Josh, you are making me see the light! Truly I wouldn’t have been able to see the obvious without you pointing it out for I am just a foolish Canadian. Of course, I see it now: Our system is only possible because of the strictly capitalist system that exists in the US. Your cut-throat system affords us our compassionate one. America is good, good, good! Thanks for your apostolate in pointing this out to us.

And thank you, USA, for your superior ways. We are so glad you’re there. What would our lives be without your perfect way? We are unworthy to even gather the crumbs at your table but in your munificence you allow us to do so. Thank you! Again and again we are reminded of your superior might and wisdom, and we rejoice. Thank you, thank you so much, for your willingness to allow little grandmothers to be turned out of care facilities so as to make room for more profitable patients so that more research and technology might be funded. We know it’s all to our good and for this we are grateful. We repent of our ingratitude and we prostrate ourselves towards the south from whence our help and only hope comes. Thank you, thank you, thank you! Amen.

Re: Wifi: Michael’s got like, 5 machines using that wifi router at home, so it seems like a chore to have to lock in all of the MAC addys. I think a 128 bit WEP key would be sufficient.

Sorta ironic, really. The hacker in me wants to give the kid some props for getting access any which way he can, but, of course, unsupervised ‘net access in a place like OBI could be bad bad bad.

I do get a thrill out of bringing my Nintendo DS to strange places and looking for open networks. Nothing like playing networked Mario Kart on somebody else’s bandwith to make ya feel like a real pirate. Ahhhr.

Michael: Follow Ryan’s advice…. For an extra measure of security I will also only allow my MAC address to the wireless your using.

Michael: What you basically want to do is to set up encryption on your network. Exactly how you do that depends a bit on the particular wireless router you have, but the basic process is to go to your router’s admin page (for mine, you go to 192.168.0.1 or 192.168.2.1 or something like that with a web browser), and then log in, and then look around for options that look like “Security” or “WEP” or “WPA” or “Encryption”. You should be able to specify a passkey (be sure to write it down or remember it!); any computer wanting to use your wireless network will then have to enter that secret key.

Rachel- I do not know if read my comment while you were gone but it was a pleasure to meet your daughter. You must be really proud of her.
What was her impression of New Orleans?

Can someone tell me the simplest way to keep someone from stealing my wireless? Apparently some kid in the dorm with a hot computer is able to get my wireless signal.

Josh, ‘my technology is better than your technololgy’ is only one aspect of medical care. In the US we have major issues with the delivery and management of medical care. Canada saw ‘access’ as the major problem and chose socialization as the route of correction…which has both negative and positive consequences. Capitalism as the driving force behind medical delivery has it’s negatives and positives as well.

Equity is elusive in medical care; I’ve watched a person with Rocky Mountain HMO pay $500/day for chemical dependency treatment while sitting next to a person with no insurance paying $1,000/day for the same thing. Off to their right is a person on Medicaid paying $170/day.

Now that’s capitalism! (jn)

I haven’t posted in a while, but thought I’d pop back in and say “hello.”

Paul Owen posted a pretty provocative post over at Communio Sanctorum on the errors of “popular Calvinism.” It’s bound to get him in lots and lots of trouble.

I was gone last week on a short-term mission trip to Honduras. I know there have been a few conversations on here about these kinds of trips, though I’ve not followed them very closely. I can imagine what the criticisms might be, and I’ve often shared in voicing these criticisms: that no real missions are happening, that they’re motivated by “white guilt,” that they’re just basically sight-seeing trips, etc. I don’t deny that there are those who do these things for those reasons, but I would like to say, on the positive side, that I have been to Honduras now for three years in a row and I am awed by what God does in these trips. We take doctors, dentists, an optical team, a construction crew, and a few preachers. Just last week, for intance, we went to a pretty poor village, put a roof on Baptist church, pulled over 700 bad teeth, gave out thousands of de-worming pills, preached numerous sermons, handed out rice and beans and clothes to the poorer villagers, identified a few very serious medical situations and paid to have them taken to Tegucigalpa and treated in the hospital, delivered blankets to some folks who had none, and tried to encourage the believers in this village.

I am NOT saying this boastfully, believe me. Let me assure you that, now more than ever, I am ashamed of my own weak witness for Christ, especially when it is compared to the bold commitment of the pastors in this village. I simply highlight this to say that there is and can be a great deal of good done on these trips, if they’re done right. I’m glad I went.

