Category: General

Goodblog

I’ve added a new category to the blogroll at the right. The “Under Surveillance” category is going to be where I put new blogs that I’ve discovered until such time that I decide to keep them. If I decide again’ it, they’ll discretely disappear, never to be heard from again. If they stay, I’ll move them up to a ”real” category, above, and put a few notes up about why everyone ought to read my newfound blog.

[Pseudo-Polymath](http://pseudopolymath.blogspot.com/), was a quick decision. I have no idea what Pseudo-Polymath means, but the tagline is “Christianity, Ethics, Bike Racing, and current events from right of center.” I’m pretty sure it’s the ‘Christianity’ that I’m going to focus on. At least, He’s going under the “Religion” category.

Mark Olson, whose blog it is, is a good thinker, a good writer, and has a **lot** of interesting things to talk about. Here are a few of them:

Continue reading “Goodblog”

Church Services

John at [Rabe Ramblings]( http://johnrabe.blogspot.com), has posted some comments regarding Willow Creek Church’s move to start “satelinte campuses,” using the franchise model (to quote a quote):

>”When Starbucks opens up a Starbucks,” Tomberlin said, “people expect it to be Starbucks, not a mom-and-pop coffee shop. There’s a lot of meaning in the Willow brand.”

I’m going to go with Mr Rabe here: [Yuck.]( http://johnrabe.blogspot.com/2005_01_01_johnrabe_archive.html#110615683598267399)

If you’re planting multiple churches with the same name and same basic order of service, you’re not a single church. You’re a denomination

While I’m at it, I thought I’d present a few thoughts on my ideal church setup…

Continue reading “Church Services”

Dead Birthday Cake

Today is my birthday.

KB took me out, I had curry chicken (yum) at the Bombay Grille, he got me a yummy cookie cake from the Great American Cookie Co., I got a nice nap, and then on the way into the building of my dorm I dropped most of the cake that I was going to share with my hall mates (I am very sad….no one should drop their birthday cake three flights of stairs away from sharing it while trying to get through an access card door). I’ll live tho. I did manage to save two pieces (dropped 6-8 pizza slice size pieces). I’m going to go to bed and eat my cookie pieces tomorrow. All in all it was a nice birthday.

Hope you all have a wonderful week and that you had a restful day on my birthday.

Peace and Blessings.

Date Night

Valerie and I have been discussing how we want to run our marriage for some time now, and the subject has come up recently of “date nights.” Valerie really wants to have a weekly date night. My response has been somewhat apathetic. I’m not opposed to going out (good heaven’s no!), and I see the argument that you don’t want to get caught up in the day-to-day of things and start ignoring the happiness of your family, but… I guess my reaction to having a scheduled date night is something like having an adult bed time. Yeah, I should go to bed at a decent hour, but a bed time?

Now, [TulipGirl](http://www.tulipgirl.com/mt/archives/000549.html) has a post up on some other problems with the idea of a date night. It’s pretty balanced too.

The problem isn’t with the custom, it’s some of the ideas that come with it. I’d be very happy with a “family night,” a nightly devotion, and any other number of “us” activities, probably all of which we’re going to use. An individualized family is no family at all, and just being in the same room together, no matter what we’re doing goes a long way.

Analyzing Morals

I have a class that I’m taking this semester that used to have me extremely worried and now only has me a little worried. The last CORE class we take here at Queens is an ethics class. Now Queens is a private school that is affiliated with the more liberal end of the Presbyterian Church almost to the point that you don’t see the Christianity at all unless you go down to the dusty tomes of the archives (which I was privileged to work in for two years). My worry was ‘what kind of ethics am I going to be taught in this type of atmosphere?’ I had heard horror stories from former students (including KB) about the class simply smashing liberal platform ideals into the student’s head without a glance at the conservative side. Not only is this unbalanced but it’s also pompous, arrogant and stupid. How can you expect to induce ethical thinking when you’re telling the student’s what to think anyway?
Continue reading “Analyzing Morals”

Who’s He Kidding?

[Jollyblogger](http://jollyblogger.typepad.com/jollyblogger/2005/01/jolly_digest_11.html) writes:

>I have been a bad blogger of late. One of the cardinal rules of blogging is that he who blogs should read the blogs of others. A corollary is that he who blogs should link liberally to others. I haven’t been doing this lately – time has been a bit scarce and so whatever blogging time I have had has been used to do my own posts and I really haven’t been reading too much of others stuff, nor have I been linking.

Heh. Who’s he kidding. I don’t hardly link to nobody. That and the fact that I don’t hardly post, of course, probably explain our phenomenal lack of readership, which right now, I think, consists entirely of family members. Ah, the devotion of family.

Nevertheless, David Wayne has a [great aricle](http://jollyblogger.typepad.com/jollyblogger/2005/01/jolly_digest_11.html) up discussing the meaning of *Logos* in John Chapter 1. Continue reading “Who’s He Kidding?”