Oklahombres

just bought this nifty-looking software for my Mac called MacJournal I’m not sure how all the features work. But if this makes it to the blog, then buy the product.

It looks pretty neat any way. My laptop goes with me everywhere I go, but an internet connection doesn’t. That means I have lots of time to write a post but no way to get in my blog to begin a post, or edit posts begun and saved but not published. I’m left with the alternative of writing into a word processor and later cutting and pasting into WordPress later when I am online, at which point I have to add links, graphics, etc. This looks to be much better—if it works. We’ll see. Stay tuned.

y pastor has gone and done it now. This last Sunday was simply a disaster. I just don’t know what I’m going to do with him. You know, there are some things you can over look, and then there are those breaches which are inexcusable. The only thing worse than one such occurrence is two; in the same day.
The Comforting/Terrifying Judgment of God
The first instance was with the morning message. This has been building for weeks, as this is the twelfth or so in a series from the book of Revelation, but this Sunday’s message really made it clear what Brother Pastor was up to. He is clearly preaching the book of Revelation as if it had as much relevance to the people who first read it as it has to us today. Who ever heard of such a thing?
God’s Grace Doing the Impossible
Later, with the evening service Pastor does the other thing that just went all through me. Who ever heard of someone finding Jesus in the Old Testament? What’s more than that, who ever heard of someone being told to flee to Jesus for salvation from an Old Testament text? Well, that’s exactly what he did. Heck, everybody knows those folks in the Old Testament were saved by doin’ good and sacrificing all of those animals.
You can go and read the notes and listen to the audio, but I’ll just warn you in advance strange things might happen. Before you do, have your wife hide your Left Behind series in a safe place, and have your calendar handy. You know, the one with the big red check mark on the square when you walked the aisle and prayed the prayer, so you’ll remember what you did, and not do something foolish like pray for mercy and grace.

There were some present at that very time who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And he answered them, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered in this way? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. Or those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”

Luke 13:1-5

The best and not so good of this week’s ‘religious’ talk:

SBC resolutions and gluttony:

“If such a resolution makes it to the floor of the convention, I wonder if it will be amended to limit participation in denominational life to those who are not gluttons?” Tom Ascol at The Founders Ministries Blog.

Not gonna happen, but we’ll see. See you ’round like a donut—in Louisville.

The IMB and Believers Baptism:

“This means that the IMB was correct in placing the guidelines on baptism in place because the overwhelming majority of SBC pastors believe a person baptized in a church that does not believe in eternal security has not experienced a scriptural baptism.” At SBC Today.

Logic 101: If the overwhelming majority happens to be wrong, is that still what this means?

On Church Signs:

“IMHO, the proper use of church signs is to display God’s Word. Those who write a clever saying and then attach “God” to it, come very close to blasphemy to me. I would be very careful in attributing to God the words of men. I prefer the words of God.” Les Puryear at sbc IMPACT!

A sound principle in which I can find no fault.

Rant of the Week:

“My denomination is more interested in evangelism than any other denomination in existence or Christian history. Its entire apparatus of denominational machinery is devoted to the promotion of evangelism. Its denominational publications and web sites are basically all evangelism, all the time.” Michael Spencer at internetmonk.com

I never cease to be amazed at the insight of this guy that most in our denomination view as “fringe.” Just as a couple of bonus questions, does any body in the SBC know the meaning of personal holiness, and what the chief end of man is? Keep rantin’, brother iMonk.

On Multi-site Churches:

“Multi-site church is a logical and efficient solution to a problem brought on by bad missiology.” At Missions Misunderstood.

Nothing funny, ironic, or sad here. It’s just a good post. Read it.

Jonathan Edwards Resources:

“October 5, 2008 is the birthday of Jonathan Edwards (happy 305th!). And on this date the Jonathan Edwards Center at Yale will launch WJE Online 2.0, a new 73-volume(!) digital works of Edwards, which will include the full electronic versions of the printed Yale Works (25 volumes) and another 47 volumes of unpublished, digitized sermons and other material.” At The Shepherd’s Scrapbook.

Edwards still looks good for his age. Check out the site.

