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Life,

 

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Wade

Response to “Why Evangelicals Should Oppose Trump and Vote Democrat”

Response to “Why Evangelicals Should Oppose Trump and Vote Democrat,” an article by Robb Ryerse dated January 31, 2020, by Wade Rutland Howell Jr. Ph. D.

In this sort article Robb Ryerse claims that Republicans, and more specifically Evangelical Christians, should abandon their party and support democrats to defeat President Trump. The article itself is short and I encourage anyone who has not read it to do so. There is no heavy lifting to be done, it is simply an appeal to elect Democrats over Republicans because Trump is the devil. I am only partially joking with that summary.

As best I can determine Mr. Ryerse provides about six reasons for Evangelicals to redirect support from Trump and Republicans this year. He also notes he only needs about five percent of Evangelicals to ensure Trump does not win. By the way, he also notes that he works with a group called Vote Common Good against Republicans. I also visited this group’s website and read what they are about. The group seems to think Democrats don’t know how to speak to religious people effectively and desire to have religious people agree that they should vote for the common good, rather than their own self interests. What the common good is, however, is not explicitly stated. So, while the website does not tell us what the common good is, it does tell us that voting for democrats is how we get it. It is interesting that Mr. Ryerse argues people should not blindly support Trump and Republicans but should vote for “common good” which means voting for Democrats, apparently without regard for who the candidate is, or as others might call this, to vote blindly for Democrats. My Ryerse himself, in his article, defines the common good as “getting Trump and his enablers out of office.”

What about those six reasons to redirect support away from Trump. I will list them and address them now. First, Trump does not believe what Evangelicals believe (about abortion) and only supports it publicly so that Evangelicals will vote for him. I am not sure why this is a problem. Voters may prefer someone who believes as they do on issues (I certainly would). The next best situation would be to have someone who will promote policy that aligns with issues of the voters even though they might not agree with it personally (what Mr. Ryerse accuses Trump of this). It would be much worse have someone who promotes policies contrary to the voter’s ideals, whether they say they agree with you or not. Trump’s inner convictions about abortion (for or against) are greatly overshadowed by the public actions he has taken. If, as Evangelicals, we believe that the common good includes (at least in part) opposition to acceptance or normalization of abortion, then I fail to find Mr. Ryerse’s reason to redirect support from Trump to a Democrat convincing. Especially since Democratic candidates actively seek to promote the acceptance and normalization of abortion.

Second, the common good is advanced by defeating Trump and Republicans. I suppose this claim must be self evident, because Mr. Ryerse simply asserts this claim without argument. I suppose I must be blinded to the clear evidence of Trump’s malice and the Republicans who are falling all over themselves to do whatever the president wants. Mr. Ryerse asserts that the President has disdain for decency, disrespect toward right and wrong, and disregard for the vulnerable (his alliteration shows his Seminary Training is paying off). Unfortunately, Mr. Ryerse did not provide me with examples detailing the issues, so I will have to await this clear evidence to show up so I can evaluate it. I could just take him at his word, he is a Pastor after all. The only problem with that is that I am also a Pastor and have been serving in Churches for almost twenty years. I am afraid I will have to wait for Mr. Ryerse or others to provide evidence and argument that will show me that my own assessment of the public record is in need of amendment.

Third, supporting President Trump because of his position on abortion is a deal with the devil. Evidence offered for this position is that Evangelical support of Refugee resettlement programs has shifted among Evangelicals and he ties this to allegiance to The President. The question we have to ask about Evangelical support for Refugee resettlement is why the shift. Mr. Ryerse infers the reason as related to supporting the president. Could it be that greater examination of the program has caused people to reevaluate their positions? If so, that would be similar to what Mr. Ryerse is asking Republicans to do. I do not know why Evangelical support for a particular program has shifted, or even that it has shifted, but I am confident it is not because Evangelicals  were told to change their position of the President will no longer hold to a pro-life public policy. If it was, I never got the memo.

Forth, a procedural vote in the Senate impeachment trial of President Trump against calling witnesses is the exaltation of the Executive branch over the Legislative branch. Here we have our first argument. Mr. Ryerse claims the following: either Republican Senators vote to allow witnesses or they abandon their responsibility as a co-equal branch of government. It is nice to read an argument on page five of six of my printout of Mr. Ryerse’s article. Unfortunately, this argument, which is presented as a constructive dilemma, turns out to be a false dilemma. A third alternative to the motivation for the vote of Republican Senators is that they believed that the impeachment charges, even if true, were not sufficient to remove a president. Maybe they thought what Trump was accused of was not wrong, or that the entire impeachment from the house was only political, or that what President Trump did was wrong but did not rise to the level of impeachment (think back to the Clinton impeachment), or that there may have been something there but that the House of Representatives should have done a more thorough job with fact finding before sending the articles to the Senate. I just provided four other possible reasons (I am sure there are many more also) which makes Mr. Ryerse’s (with only two choices) dilemma a false one.

Fifth, Evangelical support to President Trump is blind and abandons previously held values. Instead of another argument, with this point we only get another assertion. But we can ask the question, do Evangelicals support the President blindly? I don’t think so. Do they support him robustly? Yes, I think they do. Do Evangelicals think the President can do no wrong? No, certainly not. As an Evangelical, a Pastor, a Philosopher and Theologian, I believe the president is no moral exemplar, but he was far better (on the whole) than the alternative in 2016. I suspect that he will be far better than the 2020 alternative also.

Sixth, Republicans should vote for the Democrats (just this one time) for the greater good. Here we get a final argument. Mr. Ryerse writes Republicans should support Democrat candidates this election “Because a deal with the Democrats is better than a deal with the devil.” I actually agree that a deal with the Democrats would be better than a deal with the devil. I disagree that Trump is the devil. In this final sentence of the article Mr. Ryerse steps into the open and states outright what the tone of the article hinted. Mr. Ryerse does not view the President and the members of the Republican party as good faith actors who disagree with him. He sees them as enemies of the good. While this can be an effective rhetorical tactic, it commits another logical fallacy. It is an ad hominem attack. Here we see that Mr. Ryerse thinks to highly (or lowly) of the President. President Trump is a man, not a demon or supernatural entity of evil. He is a fallen human, who needs salvation only found in Jesus Christ, just like every other human.

A vote to re-elect President Trump is not a vote for Satan. Votes for Republican candidates in other races are not votes for the hordes of hell. Likewise, votes for the Democratic candidates are not votes for Satan and the hordes of hell either. This is not to say that the votes are not consequential, because they are.

I believe that the Democrats believe that what they support is good for our country. I do not question their patriotism. I simply cannot understand how they could possibly think what they are proposing would be good for the USA, Americans, or the world. I can, however, see how the agenda pushed by Democrats candidates is good for Democrat candidates.

