A Republic, if you can keep it.

For the full monty, go here. In these trying times, it's important to remember that we live in a land of opportunity: We have the opportunity to succeed and to fail.

Those who seek a land of government-backed promises are not seeking the dream of America.

On Becoming a Reformed Catholic

I'm thinking of making a weekly rule (not sure yet...bear with me) on blogging. Thursdays would be reserved for Theology. Wednesdays for Worship. Saturdays for silliness. Mondays for musings... Anyway, here's an early stab at Theology Thursday.

A major hurdle in my journey from Presbyterianism to Anglicanism was being forced to abandon the Westminster Confession of Faith as my doctrinal standard. (Yes, I had scruples but they were primarily in the area of praxis.) I'd long known that the Westminster began as an expansion of the 39 Articles of Religion which had been the basis of the Evangelical Reformation of the Catholic Church in England. But something I admired about Westminster was its comprehensiveness.

After a year of intense reading and soul-searching, I've come to cherish the 39 Articles. I cherish them as an irenic statement of evangelical truth, written from a pastoral perspective. The shepherding qualities of a bishop are clearly evident in them. For instance, ..

In a new journal for orthodox Anglicanism, 39 Articles, I came across an article titled "Kindred Spirits" which addresses the continuities and discontinuities between 39 Articles and WCF. It was a blessing to read. Here's an apt snippet:

While the preface to the 1549 prayer book notes that “There never was any thing by the whit of man so well devised, or so surely established, which in the contin­u­ance of time hath not been corrupted. . . .” both documents do set forth a very concise system of doctrine that is easily understood by any that care to read them. It is in the setting forth of the doctrine contained in Scripture that both documents find their wholeness, and that is what determines the degree to which they remain un­cor­rupted. The system set forth is as harmonious to the Word of God as the work of man can be. Ac­cord­ing­ly and not surprisingly, both are systems that have with­stood the test of time and temp­tation.

There is another way in which both documents, at least from a Calvinistic point of view, are com­plete. Historically, Calvinists have defined a true church by the following marks: the preaching of the gospel, the right adminis­tration of the sacraments, and church discipline. In both docu­ments, The Thirty-Nine Articles and the Westminster Confession of Faith, we find excellent and con­cise definitions of these marks, discussions that are both in harmony with each other and with scripture. From a pastoral stand­point — and this is indeed the where the rubber meets the road — they are wonderfully complete. The documents then find their ultimate completeness in their usefulness to the church.

I encourage you to read the rest here.

Losing God the Father

Last Spring, a seminary friend of mine was invoking his privilege as a senior to give one sermon at the midweek chapel service. The senior sermon serves as an opportunity to share something of your faith with the community that, for two or more years, has been part of shaping that very faith. There are basic, "broad middle" sermons. Some sermons that question the person's call after 2.5 years of education. Many sermons that criticize the Bush administration. And a plethora of GLBT, Social Justice, or other standard Christian Left sermons. Fine and dandy.

But my friend was called in to the dean's office. His crime? He dared to use masculine pronouns and speak of God the Father. Apparently, inclusive language isn't meant to include half of the population.

Don't get me wrong. Inclusive language in regards to humans is a good thing (though it can make for poor writing in the hands of less-skilled writers). It's a seminary policy to use inclusive language.

But a recent Touchstone article asks, "What are we losing?"

A lot of feminist and post-modernist theologians talk about how people have felt excluded by masculine god-talk. (Which, let's be clear, is MASCULINE, but not necessarily MALE.) They want to jettison 4,000 years of linguistic reflection on the basis of 40-60 years of empowerment talk. But I don't think they've thought through all the implications. They can tell you why they don't want masculine god-talk, but have a harder time justifying the alternative they propose.

Do you know why masculine god-talk is important? Please feel free to use the comments section to elucidate. And stay tuned...the vicar is about to stir things up.

This World Is Not My Home

Fortunately, neither is this place.

Epistolary Epiphany

Sunday was Proper 22A, and the appointed epistle reading was from Paul's letter to the Philippians. The passage begins so familiarly - "But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." With texts like these, the sermon simply writes itself. The parable of the tenants was the more challenging text, and it's what I preached.

Yet, I found myself struck anew by Paul's words...or rather, his emotion, as the epistoler read the lesson this morning.

"For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ."

While he later mentions a striving between Euodia and Syntoche, I don't think that's what is in view here. Rather, I think Paul is grieving for people who have fallen away from the faith.

We read the letter to the Galatians and think that Paul is just ready to give both barrels to anyone that dares sniff of apostasy. And in 1 Corinthians, he doesn't hesitate to hand a notorious sinner over to the devil for judgment. Yet here in Philippians, Paul is talking about someone who used to strive to attain the heavenly calling...and then fell.

Heretics.
Liberals.
Apostates.
ReFORMERlies.
Mainliners.
Corpse-churchers.

Whatever you've said about them in the past, did you do so even with tears?

