Well, as you can tell, I’m still “monkeying around” with RapidWeaver in attempting to get just the look I want for this blog. Please be patient with me, I’m trying not to break the Internet. Here’s my Friday Five (plus a couple of other thoughts):

Five Observations About the Olympics –

My family hasn’t gotten into the Olympics quite like we have in the past. One year (I believe it was the winter Olympics of 1992?), when our oldest was only 6, we set up chairs in our living room, went through an elaborate ritual to actually pretend we flew to the Olympics that year. We loved it and had great fun. Now, our oldest is away from home, preparing to get married next June; our two youngest are very busy with pre-season sports training and we’re running the parental taxi like crazy, so there’s not as much energy left for the Olympic events. Besides, I’m older now and staying up until 11.30 PM or even midnight and then trying to get up when my body tells me its used to getting up (around 4-4.30 AM) is nearly a disaster. All that said, here are some observations from this go round in ’08:

1. Is it just me, or are the announcers beside Al Troutwig for gymnastics really, really annoying and all pouty when the Americans aren’t doing well. Last night, while watching the women’s all-around, my parental instinct kept kicking in and wanting to look sternly into their eyes and with a firm voice say, “Stop whining. Stop pouting. It’s tremendously unfair to all those around you.”

2. The ubiquitous Michael Phelps is amazing. (he’s ubiquitous because he’s done so well, no one will leave him alone!) I vaguely remember being interested when Mark Spitz won his 7 golds back in ’72, but for the sake of the historical, this is really cool.

3. Okay, I’ll jump on the bandwagon... there’s no way all the Chinese women’s gymnasts are 16 or older. Did you see the photo of one of their tiniest looking girls whose missing a tooth? Unless she’s from the far south in China, and her parents have 2-3 cars up on cinder blocks in their front yard, 4-5 dogs roaming around looking real mangy, and have all married their cousins, then I just have a hard time believing they’re old enough to matter.

4. Michael Phelps again: I wonder what he’ll do, or become when this is all said and done. For the past, what, 23 years, his life has been swim–eat–sleep; swim–eat–sleep. After all the golds, then what?

5. While I understand the modern “need” to get all the news of the Olympics to us as fast as possible, I really wouldn’t have minded tape delayed broadcasting. Then, you could actually watch these games at a decent hour. During March Madness, there’s much ado about how much productivity is lost due to all the watching of basketball. I wonder how much is lost because people stay up way too late to watch these games.

Well, that’s it. That’s my five. I do have one more bit I want to share with you, dear reader. This is another quote from Of First Importance, and if it doesn’t stir your heart, then just reach out and grab that branch anyway:

“Imagine you are on a high cliff and you lose your footing and begin to fall. Just beside you is a branch sticking out of the edge of the cliff. It is your only hope and seems more than strong enough. How can it save you?
If you’re certain the branch can support you, but you don’t actually reach out and grab it, you are lost. If instead your mind is filled with doubts and uncertainty that the branch can hold you, but you reach out and grab it anyway, you will be saved. Why?
It is not the strength of your faith but the object of your faith that actually saves you. Strong faith in a weak branch is fatally inferior to weak faith in a strong branch.”
—Timothy Keller, The Reason For God (New York, NY: Dutton, 2008), 234

Tags: olympics, sports, opinion, quotes

I take preaching quite seriously. I think that I hold it in very high esteem. I also hope that I honor it through my own efforts.

But when I read this yesterday, it bothered me (I don’t want to link to the post, in case you’re wondering. I’d rather not take up a debate on this matter):

If you are walking up to that pulpit and you are not absolutely certain that you know exactly what that text means and what we are supposed to do in light of it then you need to sit down. You should feel like you know that passage better than anyone in the room…because you have studied it all week long. If this is not the case you should not be preaching.

Here were my initial thoughts: I’m not sure that I could ever preach again. I know that, on occasion, there are older, more mature saints, who know a passage at least as well as I do, perhaps even better. I think I understand the confidence the person is talking about: you’ve studied the text, you’ve done your work, you know the point... now, get up there and preach it with the authority that God has given you as a pastor/preacher of the Word.

But I dare say, there are Sundays (thanks to the grace of God, not many, but still, there are days) when I ascend to the pulpit with the sense that a passasge has escaped me in some respect. Can I say, with absolute, unshakeable confidence that I know beyond the shadow of a doubt what every single text I preach on means? (I’m wondering if this person skips around from text to text, because if you preach like I do, walking through a book of Scripture, passage by passage, you’re gonna run into some difficulties along the way.)