I suppose Mr. Ryerse would simply see me as a blind follower of President Trump. Just another Evangelical who can’t see past myself to the “greater good” which he has such a great apprehension of. Maybe that is it. Maybe my instance on logic, argument, evidence, and public policies that do not further consolidate power in the hands of the few means I can’t see this greater good he is pointing to. Maybe if he is so inclined, he can spit in some clay and rub it in my eyes like Jesus did in John 9:6, then maybe I will be able see truth of his words. Till then, I guess I will just go on until I can be healed of my blindness.

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Thoughts on Star Wars Episode VII

As some of you may know, I was not excited about Disney's New Pop-Star Wars. There has been a lot of hype and some people are going quite batty over it, so I have held my comments close. I very rarely go to the movies and I expected to see it some time later after it was out of theaters. Two things to keep in mind as you read this. 1) The Star Trek franchise is far superior to the Star Wars franchise. 2) I am in the minority that think episodes 1, 2, and 3 of Star Wars are much better than episodes 4, 5, and 6.

I fully realize that my position puts me in danger of never being allowed to join 501^st Legion (Vader's Legion) 

and the Jedi Academy of North Florida won't allow me to be trained (much cynicism in me, they sense). All that is fine. I must speak (or rather type) the truth, and if that truth is painful, well then, suck it up buttercup.

I went to see Disney's new cinematic marketing experiment with very low expectations, somewhere between Hanna Montana and The Suite Life on Deck.
So the movie exceeded my expectations, but only barely.





First of all, the Star Wars universe needs an infusion of new ideas. Come on, really another Death Star, but this time it will be a lot bigger. This time it is a planet that way it would take a death star to destroy the new Super Planetary Star Eating Death Star (SPSEDS).
I know people are fixated on size, but give me a break.

One Direction Logo

First Order Logo

Once again the military industrial complex (First Order this time...what an awful name, I could not help thinking One Direction every time they said First Order) is looking for a small cute droid on a desert planet because it has information that could be dangerous in the hands of the Rebels

(sorry Resistance). The droid ends up with someone who does not know they can use the force and this person decides to help get the droid back to those who need it. (This plot line is completely different from a droid taking a message from Princess Leia to an old man in robes on a desert planet, because this is an old man in robes on a desert planet trying to get a message to Princess/General Leia....totally different.)

Also the droid and the new
force wielder end up leaving the desert planet on the Millennium Falcon while being hunted by the military industrial complex.

So this was not at all like episode IV, I mean in episode IV Han Solo and Chewbacca pilot the Falcon....in VII it takes five or six minutes in space before Han and Chewy show up, to pilot the ship “that made the Kessel Run in less than 12 parsecs.”Also there is some stuff about dangerous mouths with tenticles and Han going back into smuggling since there did not seem to be a future in rebelling after the take down of Death Star 2.

We do see a new element in VII, a Storm Trooper with a conscience. Not sure how smart taking a Rebel Pilot (sorry Resistance) to fly a TIE fighter to freedom is. And by the way, that must have been the strongest coupling in the history of the universe to hold the TIE fighter there long enough to blow up stuff in the hanger bay which was totally different from the way Anikin did in the Phantom Menace.

We also have a new pair of Siths. The wannabe Vader 2.0 has a new blaster pause ability which lasts about 300 seconds, a shiny new red light saber with a cross-guard on the hilt (for protection and to inflict shoulder damage to novice ex-storm trooper saber wielders). He also is a collector of Star Wars memorabilia as he has the burned out Darth Vader helmet and geeks out over seeing the Collector's Edition Anikin Skywalker/Darth Vader light saber. We find out he is the love child of Han Solo and Leia, who turned against his uncle (destroying Luke dreams of tuition free Jedi prep academy and causing Luke to run away). When he finally takes of his mask, we see the dark side of the Wonder Years.

The dark side, which as we all know has been touting the cookies it has for some time, apparently also has more acne. So about 1/3 of the way into the movie we have Emo Solo and One Direction hunting for the droid with the schematics to the Death Star (sorry, map to Luke Skywalker) and we get a Cantina scene!! YES!! Finally...I mean in IV they left the cantina and got on the Falcon and now they fly on the Falcon to a Cantina..Totally Different.

The Cantina is run by none other than Edna Mode...(AKA Maz Kanata). In the cantina we get our Disney star appearance by Miley Cyrus

who climbs off an ogre (talk about type cast) to call One Direction. One Direction shows up, lead by Emo Solo on his giant flying Manta Ray to blow up the establishment of ill repute. Meanwhile, Fin and Rey (apparently names with more than one syllable are unfashionable) are splitting up and Rey starts to run away from her destiny only to get captured by Emo and flown away.

In this movie, however, the Rebels.....(Resistance) fights back and the much awaited X-Wing fighters who chase away the bad people. Who shows up on the scene but Princess, or General, Leia who is committed to eating better and no longer carries her cinnamon buns with her on set.

But now, filled with confidence and rage, One Direction unleashes the SPSEDS ultimate weapon that fires a faster than light weapon (that you can still see on its way to kill you...meh...not sure how to explain that..) and that fires with a width of less than a planet (since that is what it is coming out of) and then is wide enough and bright enough to be seen from several star systems away and which the light traveling out from it would have to travel faster than light, so that everyone can see it....ouch...but which condenses back to less than planet size before splitting up and becoming an intergalactic shotgun blast which blows holes in the planets and the plot at the same time.) BUT IT WAS A BIG EXPLOSION. BOOM. To top that people would have to blow up a star, oh....wait, Star Trek already did that.

Now that the Senate is out of the way....which, by the way, who is funding these guys...The Empire funded the Imperial Army, which would have become the Republic's army again after Palpatine's death. How do we still have either the remnant of the Imperial Army re-branded and hostile to the Senate and have a Rebellion (sorry, Resistance) that is not the Republic's army...Is there no army for the Republic and the Senate? Do we really have just two rogue factions with the Senate in the middle? How do you fund planet sized super weapons without a stable tax base and a strong, growing middle class? Seems fishy.

But, now the real challenge. How to you destroy the SPSEDS before it can eat a star and recharge and blow you up? And this time they fixed all the flaws of the previous Death Stars. You can't blow up the shield generators on the planet, because the planet is the Death Star. They already eradicated the Ewoks so you can't get stone age technology to beat back the defenses. They built buildings over the exhaust ports, so you can't just shoot into it with the force to blow it up. How do you overcome this? Send Han and Chewy (along with Fin, the ex Storm Trooper Janitor) and plant a few IEDs (like any good Resistance fighter) and blow up the building before the SPSEDS finishes its star lunch and rescue Ren in the process.