Mike Birch…check your email. If you want to go to the BHT 3d with me Sunday, write me back.

Just thought I would tell everyone I am back. Mom is doing fine. I am bogged down getting the tax stuff ready and mostly going to only be reading for a few days.

Passionate prose is a real revelation – World – Times Online B16 is surprising the journalists who expected a Rottweiler encyclical.

Annie: You guys better come to the central coast and visit me. Let me know when your due to arrive and I’ll brew a special batch for you guys! Maybe we can get out and do some crabbin’.... Crab and homebrew…. now that’s awesome!

Kurt: Yes I do bottle. I really don’t have anywhere good to put a keg…. plus unless you buy all the Co2 equipment, you have to drink the whole keg before it goes bad. Bottles work great for me.

Here’s a 5pm pst. photo of the beer I started last night fermenting in the carboys! Now that’s a high krausen!

(P)eople are not turned away or turned out of Canadian hospitals because they can’t pay or can no longer pay. It doesn’t happen.

They’re just shunted onto a waiting list like everybody else. The overall effect is the same with either system.

I like Mark Buchanan, and I am looking forward to his new book, The Rest of God. His other books have been a pleasure to read. I like it when I have almost no idea what theological perspective a person is coming from.

Eugene Peterson’s Eat This Book is also going to be a treat.

I’m starting to work on our Spring Spiritual Emphasis Week. I want to invite all the BHT Lurker/Fellow family to come down during April 9-12. Steve McCoy (yes…that one) is going to be preaching. I’ve mainly invited him to get him to teach a seminar on how to marry a babe, and another one on theological photography. Matthew Smith from Indelible Grace is doing two days of music. (He’s blogging here.) (RUF people gotta come hear Matthew!) Various OBI worship teams/leaders and Creative Ministries folks will be contributing as well. I think it’s going to a very cool week. I may do some emerging stuff just because I can ;-) Come over and help us.

And finally….you know how people think the Imonk is sometimes a bit too…..too….crude and rantilicious? Well…read Mark Driscoll’s reply to Brian Mclaren’s now infamous “homosexuality” post. But put down your drink first. This is raucous, rude and inyoface.

Every so often, the Spencers just get tickled at something that strikes us funny. This month, we’ve derived endless hoots and laughing spells from a little game called “Gifts With A Subtle Message.”

The idea here is that some gifts have an implied message behind them that may be somewhat….uh…..brutal.

So…what is the message when someone says…

“I was just out shopping today, saw this case of Extra Strength Certs, and immediately thought of you.”

“It’s just a few little personal things to let you know we appreciate you: Toothpaste. Soap. Deodorant.”

“Pastor, your twenty years here have been great. We want to give you this special designed set of luggage to say just how we feel.”

“Everyone at the office pitched in and picked out some things for you to use at your new job: Hair removal cream. Nasal/Ear hair trimmer. Q-Tips.”

This is what happens when you are around Jr. High kids too much.

Dennis – The crawfords are counting on tasting one of these boasted homebrews in june. :-) We will be staying a few days on the coast just north of cheese-land.

Dennis: Do you actually bottle your brews, or just go the keg route? And where in your house do you do the actual fermenting?

Kurt: After an initial investment of about $120…. I can extract brew for about $0.35 a bottle. All grain is about $0.23 a bottle and more equipment is needed.

Phillip: I am sorry the homebrews you have tasted have been sub-par. I promise you, if a homebrew is made right, you will have a hard time drinking from any other well.

I have been reading Meyer’s blog for a few weeks now, and I am impressed with the tone and thoughtfulness with which he addresses issues.

I found his posts on the FV debate within the PCA to be full of persepctive and care. They are worth reading and give a good overview.

Here is a taste:

Doing theology by slogans and labels is a violation of biblical wisdom. James warns that we are to be “quick to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger” (1:19). Jumping to conclusions about someone because of who they have read or what topics in theology they are interested in is irresponsible. This is the lazy man’s way of judging a another’s theological integrity. . . .

