two things: one year of blogging and healthcare reform

I’ve now been blogging for over a year.

Wowser.  I started in mid-November last year and have blogged an average of three times per week.  That seems like a lot to me.  Of course, when I started I posted frequently– four or five times a week; now I’m doing well if I get two in.

I’ve enjoyed it and benefitted from it.  I’ve fought against the particular sins that blogging has made me prone to (or revealed in me) and come out better for it, although still always having to be on guard.

My goals have been twofold: primarily to refine and test my thoughts and opinions regularly according to godly, gospel standards.  And secondarily, to edify the body through that.  I think, by God’s grace, that has happened in some measure.

Still, I’m trying to decide where to go from here.  Do I keep blogging?  Do I take a break?  Do I quit altogether?  I think God could be glorified in any of those options.  So, I’m thinking about it, talking to Mr. TommyD, and leaning on the Holy Spirit to convict in the areas where conviction is needed and also feeling freedom in Him to make a decision.

So that’s that on a year of blogging.  And if I decide to take a break or quit, I won’t just drop off without notice.  I’ll give a heads up.  As of now, I’m going to keep writing as it’s beneficial for me.

Next up, healthcare reform.

My dad gave a talk about it a week ago and I thought I’d link to it because it was really good.  It looks at the history of medicine and provides a foundation for understanding the current debate according to godly, ethical standards.  It’s not short.  But brevity and understanding history rarely go hand in hand.  Sometimes it takes more than 22 words to get your point across.  I hope some of you will invest your time in reading it.

sin produces death through what is good

Paul says a lot of wonderful and nuanced things in Romans 7.

For instance, he says, “if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin.”  So the law is not sin-producing, but rather, sin-alerting.  And sin, being very sneaky and conniving, seizes “an opportunity through the commandment” to produce all kinds of sin in me.

Then the clarification, “Did that which is good, then, bring death to me?  By no means!  It was sin, producing death in me through what is good..” (7:13a)

I am in complete awe of that verse and how jam-packed it is with meaning that effects me everyday.

The law was good.  It is good.  It is holy and just and loving.  Yet, sin can take a good thing and turn it into an opportunity for sin to abound.  Not just for us to be sin-aware, but for sin to increase!  To be “sinful beyond measure.” (7:14b)

I can think of multiple ways this happens even with the good gifts God gives me on this side of the cross.  The law was given before the cross, and yes, sin seized the chance for sin to abound through the giving of the law.  But after Christ’s death and ressurection, it would seem to me that the gifts from God relating to His body and Christian life would be immune to such sin entanglement.  But I find it isn’t so.

Some of the best gifts given after Christ’s atoning sacrifice, like the fellowship of the body, spiritual gifts of discernment or teaching or service, and many more are all still vunerable to sin’s perversion.  Sin can take the good gift and produce death through what is good.

Now, for those of us in Christ, His righteousness covers us and ultimately death is not produced in us.  He also gives His Spirit to guide and help us in our weaknesses.  We have tools with which to fight the enticements of sin.  And I am so thankful for that.

Left to my sinful flesh, I begin to idolize the gift of fellowship over the Person without whom no fellowship could ever exist.  I start to value spiritual gifts over the subject of which the gifts should be about.  And what’s worse, an attitude of entitlement about the gifts creeps in.

So, I say with Paul, “Wretched [wo]man that I am!  Who will deliver me from this body of death?” (7:24)

And then Paul answers, “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!”  It’s Jesus who delivers us from this body of death.  And there is no condemnation for me.  I wage war on the sinful members of my body and in my inner being I rejoice in God’s loving commandments and His good gifts.  So God is God, good gifts are not.  But good gifts are free to be embraced as good when God is my Treasure and Sweet Reward.

Has sin ever taken a good thing in order to try and produce death through it in your life?

all of life is waiting

Isn’t it true?

I’m hard-pressed to think of a time when I’m not waiting for something.

Some things take a long time to wait for, other things are short waits.  And there are even things we wait for that never happen.  Sometimes we wait for things and we don’t know what they are.

