From the Pew: For God So Hated The World

From the Pew: For God So Hated The World

I'm a GREAT grandaddy

Our oldest daughter called us this morning (it was really dark!) to tell us that Addison Kate Cline arrived at 0258 weighing in at 6'13 and 19.5". Jenny's labor wasn't too long and the delivery went well.

I just wish she was closer than the 3000 miles that separate us. Oh, well.

More later.

Good reads

Here are books I’ve read recently or are on my “to read” shelf. I got most (used) from Amazon.
*** are absolute must reads. ** must reads.

*** The Body Broken: Embracing the Peace of Christ in a Fragmented Church
Jack Reese does a wonderful job at identifying the causes of church splits without dealing with the issues themselves. Includes about as good a explanation of Phillipians as I’ve read.

*** How to Forgive When You Don't Know How by Bishop, Jacqui; Grunte, Mary
This is about as good as it gets on the subject.

*** Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes: Cultural Studies in the Gospels
Some of the best discussions of parables, SoM, women.

*** Decision Making and the Will of God: A Biblical Alternative to the Traditional View
Friesen will relieve much anxiety in every day decision making.

*** Facing Our Failure: The Fellowship Dilemma in the Conservative Churches of Christ by Todd Deaver – here is a book that discloses many inconsistencies on the part of all RM congregations in extending fellowship.

*** The New Testament World: Insights from Cultural Anthropology by Bruce J Malina

*** American Jesus: How the Son of God Became a National Icon
and
*** Brand Jesus: Christianity in a Consumerist Age
Taken together, these two illuminate a huge obstacle to be overcome in our evangelism.

*** A Tale of three Kings: A Study in Brokenness [Paperback] by Edwards, Gene
Absolute MUST read, especially for elders and wantabe elders

*** Constantine's Bible: Politics and the Making of the New Testament
As good as there is on the canonization of scripture

** Hebrews: A Call to Commitment by Lane, William L.
This is my favorite. A small paperback.

** The Doctrine of the Trinity: Christianity's Self-Inflicted Wound
The best I’ve read on this subject

** Roman Wives, Roman Widows: The Appearance of New Women and the Pauline Communities
Neither egalitarian nor complementarian. Does explain much of Paul’s statements concerning women.

** The Myth of Certainty: The Reflective Christian & the Risk of Commitment
A reminder/warning for all of us.

The Lost History of Christianity: The Thousand-Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia--and How It Died
A must read for church history buffs

Spiritual Marketplace: Baby Boomers and the Remaking of American Religion

Truth Is Stranger Than It Used to Be: Biblical Faith in a Postmodern Age

Images Of The Church In The New Testament (New Testament Library)

Colossians Remixed: Subverting the Empire

Love Your God With All Your Mind: The Role of Reason in the Life of the Soul

unChristian: What a New Generation Really Thinks about Christianity... and Why It Matters
This is a real eye-opener.

From Symposium to Eucharist: The Banquet in the Early Christian World...
Shows how the Christian assembly mirrored the common meal of the 1st century

Jesus of Nazareth by Pope Benedict 16. An amazing read. No RC propaganda.

Redeemer Nation: The Idea of America's Millennial Role
Documents America’s attempt at policing the world

Stealing Jesus: How Fundamentalism Betrays Christianity

In the Shadow of the Temple: Jewish Influences on Early Christianity

Idols for Destruction: The Conflict of Christian Faith and American Culture
Herbert Schlossberg


The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief
Francis Collins

Render to Caesar: Jesus, the Early Church and the Roman Superpower
Christopher Bryan