I know I haven't...not until this morning.

Thank you, Jesus, for still speaking to those of us you've called to speak for you.

Layered complicity explained

You should also check their presidential pick.

Modern Art

I honestly don't know whether to laugh or cry. Look at this:


Looks like the energetic frenzy of a toddler with a crayon, right?

Now realize that it actually was done by a toddler with a crayon.


That's what you get from all those extra college edumacated folks I spoke of this morning.

Why We Need Less College Graduates

Yes, Bluto. Suprising but true, I'm against it.

Why?

Well, I'm very much in sympathy with the basic thrust of this article.

We've created an unnecessary expectation that our children will go to college. Yet in too many cases, it is just a well-funded period of prolonged neoteny and adolescent alcoholism rather than a time for the mind and spirit to be formed.

I really wish we would follow the lead of other countries that reserve a liberal education for those who can take it with good effect, and focus on vocational training for the vast majority of people who cannot (or will not) succeed in college.

Short Memory

Guess what else he was right about...

Haughty vs Hottie

Any Questions?

1984 Comes to Missouri

It looks like the Obama campaign is relying on his skills in community organizing to get out the vote in Missouri. And Missouri's governor is pretty upset about it.

KMOV broke the story (and I think Rush got the word out). Here's the YouTube video (for as long as it's up).

St. Louis and Missouri Democrat sheriffs and top prosecutors are planning to go after anyone who makes "false statements against Obama" during his campaign.

I can’t even begin to describe how wrong this agenda is. Are they doing the same for McCain? How about Nader?

He said we were scared because he's not like those other presidents on our currency. Well, my problem is that he's too much like some guys on the currency of other countries:

Joseph Stalin said:

• Education is a weapon whose effects depend on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed.
• Ideas are far more powerful than guns. We don’t allow our enemies to have guns, why should we allow them to have ideas?
• Print is the sharpest and the strongest weapon of our party.
• The people who cast the votes don’t decide an election, the people who count the votes do.
• When we hang the capitalists they will sell us the rope we use.

Remember this, gang, when they pull out the fascism card (which never seems to be applied to thugs like ACORN). When did America lose it's basic belief that increasing freedom was the solution to the problems of humankind?

Community Reinvestment Act

Yeah... keep blaming the free market.

Mortgage Meltdown

What they aren't telling you...

Can we get this for blogging?

Thank you, XKCD!!!

Enough XP Points to get to Level Up?

I guess it depends on who you ask...

Needling Questions

Coming to a church near you?

Make sure your members know what you believe, and the pastor is equipping you to know why you believe it!

Preaching Hell in a Tolerant Age

Brimstone for the broad-minded.
by Tim Keller

The young man in my office was impeccably dressed and articulate. He was an Ivy League MBA, successful in the financial world, and had lived in three countries before age 30. Raised in a family with only the loosest connections to a mainline church, he had little understanding of Christianity.

I was therefore gratified to learn of his intense spiritual interest, recently piqued as he attended our church. He said he was ready to embrace the gospel. But there was a final obstacle.

"You've said that if we do not believe in Christ," he said, "we are lost and condemned. I'm sorry, I just cannot buy that. I work with some fine people who are Muslim, Jewish, or agnostic. I cannot believe they are going to hell just because they don't believe in Jesus. In fact, I cannot reconcile the very idea of hell with a loving God—even if he is holy too."

This young man expressed what may be the main objection contemporary secular people make to the Christian message. (A close second, in my experience, is the problem of suffering and evil.) Moderns reject the idea of final judgment and hell.

Thus, it's tempting to avoid such topics in our preaching. But neglecting the unpleasant doctrines of the historic faith will bring about counter-intuitive consequences. There is an ecological balance to scriptural truth that must not be disturbed.

If an area is rid of its predatory or undesirable animals, the balance of that environment may be so upset that the desirable plants and animals are lost—through overbreeding with a limited food supply. The nasty predator that was eliminated actually kept in balance the number of other animals and plants necessary to that particular ecosystem. In the same way, if we play down "bad" or harsh doctrines within the historic Christian faith, we will find, to our shock, that we have gutted all our pleasant and comfortable beliefs, too.

The loss of the doctrine of hell and judgment and the holiness of God does irreparable damage to our deepest comforts—our understanding of God's grace and love and of our human dignity and value to him. To preach the good news, we must preach the bad.

But in this age of tolerance, how?

How to preach hell to traditionalists

Before preaching on the subject of hell, I must recognize that today, a congregation is made up of two groups: traditionalists and postmoderns. The two hear the message of hell completely differently.

People from traditional cultures and mindsets tend to have (a) a belief in God, and (b) a strong sense of moral absolutes and the obligation to be good. These people tend to be older, from strong Catholic or religious Jewish backgrounds, from conservative evangelical/Pentecostal Protestant backgrounds, from the southern U.S., and first-generation immigrants from non-European countries.

