With Friends Like This...

Here is the Obamassiah's chosen running mate heaping scorn upon the Obamassiah. Geez! With friends like this, who needs the "Republican attack machine"?

Advice to Young, and Would Be, Pastors

The best advice I can give you any contemplating the ministry, or who has recently begun a ministry: Have something to fall back on.

We often go into ministry with lofty visions of parsing Greek words in sermon preparation, comforting the sick, helping the needy and so on. We have such lofty expectations that we do not think about what will come next in our lives. Not everyone who enter vocational ministry will be in the ministry their entire life.

I would advise a young college student who is planning a life in ministry to select an appropriate major, or minor at the least. When I went to college I was not planning on ministry, but many of my fellow students were. They majored in religion with plans for attending seminary after graduation. This is a mistake. If one is planning on attending seminary after college, major in something else while in college. If one is not planning on seminary, consider a double major or pick a minor that will help.

I am thankful that I have had something to fall back on after leaving (temporarily?) the ministry.

Be wise. Plan for life after the "professional" ministry. No one who is a Christian ever leaves ministry, but many leave the paid ministry.

Wonderful, Great, OPPRESSIVE China

From Voice of the Martyrs comes this story:

Pastor Zhang “Bike” Mingxuan, known for traveling across China on a bicycle to evangelize, was arrested by Chinese police just two days before the Olympics began. Pastor Bike was the inspiration for the recent partnership between The Voice of the Martyrs and China Aid Association to create the Olympic Prayer Band.

This story came across on an e-mail alert and is not posted on the website. Here are some more stories of the "benevolent" regime of China showing "openness and tolerance" toward citizens who follow Christ.

While Matt Lauer, Meredith Vieira, Bob Costas and the other NBC lackies fawn over how wonderful China is, remember that the Communist government of China is jailing people for being Christians.

Wow! I am Impressed!

In my one class last spring, we never received a syllabus. Never. Still waiting...

My classes for this fall start next Wednesday, and I have already received the syllabus for one of the classes. At least now I can plan my schedule.

The older I get, the more I like to plan. I want to know what is coming next. That way, I can set aside time to study. The problem with the class in the spring was constantly shifting expectations and assignments. The class itself was very interesting, but I hated that we never really knew what was coming next.

I think ("hope" may be a better word) it will be different this fall.

Back From Vacation

We just returned from vacation yesterday. We spent a week in Memphis with my wife's sister and her family. Our niece is three. She bossed our kids around all week. It was pretty funny.

We ate some great Memphis barbecue at Jim Neely's Interstate Barbecue. It was magnificent.

We saw Graceland, the home of one Elvis Aaron Presley. My eight-year-old son went to Memphis with no clue who Elvis was. After touring Graceland, he wanted to be rich like Elvis. Later that day, he asked, "Dad, why didn't you name me Elvis?" My response, "Because, we didn't want you to get beat up." The one thing that surprised me is that Graceland was smaller than I thought it would be.

We went to the Shiloh Battlefield. It was only the second American Civil War battlefield that I have been to. (The other is Gettysburg.) I cannot even think of the words to describe it. There is a sense that so many men died there. It is almost as if they blood still cries out from the soil.

We went to the National Civil Rights Museum, which is on the site of the Lorraine Motel where Martin Luther King, Jr. was murdered. Most of us fail to realize the struggle that so many African-Americans went through to attain equal rights.

We went to Mud Island, which has a scale model of the last 1000 miles of the Mississippi River and a museum of the Mississippi River.

We went to the Pink Palace, which was the home of the founder of Piggly Wiggly, the first modern grocery store. The kids had fun doing a treasure hunt for which they won a bunch of junk.

It was a great time, and very relaxing.

Yippie!

I picked up my laptop this morning. I am back in the... (Well, whatever I am in, I am back).

You never really realize how much you miss something until it is gone.

I Miss My Laptop

My laptop is in the shop with a power cord issue. I am having to use my old desktop. This thing should be in a museum of ancient history. It runs Windows 98. I mean that is so last century. I am tied down to one place, as this thing is only portable with a moving van.

Not that anyone cares about my whining.

Challenging Evangelical Assumptions, Part 2

Assumption Two: Communion is unimportant.

This is, of course, one that is not written. It is more unconscious.

This comes from the comment that I often heard, "When you take communion all the time (or frequently), it loses its meaning." How does the sacrifice that Jesus made lose its meaning. It is something we should meditate on daily? Communion is a powerful reminder of that. Churches were often scorned when they took communion weekly.

In our little church, we took communion once a quarter (four times yearly), as prescribed by the powers that be in our denomination.

Fortunately, some evangelical churches have foregone this practice and started taking communion once a month. I am glad to see the increase in participation in the Lord's Supper.

