3/31/07

Pops from the Past

I've been thinking about the past a lot this week--and it's a good thing. Sometimes it just seems like a series of events and people from the past visit our present--all at once--and we can't help but reflect. And maybe it's the time of year; April 10 is the anniversary of Jon's death. And while I don't dwell on that date anymore, I think it's still there, among my memories, even though I'm not consciously focused on it.

So last night I was having a lovely evening with a favorite friend, and I was telling him about some of the blasts from the past that I had experienced this week, which led to a conversation about some of the hard things that I've had to deal with: the death of my sister and husband, an ugly church split, trying to find a new church home with a four-year-old and two-year-old in tow, and particularly the sense of isolation I had felt through it all, the sad reality that I really didn't have many friends through much of it.

And then I realized that I had something new to bring to the story--the happy reality that God had preserved me through it all (great is His faithfulness), that we now are members of a wonderful church and hear the faithful preaching of the gospel every week, and--for this "social butterfly"--the blessing of many treasured friends. And those blasts aren't really blasts at all--just tiny pops that remind me of a rough patch on an otherwise joyful journey.

3/29/07

What Does a Biblical Relationship Look Like?

It's an interesting place to be--this singleness as an adult. Especially as an adult with children. And so whenever the subject of dating comes up in a newsletter, a new book, in an article, or just in daily conversation, I'm interested. I'm also interested because I have a fifteen-year-old girl who thinks it sounds like a fun thing to do, but I haven't really had to deal with dating as a parent--only as a single woman trying to find her way.

It's not an easy thing to master--this dating thing. Conducted unwisely or carelessly, it results in far more pain than pleasure. And I've often thought that there must be a better way. So an article that I found today at www.Boundless.org shares some of the conclusions that I have drawn based on good and bad experiences, a lot of thinking, and a lot of reflection on just how God does want us to conduct ourselves with members of the opposite sex when we aren't married. The article, "What Does a Biblical Relationship Look Like?" by Scott Croft, an elder at the Capitol Hill Baptist Church, contrasts the differences between courtship and dating.

Croft defines courtship and dating, and then he discusses three broad differences beween what he calls biblical courtship and modern dating. Courtship, he says, begins when a single man approaches a single woman by going through the woman's father (or appropriate authority) and then conducts the relationship with the woman under that authority. Courtship has marriage as its goal. Dating, on the other hand, begins when either a man or woman initiates a relationship, with more-than-friends as the goal. The relationship is conducted outside of any authority. It may or may not have marriage as a goal.

First, Croft sees a difference in motive. The motive behind courtship is to find a spouse. A man initiates a relationship with a woman because he believes it is possible he will marry her; the courtship is to determine whether that belief is correct. Dating, on the other hand, may not (and often doesn't) have marriage as a goal at all. Recreation and fun are often the motivation. So in modern dating, the more experience a person gathers is good, because by trial and error we discover the spouse who is right for us. In this approach, people often become physically and emotionally intimate with many people before settling down with one. Croft, who teaches on this subject in his church, advises singles that if they cannot see themselves happily married in less than one year, then they are not ready to date. (And while I agree that a prolonged process is certainly not ideal, I'd be reluctant to be so assertive with a time line such as "less than a year." But I think his point may be the one I've made with my daughter, that dating is for those who are prepared to be married within a reasonable amount of time.)

The second contrast Croft draws is in mindset. Modern dating is selfish in nature--the whole process is about me. People approach members of the opposite sex asking, "Will this person make me happy? Have I done as well as I can do--or might someone better come along? What is the chemistry between us like?" Of course the biblical motivation for marriage calls for sacrifice (cf. Philippians 2:3, Ephesians 5:25). A man should be looking for a godly woman as defined by Scripture, one that he loves and is attracted to, but instead of asking, "How can I find the one for me?" he should be asking, "How can I be the one for her?"

Croft's third contrast is concerned with method, and he sums it up this way: In dating, intimacy precedes commitment; in courtship, commitment precedes intimacy. He addresses both emotional and physical intimacy here. In modern dating, he sees couples acting like they are married to see if, in fact, they want to commit to marriage. They share their deepest thoughts and feelings with each other, spend lots of time alone together, and become physically intimate. If it all works well, the couple gets married. But if it doesn't work out, the couple breaks up. And there can be several broken relationships before a person arrives at a lasting one. The goal with dating is to gather as much information and experience with a person as possible to ensure the right decision is being made. But this implies a marriage-level commitment where one does not exist. And much damage is done and many are deeply hurt by this type of relationship.

With a courtship, commitment precedes intimacy. In 1 Timothy 5:1-2, Paul tells Timothy to treat younger women as sisters, with all purity. In this model, the goal of spending time together is to get to know one another so that the couple can make a wise decision regarding marriage, and conversation topics and activities should all have this in view. In relating to one another before marriage, men should not treat women as though they are their wives, physically or emotionally. The end result of this type of relationship is that women are treated with respect and are honored, even as they are being pursued.

Most of us date as young people who have much to learn. We often make mistakes as we grow into our adult lives and take more and more responsibility for decision making from our parents. There is a greater cost to some mistakes than others, and probably the costliest mistakes of all occur in our relationships with members of the opposite sex.

I've been in the unique position of being an adult navigating the dating world, and at one time, I believed that the modern approach to dating was the only way--a "necessary evil" for those who hoped to be married. I was aware that a few lonely voices were crying out that the courtship model was the way to go, but it sounded old-fashioned and silly to me--way beyond what was required. And having experienced both the modern dating approach and the courtship approach, I have to say that I've found courtship to be wiser and more meaningful than any dating relationship I have ever experienced. It's the way I'll be encouraging both my children to take, and hopefully there will be other parents out there who will be encouraging their children in that same way.