Ren, is not a weak character to be pushed around by Emo Solo and his interrogation of her AWAKENS the force within her. So the big bad, overly emotional, Sith gets scared of a young girl in restraints. Ren quickly uses Jedi mind tricks to get free and runs into her rescue party as they are trying to figure out how to blow up the SPSEDS.

The foreshadowing of a “I know there is good in our son” moment by Princess, or, General Leia resolves as Han tries to turn his son back to the light side. Emo is not having any of that and kills dad, making Chewy and the audience gasp. Chewy shoots the Emo and wounds him, apparently his blaster pause did not work this time. Everyone else tries to escape and blow up the building to destabilize the planet er...space weapon..or whatever this thing is. But it is not over without an epic lightsaber duel between a Sith and two different people who have no training in use of the force or saber techniques. No matter, the epicness of the battle cannot be denied as the Sith is able to singe the shoulder of the janitor trooper and get beat by a girl only to be saved by an earthquake.

Meanwhile, back at the Death Star trench scene from episode IV, the explosion does not do the job so a new Rebel (Resistance) star pilot has to fly through a trench

(not at all looking like Luke from IV) and into a large open space (not at all like Lando and Chewy do in the second Death Star from episode VI). But this is quite different because when this SPSEDS blows up it becomes a star again. (Somehow a planet sized contraption absorbed the energy from a star, the size difference should be immense, and then became the star again when it blew up, but moved over a little bit.) Someone should have talked to Abrams about the difference in scale
between a star and a planet. It only looks like a small disk in the sky from here on Earth. From the perspective of a star the size of our sun planet is very small. So now all the gravitational pull in the surrounding systems are out of whack because One Direction's concert hall blew up and moved a star.

Now for the celebration...or not. Returning to the Rebel base (er...Resistance headquarters) and we tell everyone Han is dead. But R2D2, who has been so depressed at losing Luke that he has been catatonic, wakes up and has the larger map that the small piece held by the cute new droid fits into seamlessly. Now the Resistance knows where Luke is. They have been looking for him since he left the note telling them where he went. How could Luke know that C3PO would knock over a glass of java juice and ruin the instructions of how to get to where he was going. Everyone this entire movie has been looking for the map to Luke. We assumed it was so that they could go and get Luke to battle One Direction and Emo Solo. But, that is not the case. Apparently it was just so they could have a completed map. Whew...what a relief, our map is complete. 

The only person interested in actually finding Luke is the newly awakened Ren and she takes Chewy along as copilot of the Falcon.Will Ren find Luke? What will she do when she finds him? What does the original Jedi temple look like? Will we find out. Yes we find out. The Jedi originated in, wait for it...Ireland. Yes it is Ireland, Skellig Michael to be precise. Just in case you want to go there for vacation. If you do, watch out for the puffins. At long last, Luke Skywalker is found and Ren gets to meet the Jedi legend. What suspense. What drama. What will he say. Will it be a wise “I've been waiting for you.” Or an inquisitive, “why have you come?” Or even a sarcastic “What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?”

Ren gets to the top. She finds Skywalker. They must have cut out the part where she said “I think this belongs to you.” But she just hands him the long lost light-saber. The lightsaber that would bring back memories of the time dad came out to get him really upset and Luke didn't want to listen, and they both got angry and tried to kill each other, and dad cut off his arm. Talk about bringing up all kinds of emotional baggage at the end of a movie.

And still the pregnant silence awaiting a word from the long lost Luke.....and we are still waiting. Don't get me wrong, I am glad he didn't speak. There was probably a clause in the contract that doubled his pay if he had a spoken part. He needed to save his voice for that new animated batman series, the Joker has a lot of lines after all. They didn't want to hang out on Irish island and wait for him to get his part right. I get it. In fact, I think Mark Hamill should be given an Oscar for best extra in a Disney Film.

My young girls liked the movie. I thought it was yet another in the series that doesn't offer much except cool special effects. Not sure where things go from here. I hope they get better.

From: Wade Howell

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Wade Howell

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The Day the World Changed

Not very often does the world change overnight. I suppose that a fundamental change in the fabric of the world only happens on very rare occasions. But it has happened. One day the world was a certain way and when people woke up the next morning things were radically different. But I will come back to this in a moment.

On June 26, 2015 the Supreme Court of the United States of America ruled that same sex marriage is a constitutional right (or something to that effect). Some rejoice while others mourn. This ruling will be debated and discussed without end for some time to come.

Many people are concerned about what effect this decision will have on the Church. Now that the United States has accepted a definition of marriage that is contrary to a biblical view of marriage, what will happen to the church? To seek to provide an answer to that question, I will ask a few more questions.

First, now that the Supreme Court has ruled, are there still people in the United States who do not have a relationship with Jesus Christ? Did the ruling somehow eliminate those who need the Gospel from our shores? The reality is that there are still millions of people in our country who are outside of God's family and who need a savior. The church should not panic, we still have the same work to do today that we had yesterday.

Second, now that nine justices have voted five to four that same sex marriage is constitutional, did that ruling remove God from his throne? Is God no longer sovereign because of this ruling? God is the same today as he was yesterday. Overthrowing thousands of years of historical precedence by the Supreme Court of the United States has not overthrown the King of the Universe. The Alpha and Omega is not threatened by our country and its laws. The church should not wring its hands in fear, God is still as much in control as he has always been.

Third, has the judicial ruling taken away the power of the Gospel of Jesus Christ? Are lives no longer able to be reconciled to God because of the votes of five judges? The power of the Gospel to change the heart of a human has not been diminished. The atoning work of Jesus is still the only hope for the world and still has the power to transform rebellious people into God's family. We should be about the same thing we should have always been about, sharing the good news of Jesus Christ.

Although many Americans are upset about the change in direction of our country, I suspect that the Sun will still rise in the morning. People who are living in rebellion to God will still need the Gospel tomorrow as they did yesterday. The fields are still ready to be harvested and workers are still needed to bring in the harvest.

One thing this ruling may do is show people that the United States of America is not the savior of the world. Sometimes I think we forget that. Jesus saves people, not the good ole USA. People may be concerned that our country is getting farther away from God, but we have many laws in our country that allow for sin. Marriage is a high profile issue, but it is not the only issue that departs from God's will.

The United States, however bad we might think things are getting, is still not as hostile to Christianity as Rome was. (At least we are not crucifying Christians, well not yet anyway). The Church survived Rome and will survive the United States of America also.

Will things change in our country as a result of this ruling? It seems so. It seems that same sex couples will be treated the same way that opposite sex couples are treated in the eyes of the law. This ruling may mean that our churches may face legal challenges in the future. This may mean that people and organizations might try to force Christians to replace the understanding of marriage, derived from scripture, with a legal definition declared by the court. There will be challenges, but there have always been challenges.

