Blogotional

Milt Stanley quotes Jeff Weddle:

We live in an age of irresponsibility.

Students don’t study for their tests and yet demand good grades. Employees play solitaire all day, drink coffee, and steal pens and yet demand more pay. Singers who can’t sing get mad when Simon Cowell tells them they stink.

The whole world is screaming, “Don’t judge me on what I do; judge me on who I think I am.”

What a dumb world, eh? Wonder where they got that philosophy from?

The Church.

He's right you know.

What are we going to do about it?

Technorati Tags:grace, action, morality, ethic, responsibility
Generated By Technorati Tag Generator

Related Tags: Illuminated Scripture

iMonk classic:

After a moment, one of the Christians present begins to speak. He speaks longer. His tone is different. He’s quoting verses…and more verses.

There’s a sense of finality and authority to this talk. You can sense a reaction, even before anyone says anything.

[...]

Then another Christian speaks. This person validates that the quoted verses are crucial and important for Christians to understand. But this person raises questions. She interacts with the scripture AND with the comments of the other participants. From ideas in the verses- like submission, for instance- she asks the group to explore what submission might mean in a non-abusive context?

The room relaxes a bit. This Christian wasn’t authoritative. She wasn’t ending the discussion. She was continuing it. She was curious. She didn’t have all the answers, but still had questions. She wanted to listen to others; to hear their insights and experiences.

Michael talks about those that stop with scripture and those that start. I'd put it this way - for some scripture is a laboratory manual and for others it is literature. But I want to leave this wonderful intellectual discussion for a moment and concentrate on these two people he described.

The first drew negative response, the second positive. One was attractive, one not so much. Which one do you think was Christ-like.?

of course, the quick answer was the attractive one, but Christ often quoted scripture both authoritatively and in chastisement. And yet he remained attractive.

When it comes to being a good Christian - it is often not about the little things, but the big ones. In this case its not about how we use scripture, but who we are when we use it. Have we allowed the Holy Spirit to transform us sufficiently to be authoritative, even chastising and yet winsome? If not, I would suggest that perhaps we us scripture study as a means of holding the Holy Spirit at bay.

I know I have at times.

Technorati Tags:scripture, tranformation
Generated By Technorati Tag Generator

Jollyblogger:

My only concern in sharing this story is that we Christians have our own “Christian industrial complex” that we can find ourselves playing to without realizing it. We have a clear celebrity system which becomes very tempting to try to break into.

Those are temptations we need not fall into, but they are there nonetheless there. When we seek to break into them, the seeds of self-promotion are always present. And I hope I can warn any of you who may be susceptible, away from that.

[...]

I figure that I have now been a Christian for 10,000 days or so, so I’ve had at least 10,000 or more lessons in dying to self. Most of them I didn’t pay attention to. Now I do pay attention to those things.

And I know this beyond a shadow of a doubt – self-promotion can not be accommodated in true Christianity. In True Christianity, the self has to disappear, not be promoted.

I know one more thing beyond a shadow of a doubt. Jesus died for people who find it hard to die for Him. He’ll catch you when you are dying. You don’t need that self you were trying to promote, you need His grace – to the degree you can ditch the self, to that degree you’ll get more of Him.

Particularly poignant words from a man that is dying.

The cross was the beginning of our salvation. It is also our example.

Technorati Tags:self-sacrifice, grace, death
Generated By Technorati Tag Generator

Tags: cartoons, catblogging, Aggie, Flash, LoganV

Technorati Tags:4th of july art
Generated By Technorati Tag Generator

HEROES AND ARTISTS - TIMBER WOLF

Francis Manapul

Mike Grell

Yildray Cinar

Technorati Tags:comics.comic books, comic art, heroes and artists, timber wolf
Generated By Technorati Tag Generator

Heather Wilson in the Washington Post:

For most of the past 20 years I have served on selection committees for the Rhodes Scholarship. In general, the experience is an annual reminder of the tremendous promise of America's next generation. We interview the best graduates of U.S. universities for one of the most prestigious honors that can be bestowed on young scholars.

I have, however, become increasingly concerned in recent years - not about the talent of the applicants but about the education American universities are providing. Even from America's great liberal arts colleges, transcripts reflect an undergraduate specialization that would have been unthinkably narrow just a generation ago.

As a result, high-achieving students seem less able to grapple with issues that require them to think across disciplines or reflect on difficult questions about what matters and why.

I think that is very true, and I wonder if the same could not be said for how we do church. We no longer seek to make well rounded disciples - we offer a plethora of experiences to produce - worshipers, self-helpers, anything but disciples.

What I find most troubling is we have done so in the name of evangelism and yet evangelism was meant to happen in a person-to-person fashion. How can it if we do not make people that are capable by being both knowledgeable and winsome - smart and of good character?

We are in a sad place.

Technorati Tags:discipleship
Generated By Technorati Tag Generator

Technorati Tags:joke, humor, friday humor, snagglepuss
Generated By Technorati Tag Generator