Winning Ways: Still Life

"Still" describes someone who is calm, not anxiously moving or nervously talking.


"Still" describes someone who is constant: They are still the same.

"Still" describes a person who is controlled: They won't retreat but stand still.

But is "still" a good word to describe you?

I've been thinking a lot about this word. God commanded us to "be still" in our crisis and trust him (Psalm 46:10). God spoke to the burned-out prophet Elijah in a "still, small voice" (1 Kings 19). The Apostle Paul told us to be ambitious to lead a quiet life (1 Thessalonians 4:11).

We love the big and the flashy these days:

We read books that tell us we ought to expect the astonishing when we pray. Just ask God to give us this day our daily bread? How dull.

We go to conferences that tell us we're second-class disciples unless we've quit our jobs to start a third-world orphanage. If you're a working stiff who faithfully raises your kids and loves your spouse and serves in your church, well, that's not enough.

Really, I don't want to belittle the longing for a spectacular life. I sometimes need the reminders to pray boldly and to live boldly.

But still.


In the calls to expect the extraordinary I'm afraid God's people are forgetting the ordinary. We're called to be faithful, stubbornly obedient, and to look for God to show up in the routines of daily living.


So, starting this Sunday, we're starting a new study series called "Still." Across the next several weeks we're going to examine God's commands to be still, to stand faithful, and to do well the too-often dull work of life. We'll start with burned-out Elijah in 1 Kings 19. He needed the reminder that God doesn't always work in the big flashy ways Elijah expected. Join us @ 10.

Have you turned in an "Explore God" testimony yet? We want to know how the "Explore God" campaign has impacted you. Did it settle a question you were wrestling with? Did you get into some interesting conversations in the community? Did you make a decision for Christ? Give us your impressions and stories at jami@hbcaustin.org. Your story will be a real encouragement to the leaders of this campaign. We'll publish as many as we can on November 10.

__________________________________________

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Links to Your World, Tuesday October 29

At "Links to Your World," things are gettin all Halloweeny up in here.




Join us at the Hillcrest Trunk-or-Treat and Pumpkin Party




Here's a website claiming to help you find out if a previous occupant died in your house and is still hanging around to haunt it. Sadly, they missed the better title for their web page. They should have called it Ghoulgle.


 

10 Cyborg Jack-O-Lanterns

 

Creative Halloween costumes:

 

Not everything at "Links" is about Halloween:

 

Did you ever expect to see the day when the Vatican suspended bishops for rich living and Bible-belt Protestant pastors stepped in to fill the gap? (HT: Paul Pastor) Furtick's house is a big, big house, with lots and lots of room. Sadly, some of that square footage is mine, since I bought 4 copies of his book, Sun Stand Still, for Ministry Staff discussion. Sigh. 1986 Peter Gabriel, tell us what you think:

 

Are Smartphones Turning Us Into Bad Samaritans?

 

Links to Your World, Tuesday October 22

10 reasons why America's future is going to look a lot more like Texas

 

A word cloud of the words women most use on Facebook:



 

 

 

 




...and men:




 

 

 

 

 

 

Sermon Illustration Alert: In some parts of the world, people change their names in hopes of changing their lives.

 

What will we do with Earth's remaining 19 years?

 

"'Silence is like scouring sand,' he says. 'When you are quiet, the silence blows against your mind and etches away everything that is soft and unimportant.' What is left is what is real—pure awareness, and the very hardest questions." Here's a fascinating story about one man's quest to preserve a little spot of wilderness where there is no human-generated noise.


 

"There are times to speak up, particularly when issues of justice are involved, but an endless stream of calling people fools or liars -- people whom your neighbor voted for -- just does not make sense for the Christian. Unless, of course, you just want to preach to the choir and not reach the unchurched. The end result is another stumbling block for those we are trying to reach." You should read this post by Ed Stetzer.


 

The Atlantic: "Stable marriage and community are the secret sauce of economic well-being that nobody on the left wants to admit to using"


 

Churchgoing youth are 70 percent more likely to enroll in college than unaffiliated peers, research finds.


