I’d like to thank all the little links out there. Without you, this wouldn’t be possible. You toil under the hot lights of computer screens around the world, often unnoticed and unappreciated. But friends, this is your moment to shine. Make us proud! World, I present to you, The Weekly Town Crier! Where there are no little links!
Tell my younger brother: the first borns are smarter!
Watch this man do with three kites at once what I can’t do with one kite at once!
Read this article which equates the process of naming a baby with branding, pointing out that some people are even hiring consultants!
Read this piece which wonders about the personalization of media culture and why Hip Hop isn’t more relevant.
Read as Brother Andrews asks “Have you prayed for Bin Laden Today?”
Browse the Minneapolis Star-Tribune’s list of ten great musical moments on television.
Read as Steven Van Zandt defends the practice of up and coming bands bands licensing their music.
Read about why Cameron Diaz was recently booed in Peru becuase of her “trendy” Maoist messenger bag.
Read this report of Obama’s recent claim that “right-wing evangelical leaders have exploited and politicized religious beliefs in an effort to sow division.”
See picture’s of the winner of 2007’s “World’s Ugliest Dog” contest.
Ever wonder what you just stepped on? Visit What’sthatbug.com to find out.
Read what former gold medalist Ray Mercer had to say about his recent MMA defeat by noted street fighter Kimbo Slice: “”It was like I put my head in his armpit and said, ‘Go ahead, choke me.’ From now on, I’m sticking to boxing. I can’t get choked out in boxing.”
Take the iPhone “guided tour.” Browse as the official reviews begin to come in. Also browse as the monthly fee figures have finally been released.
Read as the New York Times examines the current trend of “indie” artists collaborating with “pops” orchestras.
Read this list of ten ways to improve your mind by reading classic literature (ht: lhb).
Sign up for eMusic, find lots of DRM-free downloads and help me earn free downloads in the process. Everyone wins!
Read about former professional wrestler Chris Benoit who was recently found murdered along with his wife and son.
Read about the man who threw a log at a bear and killed it!
Read about recent reports that America is the most charitable nation on earth.
Read about doctors backing away from a controversial proposal that would have designated “video game addiction as a mental disorder akin to alcoholism.”
Read about the Supreme Court ruling against “Bong Hits 4 Jesus.”
Read as Dr. Mohler asks: “Have we reached the point that a Christian who affirms traditional church teachings cannot be appointed to public office?”
ReadRolling Stone’s report that iTunes has surpassed Target and Amazon to become the third largest music retailer.
Read about the fake priest who was recently arrested baptizing a baby.
Read about the baby girl with 27 names: 25 of which are boxing tributes.
I am convinced that the Gospel is for all of life and ought to fuel the soul as well as the imagination. To that end, I regularly try to set aside some time and space each Friday to encourage the pursuit of creativity. I try to do this in a couple of different ways. I regularly link to Joe Kennedy, Will Turner, Timmy Brister, Steve McCoy, Joe Thorn, who post photographs on Fridays, along with the Friday Flickr Group in which they participate. I also often highlight a poet (who may or may not be Christian, but who above all, uses words well) and I highlight a musical artist who makes at least one track available for free and legal download and recently, I’ve begun highlighting an artist along with at least one piece of their artwork.
Today’s featured poet is Nikki Giovanni (b.1943-). Giovanni is an American poet and is Giovanni is currently a Distinguished Professor of English at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.Giovanni is a lung cancer survivor and eventually lost a lung as a result. She is a prolific writer and has since written more than two dozen books including volumes of poetry, illustrated children’s books, and three collections of essays. Much of her poetry has been inspired by and deals with the civil rights movement in America. Today’s featured poem is called “Balances.”