3/27/07

Not So Great Hymns of the Faith: "He Lives"

It was suggested that I take a look at this hymn for my series, "Not So Great Hymns of the Faith," and it actually does share a theme with last week's selection, "In the Garden." There is also a kind of inverse correspondence between this hymn and the sermon for Sunday, March 25.

So for those of you who may be wondering if you missed something somewhere, I explained the rationale for my selections for the "Not So Great Hymns of the Faith" in the March 19, 2007, posting. But as a reminder, my comments are concerned with whether these songs are the best choices for corporate worship. They may be expressive of truth, they may be beautifully penned, they may be meaningful in the appropriate setting; the question is, Are these the best choices for a worship service where we are to be focused on honoring our God?

As I consider the lyrics to both "In the Garden" and "He Lives," I am reminded, oddly enough, of my Introduction to Philosophy class at Cedarville College (now University), and our beloved philosophy professor, Mr. (now Dr.) Grier. We were in awe of this Calvinist-teacher-in-a-Baptist-college who had studied at Westminster Seminary under teachers like Van Til, Murray, and Young. To say that we admired and respected our Mr. Grier is an understatement. So I will never forget the lecture on epistemology in which Mr. Grier told us about his favorite hymn. When Mr. Grier asked, "Do you know what my favorite hymn is," I was on the edge of my seat. I just knew he was going to name some glorious Reformation anthem that could be found in the Trinity Hymnal or some Psalter somewhere. But his answer was completely unexpected: "Jesus Loves Me." What? That's a Sunday school song; that's the first song a child learns as soon as he or she is capable of talking. But the explanation was powerful: "Jesus loves me, This I know, For the Bible tells me so." In its simplicity, the child's hymn expresses a profound truth: We know of Jesus and His love, we know of truth itself, not because of how we feel in our hearts or because of some kind of emotional lift that tells us the Holy Spirit has taken up residence, and not because God Himself speaks to us in a still, small voice or walks with us in the garden--but because the inspired Word of God tells us--in no uncertain words--so.

And that brings me to the lyrics for this week's choice:

I serve a risen Savior, He's in the world today;
I know that He is living whatever men may say;
I see His hand of mercy, I hear His voice of cheer,
And just the time I need Him, He's always near.

Refrain:
He lives, He lives, Christ Jesus lives today!
He walks with me and talks with me along life's narrow way.
He lives, He lives, salvation to impart!
You ask me how I know He lives? He lives within my heart.


In all the world around me I see His loving care,
And tho' my heart grows weary I never will despair;
I know that He is leading thro' all the stormy blast,
The day of His appearing will come at last.

Rejoice, rejoice, O Christian, lift up your voice and sing
Eternal hallelujahs to Jesus Christ the King!
The hope of all who seek Him, the help of all who find,
None other is so loving, so good and kind.

There really isn't anything untruthful in the verses of this song. The first person dominates, however, which makes me question how well suited this song is for worship.

Again, if our attention is to be drawn to our God and to worshipping Him alone in all of His majesty, power, and glory, then why would we want to sing about what we do? In any earthly endeavor, if we gather to honor another person for some accomplishment, we wouldn't think about talking about ourselves and what we do, and yet this is so often what the church does when it gathers for corporate worship. And so we forget why we're really there, caught up in an emotionally uplifting melody that pleases our sensibilities.

What I find most problematic in this song is the chorus, with its emphasis on a subjective experience with and knowledge of God. Like "In the Garden," God walks with us and talks with us. And yet He doesn't. His Son walked and dwelt among us at a point in history, but He doesn't today. And He does talk to us--through His Word. But then we do get to the problem of how we know He lives: "He lives within my heart." But there are those who don't believe He lives, because He doesn't live within their hearts. So does that make Him alive for those of us who feel Him in our hearts and not alive for those who don't? And I have to admit that if the truth of God's existence were dependent on what I feel in my heart, some days I would have to wonder.

Thankfully, this is not how we know He lives. This is not how we know truth. The apostle John tells us in 1 John 1:3--What we have seen and heard we proclaim to you also, that you may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ. You ask me how I know He lives? The Bible tells me so.

3/25/07

1 John 2:3-11: Keeping His Commands

As our pastor was preaching from 1 John this afternoon in his continuing series on this epistle, I couldn't help but think that this was a book for people whose minds function like mine--people who like written instructions, checklists, and--above all--order. And I also thought about my first really close look at this book when I was a college student and I was struggling with assurance of salvation; Jon, then my fiance, pointed me to this book, which gives us proof after proof to test ourselves and then be reassured (or not) about our salvation. This book establishes once and for all that our status in Christ is not dependent on ourselves or our feelings, and that's a huge comfort for a recovering Baptist. I loved this book then, and I love it now.

In his introduction, our pastor pointed out that this passage is a description of those who are keeping commandments--nowhere here are we commanded to keep the commandments. We are then given four proofs for checking ourselves to know whether we truly know God.

John is very straightforward in v. 3: "And by this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments." This is not a knowing about God, like someone we have read about in a book. We may have information about and knowledge of someone we have read about, but we don't really know that person. John is talking about knowing the true God. The second thing to note in this verse is that we don't come to know God by being obedient. This is not a conditional situation. In fact, this is an objective standard--His commandments. No one who truly knows God would think that it doesn't matter what he or she does. Keeping God's commandments is the result, the response, to the grace of God, who saves us and is known by us.

