Photo Phriday

Gosh, I almost forgot. This is my trusty dog, Foxy. I called her and called her to come over, and finally she did, with her back to me. "Good dog." I borrowed my cousin's Nikon d50, took some shots of her this evening and eventually ran the battery down, so they can't take anymore shots of their kids. (Insert evil laugh here.) Now my only problem is I want one I can call my own.

Photo Phriday

In order to join much of the blogger world, I'm instating Photo Phriday. I took this while I was in Minneapolis back in October for the Desiring God Ministry Conference 2006. Ben's wife Maris--my roommate from college, him, not her--saw this about the same time I did and made someone stop to take the shot. Check out some of these guys, their shots are great: Joe Thorn, and Steve McCoy.

Mm Mm Good

Seminary classes can be really interesting sometimes, especially when you have 10+ hours in the car to think about the semester you just finished. Even more so when it's the first semester that you've finished all the work within the semester. North Park's in Chicago, Chicago and so we get people from all parts of the city and all parts of the faith traditions that are represented here. More than one would think, we get a lot of people from the South-side, which, according to my roommate, is just as ethnically diverse as the North-side, but without all the glitz--which is probably a good thing. Many of our South-side brothers and sisters come from more vocal traditions than the rest of us. (It seems Presbyterians and Covenantors have a few things in common.) During lectures, one can hear "mmm" or a few "Amens," and an occasional "Preach IT, Brother [or Sister]!"

During most car rides, I listen to sermons or talks, along with the usual plethora of music. Today, I listened to Dr. Timothy Keller's talks from the Reform & Resurge Conference 2006. He's the Senior Pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church in NYC. In his three talks, he spoke on "Being the Church in our Culture," "Preaching the Gospel," and "Doing Justice." I can't begin to do them justice even though I've listened to them several times now, so I'll resort mainly to the descriptions of them from theresurgence.com. "Being the Church in Our Culture" puts a lot of emphasis on doing Church in the cities, having a better understanding of the Gospel, integrating their faith with their jobs, committing to the good of the city and contextualizing the Gospel. In his second talk, "Preach the Gospel" he spoke on preaching the gospel as the building of God's Kingdom through people being redeemed by the atoning work of Jesus Christ on the cross, combining older evangelical thought with the pervasive postmodern outlook. In "Doing Justice" he provides the first Gospel centered explanation of being justice-oriented that I have heard--and I've been at a justice-focused seminary for 2.5 years--speaking to what is justice, as defined by the Bible, what it means to do justice, who should do it, and how you can be one of those people. It's well-worth your time and should bring you to think of Campbell's Soup--mm, mm, good.

P.S. I'm not trying to side-step any more conversation about Women in Ministry. I'm just writing what's going on in my life right now. Plus I'll be in New Testament 2 this next semester, and have a feeling we might run across a few verses on the topic.

Frangalian?

The most annoying question a guy like me can be asked is: "Room for cream?" This happens whenever I find myself in a coffee shop, trying to figure out how grande is actually small and if the words chalked onto the board behind the counter are French, Italian, Spanish or some combination of the three. Frangalian? Anyway. As I've said before I like my coffee with beans and water. Don't serve it to me cold. Don't add flavors. Don't try to sweeten it. Don't muck it up.

Why does this dude keep talking about his coffee?

First, I'm trying to convince all of you to drink it this way. Second, the most efficient way for Christians to get anything done is over coffee, of which I've sat down twice with my sisters and hacked out some understanding between us.

I know it's been a while since I posted about anything. School work had to be done. Thanksgiving was upon us. More school work had to be done. But instead of mass marketing my theology tapping at keys and burning my retinas, I got to have face time with some real people, asking real questions, and hammering out real answers. We opened the Scriptures together and philosophized and theologized. For me, it was extremely beneficial. I can only hope the same for them. Not that I convinced them of my particular viewpoint, but that we are able to come to a better understanding of where we're both coming from and where we can sharpen one another.

Hopefully, when the semester dies down, I'll be able to start posting on a more regular basis.