ICYMI Thursday

In case you missed it:

I’d encourage you to read this article on the value of pessimism, but you probably won’t, so I won’t get my hopes up.

 

“If private religious organizations have the right to define their communities in terms of doctrine, does this First Amendment right no longer apply to doctrines linked to sex?” GetRelgion’s TMatt asks a critical question for our Times.

 

From the “No, Duh” Department: Studies show that men regard women who pay attention to them as more attractive while women aren’t necessarily attracted to men who pay attention to them.

 

Your Edgy Billboard Is My Kid’s Nightmare

 

Do churches in the American South still maintain an implicit policy against interracial marriage? Romesh Wijesooriaya knows the answer first-hand. 

 

New technology has always received complaints that its ruining us. In 1858, People Said the Telegraph Was ‘Too Fast for the Truth.’

 

It's healthier to see love as a journey two people undertake rather than as a union of two people who are destined to be together.

 

"Women love to invade guy spaces – but men avoid gal spaces." David Murrow explains why the design choices of our church buildings will either draw men or repel men.

 

Which form of contemporary Christianity is best suited to living out the time of exile that is fast approaching American Christians? Rod Dreher started a fascinating online discussion off a Carl Truman article. 

 

“Most people in the West would be surprised by the answer to the question: who are the most persecuted people in the world? According to the International Society for Human Rights, a secular group with members in 38 states worldwide, 80 per cent of all acts of religious discrimination in the world today are directed at Christians.” The Independent

 

Chilling: “An Australian couple rented a Thai woman’s womb, and in due course, she delivered twins. But one of the babies has Down syndrome, and that just wouldn’t do. So, they simply left the disabled baby behind with no means of support except the love of the surrogate mother.”

ICYMI Thursday

 

In case you missed it:

I want a T-Shirt from the Liberal Redskins (“Home of the Angry Red!”) but their online store probably isn’t prepared for the orders about to come in.

 

An Austin smoke shop is taking bids for a “drunk hipster soul.” It was given to them by a customer in exchange for a lighter, and now sits in a jar on their counter.

 

Losing Korean baseball team replaces missing fans with cheering robots.

 

“Do a barrel roll,” “Zerg rush,” “Google in 1998,” and other search terms that generate unusual results in a Google search.

 

David Murray says there are 14 kinds of spiritual seekers. “It would help ‘seekers’ if we acknowledged they exist and that there are many different kinds of them with many different and challenging needs.”

 

First Things Pete Spiliakos says conservatives send a “mixed message” on immigration and the way forward is to make sure that “internal immigration enforcement (especially universal job verification and a visa tracking system) is put in place first and that, after such a system is institutionalized, long-standing unauthorized immigrants get both legalized status and a relatively quick path to U.S. citizenship."

ICYMI Thursday

This was from the Hillcrest Picnic and Baptism 2013.
We’re doing it again this Sunday!
Learn more here.  

In case you missed it:

Everyone In Middle East Given Own Country In 317,000,000-State Solution

 

A tree planted in memory of Beatle George Harrison is being destroyed by…beetles.

 

You need The Nostalgia Machine today.

 

“We force the servers to grovel for tidbits left out of the kindness of customers' hearts, and we extort customers into paying their salaries. No matter where you go and who you talk to, it seems like everyone hates America's tipping culture.” Hear hear.

 

Sermon Illustration Alert: If you’re a preacher and you can’t find a way to use this story in a sermon, turn in your ordination card. In “The Chameleon,” the New Yorker’s David Grann reports on a French serial impostor who has taken on the identities of the missing or dead, including the long-lost son of a Texan family.

 

“‘The Dark Night Project,’ is an effort to document, analyze, and publicize accounts of the adverse effects of contemplative practices.” Adverse effects? Of meditation? “In late January this year, Time magazine featured a cover story on ‘the mindful revolution,’ an account of the extent to which mindfulness meditation has diffused into the largest sectors of modern society….What the cover story did not address are what might be called the revolution's ‘dirty laundry.’” The “dirty laundry” includes meditation practitioners who were “fairly out of commission, fairly impaired for between six months [and] more than 20 years.” After all, meditation isn’t about learning to “get in the zone” but about discovering things such as life’s impermanence and the self’s non-existence. Interesting perspective.

