How about a little encouragement for a change?

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Kevin DeYoung gives some encouragement via his latest sermon, from Romans 16:

We probably don’t think of Paul has a great encourager, more of a champion of the gospel or defender of the faith, but the only reason we don’t see him encouraging others is because it happens so frequently. Could you find ways to build up those you love in front of others? We tend to put people in their place more easily. We mention the two things that bother us instead of the ten things we appreciate. Or we give a compliment so that we can tear them down (“He’s a good friend. Nice guy. But…” or “Bless her heart…”). Again, God isn’t asking us to be fake. He isn’t telling us to be mindlessly positive about everyone and everything. But frankly that’s not the problem for most of us. We could use the practice–in emails, letters, in everyday conversation –of building people up with encouraging words. How do you publicly talk about your spouse? Your church? Your pastor? The people in your church? Your parents? Your kids? Your co-workers? Are their legitimate opportunities to sincerely encourage them directly or affirm them before others?

Now playing at the iTunes Store: Up short ‘Partly Cloudy’

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Partly CloudyThe short that played before “Up” in theaters called “Partly Cloudy” is now available for $1.99 at the iTunes Store.

 

New ground being broken in Georgia on embryo adoptions

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From the Christian Examiner:

ATLANTA — The nation’s first law governing the adoption of embryos is set to take effect in Georgia after being passed by the legislature and signed by the governor.

The “Option of Adoption Act,” which will go into effect July 1, will provide safeguards for both parties involved in an embryo adoption, which is a unique form of adoption in which a couple — often an infertile one — adopts one or more surplus embryos from a couple who has undergone in-vitro fertilization (IVF).

Embryo adoption allows the adopting mother to experience pregnancy and has been promoted by pro-lifers for years but, until now, has not been governed by the laws of any state. Significantly, the Georgia bill amends Georgia’s adoption laws to make clear that embryo adoption in fact is a form of adoption. The law also allows adoptive parents to file in court for a final order of adoption (for the child who is born as the result of the embryo adoption), which supporters of the new law say clarifies that the adopting parents are eligible for claiming some but not all of their expenses for the federal adoption tax credit, which this year is more than $11,000.

Although embryo adoption tends to be cheaper than traditional adoption it nevertheless can still cost several thousands of dollars.

Couples who undergo an embryo adoption in a state without such a law as Georgia’s must sign private legal contracts that treat the embryo as property. The new Georgia law defines an embryo as “an individualized fertilized ovum of the human species from the single-cell stage to eight-week development.”

The law has the support of the nation’s embryo adoption programs, including Nightlight Christian Adoptions, which runs the nation’s oldest embryo adoption program — the Snowflakes program.

“Science has outpaced our legislation in clarifying the rights of the parties in potential disputes involving embryo transfer between families,” Ron Stoddart, executive director of Nightlight Christian Adoptions, previously told Baptist Press. “There needs to be certainty, particularly before an embryo is thawed and implanted in the womb of an adopting mother.”

HT: Zach Nielsen

The wave that will sweep you away: Google shows how

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The demonstration is a little rough in spots, but the idea of combining all of these into one app is amazing. Google Wave will really be something when it hits.

 

HT: Andy Wibbels

The death of George Tiller is a tragedy

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Abortionist George Tiller was shot and killed Sunday while at church. From the story by the Associated Press:

 

Prominent late-term abortion provider George Tiller was shot and killed Sunday in a Wichita church where he was serving as an usher, his attorney said. The gunman fled but a city official said a suspect is in custody.
The city official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly about the case. The official did not provide additional details.
Long a focus of national anti-abortion groups, including a summer-long protest in 1991, Tiller was shot during morning services at Reformation Lutheran Church while his wife was in the choir, his attorney Dan Monnat said. Police said the gunman had fled in a car registered in Merriam, a Kansas City suburb nearly 200 miles away.
Tiller’s Women’s Health Care Services clinic is one of just three in the nation where abortions are performed after the 21st week of pregnancy.

Prominent late-term abortion provider George Tiller was shot and killed Sunday in a Wichita church where he was serving as an usher, his attorney said. The gunman fled but a city official said a suspect is in custody.

The city official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly about the case. The official did not provide additional details.

Long a focus of national anti-abortion groups, including a summer-long protest in 1991, Tiller was shot during morning services at Reformation Lutheran Church while his wife was in the choir, his attorney Dan Monnat said. Police said the gunman had fled in a car registered in Merriam, a Kansas City suburb nearly 200 miles away.

Tiller’s Women’s Health Care Services clinic is one of just three in the nation where abortions are performed after the 21st week of pregnancy.

This is a tragedy, plain and simple. George Tiller did not live a life that glorified God. Like the countless babies he saw in his work, his life was ended abruptly but, unlike them, he will be held accountable before God. Hopefully, there was some realization of that in whatever time he had before he died and he repented before God. For the person who did this, they did not honor God with their actions. Robert P. George, who holds strong pro-life views and teaches law at Princeton University, speaks well when he talks about Sunday’s events:

Whoever murdered George Tiller has done a gravely wicked thing.  The evil of this action is in no way diminished by the blood George Tiller had on his own hands.  No private individual had the right to execute judgment against him.  We are a nation of laws.  Lawless violence breeds only more lawless violence.  Rightly or wrongly, George Tilller was acquitted by a jury of his peers.  “Vengeance is mine, says the Lord.” For the sake of justice and right, the perpetrator of this evil deed must be prosecuted, convicted, and punished.  By word and deed, let us teach that violence against abortionists is not the answer to the violence of abortion.  Every human life is precious.  George Tiller’s life was precious.  We do not teach the wrongness of taking human life by wrongfully taking a human life.  Let our “weapons” in the fight to defend the lives of abortion’s tiny victims, be chaste weapons of the spirit.