The way to show traditional persons their need for the gospel is by saying, "Your sin separates you from God! You can't be righteous enough for him." Imperfection is the duty-worshiper's horror. Traditionalists are motivated toward God by the idea of punishment in hell. They sense the seriousness of sin.

But traditionalists may respond to the gospel only out of fear of hell, unless I show them Jesus experienced not only pain in general on the cross but hell in particular. This must be held up until they are attracted to Christ for the beauty of the costly love of what he did. To the traditional person, hell must be preached as the only way to know how much Christ loved you.

Here is one way I have preached this:

"Unless we come to grips with this terrible doctrine, we will never even begin to understand the depths of what Jesus did for us on the cross. His body was being destroyed in the worst possible way, but that was a flea bite compared to what was happening to his soul. When he cried out that his God had forsaken him, he was experiencing hell itself.

"If a mild acquaintance denounces you and rejects you—that hurts. If a good friend does the same—the hurt's far worse. However, if your spouse walks out on you, saying, 'I never want to see you again,' that is far more devastating still. The longer, deeper, and more intimate the relationship, the more torturous is any separation.

"But the Son's relationship with the Father was beginning-less and infinitely greater than the most intimate and passionate human relationship. When Jesus was cut off from God, he went into the deepest pit and most powerful furnace, beyond all imagining. And he did it voluntarily, for us."

How to preach hell to postmoderns

In contrast to the traditionalist, the postmodern person is hostile to the very idea of hell. People with more secular and postmodern mindsets tend to have (a) only a vague belief in the divine, if at all, and (b) little sense of moral absolutes, but rather a sense they need to be true to their dreams. They tend to be younger, from nominal Catholic or non-religious Jewish backgrounds, from liberal mainline Protestant backgrounds, from the western and northeastern U. S., and Europeans.

When preaching hell to people of this mindset, I've found I must make four arguments.

1. Sin is slavery. I do not define sin as just breaking the rules, but also as "making something besides God our ultimate value and worth." These good things, which become gods, will drive us relentlessly, enslaving us mentally and spiritually, even to hell forever if we let them.

I say, "You are actually being religious, though you don't know it—you are trying to find salvation through worshiping things that end up controlling you in a destructive way." Slavery is the choice-worshiper's horror.

C. S. Lewis's depictions of hell are important for postmodern people. In The Great Divorce, Lewis describes a busload of people from hell who come to the outskirts of heaven. There they are urged to leave behind the sins that have trapped them in hell. The descriptions Lewis makes of people in hell are so striking because we recognize the denial and self-delusion of substance addictions. When addicted to alcohol, we are miserable, but we blame others and pity ourselves; we do not take responsibility for our behavior nor see the roots of our problem.

Lewis writes, "Hell … begins with a grumbling mood, and yourself still distinct from it: perhaps even criticizing it. … You can repent and come out of it again. But there may come a day when you can do that no longer. Then there will be no you left to criticize the mood or even enjoy it, but just the grumble itself going on forever like a machine."

Modern people struggle with the idea of God thinking up punishments to inflict on disobedient people. When sin is seen as slavery, and hell as the freely chosen, eternal skid row of the universe, hell becomes much more comprehensible.

Here is an example from a recent sermon of how I try to explain this:

"First, sin separates us from the presence of God (Isa. 59:2), which is the source of all joy (Ps. 16:11), love, wisdom, or good thing of any sort (James 1:17) . …

"Second, to understand hell we must understand sin as slavery. Romans 1:21-25 tells us that we were built to live for God supremely, but instead we live for love, work, achievement, or morality to give us meaning and worth. Thus every person, religious or not, is worshiping something—idols, pseudo-saviors—to get their worth. But these things enslave us with guilt (if we fail to attain them) or anger (if someone blocks them from us) or fear (if they are threatened) or drivenness (since we must have them). Guilt, anger, and fear are like fire that destroys us. Sin is worshiping anything but Jesus—and the wages of sin is slavery."

Perhaps the greatest paradox of all is that the people on Lewis's bus from hell are enslaved because they freely choose to be. They would rather have their freedom (as they define it) than salvation. Their relentless delusion is that if they glorified God, they would lose their human greatness (Gen. 3:4-5), but their choice has really ruined their human greatness. Hell is, as Lewis says, "the greatest monument to human freedom."

2. Hell is less exclusive than so-called tolerance. Nothing is more characteristic of the modern mindset than the statement: "I think Christ is fine, but I believe a devout Muslim or Buddhist or even a good atheist will certainly find God." A slightly different version is: "I don't think God would send a person who lives a good life to hell just for holding the wrong belief." This approach is seen as more inclusive.

In preaching about hell, then, I need to counter this argument:

"The universal religion of humankind is: We develop a good record and give it to God, and then he owes us. The gospel is: God develops a good record and gives it to us, then we owe him (Rom. 1:17). In short, to say a good person, not just Christians, can find God is to say good works are enough to find God.