 

Anderson Cooper tries getting through a typical day using a schizophrenia simulator.

ICYMI Thursday

In case you missed it:

8 of the Absolute Worst Times to Take a Selfie

 

Kathryn Gin Lum of Aeon does a pretty good job with her overview of the concept of hell—and why it’s not going away any time soon.

 

I bet you didn’t know some Southerners moved to Brazil after the Civil War instead of endure Yankee occupation. Enclaves of descendents still exist.

 

Is man-made climate change “settled science”? And who benefits from overblown climate change forecasts? An interview with Lord Christopher Monckton.

 

OZY reports on Swiss “Carriers of the Secret” or “Fire-Cutters” who have been healing burns for centuries with prayers they don’t charge for. Doctors are baffled.  

 

“Millennial politics is simple, really. Young people support big government, unless it costs any more money. They're for smaller government, unless budget cuts scratch a program they've heard of. They'd like Washington to fix everything, just so long as it doesn't run anything. That's all from a new Reason Foundation poll surveying 2,000 young adults between the ages of 18 and 29. Millennials' political views are, at best, in a stage of constant metamorphosis and, at worst, "totally incoherent," as Dylan Matthews puts it.” The Atlantic

 

“If a brother or sister has cancer, diabetes, or a stroke, we pray that God will give the doctors and nurses wisdom and skill to relieve their suffering. We realize there is an important place for caring for their bodies and souls, for their medical needs—which are beyond the church's competence—and for their relationship with God. And yet, when it comes to mental illness, we still don't really believe that it is a medical problem.” Michael Horton explains how ignorance about mental illness is based in poor theology.

On His Mind, In His Heart, The Apple of His Eye, From the Foundation of the World

Christ died for a people he would bring to himself. We were on his mind, in his heart, the apple of his eye, from the foundation of the world. As we sometimes sing (emphasis added):

The church's one foundation
is Jesus Christ her Lord;
she is his new creation
by water and the Word.
From heaven he came and sought her
to be his holy bride;
with his own blood he bought her,
and for her life he died.

John Piper explains five results that come to pastors and their congregations when gripped by this conviction:

Knowing and experiencing the reality of definite atonement affects us with deeper gratitude. We feel more thankfulness for a gift given to us in particular, rather than feeling like it was given to no specific people and we happened to pick it up.

Knowing and experiencing the reality of definite atonement affects us with greater assurance. We feel more secure in God’s hands when we know that, before we believed or even existed, God had us in view when he planned to pay with his blood, not only for a free offer of salvation but also for our actual regeneration and calling and faith and justification and sanctification and glorification—that it was all secured forever for us in particular.

Knowing and experiencing the reality of definite atonement affects us with sweeter fellowship with God. A pastor may love all the women in his church. But his wife feels a sweeter affection for him because he chose her particularly out of all the other women, and made great sacrifices to make sure he would have her—not because he offered himself to all women and she accepted, but because he sought her in particular and sacrificed for her. If we do not know that God chose us as his Son’s “wife” and made great sacrifices for us in particular and wooed us and wanted us in a special way, our experience of the personal sweetness of his love will not be the same.

Knowing and experiencing the reality of definite atonement affects us with stronger affections in worship. To look at the cross and know that this love was not only for the sake of an offer of salvation to all (which it is), but more, was the length to which God would go so that I, in particular, would be drawn into the new covenant—that is the bedrock of joy in worship….When a church is faithfully and regularly taught that they are the definite and particular objects of God’s “great love” (Eph. 2:4), owing to nothing in them, the intensity of their worship will grow ever deeper.

