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A La Carte (12/30)
- 12/30/10
- 13
The year is quickly drawing to a close. Blink. It’s gone. It seems that life goes by so quickly. I wonder if it will seem the same in heaven, or if time will pass slower as we draw the greatest value out of each and every day.
New Year’s Resolutions - Mint.com offers up some new year’s resolutions that will improve your finances in 2011.
Snow Flakes - Here are some snow flakes as seen under an electron microscope. I’m not surprised to see that they are even more beautiful when seen at the microscopic level.
The First Decade - Life offers up a collection of the photos we’ll all remember through the first decade of the 21st century.
Television by the Numbers - This is an interesting infographic.
An Open Letter to Derek Webb - Frank Turk pens an open letter to Derek Webb. It’s worth reading.
Give Your Pastor a Break - Kevin DeYoung offers a word on behalf of pastors. “The point of my plea is simple. For any elders, deacons, trustees, committee chairs-to anyone with authority over the fringe benefits for your pastor in 2011-please make sure there is enough time for a real vacation and some kind of study leave.”
Are You SAD? - David Murray addresses Seasonal Affective Disorder:
Are you SAD? from Puritan Reformed on Vimeo.
I have taken my good deeds and bad deeds and thrown them together in a heap, and fled from them both to Christ, and in him I have peace. —David Dickson
I am a follower of Jesus Christ, a husband to Aileen and a father to three young children. I worship and serve as a pastor at 
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Comments (13)
Turk’s “open letter” is hilarious and (mostly) ridiculous. Nice Counting Crows reference though.
I’d call him a “Turk-ey” but I don’t want to get down on his level. Perhaps I can “mention” it in an “open letter” to Frank Turk.
What baffles me about Webb is I go back and listen to a song like “Thankful” and it’s one of the most fun, reformed songs I’ve ever heard. Wonder where the social hipness and relevancy came from? So disappointing…
@comment #1 “Michael”-I’m not a fan of Frank Turk. Just don’t care for the man. But perhaps you could try actually engaging his article -where it is posted(Pyromaniacs), instead of mocking him behind his back here at Challies. Or, if you can’t do that, try engaging the article here with actual arguments.
I just find critical “open letters” so pretentious to begin with. A sort of “Hey choir, listen up - I’m about to preach!”
Here I go: Derek Webb is someone who does “not want to be held morally and philosophically culpable for the trash they [he] flatulently expel[s] into the common conversation.” AMEN BROTHER - PREEEEEACH IT!
Not to put too fine a point on it… and I certainly don’t believe Webb is on the level of the great Reformers, but things like the following were said to them as well:
“Are you really more-qualified to make moral, political and social pronouncements than anyone else — than pastors and qualified teacher of the Bible?”
“Is it really at all reasonable let alone generous or spiritually-mature to denigrate pastors?”
I don’t see anything in Webb’s actual words that indicates he believes his “moral pronouncement trumps, for example, John Piper.” And while we’re naming some people’s fixations and idolatries, that a good one to start with (and I say that as an admirer of Piper BTW. I love him - he’s just not my pope, and I don’t think he wants to be anyone else’s either.)
If Webb wanted to be a big star, as Turk accuses him of aspiring to, he wouldn’t put himself on a career path where he’s lambasted from both sides. He was already established in the CCM market and could be making a much nicer living there.
Turk makes inferences about what Webb is saying and nails him to the wall for it, all in the form of an “open letter”. It’s bad form and it’s a blatant shout out to his own army of sycophants.
Wow…the snowflake looks almost creepy. But cool.
So, Michael, take it up with Frank Turk in person i.e. where he wrote so “pretentiously”. He asked Webb for dialog on the subject. Instead, Webb has resorted to a “twitter war”. Like I said, I don’t care much for Turk, but you’re certainly coming across as just as pretentious as you claim him to be. You’re making all kinds of accusations and inferences and can’t be bothered to address the Biblical questions that Turk asked.
As soon as Turk bothers to address the Biblical issues Webb raised I’ll address the issues Turk raised.
How does that sound?
Or I could get back to my sermon on Ephesians and forget the whole thing happened. ;-)
Frank Turk also wrote another blog yesterday that goes with the letter.
http://teampyro.blogspot.com/2010/12/notes-where-i-am-coming-from.html
I’m not a great fan of pyromaniacs blog for a number of reasons. (Childish, tedious graphics in the middle of text, condescending, arrogance often - to say the least), however the article by Turk seems quite well balanced and what I like to follow up on are the often-time, excellent blog comments.
The first decade of the 21century - is it from 2000-2009, or from 2001-2010? If the year 2000 part of the last decade of the C19th? then it would be from 2001-2010…..
So, Michael, you still insist on attacking Turk from behind? Yet you claim to be working on a sermon? Why didn’t you think of your sermon before you started stabbing people in the back?
Nothing like a good blog war. They’ll definitely know we are Christians by our blasting each other over the internet.
Nice clip on Seasonal Affective Disorder. The advice fits with God’s restoration of Elijah.
A very interesting book well worth reading is “The Loss of Sadness: How Psychiatry Transformed Normal Sorrow into Depressive Disorder,” Allan V. Horwitz, Jerome C. Wakefield,
The authors talk of our unreality in expecting uninterrupted gregariousness. They helpfully distinguish normal sadness from biologically based sadness. Any one dealing with depression or counseling others should read this work.
I recently posted on the meaning and cures of discouragement using God’s restoration of Elijah as an example. If interested, http://thinkpoint.wordpress.com/2010/12/31/feeling-post-holiday-blues/