There was a day that changed the world, but it was not this day. The day that changed the world was not June 26, 2015, it was a day a little over two thousand years ago. On that day a cosmic event signaled the birth of the King of Kings. On that day God took on humanity and lived among his people. Jesus was born so that he could die to save us from our sins. He accomplished his mission and left us work to do. We carry on, hoping in him and knowing that he has overcome the world.  

Patriotism and Worship, Two Great Tastes that Don't Go Together

I friend of mine wrote a post about why he (a pastor and Army Guard Chaplain) will not celebrate Independence Day in his church. Click here for his post. Page makes some good points in his article. I have been contemplating proper worship for some time. Since I am now serving as a pastor, worship planning is my responsibility and I am no longer simply a participant. I will use the prompting of my friend to put a few of my own thoughts on the subject online for your consideration.

First, I am also a veteran. I served as a Navy Hospital Corpsman for six years (1992-1998). I missed the first Gulf war by several months as I was finishing High School, but enlisted shortly after graduation. I served my country out of a sense of patriotism. I was proud to serve and to continue a history of military service from both sides of my family. My parents both served as did others on both sides of the family. My parents even met in Japan (Mom is from Pennsylvania and Dad is from Florida, both served in the Air Force and would not have met but for their service). I think the USA is a great country. I am proud to be an American. We have our problems, but I believe we are an exceptional country.

Having said that, I am dismayed at the corruption of worship in the Church. Worship of God is primary. Well, it should be primary. In fact, in our weekly gatherings (those things we call our worship service) we should worship God exclusively. Unfortunately, we often sing praise to things other than God. We often attribute worth (or to say it differently, worship) things other than God.


Some will say, "Wait Wade!! What do you mean we praise and worship things other than God? That is preposterous!" Oh really? Is it that out of line to claim that we praise things other than God, when we gather for worship? Take the Lee Greenwood song, God Bless the USA. Click here for the lyrics if you would like to read them. I like the song. I agree with the sentiment of the song.

Here is the video with the lyrics. God ahead and play it now if you want. Sing it if you want. Cry a bit if you need to. Continue reading when you are done.

I WOULD NEVER permit this song to be sung in a worship service.

I would sing it at a picnic, concert, or when it comes on the radio. But I would not allow this in a service that we have dedicated to God. The song is not about God and does not praise or attribute worth to God. This is a beautiful song about a person's love for their country and some of the attributes of the country. Asking God to bless the USA does not make the song about God and it does not make it a praise or worship song. It simply makes it a song that mentions/acknowledges God.

But since the song is about something other than God, it does not belong in a service that is supposed to be about attributing worth to God.

God is jealous. We overlook jealousy attribute of God sometimes. I think that is because we view jealousy in a negative light. We tell our kids not to be jealous of others. But when it comes to God, he is right to be jealous. The sense in which God is jealous is the sense of guarding what is rightfully his. All praise and worship are due God. God is right to guard what he is due.

Christians must be careful when we gather for worship. We need to ensure that we do not worship something other than God in a service we have dedicated to God. We would not think it appropriate to sing a song about Russia or Jamaica, would we? We would not think it appropriate to sing a song about how much love and appreciate our lunch meat? Even if our bologna has a first and last name. If we would not sing about lunch meat and other countries in our worship services (because those songs are not about God) why would we sing about our Country and not about God?

It is not just that those songs (which are not necessarily bad) are not appropriate for worship, they are taking from God that which he is due in our worship. God takes worship seriously. He brought an end to Eli's priesthood when his sons Hophni and Phinehas corrupted worship. Eli's sons stole from God and those coming to worship and the consequence was their death and punishment on Israel.

In our worship, when we take pledges to flags, sing about things other than God, and praise things other than God, we are essentially doing the same thing Hopni and Phinehas were doing. We are not giving God all that is due him. When we sing about a country we are diverting what is due God to a country. When we sing about ourselves we are diverting what is due God to us (more about that later). If we were to sing about bologna we would be diverting what is due God to lunch meat.

What about singing songs about ourselves?

A lot of songs we sing our about ourselves. Look at the subject of the sentences. They are often I or me and are about how we feel or what we are going to do. Singing something like "I will worship" is not the same as singing "I worship you, almighty God." The first is singing about what you are planning on doing. The second is actually worshiping.

When you look at the songs that are popular, many are singing about us, and are not giving praise to God. This is true of new songs and of many songs in our hymnals. "I love to tell the story" and "Oh, How I love Jesus" are old hymns but they are still about what the person "I" is doing or likes to do. Even "The Old Rugged Cross" is a song about what I am going to do (I will cling to the old rugged cross).

I am afraid that we have turned our times of corporate worship into times when we ding about ourselves and other things as much or more than when we sing about God. We should be careful not to take what is due to God and deny giving it to him. We should not sing about what I am going to do, we should sing about what God has done or is going to do.

Outside of our worship services, I have no problem with songs that sing about what I am going to do. But in our worship services, we should be careful to make sure God is the one being glorified, not ourselves.

To sum it up....

Patriotic songs are not bad. Songs about how being a Christian makes us feel are not bad. Songs about lunch meat are not bad. Have a concert and sing those songs. Have a picnic and sing those songs. But think twice before singing those songs in worship.

Singing songs about things other than God in the time we have dedicated to worship God, may very well be bad. I think it is. I also think that church leaders must be careful to make sure that does not happen. Unfortunately it is happening on a regular basis. God punished Eli because he did not protect the worship of God and many suffered because of his failure. May church leadership today take care to protect worship from anything that does not belong there.

That is my take on the issue. Feel free to comment.
Wade

Thanksgiving: To Shop or Not

Social media is a buzz with outrage about people shopping on Thanksgiving. Several people have shared this article http://www.huffingtonpost.com/matt-walsh/shopping-on-thanksgiving_b_4310109.html
and have noted that they agree with the sentiment.

Let me lay my cards on the table before I start a tirade. I do not like to shop. To borrow phrasing from a genius of the previous century:

I do not like to shop here or there,
I do not like it anywhere.
Not in a box.
Not with a fox.
Not in a house.
Not with a mouse.

No, this is not going to turn into a post where I end up liking shopping at the end. My point is that since I avoid shopping as much as possible, I really don't have a dog in this fight. I do, however, have some observations and a few thoughts I would like to share.

First, we are over-commercialized as a society. We are constantly marketed to and we seem to love it. After all, isn't it nice to have people telling you that you are worth it. You deserve a new car. You deserve an upgraded gadget. If the things you have still function, so what, you can have better. Not only can you have it, you should. Some voice from the digital netherworld tells speaks to us and tells us how good we are and how much we deserve things. It knows us. It knows our desires and deepest needs for fulfillment. How it makes us feel so empowered....Oh...wait....none of that is true. The voice in our heads (coming from the speakers or ear-buds) doesn't want what is best for us. The voice doesn't know us, or care for us. Have we forgotten that advertising is for the benefit of the business, not necessarily for our benefit.