Knowing and experiencing the reality of definite atonement affects us with more love for people and greater courage and sacrifice in witness and service. When a profound sense of undeserved, particular, atoning love from God combines with the unshakable security of being purchased—from eternity, for eternity—then we are more deeply freed from the selfish greed and fear that hinder love. Love is laying down one’s conveniences, and even one’s life, for the good of others, especially their eternal good. The more undeservingly secure we are, the more we will be humbled to count others more significant than ourselves, and the more fearless we will be to risk our lives for their greatest good.

From the closing chapter of the book, From Heaven He Came and Sought Her: Definite Atonement in Historical, Biblical, Theological, and Pastoral Perspective, Various Authors

ICYMI Thursday

Nothing says "Happily Ever After" than
wedding photos with a tornado in the background.

 

Sermon Illustration Alert: A Chicago author who co-wrote the book “How to Survive the Bulls of Pamplona” was gored Wednesday morning during the Pamplona bull run

 

Booze Causes 10 Percent of Working-Age U.S. Deaths

 

The Time headline is: “What Starbucks Tells Employees About Breastfeeding Customers.” My guess is they tell their employees not to. But maybe I should read the article.

 

British phrases Americans should start using right away:

 

Kirsten Powers: “Liberals who obsessed over President Bush's abuses of executive power are suspiciously silent now, or worse, defend the same behavior they found abhorrent in a Republican.”

 

“Some people are asking whether society’s concern for the constitutional rights of people with mental illness has led to their abandonment.” WaPo

New Adult Groups and other Hillcrest Happenings

Several new Common Ground groups are starting this summer. All of these will begin on July 20 in the MPC unless otherwise noted.

Newt and Judy Hamlin begin a group for grandparents.

Paul and Marina Rusch begin a group for parents of middle schoolers.

Charles and Jan Dunn have already begun a group for parents of children in the later years of high school and college.

On August 17, David and Linda Green will begin a group for young couples “BC” (before children).

Diane and I begin a “newcomers” group on July 20. In addition to reaching out to newcomers, we’ll invite worship service attendees who haven’t yet connected to a small group. After 8-10 weeks in our group, participants will be guided to join the Sunday School class or Common Ground group that’s best for them.

No one is being asked to leave their existing group to participate in these new formations. But if you’re interested in joining any of these new tables or if you have questions, contact me. Be in prayer for the continuing growth of our Bible study ministry!

Church Picnic and Baptism. Join the Hillcrest Family for a picnic and outdoor baptism! On July 27, we'll gather for worship at our normal time (10am) and place (Steck Avenue). Then at 11am, instead of gathering for small group Bible study, grab some lunch and bring it to City Park! We have a section of picnic tables reserved until 3pm. You can learn more at our website, where you’ll find a video explaining baptism and a slide show of last year’s picnic.

“God Is Closer Than You Think.” This week our Sunday morning sermon series continues with a message called “Finding God in Your Crisis.” In 2 Kings 6, when Elisha was surrounded by enemy forces, his servant was in a panic. The prophet prayed for his servant: “Open his eyes, Lord, so that he may see.” The prayer was answered, and the servant saw they were protected by angelic forces in “chariots of fire.” Join us this week so you’ll be ready to look for God at work in your next crisis.

Discover Hillcrest. This Sunday I host my “Discover Hillcrest” class for those ready to join and for those just checking out the church. It’s a one-time class that meets for one hour in the MPC after the morning service.

“The Supreme Court has assumed such overwhelming national, unilateral authority”

Baylor prof Thomas Kidd on the Hobby Lobby case:

The fact that four of the justices would not extend even such a modest grant of religious liberty is sobering. It reveals again why perhaps the most important issue in presidential politics is the question of Supreme Court appointments. The Supreme Court has assumed such overwhelming national, unilateral authority on issues such as religious liberty, that the switch of just one justice can reverse the status of a basic freedom in America today. This is not a good system, and one wishes that on this and many other issues we could return to an actual federal system in which states and localities had leeway to craft their own policies according to local sensibilities, instead of those of five unelected justices. But we are where we are.

ICYMI Thursday

Not sure why you’d want to advertize
how slow your church services are…

 

In case you missed it:

Tim Howard: Futbol’s most famous saver knows the Savior.