The doctrinal development issue looms large over this whole controversy. Those who are most critical of the FV/AAPC men seem to have put the Reformed tradition in the deep freezer. They will tolerate no further light to break forth from God’s Word. Everything has already been discovered. But such a stance can easily slip into a subtle form of idolatry and sometimes looks worse than Rome, which at least admits the tradition is “living” and therefore “growing.”

He was part of the Missouri Presbetry report which came out Jan. 17th.

If there are many more men like Meyers (and Joel ;-) in the PCA, maybe it won’t split again.

Phillip, BHT is a wonderful place for people that can tolerate parallel processes with multiple convergences. We are a wide, deep river that meanders over a broad, verdant valley. Sometimes one must keep paddling without seeing the destination; sometimes even setting a course to a reciprocal bearing in order to arrive at one’s intended destination.

IOW, one needs a high tolerance for BS to put up with us and not everyone is so gifted.

Kent: On that Tinklings post, I see Mrs. De has cracked the code in comment #24. Now what are we gonna do; people know! Michael threatened to give it away a couple of days ago, but I hoped most people missed it. De spells it all out. The horror!

Anway: I’m on a posting tear, I know. This will be my last for the day, I suspect!

One of my brothers was talking to me a few days ago about our favorite countries, and it came up that both of us have the same favorite country. Unsurprising, right? But it’s not the good old US of A! In fact, I freely admit that part of what drew me to the Anglican church is that I’m an Anglophile. I love England, the US, Australia, and Canada, probably in that order. If I have to separate out Ireland and Scotland, they’d come pretty high on that list, too. New Zealand is last. Just because.

So sure, the US kicks butt in terms of research (or has historically, anyway), but the English invented the entire English language*, which is surely a point in their favour, eh?


* And yeah, I know it’s not that simple. It’s funnier than going into how it’s a Germanic language descended from Old Saxon and so on.

Phillip: Homebaking may be cheaper, but I don’t think it is ever faster. Also, I wonder if, after you’ve made the initial investments, homebrewing might be cheaper. Perhaps our brewers can weigh in on the cost per bottle. Having 10 gallons of a good brown ale on tap is probably a pretty good feeling.

Regarding that new blog quartet…I dunno, I feel a lot of apprehension. I’m pretty annoyed at Duncan’s handling of the whole FV report thing. He needs to admit that they did people like Mark Horne wrong. As for Mohler, his opinions make me feel like I’m listening to some Independent Baptist preacher talking about booze, gamblin’ and swearin’.

Mahaney and Dever seem pretty cool, though.

Does everybody but me already know that CJ Mahaney, Mark Dever, Al Mohler, and Ligon Duncan are blogging together? I might actually start to read stuff by Mohler again as a result of this!

Joel: Kurt brings up the bakery analogy, but here’s the thing: In all but the rarest of circumstances, it is both cheaper and faster to bake a batch of cookies than to buy one. Plus, they put a lot of nasty chemicals in store-bought cookies.

I don’t drink Butt-weiser or whatever nasty crap it is people who don’t actually like beer drink. I drink the good stuff, and I doubt I can produce 72 ounces of really good-tasting beer for $7 with homebrewing, or that I can produce it in time for dinner tomorrow. The few times I’ve tasted home-brewed beer (or wine, for that matter), I haven’t been impressed. There have always been excuses, but the good folks at New Belgium don’t make excuses.

for a small country I don’t think our record in medical research is anything to be ashamed of.

Or your Navy. I happen to think your tugboat and canoes are precious :-)

Gee, Josh, don’t get your knickers all in a knot there, buddy (JN). I grant your point about the excellence of US medical research et al. Your response has nothing to do with the lone point I was making, which is that people are not turned away or turned out of Canadian hospitals because they can’t pay or can no longer pay. It doesn’t happen.

BTW (but that’s not my point) – for a small country I don’t think our record in medical research is anything to be ashamed of.

Check out this very cool video on great cathedrals from noted poet and photographer Patrick Poole. I’ve also seen the video he talks about, (but doesn’t post), on the National Cathedral, and it is even better. Enjoy.

Kent, I’m not giving up on Michael just yet. This IMB goofiness might propel him straight into our paedobaptistic covenantal arms (we have lots of credo members, Brother iMonk). But we’ve got to intercept him or else it’s another convert to Shinto.

Michael converted to Lutheranism…Josh wins, I resign.

(Paraphrasing Donald Miller from Blue Like Jazz.)