in life
one is always
balancing
like we juggle our mothers
against our fathers
or one teacher
against another
(only to balance our grade average)
3 grains of salt
to one ounce truth
our sweet black essence
or the funky honkies down the street
and lately I’ve begun wondering
if you re trying to tell me something
we used to talk all night
and do things alone together
and i’ve begun
(as a reaction to a feeling)
to balance
the pleasure of loneliness
against the pain
of loving you
Today’s featured visual artist is Gustav Klimt (1862-1918). Klimt was an Austrian artist known for his paintings, murals and sketches, often dealing with the female form. Klimt’s Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I (featured above) is the third most expensive painting on record, selling in 2006 for an estimated $135 million and now adusted at $137.6 million (view Wikipedia’s list of the most expensive paintings on record here). Though the Portrait has been identified as one of the most expensive paintings, it is perhaps Klimt’s painting The Kiss which is better known, being seen at poster shops in malls worldwide.
Today’s featured musical artist is one of my favorite acts: Tortoise. Part of the fertile Chicago music scene and often labeled “Post-Rock,” Allmusic says that: “Tortoise revolutionized American indie rock in the mid-’90s by playing down tried-and-true punk and rock & roll influences, emphasizing instead the incorporation of a variety of left-field music genres from the past 20 years, including Krautrock, dub, avant-garde jazz, classical minimalism, ambient and space music, film music, and British electronica.”
Tortoise have indeed been one of the most influential bands to come out of Chicago, with members playing a wide variety of side projects and producing as well. Today instead of downloads, we’re featuring two videos. These are high quality live videos and appear to be from a foreign television special, though I don’t know the actual source. The first video is entitled “I Set My Face to the Hillside” and is a song from their 1998 release TNT.
This second video appears to be from the same performance and is a “medley” of sorts, featuring a combination of “Magnet Pulls Through” (from the 1994 self-titled release) and “Eden” (from 2001’s Standards).
Every once in a while I like to highlight the interactive nature of blogging by opening things up for your input and interaction. Sometimes this takes the form of reader-response lists (see here and here for books listes and here for a music list example). Today I just want to know what music you’ve been loving lately and why. Please share with the rest of us what you’ve been listening to a lot and what draws you to that artist. If possible, please offer a brief description if people might not be familiar with the particular artist. I’ll try to compile everything as responses come in. Thanks for participating! I’m looking forward to seeing what everyone else is hearing.
Don’t forget, today and tomorrow only, Desiring God Ministries is running a great special: every book is only five dollars. No limits. Don’t miss this great opportunity.
Senator Barack Obama recently had some harsh words for those he feels have “hijacked” faith and “exploited and politicized religious beliefs in an effort to sow division.”
Obama, speaking to the national convention of the United Church of Christ, continued: “Somehow, somewhere along the way, faith stopped being used to bring us together and faith started being used to drive us apart.” Of course the senator blamed the “Christian Right” (a term he does not here define) as being all too eager to divide rather than bring together around the campfire.
What strikes me about Obama’s comments is just how underdeveloped his take on faith truly is. Faith, by its very nature, divides; much less biblical faith. Since Obama claims to be a Christian, it might be helpful to examine how Christ understood at least part of what He came to do. Consider Luke 12:49-53, where Jesus says:
I came to cast fire on the earth, and would that it were already kindled! I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how great is my distress until it is accomplished! Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth? No, I tell you, but rather division. For from now on in one house there will be five divided, three against two and two against three. They will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.
While I understand Obama’s politicized point, it is just that: a politicized point. It is not anything representing true biblical faith. Obama paints a picture of a campfire singalong to the chorus of Kum Ba Yah while Jesus says that part of His ministry will actually bring division, rather than the unity that Obama seems to so wistful for. I wonder what Obama would say to Jesus’ own question: “Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth?”
The Gospel, by its very nature separates people with its radical claims on all of life. It asserts, not only that there is right and wrong but that some people are wrong and that not everyone can be right. We are not free to define the content of faith simply so we can claim an empty unity. Faith in this sense is meaningless because it is nothing more than a postmodern catchphrase that means nothing and in the end, false unity is worse than honest divisions. Obama empties faith language of anything that makes it meaningful in the first place for the sake of pretending to bring people together which is far worse than honestly dividing over strongly held faith commitments.