We wait for vacation time, and we wait to come home.  We wait for the right person.  We wait for the big question and the wedding day.  We wait for pregnancy and we wait for the birth of a child.

We wait for a friend to call and we wait to call a friend.  We wait for the big game and for the snacks to be ready.  We wait for people to arrive and we wait for them to go home (hopefully not too often).

We wait for the flowers to bloom and we wait another day to cut the grass.  We wait for a better job or we wait for a raise or we wait to be fired.  We wait for payday.

We wait for Sunday to come around and we wait for the kids to get better.  We wait for test results and we wait for the evening when we can crash.  We wait for our kids to know Jesus as their Savior.

We wait for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  We wait for Good Friday and we especially wait for Easter Sunday.  We wait for the coming again of the Lord and we wait for the glory of God in heaven.

All this waiting got me thinking about the things we don’t have to wait for.  I don’t have to wait for the coming of the Holy Spirit.  He lives in me and counsels me.  I don’t have to wait for a Savior.  The Savior has come and salvation is mine through Jesus Christ.  I don’t have to wait for God to make Himself known.  He is known through His Word that I can read as often as I want.

I don’t have to wait to be comforted by the Comforter, or to be known by the all-knowing God.

The biggest matters of life, I do not have to wait for.  God has satisfied the waiting time with His Son and His Spirit.

Yet, on Earth, waiting for a million other things, some very important, remains.  And what an opportunity to trust God and to know that as we wait, we wait on Him.  I say with David:

“I waited patiently for the Lord;
he inclined to me and heard my cry.
2 He drew me up from the pit of destruction,
out of the miry bog,
and set my feet upon a rock,
making my steps secure.
3 He put a new song in my mouth,
a song of praise to our God.
Many will see and fear,
and put their trust in the Lord.”

What have you been waiting on lately?

grace on difficult days

Everybody has rough days.  Hard days.  Painful days.  Difficult days.

It’s one of the things every human has in common, isn’t it?  It’s easy to become myopic on these days.

Lately I’ve been trying to recognize what God’s grace looks like in my life on these difficult days.  Intellectually I know that God’s grace may very well be the difficulty.  But in the midst of it, I rarely feel this.   Although knowing it does make a huge difference.

Anyway, today I’m making a small list of how God’s grace is felt by me in the hard moments.. sometimes moments that string along for days or weeks.

1) I feel God’s grace when my 5-yr-old daughter sees my difficulty and ministers to me by offering to play with her younger sister in the other room.  Thank you Lord.

2) I feel God’s grace through a husband who’s willing to do whatever it takes to make sure his wife is well-cared for.

3) I feel God’s grace when phone call from a stranger jars me out of some unhelpful thoughts and unwittingly reveals that my life is really a string of blessing upon blessing.

4) I feel God’s grace in Advil Liquid Gels.

5) I feel God’s grace in a messy house that is evidence that we have friends who like us enough to come to our home and stay for a few hours.  I wish it lasted longer.

6) I feel God’s grace in a schedule that is empty today, but full tomorrow, and keeps me from drowning at home.

7) I feel God’s grace in the ministry of His Word.  It is powerful.  It is active.  It contains the power and Person of the Gospel, which I need.  Everyday.

8) I feel God’s grace in the gift of prayer.  The Spirit and the Lord Jesus make it possible for me to pray to God the Father.  They cover me and utter for me.  They bring me to the throne of a Tender Father, not a wrathful one.

9) I feel God’s grace in the sun heating up my back as I type this.  And a house with many windows that lets it stream in.  And when I’m done I will turn around and soak it in on my face and my eyeballs.

10) I feel God’s grace in that, when I sat down, I only had 4 or 5 things to list as His felt grace for today, but He is faithful in showing me many more.  More than I could ever record.

How are you experiencing His grace today?

“..abortion has done what the Klan only dreamed of.” -Dr. Alveda King

CNS News reports that, “Abortion kills more black Americans than the seven leading causes of death combined, according to data collected by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for 2005, the latest year for which the abortion numbers are available.”