 

Reasons for caution against "assisted suicide" measures: "My problem, ultimately, is this: I’ve lived so close to death for so long that I know how thin and porous the border between coercion and free choice is, how easy it is for someone to inadvertently influence you to feel devalued and hopeless — to pressure you ever so slightly but decidedly into being “reasonable,” to unburdening others, to “letting go.” Perhaps, as advocates contend, you can’t understand why anyone would push for assisted-suicide legislation until you’ve seen a loved one suffer. But you also can’t truly conceive of the many subtle forces — invariably well meaning, kindhearted, even gentle, yet as persuasive as a tsunami — that emerge when your physical autonomy is hopelessly compromised....Advocates of Death With Dignity laws who say that patients themselves should decide whether to live or die are fantasizing. Who chooses suicide in a vacuum? We are inexorably affected by our immediate environment. The deck is stacked." Ben Mattlin for the NY Times

 

Winning Ways: Telling People About God

After attending many conferences and reading many books on the work of ministry, I still haven't found a better definition of a pastor's job than the one given by my firstborn when he was a preschooler.


When Michael turned four, it was time for him to start sitting with his mother in church services instead of attending the preschool care. After a few weeks of observing the hour-long services of songs, prayers, and my teaching, he had an observation.

"I know what your job is, Daddy," he told me over Sunday lunch.

"Oh?"

"Your job is to tell people about God."

"Well, that's right, Michael. I'm a pastor, and my job is to tell people about God."

"Daddy?" he continued.

"Yes, son."

"It takes a lo-o-o-ong time to tell people about God, doesn't it, Daddy?"

Well, I guess the boy was right! When your job is to tell people about God, there's a lot to say.

But the opening line of the Apostles Creed gathers up all the Bible says about God in a single sentence: "I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth." In that statement I confess that God is my Maker, my Ruler, and my Father.

That's worth a closer look this Sunday. We'll close our seven week citywide "Explore God" campaign with the question, "Can I Know God Personally?"

By the way, we want to know how the "Explore God" campaign has impacted you. Did it settle a question you were wrestling with? Did you get into some interesting conversations in the community? Did you make a decision for Christ? Send your impressions and stories to my assistant, Jami (jami@hbcaustin.org). I'll prepare a newsletter column from the reports.

I've enjoyed studying the "Seven Big Questions" with you. And this last Sunday of the study series may be the most important. Many people are willing to say, "I believe in God"--and what they are saying is, "I believe God exists." But our goal should be to know God. To have a relationship with him. To "improve our conscious contact with God" as those in recovery groups put it. A.W. Tozer once said, "I want deliberately to encourage this mighty longing after God. He waits to be wanted. Too bad that with many of us he waits so long, so very long, in vain."

Bring a friend this Sunday @ 10!

 

Links to Your World, Tuesday October 15

The average cell phone user accesses his or her phone screen 10 times an hour

 

Welcome to BridesThrowingCats. It's brides throwing cats--what else were you expecting?

 

Another reason Alamo's the only place to watch a film: Madonna banned for refusing to stop texting during a flick.

 

How to cut toast.

 

"I do not think that the evolutionary ‘explanations’ for consciousness that are currently doing the rounds are going to get us anywhere. These explanations do not address the hard problem itself, but merely the ‘easy’ problems that orbit it like a swarm of planets around a star. The hard problem’s fascination is that it has, to date, completely and utterly defeated science. Nothing else is like it. We know how genes work, we have (probably) found the Higgs Boson; but we understand the weather on Jupiter better than we understand what is going on in our own heads. This is remarkable." Michael Hanlon for Aeon.

 

More people who live together are introducing their partners as their fiancé, despite no actual plans to get married.

 

Malcolm Gladwell, on his return to faith while writing his latest book: "I realized what I had missed. It wasn't an 'I woke up one morning' kind of thing. It was a slow realization something incredibly powerful and beautiful in the faith that I grew up with that I was missing. Here I was writing about people of extraordinary circumstances and it slowly dawned on me that I can have that too."

 

This family who survived the terror of the Nairobi mall serve with our International Mission Board. Katherine Walton has been I nterviewed by “The Today Show,” “Good Morning America,” TIME and People magazines and even Glamour magazine.

 

Winning Ways: Is the Bible Reliable?

In the film Castaway, Tom Hanks played the lone survivor of a FedEx jet crash marooned on a deserted island in the south Pacific. A few packages from the jet washed up on the shore with the castaway, and he opened them in hopes of finding something that would help him survive. When he came to the last package, though, he chose to keep it intact. His determination to eventually deliver that package to its owner was his thin connection to the hope of rescue. In fact, the film ended with the delivered castaway delivering that package to its recipient five years later.