It is no wonder that we act the way we act. With the constant pounding of how much we deserve and how special we are (especially if we buy their product) we almost certainly have to give in at some point. Besides we really do want some of these things.

By the way, it is also easier. After all, if we are really honest, we probably don't deserve that new car. And that bigger, more powerful, shiny thing, we probably don't deserve that either. Backing down from deserve, we probably don't even need it. We are surviving, and probably thriving, now and we don't have whatever it is that we supposedly need.

Marketers have figured out that the longing (at the heart of the human condition) which needs fulfillment from a transcendent source, can be temporarily pacified with stuff. They make a living off of the temporary nature of the satisfaction, because they know we will need a new fix in a short amount of time. As our society becomes more spiritually impoverished, we cry out for more and more material things to quiet the part of us yearning for connection to that which is beyond this world. So we buy stuff.

Second, we have traditions and customs and we don't want people to mess with them. At least that is what we say. On Thanksgiving many people will gather with people who they have some sense that they must like/love (because they are related) and share food. I know that many people love gathering with family, as do I, but for some it is just another obligation.

For years now there have been a few acceptable intrusions on the "SACRED THURSDAY OF TURKEY." There is a parade, football, and for some people, hunting.

A parade is an acceptable intrusion. I admit there are many things I do not understand. I know a few things fairly well, but parades baffle me.

The first thing that baffles me about parades is that anyone would want to have one. In High School Band I was forced to march in them. I later found out that compelled parade marching is outlawed under the Geneva Convention, it is apparently next to the water boarding section.

The second thing that baffles me about parades is that anyone would want to go to one. As a younger child I was forced to attend parades. Although parade attendance is not specifically prohibited by Geneva, I think we should start a petition to have it added.

Finally, and most baffling to me about parades, is that someone would think it a good idea to put a parade on television. I understand that many years ago programming was limited. You might not want to air another black and white episode of The Lone Ranger on Thanksgiving. It probably seemed like a good idea to put a few cameras outside and beam pictures of streets, sidewalks, and buildings into people's homes. After all, it was Thanksgiving; people were not going to be watching the television anyway. If they happened to tune in and see people on the street, they might think it was a rather slow part of Perry Mason, and turn it off.

Apparently video feed streets, sidewalks, and buildings is more popular than anyone could have anticipated. After all there is a channel that shows a fireplace and logs burning. Don't believe me? Why don't you visit their Facebook Page  Not only are there cable channels of burning wood, there are plenty of online videos (up to 10 hours) of fireplace imitators.

Broadcasting video of things like streets and fireplaces, apparently has some following and has wormed its way into the American experience. And we don't complain about parades interfering with Thanksgiving. We don't complain about football interfering with Thanksgiving. Some people complain about hunting interfering with Thanksgiving.

But a few years ago someone thought that is was simply to Arbitrary to wait until midnight to sell stuff after the Turkey was slaughtered. They thought they might bump it up a bit and sell things on the Sacred Thursday. So they did. And gravy didn't freeze over. Green beans were still consumed. Pies, cakes, and the other bounty of the harvest did not come crashing down to destroy their place of business. So more retailers became emboldened.

But something is stirring. Now, sliding back from the fowl feast, we hear cackling disapproval.  A gobbling of disgust bursts forth at the prospect defiling so sacred a day. It is acceptable to watch video of streets and sidewalks, and to watch grown men play games, but to go shopping, that is too much. There are approved activities on SACRED THURSDAY OF TURKEY and shopping is not one of them.

The complaints, as I have gathered, are as follows.
1) People should put family above shopping.
2) Traditions should be observed, rather than shopping.
3) When you shop, someone has to work instead of being with their family.

There are probably others, but these are the three I will address.

First, just because you have certain traditions does not mean that everyone else does the same things you do. Whether or not you watch streets and sidewalks Thanksgiving morning or watch grown men case each other in the afternoon, not everyone does.

You enjoy the parade? Great! Enjoy it. But please don't ask me to. (I would rather have teeth pulled.)
You love football? Great! Have fun watching it.
You like to spend all day hanging out with your family? Great! Have fun and enjoy them.

For many years now, holidays have been about going from one gathering to another for my family. Never enough time at one place and then we have to go and meet with another side of the family. Because of that, we have often had holiday meals (Thanksgiving and Christmas) on other days. (I can hear the gasps.) We have even had to have breakfasts rather than dinners.

The point is that families have to make things work, and that doesn't mean that everyone will do things the same way. So embrace the fact that not everyone will sit down to eat about the same time your family sits down to eat your Thanksgiving meal. Schedules are fluid and why should we expect everyone to do things the same was as we do?

If you have your Thanksgiving meal on Saturday, because that is when everyone can get together, then that means you will have free time on Thursday. Maybe that time can be used to get some things accomplished, that is unless the Turkey Police decide that you can't.

The final issue I will address is the idea that if you shop someone can't be with their family. Many people work on Thanksgiving, just because you might not does not mean that other aren't. Healthcare workers, utilities workers, police and fire, convenience store and gas stations, military, and others. Not to mention the people who work the parade and football games. Lots of people already work holidays. So they can't be with their family, right? My guess is that they will share their meals at alternative times.

So why should retail be different? If someone wants to work on Thanksgiving, who are we to tell them they should not. Who are we to tell them they are somehow less to earn a living on this day.

The reality is that we have problems in our culture. We need more, as a country and as people, than things. Our country and culture have changed and are changing. But getting mad at retailers for being open on Thanksgiving is not the answer. Being open for business on Thanksgiving is not the problem.

But it is easy to object to change and claim that the change is the problem. It is easy to share a picture or a post that says how outraged I am about retailers being open on Thanksgiving and how destructive it is for our nation. The hard thing is to be thankful. The difficulty is to be the agent of change that rejects the easy answers and gets to the root of the problem.

The fact is that we are needy people living in a cruel world. We should not take for granted the blessing we have and we should seek to be blessings to others. At the same time we should be careful that we don't deprive others by insisting that they do things the same way we do.

Are we hated as a nation? Should we be?

On September 11, during a period of reflection for many in the United States, our country found itself under assault once again. Our diplomatic envoys to various countries in the Islamic world are threatened and some Americans have been killed.

Many Americans are angered that our country has been threatened and many more are critical of our current administration for projecting weakness, rather than strength, which may have emboldened those who threatened us.

We should project strength as a country. I am not sure about how flagrant we should be in projecting that strength, but foreign policy decisions are not made by me. But I have some questions. People have told me that I ask many questions but do not provide the answers. Maybe that is because I don't know the answer, but only the question. Maybe that is because there is no good answer to some questions. Or, perhaps, it is because the best way for someone to accept an answer is for that person to think about the question and discover the answer for themselves.

