For a long time, all I knew about Mo Isom was that she was a female athlete at LSU who had produced some entertaining light-hearted videos with some of LSU’s football stars. What I didn’t know (until last night) was her riveting backstory. I was not aware of the fact that this LSU homecoming queen had a real shot at becoming LSU’s first female place kicker. Nor did I realize that she was an outspoken Christian who had walked through a tremendous amount of turmoil in her own life. The jokester in the YouTube videos had betrayed none of those things.
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Illegitimate Responses to Illegitimate Rape Remarks
I have been out of pocket this week and until now unable to comment on the controversy surrounding Rep. Todd Akin’s remarks about rape. As a result, much of what needs to be said in response to this enormous gaffe has already been said by others. Nevertheless, I would add one observation to the discussion that has been bugging me all week. I have been disappointed by Republican responses to Akin that are driven more by politics than by pro-life principles. Over and over, I have seen politicos trying to dissociate the Republican presidential nominee from Akin’s “illegitimate rape” remarks by emphasizing that Mitt Romney supports abortion rights for women…
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Russell Moore on Theological Education in WSJ
Russell Moore has a really fine article in The Wall Street Journal. It’s about theological education, student debt, and the future of online education. He rightly argues that the whole enterprise needs to be more closely related to and accountable to churches. Here’s a snippet: There will always be those who get a law degree or an M.B.A. (and the resulting debt) and then sense a call to ministry. The history of the church—see Augustine and John Calvin, not to mention the original 12 disciples of Jesus—is filled with “second-career” ministers. But the ideal pattern is for churches to seek to identify, early in life, those who are gifted and…
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Do Same-Sex Partners Have Parental Rights?
Rev. Kenneth Miller is a Mennonite minister from Virginia, and he is facing prison. Why? Because he helped a woman named Lisa Miller flee the country with her biological daughter. Why was that a crime? Here’s the story from the Burlington Free Press:
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How to preach the steamy parts of the Song of Solomon
I have a general complaint about the way that some preachers approach preaching on the Song of Solomon. The content of the Song is sometimes cited as the Bible’s permission-slip to deliver salacious sermons about sex. I think this is wrong-headed. The Song of Solomon gives us a poetic depiction of the marital act that is cloaked in symbolic language. Should not preachers exhibit similar discretion when speaking about the marital act? Shouldn’t our speech about sex be more discreet and indirect than it is provocative and explicit? It seems to me that preachers would do well to explain what the Bible says using the same level of discretion that…
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Why the Sovereignty of God Is Important
Tom Schreiner is a dear brother, friend, and colleague, and he and his family are walking a painful road right now. On Friday, Tom’s wife Dianne was in a serious bicycle accident that left her with a brain injury. The Southern Seminary community has been praying fervently for her, and there have been some encouraging signs. Yet the injury is still a very serious one, and the prognosis is still not certain. Please pray for Dianne, Tom, and the rest of the Schreiner family.
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Skip Bayless Censored Defending Tebow?
On Friday, Skip Bayless tweeted that he would be appearing on ESPN’s “First Take” and would be defending Tim Tebow from those who “persecute” him concerning his Christian faith. Twice during Bayless’ remarks, ESPN cut abruptly to commercial. Some are suggesting that ESPN was censoring Bayless’ remarks. I suppose that’s possible, but it seems unlikely to me. Why would they be so obvious if that’s what they were doing? Why would they allow some of his remarks if they wanted to suppress Bayless’ views? To me the censorship charge doesn’t seem to add up, but you can watch above and form your own conclusions. In spite of the interruptions, I…
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Russell Moore Rightly Skewers Pat Robertson
Russell Moore’s take on Pat Robertson’s most recent abomination is a must-read. Moore writes: Let me just say this bluntly. This is not just a statement we ought to disagree with. This is of the devil…
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On the FRC Shooting and “Hate” Groups
I confess that I have been watching with some disgust the lack of coverage in the national media about the shooting this week at the Family Research Council. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, then you are a walking illustration of my point. If a deranged conservative had shot a security guard at the headquarters of the Human Rights Campaign, I guarantee that the news would have been as big as the Aurora shootings last month in Colorado. But this has not been the case with the FRC shooting. Case in point: The New York Times had the story on page A11.
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Free Song from Andrew Peterson and Desiring God
Andrew Peterson has given Desiring God Ministries permission to give away a free song from his new album. The record won’t be released until August 28, but you can download the song “Rest Easy” right now. Visit the Desiring God blog to download a free MP3 of the song. You can take a listen to the song below. [audio:http://cdn.desiringgod.org/audio/blog/RestEasy.mp3] In the video above, Peterson gives some background to the song. Among other things, he says: “This song is an exhortation to myself to anyone else out there who might be struggling to believe that God can both know them completely and love them completely.”