"You can believe that faith in Christ is not necessary or you can believe that we are saved by grace, but you cannot believe in both at once.

"So the apparently inclusive approach is really quite exclusive. It says, 'The good people can find God, and the bad people do not.'

"But what about us moral failures? We are excluded.

"The gospel says, 'The people who know they aren't good can find God, and the people who think they are good do not.'

"Then what about non-Christians, all of whom must, by definition, believe their moral efforts help them reach God? They are excluded.

"So both approaches are exclusive, but the gospel's is the more inclusive exclusivity. It says joyfully, 'It doesn't matter who you are or what you've done. It doesn't matter if you've been at the gates of hell. You can be welcomed and embraced fully and instantly through Christ.' "

3. Christianity's view of hell is more personal than the alternative view. Fairly often, I meet people who say, "I have a personal relationship with a loving God, and yet I don't believe in Jesus Christ at all."

"Why?" I ask.

They reply, "My God is too loving to pour out infinite suffering on anyone for sin."

But then a question remains: "What did it cost this kind of God to love us and embrace us? What did he endure in order to receive us? Where did this God agonize, cry out? Where were his nails and thorns?"

The only answer is: "I don't think that was necessary."

How ironic. In our effort to make God more loving, we have made God less loving. His love, in the end, needed to take no action. It was sentimentality, not love at all. The worship of a God like this will be impersonal, cognitive, ethical. There will be no joyful self-abandonment, no humble boldness, no constant sense of wonder. We would not sing to such a being, "Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all."

The postmodern "sensitive" approach to the subject of hell is actually quite impersonal. It says, "It doesn't matter if you believe in the person of Christ, as long as you follow his example."

But to say that is to say the essence of religion is intellectual and ethical, not personal. If any good person can find God, then the essential core of religion is understanding and following the rules.

When preaching about hell, I try to show how impersonal this view is:

"To say that any good person can find God is to create a religion without tears, without experience, without contact.

"The gospel certainly is not less than the understanding of truths and principles, but it is infinitely more. The essence of salvation is knowing a Person (John 17:3). As with knowing any person, there is repenting and weeping and rejoicing and encountering. The gospel calls us to a wildly passionate, intimate love relationship with Jesus Christ, and calls that 'the core of true salvation.' "

4. There is no love without wrath. What rankles people is the idea of judgment and the wrath of God: "I can't believe in a God who sends people to suffer eternally. What kind of loving God is filled with wrath?"

So in preaching about hell, we must explain that a wrathless God cannot be a loving God. Here's how I tried to do that in one sermon:

"People ask, 'What kind of loving God is filled with wrath?' But any loving person is often filled with wrath. In Hope Has Its Reasons, Becky Pippert writes, 'Think how we feel when we see someone we love ravaged by unwise actions or relationships. Do we respond with benign tolerance as we might toward strangers? Far from it. … Anger isn't the opposite of love. Hate is, and the final form of hate is indifference.'

"Pippert then quotes E. H. Gifford, 'Human love here offers a true analogy: the more a father loves his son, the more he hates in him the drunkard, the liar, the traitor.'

"She concludes: 'If I, a flawed narcissistic sinful woman, can feel this much pain and anger over someone's condition, how much more a morally perfect God who made them? God's wrath is not a cranky explosion, but his settled opposition to the cancer of sin which is eating out the insides of the human race he loves with his whole being.' "

A God like this

Following a recent sermon on the Parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man, the post-service question-and-answer session was packed with more than the usual number of attenders. The questions and comments focused on the subject of eternal judgment.

My heart sank when a young college student said, "I've gone to church all my life, but I don't think I can believe in a God like this." Her tone was more sad than defiant, but her willingness to stay and talk showed that her mind was open.

Usually all the questions are pitched to me, and I respond as best I can. But on this occasion people began answering one another.

An older businesswoman said, "Well, I'm not much of a churchgoer, and I'm in some shock now. I always disliked the very idea of hell, but I never thought about it as a measure of what God was willing to endure in order to love me."

Then a mature Christian made a connection with a sermon a month ago on Jesus at Lazarus' tomb in John 11. "The text tells us that Jesus wept," he said, "yet he was also extremely angry at evil. That's helped me. He is not just an angry God or a weeping, loving God—he's both. He doesn't only judge evil, but he also takes the hell and judgment himself for us on the cross."

The second woman nodded, "Yes. I always thought hell told me about how angry God was with us, but I didn't know it also told me about how much he was willing to suffer and weep for us. I never knew how much hell told me about Jesus' love. It's very moving."

It is only because of the doctrine of judgment and hell that Jesus' proclamation of grace and love are so brilliant and astounding.

Tim Keller is pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City.

Originally published in Leadership journal, October 1, 1997.

Copyright © 1997 by the author or Christianity Today International/Leadership Journal.

For more on Hell from Tim Keller, go here.

Rock the Quasar

The Devil's Greatest Trick

He's wiley one.