During Super Bowl XXXVII, FedEx ran a commercial that spoofed the movie. In the send-up, after the FedEx employee delivered the package he had protected for so long, curiosity got the best of him. "Excuse me," he asked the recipient, "what was in that package after all?"

She opened it and showed him the contents, saying, "Oh, nothing really. Just a satellite telephone, a global positioning device, a compass, a water purifier, and some seeds."

No doubt those things would have come in handy for a man stranded on a deserted island!

The Bible is also something filled with good things that we miss if we neglect to open it. Many will neglect to open it because they have suspicions about its dependability. They've read or heard enough skeptical reports to doubt that the New Testament takes us right back to the actual words and actions of Jesus.

That's why we need to spend a Sunday in our "Seven Big Questions" series to deal with the reliability of the Bible. This Sunday I'll give you five reasons you can trust the Bible to give you accurate information about Jesus.

The Apostle John said, “What we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked at and touched with our hands, concerning the Word of Life . . . we proclaim to you also, so that you too may have fellowship with us” (1 John 1:1-3 NASB). That’s the reason the Bible was written. The earliest followers of Jesus wanted you and me to share in their remarkable experience with Jesus. By reading their words, we can enter into a fellowship with these people who actually walked and talked with him.

Come this Sunday and I'll give you good reasons to open this wonderful package from God called the Bible.

Additional Note: Keep up with all staff newsletter columns at our website. This week, Gene writes about two Hillcrest ladies in leadership with Faith in Action, Steve reminds you of how you can help with the upcoming Craft Show, and Karen reflects on five years as our Kids Minister.

__________________________________________

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Links to Your World, Tuesday October 8

In a post about toxic online commenting, John Blake for CNN defines several types of religious and atheist commentors. Horrible stuff here. It's one reason I pretty much ignore the comments feature at online sites.

 

Read a Lawyer’s Amazingly Detailed Analysis of Bilbo’s Contract in The Hobbit

 

You Talk Too Much. If you're wondering if I had certain people in mind when I added this to the list, yeah, I was probably thinking of you. :-) As the wise man once said, "It's OK to hold a conversation--just let go of it once in a while.

 

Facebook Version of Marriage Going Great

 

Online atheists love their memes, especially the ones that are “devastating” to religon as well as being humorous. Here are few such Devastating Arguments Against Christianity (Courtesy of the Internet). As it turns out, the arguments are indeed devastating…just not to religion. (HT: Evangelical Outpost)

 

Sermon Illustration Alert: Family Hosts 200 Homeless People for Dinner After Daughter's Wedding Gets Called Off

 

James Taranto says Stan Greenberg is a racist when speaking of white evangelical Republicans. Taranto has a point.

 

I did not know this: "Surprising new research from the University of Texas suggests that people who often say "I" are less powerful and less sure of themselves than those who limit their use of the word."

 

WSJ: Churches Take a Stand on Pews, Replacing Them With Chairs. At Hillcrest I like our decision to go with pews in the big renovation, but this is a trend we'll need to pay attention to.

 

Time: "Once a taboo topic, mental illness is an increasingly prominent plot line on television....Aside from helping those unfamiliar with mental illnesses to have a more realistic and unbiased view of psychiatric disorders, the depictions may help patients struggling with mental illness as well. “Someone with bipolar disorder may identify with a character and say to themselves, ‘if they can get through it, I can get through it.’"

 

Winning Ways: What If God Was One of Us?

In her hit song, "One of Us," Joan Osbourne sang:

What if God was one of us
Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on the bus
Trying to make his way home

Some just consider the song irreverent, but Osbourne was asking an important question: Does God know what we’re dealing with down here?

The answer is found in the life of Jesus. The Apostle John beautifully described the life of Jesus as God who "became flesh and made his dwelling among us" (John 1:14).

This Sunday we'll continue our "Explore God" series with the question of Jesus' identity. Many regard Jesus as one of history's great moral teachers--another like Gandhi or Buddha, for example. But, as C.S. Lewis famously put it,

A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher....Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse....Let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.

Why is this important? Two reasons.

First, because Jesus is everything it means to be God, knowing Jesus is the best way to know God. Jesus wasn’t simply a man who was filled with the presence of God: Jesus was the presence of God. And so if you want to know what makes God smile, look at what made Jesus smile. If you want to know what enrages God, look at what made Jesus angry. Any claim about who God is and what God likes must be measured by the words and life of the man who was God-in-the-flesh: Jesus Christ.

