Random Designer Wrap-Up
I found the last several chapters of Random Designer quite attractive, I think partially because I’m from a Wesleyan background. We cross the “somehow” barrier and find that human beings, by whatever means that was accomplished, want to connect with their creator. In chapter 20, this is presented as “A Choice and a Chance.” The…
New Year Blog Dressup
I spent a good bit of time yesterday dressing up my blogs for the new year. This unseemly waste of time on the merely visual probably came to pass because I’m fighting a cold. I like to keep my three blogs, this original Threads blog, and the two I derived from it (Participatory Bible Study…
Happy New Year!
I’m starting the new year with a new theme for this blog. I’ll be using a similar theme for both my Threads and Jevlir Caravansary blogs. The basic design is from here. All I have modified is the header image.
My Theological Worldview
. . . at least according to this quiz. (HT: Gentle Wisdom) What’s your theological worldview?created with QuizFarm.com You scored as Evangelical Holiness/Wesleyan You are an evangelical in the Wesleyan tradition. You believe that God’s grace enables you to choose to believe in him, even though you yourself are totally depraved. The gift of the…
Preachers: Respecting without Idolizing
Eddie Arthur at Kouya Chronicle comments on recent debates about John Piper and justification. Amongst other things, he says this: It might surprise some of you that I recommend Dougs articles because in his review of Pipers criticism of Wright, Doug comes down fairly and squarely on the side of Wright, not Piper. For most…
The Quest for Absolute Certainty
When I was a teenager, I was very involved in electronics, something that has stuck with me. My first real efforts at understanding science came in working with electricity. One day I was discussing the theory of electricity, and specifically how it “moves” through a circuit with my father, also an electronics hobbyist. We had…
On Being Moderately Sheeplish
Joe Carter has had a salubrious encounter with the human mind, such as it is, and has discovered that conservatives are sheeple too. “I have to confess that I’d always associated sheeplishness with the Left,” he starts out, but then notes how, in his new role with the Huckabee campaign, he has found sheeplishness amongst…
Random Designer VI – Take 2
After some comments that followed my post Random Designer VI, I decided to go back and re-read those chapters to try to make sure I was reading Dr. Colling correctly. I have also finished reading the book and thus am no longer in danger of responding to something which will be clarified in later chapters….
Christian Carnival CCIV
It’s the day after Christmas and what a mess! I bet that’s what many are saying, anyhow. Our Christmas has been very quiet this year. That’s because my wife ended up taking all the traditional holidays working, and our grandchildren don’t arrive until the end of the week. We’ve done a little bit, but the…
Christian Carnival #204 Coming Today
I will be posting the next Christian Carnival, #204, sometime this afternoon. Watch for it!
The Joy of Being Unscientific
I write so much about science on this blog that it’s quite possible to get the idea that I think science is the major way of knowing, and certainly the most important one. But in my day to day life I deal mostly with things that are not precisely scientific. Science tells me how an…
Christian Carnival Will Be Here
There will be a Christian Carnival the day after Christmas, and it will be right here. Be sure to submit your posts. You can find the links to the carnival and the form at the bottom of the right sidebar.
The OTHER War on Christmas
A couple of days ago my wife and I were discussing just how little we cared precisely how someone greeted us during the holidays. As usual, Jody made it clear that she would greet people however she wanted, which normally means “Merry Christmas” while at the same time mentioning appropriate occasions for the use of…
Florida Science Standards Debate Heats Up
I can’t seem to keep up with everything that’s happening in the debate about science standards here in Florida, but Brandon Haught, our Florida Citizens for Science communication director (I’m a board member) is doing an excellent job on the FCfS Blog. In particular, I’d like to call attention to two blog posts there: Those…
Misunderstanding Translations
A friend drew my attention to this article on the ESV today, and I’m deeply disappointed in what I found there. I’m going to comment on some key difficulties with that article. But the author also links to this article by John Piper, which doesn’t so much surprise me, as put in context some other…
Christian Carnival #203 Posted
. . . at Bounded Irrationality. Check it out.
Biblical Inerrancy and Evolution
It’s very easy to equate the creation-evolution debate amongst Christians with the inerrancy debate. Many assume that those who accept the theory of evolution will automatically reject inerrancy. But this is not the case. This confusion results from another incorrect equation–Biblical inerrancy with Biblical literalism. Biblical literalism is itself a difficult concept to get ahold…
Random Designer VI
Chapter 16 of Random Designer turns a bit of a corner, though it is a logical progression. I get the impression that some of the non-Christian readers will turn aside at this point, as Dr. Colling progresses into the theological. The chapter titles are “Created for Connection,” “Cosmic Loneliness,” “Where is God, Really?,” and “Embedded…
Wright and Piper on 2 Corinthians 5:21
A fair number of pixels have been lit up over the issue of how 2 Corinthians 5:21 is to be interpreted, and specifically how this relates to our understanding of justification. N. T. Wright has an interesting article on how “the righteousness of God” should be understood in this passage. This article was dismissed by…
Random Designer V
With my previous post I completed reading the first section of Random Designer. Up to this point, while we have been touching on faith, the primary purpose of the material was to outline what evolution is, and the areas and strength of evidence for it. Obviously, in any reasonable sized book, Dr. Colling could not…
You Might be a Fundamentalist If . . .
John at Shuck and Jive has some ideas on how to identify a fundamentalist, especially if that’s YOU. I’m thinking his standards are a little tougher than mine, but his are a bit closer to a “dictionary” definition, always provided you locate just the right dictionary. I’ve been enjoying Rev. John’s blog lately, though he’s…
What Do These Three Blogs have in Common?
Today’s New Reason to Believe (blog from the Reasons to Believe ministry Herescope, dedicated to hunting heretics, presumably such as me! Adrian’s Blog, to which I have responded many times. Can’t find the similarity? Here it is: All three of them prefer to operate without any user response. Now I find that a bit more…
Differences of Opinion, Lies, and Seeing the Other Side
I got started this morning on this topic by reading this post at Quintessence of Dust. Dr. Matheson is looking for a good model to use in referring to creationists and their arguments. The temptation is to regard all false statements as lies. But at the same time we have to ask why people who…
Good Teaching or Mockery?
This case should turn out to be interesting. As it is, it cries out for context. (See also this on MSNBC). A Christian high school student is complaining that his AP history teacher is mocking his faith. His mother became concerned when the teacher said that American was not founded on Christian values. Since I’d…