The second proof, in v. 4, is if we know God, we speak the truth. This is not a matter of recalling facts. If we know Him, the truth is now in us; it is a part of us. In Jeremiah 31:33, God says that He will write His law on our hearts. This heart knowing is the truth that we live and speak. Again, if we truly know God, we will live His way. Today there are many who reason differently; for example, there are some who would argue this way: "I know a man who really loves God, and he is a homosexual, but he really loves God, so it must be okay to be a homosexual." There is no disconnect between knowing God and living in truth and obedience. God's truth changes us; we don't change His law.

A third proof is perfected love (v. 5), and this is a recurring theme in 1 John. Love from God is made complete in us--it is accomplished. It is impossible for us not to keep His word when His love is perfected in us. Our heart of disobedience has been cast out. Because God loves us, we desire to be obedient. Our obedience does not make God love us. This understanding is the opposite of works righteousness.

The fourth proof is union with God in verse 6. "The one who abides in [Christ] ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked." Out of this abiding in Christ is our abiding in God the Father. Colossians 3:1 tells us we have union with Christ and the Father, and fruit will accompany that union. We are branches in the vine (Christ), so we must bear fruit. God gives us this blessed life because of our salvation, and yet we are not perfect in our obedience, but we live differently. So how do we understand that at times we sin and still rest assured that we keep His commandments and know Him? A series of "D" words helps us understand this:

1. We know there is a divide--that there is a difference between obedience and disobedience.
2. We experience deep dissatisfaction when we disobey--we are distressed by our sin.
3. We delight in obedience.
4. With great diligence, we seek to be ever more faithful in obedience--to God's glory.
5. Development--we continue to grow in discipleship, in our walk (another prominent theme in this book).

This is how we can have the comfort of knowing that have come to know Him if we keep His commandments.

3/22/07

Jerome


This is my lovely daughter, Katie, who is playing the role of Jerome, a little French-Polynesian boy in South Pacific, her school's musical. Normally Katie looks more like an Irish girl--red hair, freckles (especially in the summer), fair skin, and blue eyes. But she's enamored with the stage, and so she will do quite a bit to get into character.

Other factors besides acting and singing ability that may have helped her get this role: She is a little bit height challenged, so it isn't as big a stretch (pun intended) to play a child, and she has had French for almost two years, the language of her character.


So tonight is opening night for Katie and her fellow actors at South Christian High School, and I remember from my own high school musical days that there are few things in life during those years more exciting than opening night, than having worked hard and having some fun on the way, and worrying about that one major character who still didn't have his or her lines down at dress rehearsal . . .


And lest he feel left out, Jonathan, my son, tells me he got a 100 percent on his history test today. So there is much joy and celebration at our house this week!

3/20/07

How Do I Teach My Sons?

An interesting conversation at the lunch table at work today. Three women co-workers and I were (again) bemoaning the fact that clothes just are not being made for women who want to be modest, are no longer teenagers, and have given birth at some point. Then the conversation evolved into the difficulty those of us with teenage girls have finding decent clothes for them to wear. For those who genuinely desire to dress modestly, it is discouraging. Low-rise jeans; midriff-baring, skin-tight t-shirts; bikinis; and shorts that are way too short are the Christian mother and teen girl's nightmare--if they want to be modest.

Our conversation then turned to our speculations about the mothers and daughters who don't seem to be at all concerned about modesty, especially among those claiming to be Christian. We observed that often mothers themselves don't dress modestly, so it only follows that their daughters wouldn't.

I've always been surprised at the excuses Christian parents, especially, make for allowing their daughters to dress provocatively. When confronted, some seem surprised, as though much is being made of nothing. One mother actually told me that the immodest bikini her thirteen-year-old daughter was wearing made her feel more grown-up since she hadn't been as quick to develop physically as her friends.

But today, as we were finishing lunch, a married couple (parents of two teenage boys) joined our table and added their own concerns. The father asked a disturbing, but thoughtful, question: How do I teach my sons to show respect for these girls when they dress so immodestly?

That's a good question, and I do appreciate that there are men out there asking it (especially since I'm the mother of an almost-sixteen-year-old girl). In Designed by God, author Regina Franklin writes about the issues of modesty, beauty, and self-image for young women. She reminds them, "Our value is not determined by what we wear, but what we wear communicates what we think our value is." If we're wearing immodest clothing, she says, we're sending the message that our bodies aren't worth protecting and aren't very valuable. And this is the difficulty for my friend who is trying to teach his sons to respect young women who are not being taught to respect their own bodies and the godly principles that have been set in place for how they should be dressing.

Perhaps mothers need to take more seriously the young men who are receiving the message their daughters are being allowed to send. Franklin quotes from Every Young Man's Battle by Arterburn, et al., where a young man explains the challenge he faces: "Our eyes give us men the means to sin broadly and at will . . . We have a visual ignition switch when it comes to viewing the female anatomy. Women seldom understand this because they aren't sexually stimulated in the same way . . . Because women can't relate, they have little mercy on us and rarely choose to dress modestly."

So as summer approaches with the tendency to wear fewer clothes, perhaps the best lesson we can teach our children is respect--for God's Word, which teaches us to be modest; for our own bodies, which are the temples of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:19-20); and for our brothers and sisters in Christ, so that we don't tempt them to sin. Ladies, especially, let's not make it such a difficult task for dads to teach their sons how to treat your daughters in a Christ-honoring way.

And I do recommend Regina Franklin's Designed by God (Discovery House Publishers) to moms and daughters as excellent pre-summer reading.

