sola scriptura

Sola Scriptura -- scripture alone, the Bible is sufficient...

Check out this great blog article over on one of my favorite websites, Camp on This (Steve Camp -- yep, the singer/songwriter...)

CAMPONTHIS: TREASURING THE TREASURE OF GOD'S WORD


Here are the Bible verses with which Camp leads his article:

The Scriptures should be our joy: Psalm 1:2 and Psalm 119.
God gives His Spirit through His Word: Galatians 3:2 and Romans 8:5.
The word of God gives hope: Romans 15:4 and Psalm 78:5, 7.
The word of God makes us free: Psalm 119:45 and John 8:32
The Word of God makes us wise: Psalm 19:7-8 and 119:98.
Wisdom brings joy: Proverbs 3:13.
The Word of God gives assurance: 1 John 5:13
The Word of God overcomes the evil one: Ephesians 6:17
The Word of God revives us: Psalm 19:7.
The Word of God is our life: Deuteronomy 32:46-47
Our physical life depends upon God's word:
He created us by His Word: Psalm 33:6 and Hebrews 11:3
He keeps us in existence by His Word: Hebrews 1:3
Our spiritual life depends upon God's Word:
We are born again by God's Word: James 1:18 and 1 Peter 1:23
We go on living spiritually by God's Word: Matthew 4:4
The Word of God causes faith: Romans 10:17 and John 20:31.

reflections on the ligonier fall conference

Some of you know that Chad and I had the distinct privilege of attending the Ligonier Fall Conference last weekend up in Scottsdale, AZ (near here, Almost Mexico, AZ). We heard R. C. Sproul, John MacArthur and Ligon Duncon speak to "Hard Questions Christians Face". There's no way I would ever comment on everything discussed (besides no one would want to read my post, if anyone does!!).

But what I did take away from the conference:
God is Sovereign. Completely. Wholly. To his own glory. Soli Deo GLORIA!

Psalm 115:3
Our God is in the heavens;
he does all that he pleases.

Daniel 4:34 - 35
At the end of the days I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted my eyes to heaven, and my reason returned to me, and I blessed the Most High, and praised and honored him who lives forever, for his dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom endures from generation to generation; all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, and he does according to his will among the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand or say to him, “What have you done?”

Amos 3:6
“Is a trumpet blown in a city,and the people are not afraid? Does
disaster come to a city, unless the Lord has done it?

Christians! Don't try to "defend" your belief that God is sovereign! What I mean is this: we all have, from time to time, certain misconceptions about evil in the world, the bad stuff that happens whether natural calamity (disasters, famine, disease...), personal evil (sin of the heart that we all possess), supernatural (demonic) or the existence of hell because...

GOD EXISTS!!! He is the true and only living God! He is absolutely over everything, and will consummate all things -- that means when the time comes, evil WILL be eradicated. But for now, all of history is in line with his purposes, whether we understand it or not.

He is HOLY, HOLY, HOLY and can not look upon evil or do evil. This is the part I'm still struggling with (not because of unbelief, but because I don't get the subtle difference of these two concepts): God WILLS evil to exist, he ALLOWS it and DESIGNED it into the universe WITHOUT being RESPONSIBLE for it. In other words, God wills evil to exist but he did not create it.

Romans 3:5
But if our unrighteousness serves to show the righteousness of
God, what shall we say? That God is unrighteous to inflict wrath on us? (I
speak in a human way.)

Romans 9:22-23
What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known
his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for
destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of
mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory...

BECAUSE....

Romans 5:8
...but God shows his love for us in that while we were still
sinners, Christ died for us.

Please comment if you wish. I'd love to hear feedback.

new blog colors

Majority rules. Back to the original green and orange.

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What about this combo? (olive, fuschia and orangeish)

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Likee? Don't likee? Just messing around at 9:00 pm when I should be in bed...maybe I'll go back to the standard green template.

1 down, 30 to go...

30 days to Halloween. Yep. 30. I've been hearing about the candy explosion day for oh, 11 months now. Ingrid has asked me every day, at least 5 times a day, if she can be:

• Princess (Easy)
• Pink Princess (Easy)
• Ducky Fairy Princess Mermaid (Not so easy)
• Ariel (The Little Mermaid -- tail logistics could be a problem)
• Jasmine (no way...too much like a belly dancer)
• Belle (a personal favorite)
• One of The Incredibles (would've been SOOOOO cute - red shirt and leggings would've been practical, too!)
• Wall-E (a box...what could be easier?)
• Eve from Wall-E (hmmmm, a white garbage can?)
• Hula Badula Girl (hula girl...) (See Jasmine)
• A genie (See Jasmine)
• A door (Huh? Maybe we could've tacked the 95 theses...appropriate considering it is Reformation Day the next day)
• A rubber duckie in a bubble bath (easier than you might think...)

Ilsa would then chime in echoing whatever Ingrid said, except for a while, she really wanted to be Jack Jack from The Incredibles. With pretend fire on her head.

The question is now finally settled: Ariel and Cinderella. Thank you Target for reasonable, cute costumes.

book review = their eyes were watching god

Zora Neale Hurston is considered one of the first important African American female authors, and THE dominant African American female author in the era after the Korean war. She was born in 1891 to a carpenter/Baptist preacher and a schoolteacher.

The book was first published in 1937, but more people have read it since 1975 than read it all the years from publication until then.