Second, because Jesus is everything it means to be God, the sacrifice of Jesus was God paying our penalty himself. In 2 Corinthians 5:19 Paul wrote, "God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself." The astonishing claim of the gospel is that the man hanging upon the cross was the creator himself giving himself up to save his prized creation.

Believers need this reminder as much as those investigating faith. Join us this Sunday at 10 to celebrate the fact that God really was one of us.

__________________________________________

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Links to Your World, Tuesday October 1

Man Experiencing First Real Moment Of Peace In Years Resuscitated (The Onion)

 

For the love of Myst

 

Great a capella arrangement:

A four-year-old British boy survived the bloody Kenyan shopping mall attack after standing up to a terrorist gunman and telling him: “You’re a very bad man.” Time. The gunman released them saying, "Forgive us. We're not monsters." What's this guy's definition of "monsters"?

"Pastor Saeed is not the only Christian in chains for the Gospel," David French of ACLJ wrote Sept. 16. "He's not the only Christian who faces mortal peril simply because of his faith.... Go to Be Heard, write a letter for Pastor Saeed, then stay and learn about the plight of Christians in Iran, Egypt, Pakistan, and beyond."

 

Wait...Buddhist persecution of Christians? That doesn't fit the Western fable of Buddhism

 

CT: "According to a study of more than 100 nations, changes in the percentage of Christians—especially evangelicals—in a given country have a direct correlation to economic well-being."

Sure, you can wish Michael Goodman a happy birthday today.

 

Amy Simpson, in her post, "Evangelicals, You're Wrong About Mental Illness"--

Stop telling people they can cure their mental illness with only prayer....One sure way to drive people closer to despair is to tell them their mental illness is simply a spiritual problem, tell them to pray it away, then when it doesn’t work, just tell them to pray harder. Laying a heavy spiritual burden on people suffering from serious mental illness is a way to encourage suicide, not to prevent it....Mental illness, like other diseases, is a reality of life in a world where parts of our body–including our brains–get sick and malfunction. We don’t consider it acceptable to prescribe prayer alone for diseased livers, hearts, and pancreases; why prescribe it for disordered brains?

 

For those of you who followed five seasons of Breaking Bad right through the finale Sunday, here's James Poniewozik:

No, we’re not all Walter White. Most of us would never do what he did even in his circumstances. But have none of us ever done the wrong thing in the name of pride, expedience, or “the children”? Isn’t the world full of people who make selfish choices because they tell themselves they need to look out for their own families first (never mind what other families are indirectly affected)? To disassociate yourself from Walt is to tell yourself that your ordinary impulses–It’s not fair! I deserve this! My kids deserve this!–could never lead you to a bad place. You don’t have to kill to compromise, and Breaking Bad is all about how one moral compromise makes the next one easier.

And don't miss this Breaking Bad observation by Chris McNerney and Daniel Lee:

Walt didn't become broken—Walt was already broken. Broken on the inside by pride, lust for power and greed, all of which was neatly hidden away until circumstances brought the inner being to light. So Walt wasn't a bad person because he manufactured narcotics; he manufactured narcotics because he was a bad person, and the long-term effects of unrepentant sin gradually harden him into a ruthless psychopath....What starts off as an instinct to provide for his family mutates into a monstrous obsession to preserve the empire that Walt has established with his own two hands. Walt has been so engulfed by the darkness that he is no longer fully human. And that's because sin is a force that refuses to let up; like gravity, it relentlessly pulls us inward into itself. As Walt himself says, "If you believe that there's a hell...we're already pretty much going there. But I'm not gonna lie down until I get there" (from episode 5.07, "Say My Name").

But I didn't watch the much-ballyhooed program and I'm not sure I'll binge-watch the five seasons to catch up. A couple of years ago Diane and I thought we'd keep up through Netflix, but the first three episodes of the first season were so dark and brutal. Besides, I know something about the family heartbreak of drug abuse (another story for another day), and we didn't need further sorrow from our entertainment. In the end, Lily Rothman's reasons she doesn't watch the show are good enough for me, too.

 

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Winning Ways: Agents for Peace in a Diverse World

"COEXIST"

That's one of Austin's favorite bumper stickers, using the symbols of the world's major religions to spell the word. The Muslim crescent moon, for example, becomes the "C," the Star of David serves as the "X" and the cross stands in for the "T."