Inflicting pleasure: Perhaps Huxley was right?

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From the foreward of Neil Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business, where he suggests that Aldous Huxley may have had a better idea of what the future held than George Orwell did in his classic 1984:

But we had forgotten that alongside Orwell’s dark vision, there was another – slightly older, slightly less well known, equally chilling: Aldous Huxley’sBrave New World. Contrary to common belief even among the educated, Huxley and Orwell did not prophesy the same thing. Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression. But in Huxley’s vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny “failed to take into account man’s almost infinite appetite for distractions”. In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.

This book is about the possibility that Huxley, not Orwell, was right.

Drawings by Stuart McMillen, Recombinant Records

 

“Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust [1] destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. — Matthew 6:19-20

 

HT: Justin Taylor

Hold your twittering, please

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TwitterphoneJosh Harris posted some good thoughts about how his church recommends that worshippers not to use Twitter during services. John Piper agrees. Harris brings six points, which I think are helpful. This one is particularly good:

The most important thing I can do while I’m sitting under the preaching of God’s word is to listen to what God is saying to me. I need to actively engage my heart and mind to receive. Twitter, takes the focus off of hearing and receiving and and makes it broadcasting and sharing. So instead of my mind being engaged with thoughts of “What is the Word of God saying to me?” when I start “tweeting” my focus becomes, “What do I want to say? What do Iwant to express? What am I thinking?”

Along those lines, Piper adds these thoughts:

There is an assumption that Josh and I share, which is not understood or embraced by all. Preaching and hearing preaching are worship. Preaching is expository exultation. The preacher is explaining the Bible and applying the Bible and EXULTING over the truth in the Bible. The listener is understanding, and applying, and joining in the exultation. Hearing preaching is heart-felt engagement in the exposition and exultation of the Word of God.

This is a fragile bond. The fact that an electric cord is easily cut, does not mean that the power flowing through it is small. It produces bright and wonderful effects. So it is with preaching. Great power flows through fragile wires of spiritual focus.

The point is, we already need to battle the temptation for distraction when we are worshipping. It isn’t just twittering. Before Twitter ever came along there were myriads of things that come before us to break the focus on what God is revealing to us through worship. Don’t add another one.

And, finally, when it is over both men make clear that then yes, by all means twitter. Tell people what you have heard. Share it. Exult in it. But get the message first, that’s all.

Young woman making a difference exposing Planned Parenthood

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Reuters recently profiled 20-year-old Lila Rose, who has gone undercover to expose how Planned Parenthood is working in several states to cover up abuse suffered by young women and push abortions. From the story:

Rose stages her own sting operations at Planned Parenthood clinics, posing as a pregnant teenage girl to shine a light on what she says is the taxpayer-subsidized organization’s cover-up of sexual abuse.

She claims Planned Parenthood counselors routinely ignore their duty to report statutory rape when dealing with young girls impregnated by older men and often tell them to lie about their age or the identity of their sex partners rather than alert authorities.

Planned Parenthood declined to discuss specifics for the story, but maintained that they have strict guidelines for dealing with mandatory reporting. The organization also says that corrective measure have been taken in instances where employees violated policy. Still, the fact that the same thing has occurred time after time leaves one with the impression that Planned Parenthood is talking out of both sides of its mouth, so to speak. Because Planned Parenthood is a taxpayer-funded organization, there are ramifications for this kind of blatant disregard. From the Reuters article:

Because minors cannot legally consent to sex with an adult, health providers are required to alert authorities when an underage girl has been impregnated by an older man.

A grand jury in Marion County, Indiana, is investigating Planned Parenthood based on Rose’s videotapes and authorities in Tennessee and Arizona say they are reviewing the matter.

Officials in Tennessee and Orange County, California, have considered suspending public funds to the organization.

For people who care about abuse and torture, please note that Planned Parenthood gets $320 million each year from U.S. taxpayers so they can send children back to abusive situations for the sake of keeping abortions under cover. If protecting women’s rights is the big deal in this country that it’s supposed to be, more people should be made aware of this.

Take your medicine but put your trust in God

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Albert Mohler gives sound counsel regarding the recent case in the news about the parents who refused allowing their son to get chemotherapy to treat his cancer due to religious reasons:

As a Christian theologian, my concern is also directed to those who oppose medical treatment on what are claimed as biblical grounds.  The Bible never commands any refusal of legitimate medical treatment.  I am unspeakably thankful for modern medicine, for antibiotics and anesthesia and chemotherapy and dialysis and diagnostics.  The list goes on and on.  There is no Christian prohibition against legitimate medical treatment.  I believe that God heals, that we should pray for healing in Christ’s name, and that our lives are in God’s hands.  I believe that all healing comes ultimately from God, but that He has given us the blessings of medicine for the alleviation of much suffering and the treatment of disease.  There is no conflict here.

There are serious issues of medical ethics in the case of some treatments, even as there are excruciating dilemmas that confront physicians, patients, and parents.  Those must be acknowledged, but they are not the issues at stake in these cases.

In these cases I advise what the great Reformer Martin Luther advised — take your medicine and put your trust in God. For parents, this means to give your child the best care that modern medicine can offer, and to entrust your precious child to God and to God alone.

 

HT: Tim Challies