Politics:

“Christ is the integration point, not some grand idea, and our duties are always right in front of us, simple and plain. There are certain intellectual convolutions that could make particularity and “individualism” abstract in an idolatrous way, but that is actually hard to do. Because of the Incarnation, the bias of particularity in politics favors the anti-ideological, which is to say, it is a bias against idolatry. And that describes historic conservatism very well. At the same time, I grant that it does not describe George W. Bush’s spending habits very well — there the resemblance would be more like a pack of simians that got into an Congo merchant’s storehouse of trade gin.” Douglas Wilson at Blog and Mablog.

No one makes better use of the English language than Doug Wilson. He is the master of metaphor, the sultan of simile. We Baptists may not agree with everything he says, but Pastor Wilson always says it well.

ere’s a couple of jewels from a podcast I heard a couple of weeks ago:

Atonement is a non-negotiable concept. What do you put in its place? What happens is the gospel becomes “I can have a personal relationship with Jesus.” The devil has a personal relationship with Jesus! What kind of a personal relationship with Jesus, and what is the ground of that personal relationship? Obviously being a Christian involves having a personal relationship with Jesus, but there’s content to that relationship that defines that relationship and to just call it a personal relationship I don’t think is very helpful.

R. C. Sproul on The White Horse Inn; An Interview with R. C. Sproul, from September 7, 2008

And then there’s this. The quote is even more powerful when you realize its author is a theologian from a mainline denomination.

You just haven’t said “salvation” when you say “self-esteem.” Thank you, Robert Schuler. And you haven’t said “the good news of Jesus Christ” when you’ve said “I have found a way to help your marriage work.” In Christianity you’ve got to sit and learn the language.You’ve got to sit and learn the vocabulary, and the grammar. Christianity in a way is like learning a new language, and if you’ve ever tried to learn French, you know you’re not just learning different labels. You’re learning a different culture. You’re moving through the words into a different world. So I’m not much on the translation mode. That is the old, I think now, discredited liberal project of the 19th and early 20th century that many of us mainliners realize takes you nowhere. It’s an incredible thinning out of the gospel. It is so disheartening to see evangelicals now jumping on that and buying it. We’re all liberals now.

William Willimon, on The White Horse Inn; An Interview with R. C. Sproul, from Septermber 7, 2008.

I’m a little late posting last weeks roundup, but I had some family matters needing attention. Better late than never. Here’s the five best posts by Christian bloggers that I read this past week. Go check them out:

1. From a Pastor’s Heart:
“…there is a huge difference between “feeding” the people from the Word and “scolding” the people from the Word. I used to think that it was my job as the preacher to let everyone know what they were doing wrong. Rather than scold them, I now try to encourage them, comfort them, challenge them, and love them.”
Les Puryear at Joining God in His Work: “How Not to Preach“.

2. On Female Pastors and Beth Moore:
“When do we get the exercise in pretzel logic that explains there’s no inconsistency in having a female Bible teacher with an audience larger than any pastor in a denomination that opposes women pastors?”
Michael Spenser at The Internet Monk: “Send in the Clowns.”
I saw a news piece on ABC that exploited this very thing, interviewing three Southern students, and then Dr. Mohler, and then switching over to the LifeWay issue. We are our own worst enemies.

3. A New Theological Journal:
“But if you look carefully, you will see that they have nothing from folks from TEC (the Episcopal Confusion). Why ask for theological nuance and substance from people who are still struggling with the concept of boys and girls?”
Douglas Wilson at Blog and Mablog: “Three Cheers for Anglicans, the Kind Who Believe the Bible”

Hey, all you SBC Fundamentalists, check out this journal. Links for free samples and articles are available at the post. Be careful, though; you might learn something about the bigger world outside the compound walls. Worse yet, you might even be persuaded to sprinkle your babies.

4. On Pacing Yourself:
While I have been a sprinter
most of my life, I am [now (sp.)] trying to learn how to be the long distance
runner. The long distance runner paces himself and endures the entire
length of the race. The long distance runner of whom Paul writes in
Hebrews 12:1-3.
Les Puryear at sbc IMPACT!: “Goodbye Sprinter: Hello Long Distance Runner”

Good advice, and five good points follow on how to achieve the transition from burn-out mode to finishing-the-course mode.

5. BAPTIST: A Great Acronymn:
“My goal was … to answer the question in my own mind, “How can we revitalize our denomination?”  I approached the task from the point of view of what I would preach to the convention if asked (by the way, like most small church pastors, I have not been and I don’t expect that I ever will be asked).”

From A Contract with Southern Baptists - Part 7.

Check these seven posts out and find what the Letters B.A.P.T.I.S.T. really stand for.