A brief synopsis: Set in the 1930s, the main character, Janie is a fair-skinned, straight-haired (important to teh story) beautiful African American girl whose parents are out of the picture. It is implied that her father was white. She was raised by her grandma who was a former slave. Sour and angry, Nanna says she wants "more for her Janie" than she ever had, but basically that means anything better than slavery, so as fast as she can, she arranges a marriage for Janie at the age of 16 to a much older widower. This is the first of three marriages (the first one is never formally ended; she gets married to #2 while still married to #1) of varying degrees of happiness. The first man isn't terrible, she's just very young and is bored; she is spirited away by #2 after only 2 months of marriage. #2 (Jody) is a flashy and charismatic social climber, and apparently sees Janie's beauty as a way to hasten his prospects. They remain married for 20 years or so. It is a pitiful, loveless marriage. She runs the general store that they own, while he is the bigshot mayor of a respectable, but small town. He demands that she hide her beauty, as well as her voice. He dies old and bitter, hating her.

Soon after Jody's death, she meets Tea Cake. There is about a 20 year age difference -- SHE is 40 and Tea Cake about 20. They fall madly in love and are married very quickly. The few years they have together are exciting and full, full of hard work, friends and hardship. He isn't perfect, but he does recognize her intelligence, voice and strength. She is the one with the money in the relationship, due to the estate that is left after Jody's death. She is seen as beautiful by all around her, yet she is not on the pedastal taht Jody placed her on, which eventually was the undoing of their marriage. Tea Cake contracts rabies from a mad dog who bites him, and dies tragically from a gunshot wound by Janie's hand, when he is mad with the rabies and tries to kill her in his delusional state. It is a horrible end to a beautiful life.

Skin color (beyond "black and white" into shades of brown) and social status, beauty, community, independence, interdependence, lonliness, envy, bitterness and hatred are some of the main themes represented in the novel. Janie is so lonely for much of her life. Because Jody hides her beauty and she loses her "voice" due to his constant verbal abuse, she is to herself; the townspeople see her as aloof and stuck up, which she isn't at all. Light skinned blacks like her because of her beautiful coffee-colored skin and straight hair, and dark-skinned blacks think that she believes she is better than they; this is not the case. She's stuck in the middle.

While a very compelling book, it was quite hard to read at first due to the speech patterns duplicated phonetically. Here's an example:

Ah was wid dem white chillun so much till Ah didn't know Ah wuzn't white till Ah
was round six years old.

Once that challenge was surmounted, the story came to the forefront rather than the writing...it was distracting at first.

The Janie character is of the tragic genre, but is strong and her own woman. Alice Walker says, "There is no book more important to me than this one."

As a side, Halle Berry starred as Janie in a 2005 TV movie based upon the book. Ruby Dee is "Nanna" (the grandma). Jazz great Terence Blanchard did the soundtrack.

a happy mistake

This lovely loaf started out as baguette dough. Long story that I won't bore you with, but let's just say I was way off on my timing, and it is a timing-sensitive method. I didn't want to throw out the sponge, so I decided to wing it and do a sort-of no-knead that ended up being hand kneaded for about 10 minutes!

It smells heavenly, and has the best rise I've ever gotten out of the dutch-oven inside of the oven method of bread baking.

Hurry home, Chad, I want to crack open this baby!

funny

Yesterday, Ingrid asked me this as we were eating donuts:

What would you call a donut if it was a cat? . . . . .
A bob-a-que.

I have no idea what it means, but it's awesome...

timing

How's this for timing:

If Christ's birthday is around the 25th of December (obviously, the Jewish calendar is different, but this date on our Julian calendar is pretty close to their date), then his conception was around the time of Passover in late March or early April.

Coincidence? I think not...

I can't take credit for this scholarly thought...I read it in my "Jesus the One and Only" study guide (a Beth Moore study).

camp on this: to this one will i look...

This blog post over at "Camp on This" is so worthy of reading. Seek and support a local church where the Lord is revered, and challenge your church leadership if this is occuring!

CAMPONTHIS: TO THIS ONE WILL I LOOK...<br>God's men in ministry should be different than the world around them

tires

What a perfect morning! No humidity, about 80 degrees and sparkling skies at 8:30. And we have it all together, too! I am ready to pull down and assemble the Chariot, attach it to my bike and head off to the park with Ilsa in tow, and Ingrid cycling along.

Pull out the bike. Flat front tire. Drat. Pull out the Joe Blow tire pump. Drat. The valve steam has a leak. Call Chad. Me: Hey Hon, the tyre pump isn't working. Am I doing this right? Hon: Yep, just ream on it hard to cover the whole valve. Drat. I just dropped the cell and lost my call.

Ingrid: "Mooooom, I'm not being patient. Let's GOOOOO." Drat. My perfect morning is unraveling.

Plan B: put on the stroller kit and push to the park. Drat. Two flat side tires. Oh wait, the pump is working! Woo hoo. Drat. One of the stroller wheels is missing.

(More whining and unraveling.)

Plan C: put on the jogging kit (which is hard to just walk with 'cuz you can't turn. You have to put the front wheel up in the air and pivot). Drat. Flat single front tyre. Oh wait, the pump is working on this one. (Okay, those unraveled loose ends are tied up. Phew. Let's go.)

Off to the park. Great time! Swings! Cute dogs! Popcorn for snack! Great time!

Romans 8:28 - And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.

Eccles. 7:8 - The end of a matter is better than its beginning; Patience of spirit is better than haughtiness of spirit.

Eph. 4:1-2 - Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love...

Do you ever wonder about those times that nothing, nothing, nothing seems to go your way? Was there a wacko at the park? A mad dog? A crazy driver along the way? Why, oh why do I struggle with patience so?!! Shouldn't I know by now that God has his timing?