3/19/07

Not-So-Great Hymns of the Faith: In the Garden

Today I am beginning a new (possibly weekly) feature on Head and Heart: "Not-So-Great Hymns of the Faith." The title of this feature is derived from the popular hymnal called Great Hymns of the Faith, or, in our congregation, "the red book" (as opposed to "the blue book," The Psalter Hymnal). Caution: This feature is not for the faint of heart. Somewhere along the line, I will probably pick on a hymn that is incredibly meaningful to you for some reason--it was your dad's favorite, it was sung at Grandma's funeral, it was the first one you learned to play on the piano. But we must never let our personal experiences define our worship. We must always look to the One we are worshipping and ask ourselves how He wants us to worship Him--and that may not include that old family favorite.

My main concern is whether the songs that we're singing in church really ought to be part of our service of worship. I'm not suggesting these songs should be banished from the earth; they may have their place in our lives. I actually have a pretty large library of contemporary Christian music, and--true confessions--one of my favorites is Steven Curtis Chapman. But it's one thing to be singing along in the car or as I get ready for work, and it's another thing entirely to be in the presence of God, worshipping Him with His people.

So I go back a few weeks ago to a sermon our pastor preached on Exodus 15, the song of deliverance Moses and Israel sang in praise to God upon being rescued from the Egyptian army. (I would suggest you read the text, and if you're really interested, you can probably download the sermon from the Bethany URC site and listen to it; it was excellent.) This song, inspired by the Holy Spirit, establishes a pattern for the songs we ought to be using in worship. One of the important characteristics is that the song is entirely focused on God and His great work. The only time the pronoun "I" is used is at the beginning, when the singers sing, "I will sing unto the Lord," and briefly later on in the chapter when the singers are quoting the enemy in verse 9. Another of my favorites, Michael Horton, says in A Better Way: Rediscovering the Drama of Christ-Centered Worship: "We do not come to church to affirm our faithfulness, our devotion, our praise, and our up-to-the-minute emotional state but to be addressed, undressed, and re-dressed by God. Only when this fact is central are we in any position to faithfully praise God as 'our reasonable service.'" So if we're going to church to worship God, the songs we sing ought to be about Him.

With all that said, the first not-so-great hymn, In the Garden, is based on the Scripture passage where Mary Magdalene meets Jesus in the garden after His resurrection. Here are verse 1 and the refrain:

I come to the garden alone
While the dew is still on the roses
And the voice I hear falling on my ear
The Son of God discloses.

And He walks with me,
and He talks with me,
And He tells me I am His own;
And the joy we share as we tarry there,
None other has ever known.

This, to me, would seem to be one of the most un-Reformed hymns we sing in our church. There is a reason it is in the red book and not in the blue Psalter. (Why we even need the red book is another question entirely.) It definitely does not follow the pattern of Exodus 15, with a focus on the almighty, great, and glorious God. The focal point in this song is the first-person "I," a pronoun that occurs (along with "me" and "we") over and over. This song is only loosely based on the account of Mary Magdelene, because there really is no mention in the Scriptures of roses or dew or, as other verses of the song describe, sweet birds hushing their singing, a ringing heart, and His voice of woe calling. (Why would Jesus' voice be woeful? He is the victorious King who has just conquered sin and death and risen from the dead.)

My next question is why would the rest of us be singing a song about Mary Magdalene's personal experience? Again, who are we there to worship? Mary and her experience? The preponderance of the pronoun "I" would lead me to believe that this is Mary's experience somehow translated to me, here in the twenty-first century. Somehow (time travel?) I'm now sharing this with her. So in this case, now I'm singing about myself in a worship service that is supposed to be devoted to God.

So when we're singing these words, what are we saying about ourselves? The sappy sentimentality of the song suggests the individual's mystical encounter with Christ. He walks with me, talks with me, and tells me I am His own. Isn't this counter to the Reformation principle of sola scriptura, that our understanding and knowledge of God is based on the Scriptures alone--not on a pietistical, mystical experience? We're present corporately in the worship service to hear God's Word declared to us by the minister, and yet we're all singing about our private, subjective experiences with Christ.

Whenever this song is selected, I actually have a hard time singing it, because the whole thing is counter to what I'm supposed to be thinking about and focusing on when I'm present in a worship service devoted to the Triune God. But the song's popularity has lasted--somehow--for almost a hundred years. Certainly God is better worshipped with songs like Exodus 15 that talk about His greatness, His power, His triumph over His enemies than with some human's subjective, mystical, and individualistic experience.

We need to think--take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ--about the songs we are singing in worship. If we truly believe that this is our act of reasonable service and gathering to worship is something that we do in faithful obedience to honor our God, then we need to be sure that the songs we are singing will, in fact, honor Him and not simply please our own musical tastes. Songs like Exodus 15 and the entire book of Psalms are God's inspired songs for His people. We have no excuse for not praising Him in the way that He desires to be praised. He has shown us clearly in His Word what pleases Him.

3/18/07

Walking in the Light

The text for this afternoon's sermon was 1 John 1:5-2:2. In the first few verses of this book, the focus is on Christ, the Word of Life. The focus of this passage now turns to God Himself.

In telling us that He is light, God is communicating to us a measure of His essence. In Scripture, light is identified with truth and purity. Of course, evil is associated with darkness, and that is why nothing that is dark touches God at all. God has called us to walk in the light, to identify with the God who is light.

John provides a series of three false claims so that we can test whether we are, in fact, walking in the light. The first false claim occurs when a person says that he has fellowship with God, yet walks in darkness. Those who would claim this have no conception that God is light, that there is sin. They do not know who God is, or what His will (His law) is for their lives. In verse 7, the opposite is declared: "If we walk in the light as He Himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin." Here John is contrasting a lifestyle of evil--walking in darkness--with a lifestyle of righteousness--walking in light. The cleansing of verse 7 is an ongoing process that moves us on in a lifestyle of walking in the light.