Great conversation about art over at Thinklings, especially ‘cause it’s all about me.

Sometimes my humility overwhelms me.

Of Note: Joel is just as complex there as he is here. Michael is less of a curmudgeon ‘cause he’s in someone else’s ‘house’. Their commentors are nicer than our commentors (were).

PWinn: Joel has a point there. I mean, lotsa bakeries around you, but that doesn’t stop Herself. And I think you’re glad for that.

I’d love to try homebrewing, but I haven’t got the tools, the time or the talent (not to mention the space). Also, when it starts warming up, I’d have a hard time finding a place with the right temperature to keep the brew.

Ben Witherington: The Age of Impatience and the Lust for Certainity

Bill, I can personally vouch that O’Neill’s has mass quantities of malt vinegar. And I agree with you about the proper consumption of fish and chips.

Scott, heartbreaking; praying.

Richard, please feel free to preach the gospel of socialized medicine any time. I got your back, eh?

Phillip, yes, you can, you know, buy the stuff. But you miss out on the glorious sensuous feast that is homebrewing. To be sure, the aroma of wert cooking and sugars being liberated from proteins is not everyone’s idea of an ambrosial hint of heavenly splendor. The Valarian wizardry at work when yeast get to chomping on the sweeties in that ambery, coppery broth is not everyone’s idea of natural portents of Transfiguration and “Behold, I tell you a mystery…we shall not all sleep….” Settling for, you know, buying the stuff over homebrewing is kind of like hanging a still-life painting of roses (it’s still good, man!) in lieu of the perfumed glory of a spray of dozens of the real thing in the middle of your breakfast table.

Mark, I weep with you, brother. There are starter kits available, but my advice is to get one with a glass carboy rather than the plastic ones. I never made a good batch in my plastic one. The learning curve is not steep. It’s kind of a meandering, wobbly, “hey, I wonder what this would taste like?” learning curve. You know, it’s just homebrewing. The science is fascinating. The chemistry is cool. The equipment is really just a toy set. Best news is that all your supplies are available online these days. Last bit of advice: see if you can hook up with a local homebrew club. St. Louis environs, right? They’ve got to have one in every neighborhood. :-)

Scott writes: “Now, the rehab center is kicking her out because she’s out of Medicare days.” Say what you will about the Canadian system (and there’s a lot that needs to be said) this is the sort of thing that just doesn’t happen up here. Thank you, Rev. Tommy Douglas (Jack Bauer’s grandpa!). And prayers for your grandmother, Scott.

I’d be a lot more interested in home-brewing if there weren’t, you know, stores that sell the stuff within a mile of my house.

Friends don’t let friends drink pale tasteless-pee-colored-mass-produced-city-beer!

_{~Back to our regularly scheduled mocking and pontificating}~

I must be losing my edge. Instead of an inbox full of hate mail from fundamentalists pronouncing fatwahs against me, I actually received thoughtful, well-written challenges from Bill over at Thinklings. He’s bothered by my labeling resistance to Miller “sin,” and on reflection he has a good point. I’ve overstated my case considerably, especially in passing judgment on motives, and in casting too broad a net. I know something of the motives of the people I had in mind when I wrote the post, and I firmly believe what I posted applies to them, but it’s another thing entirely to generalize from that to say that anyone who dislikes Blue Like Jazz is sinning.

Not every reader is ready – or is ever ready, or even ever needs – to receive what’s being said in book like Milller’s. I should have left room for those who honestly are put off my his style.

Here are some excerpts from the initial remarks I made in the class I’m teaching, during the first session:

Everyone needs to feel free to move around. If the group you’re in isn’t working for you, please move to a different group.

Miller’s book will serve as a starting point for the weekly discussion. We encourage everyone to read it, but we also want you to understand that not reading it shouldn’t keep you away. Your input, perspectives and yes, even your criticism of the book, the discussion or the presentation here in class are all welcome.

Miller’s personal style is unique, and it shows in his writing. At some point, it’s likely that you will encounter something that will offend you. For some of you, that happened on the third page of the book.

I’m not entirely as wacked out about all of this as I sounded in my post. I should have tempered my remarks. My apologies to anyone offended by them.

The menu at O’Neill’s looks pretty good but it’s not fish and chips without malt vinegar.

