I don’t own an iPhone, and can’t see in the budget room for that anytime soon.
However, this discussion of iPhone medical apps is, too me, anyway, fascinating.
Particularly, I had to chuckle at one called ‘Period Tracker’.
Being a husband whose wife had a hysterectomy over twenty years ago, my first response to this was, “What is a grammar app doing in this list?” But for guys whose life situation is different than mine, this could save a lot of angst, it seems to me!
…when Trix is ‘buy one get one free’ at the grocery store.
That makes Colin very happy.
Just Colin.
Yep.
Silly Rabbit.
In the aftermath of the shootings at Ft. Hood, there is, in this post by James Fallows, resignation. But there is wisdom in his thoughts, too.
Unless our world view recognizes the reality of chaos and evil, we will not ever come to grips with such things. These are awful events, made personally worse for me because I know someone who works at Ft. Hood, and I’ve not been able to get in touch with him.
There is a lot about the presence of chaos and evil in the world that I can ‘explain’ theologically, but which I nevertheless cannot really understand. But I see in the concrete reality of the resurrection of Jesus Christ an event and a truth that contains a promise of a world in which chaos and evil will be but a dim memory.
To that end we labor and pray and hope.
Is it possible for us in the church to show too much grace to unbelievers? If we allow people with obvious and obviously ‘bad’ sin into our lives and into our churches, are we not in some way condoning their sin and becoming accomplice to it? Is this showing too much grace, a threshold from which we should draw away?
Someone from a Roman Catholic background asked me a few weeks ago if our church believes in ‘mortal sin’, in sin of such severity that it would keep one out of heaven. I told her absolutely – that every sin is sufficient to keep us out of heaven. That is why we all need Christ. But I told her that we do NOT (or should not) keep an hierarchy of sin. Pride and greed rank right up there with adultery and theft. We all are guilty, we all are living in sin, we all need the grace of Christ.
So, as those needing grace, can we inadvertently show so much grace to a sinner that we somehow encourage him in his sin? Can we show too much grace?
Did Jesus show too much grace? He was known as a friend of sinners. I don’t believe he came to have such a reputation by being quick to condemn. Our model is one who let a prostitute’s tears fall on his feet. He allowed her to wipe them dry with her let-down hair, to the consternation of those who would have treated her otherwise.
Do we tend to be more like Jesus or more like the Pharisee in that story? Can we really show too much grace?
Why would we limit the grace we would show? Are we afraid that people will not know they are sinners if we somehow befriend them as they are? Do we imagine that it is our job to make sure they feel the condemnation of sin, and must hear it from us? Do we somehow think it is OUR responsibility to change them?
Where did we get such notions?
Too much grace? I say, let’s give it a try. Let’s see what happens when we show people too much grace. Let’s see what happens if we just love people and keep our judgmental mouths shut. Let’s see what happens.
I rather think that if grace breaks out among us, it will not be greater sin that results, but something far more wonderful.
One more evidence that things are Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be
Oh well. There is at least one sign that things are not all awry.
The title dangles a preposition, but I hope that does not stop you from marking November 22 on your calendar.
Let me dangle another:
This is an event we want many people to come to.
Pass this on!
In the ‘What does my third grader know that I don’t know department’ is this tidbit of information. Apparently, between when I was in third grade and now, they’ve added an ocean.
I don’t know who the ‘they’ is that has that power, but I am informed by my resident expert in all things oceanic that somewhere around 2000, the perennial lineup of four oceans – the Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, and Arctic – was deemed inadequate for all the duties required of oceans.
This necessitated the addition of the Southern Ocean, a result of the generosity of the three bordering oceans who each agreed to donate all their water south of the 60th parallel (in exchange, it is rumored, for a sea to be named later).
So now the rest of us who went to third grade a long time ago know.
I have found the locus of Halloween Evil.
It is not
* in the little demons who parade up and down our street looking for handouts
* in the horrendously grotesque jack-o-lanterns (this one carved by our in-need-of-therapy friend Bill Kimrey)
* in the proliferation of horror flicks centered around this day.
I have discovered it as I dumped bag after bag of candy in a bowl just now in preparation for tonight’s onslaught – and carefully removed and set aside all the varieties that I wanted to hoard myself and not give to the urchins unless I’m forced to do so.
I have, you see, found the locus of Halloween evil in the place I know it resided all along.
Study is a critical aspect of the pastor’s call. To maintain it requires vision and it requires some workable form of life management.
David Allen in his extremely helpful book Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity
Eugene Peterson in a wonderful chapter called “The Unbusy Pastor” (about which I should write more sometime) from his book The Contemplative Pastor: Returning to the Art of Spiritual Direction
And such considerations would not be complete without reference to another helpful resource from another experienced (and scarred) pastor, Gordon MacDonald. In Ordering Your Private World
Law #1: Unseized time flows toward my weaknesses.
Law #2: Unseized time comes under the influence of dominant people in my world.
Law #3: Unseized time surrenders to the demands of all emergencies.
Law #4: Unseized time gets invested in things that gain public acclamation.
Our big point is that preachers/pastors need to be masters at exegeting scripture and exegeting culture. To do either demands time. To do both demands discipline.
It’s worth watching:
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