The death of any of our little ones is pressing hard. We love our children, but we remember that we are only in a position to love them as we ought to because we love our Father in Heaven more than all. Whoever does not love Christ more than family cannot be a disciple, as …
Letters on the Lock and Key Business. And More.
Inappropriate Appropriation: In your article titled “Appropriate This” you ask the question: “What do you call it when you have an acute case of vicarious embarrassment for someone who ought to be embarrassed about what they are doing, but somehow inexplicably is not?” I could not help but smile and recall a number of years …
Under Lock and Key
Introduction: A few weeks ago, I wrote something that caused some consternation in some predictable quarters. I said: “But here are some different examples. This one is taken from the world, not from Scripture, but we can learn something about the world from it. Why, if a woman sleeps with a hundred men, is she …
Tuesday and the Letters It Brings
All the Aimee Posts: Your unfolding review of Aimee Byrd’s latest is an excellent little nugget of discernment. What especially comes across to me is the awareness of subtle fallacies which, when one has truly thought through the biblical principles involved, are not so subtle after all. Thank you. I am far from pessimistic about …
Striking While the Irony is Hot
Introduction: Aimee Byrd is very aware of a mistake that would, in this kind of cultural analysis, be a very easy one to make. I am glad she is aware of it because it shows she is actively trying to avoid making it, and that is all to the good. Unfortunately, this awareness has not …
Like So Many Dried Beetles
Introduction: And so—as we continue to work our way through Aimee Byrd’s book, Why Can’t We Be Friends?—we continue to find stuff to talk about. In part I suppose that this is because life between the sexes is variegated and complex, and not a simple and straightforward relationship, like that which exists between Point A …
Not Every Letter Agrees . . .
Balsa Wood: As one who works at the organization that built Solar Probe (and knows many of the good people who built it; yes it is audacious!), I very much liked your reference. And I do expect there will be some people who speak up about what happened in St Louis. We might not be …
What the Ornithologist Knows
In her fifth chapter, Aimee Byrd helpfully offers some qualifications (and/or exceptions) to what she has been generally arguing for. She makes the important general point that temptation and sin in this area is devastating and really bad. And she also says some really good things in this chapter about how the law does not …
I, Not the Lord
It has been a few days, but I was asked to respond to a piece here from a friendly critic of my fictional letter to a wife who was preparing to leave her husband. The central thing that I would like to contest is this: “In fact, this piece straightforwardly reverses what God actually says. …
Gaaa! Jezebel!
Introduction So I want to begin my review of this chapter of Aimee Byrd’s book with some agreement. Although I differ strongly with her overarching thesis, I also want to make it clear that I believe she is reacting to some genuine problems in the “purity world.” I have seen some of those problems myself, …