Networked Cowardice and Corruption
Zondervan is releasing a new edition of the Bible, and what else is new? But as we keep making advances in semiotic contextualizations, we have now learned how to make the Bible even more accessible to middle America, which is of course where all the Bible buyers are. Take, for example, this problem passage: “The …
Pre-Cambrian Spending
Rep. Paul Ryan has introduced his budget proposal, the work of a responsible adult. The screeching began almost immediately, with shouts that Ryan and the orcs with him were hellbent on starving widows and orphans. Keep your eye on the ball. We are no longer debating whether or not there will be draconian cuts. That’s …
Grim and Deadly
Some people see the whole chessboard, and some people don’t. Some people want to know what would be so unChristian about moving that pawn right there to that other spot, while others understand what the Scriptures teach (authoritatively) about the whole game. InterVarsity is in the middle of capitulating on the issue of sodomy, which …
In Burkas in No Time
We are now seeing another round of international silliness, in which we can clearly see (if we are looking straight at it) just how social justification works. A Florida pastor with a whopping two dozen parishioners recently burned a Koran, which set off a round of riots in Afghanistan. These riots ended with with some …
Understanding Bad Words
Here are the notes for a talk to the NSA student body . . . “Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice: And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you” …
If a Charlie Sheen Rant Were a War
In foreign policy, there are two kinds of competence. Both of them are good things, but you cannot rely on one of them alone. At the same time, the presence of one can ameliorate a situation, keeping it from becoming the outright disaster it would otherwise be. Let’s take the latest adventure in Libya for …
Obams Away!
Okay, so now the most leftist president we have ever had has opened up a third front in the Middle East. Sure, it has been done in the liberal way of war . . . lots of wish-it-weren’t-soing, lots of crabwalk drills, lots of getting the French to bomb first, lots of important people doing …
Like Scarsdale
A denial of Hell is the very apex of short term thinking. Living your life here and now as though eternity matters is the epitome of long term thinking. And once these fundamental “mentalities” have set in, it is not long before you start to see other manifestations of them. Deferred gratification is essential to …
Mars Hell
Martin Luther once said that God reveals Himself in the contrary. Love is revealed in a man, contorted with pain on a cross. And an inability to understand how this can work is what creates problems for those who can find someone like Rob Bell compelling. Justin Taylor has a good summary of some of …