Here is my first question "Is America hated in the Islamic world?"

Ask most anyone in the last few days and the response will likely be YES! But that is likely a generalization based on the news feeds that are pumped through our homes and offices. Some people hate the United States, but how are we to know the extent of that sentiment? How do we even know the motivation of the people who are part of the mob? I think it is likely that many mobs in the Islamic world the past year or so had lots of people who didn't know why they were there. Were they mad? Yes. Were they whipped up into a fury? Yes.

But, could we not edit video from the Democratic National Convention in such a way as to present people in America as Anti-God and Anti-Jerusalem? After all there were people shouting and booing at the change in the party platform. Does that mean all Americans are trying to shout down things related to God and Jerusalem?

What about all of the other people who were not a part of the mobs? Where is the camera filming the families in their homes upset at the violence? Were people who were not participating in the mobs at home because they could not get there? In other words, if they could have been a part of the mob, would they have been a part of it? Or were they opposed to it? Were they indifferent? There are many things we don't know about the people in the mobs and those who were not in the mobs. We can be sure that some hate us, but many we just don't know about.

The Second question is “Should we be hated as a nation?”

As an American I want to say, NO! After all, we want peace, democracy, and stability in the world. We are the shining city on a hill, (though we have had some brown outs since electing our current administration) and stand for what is good and right in the world. We have the moral high ground. That is what I want to believe. That is the type of country I want to live in. But is that the type of country that I actually live in?

I sometimes wonder if we don't act more like a bully than a positive role model. We flex our muscles with our military. Project our power far from our shores to make sure we get our way. We also use our bank account to pay people to agree with us. Our “foreign aid” looks to me like we are trying to flex our economic muscles rather than to really help people.

In school, the bully gathered a group of people around and threatened to punch them if they didn't do what he wanted. If he had a fat bank account he could also threaten to cut people off if they did not do what he wanted. The bully was a leader. He was a leader who lead with force. People would follow him, out of fear or because they thought they could get what they wanted by following him. Eventually people lose the fear of a bully and start to fight back.

A bully is not a good leader. A good leader is strong, but doesn't have to flex his muscles in front of everyone. A good leader does what is best, not simple what he wants. A good leader helps people because it is the right thing to do, not to control them.

I want my country to be a good leader, but why do I get the feeling that we have been acting like a bully?

If we are acting like a bully, rather than a leader, how would we fix it? Well I think that we would have to have leaders running the country, not bullies. But I think we have been electing bullies lately. I hope things get better.

Land of the Not So Free, Not for Cab Fares Anyway

As a customer, a smart phone user, and just an American, I would like to think that I can use a product or service if I want to. I changed from an iPhone to Android because it cost less and I like it better. I buy generic at the grocery store because it cost less and I think the quality fine. I use Google maps because I like them better. We can choose and use the apps for our phones and programs or websites for our computers because we like them, and we don't have to ask for permission. (Unless you are a child and have to get permission from your parents or if you consult with your spouse before spending money.)

I like having the freedom to choose which products and services I will use. I don't like that the Government restricts the options I have, but most of the time we don't see the products that we are prevented from using. So, in a sense, we don't know what we are missing. But now with the spread of smart phones and technology, things may be changing. The New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission issued a notice that owners and operators are not allowed to use a new application to collect fares. Here is the notice.

What would we do if we didn't have the grand protectors at the various commissions around to protect us from new ideas and technology? Apparently New York already has contracts to handle cashless transactions. My guess is that deciding which companies can make money off of credit card processing for Taxis and Limousines is too complicated and complex a decision for business owners to make. An arm of the Government should decide which companies should be able to offer credit card processing and payment services in New York.

You would think that a business owner would be able to choose which companies they wanted to use to process their payments. I could choose a service because it was the least expensive, or I like the service, or because its my cousin's company and I want to help him out. That is a simple kind of freedom, the freedom to choose which business to use or which product to buy. Not in New York, I guess.

Closing Prayer at the Democratic National Convention

First of all, I did not watch any of the Democratic National Convention live, but neither did I watch any of the Republican National Convention live. A friend posted the You Tube video of the closing prayer to Facebook and I watched it there. Here is a link to the video and a link to the transcript.

Timothy Dolan, the Archbishop of New York and a Cardinal in the Catholic Church prayed to close the convention on Thursday, September 6, 2012. He also prayed to close the Republican National Convention a week earlier.

His prayer was reverent and distinctively Christian. He did not avoid some of the social issues that the Democratic party supports and the Catholic church opposes. He addressed the issues in a way that some may not have realized, at the time, what he was saying.

Here is an excerpt from the transcript.

May we know the truth of Your Creation, respecting the laws of nature and of nature's God, and not seek to replace them with idols of our own making. Give us the good sense not to cast aside the boundaries of righteous living You first inscribed in our hearts before inscribing them on tablets of stone. (From Cardinal Nolan's closing prayer at the DNC)

The bold portions are from the transcript (I did not add them). Note a few issues that are or could be at odds with the general direction of the politics of the Democrat party. First, "respecting the laws of nature" is a reference to ethics based on natural laws. He also asks that God prevent us from replacing the natural laws with "idols of our own making." Catholics have a long history of natural law ethics. Here are a few links for those who are not familiar with natural law. Here is a webpage with some information. And here is a You Tube video (3 1/2 min) briefly explaining natural law.

He also notes the importance of living righteously. This is a reference to both virtue and both the Old Testament and New Testament as a basis for ethics. Catholic thought has a long history of virtue ethics. Here is a link about Catholic ethics in general (it has a section on virtue ethics).

The phrase "you first inscribed on our hearts" is a reference to the New Testament book of Romans and the reference to "tablets of stone" refers to the Decalogue, or more commonly known as the Ten Commandments.

So in this prayer, Cardinal Nolan asked God to help people have an understanding of ethics and morality that is in line with Catholic ethics as grounded by natural law, virtue, the Old Testament, and the New Testament. So what do we make of this? The delegates in the room seemed to agree with Cardinal Nolan as he prayed. Are there parts of the Democratic Platform that are contrary to Christian ethics? I think so.

I think Cardinal Nolan did a great job in his closing prayer. My hat is off to you sir. I also think it is great that the Democratic National Convention made available the opportunity for him to pray to close the meeting. My hat is off to the DNC also. I do think, however, that if God grants Cardinal Nolan's petition, the election won't go well for the Democrats.

That is not to say that Republicans are "God's Party" or anything like that. But I do believe that while the official party platform of the DNC may claim to promote ideals that are in line with Christian ethics, the particular policies advocated by the Democrats are often contrary to Christian ethics. Let me also say that I think Republicans also have similar issues as it relates to policy and Christian ethics, but I believe, on the whole, that their problems are fewer than those of the Democrats.

