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Explore December 2004

  • 2004 – The Year In Review

    I am in a pensive mood today. I spent some wonderful time with the Lord this morning, just basking in His presence in a meaningful time of personal worship. Some days I can sit for an hour or two hours, reading and praying but getting nothing out of it. I allow my mind to wander…

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    Book Review – A Generous Orthodoxy

    In this article I will be reviewing Brian McLaren’s book A Generous Orthodoxy: Why I Am a Missional, Evangelical, Post/Protestant, Liberal/Conservative, Mystical/Poetic, Biblical, Charismatic/Contemplative, Fundamentalist/Calvinist, Anabaptist/Anglican, Methodist, Catholic, Green, Incarnational, Depressed-yet-Hopeful, Emergent, Unfinished CHRISTIAN, known hereafter simply as A Generous Orthodoxy. This is going to be quite a long book review – probably the longest…

  • In Deep

    This morning I began writing my review of Brian McLaren’s A Generous Orthodoxy. As of 3:45 PM I am several hours in, but not near enough finished to seriously think I will be able to post it today. There go my plans for the day! I have written most of it, but now need to…

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    Brian McLaren’s TULIP

    Brian McLaren seems to enjoy controversy. Actually, it would seem from his books that he even likes controversy merely for the sake of controversy. Like the boys in days of old who used to sneak out of church, go into the adjoining outhouse and stir up the “pot” just to create a stink, so it…

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    Book Review – Led By The Spirit

    Led By The Spirit by Jim Elliff is a short, but well-argued, satisfying and scriptural examination of how a believer can know and understand the will of God. It is also practical, having been based on the author’s own experience in being what he refers to as an illuminist – a person who, when confronted…

  • Condescending to Imperfection

    In his small but powerful book Led By The Spirit, Jim Elliff describes Christians he terms “illuminists” – people who, when confronted by difficult decisions in life, seek guidance from God by getting a series of impressions which they believes come as God directly impacts the spirit. This term is not to be confused with…

  • Merry Christmas

    I woke up this morning to find my site showing nothing but error messages. I called technical support and they told me that they are doing maintenance today and things should be up and running later this morning. You see, this is why I use iPowerweb. I called on Christmas morning and got a support…

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    Headlines (December 24)

    I thought for today, just to be different, I would grab headlines only from other blogs. Canada’s Homosexual Marriage Ruling – My friend Leslie, who is a lawyer, decided to tackle the Canadian Supreme Court’s “opinion” on homosexual marriage. With her legal mind she can read out of the document things that most of us…

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    The First Thing Every Christian Needs To Know (Part 2)

    This is the third article in the series “Five Things Every Christian Needs To Know.” Yesterday we examined the doctrine of Sola Scriptura or Scripture Alone. We saw that the first thing every Christian needs to know is that the Bible alone is the infallible rule of faith for the church. We further defined the…

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    Headlines (December 23)

    The Tiniest Baby – No baby as tiny as 8.6 ounces had ever survived before Rumaisa Rahman was born Sept. 19. Rumaisa was delivered by Caesarean section, along with her twin sister, at just 26 weeks. Remarkably, she was free of collapsed lungs, pneumonia and other complications usually associated with such an extremely premature birth.…

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    The First Thing Every Christian Needs To Know

    In the first article of this series I indicated that there are five things every Christian needs to know. These five things are distinctives which divide Christianity from every other religion. Further, they divide true Christianity, Protestantism, from Catholicism and cults and all other attempts to combine the wisdom of men with the wisdom of…

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    Headlines (December 22)

    ‘Tis The Season To Be Surveyed – A national survey of 1100 physicians conducted by HCD Research and the Louis Finkelstein Institute for Religious and Social Studies of The Jewish Theological Seminary in New York City has found that 74% of doctors believe that miracles have occured in the past and 73% believe they can…

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    Church of the Dropouts, Losers, Sinners, Failures And Fools

    Road hockey is a Canadian tradition – so much so that we invented the word “shinny” to describe the informal games that are played on driveways, roads and parking lots across the nation. It seems that today’s youth generally prefers to play hockey on the PlayStation and it is becoming more and more rare to…

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    Five Things Every Christian Needs To Know

    Over a short series of articles, I am going to introduce five things I believe every Christian needs to know. This is not to say that one cannot be saved if from ignorance he does not know these, but that these five things are of foundational importance to the faith. One may be a Christian…

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    Headlines (December 21)

    News Trends of 2004 – James Jewell, author of the Rooftop Blog has compiled a list of what he considers to be the top news trends among Christians of this past year. It begins with and obvious and most-contentious one – The Passion of the Christ – and closes with another that has generated its…

  • Biblical Methods of Criticism

    This post has been prompted by Saturday’s post regarding IX Marks Ministries and their review of the teachings of Rick Warren, as summarized and popularized in his books, The Purpose Driven Church and The Purpose Driven Life and his program 40 Days of Purpose. We live in a very non-judgmental age. The first rule of…

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    Headlines (December 20)

    47 Years For Reading The Bible – That is the very unlikely worst-case scenario for some protestors at a gay pride event in Philadelphia. Four people were arrested for reading the Bible out loud at the event, focusing, of course, on passages that condemn homosexuality. After homosexual activists became irate, city officials told the protestors…

  • Sunday Ramblings

    It has been quite a while since I have taken the time to do a ramblings article on this site. I guess some could argue that rambling is all I ever do, but that would just leave me feeling all depressed and defensive. As I write this my children are behind me trying to figure…

  • IX Marks Takes On Purpose Driven

    IX Marks Ministries has decided to focus on Rick Warren and his Purpose Driven ministries in this month’s newsletter. As part of their focus they have posted in-depth reviews of The Purpose Driven Church, The Purpose Driven Life and 40 Days of Purpose. I have deep respect for IX Marks Ministries and have been looking…

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    Headlines (December 18)

    Shootout At The Crystal Corral – On Thursday an employee of the Crystal Cathedral, home of heretic Robert Schuller, opened fire inside the Cathedral before barricading himself in a bathroom. Police officials attempting to talk him into surrendering, but he eventually shot himself, ending the holdout. There were no other casualties. The man was apparently…