 

Utah man sent to jail for fighting—over church seating

 

Why Younger Evangelicals May Feel Uneasy In A Patriotic Church Service

 

ESPN’s Jon Mooallem wants you to meet the pastor who has baptized 66 professional umpires, “calling them safe in the only way that matters.”

 

Here’s a woman who set her apartment on fire to kill a spider

 

The average American reads 19 minutes a day

Links to Your World, Thursday June 19

Woman calls the police because she didn’t get enough sprinkles on her ice cream—and the police published the call.

 

You’ve got smell! Apparently the “scent message” is now a thing.

 

At first I thought this was, like, an Onion headline: UT researchers find that people who say "like" are more thoughtful.

 

Bible verses that atheists love

 

How to talk like an Austinite in 90 seconds

 

“You will, without a doubt, have someone close to you in your family come out as gay or lesbian, if not already, then sometime in the future. How should a Christian parent or grandparent respond?” Russell Moore suggests an answer.

 

He said he aspired in his paintings to portray a world without the Fall; his own life was an exhibit of that Fall.

 

Venus and Mars in the workplace

 

“We have become so used to the way that rock sublimates our spiritual desires that it can be jolting to tune into [Christian] pop music that asks us to make plain what we seek. So much of rock is a spiritual fantasy, a sonic playground for highly secularized religious sentiment. And fantasy, in whatever form, can make the real thing look too real.” I’ve never heard anyone make this claim before, but it’s a tremendous insight into why fans of pop and rock music don’t tend to like overtly-Christian songs in the genre. In Stephen Webb’s First Things post, “In Praise of Praise Music.”

Links to Your World, Thursday June 5

 

D-Day anniversary is tomorrow. This is a cool series of interactive photos showing you several D-Day scenes then and now.

 

Hurricanes with female names don’t get taken as seriously—and end up taking more lives.

 

After the Bible, what is a Christian’s most important book? You will be surprised; I hope you will agree.

 

Regarding the woman the Sudanese government has condemned to die for converting to Christianity, Russell Moore writes “Mariam is a true daughter of Sarah, who does not ‘fear anything that is frightening’” (1 Pet. 3:7).

 

In a recent study, participants were asked to guess the age of women in photos. While the participants examined the photos, certain odors were piped into the room. “The way the participants visually perceived the women was strongly influenced by what odor they were smelling. When they smelled something pleasant, they rated the older looking faces as younger, and the younger faces as even younger. That was not the case with bad smells. Older and younger faces were perceived as similar in age.” (Time)

 

Why no one gets your sarcastic emails.

 

Sermon Illustration Alert: Google Gets 10,000 Requests A Day To Be ‘Forgotten’ in Europe

 

Twenty-five years after the Tiananmen Square massacre, few Chinese know anything about it, or attribute the reports to CIA propaganda.

 

“Law enforcement officers in Colorado and neighboring states, emergency room doctors and legalization opponents increasingly are highlighting a series of recent problems as cautionary lessons for other states flirting with loosening marijuana laws.”  NYT

 

What Myths Do We Most Commonly Realize Are False in Our 20s?

To Forbear Is Divine

When giving guidance on life with others, Paul said we should be busy -- as the King James puts it -- "forbearing one another and forgiving one another." (Colossians 3:13)

Between the two, you're going to have to forbear a lot more than forgive.

Across my years, I've heard a lot of sermons on forgiveness, I've read a lot of books on forgiveness, and I've been inspired by a lot of dramatic stories about forgiveness -- but it's forbearance that is demanded of us a lot more often. Think about it:

If you forgive your marriage partner for adultery, that may become the subject of a magazine article. But you won't have to struggle to forgive something like that near as much as you have to forbear your husband's irritating habit of using the remote to switch between three shows at a time!

Or, if you forgive your father's murderer, people will want to write a book about you, but you may never be faced with that. And yet every day you're called on to bear up under your roommate's inability to leave the kitchen as clean as you'd prefer it.

Both forgiveness and forbearance are required of Christians, but it's forbearance that is called for hundreds of times more often than forgiveness.