The second false claim is presented in verse 8: those who say they have no sin. There are actual churches who claim that once we are Christians, we have no sin. But true Christians recognize that they sin, and they confess that sin daily. We must mourn our sins and confess them. We also know that God will bring His child to a point of confession, and when we do confess our sins, we know that He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins (see Hebrews 10:21-22).

The third false claim is by those who say they have never sinned. The true focus of all of this is that we do have an Advocate, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the only one who can truly say that He has no sin, that He has never sinned. This righteous one is our Advocate. The child of God cannot take sin lightly. It must be our desire to walk in the light. We look to Christ, the one who has borne God's wrath for our sin. Through Him our sin is forgiven, and through Him we walk in the light.

3/15/07

Gay Babies? Whatever...

Today, class, will be a lesson in not necessarily believing what the mainstream media says is true; it is always wise when something sounds not quite right to check the source. It would seem that the media does tend to take conservatives--especially religious conservatives--to task. And I realize that this is not an especially profound or insightful observation, and yet I'm always a little surprised at the audacity of some to twist the words of others and how quickly the public is willing to accept the "he said/she said" accounts they read or watch.

Today during a break at work, I decided to check my AOL account for e-mails. Of course en route to accessing my mail, I saw the day's major headlines flashing before my eyes. As I skimmed through the list, I saw this headline: "Furor Over Baptist's 'Gay Baby' Article." A little surprised to see the words "Baptist," "gay," and "baby" all in the same headline, I decided to look a little further. I learned from the article that Dr. Albert Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Seminary, "has incurred sharp attacks from both the left and the right by suggesting that a biological basis for homosexuality may be proven, and that prenatal treatment to reverse gay orientation would be biblically justified." I was a bit intrigued, because I don't know a lot about Dr. Mohler, but I do know that he has been instrumental in spearheading the Founders' Movement among Southern Baptists, in an effort to return this church to its roots as expressed in the London Confession. I also know that he was one of the leaders named last fall in a Christianity Today article who is now making it "cool" to be a Calvinist. (I've always known that was cool.) And now AP reporter David Crary is saying he has written a "Gay Baby" article.

Apparently the religious community is upset with Mohler for saying that scientifc research "points to some level of biological causation" for homosexuality because this leads to the thinking that homosexuals have no moral choice about being homosexual. Gay-rights groups are upset because Mohler says that even if there is a biological basis for homosexuality, it is still sinful. They even claim that he supports medical treatment for babies before they are born that would alter their sexual orientation if it is determined that they are homosexual. Some gay-rights blogs are comparing Mohler to Josef Mengele, the Nazi doctor famous for death-camp experimentation.

My first thought was, Oh, great, another evangelical leader has shot off his mouth again, and now it's one who has even been labeled "Reformed". And then I realized, This is the information age. I bet I can access Dr. Mohler's article and find out if he really is guilty of reckless thinking.

Not only did I read Dr. Mohler's article, but I added his blog to my favorites. The newspaper article was referring to a blog posting on March 2 entitled "Is Your Baby Gay? What If You Could Know? What If You Could Do Something about It?" Note that "Gay Babies" is nowhere in the title. Also note that the tone of the article from the start is hypothetical. (The use of the word "if" and the question marks are dead giveaways.) Mohler goes on to report in his blog that scientists who have been researching whether there is a genetic disposition to homosexuality are finding some evidence "that biological factors may at least contribute to sexual orientation."
These scientists are basing their findings on research conducted on sheep.

Mohler also reports:

What makes the sheep "sexual partner preference testing" research so interesting is that the same scientists who are documenting the rather surprising sexual behaviors of male sheep think they can also change the sexual orientation of the animals. In other words, finding a biological causation for homosexuality may also lead to the discovery of a "cure" for the same phenomenon.

To the right: Note that Mohler himself is not making any assertions about whether homosexuality is biologically based. He simply is reporting about and even quoting the scientists who are conducting a study. In fact, in his conclusion Mohler points out that there is no widely accepted proof that any biological basis for sexual orientation exists. He says that given the effects of the fall, it wouldn't be surprising to learn this is true but that the Bible still condemns homosexuality, and the discovery of a "gay gene" would not overturn that moral verdict. In fact, Mohler explains, having this knowledge, if it were true, would enable pastors and churches to more effectively help those struggling with this sexual temptation.

To the left: Mohler reminds us that all humans are made in God's image. "All persons . . . are equally made in the image of God." Again, he carefully couches his ideas about prenatal treatment in a series of hypotheticals, and, in fact, he's basing his speculations on suggestions from the scientists conducting the study: "If a biological basis is found, and if a prenatal test is then developed, and if a successful treatment to reverse the sexual orientation to heterosexual is ever developed, we would support its use as we should unapologetically support the use of any appropriate means to avoid sexual temptation and the inevitable effects of sin" (emphasis added). Sounds a little different than the writer of the AP article put it. And a little more compassionate than Josef Mengele.

So I came away from this experience with a high regard for Dr. Mohler. His article is well written, well reasoned from Scripture, and highly respectful without compromising biblical principle. I would highly recommend that those readers of this blog who enjoy reading the writings of thinking Christians check out Dr. Mohler's blog.

If I could so easily locate Dr. Mohler's on-line article, read and comprehend it, and then quote it accurately here, why couldn't the paid, experienced AP reporter do it?

Find Dr. Mohler's article here: http://www.albertmohler.com/blog

3/13/07

Stranger Than Fiction

Stranger Than Fiction is a recent DVD release that I expected to enjoy, but I ended up enjoying it for unexpected reasons.

