• Christianity,  News

    A Plea on Behalf of Victims of Barbarism in Iraq

    From Robert George: I have created a website, www.iraqrescue.org, at which I have posted “A Plea on Behalf of the Victims of ISIS/ISIL Barbarism in Iraq.”… I would be grateful if friends would read the plea and, if you agree, go to the website and add your name as a signer. This is a serious matter, and I recognize that not everyone will, in conscience, see the issues just as I do. Of course, I want everyone to follow his or her conscience in deciding whether to join the signers. Visit the website here. And pray for the victims in Iraq. Maranatha.

  • Culture,  Politics

    How will gay marriage impact your marriage?

    If you’ve ever been in a debate with someone about gay marriage, one of the conversation stoppers that proponents often throw out is this: “How does gay marriage hurt traditional marriage?” Or more personally, “How does my gay marriage corrupt your straight marriage?” The thinking goes like this. What two people do in the privacy of their own home ought not concern you, even if they choose to reinvent society’s most basic institution. After all, who are you to judge someone else’s pairing? If some people want to call gay unions a “marriage,” what’s that to you? [read the rest at ERLC.com]

  • Christianity,  News

    Dr. Kent Brantley releases statement from hospital bed

    Dr. Kent Brantley’s statement: I am writing this update from my isolation room at Emory University Hospital, where the doctors and nurses are providing the very best care possible. I am growing stronger every day, and I thank God for his mercy as I have wrestled with this terrible disease. I also want to extend my deep and sincere thanks to all of you who have been praying for my recovery as well as for Nancy and for the people of Liberia and West Africa.

  • Book Reviews,  Theology/Bible

    5 Reasons to consider buying the “ESV Reader’s Bible”

    I have been reading my new copy of the ESV Reader’s Bible over the last week, and I have to say that I am really impressed with this work. If you are thinking about purchasing a reader’s Bible, there are at least five reasons that you really ought to consider this one. 1. Fine Translation: The most important thing about picking a Bible is the translation. There are many fine translations on the market today, and the ESV is leading the pack among the more literal versions on offer. As a revision of the RSV, the ESV does not use archaic expressions like “thee” and “thou.” Nevertheless, the ESV is…

  • Christianity,  Entertainment

    New movie about ChristianMingle.com

    ChristianMingle.com has now been made into a movie. Here’s the premise. A young woman pretends to be a Christian so that she can meet a nice guy through the Christian Mingle dating service. Along the way, she learns that maybe she needs to take Christianity seriously. I confess that sounds less like a premise and more like a summary of the entire movie. Blame the trailer. Watch it above.

  • Christianity,  Culture,  Politics

    NY Times reporter calls for incivility

    I have been watching with some interest the ongoing Twitter conversation between Ryan Anderson and New York Times reporter Josh Barro. Anderson supports the traditional marriage position, and Barro has been arguing that those who hold Anderson’s view are not worthy of civility. Barro says that such persons should be treated with the same intolerance that we would give to segregationists. For anyone paying attention to the current cultural climate, none of this is surprising. Still, it is jarring to see such a bald expression of intolerance from a New York Times reporter. I encourage you to read Ryan Anderson’s two blog posts chronicling the conversation (here and here). Anderson…

  • Christianity,  Theology/Bible

    My take on the Bibliotheca project

    There’s no way to understand my feeling about Adam Greene’s Bibliotheca project without telling you something about my own story as a Bible reader. I first confessed Christ as a 9-year old. I really think that is when the Lord converted me. I remember some things that immediately changed in my life after that experience. Among other things, I wanted to tell my third grade teacher at my public school that I had gotten “saved” (which turned out to be a bust, but that’s another story). I also remember having a desire to pick up my Bible and read it.

  • Christianity

    C. S. Lewis on contraceptives and new sexual morality

    “The modern situation permits and demands a new sexual morality: the old taboos served some real purpose in helping to preserve the species, but contraceptives have modified this and we can now abandon many of the taboos. For of course sexual desire, being instinctive, is to be gratified whenever it does not conflict with the preservation of the species. It looks, in fact, as if an ethics based on instinct will give the Innovator all he wants and nothing that he does not want.” –C. S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man

  • Book Reviews,  Christianity

    Book Notes: Piper, Quarles, and Stevens

    The Pastor’s Kid: Finding Your Own Faith and Identity, by Barnabas Piper Barnabas Piper has penned a very personal look at what it’s like to grow up as a Pastor’s kid. I don’t know any better way to describe what’s in this book than to quote from the foreward, which was penned by the author’s father John Piper. He writes, You will ask, “Was it painful for me to read this book?” The answer is yes. For at least three reasons. First, it exposes sins and weaknesses and imperfections in me. Second, it is not always clear which of its criticisms attach to me and the church I love. Third,…