Attention all Lexington area BHTers: The time is now. The place is here. (Just a block or two inside circle 4 on Richmond Rd.)

6 pm at O’Neills on Sunday the 29th. Noel, Ryan, Josh, leif/eric, Matthew, Joel, Mike Birch, Me and my entourage: all are invited.

I’m bringing my camera. I wan to see what the new whupped, owned and emergent Josh looks like.

A hands-on look at the new MacBook Pro – Computerworld

Michael: your prayers are heard and joined in. May I suggest a potential hobby for you? The wife and I, in an effort to exercise more and make use of some of the camera equipment we’ve blown cash on over the past year, have taken up waterfall hunting. I know there’s not a lot in Kentucky, but that’s why God made Tennessee and West Virginia. It’s great exercise and you end up seeing some of the most beautiful country God made. I will tell you – though I may be a bit biased – that North Carolina has more waterfalls than any state east of the Mississippi, and many of them are, IMO, beyond gorgeous.

My Own Prayer Request: As you guys may or may not remember, my grandmother has been in a constant state of a downward spiral, healthwise – one of the many reasons for my light posting over the past year. Her health and mental faculties continue to go downhill, and recently, while being “cared” for at a local rehab center… the nurses neglected A) to keep her broken arm in a cast – the original reason for her admittance; B) to feed her regularly; and C) to keep a buzzer on her. Add all of these up, and she ended up falling at the rest home about a month ago. She had surgery to repair 2 fractured vertebrae and went back to the same rehab center.

Now, the rehab center is kicking her out because she’s out of Medicare days. The woman can’t get up by herself. She can’t go to the bathroom by herself. My mother, who cares for her because her own brother refuses to, even though he has more room and a wife who stays at home 24 hours a day, is already on the strongest dose of antidepressants and anti-panic medicines she can take. To top it off, there’s not much that I can do other than listen and occasionally visit (something mom’s brother refuses to do).

Prayers about the entire situation would be greatly appreciated.

Don’t give two pints of blood on Wednesday and try to play 3 intense games of racquetball on Friday.

Lightheadedness, seeing spots..

Just so you know….

I had to stop the third game in the middle and get a drink just so I could finish the game.

The first bank robbery in the history of Fergus Falls took place on Tuesday morning. Somehow it was fitting that we were in the midst of near-whiteout conditions, bad enough that there was a four-semi/two-car pileup on the interstate.

The FBI and Local law enforcement are right on it, but somehow things in real life aren’t like they are on TV.

In other news…our local Lutheran High School reports that 41% of their student body made the honor roll.

Need proof that the lottery is of the debil? Just look at the amount of the cash option on this week’s Powerball jackpot. Need I say more?

Mark: THe learning curve for brewing isn’t really that big…. its fun and makes a GREAT hobby!

Speed up Firefox.

Joel and Dennis: Now I am jealous. I want to get into home brewing, but I am not going to have the time or mental capacity for a while to get into a new hobby with a big learning curve. Is there any easy way to get started so I can at least get my feet wet?

The other really frustrating thing is that I can’t find a decent liquor store in North County. They’re all the convenience store/buy something cheap to get drunk type stores. The best place I’ve found is the grocery stores, and they’re still pretty limited. I got spoiled in Minneapolis.

Joel: You’re a fine lad!

The extracts made today are so excellent, its really hard for me to justify going back to all grain. All grain brewing is way cheaper (about 20-25 cents a bottle, extracts about 35-40 cents a bottle), but way more work… So I have been using quality extracts and buying white labs yeasts. If you want to save money on yeast just take some from the bottom of your batch and place it in a sterylized beer bottle, cap it, label it and put it in the back of the fridge. There are so many different kinds of yeast its hard to store them all.

I am brewing 10 gallon batches in a stainless pot for the wart, then fermenting in 2 – 5gal carboys. I always use secondary fermenters. Its makes the quality of the beer outstanding. I often dry hop in the second fermenter.

I would love to trade recipes. I tend to like the deep porters, stouts and robust ales. I made a Brown Ale 3 weeks ago that is so dang good… It’ll curl your toes.