And so, the spirit of Margaret Sanger lives on in Planned Parenthood.

Sanger, an ardent eugenicist and founder of Planned Parenthood, spoke and wrote of her desire to get rid of such “undesirable” groups as “Negroes” through the method of sterilization and widespread birth control.  At one point in her sordid career she even addressed the women’s auxillary of the Ku Klux Klan.

Dr. Alveda King, niece of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, and pro-life advocate, couldn’t be more right when she points out that “abortion has done what the Klan only dreamed of.”

Those arguing for abortion often demand that it’s African Americans who would suffer the most by being denied the “right” to abortion.

Really?

I can and will never consider the decimation of a race of people to be a “right.”  Nor will I ever consider babies as punishment.

And I hope the reality of the number of African Americans dying each day (1,784) by abortion will jerk some pro-choicers out of their politically correct stupor and help them to realize there is nothing politically correct or civilized about genocide.

What kind of evangelical are you? Or, what do you do for Halloween?

Russel D. Moore provides these funny (and accurate) definitions of the many types of evangelical:

“If John Mark is right that an evangelical is “a fundamentalist who watches The Office,” then I’m written out of the definition since I’ve never seen the show. But, still, I think he’s on to something. Here’s an alternative try.

An evangelical is a fundamentalist whose kids dress up for Halloween.

A conservative evangelical is a fundamentalist whose kids dress up for the church’s “Fall Festival.”

A confessional evangelical is a fundamentalist whose kids dress up for “Reformation Day.”

An emerging evangelical is a fundamentalist who has no kids, but who dresses up for Halloween anyway.

A revivalist evangelical is a fundamentalist whose kids dress up as demons for the church’s “Judgment House” community evangelism outreach.

A fundamentalist is a fundamentalist whose kids hand out gospel tracts to all those mentioned above.”

A couple years of my growing up, we fell into the “conservative evangelical” to “revivalist evangelical” range.  We dressed up for our  church’s “unhaunted house.”  Many kids dressed up as Bible characters.  It was an outreach to the community as well as a way for Christians to still have fun and do a few scary things on Halloween without feeling (too) guilty.

Most years, however, we just stayed home, had friends over, ate popcorn and watched a movie.

With young kids of our own, we haven’t celebrated Halloween.  Not a judgment on people who do, it’s just where we’ve come down.  We did talk about Reformation Day last year though, although no one dressed up.  I like having the kids dress up.  They do it so often, it hardly seems like depriving them not to do it on Halloween.

See, here’s one-year-old Elianna dressed up in full costume.

I realize most people think I’m being a big stick in the mud and I’m ok with that.  My kids (and I) get plenty of fun and neighbor interaction in their lives.  They can do without it on one night of the year.  We have our reasons, and that’s enough for me.

But, back to the point, what kind of evangelical are you?  Elianna obviously ascribes to the ever popular cowboy evangelism.

a great vacation and lots of pics

We recently vacationed for three nights and four days up at MN’s beautiful North Shore!  We stayed in Lutsen and had the best time!  (Doing my best not to sound like a travel brochure and failing miserably..)

Our first stop on the four hour drive North was in Duluth at the Amazing Grace Cafe.  It was awesome!  Bread sliced an inch and a half thick.  Hard to find though.. a bit of a hole in the wall.  But packed, so obviously word gets around.

Traveling is hard work and the kids were asleep in no time.  I took the obligatory pic of the kids sleeping sweetly next to one another, so that, if ever they don’t like each other very much we can look back and say, “Ah, remember the days..”

The next day we made a stop at a park with a swing set right off of Lake Superior (which I think should be called Superior Sea.. nothing “lake” about it).  The wind was blowing and the waves were high.

Here’s the lodge of the place we stayed.  We were in a town home just a short walk from here with beautiful views of Lake Superior.  We could walk right down to the shore.