How can you increase your capacity for forbearance? You pay attention to four things.

Personality. Some are introverts, others are extroverts. In making decisions, some are rational and others are spontaneous. Not everyone thinks like us, reacts like us, or communicates like us. The more we are sensitive to this, the better we can forbear annoyances.

Perspective. As the old saying goes, "Don't judge a man until you've walked a mile in his shoes." The old proverb advises us to see things as others see them.

Progress. We can be more patient with people if we take into account where they are in their physical and emotional and spiritual progress.

Problems. So much of someone else's behavior that frustrates us is behavior that springs from the stuff they're dealing with.

This Sunday @ 10, join us for a deeper study into the power of forgiveness and forbearance.

__________________________________________

Subscribe to “Winning Ways”
and it will arrive in your inbox each Wednesday
hillcrestaustin.org/newsletters

Links to Your World, Thursday May 29

 

Why you’re afraid of the world to your left

 

Virginia Stem Owens visits Houston’s National Museum of Funeral History, and reflects on death.

 

The Myth of the Climate Change '97%'. What is the origin of the false belief—constantly repeated—that almost all scientists agree about global warming?

 

Should the 7-day week be abolished?

 

Productivity improves for those who check email no more than twice a day. Probably good advice for social media, too?

 

“The vast majority of immigrants, international students and refugees [coming to America] are coming from areas unreached by the Gospel. Wow! What an opportunity we have to share the Good News with the nations right here at home. That doesn’t mean we don’t go overseas, but it does mean we shouldn’t miss the wonderful opportunities the Father is giving His church.” From imb.org, learn three things you can do to help new immigrants around you.

 

A Sudanese woman was sentenced to death after she refused to renounce her Christian faith. Because her father is Muslim, the Sudanese court considers her to be Muslim as well, and guilty of going against her religion. They also convicted her of adultery, because the court doesn’t see her marriage to a Christian man as valid. The court says the sentence won’t be carried out until two years after she gives birth. Yes, she was sentenced to death while 8 months pregnant, and she recently gave birth to her child in prison, launching the countdown to execution. (The Skimm)

 

“Baby, you’re born that way,” but in this case let’s talk about change anyway.

How to Get Good Advice

There's a portable toilet seat for outdoorsmen called "The Off-Road Commode" because it is designed to attach to a vehicle's trailer hitch. It includes a label that cautions, "Not for use on moving vehicles."

I'll let you pause a moment in your reading to imagine someone ignoring the advice.

That was the winning entry in an annual event called the Wacky Warning Label Contest. Here's a list of some of the best labels from previous contests:

A label on a baby stroller warns: "Remove child before folding."

A flushable toilet brush warns: "Do not use for personal hygiene."

A digital thermometer that can be used to take a person's temperature several different ways warns: "Once used rectally, the thermometer should not be used orally."

A household iron warns users: "Never iron clothes while they are being worn."

A label on a hair dryer reads: "Never use hair dryer while sleeping."

A warning on an electric drill made for carpenters cautions: "This product not intended for use as a dental drill."

The label on a bottle of drain cleaner warns: "If you do not understand, or cannot read all directions, cautions and warnings, do not use this product."

A cardboard car sunshield that keeps sun off the dashboard warns: "Do not drive with sunshield in place."

A cartridge for a laser printer warns: "Do not eat toner."

A heat gun and paint remover that produces temperatures of 1,000 degrees warns: "Do not use this tool as a hair dryer."

A warning on a pair of shin guards manufactured for bicyclists says: "Shin pads cannot protect any part of the body they do not cover."

A popular manufactured fireplace log warns: "Caution - Risk of Fire."

A label on the underside of a cereal bowl warns: "Always use this product with adult supervision."

It makes you laugh and shake your head at the same time. But while all of these fall in the category of good advice we don’t need, how can we get the good advice we do need?

That’s the subject of this Sunday’s lesson. We’re celebrating graduates in the service, so this topic should help those in our church family who are about to take the next big step in their lives. But we’re never too old or too experienced to seek out advice. So join me live on June 1, or listen to the recorded message later.