With Will Ferrell playing the main character, I was waiting for Elf--a sweet, funny, and somewhat juvenile comedy. But Will Ferrell proved that he could be more than just funny; he actually can act. Ferrell plays IRS auditor Harold Crick, whose life is completely predictable. He knows how many teeth he has and how many times he will brush each one every morning. There is no variation in his life, until one morning when he hears a voice narrating his every action, every move: the voice of novelist Kay Eiffel, except one of the big questions for Harold for much of the movie is whose voice is he hearing, and why.

This movie asks the big questions: Is my life controlled by fate? Do I have anything to do with my destiny? Is the narrator making the events occur, or do they happen first, and she is just giving a play by play? And interestingly, another thread runs through the film about the role the small, seemingly meaningless circumstances of life play in how things turn out. In fact, what sets things in motion for Harold, the voiceover tells us, is his watch. (I'm not going to tell you how.)

As it turns out, Eiffel is a talented, acclaimed novelist who hasn't published in awhile. The hallmark of her novels is that all of her characters die at the end, and this is the problem for her as she tells Harold's story: how to kill him off. So Harold's quest for much of the movie is to found out whose voice is narrating his story, and why. And all the while, Eiffel is trying to create a poetic way of killing Harold off.

I don't want to give anything away here, but as Harold's character evolves from an IRS auditor whose life is, well, boring to someone who learns to live, he seeks advice from a literature professor played by Dustin Hoffman. He also has an interesting encounter with a baker who is making a political statement by not paying all of her taxes.

I don't know that we really get any solid responses to the big questions; the answers seem nebulous. But I suppose that for one whose starting point is not a sovereign God, no real answers is probably a more honest approach. Does fate control our lives? The answer seems at times to be yes. Do we have anything to do with controlling our fate? Yes again--maybe. I think my favorite insight of the movie is how seemingly small things can play a significant role in our lives. I hear echoes of not despising the day of small things, and I think of a God who uses weak things and weak people to display His power.

The movie is a little quirky but not so intense in dealing with the "big questions" to make it an intellectual exercise. For viewers like me who enjoy writers, plot lines, and how stories take shape, this is a fun, often insightful, and entertaining look at the creative process with interesting characters portrayed well. Get it in your NetFlix queue soon!

3/12/07

At the Core

This is the last post on New York City--I promise! But the real reason we were there was to learn more about what is happening in the book publishing business, and this was the first overtly non-Christian conference of this sort that I attended, so it was a little like going to Babylon for an education. But there is much that can be learned from Babylon, as long as we use discernment.

The keynote speaker of the Book Business Expo was Jeffrey Cole, director of the Center for the Digital Future, who discussed the implications of Internet use for book publishing. The good news is that reading books on-line is still not popular, but I suspect that reading books in general is not popular, based on my research of the two teens living in my home. But Dr. Cole believes that some book reading will go on, so we all heaved a collective sigh of relief.

Next I attended a session on repurposing content, again with a view to the Internet. When a book publisher repurposes content, it takes already existing material and repackages it, and in this case attention was given to taking a printed product to a different print format. It was in this session that I learned my favorite buzz phrase of the conference: digital natives. Digital natives are people who are age 25 and younger, and if anyone 25 or younger lives in your home, I don't need to go any further in explaining this term. Of course the strategies of repackaging content now for the Internet are critical, and publishers need to make sure that the content they're providing is visible to the search engines, a strategy known as SEO (search engine optimization).

Later sessions addressed "The Long Tail," which is a reference to a popular book among publishers that prescribes strategies for publishers to take advantage of sales of their backlists, or those titles that have been around for awhile. The new trend there is print-on-demand publishing, where publishers rid themselves of inventory and its expenses by hooking up with a printer that functions kind of like a glorified Kinko's. When a retailer runs out of one of your titles, they contact the printer, who has the appropriate files and prints off as many copies of a book as needed. The printer receives an order by 2:00 in the afternoon, and by 4:30 a.m. the books are printed and shipped. As one print-on-demand company rep told M. and me, there are no longer any out-of-print books because as long as files exist, a person can always obtain any book he or she wants. An interesting idea, but the costs per unit at this point are holding most publishers back, even though we were assured that all would balance out because the need for inventory and its storage would be eliminated.

On Tuesday, after a rather lengthy keynote advertisement for Google, I attended an interesting session on how to crash a book. In this case, a senior editor from Vintage Books who looked like he was about 25 told his adventure story of turning around "The Iraq Report" in 24 days. An interesting adventure story for an editor! I did attend a session on the practical use of XML. I'm still not sure what it is, but I know that if our publishing company has any hopes of survival, we'd better have it.

It was an excellent learning experience, and it was the first publishing conference I've attended where the major theme was not trying to reach Gen X, a problem most major Christian publishers seem to obsess over. It was a breath of fresh air. The theme of this conference seemed to be a more direct approach--any form of media that hopes to survive with any age group must learn to take advantage of the Internet. It was a great learning experience that inspired some interesting ideas for the three of us who attended from our publishing house.

3/11/07

Hearing the Word of Life (1 John 1:1-4)

Good news for those of you who like reading my sermon posts. Our church now has a website where Pastor Freswick's sermons are downloadable: www.bethanyurc.com/sermons.htm

I guess this makes my sermon blogs obsolete, but I like writing them down, so they will still be here anyway. It's my blog!

This afternoon's sermon was from 1 John 1:1-4. I suspect that we're starting a new series on this New Testament epistle. Two of the themes we will be looking at are these: 1 John tells us that we are either children of God or we are not; also, John wants us not to have any doubts about our salvation.