Gene Edwards’ depiction of Acts: Peter & Paul’s ministry
These six books should be required reading for every student of the NT church. They are written as adventure novels that fill in the blanks of Acts. Jr High kids enjoy them a great deal. I got a complete set for $50 – well spent.
Revolution - The story of the first seventeen years of the Christian faith. This book begins where The Triumph leaves off . . . at Pentecost. You should know that this is not a book for the faint-hearted. Edwards wrote Revolution at age thirty. It is a book which keeps asking the question: “Does the first 17 years of Christian history look anything like the modern-day practice of Christianity?” If you want your Christian practices challenged, this is the book to read. If you are a Christian desperately struggling with the problem of “church,” you will want to read this book.
The Silas Diary - This book takes up exactly where Revolution ends. It opens with Paul and Barnabas leaving Antioch, until the time they returned four years later. During those four years Paul planted four churches in the Gentile world. When you have finished The Silas Diary you will understand the book of Galatians. In fact, Galatians will come alive to you in Technicolor, 3-D, and stereophonic surround-sound. And if your experience is like others who have read this book you will find yourself saying, “I feel like I was there. I met Paul. I feel like I have met Barnabas. And now I know what it was like to live in the first century. I know the Galatian Christians. I feel like I have been in their homes and gathered with them in their meetings. As to Paul and Barnabas, when they hurt, I hurt; when they were cold, I was cold; when they cried, I cried; when they triumphed over their enemies—the Judaizers, who were trying to destroy those four churches—I stood up and cheered.”
The Titus Diary - This book takes up where The Silas Diary leaves off, Paul is on his second journey, a journey into Greece. (In those days northern Greece was called Macedonia and southern Greece was called Achaia.) This is the story of Paul in Philippi, Thessalonica, Berea and Corinth. When you have finished this book you will feel as though the lashes received at Philippi landed on your back, that you were in that prison cell when the earthquake came. You will feel you actually visited Corinth and smelled its streets, heard the hawkers in the marketplace, and watched the slaves as they pulled ships across dry land. You will understand their problems as three cultures clashed there in that Corinthian church. You will meet the wonderful Priscilla. Later you will sit in the room with Paul as he writes I Thessalonians. You will be able to pick up I Corinthians and understand every word of it, with perfect clarity.
The Timothy Diary - The Timothy Diary tells you the story of Paul's journey, his time in Ephesus and how he trained eight young men to be church planters. In The Timothy Diary Paul's young Christian companion, Timothy, gives a firsthand account of the third journey, how Paul trains a handful of young men to take his place after his death. Stand beside Timothy as he meets the apostle Peter- "The Rock"! Feel Timothy's surprise and nervousness as Paul asks him to preach in Solomon's Colonnade before the entire Jerusalem assembly, including several of the Twelve! Hear Paul's answers to the very difficult questions posed by the church in Corinth.
The Priscilla Diary - Hear the stories of Paul's continued travels to the first-century churches narrated from the unique perspective of Priscilla, a vibrant first-century Christian woman! Paul faces "the darkest days of his entire life" while he frantically searches for the missing Titus. Are Paul's fears warranted? Has Titus been assassinated in Corinth? Read of the writing of Paul's most personally revealing letter to the church at Corinth. And marvel at the truths Paul conveys to the church in Rome, a letter "of all that Paul considered central to the Christian life." In Jerusalem Paul faces his old enemies and stands trial before the Roman and Jewish officials. Paul spends years in jail before the Roman governor issues a ruling that sends Paul to Rome in chains. Paul's final and most harrowing journey by ship awaits him!
The Gaius Diary - Gaius tells of the fall of Jerusalem and the martyrdom of Christians torn apart by wild animals in the Coliseum and of others perishing as human torches in Nero's garden. Near the end of the book Paul's own death is very movingly described. Despite seemingly overwhelming persecution, the church survives and successfully incorporated Gentile and Jewish Christians with the incredible shepherding of two apostles: Paul (founder of many Gentile churches) and Peter (Jesus' disciple and head of the Jerusalem church).

Are we teaching another gospel?

No greater love than the man who recognizes the shortcomings of his spiritual legacy and braves the slings and arrows of proponents of those shortcomings when he voices his observations. Here is one such critique by a life-long Restorationist and elder of Alabama congregation.

This brother along with Al Maxey are voices of reason within our branch of the tree of Christianity.

Dan

iMonk on salvation and the church

Michael Spencer, the internetMonk, takes well deserved pot-shots at the Church of Christ. Check it out. Don't miss the many comments.

FWIW, I do believe that salvation is directly tied to church participation, i.e., a Christian disconnected from a local representation of the Body of Christ (with whatever Sign Out Front) is doomed to death just as my finger would be when separated from my body.

Guilty parenting

Many times during the past 55 or so years I've noted the lives of children of spiritual parents and wondered what was wrong within the home that produced such terrible kids (me included). Then I became a father -- 4 times in 42 months -- and prayed constantly that my kids wouldn't be like those preacher/elder/saintly fathers. Despite my failures (but their mother's successes), my daughters love the Lord and do their best to provide their children healthy Godly homes. They did a great job.

