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Verse, Fame, and Beauty are intense indeed… |
”The riches of music are so excellent and so precious that words fail me whenever I attempt to discuss and describe them… In [sum], next to the Word of God, the noble art of music is the greatest treasure in the world. It controls our thoughts, minds, hearts, and spirits.”
-Martin Luther
Dr. George McPhee visits Saint Andrew’s from Glasgow, Scotland for a special organ concert
4:00pm Sunday, May 1
Image by Lel4and
You can hardly escape coupon-mania due to all the buzz around the TLC show Extreme Couponing. Those stockpiles are a little nuts, but if you’re like me you’re also a little jealous (guilty?) they’re getting household necessities for next to nothing (or in fact nothing)! I don’t know about you, but I don’t have 60 hours a week to devote to couponing or a spare room to serve as storage facility. Still, it seemed like there were some sound principles at the core of the extremity. I don’t need 250 deoderants just because they’re $.10, but can I get five or six?
A friend pointed me to the awesome site SouthernSavers.com, where someone does the legwork for you! There are lists of deals by store or product type; by under-$1 items and good-stock-up-price lists. You can make printable shopping lists by store right from the lists she gives. All for free!
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Chris Brogan wrote about storefronts, where he discusses how digital marketing coincides with traditional retail sales tactics. A great post to share with those who still don’t understand why they should market online. He also wrote a very practical list of tips for flying. He sounds like me at the airport, which makes me feel good! I can’t think of a tip to add, except to suggest that you buy a Kindle {Amazon Affiliate link}. 
Seth Godin makes a poignant point on the way our economy is changing as a whole:
It takes a long time for a generation to come around to significant revolutionary change. The newspaper business, the steel business, law firms, the car business, the record business, even computers… one by one, our industries are being turned upside down, and so quickly that it requires us to change faster than we’d like.
It’s unpleasant, it’s not fair, but it’s all we’ve got. The sooner we realize that the world has changed, the sooner we can accept it and make something of what we’ve got. Whining isn’t a scalable solution.
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“If you really believe that those who don’t have faith in God will burn in hell for eternity, how much do you have to hate someone not to share the gospel with them?” An atheist (Penn Gillette) tells the story of a man who gave him a Bible.
Gene Veith discusses how a group of atheists is trying to get a chaplain approved for the military. I’m all for it. We already have Buddhist, Muslim, and other types of chaplains. Of course atheism is a religion. Faith in “chance” (the Big Bang, etc.) is definitely a religion. I’d much rather them be recognized this way than always trying to pretend (like in the school system) atheism is the lack of a religion when in fact it probably requires more faith than the rest of them put together.
A metropolitan (bishop) of the Orthodox Church in Russia was faced with an atheist in the congregation who loudly declared, “Today nobody believes in the resurrection of Christ.” Instead of answering the claim, the metropolitan cried out, “Christ is risen!” and the hall, which was supposedly filled with atheists, responded with a roar, “Indeed He is risen!”
This is the proclamation of faith. It is often a waste of time and energy to argue with doubters–including ourselves. If we are assailed with unbelief, let us return to the bedrock of faith: the resurrection, for without this our faith is certainly vain. Let us shout (even alone with our private doubts) Christ is risen! It is a fact. Everything else is trivial by comparison.
-Elisabeth Elliot
Go to dark Gethsemane, ye that feel the tempter’s power;
Your Redeemer’s conflict see, watch with Him one bitter hour,
Turn not from His griefs away; learn of Jesus Christ to pray.
See Him at the judgment hall, beaten, bound, reviled, arraigned;
O the wormwood and the gall! O the pangs His soul sustained!
Shun not suffering, shame, or loss; learn of Christ to bear the cross.
Calvary’s mournful mountain climb; there, adoring at His feet,
Mark that miracle of time, God’s own sacrifice complete.
“It is finished!” hear Him cry; learn of Jesus Christ to die.
Ah, holy Jesus, how hast Thou offended,
That man to judge Thee hath in hate pretended?
By foes derided, by Thine own rejected,
O most afflicted.
Who was the guilty? Who brought this upon Thee?
Alas my treason, Jesus, hath undone Thee.
’Twas I, Lord Jesus, I it was denied Thee.
I crucified Thee.
For me, kind Jesus, was Thy incarnation,
Thy mortal sorrow, and Thy life’s oblation;
Thy death of anguish and Thy bitter passion,
For my salvation.
Lo, the Good Shepherd for the sheep is offered;
The slave hath sinned, and the Son hath suffered;
For our atonement, while he nothing heedeth,
God intercedeth.
Therefore, kind Jesus, since I cannot pay Thee,
I do adore Thee, and will ever pray Thee.
Think on Thy pity and Thy love unswerving,
Not my deserving.