Free Access to My Sermon Illustration Database--and Other Resources

Whether you're a preacher, teacher, or writer, every communicator needs fresh ideas that reinforce or highlight his or her points.  For decades I've collected illustrations and cataloged them by topic.  I'm making the database available to everyone.

Check it out at www.hillcrestaustin.info/sermonillustrations.

To use it, simply enter your desired topic in the Topic field.  If you enter multiple topic words, separated by spaces, you'll find only those illustrations that address both topics.  We've found that it sometimes helps to use double quotes, with spaces, to get more exact results.  So, if you just enter the word sin, you'll get all the illustrations under the topics of sin, sing, and single.  If you enter the word as "sin " you are more likely to find what you're looking for.

The Text field is helpful if you want to search within the text of the illustrations themselves.  So, do a search for "Tim Keller" and you'll get all the illustrations that have "Tim Keller" in them.  (Again, use the quotes.  Just typing the words Tim and Keller will get you every illustration with both Tim and Keller somewhere in the text, but it might have nothing to do with Tim Keller -- e.g., it may be an article about Tim Knight and Roger Keller.)

The ID# field is useful if you have found a specific illustration to which you would like to return later.  Just note that illustration's ID# and then, when you want to return to that specific illustration, enter the ID# in the appropriate search field.

This database has evolved over the years to meet my own unique needs as a communicator, so you'll have to take it as it comes.  Some entries include links to Kindle books that won't take you to my Kindle content.  (You'll get the author's complete quote, though.)  Also, items clipped from a web page and copied into the database often preserve the formatting from the original source, which may make the entry look odd.  Despite the "raw" look to the entries, however, I hope you'll still find some use from my database.

While I'm making stuff available for free, here is more content that has always been available:

Newsletters. All my newsletters since 2003 are available here.  "Winning Ways" is my devotional column that is sent by email every Wednesday, and "LeaderLines" is an occasional newsletter addressing issues of church leadership.  You can subscribe to either or both of these here.  The archive page has a search field that enables you to find a particular word or phrase across the entire collection of newsletters.  Please credit me as the author if you use my newsletters in your not-for-sale work.  If you want to use my content in your for-sale work, get my permission first (tom@hillcrestaustin.org).

Sermons.  All sermons delivered at Hillcrest since 2000 are available here.  In many cases, listener outlines and small-group discussion guides are included.  Please credit me if you use the sermons in your not-for-sale work, and credit Hillcrest if you use the printed material in your not-for-sale work.  If you want to use any of the content in your for-sale work, get my permission first (tom@hillcrestaustin.org).

Evangelism Material.  If you're looking for ideas on creating a more evangelistic church, I have a 90-page guide available here.

For any questions on the use of the illustration database, please contact me at tom@hillcrestaustin.org.  My thanks to Paul Waldo for managing this database (along will all the other content on our church's auxiliary website (www.hillcrestaustin.info).  For our church's main website, go to www.hillcrestaustin.org.

Links to Your World, Thursday May 15

On Mother’s Day I mentioned Kevin Durant’s tribute to his mother in his MVP speech. Here it is:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Research shows a husband really can be nagged to death.

 

Gollum wasn’t evil; he just had a Vitamin D deficiency.

 

We’ll need this in Austin soon: The rain that filters through this house’s “bio-concrete” is clean enough to drink.

 

The Church Needs More Tattoos

 

“Pun Slams,” sort of like “poetry slams,” but with plenty of groans.

 

Psychologist Linda Crane, on her son’s diagnosis of schizophrenia: “It took me a long time to come to terms with it. Even I had a hard time understanding it, how this bright man, with a brilliant future, could suffer like this. One thing I learned was that as soon as you mentioned the word, people stopped seeing the person. They just saw the diagnosis and a collection of symptoms. Doug, my son, was forgotten.” Great quote from a great article about the Schizophrenia Oral History Project.