*****Back to our regularly scheduled menagerie and those hyper-calvanists squawking about crap no one cares about. (JN)*****

Purgatorio has a helpful definition of Seeker Sensitive:

Seeker Sensitive:
1. (adj) The idea that you can make the unchurched comfortable in church by removing things from the church that make the unchurched uncomfortable… which, strangely, also tend to be the things that make church a church.
2 . (adj) See bait-and-switch
3. (noun) Goat food

Dennis, you wrote: 10 Gallons of deep dark Irish stout in the fermenter… Finished my sermon for Sunday….

First, let me just state the obvious: that is SO right on so many levels.

Next, shop talk. OK, have a homebrew. Good. Now, do you have a primary fermenter that is 10-gal? Or do you use two 5-gal? I do the 5-gal glass water cooler thing and have had no bad batches for years now.

Also, do you mash? I haven’t gone to the grains yet since I’ve liked almost every batch I’ve made from extracts. Same heavenly smell permeating the house, less work. Although that means less time for a homebrew, which is a minus. If you mash, could you briefly describe your rig?

My sincere apologies to you non-imbibers for occupying this corner of the, ahem, bar with stumbly-type obstacles. Homebrewers can be a bit gung-ho with their hobby, but in a laid-back kind of way, no?

6PM PST: 10 Gallons of deep dark Irish stout in the fermenter…... the new MDC podcast is out “Put Your Bullet in Your Pocket”...... Finished my sermon for Sunday…. All-in-all, a pretty productive day I’d say.

Nicholas Perrin has a review of Guy Waters’ Justification and the New Perspectives on Paul in the most recent edition of the Wesminster Theological Journal.

For those who may not know, Waters was one of the main contributors to the “Mississippi Valley Presbytery” report. It was that presbytery that has raised the biggest stink about the NPP.

Perrin writes:

It should be said, in all fairness to the scholars under scrutiny, that it was never their intention to conform their reading of Paul to the details of the Westminster Confession. Of course, one would expect the point to be so obvious that it would hardly need stating. Nevertheless, we have in Justification and the New Perspectives an author who seems to be demanding a methodology from his opponents they would never be interested in using, demanding answers to questions they are not interested in asking, and demanding language they simply do not speak.

and

“Here attention to nuance and cogent logic must be the order of the day. Unfortunately, Mr. Waters has produced a book that is neither dispassionate nor charitable, neither attentive to nuance nor cogent in its logic.”

HT: The Craw

Prayer Request Thingee.

First, continue praying for some very practical needs in our family. God’s timing is perfect, but I don’t appear to have a printed schedule. He’s cutting things a little close :-)

Second….I have to make a decision about what I am going to do this summer. My record has been like this: When I teach, I make money, I stay busy, I work hard and preach hard. When I don’t teach, I am lazy, I do stupid stuff, I am a waste of air.

I really feel that the Lord wants me to do something this summer for myself. My health needs attention. I wish I lived somewhere that I could join a gym or otherwise do something health-wise, but I don’t. I’d like to travel and visit some churches. Some EC. Some reformed and Baptist. I’d like to go to a conference. I’d like to do Meinrad. I really don’t know.  Mom’s presence here is a limiting factor. Clay may need some transportation assistance from me. If I don’t work, I won’t have a lot of extra cash. All factors. But I really feel that God is nudging me to take care of myself for a few weeks in some ways I haven’t.

I have to tell the school if I am going to teach very soon, so pray I take the right step and follow through.

I’m flying into Louisville on Saturday with a fairly long layover in St. Louis. I’m thinking of travelling “Chinese”.

For the KY Meat Space crew, I have down 6pm at O’Neills on Sunday the 29th. I got tickets to the Arkansas-Kentucky game before that :-) so Woo! Pig! Sooie! (We’ll lose even though UK sucks this year).

Couple of good posts from a blog Matthew Henry John Bartlett:

First: A summary of John Howard Yoder’s critique of a middle class Jesus.

Second: A follow up post surveying the teaching and example of Jesus in Luke. This is a good example of what you can do in Bible study to really get people’s minds moving in the direction of what Jesus is saying in all that he does. Picking apart verses is not always the way to get the meaning.

I am glad to see some homeschooling mom’s take a stand against legalism and show some Christ-like sanity on the “spear” movie issue. I dont advise reading the comments though.

The SAHM bloggers need to keep challenging the stereotype of TR/legalist fan club.

