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Mr Orson Scott Card, writing for the Rhinocerous Time of Greensboro, penned a scathing editorial on the state of journalism in America. He calls out the media in America, calling them a “Public Relations Machine of the Democratic Party.”
I highly recommend his piece entitled “Would the Last Honest Journalist Please Turn On the Lights?” Read it here.
Anne Jackson just put up a post about things people feel like they can’t say in church. The responses to her post were certainly eye opening. It’s true, isn’t it, that too often we tend to discourage plain talk at church in favor of “church talk.”
While we could certainly say that there are things which have no business being spoken anytime or anyplace, but why do we feel like we have to have a special language in church? I’ll tell you what I think it is. We create an environment in our churches where we encourage fake-ness. Oh, we say we want people to be real, but I’m not convinced that we always are ready to hear what might come out of their mouths if they were real.
People have got real issues, and are dealing with things that they don’t talk about at church. How do we encourage honesty and openness? Well someone has to be open and honest — it may (and should) have to start with leaders. We’ve got to admit we’re not perfect (a fact most people already know), and stop acting like we don’t have any faults or flaws — maybe at some point people expected their pastors to be perfect, but today they’ve seen enough to know that even pastors and church leaders aren’t without faults.
Another thing we’ve got to do is to show that we’re willing to love (and maybe even accept) people, even knowing that they’ve got problems. One of the major criticisms that people have about church is that we don’t love people like Jesus did.
But just wait, there’s more. I believe that as a church we should be willing to love and accept anyone. ANYONE. (yikes – just wait–God’s going to make live that out now. It’s easier said than done, because some people are really difficult, and hard to love). Don’t stop here, this is where it gets harder. Jesus did love everyone, and showed love especially to sinners and outcasts, but He didn’t just accept them — that wasn’t the end of it. He loved them too much to leave them where He found them. You see, Jesus demanded that people change. He accepted them, but then He told them to stop sinning.
As Church people, too often we want to accept people after they’ve changed and gotten it all together — hence the facade of “I’m ok, you’re ok.” That’s not how we should be.
As sinners, too often we want people to love us and accept us unconditionally, and let us do what we want. We don’t want to hear that we need to change. That’s not how we should be.
Love is hard, it takes work. So does life change. As a church we’ve got to be real, but we’ve got to help people make the necessary changes in their lives — and that means a big commitment.
I saw this posted yesterday by Steven Furtick, pastor of Elevation Church in Charlotte, NC.
He poses the Question, “What do you do when you really need rain, but instead, God answers by fire?”
What about when God turns up the heat, puts on more pressure, allows hard times? We must remember that God is God and that He has a plan. I encourage you to read the post, it encouraged me.
That message will preach brother!
I just got back from a trip to Atlanta and interviews at the North American Mission Board. It was quite a blessing and I really appreciate the folks at NAMB. I was blessed by the opportunities to see first-hand what they do and how they are using our Cooperative Program money to advance the Gospel.
My interview went well and I look forward to the opportunities I will have to serve in the future as a military chaplain. Also,I have been encouraged to give more and give better to missions, and to encourage others to be a part of the work of advancing the Gospel in North America. There are a staggering number of people living in North America (esp. Canada, US, and island territories) who have not been evangelized. I’ve been challenged once more to pray harder and look for more ways to be a part of the work of spreading the Gospel.
This week one of our church members bought out a showing of the movie Fireproof at a local theater. Our church made the tickets available, so my wife and I went to see the movie, along with many other church members, last night.
This movie is the third movie produced by Sherwood Pictures, a ministry of Sherwood Baptist Church in Albany, GA. Their previous release, Facing the Giants, was a big hit among the faith community and church crowd, but I never saw it. As a rule I’m pretty cynical about media that claims to be “Christian.” I think that there are a lot of low quality products hawked to church-goers under the guise of being a “Christian” book, album, movie, etc.
Still, when we got the chance to see Fireproof for free, we thought “why not?” And, let me tell, I am glad we did! I’d heard a little from others who warned me that the acting was mostly amateur, and that the production was not quite Hollywood Blockbuster quality, so my expectations were not too high. Having said all of that, I really enjoyed the movie. When others told me “the story makes up for everything else,” I thought it was like saying – “he/she’s ugly, but they’ve got a great personality.” You know what I mean?
The fact is that Fireproof is no “ugly duckling.” The story is quite compelling, and as a young husband and Christian I really enjoyed it. I felt at times during the movie convicted, encouraged, sad, excited, frustrated and full of mirth (you know, I laughed, I cried). I’ve always enjoyed most the movies that make me feel things, and this story certainly does that. There are great moments of tension, action, and some funny moments in addition to some very tender times.