Gas Crisis Gets Violent

Think the gas crisis is only painful at the pump? Think again!!! Have you seen a clearer indication that we're moving to a poolice state?

Of course, it was later dismissed. The magistrate didn't want to see what this guy might [[ahem]] "bring up" in court. He's lucky that the Goracle didn't have some sort of green-house gas emissions legislation to slap on him.

(Please...no Fanny Mae jokes...)

Ignorance is no excuse

Does this scare anyone else?

Witchcraft and Wrightcraft

Alright... If Jeremiah Wright can rant and rave about the powers of evil as he sees them (you know, middle-classness, capitalism, whitey making AIDS to infect blacks, heterosexism, whatever) and pray against them, then nobody should be surprised that an evangelist from Africa would pray against the powers of evil as he sees them (including indifference by evangelicals, the powers of darkness - both human and spiritual, etc).

Our Life

And my wife thinks I keep those books for me...

I think every pastor - especially those who homeschool - can sympathize.

h/t Wondermark

Palin Foreign Policy

In news of the ridiculous, Facebook now has a group called "I have more foreign policy experience Sarah Palin." The description: "For all of you dumbfounded by the selection of Governor Sarah Palin as John McCain's running mate. This moose-eating political featherweight could be a heartbeat away from the presidency—what a frightening thought." Hooray for the politics of CHANGE!!!

So how should Palin respond the next time an inquisitor seasoned and unbiased journalist asks about her INcompetence in foreign policy?

"I’m at least as competent in foreign affairs as Democratic Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton was in 1992, unless you count the time he spent as a draft dodger during the Vietnam War leading anti-American demonstrations in Europe. But you in the press never asked about his foreign policy qualifications."

Too soon for the sainted serial seducer?

Okay, how about this one:

"I’m at least as competent in foreign policy as Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter was in 1976. But, then, as President, Jimmy Carter helped topple America’s ally the Shah of Iran leading to the present nuclear weapon-seeking theocratic regime in Tehran. And that’s what started the Iran-Iraq war that led to Saddam Hussein having the world’s fourth biggest army. And Mr. Carter’s incompetence also led to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, which spawned a terrorist group called al-Qaida led by Osama bin Laden, which used what it learned to attack our World Trade Center and Pentagon — 3,000 American deaths on the bloody hands of Jimmy Carter."

The media can shine a nice light on an empty suit, but it's still an empty suit.

Preaching the Profit

Somebody call the prosperity preachers (ahem...I'm talking to you, Joel Osteen) and tell'em their missing out on a good marketing experience.

No offense intended to Warren Wiersbe or Mr. B Natural.

Is your preacher equipping you to serve Jesus? Or just to live your best life now?

What is best in life?

If you ask Conan the Barbarian what is best in life, he'll give you a straight answer.



He couldn't be more wrong.

What is better than that is to bring your children into the household of faith by covenant baptism.




Presenting Lillianah Kathryn-Marie and Elias Zebulun Larimer - born anew of water and the word (John 3:5) on the Feast of St. Matthew the Apostle & Evangelist (Sept. 21, 2008).

"...here Christ is speaking of baptism, of real and natural water such as a cow may drink, the baptism about which you hear in the sermons on this subject. Therefore, the word water does not designate affliction here; it means real, natural water, which is connected with God's word and becomes a very spiritual bath through the Holy Spirit or through the entire Trinity. Here Christ also speaks of the Holy Spirit as present and active, in fact, the entire Holy Trinity is there. And thus the person who has been baptized is said to be born anew. In Titus 3:3 Paul terms baptism 'a washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit.' In the last chapter of Mark we read that 'he who believes and is baptized will be saved.' (Mark 16:16.) And in this passage Christ declares that whoever is not born anew of the water and the Holy Spirit cannot come into the kingdom of God. Therefore, God's words dare not be tampered with."
(Martin Luther's Sermons on the Gospel of Saint John, Vol. 22, p. 283.)

Eye of the Beholder

h/t: Cagle Cartoon Index

New Posters at Spurgeon.org

Here's a teaser

Here's a hint: When people say they want Jesus apart from the Bible or the apostolic witness of the historic church, they're just giving you their own time-bound ideas packaged in religious nicetude and riding on the coat-tails of "mere" Christianity.

You are what you eat

Apparently, researchers at Oxford University have found out that if you are a vegan you're more likely to become a vegetable in later life.

Of course, one look at the proto-vegetotalitarian could tell you that.



Ooh...looks like the effects are starting early for some EarthFirsters.

So what do we do with Romans 14 now?

Hymn for Ordination Today

God the Spirit, Guide and Guardian

Tune: Hyfrydol

God the Spirit, guide and guardian, wind-sped flame and hovering dove,
Breath of life and voice of prophets, sign of blessing, power of love,
Give to those who lead your people, fresh anointing of your grace.
Send them forth as bold apostles to your church in every place.

