Blogging: Controversy or Edification?
Tim Irvin, commenting on the "The Soap Opera Called 'Blogging'," writes,
The goal of blogging seems to have turned from posting something of
practical benefit and edification, like Bible Studies, Sermons and
Theological Essays to posting something that attracts the most response
and attention from readers. It's kind of a shame that so many gifted
and talented writers are devoting so much of their energy to the
trivial and mundane.
The fact of the matter is that my controversial stuff is the stuff
driving traffic to my site; I suspect that's how it is with everybody.
Almost nobody hands out trackbacks for a pastoral, edifying blog posts.
I want to be clear that pastoral and edifying posts can be, at the same
time, controversial. But their end must be God's glory not winning a
fight, and their tone must be gracious and humble, while even at the
same time defending truth (Pyromaniac has an
excellent warning
for me against a postmodernist perspective on internet
controversy). So while once again, renewing my commitment to
blogging consistent with the title of my blog, I would like to refer
you to a few of my favorite blogs that are consistently godlike in
their tone, manner, and content*:
*Not an exhaustive list. Limited to those that popped into my mind as I
wrote this. I would love to have readers help point us to other
God-ward blogging
Too much time on her hands...
75,000 legos, a little dedication, and a year and a half and what do
you get? A church building with seating for 1372 little lego people.
Read about it
here.
Saturday Blogspotting 11/19/05
My first exercise in
blogspotting: I've never done this before so please forgive me if
I
missed something. Just
email me and I'll be sure to include it next
time. Here goes:
First, blogroll-spotted at:
Blogspotted at:
Derek Webb Didn't Answer My Question
In anticipation of the release of
Mockingbird
. I was so excited when Tim Challies told me that he was going to ask
Derek Webb the question that I submitted for his interview (
part 1 here, and
part 2 here). My question was
In your opinion, what is the most underappreciated of your songs and why?
The sweet thing about Derek Webb's music is that some of the coolest
and most thoughtful concepts which he communicates, which really show
that he is writing from his heart, come out in some of the most
non-catchy of his music. So much of people's (like mine) favorite songs
are their favorite because the tune sticks in their head. My two
personal favorite Derek Webb songs are "The Church" (from
She Must and Shall Go Free) and "Ballad
in Plain Red" (from
I See Things Upside Down). So I was excited to hear how he'd answer. Well guess
what?
He totally avoided the question. I
guess that it was a hard question to answer thoughtfully on the spur of
the moment, so Derek, if you stumble upon this post, now that you've
had time to think about it, I'd love to hear your answer.
Scripture: Our Only Protection
I just read a post by Mark Lauterbach at his excellent blog,
GospelDrivenLife.
Having heard a sermon mentioning a verse he knew well but had not read
in years, he was forced to rethink his position that it is Scripture
and not systematic theology that is protecting him from error. Once we
"exegete a passage" we are not done with it, so we can move on. No, we
are simply better able to understand it in its context the next time
around. I must guard myself from the temptation to make my conclusions
about Scripture the infallible truth by which I live instead of
Scripture itself. One might then argue, "How can you know what
Scripture says apart from your exegesis of it." I can't. I must read it
(observation), I must seek to understand it, then I must make
conclusions about it (or conclude that I cannot make any conclusion -
interpretation), and finally I must live according to what I have been
taught by the Spirit (application). However, my tendency is then to
take my interpretation, and like Lauterbach says, and "read it back
into Scripture." I spent two years working through the book of
Galatians. My tendency, therefore, is to use my understanding of the
book of Galatians to help interpret the rest of the Bible and I find
application from the book in literally every facet of life. That's
good. The bad is that my tendency is also to not return from the book,
having been informed by new understanding of God and His Word, to
further refine or even challenge my understanding of that epistle. If
that happens with a New Testament book which I find myself reading
often for pleasure (and because it's short), how much more for an Old
Testament book that does not get near as much coverage and is harder to
understand!
(read more...)
I tiptoe Gingerly into Pyro's debate
After accidentally
shaking up the whole blogosphere,
Pyromaniac points out that he hasn't even blogged on his stance in the cessationism v continuationism debate.
His blog actually does a great deal to clear the air after many of the
knee-jerk responses that have flown from both sides of the debate after
he mentioned it. He points out that his comments were directed
toward the "prophetic-utterances-gone-bad" group (on this point I
must link to videos that I personally find very hilarious and an
illustration of what can happen when prophetic utterances go bad:
Robert Tilton).
He even makes the point (which I think is an understatement), "I
think I have much more in common with my 'Reformed non-cessationist'
brethren than I have with liberal cessationists." He summarizes what he
has said into four statements:
(read more...)
My Name is John Daker...
I just had to share, I think that
this is one of the randomest,
funniest videos I have ever seen. According this site,
John Daker's
performance was first seen on public access television.
Any attempt to
describe
the video will not do it justice. You can get all of the
individual clips at
getupoutmy.biz, but check out the
little clip
first. This goes down in my all-time favorite internet phenomena list along with
Peanut Butter Jelly Time and
All Your Base Are Belong to Us.
My Name is John Daker...
I just had to share, I think that
this is one of the randomest,
funniest videos I have ever seen. According this site,
John Daker's
performance was first seen on public access television.
Any attempt to
describe
the video will not do it justice. You can get all of the
individual clips at
getupoutmy.biz, but check out the
little clip
first. This goes down in my all-time favorite internet phenomena list along with
Peanut Butter Jelly Time and
All Your Base Are Belong to Us.
Great Site for Greek Practice.
I stumbled upon Zach Hubert's,
zhubert.com's Bible.
It is an amazing web-based interface that really helps for those like
me are still new in the Greek. It's nothing like the powerful tool of
Libronix,
but for me I think I will be using it often just as a handy, very
smooth interface to read the Greek Bible side-by-side with the English
to help me learn and cement the Greek into my memory. As you drag over
each Greek word, the definition along with the a simple parsing of the
grammatical function of the word. The site also has
Greek flashcards
for very effective vocabulary quizzing. I suspect that even with almost
no Greek knowledge at all the site would still be at least slightly to
refer to when the English is ambiguous on number (you plural vs you
singular), gender on pronouns (what is the antecedant), and other stuff
like that. Besides, this site is just plain cool and looks like tons of
work. It
looks like
they are about to undertake the Hebrew Old Testament. Bookmark this
site. Looks like they'll be turning out some very functional and
easy-to-use tools.