I've reached the conclusion that John Rosemond (see below) is right -- while homelife is a strong influence, a kid does what that kid will do.

Here's Rosemond's column from last week (bold emphases mine):

Living with Children
John Rosemond
Copyright 2009, John K. Rosemond

One of the defining features of today’s parenting mindset is guilt. Mothers seem to be especially susceptible to this psychological virus—today’s moms, that is. Fifty years and more ago, before the psychological parenting revolution of the late 1960s and early 1970s, mothers were more immune to guilt. Back then, when a child behaved badly, the mother made the child feel guilty. These days, when a child behaves badly, the child’s mother is likely to experience the guilt due the offense.

This has happened because today’s moms—the primary consumers of parenting information and therefore its primary victims—believe that parenting produces the child. That’s understandable. After all, if one goes to a mental health professional because of some problem, the overwhelming likelihood is that the MHP is going to ask questions about the person’s childhood. Determinism has been a dominant feature of much if not most psychological theory since Freud, and even though it is not supported by research or common sense, it lingers on.

Mainstream psychological theory is hard pressed to explain how a person who grows up with every conceivable advantage takes a hard left turn as a young adult and winds up trashing his life, much less that he keeps making the same mistakes over and over and over again. Violent criminals do not all come from violent families. Pathological liars do not all come from pathological families.

The only conclusion upheld by common sense: Parenting does not produce the child. Parenting is an influence, and it is certainly prudent for parents to do what they can to maximize positive influence, but in the final analysis, the child produces himself. At any given point in his life, he takes your influence (along with a host of others) and he decides what to do with it. He is the decider.

Prior to the Age of Psychological Parenting, parents understood that they could only do so much. They understood that no matter how “good” their parenting was, their children were still capable on any given day of going to school or out into the community and doing bad things—really bad, even. In the final analysis, therefore, their children were responsible for their own behavior. So back in those not-so-long-ago days, when a child misbehaved, the child’s parents weren’t likely to agonize over it, punishing themselves. They punished him.

All too many of today’s parents, in the same circumstances, punish themselves. They agonize. They feel bad. They search themselves for the answer to “Why?” Consequently, their children are not being held fully responsible.

Of late, I’ve been asking my audiences two questions:Is parenting more or less stressful, do you think, than it was in the 1950s? Are today’s children more or less happy than were children in the 1950s?Every audience—of which there have been approximately ten so far—has reached instant consensus. Their answers have been, respectively, more and less. Those are, of course, the correct answers. I simply propose that much of the stress is due to parents holding themselves responsible for their children’s misbehavior. And I propose that much of the unhappiness is because children are not being held responsible for their own behavior.

Family psychologist John Rosemond answers parents' questions on his website at www.rosemond.com .

Fathers and Holy Spirit

A couple of days ago I offered a brief summary of post-NT writings (Clement thru Augustine) that expected Jesus' return, the resurrection and judgment in their future. This is a 15 page .doc that I will make available to whomever asks -- by Email, please.

I just discovered an explanation of why they missed it. I hope you'll read it.

While on this subject, here is my observation that when it comes to the Holy Spirit, preterists are no different than futurists:

I find it interesting that preterists (I'm one) make a big deal about who would see the parousia/resurrection/judgment (PRJ) -- recognizing that it was Jesus' generation, not any subsequent (post-70) readers.

Yet, these same preterists, thru the imposition of themselves into the text by assuming the role of antecedent of the second person pronouns, fail to apply the same criteria to the promise of the Holy Spirit:

1) the promises Jesus made in the "upper room" were to the Apostles specifically. Nowhere do we find the same promises being made to disciples in general.

2) the reception of the HS promised in Acts 2:38 was not simultaneous with baptism, as Acts 8:14-18 demonstrates. Reception of the "gift" was thru the "laying on of Apostolic hands."

3) in the "upper room" Jesus explains that the HS would be a temporary (note the use of "little while") substitute for Jesus during his absence -- the 40 years between his ascension and parousia.

4) the HS is absent in the New Jerusalem of Rev 21:10 - 22:5 (the post-PRJ church); a substitute is not necessary since the resurrected church (the kingdom) is in the very presence of Father/Son.

5) subsequent "days to come" saints rely on the past work of the HS as proof of the 1st century events; being in the presence of God continually negates the need for another, temporary non-God/Christ representative.