June 5 2009

Psalms 143:12 ->This is acceptable, if your enemies are God's enemies.

Proverbs 5:6 ->Be wary of those who don't know/contemplate the consequences of their actions.

Proverbs 5:21 ->A man's ways are not hidden, but considered and known.

Galatians 1:12 ->Yet there is no contradiction between Paul's Gospel and the other disciples' Gospel

1 Peter 1:1-2 ->Believers are expected by God to do. The Spirit has set us apart, we have been made clean so that we may obey. Not for our own benefit.

1 Peter 1:2 ->Acknowledge a hope, a desire not just for a little good, but the fullest good for others!

Quote: "The majority of men meet with failure because of their lack of persistence in creating new plans to take the place of those which fail." Napoleon Hill.

Thought #1: Are we sure we want success advice from a guy named Napoleon?

Thought #2: Somebody said this: "Failure is rarely permanent. Quitting is." (not remembering who.)

Thought #3: Commit your goals to be God's goals, and failure flees!

Moving toward the Horizon,

Doug

Lifeway misses a point

Ok, I'm a Southern Baptist. In fact, I've been a Southern Baptist longer than I've been a Christian, though I now realize which is more important. So, as a Southern Baptist, I'm predisposed towards a couple of things:

1.) A preference to purchase stuff made by Southern Baptists, for Southern Baptists, like stuff from Lifeway, the bookstore formerly known as the Baptist Bookstore, part of the group formerly called the Baptist Sunday School Board.

2.) A tendency to be irritable and itching for an argument, especially with fellow Baptists. Most Southern Baptists will argue for a short time with other denominations, like Methodists, other religions, like Muslims or Mormons, but can argue for decades with fellow Baptists. I think the 'silence in heaven' in Revelation 8:1 is that point in eternity when the Lord Himself finally separates the last two Baptists and tells us to hush.

So, today, I have a situation where #1 and #2 have collided. Yep, I've got something made by Baptists that has me itching for an argument. What is it? It's something on my Summer 2009 Sunday School Teacher's Guide.

But it's not the content. It's an advertisement on the back. What are we advertising? Well, we're advertising a Bible study based on the book The Love Dare, which comes from the movie Fireproof. Now, I like the movie, and I bet the book is great. I'm sure the Bible study is tremendous. But the ad is bad. Plain and simple. What's wrong with it? The lead line for the advertisement is "How to change a spouse in 40 days." The text then goes on to rave about how, if you want your spouse to improve, bring them to this Bible study. They'll change. There's a short nod that you might be changed as well, but the advertisement's main text says that this Bible study "contains the kind of prayers, Scripture, and provocative questions that can completely transform a husband or wife. It's an amazing process, but don't be surprised if it's you who is changed forever."

In other words, you might be changed, but this study is guaranteed to fix what's wrong with your spouse. There's also the side question of whether one should list prayers first, as if they are more important than Scripture. Given that prayer is talking to God, and Scripture is God's word to us, I'd think Scripture has more power to change. But, that's a different argument.

I thought perhaps this was an isolated issue, that I was being to sensitive, but this morning, I was picked up my copy of Biblical Illustrator (which is one of the greatest resources Lifeway does), the ad on the back cover caught my eye. It was for a Bible study about attitude, and led with the question "Do you know someone who needs an attitude change?" and went on about how this Bible study would fix them just right.

Now, I know that both of these studies will present God's word with the emphasis on life transformation and marriage transformation. But I take issue with the idea behind the ads. These are, first of all, resources that are liable to be left visible to a wide range of folks. If a Sunday School teacher has this teacher's guide at home, and her husband or his wife sees the ad on the back, then gets invited to do the Love Dare Bible Study with the church, how is that spouse going to respond? With hesitation or aggression: here's my spouse, trying to change me again!

Second, I think this might put us up against Jesus' teaching that we should take the log from our own eye before we hit our brother up about his speck, in Matthew 7:4.

[in the interest of that: I will do my best to not produce advertisements telling people that I can change their spouse or their friend/family member's bad attitudes. My goal here is not to judge Lifeway as being evil, just to express they could do better!]

These ads just read to me like the people that respond to sermons with a "I sure wish _____ had been here to hear that! They sure needed it." Sure, but did you hear what God was saying to you? Or are you too preoccupied with changing your neighbor?

When we look at people through eyes of how they should change, we tend to miss seeing them as people. Yes, we want to see everyone come to faith in Christ, and all of those who follow Him to follow Him closer and better. But I think we can advertise Bible studies on their content alone, rather than emotive appeals to people's desire to change other people.

Just my 2 cents worth.

Doug

June 4 2009

Proverbs 4:16 ->The wicked are not satisfied to destroy only themselves.

Proverbs 4:18 ->Our obedience sometimes seems dark and shadowy, but it brightens as we walk longer. It is a sunrise, day is coming!

Revelation 9:6 ->evidence here that death is allowed or denied at the will of God, not man.

Revelation 9:5 and Revelation 9:15 ->establishment of a warning time, long enough, yet fixed.