In the end, Obama is doing the same thing he sounds so frustrated about. He’s using faith (his version) to divide rather than bring together. If he were sincere about faith “bringing us together,” besides the fact that that faith would have no content, he wouldn’t point fingers as he does; he’s just as willing to exclude some as those he derides. This is nothing more than a not-so-veiled attempt to put his finger in the faith/politics game so that he can say, “See, I talk about faith too!.” But in order to do so, he has to find some way to make nis non-faith seem acceptable. The only way to do that is to discredit mainstream approaches which understand that faith separates.
Faith unites the likeminded while bringing division elsewhere. When religious faith is defined, by default, most versions claim that someone else is wrong. Positives also have negatives. Once we claim a positive faith in something, we are saying others are wrong. Jesus Himself said that no one comes to the Father except through Him (John 14:6) and Acts 4:12 reminds us that salvation is found in no other name. Surely these truths will bring some division when proclaimed. Obama must be willing to say that everyone is right in order to say that faith’s only function is to “bring us together.”
We can take Obama’s point and find some useful reminders. Too often biblical faith divides, not because of its content but the way it is presented. It is sometimes potrayed in an angry, even prideful manner. For that, we must thank Obama for his reminder that are always to “consider others as more significant than ourselves in humility,” (Philippians 2:3), putting on “compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience” (Colossians 3:12). We must be vigilant that the way we present and apply the Gospel does not distract from its content. The content of the Gospel is divisive enough, it doesn’t need our help. But, somehow, I don’t think this was Obama’s point.
We should not be surprised at, nor should we lament the divisive effects of faith. John says that we should not be surprised when the world hates us (1 John 3:13) and Jesus reminded his disciples that a servant “is not above his master” and that just as the world hated and persecuted Him, they will do the same to His disciples (Matthew 10:23-25). As warm and fuzzy is Obama’s conception of faith, it is simply not biblical and he must be called out for using the political/religious rhetoric he is so critical of.
I’ve been reading D.A. Carson’s book Love in Hard Places, which is the follow-up to his wonderful little book The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God. In the first book, Carson examines the different ways the Bible speaks of the love of God. In this second book, he applies that to Christian love, for God and others. It is both a challenging and edifying book.
In his examination of Christian love, Carson begins with Jesus’ “double commandment.” When asked what is the “great” or “most important” commandment, Jesus responds (Matthew 22:34-40 and Mark 12:28-34, here citing from Mark):
And one of the scribes came up and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that he answered them well, asked him, “Which commandment is the most important of all?” Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” And the scribe said to him, “You are right, Teacher. You have truly said that he is one, and there is no other besides him. And to love him with all the heart and with all the understanding and with all the strength, and to love one’s neighbor as oneself, is much more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.” And when Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And after that no one dared to ask him any more questions.
As Carson notes, one of the great “themes” of Jesus’ ministry “was that love, rightly understood and practiced, actually fulfilled Old Testament law” (italics original). Jesus’ answer cites one of the most important Jewish passages in all of the Old Testament, the Shema, the closes thing Judaism has to a creed (Deuteronomy 6:1-9):
Now this is the commandment, the statutes and the rules that the LORD your God commanded me to teach you, that you may do them in the land to which you are going over, to possess it, that you may fear the LORD your God, you and your son and your son’s son, by keeping all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be long. Hear therefore, O Israel, and be careful to do them, that it may go well with you, and that you may multiply greatly, as the LORD, the God of your fathers, has promised you, in a land flowing with milk and honey. “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
What we find Jesus saying by referencing the Deuteronomy passage is that loving God cannot be separated from fearing and obeying Him and this comes from His Word. Love for God is active and it is fueled by the Word of God. Notice the central place given to the Word of God throughout these verses. The context begins by calling for obedience but ends by stressing the role of the Word in everyday life. It is to be a constant companion and guide. Carson concludes that “if Jesus has any respect for the context of the text in Deuteronomy he is quoting in Mark 12, he is saying that loving God with heart and soul and mind and strength is bound up with reading, cherishing, meditating on, and obeying God’s words.”