The decal preaches the conviction that no one religion can corner the market on truth. "You have your way of perceiving God and I have my way," the sticker seems to say. "We're all just taking different paths up the same mountain, so I'll see you at the top."

That's why this Sunday's study is one of the most important in our "Explore God" series. We'll seek to answer the question, "Is Christianity too narrow?"

The concern behind the question is how to be charitable in our diverse world. Won't a belief that Jesus is the only way to God only lead to ill will in our schools, workplaces, and communities?

But within the Christian message are resources that can make its followers agents for peace on earth. I can think of three.

Common Grace: We know there are basic values self-evident to everyone, not just Bible readers. So, we can work together with people of other faiths--and no faith--to build decent communities.

Saving Grace: The gospel teaches that our salvation comes by grace alone. God drew us to himself not because of our nationality or our ethnicity or our moral self-discipline. It wasn’t that we were smarter or had a greater moral sensitivity. It’s all of grace. So we can relate to others who don’t get it because there was a time when we didn’t get it.

The Example of Jesus: At the very heart of the Christian story is a man who died for his enemies, praying for their forgiveness. Reflection on this can only lead to a radically different way of dealing with those who are different from us.

So the gospel message, even with its exclusive claims about Jesus, has the resources to make believers agents for peace. Sadly, Christians don't always put these resources into practice in their relationships in the world. But the more we understand the gospel we believe, the more we can communicate the exclusive claims of Jesus in a manner that builds relationships, even with those who don’t accept our claims.

Join us this Sunday at 10 to dig deeper into this topic!

__________________________________________

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Links to Your World, Tuesday September 24

Funny stuff worship leaders accidentally say. It's tough to talk and do key changes between songs.

 

"You don’t want to be that guy at the party who’s crazy and angry and ranting in the corner — it’s the same for Twitter or Facebook." Best quote from a story as to why social media is driving the spread of positive stories. I've got some folks on my social media feeds that haven't got the memo yet.

Wacky Puritan Names, including If-Christ-had-not-died-for-thee-thou-hadst-been-damned. Son of Praise-God Barebones.

 

Why is Zambia So Poor?

 

CT: "Evangelical, fundamentalist, or born-again Christians (48 percent) agree prayer and Scripture study alone can overcome mental illness." Thus furthering the misunderstanding and stigma. Whatever the illness, let's thank God for prayer, Scripture, AND medicine. Ed Stetzer has more to say on the survey here.

Rick Warren reflects on the CNN interview Piers Morgan conducted with Warren and his wife, Kay, about their son's mental illness and suicide.

 

Rod Dreher: "As someone who strongly believes that Israel has a right to exist, it nevertheless offends me that so many of my fellow American Christians spend so much time and effort defending the interests of Israeli Jews — as we should, given how friendless they are, and how important Israel is morally and strategically — but treat their fellow Christians in the Middle East as an afterthought, if they think of them at all."

 

We've all heard reports on declining church attendance among young adults. Thankfully, it's just not true.

 

Terrorists Target Christians in Nairobi Shopping Mall, Killing 68

Suicide Attack on Pakistani Church Kills 78

"They've told him many times that they would free him and allow him to return to our family, the kids and I, if he would deny his Christian faith, and he's stood strong in that prison. He's led many, many - over 30 people - to Christ in that prison." Saeed Abedini's wife, Naghmeh, recently spoke to students at Liberty University. I will be attending a special worldwide prayer vigil for American Pastor Saeed Thursday, Sept. 26 -- the one-year anniversary of his imprisonment in Iran.

 

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Winning Ways: A Broken World and a Good God

Have you had a "but even so" moment yet?

Kobayashi Issa was an 18th century haiku master. In my favorite of his poems he wrote:

The world of dew is, yes,

a world of dew,

but even so

As a lay Buddhist priest, Issa believed that the best response to suffering was stoic detachment, freeing oneself from the impulse to cling possessively to impermanent things. In his haiku, then, he acknowledged the way he was taught to see the world--as ephemeral dew. And yet with that last line he pushed back against this worldview at the same time.

Given his experience with suffering, the pushback is understandable. As Pico Iyer recently wrote in the New York Times:

Issa had seen his mother die when he was 2, his first son die, his father contract typhoid fever, his next son and a beloved daughter die. He knew that suffering was a fact of life, he might have been saying in his short verse; he knew that impermanence is our home and loss the law of the world. But how could he not wish, when his 1-year-old daughter contracted smallpox, and expired, that it be otherwise?

