prevailing sense is that such a "leaving" is the normal thing to happen, due to several social forces on youth. I do not doubt that these forces may be there. However, I wonder if this is more the result of parents not cultivating the strength in their youth to deal with the forces than the church dealing with its own relevance to these young adults. I do not dispute that churches, in dealing with our culture, must be aware of the forces being brought to bear on the people. But this is true for adults and youth.

In my experience, the more significant force in the life of youth and young adults, is the life-long influence of their parents. It is from Mom and Dad that the value of the fellowship of the saints, and the value of the teaching of God's Word comes. It is here that youth and therefore young adults grow to understand the value of serving God, by seeing Mom and Dad do it, and then doing it with them.

In the early church, the youth ministry was not about having fun, and parties. It was about challenging youth to godliness, and even to such deliberate action that would lead to martyrdom. And the early church flourished, in the midst of the most self-centered and hedonistic culture of its day.

I want the youth ministry here to reach young people, and help them prepare to be young adults. But it seems to me that trying to figure out how we can be relevant to their worldview is missing the point. We may have to do some of that with the young adults we have today. But, this will just continue to spiral down if parents do not seek to pass on their value of God and His church to their children.

How is this done? No room for an extensive treatment here. However, when our families only attend church when there is nothing better to do, when recreation takes the place of the Lord's church, when the attitude is that all we need to do is show up once and we've paid our God off, then we will continue to see the gap widening. And it will not merely widen on an age vector. It will continue to widen in the spirit. Soon, we will have a whole generation, raised by "Christian" parents, who do not know God, nor will they care.

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Student Volunter Movement

I came across this opportunity for young adults. Anyone who can get away for this, should consider it. Group: Student Global Impact. This is a ministry of Inter-City Baptist in Allen Park, MI.

Monday, November 12, 2007

Worth Considering

Rod Decker has said some things that pastors often say, but few academics will say, let alone few in academic administration. His article "A Teaching/Ministry Career" is worth the read.

Friday, October 19, 2007

Pirate Ships and Swash-buckling Veggies

What did the church do before film? The first two millennia of the church must have been a real drag.

It's hard to imagine what kind of pastoral teaching ministry would need the Veggie Tale crew to help them teach the word of God. Larry the Cucumber, Mr. Lunt, and Pa Grape are going to be Pirates, "The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything" from BigIdea Productions and Universal Pictures. I know that the whole idea of Pirates for Christ is a bit much for many people, but renting theaters and filling them with people to hear the "truth" and then explaining the "parables" is, at least to me, "off the charts" ("here there be monsters"). The whole idea is to help children understand that heroes don't have to be big and strong, or smart, or pretty. Ok, I get it. But isn't this trivializing the effects of the gospel and the Holy Spirit in the lives of children a bit (more than a bit)?

Don't get me wrong. The trailer is cute. And the story will, I am sure, be engaging. But churches using it in their teaching ministry - renting whole theaters for the purpose! It sounds to me like a whole lot of thought went into the marketing of this. And they found just the right market - gullible pastors or churches who have either lost touch with the power of God's word, or lost control of their youth and children's ministries.

"Arrrgh, where be the land, Matey?"

"Avast, no where near here."

(Pardon the poor pirate lingo.)

http://www.veggiepirates.com/
http://screenings.bigidea.com/events/list
Original source: CR Newswire email, November 19, 2007.

The Rock and the Hard Place, Politically

I have been pondering the upcoming presidential election. In my musings, I found this article by Justin Taylor. It is definitely worth reading. I have thought most of these thoughts, but have not articulated them all at once. I do not know that Mr. Taylor has any answers, but he definitely puts some things into perspective.

Thursday, August 16, 2007

Unarguably a Culture of Death

"The Pastor's Weekly Briefing" for August 17, 2007, ran the following article.

"Lethal Injections Avoid PBA

"In response to the Supreme Court decision upholding the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, many abortionists in Boston, Mass., and around the country are injecting preborn babies with a lethal drug dose before aborting them, according the Boston Globe.

"The National Abortion Federation is training doctors to inject potassium chloride into a preborn baby's heart to avoid any chance of partially delivering a live fetus. In Boston, three major Harvard-affiliated hospitals — Massachusetts General, Brigham and Women's, and Beth Israel Deaconess — have responded to the ban by making the injections the new standard operating procedure for abortions beginning at around 20 weeks' gestation, said Dr. Michael F. Greene, director of obstetrics at Mass. General.