 

David Mathis: “At the end of his important essay “On Fairy Stories,” Tolkien [author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings] explains from where he intends his tales to draw their power — from the emotional reservoir of the Christian gospel. The “primary world” story of the Son of God himself, taking full humanity at Christmas, living flawlessly in our fallen world, sacrificing himself to rescue us on Good Friday from God's just wrath, and rising again victorious on Easter as the living Lord of the Universe — here is the Story for which God made the human heart and the Story from which all good stories derive their power….Finding Jesus in The Hobbit doesn’t mean shoe-horning Gandalf or Bilbo or any other character into some Christ mold, but following the story, truly tracking its twists, feeling its angst, and knowing that the “turn” — the Great Unexpected Rescue just in the nick of time, the place where our souls are most stirred, relieved, and satisfied — is tapping into something deep in us, some way in which God spring-loaded us for the Great Story and the extent to which he went to reclaim us.”

 

In his NYT opinion column, Ross Douthat reminds us that the New Testament documents are a much more reliable guide to Jesus than the later “gospels” that we’ve heard about: “What's true of the new text [claiming Jesus had a wife] has been true of nearly every alternative gospel, ‘lost’ or otherwise, that ended up excluded from the Christian canon….[N]one of the endless apocryphal documents can compete with the actual New Testament - and particularly the synoptic gospels and the Pauline epistles - when it comes to historical proximity to the events of Jesus's life. They're useful windows into the religious trends of subsequent centuries, but they tell us next to nothing about what Jesus and his earliest followers thought and did and said.” Douthat says the popularity of the “alternative” gospels “tells us much more about the religious preoccupations of our own era, and particularly the very American desire to refashion Jesus of Nazareth in our own image rather than letting go of him altogether, than it does about the Jesus who actually lived.”

 

It’s a popular argument among progressive Christians that, since Jesus said nothing about homosexuality it must not have mattered to him. Wesley Hill, who writes about staying biblically-faithful amidst same-sex attractions, explains the errors in this thinking.

 

How to Write for Busy Readers. I try to follow these points in my weekly devotional, Winning Ways. You should, too.

Links to Your World, Thursday May 8

About that “#blessed” hashtag in social media: “There’s nothing quite like invoking holiness as a way to brag about your life. But calling something ‘blessed’ has become the go-to term for those who want to boast about an accomplishment while pretending to be humble, fish for a compliment, acknowledge a success (without sounding too conceited), or purposely elicit envy.” Jessica Bennett

 

10 Things You Should Never Do When You’re Angry

 

A U.S. map based on a Gallup poll from last year shows the relative interest residents of each state have in moving out of that state.  (HT: 22 Words)

 

A new study from Stanford researchers found that a person’s creative output can increase by as much as 60% when walking. HT: Time

 

Serious reading takes a hit from online scanning and skimming, researchers say. I think this is true. I read a lot of blogs and short articles, but I still need the longer arguments laid out in books.

Are You a Wounded Parent?

In a gathering of empty-nesters I asked how many of them grieved for grown children who exhibited no real relationship with Christ. Three out of four people in the room raised their hands.

Maybe you would have raised your hand, too? Maybe your teenaged kids or grown kids have moved off the path you set them on.

There’s a story from the life of Elijah that can give you hope (1 Kings 17). I see five parallels between the widow in this story and wounded parents.

First, we grieve. The widow who had been taking care of God’s prophet lost her son to death, and it broke her heart (verse 17). It’s a similar feeling for parents who can’t see any spiritual life in their grown kids.

Second, we’re confused. The widow lost her son even after she had been so faithful to God (verses 7-16). Likewise, after all our years of serving God we wonder how it could be possible to see our kids spiritually unengaged.

Third, we unfairly blame ourselves. Elijah’s caregiver assumed that her child died because of some moral failure in her past (verse 18). But maybe you know those feelings, too. It is almost impossible not to feel that your Christian example or your parenting skills have failed.

Fourth, we entrust our grown kids to God’s care. In our story, Elijah brought the boy to the upper room and prayed (verses 19-21). Have you noticed how some of the most significant events in Scripture took place in an upper room? The Lord's Supper was insti­tuted in an upper room. The Holy Spirit was given to the apos­tles as they prayed in an upper room. Simon Peter raised a widow from death in an upper room. And Peter led the church to reach beyond Jews to Gentiles after experiencing a divine vision on the upper deck of a house. We need to bring our own burdens to the upper room, too!