One further problem, it is still often left as an add on at the end of the worship service. We sing, we pray, we hear a sermon, and (oh, yeah) we have to take a tiny cracker and tiny cup of grape juice.

Communion needs to be more integrated into the worship experience.

Challenging Evangelical Assumptions, Part 1

I grew up in an evangelical church, the Church of the Nazarene. I was fully educated in the ways of the evangelical church. We were not fundamentalists, but somewhat legalistic. I want to examine some of the assumptions that I grew up with. (I will explore these off and on over the coming weeks, and perhaps months). Some of these assumptions are codified, and some are unspoken, and perhaps a few are even unconscious.

Assumption One: Prayer must be spontaneous to be sincere.

This is one that is not codified, but is certainly unspoken. I recall hearing criticisms of churches that read their prayers. In our church, prayers were sincere because they were spontaneous. We were somehow closer to God because we prayed in an utterly spontaneous way.

Here is the challenge I would issue. Why is spontaneity equated to sincerity? Think back on important moments in your life (proposing to your girlfriend, giving a big speech, taking a test, etc.). Were any of those spontaneous? Did you take a big test without studying? Anything that is important takes preparation. Are we not saying that prayer is unimportant if we "go off the cuff"?

As far as I am concerned, pre-prepared prayers can be very effective in focusing our attention on God. This could be done either through praying the Psalms, using great prayers of the saints, or writing our own.

Another aspect of spontaneous prayer, is that it is usually the same thing every time. Sure the order in which we pray for the missionaries.

I seems that spontaneous prayer is born of laziness rather than sincerity.

If prayer is important, it should take time.

Who Says Drilling for Oil Will Not Help?

Those opposed to drilling for oil, either offshore or in the barren ice-laden wilderness of Alaska, say that there will be no short-term benefit. They say it will be a decade before any of that oil will hit the gas station.

Last week, President George W. Bush lifted the executive ban on offshore drilling, while encouraging the do-noting-Democratic-controlled Congress to lift their ban.

Look what happened last week. Oil dropped $16 per barrel. Gas dropped nearly $0.10 per gallon. Yes, this has all been very short term.

If just talking about drilling can have this result, imagine what would happen if (and, hopefully, when) drilling actually begins. Gas probably will never again be $0.99 per gallon, but it does not have to stay at the $4.00 range.

Drill Here!
Drill Now!
Pay Less!

What's Wrong with the Boss? Part 2

An article by Franz Lidz from September 2007 talks about Steinbrenner's condition. Apparently no one associated with the Yankees or Steinbrenner's family comment on the subject.

What's Wrong with the Boss?

Is George Steinbrenner ill? Before last night's Major League Baseball All-Star Game, Steinbrenner was escorted to the pitcher's mound at Yankee Stadium to deliver the baseballs for the ceremonial first pitches. He looked terrible. He rode a golf cart and never left it.

Perhaps I have been under a rock, but is he ill? I noticed earlier this season that his son, Hank Steinbrenner, was front and center during the Jason Giambi controversy.

President Bush's Statement

It is not very often that you will hear a politician, even a Republican, say something like this. At a press conference today (7/15/08) President Bush was asked about conservation. Some pencil-neck reporter asked whether he would encourage/mandate conservation. Bush's response was priceless (from Politico.com):

"They're smart enough to figure out whether they're going to drive less or not. I mean, you know, it's interesting what the price of gasoline has done," Bush said at a news conference in the White House press room, "is it caused people to drive less. That's why they want smaller cars: They want to conserve. But the consumer's plenty bright. The marketplace works."

"You noticed my statement yesterday, I talked about good conservation and — you know, people can figure out whether they need to drive more or less," he said. "They can balance their own checkbooks."

"It's a little presumptuous on my part to dictate how consumers live their own lives," the president added. "I've got faith in the American people."

It is refreshing for a politician express faith in the American people. Most politicians (including many Republicans) think that the government has to take care of us because we are too cotton-picking stupid to take care of ourselves or make decisions on our own. Thank you, President Bush, for expressing faith in "We the People."

The Bible and Socialism

The Bible does not endorse one specific kind of government, except perhaps theocracy. It never ceases to amaze me that some folks are insistent that the Bible promotes socialism. (It also amazes me that some think it endorses capitalism or democracy.)

Yes, the early Christians shared all things in common, but it was voluntary. We should voluntarily support our fellow man who is in need. We should support our churches with our money. There should be nothing coercive about it.

No where does the Bible advocate the government taking care of charitable needs. That is our job as Christians. Jesus told us to do it. He never said, "Caesar will take care of the poor or needy."

This Sounds Painful

From FoxSports.com: Chris Snyder of the Arizona Diamondbacks

News: Snyder (testicular fracture) is progressing and he'll be reevaluated on Monday, the Arizona Republic reports.

I do not even want to know how that happened. I cannot imagine the pain he is/was in.