Is there anything better than kids climbing on rocks?  For them, I mean.. for me, it was slightly worrisome with so much cold water around to fall into.  I did a lot of hanging on to the back of jackets and trying to keep feet dry!  Seth was pretending to take a rock nap.

The trip was made complete having my mom and dad and Aunt Julie join us.  Way too much fun.

Yep, she’s as high up as she looks and laughing to boot.

Here’s Eliza by what I called the tumor tree.  Strange isn’t it?

Now here was my favorite stop of the whole trip.  The World’s Best Doughnut Shop.  They aren’t kidding.  I could have spent a few more hours at this ridiculously small doughnut heaven.

Snow on our fourth and final day up North.  It was perfect.

We took a gondola ride up Lutsen Mountain.  Very cold, but great views and lots of people to wave at along the way.

The one and only picture of Tom and me from the trip!  A stunning self-portrait!

Well, that’s it!  We will definitely be going back in years to come.  It was about as perfect a vacation as we could’ve asked for! We enjoyed God’s creation in beauty and hiking and eating and playing and people!

a good day to honor 30 years of serious pastoring

I couldn’t be more thankful for the serious (see post below) preaching and pastoring of Pastor John Piper.

Don’t miss this wonderful telling of the story by Justin Taylor of how Pastor John went from professor to pastor.

It’s worth clicking over just to see the cross-bling picture.

I’m thankful to the Lord for the way His Word is explained and revered and loved by my pastor.  It has made me love and fear God and His Word more.  As God has been exalted over and over in the mouth of Pastor John, I have tasted over and over His goodness, His sovereignty and His grace.

How are you thankful for your pastor?  Today would be a good day to honor them for 30 days, 30 months or maybe even 30 years of faithful ministry.

5 minutes of absolute ackwardness

Justin Taylor offers analysis on the inappropriate audience laughter during Pastor John’s message at a Christian counselor’s conference.

If you feel like being very uncomfortable, listen to the first 5 minutes of this sermon.

As Pastor John delivers a gut-wrenching opening to his sermon, the audience inexplicably roars in laughter at the most unbelievable moments.  Greg Gilbert offers more analysis on the training of Christian “audiences” to be cued to laugh, especially during the opening remarks to a sermon.

After having sat under the teaching of Pastor John for many years now–most of my adult life–I can hardly think of a time where he was intentionally funny from the pulpit.  However, he has on many occasions been unintentionally funny.  For more on his unintentionally funny comments, see Jamsco’s documentation.

Yet, to my recollection, he generally has understood why what he has said is causing laughter.  I’ve never heard him so perplexed, nor felt as perplexed myself, than when listening to those first 5 minutes.  Truly bizarre.

Any thoughts on the unusual laughter?  Were they nervous?  I wonder if I would have been swayed by the contagiousness of the laughter and chuckled inappropriately myself?  Probably not, because I’m familiar with the serious nature of Pastor John’s preaching.

Ever been caught laughing at something that was *not* funny?  I’m sure I have.

a provocative reality for parents

Apart from their own sin nature, it’s almost certain that I will be the single biggest influence of sin in my children’s lives.

What do you think?  Do you own that?

Here’s why I own that and continue parenting with boldness(instead of throwing in the towel in hopelessness): Christ and His work on the Cross makes all the sin that I commit around and against my children an opportunity for them to see the effective and redemptive work of the Savior in their sinful mother’s life.

Do I sin willingly or without shame and grief: no, no, no.  But the grief that accompanies the sin, the confession and repentance and forgiveness that happen, are the primary ways my children will actually be able to see the Gospel with their own eyes.

And I pray that seeing it day after day, reading it in the Word day after day, that they will want to taste it for themselves.  And that God will call them to taste and see that He is good.  That He is sweeter than honey.  That the Person of Jesus is wonderful and terrifying and gracious and uncompromising and more than they could ever exhaustively know.

Yet that they will long for more of the knowledge of God and His Son and will pursue it with the complete devotion of bought and paid for children of the Heavenly Father.