Image by Danielle Rebel
Jennette Fulda wrote a great review of Wendy McClure’s new book The Wilder Life: My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie {Amazon Affiliate link}:
Know that those places you visit might seem smaller because you’ve become bigger. Sometimes you have to go there, though. Sometimes you need to know where you came from so you can better see where you are and who you love.
The CHOW blog did a great post on the recipes found in a handwritten cookbook from 1889.
Gene Veith posted some of a piece Sally Kohn wrote in the Washington Post. He sums it up:
She concludes that the problem is that liberals are just basically good tolerant people, while conservatives are mean. Liberals, she argues, need to stop being tolerant of conservatives.
The rest of this week will be posts related to Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter. The Resurgence blog tells some of the history behind our traditions– Since When Did Bunnies Have Eggs?
Image by L2F1
It’s Holy Week, a time to prepare our hearts and contemplate the guts, grace and glory of Jesus’ finished work on the cross.
Let us meditate a moment on the passion of Christ….true contemplation is that in which the heart is crushed and the conscience smitten….You must be overwhelmed by the frightful wrath of God who so hated sin that he spared not his only begotten Son. What can the sinner expect if the beloved Son was so afflicted? It must be an inexpressible and unendurable yearning that causes God’s Son himself so to suffer. Ponder this and you will tremble, and the more you ponder, the deeper you will tremble.
The whole value of the meditation of the suffering of Christ lies in this, that man should come to the knowledge of himself and sink and tremble. If you are so hardened that you do not tremble, then you have reason to tremble. Pray to God that he may soften your heart and make fruitful your mediation upon the suffering of Christ, for we ourselves are incapable of proper reflection unless God instill it.
The greater and the more wonderful is the excellence of his love by contrast with the lowliness of his form, the hate and pain of passion. Herein we come to know both God and ourselves. His beauty is his own, and through it we learn to know him. His uncomeliness and passion are ours, and in them we know ourselves, for what he suffered in the flesh, we must suffer in the spirit. He has in truth borne our stripes. Here, then, in an unspeakably clear mirror you see yourself. You must know that through your sins you are as uncomely and mangled as you see him here.
We ought to suffer a thousand and again a thousand times more than Christ because he is God and we are dust and ashes, yet it is the reverse. He who had a thousand and again a thousand times less need, has taken upon himself a thousand and again a thousand times more than we.
No understanding can fathom nor tongue can express, no writing can record, but only the inward dealing can grasp what is involved in the suffering of Christ.
{Taken from the Desiring God blog}
I have been doing an irregular series of posts recommending three essential books from one author. With C. S. Lewis, that’s impossible. To attempt to limit it to three would be a painful disservice.
Several friends of mine have told me they’d like to read more Lewis, and I’m betting others are in the same position– when there are so many options, where do you start? I’ll let you decide for yourself. Here is a list of some of Lewis’ major works with a brief synopsis. Get reading!
The Chronicles of Narnia
A fantasy series for children about another world, some of which is allegorical. Start your kids on this early and often, and there’s a lot here for adults too. They’re books that seem to grow with you.
Mere Christianity
The apologetics classic that’s an adaption of a series of radio addresses Lewis gave in England. It’s an approachable intellectual argument for faith and truth.
The Screwtape Letters
A fictional correspondence between two demons (an uncle to his inexperienced nephew). While the theology of a personal tempter is a little shaky, there are more convicting passages here than you’ll find in ten books by lesser authors. It’s an exploration of ways we fall away from God through all those little distractions and foibles we’d like to believe aren’t really sins.
The Great Divorce
A fictionalized look at heaven and hell with a lot of application for our lives on earth. It’s Lewis’ allusion to Dante’s Divine Comedy, among other works. (Wikipedia claims there’s a film version coming out this year, but I couldn’t authenticate that anywhere.)
The Pilgrim’s Regress
One of the few of his books I haven’t read (yet!), this is his first novel after becoming a Christian, written in the style of the classic A Pilgrim’s Progress.
Space Trilogy
Fictional series (I’ve written about the first book before) dealing with the dehumanizing of science fiction and literature in general at the time. (The Abolition of Man, written from a series of lectures, deals with this topic too.)
Till We Have Faces
A retelling of the myth of Cupid and Psyche, it’s an exploration of a character who comes to faith when those around her do not.
The Four Loves
His work on the types of love: friendship, eros, affection, and charity.
The Problem of Pain
An apologetic classic dealing with common arguments he encountered against Christianity.
Miracles
Another apologetic work arguing for the truth.
The Weight of Glory
An absolutely wonderful piece (one of my all-time favorites), generally published with other excellent addresses; a beautiful reminder of what Christ has done for us.
The movie comes out today. Go see it!