In chapter 1, the Word of Life is set before us so that our joy may be full, and we experience fullness of joy through a certain knowledge that we have eternal life. This Word of Life is not separate from Jesus Christ, who is the Word made flesh (John 1). In fact, this Word is the Christ of Life. This Word was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we beheld and what our hands handled. Our pastor pointed out that in the original Greek, verses 1-4 were all one sentence, with the main verb being "declared" in verse 3. (I actually remember this from my brief study of Greek my senior year at Cedarville University, where 1 John was what we translated.) John sets forth Jesus as the Word in contrast to the Greek belief that anything that is physical is evil, and that is all captured in the Greek concept of "word". The Holy Spirit, through the writers of Scripture, redefines "word," so that the Word becomes flesh and dwells among us. This would have been a ridiculous notion to the Greeks. So John's focus becomes the humanity of Christ, although his explaining that the Word was from the beginning also is an expression of His divinity.

So John begins his letter by establishing this as an apostolic declaration. There are personal witnesses to this Word: "what we have seen with our eyes, what we beheld and our hands handled." The first phrase is more than just seeing; it connotes a focus, a moment of close examination, as if under a microscope. Some commentators believe John may be referring to seeing Jesus after His resurrection. Again the emphasis is on Jesus' being a true man. In verse 2, John tells us that this "life was manifested." It has come to us. Jewish believers would have immediately connected this with the Old Testament blessing: "The Lord make His face shine upon us." Manifested in this case means "shining upon us." In verse 3 John speaks in an authoritative way--this is no mere suggestion or plea. This is his declaration; he bears witness (v. 2), and in the Greek this bearing testimony is the word from which we have derived "martyr." John is coming to us with the authority of Jesus Christ.

The purpose of all of this, in verses 3 and 4, is that we might have the fellowship of believers, that confidence of brotherhood. We also have fellowship with God, so that we know Him and walk with Him. This does not fill us with fear, but with joy. So everything that John has been telling us in verses 1-3 and what follows in the rest of the book should fill us with joy. The assurance of our salvation is our sure foundation, which is rooted in Jesus Christ.

3/10/07

Apple Sauce (Continued)

My co-workers and I really were in New York on business, but more on that later (left my notes at work).

So after we finished attending sessions on Monday and Tuesday, our time was our own. During a break Monday morning, I walked over to the St. James theater to get tickets for Tuesday night to see The Producers. I get a national theater newsletter, and I had printed off a page that said that if I presented it at the box office, I would receive 50 percent off. And even though I had printed it off and taken it with me, I really didn't think it would amount to anything. So when I handed it over to the person working at the box office, I nearly fell over when I found out that we were getting $110 seats for half the price! And the seats were in the orchestra section, row 13, center. Things were going well.

The weather was unseasonably cold, of course, with biting winds and snow. But we were determined to experience the city--on foot. Just walking around in the theater district is an amazing adventure, but the challenge was on to find a reasonably priced dinner(since breakfast had not been very reasonably priced). Our quest took us to Rockefeller Center, where we enjoyed seeing the famous ice rink and other sights, but, unfortunately, no reasonably priced meals. A few blocks from there, we found St. Patrick's Cathedral, which K. and I decided was not as awesome as the National Cathedral in D.C. But it was interesting (and sad, actually) to see the people there praying and truly, in some instances, worshipping the icons. Soon after, we encountered that most famous of New York gourmet delights, Burger Heaven, which did offer food at a reasonable price. After we returned to the hotel, M. and I climbed under our respective covers to warm up and watched a movie in our room, one of my favorite hotel things to do.

Tuesday night was the big Broadway musical event--my second and K. and M.'s first. The evening began at a real New York Italian restaurant that offered good food at a somewhat reasonable price. And then it was on to the St. James, where Tony Danza was starring in The Producers. Our seats were great, and it was certainly exciting to be watching a live musical on Broadway. While the show was a little more risque than I had expected, it was a biting satire--and very funny. The sets were elaborate, and the actors fantastic. There really isn't anything quite like it.

Having finished all of our sessions, M. and I were ready for yet another NYC experience: SHOPPING. Because she actually had shopping experience in New York, M. was much more prepared for this than I. As usual, I had the absolutely worst possible shoes for this. (Last September, I went hiking with a friend in a local park through muddy swamplands--in cute sandals! Obviously I haven't learned much). And while I had come with gloves, I had no hat or scarf. I had purchased a reasonably priced scarf at a souvenir shop on Tuesday. So our game plan was to start at the southern part of Manhattan and work our way up--via the subway.

I've been on subways before--in London and D.C. But this was every bit as disgusting as we've all heard. (I barely missed walking through vomit at one point.) Our first stop was at the South Seaport shops, kind of a mall of touristy stores. I did make my first purchase there--ear muffs. Our next stop was probably my favorite--Canal Street in SoHo. This is sort of a citified version of a flea market--except the shops are filled with my favorite things: knock-off designer handbags and cheap clothes and jewelry. At one store I bought my first two faux handbags--a Prada and a Kate Spade (for my Katie--and all her friends are jealous!). At the next stop was a must-have Dolce and Gabbana spring bag, but I didn't have enough cash (that's all they take). When I asked the store clerk if she could take the cash I had for it, she directed me to the ATM located in the shop. That is good sales strategy. I decided that my quota of cheap, knock-off handbags was now filled, until the salesperson in the next shop approached M. and secretively motioned her to the back, where there would be Gucci, Prada (the real thing, of course). I looked at a nice, so-called Gucci bag--kind of a briefcase sort of thing--just for fun. I asked the salesgirl how much it was, and she told me forty-five dollars. I indicated that I wasn't interested, and then she responded by asking me how much I wanted to pay for it. My goal here was to leave the shop with no more purses, so I told her the ridiculously low price of twenty-five dollars. She came back with forty, I said thirty, and then M. so helpfully suggested I offer thirty-five. Now it had moved beyond shopping into a competition, and two forces converged, rendering me helpless: competitive shopping. Of course the salesgirl accepted my offer of thirty-five dollars, and now I had purchased four bags that I was going to have to get back to Michigan somehow. (And M. insists that the Gucci bag is real because it has no "made in China" tag like the others we purchased.)