"Dr. Gene Rudd, with the Christian Medical Association, called it an appalling situation. "In an effort to technically circumvent the partial-birth abortion ban," he told Family News in Focus, "abortionists have basically moved the death of the baby by just a few inches and few minutes." He also points out that if potassium chloride gets into the mother's system, it could place her health at risk. "We have breached a major tenet of medical ethics," Rudd explained. "We're not really doing what's in her best interest. We're doing what's in the physician's best interest."
Denise Burke, staff counsel for Americans United for Life, pointed out the irony of the situation, in that potassium chloride is also used to execute death row inmates."

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

He doth protest too much

I have been listening to the latest media juggernaut. It seems Mr. Don Imus, a well-known radio celebrity, used some fairly unflattering language when speaking about a certain university's women's basketball team. Since then several leaders of the black community have been calling for his professional head.

To make reparations, Mr. Imus has admitted his guilt, but also that it was an unthinking, un-Imus remark. In trying to placate that wrath of the "media-gods" he is trying to make everyone think that these remarks came out of nowhere. He says they are as reprehensible to him as they are to others. That may be. But they did not come from nowhere. And here is the lesson for him and for you and me.

The Lord told us that "out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks." What the Son of God wanted us to know is that if we want to know where something came from, we look at ourselves. The Devil does not make us do it, and we cannot blame it on those who are too sensitive. Our sinful hearts are the source of those things that get us into trouble.

More than once I have made statements that I wish, sometimes immediately, I could retract, or better yet, make un-said. Where do these come from? From the heart. I may not even know the idea is there, but as the Prophet said, "the heart is deceitful and desperately wicked, beyond understanding." And it is my heart. And it is your heart.

When we say or do thoughtless or wicked things, to get beyond them, we must own them. And then we must confess to the God who has already forgiven our sins. Oh, and then we must take our "lickin'" from those we offended. But through it all, the surprise should not be that there is wickedness in our hearts that will express itself when we are not looking, but that not expecting it to come out, we were not on guard.

Wednesday, February 21, 2007

Regarding God Securing His Word to Us

What follows is my attempt to communicate my understanding of how God gave His Word to man, how he has made it available to us today, and what we are to do to be faithful to it. If anything, I admit that this is an attempt to move forward, though admittedly, probably not there yet.

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I believe that God has secured His Word to believers for use in ministry and life (Isaiah 40:8; 2 Timothy 3:16-17; 1 Peter 1:23-25). By this, I mean that, through the many various texts available to us, the actual rendering of God’s Word is available, though not necessarily in any single text.

First, I acknowledge that nowhere in scripture is there any statement determining or demonstrating the method of this securing. Second, I acknowledge that there are many variant texts and textual traditions available. Third, I find no scriptural authority to exalt one text or textual tradition, or one translation over another. Therefore, I understand that God did not secure the text to us in the same manner as He inspired the original text. I am compelled to accept that, while God miraculously originated the Bible through inspiration, He has chosen to secure it to us through secondary means (see Deuteronomy 17:18 and possibly Jeremiah 36:26-28).

Since God has secured His Word to us in the form of a multiplicity of manuscripts, I acknowledge the need for careful and faithful textual analysis as the means to finding the most accurate representation of the text of the original writings. I acknowledge also, that these representations of the text are compilations done by men. Though biblical interpreters may judge some translations more faithful to the "original text" in general, no one translation, or compiled representation of the “original text”, carries a God-ordained superiority, or a universal biblical mandate, above all others. Consequently, some of the variations in the wording of such translations are interpretive, while others present themselves because of a variance in the text used for translation.

Nonetheless, though no absolute determination regarding the actual text is possible, these variations do not necessarily signify a deviation from God's Word. The authority and power of the Scriptures derives from the God who gave them, and God has chosen secondary means to secure the text of Scripture to us. Therefore, God's authority and power follows through with His chosen means (Deuteronomy 17:18-20) to make available to us translations that are reliable, authoritative, and effective (Isaiah 55:11; 2 Timothy 3:16,17; Hebrews 4:12).

I acknowledge that, when based on careful, normal-literal translation of the best representation of the text of the original writings, today's English (or Spanish, Russian, etc.) translations are reliable, and carry God’s authority and power derived from that of the original writings.

I am sympathetic with the notion that, due to the importance of God’s Word, we need to get this right. I understand that there are several theories of textual analysis. However, I find no basis in the explicit statements of scripture, or in the larger teaching of the Scripture, that mandates choosing one theory over another. Recognizing that not all can be 100% right, I understand that all, in some way could be wrong. It is up to me, as a careful student of God’s Word, to give due diligence (2 Timothy 2:15) to both the choice of textual theories I accept, and the method of translation and interpretation I utilize. I must also grant that same freedom and responsibility of diligence to my brother.