So I agree with the sentiments of Cardinal Nolan. I also ask God to grant the petitions he prayed for at the close of the DNC.

The Gulf Coast and New Orleans Hit Again?

 Seven years ago I was starving for news. My home was in one of the hardest hit areas on the edge of New Orleans, and we were wondering what happened. By this time (September 2nd) I was back in the region, not New Orleans, but a bit north in Mississippi. Our home Church had sent a team to check on some friends of the pastor and give out some supplies. Being able to serve took my mind off of the deviation of my community. I was doing something to help some of the people hurt by the storm, even if it was not my own community.

Seven years later, its weird. Things feel much different. My family no longer lives in the New Orleans area and we have significantly fewer friends that live there than we did before. Issac was not a Katrina, though it was devastating in its own right. My wife and I were concerned for the area, for the people and for our own friends who remain, but we were not glued to the news. I guess going through Katrina, in the sense that we had more friends and a home in the disaster area, was quite different for my family than for the rest of the nation who was not as connected to the region. We lived in the area that was then under water, and we knew our home and possessions were there. We knew people who died as a result of the storm. Now, as I experience Issac as an outsider, maybe I am beginning to see that Katrina was just another disaster in a world filled with disasters.

It is interesting to think I might have felt about Katrina the way I feel about Issac now, if I did not live in the New Orleans area at the time Katrina struck. For me and my family, that would be completely different. We learned a lot about God's provision, mercy, and grace through the post-Katrina life we lived. We learned that our things (that is our stuff, our material possessions in our home) were not nearly as important as we treated them. When you lose everything, you gain a tremendous sense of freedom. In the months following Katrina we were given many wonderful gifts by people who wanted to ease our suffering. To put it plainly, we got a lot of stuff. With that came the loss of the freedom we had when we had so little. We gained some comfort from our possessions, but we also had to take care of the possessions and make sure they were secure.

We tend to think it is the abundance of things that make us free, but maybe it is the lack of things that make us free. Maybe each little item we “own” actually ties a small string to us. More and more stuff equals more and more strings, which lead to less and less freedom. Maybe that is a lesson that God wants us to learn. The more we focus on the “stuff” that we have on earth, the less we can find our delight in God. The less “stuff” we have, the more opportunities we have to delight in God. Of all the things we lost in the storm, I knew God would never lose us. And we never lost God either, because when all was washed away, we still had a string tying us to God.  

Bible Belt Pastor Looses Faith: Not Surprising

Someone says “Did you hear about the pastor who became an atheist after 25 years in ministry.” People gasp and a hush comes over the room. Someone tells the story about the article posted on Facebook. Slowly the conversations resume, many about the details just shared. The people interject statements like, “I can't believe it, a pastor” and “after 25 years, how could you believe for that long and then loose faith.” Many of the people reassure themselves that they would never doubt their faith, that they would never abandon their faith after so long.

Sadly, however, many of the Christians in that crowd probably experience a bit of hesitation and anxiety when thinking about a long term pastor leaving the faith. Some of them will probably think, if he abandoned his faith, what keeps me from doing the same. After all, pastors are supposed to have more faith, and much stronger faith than that of regular church members. If a pastor with 25 years of experience looses his faith after reading Richard Dawkins, then what hope does a regular Christian have?

If a seen like this actually happened, I don't have any knowledge of it. I read the article about Jerry DeWitt on Facebook after some friends posted it but I can't say that I'm surprised.When you dig a little deeper into the article you find that within a few weeks of having a conversion experience he was asked to preach to his church. He got an emotional high out of the experience and that was, apparently, his call to ministry. DeWitt never went on to complete a college education and from the article it appears that he had no formal seminary or religious training.

So someone who had served in ministry for a number of years but had no formal training for ministry, and no formal education beyond high school comes in contact with educated and intellectual atheists and has a crisis of faith. Why would we be surprised? Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett are not stupid. They are both highly educated and very intelligent men. I had the pleasure dining with Daniel Dennet. We had a good conversation and I do not doubt his intelligence, his argument against Christianity, however, I find deficient. But if I did not have a certain level of training in philosophy and logic, I might have been persuaded. My case, and many others like me, is one in which education preserved my faith, instead of destroying it.

You see, when I sensed God calling me into ministry, it was something I struggled with. I was part of a church and wanted to be more involved, but I also had other plans for my life. I had a job and wanted to earn a lot of money. When I got the sense that God wanted me to serve him in ministry, I did not feel elation, but more of a dread. Why would God choose me? What would this mean for my family? I struggled with this for a while and talked with my wife and some friends who were in the ministry before I finally acknowledged that this was where God was leading me. For those of you who know me, I am a bit of a geek. So one of the first things that came to my mind was “I have no idea how to serve God in ministry.”

I grown up in a religious area and I had gone to church from time to time but I was not raised consistently in a church. The first thing that came to my mind is that I have no skills that I would need to work in a church. At that point, when I knew God was calling me into ministry, I began to search for ways to get the training I would need to be able to serve. And so, I went to seminary and completed three advanced degrees. Along the way I learned a lot of things about the way the church works and about the difficult issues that Christians have to understand and have to be able to deal with if they want to be honest with themselves.

Christianity has hard issues. Some of the questions that atheists like Dawkins and Dennett bring up our genuine questions. There are some difficult issues that we have to settle in our own minds if we are going to accept the idea that an infinite God took on humanity and lived as a human, died on a cross, and was raised on the third day. Too often we think that answers to these types of questions are simplistic. Too often we relate these types of answers to emotional experiences that we had. The challenges that come against Christianity from intellectual atheists are real challenges, but that does not mean that they are unsurmountable.

A large number of thinking Christians have read and responded to the arguments that Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett leveled against Christianity and have found them to be lacking. This does not mean that every Christian should try to understand Dawkins and Dennett and respond to their charges, but they should at least know that some have. I think we may have missed opportunities to minister to those in our congregations when we ignore the genuine challenges to our faith that are being leveled from the secular world.

As Christians, we should not shy away from challenges to our faith. We should not act as if we are supposed to have some kind of a blind faith. We were never called to have a blind faith. We have reasons for the hope in us. In our churches we should not settle for a simplistic faith that denies any substantial challenges and claims that "everything will be all right" if we just believe. Our faith should be founded on the hope we have in Jesus Christ and the robust intellectual tradition that we have as Christians.