Galatians 1:6 ->Paul does not do anything to "happy up" his readers or break the ice or use any rhetorical or literary devices before he his straight at the point. Don't assume you always have to go around to get to your point. Hit it direct.

1 Peter 1:1 ->Peter is writing to the same area Paul wrote Galatians for.

Quote: "Managers and executives are not necessarily leaders. The real leaders in an organization may not have titles on their doors." -Phillip B. Crosby

Thought #1 ->Many organizations strive to force people to accept leadership from titles, rather than find leaders and force titles on them!

Thought #2 -> Wise managers and executives connect to real leaders.

Thought #3 ->Yet this post is true of the business world, and the Christian world, we'll spend fortunes on the people with titles, and next to nothing on the 'ordinary' people. Encourage, train, develop all through the organization, you don't know who is making the real impacts!

Moving toward the Horizon,

Doug

Book Review: Nelson's Illustrated Guide to Religions

As I've noted here before, I get the opportunity to review books for Thomas Nelson Publishers. They send me a book, I read it, review it, and get to keep it for free. They ask for honesty, which they get from me, even though I do rate most of the books fairly highly. Why? Well, they don't just send me random books. I get to pick the books I want, so I have a prior interest, plus, these are books that have already been considered, vetted, edited, rewritten, and so on. Between getting books I want and the process, I don't hit many books I don't like. But, there might be first one.

Ok, so the book is: Nelson's Illustrated Guide to Religions: A Comprehensive Introduction to the Religions of the World. The author is James A. Beverley, who is Professor of Christian Thought and Ethics at Tyndale Seminary.

So, let's look at this book. I've done it in a question/answer format, using questions I consider when buying a reference work:

First question: Is the author qualified to write a resource book like this?

Generally, when I look at a resource or reference book, I want to know if the author is qualified. I could write a reference of religions, but my experience and world involvement is pretty sparse. Dr. Beverley, however, has been doing academic study of world religions for 3 decades. Moreover, he's taught classes on 6 of the 7 continents, and no major world religions are based on Antarctica, which he's missed so far. So, he's read the books, he's studied the material, and he's seen the places where things generally happen. So, author qualification is there.

Second question: How well does the author handle author bias in the book?

In the introduction, Dr. Beverley is up front with his primary bias in favor of Evangelical Christianity. He allows the reader to know that he is examining all of these religions in light of their truth claims and history, and that his starting point is the truth of Christianity. Some might prefer a book that claims to be completely unbiased, but that's a logical impossibility. Everyone has some assumptions and biases about what is true and what isn't, the author does the reader a service by disclosing his biases.

Secondly on this question, the author does not, as some Christian guides to world religions do, present each religion as a list of errors compared to Christianity, nor does he list a tips for evangelism section on each group. He does provide links to both official sources and known critical sources on each group.

Third question: Is the material presented in an accessible fashion?

I'd give the setup and design of this book a resounding endorsement. The use of full-color photographs and charts is easy on the eyes, and brings a realism to the understanding. Moreover, the division of the book into major sections that are similar, with individual groups detailed in each section, is very helpful. The book uses colored charts to summarize information on each group, so there is no risk of accidentally reading into another section without knowing it.

All in all, I found Dr. Beverley's work satisfying, and will use it as a lending resource for church members with questions about other religions.

Economic lessons worth learning

When you get a chance, take a look at these videos. I saw them this morning over at another right-wing extremist website, and the guy in the video asks they be shared to spread the word. I know economics can be a complicated science, but I think part of the complications are being ignored.

No profiling!

Just remember, you can't assume someone is a violent terrorist just because they become a Muslim.

Tell that to William Long of Conway. Shot by a convert to Islam. Carlos Bledsoe became a Muslim, changed his name to Abdulhakim Muhammad, and then decided to go shoot American military personnel.

Here's the link.

You'll note that Muhammad is called the accused shooter. It's nice of the media to give him a presumption of innocence. I wonder if they've adjusted the articles about the killing of Abortionist Tiller in Kansas. The first articles referred to Scott Roeder simply as the shooter, the killer, the assassin in one article. Interesting, isn't it? A Muslim terrorist who cold-bloodedly slaughters a guy fresh home from boot camp gets presumed innocent. A man who murders a child-killer gets assumed guilty.

And you wonder what's going on here? Becaue I sure do.

June 2 2009

Proverbs 2:6 ->Learning should cycle back to knowledge of God, which illuminates all other knowledge.

Proverbs 2:9 ->Our understanding of justice issues should be Biblically driven, not socially informed. It's backwards to let society tell us how to behave as Christians.

Proverbs 2:10 ->Followers of God are pleased to learn.

Revelation 9:20 ->Repentance doesn't come from people's own decisions, it comes from the work of God.

1 Peter 1:1 ->Peter is not just "an" apostle; he's a very significant part of the church and its initial development. He's showing an important trait here: humility.

Quote: "The strongest principle of growth lies in human choice." -George Eliot

Thought: We pray, pray, pray, but God requires us to act! We must choose to obey Him, we must make choices to grow as we should.

Moving toward the Horizon,

Doug