No matter how neatly we arrange our worldview, suffering scrambles it. This is true whether we're founding life on Buddhist principles or secular sensibilities or any other persuasion.

And it's true of Christian convictions, too. What does the Christian do with her belief in an all-powerful, all-loving God when heartbreak crashes in?

This may be the toughest of the Seven Big Questions in our "Explore God" series. It's certainly the most personal.

I read a fascinating report in Wired about a study in pain management. In experiments, scientists found that we survive pain better if our minds are occupied with thoughts of someone we deeply love.

Exactly so.

In the Christian worldview, we process suffering by focusing on the One who suffered for us. Of all the world's religions, only one describes God as experiencing the ruin of the world as a man. But on the cross he was doing more than just identifying with the ruin of the world: He was carrying away the sin that ruined the world so that he could begin the process of making all things new.

Are you in pain? We'll help you focus on the Beloved this Sunday.

__________________________________________

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Links to Your World, Tuesday September 17

After a feature on NBC news, a blog post by Kim Hall, the Director of Women’s ministry at All Saints Presbyterian in Austin, Texas went viral. The topic? Girls who take suggestive selfies and boys who can't un-see them. (HT: Wednesday Link List)

 

The Real Housewives of Duck Dynasty

 

WestboroMingle: Where Hate and Love Come Together:

 

NYT: "Schizophrenic patients early in the course of their disease are acutely aware that they are losing their grip on the stable life they once had; they are like the sparrow from Dr. Montross’s childhood that dies in the struggle to free itself from the netting on her grandmother’s blueberry bushes. The bird 'must have understood how the more it moved, the more tangled its feathers would become.'" Touching. Heartbreaking.

 

10 People Who Switched Carrers After 50 (And Thrived)

 

Sermon Illustration Alert: Let E-Scapegoat Take Your Sins Away

 

"I don’t think we need to go to church every week. Why don’t we just wait until there’s something new to learn?" Good post about the point of church attendance.

 

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Winning Ways: We Came to Believe

 

God-deprived hearts, like oxygen-deprived heads, can't think clearly enough to accept the obvious.

Jon Krakauer's book Into Thin Air documents the consequences of oxygen-deprived heads. It's a book about the ill-fated expedition to Mount Everest during the spring of 1996. Ascending Everest is, of course, a risky venture, but it was human error that caused some to lose their lives on that climb.

For example, there was Andy Harris, one of the expedition leaders. Harris was in dire need of oxygen during his descent, but he died holding oxygen canisters in his hand. They had been left for him along the trail down. Those who had already passed the canisters on their own return to base camp knew that the canisters were full. But when Harris radioed the base camp of his crisis, they could not convince him that the canisters were full and that he should use them. Disoriented from his lack of oxygen, he insisted that they were empty and were of no use.

He held all the containers of oxygen he needed to survive but -- now follow me here -- what he held in his hand was so thin in his head that he could not recognize what he held in his hand was what his head needed.

Got it?

I've just described life before God. It's the very lack of God that makes us unable to see that what we lack is what we need! And so we keep doing life on our own and making a mess of things.

But many of us can testify: "We came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity." That phrase should be familiar to anyone in a Twelve Step program. But even if we've never needed an addiction recovery group, many of us could say that the Second Step perfectly describes how we awakened to our need for God.

We came to believe.

First, "we came" -- we attended a church service, we read a book about faith that a friend loaned us, we joined a Bible study.

Then, "we came to" -- that is, we woke up to spiritual reality.

Finally, "we came to believe" -- that is, we decided that this God-talk made sense and we accepted it.

This week, come. Maybe you'll even come to. Or, best of all, maybe you'll come to believe! Our "Explore God" series continues this week with my lesson at 10 and discussion groups at 11.

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Links to Your World, Tuesday September 10

What does the fox say? Wired says the viral video isn't totally wrong.

 

How texting turns us into liars.

 

Well, why didn't you just say so? Doug Wilson's one-sentence summary of the Syrian thing: "I want Congress to authorize something I don’t believe they need to authorize, and which I reserve the right to do anyway whether or not they authorize it, in order that I might defend the credibility of a red line I didn’t actually draw, so that I may take decisive action that will not in any way affect the momentum of the Syrian civil war or, if it accidentally does, al-Qaeda will the stronger for it, in order that I might have a chance to do what I have spent a decade yelling about other people doing."