What I love the most is that there is a certain realism to the movie. This is something that so many Christian products lack. The gospel is told in the movie, but it doesn’t seem forced upon the story. The movie deals with some of the very real issues within marriage, love, and relationships. It was also nice to hear some actors and actresses with real southern accents (not fake Hollywood ones). There were many moments where I found myself thinking — “this is how real people talk/act” –as opposed to how movie people talk and act.
On the whole, I left the movie last night, not only pleasantly surprised, but impressed with Fireproof. Sherwood Pictures certainly shows that they know how to make a movie, and that Christian movies can have quality too.
When will the government bailouts end? When will this time of financial crisis end? Let me submit to you that it will not end with the election of one of these candidates. Rather, our economic woes in America will continue until we recognize the fact that we must all learn to live within our means (especially Congress). Until Americans, and our leaders learn to control ourselves and not spend more than we make, our economic future will always be in doubt.
The Debt Clock
Check out this story I found today through Drudge Report: The Debt Clock in New York, which shows passersby the tally of our national debt, ran out of digits. I’m serious – read here. What’s that? You didn’t think I was joking? Yeah, I believed it immediately too. 14 digits apparently isn’t enough – that’s tens of trillions of dollars (we’re talking about millions of dollars per household). It was bound to happen with our congress and their spending habits. They’re like junkies and their drug of choice is other people’s money (yours and mine).
The Next Bailout
So as I was watching the news this afternoon, I saw the next bailout waiting to happen. Here it is.
Yahoo News also reported that GM’s stocks have fallen to a 50 year low. Their stock is now worth what it was in 1950. Less than $5 per share. Ouch. I feel for the shareholders — hold on, the bailout is coming. Why? Because GM (and the other “big three” automakers) has long been considered a cornerstone of the US economy. Officials in the Treasury department are already having fits over this, I’m sure. They’re already trying to figure out how to bail out the automakers. Plus if GM goes, not only does our economy go, but also one of the leading producers of Green automobiles. Oh yes, it’s true.
Bailout Failure
The bailout situation is almost laughable – except it’s actually happening! The amount of money being spent is ridiculous. We’re not even talking about real money anymore — they’re just making it up as the spend it. Nobody in Congress will have to pay it back, because they’ll all be dead (or at least out of office–God willing) when the time comes to pay the piper.
Oh Lord, please deliver us!
I saw a story yesterday that I thought worthy of comment. Let me know what you think.
So here’s the story:
“Blindness,” based on a book by Nobel Prize-winning author Jose Saramago and directed by Academy Award nominee Fernando Meirelles, depicts a city in the thrall of a virus that suddenly robs its citizens of their sight. Soon society collapses and stricken descend into a brutal Hobbesian new order. When the book came out, it was praised for its use of blindness as a metaphor. But as the movie is about to be released, it has been lambasted by Dr. Marc Maurer, President of the National Federation of the Blind.
To read the whole statement from the NFB go here.
Here’s what I think:
1) I have neither seen the movie nor read the book, so I’m not sure how seriously to take the claims of the NFB.
2) The NFB statement is right in saying that Blind people are able to live their lives and do most things that seeing people are able to do.
3) This type of protest is becoming more and more frequent. It seems that many many films these days offend someone. I don’t think that the blame can all be laid squarely upon the filmmakers. I think many individuals and groups find things offensive because they choose to be offended.
There are many things that Hollywood does that I, as a conservative Christian, find offensive. However, these sorts of protests and boycotts are simply opportunities to draw attention — to activists and to whatever it is that they are protesting.
I believe that there are times when offense and protest might be warranted, but too often these days it seems that look for excuses to be offended. I truly feel sorry for those who live their lives that way.
Are these two mutually exclusive? Should Christians be competitive or non-competitive. I’m specifically thinking about sports.
There’s context here, so maybe I’d better explain myself. Our church has a fantastic youth ministry. One of the events that this ministry does every year is a youth flag football tournament. Sunday afternoon our youth and their friends descended upon the local high school’s practice fields. We had a great time. The last games that were played pitted student ministry workers against the church staff team, and then the staff against the top student team. I have to confess, our staff is really competitive.
So we won the game against the youth staff and played the final game against the students. We tied them and scored in the overtime on a trick play. Some folks expressed some disagreement with the running of a trick play, indicating that it was wrong for us to go so hard against the students. It’s true we played hard and didn’t pull any punches.
All this got me thinking, should Christians be competitive? Or should Christians instead encourage non-competitive pursuits and methods so that everyone can win?
I think of Paul, who often uses examples from sporting events in his letters. He talks about playing to win — he’s referring to how we live the Christian life. Does it then follow that Christians ought to “play to win?” Does this have anything to do with doing our best, or are the two unrelated?
What do you think?