Christ our Savior, sovereign, Shepherd, word made flesh, love crucified,
Teacher, healer, suffering servant, friend of sinners, foe of pride,
In your tending may all pastors learn and live a shepherd's care;
Grant them courage and compassion shown through word and deed and prayer.

Great Creator, life bestower, truth beyond all thought's recall,
Fount of wisdom, womb of mercy, giving and forgiving all,
As you know our strength and weakness, so may those the church exalts
Oversee its life steadfastly yet not overlook its faults.

Triune God mysterious being, undivided and diverse,
Deeper than our minds can fathom, greater than our creeds rehearse,
Help us in our varied callings your full image to proclaim,
That our ministries uniting may give glory to your name.

*GOD THE SPIRIT, GUIDE AND GUARDIAN

Words by Carl P. Daw, Jr.; Music by Rowland H. Prichard © 1989 Hope Publishing Company, Carol Stream, IL 60188

Useless Boycott

WARNING: Links in this blog post may not be safe for work or children!!!

Americans for Truth are upset that Miller Light took out an ad in the booklet for the notoriously licentious Folsom Street Fair. It's one of the most perverse displays this side of Sodom.

But somehow, I don't think you're going to be effective marketing a beer boycott to Baptists.

P.S. None of what they do is free speech. I think the framers of our liberties were wise to make freedom of speech - not freedom of expression - our right.

Hockey Moms for Truth

If that doesn't change your vote, I don't know what will.

The Goracle Flubs Again

He apparently has a new House Boat that he calls Bio-Solar One. He says it's environmentally friendly - run on solar and bio-fuels.

Unfortunately, photographers caught him plugged in to not one, but TWO regular outlets at the marina!


Al is shameless.

He also has him a gas-guzzling sea-doo on the back! As Glenn Reynolds often says: I’ll start acting like there’s a climate crisis when Al Gore does.

Jedi Jesus

Introducing
The Star Wars Savior

JEDI JESUS

Now with improved SMITESABER action!!!

Only uses the Light-of-Men Side of the Force.

h/t Windstar Embroidery

Glacier Gladness for Global Madness

The BBC recently reported on some archaeological finds from the Alps indicating fluctuating temperatures over the last 7,000 years. Included were paleolithic artifacts, Roman coins, and Medieval clothing.

I really hope people will take time to listen to history before attempting to abandon a way of life that has produced some of the greatest humanitarian advances of all time.

BUSTED

H/T Wondermark

Palin and the Prochoice Problem

It seems that an OBGYN in Canada is concerned about ArchVillainess... I mean, Republican VP Candidate Gov. Sarah Palin's decision to give birth to Trig, her youngest who also happens to have an extra chromosome. His concern is not about her ability to do the job, or the impact on the family. It's not even about Sarah or Trig's health and well-being.

He's concerned that such a prominent role being given to a woman in this situation might reduce abortions.

You just can't make some stuff up.*

Thankfully, some Canadians actually think it's not so bad an idea to let children with Down Syndrome live. Now Trig has become, literally, their poster-child.

If you've known a person with Down Syndrome, you could probably attest to their near-angelic nature. While I can't say I've had extensive experiences, I will say that each encounter has led me to experience something more of the mysterious love that God has for me in Christ Jesus. Their utter openness, compassion for others, and gentleness....

It puts most Christians I know to shame. Since last Sunday's epistle was on letting your love be genuine, let's ask God how he might be giving us another chance to learn a lesson we desperately try to forget.

*p.s. It's still better than uber-moonbat Wendy Doniger is able to manage. I think her work on androgynes has confused her about what actually makes a woman. "Pretense of a woman", indeed!

Spare Change

Everybody is talking about Change these days.

Especially reverent tones regarding change are used when speaking of The One.



Well... at least this lady can count on some change.

Why? Because it turns out that Barack Hussein Obama only pays the ladies pennies on the dollar. That's right...

Barack Obama pays his women campaign staff less than he pays the men on his campaign staff.

Palin Facts

Look at it this way. One VP candidate could protect you from zombies. The other... well, he looks like one.

Even Chuck Norris is running scared.


h/t PalinFacts

Help Hurricane Vicitims

Rev'd Bill Crawford at First Presbyterian of Thibodaux has set up a PayPal account where the church can process donations for immediate relief of hurricane victims.

Please help if you can.

Imminent Domain

Does it bother anyone else that the government now holds close to 90% of all mortgages? I refer, of course, to the $200 billion dollar bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Before bailing out mortgage companies, the United States government had direct ownership of nearly 30% of its total territory. These federal lands are used as military bases or testing grounds, nature parks and reserves and indian reservations, or are leased to the private sector for commercial exploitation (e.g. forestry, mining, agriculture). They are managed by different administrations, such as the Bureau of Land Management, the US Forest Service, the US Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Park Service, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the US Department of Defense, the US Army Corps of Engineers, the US Bureau of Reclamation or the Tennessee Valley Authority. This map details the percentage of state territory owned by the federal government.