 

Be prepared or trust God?

 

In high school I considered a career in genetics while uncertain about my call to ministry. So, this article fascinated me: "Scientists have known for decades that genes can vary their level of activity, as if controlled by dimmer switches....This variable gene activity, called gene expression, is how your body does most of its work....Our social lives can change our gene expression with a rapidity, breadth, and depth previously overlooked....'You can’t change your genes. But if we’re even half right about all this, you can change the way your genes behave—which is almost the same thing.'" Some real implications here for the science-level debate over free will, lessons on the effects of social isolation, and some caution on the over-simplified argument that, "Baby, you were born this way."

 

"Our understanding of the biology of mental disorders has been slow in coming, but recent advances like these have shown us that mental disorders are biological in nature, that people are not responsible for having schizophrenia or depression, and that individual biology and genetics make significant contributions." NYT

 

What’s Schizophrenia Like? A Woman Who Hears Voices Explains It Beautifully:

 

 

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Winning Ways: Why You Exist

(cross-posted at Get Anchored)

Does life have any purpose? If so, what is it?

That's the first of Seven Big Questions we'll start with this Sunday. It's part of our citywide "Explore God" campaign. Bring somebody at 10 for my talk, and then encourage them to stay at 11 to discuss it with your small group.

The reigning worldview is that life has no purpose. It's a bleak claim, but anyone who questions it loses cultural cache. Just ask acclaimed philosopher Thomas Nagel. He suggested in his 2012 book, Mind and Cosmos, that natural observation should lead anyone to see that there is intention to the world. He's still an atheist who won't attribute that evidence of design to a personal God. But just his suggestion that there is some sort of unfolding plan to the universe led to vicious attacks by many fellow academics.

But you don't have to read elite scholars to run into the question of life's purpose. The issue arises for most people simply through the weariness and dissatisfaction of daily living. In his award-winning entry, "Repetition," spoken-word poet Phil Kaye said:

My mother taught me this trick, If you repeat something over and over again, it loses its meaning....Our existence, she said, is the same way. You watch the sunset too often, and it just becomes 6pm. You make the same mistake over and over, you’ll stop calling it a mistake. If you just wake up, wake up, wake up, wake up, wake up, wake up one day you’ll forget why.

Have you forgotten why?

I suggest a single word for the purpose of life.

Love.

To discover you are loved by the Creator. To trust that everything you experience is filtered through his loving intentions. To gladly respond to his commands knowing that they are for your good. To enjoy his creation in accordance with his instructions. To relate to men and women around you as those God also cherishes.

Love is the reason there is something and not nothing.

Live out of this truth at the center, and it changes everything. Let's talk more about it this Sunday @ 10. Send this to a friend with an invitation to join you for the worship service and your small group!

(For an excellent review of Nagel's book, check out Alvin Plantinga's article in the New Republic.)

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Links to Your World, Tuesday September 3

Glad to see Baylor's standing. Behold college football's "Grid of Shame"

 

Bugs: It's what's for dinner.

 

Sermon illustration alert: "Worrying about making ends meet, it seems, can occupy enough of the brain‘s finite thinking power that it makes it difficult to think clearly" (Time article).

 

"Poised to be the biggest cable show of all time, Duck Dynasty is the highest rated show on TV to consistently portray a family that is unapologetic about their Christian faith and their affection for one another. The pop culture phenomenon is making it harder for television executives to ignore the demand for shows that portray families who put God first in their lives." 9 (More) Things You Should Know About Duck Dynasty

 

"American pastor Saeed Abedini is losing hope for leaving the most notorious prison in Iran." American pastor, y'all.

 

"Miley [Cyrus] has a history of following Jesus and church membership....But as her recent antics demonstrate, the Bible’s command to continue meeting with other believers is for our own good. It’s the place where our internal compass gets reset after the world’s constant pull off course. When a person is constantly surrounded by people with compasses pointing away from Jesus, they will find it incredibly difficult to remain focused on True North. Over time, that person will become indistinguishable from their peer group." Link

 

"Somewhere along the line we evangelical Christians have gotten it into our heads that our neighbors, peers, and most Americans don't like us, and that they like us less every year. I've heard this idea stated in sermons and everyday conversation; I've read it in books and articles. There's a problem, though. It doesn't appear to be true." Bradley Wright provides a needed corrective.

