Church discipline is relatively rare in the modern church and, because it is rarely done, when it is done, it is too often done poorly. As with everything, we have to turn to the Scriptures for guidance and protection. “I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. Yet …
Keeping the Central Room Clean
The word akatharsia means uncleanness, and the New Testament uses the word to refer to moral uncleanness. In Matt. 23:27, Jesus refers to the Pharisees who are whited sepulchres outside, but inside are full of all uncleanness. The pagan Gentiles had the same problem, and God gave them up to uncleanness (Rom. 1:24). The Roman …
No Dualism Here
“A mouthful of sea air, or a stiff walk in the wind’s face, would not give grace to the soul, but it would yield oxygen to the body, which is next best” (Charles Spurgeon, Lectures to My Students, p. 158).
Odd Cousins
“American cool and American racism were born together and have grown up together. Cool as we know it was born in the shadowy intersection of black and white America” (Paul Grant, Blessed Are the Uncool, p. 16).
How Big a Problem is Porn?
Here is some good news, I guess, depending on how you look at it, but bear with me for a moment. I have long had trouble with people who try to encourage or alarm us with raw numbers alone. Raw numbers alone are often a very misleading part of the story. An example would be …
A Cupboards Interview on the Radio
As mentioned last week, Nate is on a short tour promoting 100 Cupboards for Random House, and here is a link to one of the radio interviews. This one is, I think, from Salt Lake City.
Discipline in Context
Yesterday’s sermon was third in a series on loving little children. You can find it here.
No Fault
Pilate several times says that he had found no fault in Jesus (Luke 23:4,14). The word is aition, and contextually refers to the charges that had been made against Jesus, which were charges of sedition and blasphemy. In the same chapter the same word is rendered as cause, but meaning the same thing — “I …
Cool and Uncool
“But what is cool anyway? For a passion so prominent in our hearts, we barely notice it, or think about it. We watch our tempers, we control our appetites, and we surrender our jealousies to God, but cool flies below our radar . . . I am defining cool as the private performance of rebellion …
Serious Filums
A few days ago I stumbled across a documentary on the trials of movie makers in dealing with Hollywood’s rating association, the one that supplies ratings for filums. I didn’t watch it long, and what I did watch was kind of choppy because the raunchy clips required channel-switching, but still it was quite informative. The …