The top 10 list of states with the highest percentage of federally owned land looks like this:

1. Nevada 84.5%
2. Alaska 69.1%
3. Utah 57.4%
4. Oregon 53.1%
5. Idaho 50.2%
6. Arizona 48.1%
7. California 45.3%
8. Wyoming 42.3%
9. New Mexico 41.8%
10. Colorado 36.6%

Notable is that all these states are in the West (except Alaska, which strictly speaking is also a western state, albeit northwestern). Also notable is the contrast between the highest and the lowest percentages of federal land ownership. The US government owns a whopping 84.5% of Nevada, but only a puny 0.4% of Rhode Island and Connecticut. The lowest-percentage states are mainly in the East, but some are also in the Midwest and in the South:

1. Connecticut 0.4%
2. Rhode Island 0.4%
3. Iowa 0.8%
4. New York 0.8%
5. Maine 1.1%
6. Kansas 1.2%
7. Nebraska 1.4%
8. Alabama 1.6%
9. Ohio 1.7%
10. Illinois 1.8%

Even the 10^th place is still below the two percent mark.

Where's that right to private property when you need it, if the government can now exercise fiscal controls to get you out of your house WITHOUT having to go through eminent domain payments?

h/t StrangeMaps

The Bullwinkle Stops Here

The Dennis Miller show was discussing Palin's acceptance speech. Miller asked a middle aged female caller "Are the Democrats scared?" She replied "They woke up with a moose head in their bed this morning!"

Abstinence Education and Its Consequences

Some low-lifes have taken a couple of punches at Sarah Palin's position on abstinence based sex-ed because of what happened to her daughter, Bristol.

Well let me show you what choice we're really making.


So much for HOPE overcoming all things.

I'll take a woman living up to her principles, even when it isn't expedient, to a bloviating pro-abort ANYDAY!

Who Ya Gonna Call?

Does your denomination require its ministers to affirm the doctrine of the Trinity?

What difference does it make?

In a series of blog posts, I'd like to consider what is at stake when we discard orthodox theology. I hope my readers will join me in this effort to "put wheels on" our proclamation.

And Now for some good news

Help a wounded vet today!

Forty-five years later

"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."

-- The Rev'd Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
August 28, 1963

Ask your local Obama supporters what they know of the content of his character. Ask them if their presidential candidate believes that little children have a right to life. (Obama opposes every sensible restriction on abortion/infanticide - protections that are granted the preborn in the most liberal of European democracies!)

Live the dream of looking beyond skin color - either to assume guilt or to be absolved of guilt. And recognize that all who are created in God's image - male and female, black and white and brown and red, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, preborn and postborn, intellectually gifted or developmentally retarded - ALL WHO BEAR GOD'S IMAGE have a fundamental right to life. And no government on earth can condone the taking of that life without due process for God's laws writ large in nature.

In the word's of Dr. King, "Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children."

Putting the MESS in Messiah

Would somebody please sic the Americans United for Separation of Church and State on these guys?

Oh wait...they're only concerned if someone believes that Jesus is the Messiah.

If You Thought They Messed Up the Olympics

This little gem is from the English (Engrish?) subtitles on a Chinese-made hack of Star Wars Ep III.
Believe it or not, Anakin Skywalker would be an improvement over some of the folks I know that got "made" [ministers] by the Presbyterian Church.

Indecision 2008

I'm having trouble.



I'm not sure if this gets tagged under politics, humor, or zombies....

Was Spong Wrong?

For some reason, people are still reading John Shelby Spong. His recent article in the Washington Post is titled "Good Show, Poor Theology."

When I first read the title, I thought: "He must be talking about a rather up-the-candlestick Anglo-Catholic parish in TEC." You know the kind. Appareled amices and albs on every server. Chanted Psalms, sung gospels, and solemnities abounding. A priest that enters in cassock, surplice, hood, tippet, cope, zuchetto and biretta, then changes during the anthem into alb, amice, crossed stole, silk cincture, and chasuble. Lot's of bells, smells, bowing and wowing - but the sermon is about the latest episode of 60 Minutes or the View.

No such luck. Instead, Mr. Spong was talking about Dr. Rick Warren's forum for Obama and McCain. He went on to say this:

Homosexuality is no more a choice for gay and lesbian people than heterosexuality is a choice for straight people. It takes a while for that knowledge to trickle down to the masses. Prejudice lives only in the untrickled down gaps. The condemnation of homosexuality as a sin or as a distortion by the hierarchy of the Vatican or the leaders of evangelical Christianity is simply a sign that both groups live in the backwaters of knowledge and education. As this knowledge spreads, those groups will look like what they are - dated people similar to the members of the Flat Earth Society.

Tell you what, Spong... I'll publicly acknowledge that "homosexuality is no more a choice for gay and lesbian people than heterosexuality is a choice for straight people" if you'll publicly acknowledge that there might be a reason other ignorant prejudice for resistance to homosexual acts.

My Brother's Keeper?