I think what goes on in my mind the most is what one of my seminary profs said in a homiletics (preaching) class: If you’re a bit nervous just prior to preaching, don’t be concerned. You should be. You’re about to open your mouth and speak for God. You’re about to speak to His people His Words. And what they’ll be hearing should be God, not you. So, yes, you should be a bit nervous; not fearful or even paralyzed by fear. But if you don’t have a measure of “holy fear” in your heart at this great task of preaching, then you ought to be very afraid.

I’ve never forgotten those words. And they speak of more grace to me than the quote given above. The one (from my old prof) seems to put the focus upon God and the holy apprehension that ought to come over all of us when we approach Him, especially during the preaching of His Word. The other (from a pastor whom I’ve never met, but I’ve read and listened to) speaks law to me. I know he would disagree (I hope, anyway), but these words are an unnecessary burden that would shut my mouth for good. And I’m not sure there is as much Scriptural merit for the sentiment as there is for that of my professor.

With that said, I’ll be working diligently to speak forth the Word of God this coming Lord’s Day, knowing that as I ascend to that place, it really needs to be His words I’m speaking, not my own.

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Tags: preaching, grace, law, fear, holiness

Tags: youth group, swimming

I’m feeling a bit stretched after yesterday and with my schedule today. Bear with me please.

I had a licensing interview* in the Twin Cities yesterday. It was an excellent time. The candidate performed very well. One of the joys was sitting on the interview with Dean Johnson. Dean was once our North Central District's Superintendent. He's since moved on to other things, like retirement. Except he's finding himself almost busier in retirement than he was before. "But it's a good thing, I think," he quipped. Dean's experience spans several decades as a pastor and as a leader. I would love to be able to sit down with a man like this over lunch, about once a month and just pick his brain and experience involving all things pastoral. What a resource that would be.

The interview involves me leaving home at 6.15 AM, sitting in the District office from 9 AM 'til about 12.30 PM. Then I jump back in the car and head for home, hoping I'll not get too tired while driving. (I made it home safely; about an hour after I got home, there was a serious accident on the highway I'd travelled.) Before I left the Cities, I had to make a quick stop at the Apple Store in the MoA (that's Mall of America, for all you initially-challenged). Yes, this was a serious visit: I'm trying to figure out how to get our church sound system "wired" through my aging iBook so I can record our worship services directly through to the appropriate software. It's just gotten a bit tedious doing it one of two "old-fashioned" ways: 1) use a digitial recorder set up somewhere in the front two pews and record "through air space" (that means no direct conneciton to the system), download that audio file to my iBook (it's in a .wma format, which my laptop can read, but is more tedious... wait, I used that word already, so let's check the thesaurus: yes, there it is – mind-numbing, sould-destroying, wearisome – the right words for dealing with something that only get "programmed" for Windoze machines. Then I can manipulate that file to burn to CD. Or, 2) if the digital recorder (this past week) hasn't worked properly (this past week) and has failed (this past week) to record anything at all (this past week), then I have to use our system's cassette tape (this past week) recording which does connect directly through our system. That's a much longer process, but it does work (well, with the exception that during our congregational singing, all you hear are the worship team's voices – nothing wrong with that, except I just love hearing lots of voices sing.

Wow, that was a rabbit trail, wasn't it. Sorry, back on track here.

After a brief rest and supper with the family, I had things to catch up on, so "worked from home" for a bit last night. That got a little distracted, on occasion, while watching some of the Olympic events out of the corner of my eye.

Today will stretch Ann and I even more, schedule-wise. She has to clean two houses. Jonathan has to catch his football practice car-pool at 7 AM. I have a chapel service to lead at a local senior living facility at 2 PM and Elizabeth has to be at soccer practice at 3 PM (my chapel usually runs 30 minutes and from where I'll be, it will take close to 30 minutes to get E. to her soccer practice, cutting it close, but make-able). Then Wednesday's schedule has me with a morning appointment at 9 AM, which will rund about 2.5 hours, making me late for Prayer Time at church, which starts at 11.30 AM.

All this is to say: this is an incredibly uninspired, uninteresting post from a mind that is wandering a bit at 5.30 in the blessed A.M. So please, bear with me. Thanks!

Tags: schedules, busy-ness, hectic

I’m back...

... from vacation and rest and study and times of refreshment.

Yesterday was the first Sunday morning back in our church, in our sanctuary, with our congregation, worshipping together. It was wonderful. The week prior was our church picnic and that was truly wonderful also, but this was the first time to be back “in the pulpit” in four Sundays. I’ll leave all judgment to the Lord and any other assessment to the people. Let’s put it this way though: I was thankful to worship with God’s people, to celebrate the Lord’s Supper with them and to be able to open the Word before them.