Our next stop was Greenwich Village and the NYU area, and M. asked a city worker to take a picture of us by the famous arch that appears in so many movies and TV shows, including one of my favorites, When Harry Met Sally . We ended our shopping experience at Macy's in Herald Square and found out that people from out of town who are shopping there get an eleven percent discount (don't ever say that this blog does not offer practical information).

By now I was thorougly exhausted and in pain and was sure that upon returning to Michigan, my feet would have to be amputated, and all because I am too vain to wear tennis shoes. After getting two huge pieces of cheesecake to go at THE cheesecake place when in NYC, we collected our things and got a cab to take us back to LaGuardia. Again, the experienced M. had brought along a duffel bag just in case we actually purchased anything when we shopped. So the first part of our cab ride was spent stuffing as many handbags and sweatshirts into the small duffel bag as possible. And it turned out that the Gucci bag was a smart idea--I was able to stuff some of my purchases and my purse into it (readers of the Shopaholics books are smiling right now at this rationale).

Our cab ride back to the airport took us through Central Park, and I held my breath as I went through airport security and was informed my tote bag (with the cheesecake) had to be searched. In the end, I lost a bottle of water, which I begged for a drink from--those security people are harsh--and a plastic fork that I planned to use to eat the cheesecake. Thankfully my cheesecake was not a security threat. The fork problem was quickly solved on the other side, where the fast food restaurants were filled with apparently less threatening plastic forks than the one that had been in my tote bag.

And that brings me to the end of the purely pleasure parts of our adventures in the big city. I arrived in Grand Rapids with three purses I did not need, extremely sore feet, and some really great memories (and, obviously, lots of blog fodder).

3/8/07

The First Bite

My adventures in New York are now only a memory. I'm back in Grand Rapids, where there are no skyscrapers, no view of Broadway theaters, no Times Square, and no SoHo. But it's home.

While I've been to New York two times in the past, those visits were only day trips, and I spent a lot of time walking around and just skimming the surface. Even though this trip was a business trip to the Book Expo, my co-workers and I did have an opportunity to do some exploring.

The first moment of note occurred when we all arrived at La Guardia. We retrieved our luggage and were headed out for a taxi when a man and his son (I assume) approached K., asked where we were going, and offered to take us to our Times Square destination for what K. decided was a very reasonable cost. I somewhat reluctantly handed my suitcase off to the little boy, who seemed a little too eager to me to take it. M. and I felt even more nervous when we all crossed the street--past the Yellow Cabs and into the parking lot--and were led to a raggedy looking white limo. For a few moments, I imagined the headlines: "RBC Ministries Employees Missing in NYC" or "Bodies of Three Discovery House Employees Found in Harlem Alley." I also had visions of being left somewhere in some nasty looking alley while M. and K.'s laptops and the rest of our luggage drove away in the limo, never to be seen again.

Soon, however, I realized that we were crossing a bridge into Manhattan, and before I knew it, we were looking at Times Square, which was just yards away from the entrance to our hotel.

Happily, it just ended up being a somewhat noneventful ride into the city--my first in a limo of sorts. And if the ride in was a little less than glamorous, the hotel more than made up for it. Registration was on the eighth floor, and while we waited to get checked in, a hotel concierge handed us each an expensive bottle of water and two squares of dark chocolate. M. and I were given a room on the sixteenth floor, with a view that looked out on Broadway theaters, including the theater where Vanessa Redgrave was starring in a new play, The Lion King, A Chorus Line,and, a block over, The Producers. In fact, the Marriot Marquis where we were staying featured its own Broadway theater on the third floor!

Needless to say, M. and I were a little beside ourselves with all of this. And it was just the beginning of the excitement. . .

3/3/07

The Big Apple

I love my job--really! As if it weren't enough that I get to be an editor, I get to be an editor at a Christian publisher, with an incredibly knowledgeable and experienced team leader and mentor (they don't like to be called bosses), and I get to work with a highly motivated team of overachievers like myself--and we all truly like each other! (The exclamation points are getting a little out of control here, I admit, but this is genuine enthusiasm!) And then--about a month ago--I got to experience the icing on the cake.

Our team leader called an informal meeting of three of us: me, our production manager, and our marketing manager. M., our production manager who has also become one of my favorite girlfriends of all time, informed me on our way to collecting K., the marketing manager, that we three were headed to New York City to the Book Business Conference and Expo. While it made perfect sense to me that M. and K. should be going, it really wasn't registering that I would be going along, and I kept asking M., "Are you sure she said me?" But I should have known that M. would never be capable of a joke that cruel.

So we collected ourselves (K. was pretty collected--he travels all the time) and told our team leader, "Yes, I think I can find time for that in my schedule."

All this is to say that I'm going to be pretty busy for the next few days at the conference and possibly at a Broadway show after the conference is over for the day, which is why there probably won't be too many new postings the first part of next week. Let me see . . . I could blog, or I could make adventures to blog about from New York City--and of course I'm going to be learning a lot too! It's a tough decision, but I'm leaning toward adventure...

And I'm also feeling a little like Melanie Griffith at the end of Working Girl. The setting will certainly be right--at least for the next few days!!!