NEW ORLEANS — Pastor and author Rick Warren has signed a deal to purchase the New Orleans Saints football franchise for $320 million from current owner Tom Benson, and has pledged to pour his time and energy into helping the city and team rebuild.

“This is the start of the Saints’ turnaround,” a Warren spokesman said. “America is going to see what a purpose-driven team can accomplish.”

Via LarkNews

iMonk wrote: “I will say we only had the finest, high grade idiots in our comments.”

I don’t know. The rankest I’ve seen are over at WorldMag blog. I’m really disappointed that World hasn’t shut down those comments: or at least made you register with a valid Email address. I find many of the comments out there quite damaging to the name of Christ.

HPR | Reading Genesis with Cardinal Ratzinger A defense of Ratzinger’s non-literal approach to Genesis. There are some real gems in here. I mean, things that I simply live by and live for. The “Third Principle,” the unity of the scriptures in Christ, is just beautifully put. I highly recommend the article. The RCC has good stuff on interpreting Genesis. Ken Hamm is not in sight.

Why should the Sacred Scriptures be treated as a unity? What is the source of this unity? In response, Cardinal Ratzinger provides his third and final criterion for interpreting the sacred text: We are to read the Sacred Scriptures with Him in whom all things have been fulfilled and in whom all of its validity and truth are revealed. It is Christ who unifies the Bible. The entire Bible is about him.

Thus, Genesis has to be read in the context of its fulfillment in Christ. Therefore, the Holy Father asserts that the first creation account cannot be read without reference to the conclusive and normative scriptural account of creation which begins: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made (John 1:1;3, Revised Standard Version). For Cardinal Ratzinger, it is Christ who sanctions readings of the sacred text that move beyond a strict literalist reading because it is Christ who wishes to communicate profound theological truths that penetrate the human heart and soul. Christ frees us from the slavery of the letter, and precisely thus does he give back to us, renewed, the truth of the images.

Still reading the Pope’s encyclical, but stopped when I read this:

Corresponding to the image of a monotheistic God is monogamous marriage. Marriage based on exclusive and definitive love becomes the icon of the relationship between God and his people and vice versa. God’s way of loving becomes the measure of human love. This close connection between eros and marriage in the Bible has practically no equivalent in extra-biblical literature.(para. 11)

I have done a few of her studies and they have been helpful in my spiritual life. However, the last study I started, Believing God, which MR is reviewing, I just couldn’t get past week 2. Frankly, it just felt like alot of work. Disston is right when she says “Although she wants to be theological and Christ-centered, too much of Moore’s material is about her take on her experience with God.” Moore has “plucky” overcoming faith, you should too.

I have found this to be true with several women’s study series I have done. For example, the Motherwise studies. These and Moore’s were great as they began – excited to share the basics of the gospel in the lives of women they feel called to minister to. But when the authors keep going and feel pressure to create something really unique and more marketable, they seem to begin to construct theology off their own experience and the sensibilities of their niche market; then things start to get ugly.

Michael – enjoying your sermon series.

That CT essay is an excellent critique of Warren’s PEACE plan. I’m just stunned at the naivete of intelligent and informed people like Warren who seem to really believe that with strategies reducible to slogans like “Teach a man to fish…blahblahblah” one can effect systemic change in a nation or an entire continent. It’s like hearing an incarnated Eugene Henderson set loose upon the world. As we like to say in the South (sincerely), “Bless his heart.”

Politically Driven Injustice – Christianity Today Magazine Rick Warren can’t fix Rawanda.

Good day for lurker quotes. Luker John sends along this paragraph from a review in JETS that sounded like some of our thoughts on the TRs:

As I read this work I felt sad. Here is a man who has read a lot of literature and can accurately present parts of the positions of various authors. But he does not appear to have deeply grasped most of the positions of those he attacks. Instead, anything he is against, from reformed eschatology to open theology, from gospel criticism to the NIV, is all lumped into one great hermeneutical failure based on the false idea of preunderstanding, without any awareness of the preunderstanding he himself demonstrates (and which his reformed colleagues would quickly point out). Would that the world were so simple, but then from the perspective of Milton Terry, perhaps it looks that way.
>From Peter H. Davids review of Evangelical Hermeneutics: The New Versus the Old. By Robert L. Thomas.

