Idol Matching 3
Recap In this series, we’ve been dealing with some of the idols in the world that need to be torn down and the fact that Christians keep their own version of these idols in their hearts. Same-sex mirage out there is akin in some ways to fornication and sexual looseness or an unbiblical desire for […]
No Floor to Stand On: Hollywood Faces Sexual Assault Scandal
Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein was outed as a sexual predator last week in a New York Times story. Or, more accurately, he was outed nationally and with corroborating evidence. His predations on young women have long been the rumor of the film industry. Thus far twenty-seven women have made public accusations against Weinstein, including Oscar […]
No Exceptions: Pro-Life Mom Refuses Chemo to Save Unborn Baby
Carrie DeKlyen, a Michigan mother of five, started getting headaches last March. After the pains worsened she saw a doctor, and scans showed a brain tumor. According to the Chicago Tribune, the pathology report revealed something more cruel: glioblastoma, a rare and aggressive brain cancer. She would have the tumor removed in April, but the […]
Reformation Grace in “East of Eden”
This autumn marks the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther’s pinning of the ninety-five theses. Whether you’re Lutheran or not, Luther and the Reformers’ impact on the world is undeniable, unforgettable. Of all Luther’s works, the De Servo Arbitrio (On the Bondage of the Will) cut to the heart of what the Reformers defended: It is in […]
Kill You to Call – Nicki Bluhm and The Blues as Connection
The Blues are sad songs. No one wants that. And yet The Blues persist. There is little reason to believe that The Blues is going away. Even when the current pop music is thumping and protesteth its cheerfulness too much, The Blues continue to hold a steady fanbase. I was sitting in one of my […]
Most People Don’t Look
Most of the people who walked by us looked indifferent; they probably didn’t even notice our signs. But of those who actually looked at us, most of them smiled or gave thumbs up. Many stopped by and said thank you for volunteering. One woman stopped by to talk about the hypocrisy of our culture. (Recently […]
Idol Matching 2
Round Two Same-sex mirage and divorce. Same-sex mirage and fornication. In a previous post, I argued that far too often, the idolatry we enshrine in our own hearts matches the idolatry present in same-sex mirage. As Christians, when we countenance any sort of abuse of God’s gifts of sexual intimacy and marriage, namely divorce and […]
Christian Scientists
Several years ago, a lot of press was given to the new Common Core standards that were implemented nationwide. At the request of several state school boards, the Common Core standards are English and Math requirements handed down by the federal department of education. These set new federal requirements in reading and math, and were […]
Rob Bell’s “What Is the Bible?” Part 4
Given what Bell has said so far about the Bible, a brief excursus about the doctrine of Scripture would be helpful. As I have pointed out, one of Bell’s problems is that he will simply not accept some things that the Bible says, especially what the Bible says about itself. Several salient points should be […]
Making Welfare Less Important
We must move toward serious welfare reform not by simply pressuring people to work, but rather by supporting the pursuit of higher-wage employment. The ultimate goal would be to get rid of welfare entirely, or at least reduce it to being a last safety net for those without any other assistance available. If we emphasize […]
David Foster Wallace and the Worldly Perils of Entertainment
A Christian’s Introduction to David Foster Wallace, Part 1 When I read the Parable of the Sower, I often feel like the young plant sown among thorns. I am beset every day precisely by the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches, not so much the “trouble or persecution” Christ refers to in […]
Review: CrossPolitic Live
I’ve always wanted to watch an extended political interview where the host stubbornly refuses to allow the politician to retreat to pat answers and stump speech talking points, where he interrupts evasive techniques and forces arguments to their logical ends. Sure, Bill O’Reilly made a career out of his no-spin schtick, but despite the yelling […]
States’ Rights and the Union: An Ongoing Debate
When we think about states’ rights, our minds often go straight to the Civil War. Few of us recognize that the debate is actually still quite alive. Events like those in Charlottesville draw our minds back to unresolved animosity of the War Between the States, but we should be using these events to help us […]
Easily Steered: Support for Same-Sex Marriage at Record High
The LGBT war machine rolls on. According to the latest polling data from the Pew Research Center, natiohttp://www.people-press.org/2017/06/26/support-for-same-sex-marriage-grows-even-among-groups-that-had-been-skeptical/nal support for so called same-sex marriage is at a record high, with nearly two-thirds of Americans saying they favor allowing same-sex couples to marry. [1] Even groups traditionally opposed to same-sex marriage such as baby boomers, blacks, […]
A Just War and Just War
There’s a world of difference between a just war and just war. There is war for a just reason, and there is war just to be able to say you did something while in office. Wars can serve to boost patriotism, nationalism. and For the GOP, it often bolsters the “rah, rah, rah” spirit that […]
It’s Edited: Don’t be Duped by the Newsertainment
Editing is an art form. My son Cedric was coming in the front door a few days ago when his sister asked, “Did you eat an ice cream sandwich?” He replied, “Malachi had two.” That was, strictly speaking, true. Malachi had eaten two ice cream sandwiches. The difficulty is that Cedric had also eaten one. […]
Fading Back to Black and White
After the Charlottesville riots, America was thrown into a fit of iconoclasticism. Tearing down statues of Confederate leaders, demanding the renaming of streets named after “white supremacists.” When did American history become so binary? I always thought that there were more groups than just white supremacists and good people. It’s ironic that, just as our […]
How Do Millennials Thrive in the Church?
A Church for the Next Generation, Part Three In the past two posts, we’ve looked at whether young people are going to church less, and why some young people leave the church. Now I want to answer another why question: if the church is as stuffy and old-fashioned as we’re always hearing, why do so […]
White Supremacy: Not our baby
One of the central plays the Left is running is to paint Christians and conservatives with the same dirty brush as they do the alt-right white supremacists. They have been calling conservatives Nazis for years, a standard retort to such offenses as budgetary math and the suggestion that the federal government wear a functioning seat […]
Six Day Creationism and Evolution
Most of us have been pulled over by a cop. Imagine for a moment that this happens to you. The cop flashes his lights, you dutifully pull over, hand over your license and registration. He informs you that he pulled you over because you didn’t stop at the stop sign. You respond with, “But officer, […]