It was also a time to gather the kids from our youth group for the first time in over a month. The neighbors let us use there pool and what a gorgeous day for swimming.

James, the Tuber (is that like a potato?)


Alex the Human Cannon Ball


Jonathan makes a big splash


Heather showing great form

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Tags: Worship, preaching, youth group, swimming

Here’s my rendition of a Friday Five (all apologies to Erica for stealing her concept):

Five Thoughts About August:

1. Our anniversary is August 1.
It’s a great way to begin any month on a positive note. This year was #27 for Ann and me.






2. Some of the hottest, most humid days of a northern, midwestern summer come in August.
This means it’s State Fair season, time for schools to start and begin administering standardized tests in buildings that really don’t have air-conditioning.







3. School sports begin.
My kids are no longer “mine” only; the football and soccer coaches think they own them for a while. If that’s the case, then I’ll start sharing the gas bill with them for all the back and forth driving to practices... at separate times!








4. September is coming.
This means cooler temps (although this morning began at 56º so I guess I’m getting an early reprieve.






5. Pastorally speaking, it’s the “slowest” part of the summer.
This allows me to have the time needed to “ramp it up” for a sermon series on Ephesians beginning in September, a new Adult Bible Class based on Jerry Bridges’ book, Respectable Sins, and a Bible study going through the book of Acts. And that’s just for Sundays!










Miscellaneous Thoughts:

Read this. Apparently it wasn’t her best life yet. Maybe it’s yet to come in a little while?








And this was a very discouraging post. If Frank’s in the top 5%, then I think I know where that puts me.

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Tags: friday, random, miscellaneous, purgatorio, blogs

It could of happened... the Lord had hardened Pharaoh’s heart. Any parallels for today? (maybe only in the fact that our public officials are no longer called Pharaoh!)

Tags: comic strips, humor, Mother Goose & Grimm, moses, pharaoh, ten commandments

I’m going to be preaching through the book of Ephesians, beginning this September. I have no idea, at the present time, how long I’ll be in this wonderful book of Scripture; I just know that I can’t rush it. There’s simply too much there, too many treasures, so many facets to explore. The danger in this kind of approach is going so slowly that I lose people. To avoid that, there will be some side trails I go down, branching off from the text itself, to help us enjoy the grace lavished upon us through this piece of God’s Word.

In preparing for this series, I came across this post by Tim about memorizing Ephesians. He also posted some photos of what his “system” looks like. Very timely; God’s providence is always good, isn’t it? So, I thought I’d copy his idea, set up my own Memory Journal (though not moleskin; sorry, I was trying to be a bit more frugal there).

I copied his schedule, printed it out and pasted it into the front page of the journal. Now I can keep on track.

This is how I chose to do the original work of each passage: rather than print and paste into the journal, I always have better recall when I write it out by hand. Not as sharp or neat, but much better for my memory. I think it must be the motor skills involved, the sounding each word out loud as I’m writing and the time it takes to write it out longhand that engrains it into me.


Going to the back of the journal (marked with a stickie note), I practice each passage, gradually adding to what I’ve learned previously. Again, the long, tedious path of writing by hand really helps me. I work backwards through the journal this way, and will probably meet up with the original entries by the time I’m through (I’ve counted out pages and know about how far this will take me). After writing out, from memory, each passage, I open my Bible and compare & check, making notations if I’ve missed something.

So far, I’m nearing the end of chapter one. By the time I start the preaching series, I should be well into chapter three. On the first Sunday of October, our “normal” Sunday for gathering around the Lord’s Table, I’ll try my “hand” publicly. Instead of preaching a message from Ephesians, I recite chapters 1-3. I tried something like this years ago and I’m not altogether certain that the congregation realized I was reciting Scripture from memory rather than preaching a message. I wonder, how powerful is that: instead of cluttering things up with my often feeble attempts, simply allowing God’s Word to go forth, proclaimed from the heart, and doing it’s divinely appointed work?

To the praise of His glorious grace.

Tags: bible, ephesians, memorization, journaling, moleskin

While on vacation, my 14-year-old son, Jonathan and I went to the opening night of The Dark Knight. We went to one of our local theatres that offers a MEGASCREEN (90 feet of pure-blow-you-away-visual-overload). Cool!

There was a nearly tangible feel to the air, an electricity of anticipation by the crowd, just waiting for the show’s beginning. All kinds of people were there: young & old, parents with children (one father in front of us had, what appeared to be, a 5-year-old boy, along with three of the dad’s buddies), high schoolers and college-aged students. All were talking, in none too hushed tones, about the film. Jonathan and I were also genuinely excited for it. We’d probably bought into the hype.