What captures me about loving God is how intertwined it is with knowing and obeying His Word. This, by necessity means growing in theological understanding and practical obedience; the two cannot be separated. It is all-consuming and encompasses all of life, reminding us that theological study is necessary but needs to result in practical changes in our lives or it is for naught.
We cannot say that we love God without taking His Word seriously (nor can we say that we love God without loving our brother, but that is a different post). The staggering number of people who profess to be Christians without ever reading their Bibles ought to cause us all to shout that there is something desperately wrong! For every moment to be a teaching moment as Deuteronomy envisions, we must first know the Word well enough ourselves to pass it on. Sadly, this just isn’t the case in far too many homes.
Far too often I am convicted of how lightly I take the Word of God. It’s not that I fall into thinking that it’s unimportant, but it’s far too easy to approach as an academic task. This is the God-breathed (2 Timothy 3:16), living and active Word of God that is sharper than any two-edged sword (Hebrews 4:12) and will never return void (Isaiah 55:11) and it is for more than the intellect, it is our “daily bread” (Deuteronomy 8:3/Matthew 4:4). It not only supports us but increases our affections for the God who gave it to us. Let’s all go read our Bibles.
Sorry for the downtime. I’ve had some technological difficulties. I had a hosting company that I loved. Everything was great. Then they decided to stop hosting, so they arranged to transfer all of their clients to a different company that was not so great. Everything went smoothly enough until I started being charged for every 500mb of bandwidth. I’m certainly not a high traffic blog, but I get enough traffic that such an arrangement is simply not going to work. So I changed hosting companies once again, but I neglected to send the appropriate e-mail stating that I was a transfer client. So, after coming to my senses, here we are again. One big happy cyber-family. Welcome home.
I’d like to thank all the little links out there. Without you, this wouldn’t be possible. You toil under the hot lights of computer screens around the world, often unnoticed and unappreciated. But friends, this is your moment to shine. Make us proud! World, I present to you, The Weekly Town Crier! Where there are no little links!
I am convinced that the Gospel is for all of life and ought to fuel the soul as well as the imagination. To that end, I regularly try to set aside some time and space each Friday to encourage the pursuit of creativity. I try to do this in a couple of different ways. I regularly link to 
Today’s featured visual artist is Gustav Klimt (1862-1918). Klimt was an Austrian artist known for his paintings, murals and sketches, often dealing with the female form. Klimt’s Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I (featured above) is the third most expensive painting on record, selling in 2006 for an estimated $135 million and now adusted at $137.6 million (view Wikipedia’s list of the most expensive paintings on record 
Every once in a while I like to highlight the interactive nature of blogging by opening things up for your input and interaction. Sometimes this takes the form of reader-response lists (see 
Don’t forget, today and tomorrow only, Desiring God Ministries is running a great special: every book is only five dollars. No limits. Don’t miss this great opportunity.
Senator Barack Obama recently had some harsh words for those he feels have “hijacked” faith and “exploited and politicized religious beliefs in an effort to sow division.”
I’ve been reading D.A. Carson’s book 
Sorry for the downtime. I’ve had some technological difficulties. I had a hosting company that I loved. Everything was great. Then they decided to stop hosting, so they arranged to transfer all of their clients to a different company that was not so great. Everything went smoothly enough until I started being charged for every 500mb of bandwidth. I’m certainly not a high traffic blog, but I get enough traffic that such an arrangement is simply not going to work. So I changed hosting companies once again, but I neglected to send the appropriate e-mail stating that I was a transfer client. So, after coming to my senses, here we are again. One big happy cyber-family. Welcome home.