I have found Celebrating Common Prayer to be very helpful. My personal prayer life still needs a lot of work, but I am doing it more than I used to.

Philip: I appreciated your point about the 39 Articles being acceptable to Arminians or Calvinist. I read the Baptist Faith and Message the same way. At our church, I would say the leadership tends toward the “low-Calvinist” approach, with some 5-pointers. That kind of diversity within the Baptist framework was one thing that appealed to me as we were church hunting.

Longtime BHT Lurker Matt:

I actually LIKE the fact that BHT has no comments. You guys do great with what you have, and you have enough differing opinions (in MY opinion) to make things interesting. You always wind up with idiots in comment sections, to whom you nevertheless feel compelled to respond. Then there’s the whole issue of moderating them, requiring
registration… not worth the hassle. As for it being “unreadable”... are they talking about the layout? As in, bottom to top? My solution: Find where you left off, click to the extended entry, then click the right arrows as you go through the posts. Much easier. Matt

Catholic Insider has moved. This is the best podcast out there. A lot to learn from Fr. Roderick if you are interesting in the RCC and/or podcasting.

Dennis: The BHT had comments for 6 months of our almost 4 year history. Let’s say that it was not a good moment. We made many good friends, but the obedient hordes of TR orcs associated with one apologist-cruise promoter overran the bar and forced closure of comments. IM comments are always open, of course. (It amuses me to no end when certain parties start going on and on about how they can’t understand the BHT. I believe that is because people assume it should be posts and threads. Actually, the BHT has one thread, and this is it.)

Steve McCoy on Mclaren’s homosexuality column. I think Mr. Mclaren’s stock is plunging. First, Wilson’s utter destruction of his book (which, even if you don’t agree with all Wilson said, you must admit was a complete rout of Mclaren’s method and many of his ideas) and then this column, which simply insults thousands of faithful pastors who realize the Bible IS clear, and THAT’S THE “PROBLEM.”

Carl Olson’s new book on DVC is excerpted at Ignatius Insight.

Mod Ref reviews some of Beth Moore’s Bible study materials. As the most popular Bible teacher in the SBC- far more influential than any SBC pastor or professor- Moore deserves some examination.

In the same issue, Michael Horton writes on “The Romans Revolution.” This one article gives an excellent overview of Romans in short form. This article and the Piper MP3 series would be a great gift for someone.

As a fallout of his Sharon remarks.

See the Washington Times.

Openly Straight Christian Activist Actor to Play Controversial Part. Funny.

Michael: Can you imagine the freakshow BHT would be if you added comments? I’d have to brew 50 more gallons of ale a month as an elixir.

From slashdot: “A new study monitored brain activity of partisans; they shun logic and use emotional processing centers to justify their candidate’s contradictory statements.” Hello, did it take freaking Einstein to figure this out?

There’s a Rick Warren article “Can Failure be Good” on Sleddog.

Todd Rhoades on Monday Morning Insight writes about blogging pastors and their proclivity towards being jackasses! Heck, many are just plain asses anyway! I’ve been to those conventions! Eeeek!

“Pastors on blogs can be more than opinionated. Some can be rude. Some can be so rigid. And some can be absolutely ruthless in their comments. It makes me wonder if they are that way with the people they serve, or if they just come to the blog to blow off steam and have a chance to treat others the way they are treated.”

I’ve been reading more complaints that the BHT doesn’t allow comments and is impossible to read.

I’ve decided to open up a discussion on the use of comments at the BHT.

Please leave your comments about BHT comments at James White’s blog. Just put it in the comment thread.

Bring it, Jim. Great post. I’ve got Miller on my reading list based on recommendations from the heretics around here but haven’t made it to him yet.

From the Morning. Good blog. Good basic stuff on the emerging church.

Three Evangelical Boxes. Good post on the “team sport” aspect of evangelicalism. There is nothing I am more thankful for about the bht than the fact that we do not represent one of the teams, but are made up of all different sorts of people.

When people ask to join, I make it a point to say that we want diversity and community. Not all one pov; not all one team.

B16’s First Encyclical is out, and it is an extended meditation on love in the Christian understanding. An accompanying CD of Praise and Worship music is coming out, as well as a journal, t-shirts and temporary tattoos.

Here’s the Fox News summary. I figure that Fox’s theologians are on top of this one.