I came across a story last week about banned words that NYC won't allow to be used on their standardized tests anymore and that gave me an idea and Dave said it was OK to run with this. We have all talked about it and we have come up with a list of banned words that shouldn't be used anymore here at SBC Voices in order to help maintain civility in blogging and commenting. I tried to come up with the appropriate number of words to ban. Carlin said that there are 7 words you can't say, but I am pretty sure there are more than that. NYC has a list of 50, but that seems a bit excessive. In a … [Read more...] about New Moderation Rules at SBC Voices
The Problem of All or Nothing
This post originally appeared at my personal blog. God is holy and perfect and commands us to be "perfect as He is perfect." Perfection: it is a standard that we all know we cannot keep. Those who spend a great deal of time thinking about it are in real danger of driving themselves crazy. It is this insistence of perfection that drives the "wretched urgency" that Michael Spencer, AKA the Internet Monk, used to opine about back in the day. But we humans have a hard time with not taking this the other direction entirely. Since we know we can't be perfect, we have developed whole … [Read more...] about The Problem of All or Nothing
The Crazy Uncle of the Evangelical Family Strikes Again
Pat Robertson can easily be characterized as a loose cannon. He frequently says things apparently without thinking them through for biblical truthfulness or even common sense. Many of them are essentially harmless and easily ignored. Some of them however beg for a response. In that way, Pat is kind of like the "crazy uncle" that you probably wished didn't belong to your family because he always seems to find a way to embarrass you at the family reunion or in some public setting. Compound this tendency with a whole segment of his show that encourages him to "shoot from the hip" every episode … [Read more...] about The Crazy Uncle of the Evangelical Family Strikes Again
Baptist Boy Imbibes Can of Busch Water
I may have forever lost my chance to get a NAMB appointment this past week and I might have to turn in my Baptist credentials or something. I drank every drop of the contents of the can you see on the right here and I enjoyed doing it (I also took this photo in a Lutheran church so who knows what is happening to me). I am writing a little tongue-in-cheek, although some may take me too seriously to be sure. This little can of water got me thinking this past week. I would like to share some of those thoughts with you. There is often a great deal of discussion about alcohol on this blog … [Read more...] about Baptist Boy Imbibes Can of Busch Water
Lessons Learned in Disastrous Situations
Wednesday (June 29th), I had the opportunity to go to Minot, ND with a visiting mission team and serve as a disaster relief chaplain for a day. I jumped at the chance to put all of that time spent training for just such a time into practice. It took a lot longer time to get to the church than normal because of the detours around flooded areas, some of which you can see in the picture. Our task was to help one of our local churches in Minot that was holding a community block party, both for those who needed a break from all the stress in the flood fight and as a way to reach out to some of … [Read more...] about Lessons Learned in Disastrous Situations
The Eyes of a Father
I got a new toy a few weeks ago. It is a standalone DVD recorder from Sony. It was a refurbished unit on clearance from one of my favorite tech sites, so we decided to grab it in hopes of dubbing off a bunch of our old home movies. So today, I pulled it out of the box and after struggling with some cabling problems (I keep tons of old cables but can't find the one for our camcorder. I dug an older camcorder out of the box and managed to get something going to try this thing out. As I write this post, I am watching the video of my first son digging into his first birthday cake after … [Read more...] about The Eyes of a Father
How Does Submission to We the People Work?
I wouldn't normally post up two posts by myself in a day, but since Dave has been out of pocket some today and this post has a "timely" basis for today, here it is. It has been a pretty slow day around anyway thanks to the holiday. Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. - Romans 13:1 I daresay that most, if not all, of us are very familiar with this verse. Since our series of discussions about patriotic worship, I have been pondering the unique status that our form of … [Read more...] about How Does Submission to We the People Work?
Imagining That Godliness Is a Means of Gain
Editor's Note: This is a repost of a post that originally appeared at my blog Jeofurry's Jesus Journey. As a pastor, there are some things in the Bible that stick out more than others to me. Paul's "pastoral epistles" are of particular note in this category. I know that I am not just like Titus or Timothy, but I can certainly learn a thing or two from the advice that Paul dispensed to these young men. Actually, we all can, but that is for another time. The reason this comes up for me now is because of something I saw on TV last night. I was flipping channels and came across a … [Read more...] about Imagining That Godliness Is a Means of Gain
But We Were Eyewitnesses
The words of Peter's epistle came to mind recently when I caught this video lecture about new ways of demonstrating that the Gospels are definitely eyewitness accounts of the life and ministry of Jesus. Thought I would share the video with you guys who might be interested in it. It is about an hour long, but very engaging. There is also a Q and A clip on youtube from this same event. The speaker is Dr. Peter Williams. … [Read more...] about But We Were Eyewitnesses
When the Queen Kills the King – It is Time for the Check Please
From the title you might be guessing that this is a post about chess. Sorry, but no. It is a title about bad sermons with an attempt at a witty headline, but it got you this far so you might as well keep reading. It is said that theology is the "Queen of the sciences," and indeed that is so, but it is dangerous when someone mistakes the "queen" for the King. I recently heard a sermon where the preacher didn't bother to quote from Scripture, aside from a couple of "glancing" mentions of two verses without citing what they even were. The sermon was based on the work of three … [Read more...] about When the Queen Kills the King – It is Time for the Check Please