But what do we do with stories about people like Jerry DeWitt? How do we handle the questions about church leaders who abandon their faith after a number of years? The first thing is that we don't hide from it. The earliest church had to deal with apostasy, and so do we. I do not know whether DeWitt was a born again believer who lost his faith or if he was someone who never had genuine faith to begin with. That's something that I can't possibly know or determine on my own. But I do know that John wrote about people who had left the church and abandoned their faith in his day. He writes:

“Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come. This is how we know is the last hour. They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belong to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belong to us.” 1 John 2:18 – 19

So pastors and church leaders who abandon their faith after years of service may never have been genuine believers in the first place. Or it could be that they are believers who are simply having a crisis of faith. In either case we should not try to deny the existence of apostasy. Our churches should have a way of responding to it.

So how should churches respond to apostasy? In the article about DeWitt there are a number of instances where he received threat and ridicule from his community. As Christians, that is a response we cannot allow. Someone who has abandoned their faith should not be ridiculed, they should be shown love. I know that we tend to think that someone who has left our group has betrayed us. But someone who is left the church and abandoned Jesus Christ has not betrayed us. The church is supposed to function as the community of God on earth. For someone to claim they no longer believe is not an offense to a local congregation, it is between the individual and God.

So as a church we should pray for them. We should live our lives as an example of the gospel. We should love them as much as we love any other person that we do not believe is a follower of Jesus Christ. We should witness to them with our lives and show the hope we have within us by the way we live, love one another, and love them.

So for Jerry DeWitt, and all those who have left the faith and been treated poorly by those who claim the name of Christ, I wish to extend my apologies. As Christians, we should be better than that. I hope that we can all come to a point of caring for, rather than glaring at, those who do not share our faith.

Grades Are Posted-Philosophy of Religion

I have posted your grades. If you have any questions let me know soon.
Have a great summer.

Wade Howell

Human Nature

Thomas Nagel-What is it like to be a bat?

Class on April 26

Everyone should have received an email explaining how to get to your grades. If you notice a problem send me an email and I will check into it. I have a number of assignments that I have as "late" and some of the last assignments are not graded, I will get to it soon. I will not take class time to check and see when I received your assignment or if I received it. If you are missing an assignment that you believe you turned in on time send me an email describing what you believe to be the case and attach a copy of the files you sent earlier (PDF or Open Office format only).
If you have not received an email from me with instructions to getting your grade it is because I don't have any of your work, or if I have received some of your work, I received it "late" and have not graded it. If this is you and I don't already know about your situation you should email me immediately.

For class on April 26
Love of Wisdom chapter five questions will be reviewed
No Quiz

The assignments on the syllabus for  4/26 will be moved to 5/3. The assignments for 5/3 will be extra credit.

Why do people leave the church when they are no longer forced to come?

Do we even have to ask that kind of question? If you are forced to do something and then no one can force you, I would quit. I used to push back against begin forced to do anything. I bet that if my mother came to me and said, "you better breathe, or I'll go get your father!" I would have held my breath. I was just rebellious when I got to the point where I finally knew everything.
But you know what is the interesting thing. I still see my mom. I still talk to and do things with my dad. We still have a relationship because WE HAVE A RELATIONSHIP!!!!!! Hello????
I don't go back to my old school building or seek out the princiPAL...I drive by it from time to time but not because I love the place, but because I have memories about friends and teachers (ie. relationships). Ok, I might stick my head in from time to time just to see how the buildings look, but it is because of the relationships that I fondly view my high school.
But in the Church we think it can be all about music and lighting and productions and pizza and trips. WAKE UP, its about the relationships we build. We need to build those relationships cross-generational. The ancient peoples of the Bible mentored the young, they did not separate them from the ones they needed to learn from. Our society is doing things very wrong on many levels. One of which is not connecting the young people to the older people. Age grading ministry and education is a problem.
Ok, Ok, Ok, down from the soapbox.
Check out the link though, the article is thought provoking.

Myths about Emerging Adults
Interesting article about young adults and their political and religious issues. They are not who we thought they were.
Another article about churches and debt management for the congregation.
Changing the Debt Culture

Central Florida Girl Found: Why did God say yes?

It is not all that often that we good news with missing children. One of the most terrifying thoughts as a parent is that your child would go missing. I heard part of an interview with the person who found her and it appears that he is a Christian.
Link to story on local news website

Did God answer his prayers and the prayers of others and allow Nadia to be found alive and safe? Yes, I think so.
But what about all the prayers for the miners and other lost children and other situations that did not result in a safe return. Did God answer those prayers? Yes, I think so. The problem is that in those situations is appears that God answered no.

So why does God sometimes say no? Wouldn't it God to answer yes to every prayer for safety and life preservation? When someone is struggling and their entire life is crumbling around them because someone they care for dearly is in peril and may never return, shouldn't God answer yes to the prayer and return them safe? I want to say that prayers for safety and to ease suffering are "no brainers." Of course God should answer yes. Why not?

Then I think back on a situation I had with my daughter. She had a splinter in her hand--it hurt. She wanted me to make the pain stop and I told her how I could get the splinter out, but it would hurt more for a little while, as I would have to scrape it out. It was best for her to let me get the splinter out. She did not want to experience the additional pain of removing the splinter and was prepared to live with the "lesser" pain of a splinter rather than the "greater" pain of removing the splinter.

I now had a dilemma on my hands. I love my daughter and don't want her to be in pain at all. I also know that  allowing the splinter to remain would likely cause more pain in the long run than the shorter experience of more intense pain of removal. What does a daddy do? I could answer her request and leave it alone. I could giver her cuddles and ice cream to make her not think about the pain. That might make her forget about the pain, but the splinter would remain. Eventually, if my hunch was right, the splinter would get infected and hurt even more.

I did what I thought I must. Although she did not want me to remove the splinter, I comforted her, reassured her, and eventually had to assert my authority and coerce her to allow me to remove the splinter. She was not happy about that. She was mad because daddy "hurt" her by taking the splinter out. She didn't like that I did that. Maybe she didn't trust me as much because I answered her request and need differently than she wanted.

In this case, I knew that it would be better for her in the long run to take the splinter out at that time and not to wait. She didn't know that  and she didn't like it, but it was best. I acted against what she wanted and what she asked for because I judged it better than her requests.

I am simply a man who tires to be a good father. I don't know everything. I can't do everything. But if a father can know what is better for his children than what they ask for, how much more should we be willing to defer to God's judgement over our own. My daughter is much closer to my level of intelligence and knowledge than any human is to God's knowledge and intelligence. Is it unreasonable to believe that I might not understand why God answers a prayer with a no, when I can understand why I might answer a request from my daughter with a no?

By the way, I comforted her after the pain of the "splinter removal" and may have even put ice cream into that equation. God will also comfort us after a painful experience that he chooses to let us go through. But we don't like to be told no.

In the case of Nadia, I am glad that God chose to answer yes. I may not like it, but I hope I can accept when God chooses to answer no.

April 12 class

PDF on miracles

Case Studies 6a

Case Studies 6b