Fifth, we stubbornly believe God can restore spiritual life. Miraculously, God heard Elijah's prayer and the boy's life returned to him (verse 22). It’s no less a miracle to see the spiritually dead awaken to life! It’s what we continue to hope for.

Take comfort. Take heart. And go deeper with us into this story this Sunday at 10 a.m.!

 

The embedded video is from Andrew Peterson’s project, Light for the Lost Boy.

 

__________________________________________

Subscribe to “Winning Ways” and

it will arrive in your inbox each Wednesday

hillcrestaustin.org/newsletters

Links to Your World, Thursday May 1

 

Life>Updates. At 8:33 A.M. last Friday, a 32-year-old woman driving to work in High Point, North Carolina, took out her phone and posted to Facebook: “The Happy Song makes me so HAPPY.” In the moment she posted the message, the woman crossed over the median of Interstate 85 and collided head-on with an oncoming recycling truck. She is dead.

 

For the WSJ, Mollie Hemingway says Heaven is For Real “is very much a part of the ancient Christian tradition of pious speculation about heaven deriving from visions, dreams and experiences.”

 

China on course to become 'world's most Christian nation' within 15 years. (Update)

 

“Muslim background believers are leading Muslims to Christ in staggering numbers, but not in the West. They are doing this primarily in Muslim-majority nations almost completely under the radar—of everyone.” CT report

 

“I'm finally on the verge of becoming famous and I'm not going to ruin it now. An abortion will further my career. This time next year I won't have a baby. Instead, I'll be famous, driving a bright pink Range Rover and buying a big house. Nothing will get in my way.” Trevin Wax says that how Britons reacted to this woman’was “both surprising and sickening.”

 

Taking notes longhand will help you remember information better than typing them out, according to new research

 

Texas had four of the top 10 unfunniest cities in the U.S.

 

Gratitude, Not ‘Gimme,’ Makes for More Satisfaction, Baylor University Study Finds

 

“Buddhism has always been missionary. Buddhists have always thought that their doctrine and practices can help to alleviate suffering and so have urged others to accept them.” Jay L. Garfield, Buddhist and philosopher, in Gutting’s series of NYT interviews. Of course Buddhists are proselytizers: It’s not just evangelicals. Anyone with the conviction that their way of thinking can help the world is going to commend it to others.

Links to Your World, Thursday April 17

 

Pixar has been hiding "Easter Eggs" in its movies since "Toy Story," and a new, seasonally-themed video asks fans to seek them out.

 

In China, Jar Of French Mountain Air Fetches $860

 

I've enjoyed these daily videos explaining what happened each day leading up to Christ's death and resurrection. The videos were produced in conjunction with the release of Justin Taylor's book, The Final Days of Jesus. The video below is for Thursday. You can find the rest of the videos here.

The Final Days of Jesus: Thursday from Crossway on Vimeo.

 

Save this story for your Good Friday reading: "The most Christological piece of music I have ever heard is Gavin Bryars’s Jesus’ Blood Never Failed Me Yet. In 1971, Bryars was working on a film about homeless people and recorded, almost by accident, an old man singing: 'Jesus’s blood never failed me yet, Jesus’s blood never failed me yet, Jesus’s blood never failed me yet. There’s one thing I know for he loves me so.' The song was not used in the movie, but Bryars was haunted by it. One day, as he went out for coffee, he left it playing on loop at his studio. When he returned, he found a group of people gathered around the tape listening in a somber mood, with some of them openly weeping. Bryars never knew the tramp (as he calls him on the liner notes), but he decided to compose an orchestral accompaniment for his simple refrain."

 

Bubba Watson: A Passion for the Gospel and Golf

 

I loved Salvation Mountain appearing in Into the Wild, Sean Penn's directorial debut. Here's the story of the man behind the mountain.