 

"If you look at the layout of the number buttons on a phone -- smart, cell, landline, what have you -- the number buttons will feature, almost inevitably, a uniform layout. Ten digits, laid out on a three-by-three grid, with the tenth tacked on on the bottom. The numbers ascending from left to right, and from top to bottom." But this article highlights the 17 design choices that Bell considered before settling on what has become our standard.

 

The Presbyterian Church (USA) rejected the popular Getty song, "In Christ Alone," because they didn't like the line about the wrath of God being satisfied at the cross. For the Washington Post, Russell Moore explains why we need to sing about God's wrath as well as God's love.

 

When I finally get around to writing that novel, I'll hope for this one-line endorsement Stephen King gave to Elmore Leonard's 1985 "Glitz": "This is the kind of book that if you get up to see if there are any chocolate chip cookies left, you take it with you so you won’t miss anything."

 

 

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Links to Your World, Tuesday August 27

Being frugal is good for your love life

 

A keyboard that shocks you if you're spending too much time on Facebook.

 

Twenty percent of non-Christians in North America really do not 'personally know' any Christians. That's 13,447,000 people—about the population of metropolitan Los Angeles or Istanbul—most of them in the United States. Story

 

The one easy daily habit that makes life more awesome.

 

What if a psychiatrist could tell whether someone was about to commit suicide simply by taking a sample of their blood? Story

 

"As I wrestled with a theology of suffering, tainted by my 21st-century Western assumption that I deserve a comfortable and happy life, I stopped asking God why and how he could let schizophrenia happen to my family. I knew the answer: We are pervasively flawed and deeply altered by our sinful condition. And faith-filled or not, there is no reason such a thing shouldn't happen in this life. No reason it shouldn't have happened to my family. And someday, when we are each remade as whole and unmarred people, I imagine creation's renewal will be sweeter for people who have suffered the way Mom has. After accepting the truth and tragedy of our collective condition, I started seeing hope and redemption in our experience." Amy Simpson explains what it was like to grow up in the shadow of a schizophrenic mom--and how she came to terms with God in the process.

 

"They were guilty of nothing more than being typical 7-year-old boys. But in today’s school environment, that can be a punishable offense." Why schools have become hostile environments for boys.

 

Related: Finding Our Lost Boys. "The church has skewed ministry to the way many women learn and respond."

 

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Connecting Your Work to God's Work

How can Christian faith make a difference in the way you choose a career and do your job? Tim Keller highlights four ways Christian faith influences and shapes daily work in this blog post, which is a summary of his book, Every Good Endeavor: Connecting Your Work to God's Work.

First, the Christian faith gives us a moral compass, an inner GPS giving us ethical guidance that takes us beyond merely the legal aspects or requirements in any situation.

Second, your Christian faith gives you a new spiritual power, an inner gyroscope, that keeps you from being overthrown by either success, failure, or boredom.

Third, the Christian faith gives us a new conception of work as the means by which God loves and cares for his world through us.

Fourth, the Christian faith gives us a new world-and-life view that shapes the character of our work.

Read the post here.

 

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Links to Your World, Tuesday August 20

What happens every single minute on the internet:

 

"Has there ever been a QB whose game inspires such a strange and dissonant mixture of joy and dread in the mind of the fan?" From a GQ profile of RGIII. Perfect one-sentence summary of watching him play ever since Baylor days.

 

Sermon Illustration Alert: Andrew Baseman's blog, Past Imperfect: The Art of Inventive Repair "reports on chipped and cracked household items that were put back together with intricate, jerry-rigged apparatus, long before the invention of Krazy Glue. 'Make dos' are anathama to traditional antiques collectors, who want only pristine items....Past Imperfect, which launched in 2010, is the platform for Baseman’s mission to save these orphaned, misshapen objects and give them the respect they deserve....He believes 'it is my duty to rescue these plucky survivors, some lingering in limbo for hundreds of years of neglect. I make it sound like I run an adoption agency on the Island of Misfit Toys, which is fine with me.'" (story)

 

Russell Moore says the Bible Belt's decline may be "bad for America, but it's good for the church."

Fear of shouting "ChristIsKing"

 

Only Canada, China, North Korea, and U.S. Allow Abortion After Viability for Any Reason

 

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