Obama has been spending plenty of time finger-pointing and telling Americans that we're not living up to the Bible's social ethic - that we just pull it out when it's convenient, then tuck it away. His stab at Saddleback Church showed how out-of-touch he is with most people whose behavior reflects a high degree of Christian devotion.

But little shows his own grasp of the faith "with its boots on" than his rhetoric being held up to his own action. For instance, he chides America for its wealth, though he is raking in MILLIONS each year in book sales. I don't begrudge him his cash, but I'd appreciate if he would practice giving away more than 1% of it before he asks me to give him another 10-15% of my income.

Secondly, if you want to talk about personal ethics, just consider the case of George Obama. What... haven't heard of him yet? Just hearing more and more about McCain having seven or eight houses (even though several of them are investment properties owned / managed by his wife's estate)?

George is Obama's little brother. He lives on $1 / mo, eking out an existence in a violent urban ghetto outside of Nairobi, Kenya. Now when I was a little kid, we sent $18/mo to a child in Haiti and $22 /mo to a child in Niger. That money came from the meager support my father paid...but we felt we had plenty compared to the rest of the world. It provided food, clothing, medicine, and education so that the children could pull themselves (and hopefully their family) out of crushing poverty. I don't know what happened to them because we lost touch after middle school. But I do know that for a while, our meager American funds were able to make them rich.

Nairobi is one of the least expensive cities on earth. It would cost very little for Obama to send cash to his half brother - who has ambitions of higher education - and it would dramatically improve George's life. So why aren't we hearing about this as an example of Christian virtue?

1 Timothy 5:8 might have something to do with that.

Before Obama opens his mouth again about McCain's money (which is mostly his heiress wife's) or American avariciousness, he needs to look to another one of those conveniently ignored passages from the Sermon on the Mount.

When Believers Don't Believe

I'm increasingly troubled by the unbelief encountered every day in the church.

Yeah... there's the lib'rals that don't believe the stuff that the Church has always believed (on the authority of the Scriptures). That's dangerous.

But equally dangerous are those who do believe all those things, and for whom it does not make a difference. I-Monk's recent jab gets at the heart of this problem.

One of the good things about having a systematic exposition of the Scriptures (at least a lectionary) is that you are held accountable for public reading and preaching on the breadth of biblical teaching. That's also what I love about systematic theology.

Each of us - right, left, up, down, and centrist-as-all-get-out have a tendency to narrow our field of vision. We need the latitude of our normative patterns (Scripture and Sacred Science) to even out our peculiarities.

Lord, I believe. Help Thou my unbelief.

Archaeological Affirmations

Since turnabout is fair play, here's an interesting archaeological tidbit.

It seems the seal of one of the enemies of Jeremiah has been unearthed. The Paleo-Hebrew script reads Gedalyahu ben Pashur, who served as minister to King Zedekiah (597-586 BC).

Gedaliah (as we know him in the English transliteration) petitioned King Zedekiah to shut Jeremiah up. They won their case and threw the prophet into a cistern.

What's the takeaway?

1) Just because you occupy a place of influence with people who have power does not mean you are with people who have authority. Zedekiah and his advisors had all kinds of power...but because they refused to listen to the one man who had God's authority to speak, we hold them in no esteem. Indeed, we'd scarcely know or care about them except that they have a part to play in the life of the man who spoke with authority - the man who spoke God's words.

2) If you want to be part of a faith tradition that makes a real difference in the world, make sure your faith tradition has actually interacted with the world. All kinds of New Agers and non-realists in religion insist that faith is an entirely subjective experience. The only "objective" element is what happens when you act like a better person or some such.

Well, while I can't disagree that changing us changes the world, I would say that it's difficult to see the difference between that sort of religion and a philosophy of life.

There is a God...someone out there, who also chooses to make a dwelling place with humankind. If you know that you can't make it on your own, then you just might need something more than your own inner reserves. And if you're going to trust in that something, you'd better make sure that something can act.

Christianity affirms that God acts in history, pointing to the incarnation of Jesus Christ as proof that God does indeed choose to be with us and for us, rather than against us or apathetic towards us. And we have the Scriptures which detail how God has stepped into historical events and changed their course or guided the people.

If your faith can't make that claim and have it backed up by rational evidence, may I have the privilege of pointing you from the shifting sands of life to a faith built on bedrock? A faith that consists of loving relationship with the Rock himself?

Like R.E.M. said

Everybody hurts....sometimes.

Zombies and Hockey

Yet another surprisingly [ahem] tasty mix. PUCKer up!


If this doesn't make sense to you, Monroeville Mall is the site of George Romero's 1978 classic Dawn of the Dead.

You can buy'em on hockey jerseys here.

Putting the Red In Blue State

It looks like Obama's chickens are coming home to roost.

Obama's campaign finally admits that his mentor Frank (referred to in Dreams From My Father) is none other than Communist Party member Frank Marshall Davis.

Thanks, comrade!