I could tell from the opening scenes this was not “my daddy’s” Batman. No KAPOW! ZOWIE! SPLA-A-T! Just pure, malevolent evil. Jonathan was a bit agitated right from the git-go and I’m not sure it got any better. After the movie was over, he was in an exceptional 14-year-old mood for about a day and a half. Yet when pressed he either would indicate things were okay with him or that there was nothing wrong.

My overall impressions of The Dark Knight: dark, sad, cynical, yet with a faint glimmer of hope near the end. I hink I can easily believe that Heath Ledger’s death in real life has played a part in the tremendous fascination, not only with the movie overall, but with the Joker in particular. Several people I’ve spoken with have remarked how totally “into” the part he seemed to be. I think he did “get into” the part well - he played a person who truly cared for no one (I’m not sure he even cared for himself or was afraid of death - perhaps this was his real life oozing over into the part?). The Joker believed there was no good left in the human heart, mind or will; that each person would seek to survive, doing what was necessary to live, no matter how morally repugnant the act appeared to be. There is one blogger’s review of the Joker in The Dark Night, who felt this was the only honest character portrayal due to the biblical notion of man’s total depravity (although I highly doubt the screenwriters intended this perspective to be seen as anything but “a dak blot on a vast minority of humanity”).

Did I see any redeeming value in The Dark Knight? Perhaps. Police Chief (soon to become Commissioner) Gordon and Batman engage in a dialogue at the end that, at least for this viewer, helped pull the whole thing off the sludge heap of despair entirely. I’ll attempt to re-crete it to the best of my memory:

Gordon: You can’t take Dent’s crimes upon you. This city needs a hero.

Batman: Sometimes we don’t always get the the hero we want. We have to get the hero we need.

Again, I’m sure this is a terrible rendering of the actual dialogue, but it captures a hint of the redemption offered. Batman’s right: the hero we need is seldom the hero we want. After all, who would want a non-descript son of a non-descript carpenter from a backwater town who came talking about being last, not first; about being the servant of all rather than the leader of all; of losing your life in order to gain it; and other such “drivel”. I mean, really, who would want a hero that announces, at every key moment when he could have risen to command and power, “I’ve come to die.” So, yes, I think it’s accurate: the hero we need is not always the hero we want.

This series will continue, no doubt. There’s talk about Johnny Depp playing the Riddler next (I’ll never be able to completely erase images of Ceasar Romero as the Joker and Frank Gorshin as the Riddler from the old TV show). I’ll hold off “final judgment” if this series has taken a bad-wrong-sinful-and-never-can-be-redeemed turn. Until then, I’ll repent of my own darkness of heart, cling to the “hero” I need – a savior, who is Christ the Lord.

In him, we have redemption, through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ...

Ephesians 1.7-9, ESV

Tags: batman, Joker, the dark knight, movies, critique, evil, sin

I’m working on a new look to the site. Rapidweaver is a very Mac-friendly site creator, so I’m giving it a try. There should be more flexibility in many areas. I’ll keep working on it. Let me know what you think. Thanks.

Tags: Rapidweaver, blogging

Yesterday was our church's annual summer picnic. It started out looking like we might have to move indoors for only the second time in my tenure here, but the skies held firm and it didn't rain. In fact, the overcast skies were actually a blessing from a sun that would have brought about very steamy conditions. Gathered in the shade of trees and shelter house, we sang and shared, ate and fellowshiped and thoroughly enjoyed a wonderful day as a church family.

God has blessed us as a church, so we took the time to give thanks to Him, as well as encourage one another with testimony to the grace lavished upon us through His church. Our sharing focused upon how God has used His church early in our lives. Great memories, thanks everyone. My only disappointment was that Erica didn't share about cherry lifesavers from the sound booth (com' on, Erica; share with all of us). And how great is it when God's children share how others in the church are used by Him to bring us to faith in Christ. Add to all this joyous witnessing was a young man, Jonas, who had just returned from a country in the Middle East, where he and several others ministered, shared the gospel, experienced life with other believers in the church there and praised the Lord for it all.

Here's a list of the songs we sang (all a cappella, since we were outdoors):

• Praise to the Lord, the Almighty

• Praise the Name of Jesus

• O Worship the King

• All Hail King Jesus

• The Solid Rock

• My Faith Has Found a Resting Place

• Love Lifted Me

• Servant of All

• Beloved

• Bind Us Together

• The Family of God

• When We All Get to Heaven

• I'll Fly Away

• Sweet By and By

I trust your Lord's Day was blessed. Let me know how.