we're moving our blog to a new home:

http://bradandgeo.blogspot.com/ 

let me know if there are any issues with the new site.

thanks - brad

christianity today is reporting that Jabez author Bruce Wilkinson is retiring after a disappointing go at making a difference in Africa. here are some quotes:

 

"Prayer of Jabez author Bruce Wilkinson, who captured the imagination of Christians by relocating to Africa from his Georgia home in 2002, has quit his ministry focused on defeating HIV/AIDS and retired from active ministry at age 58.

One turning point was the inability of Swaziland's King Mswati III and Wilkinson to agree on a meeting time in New York to discuss Wilkinson's plan to build homes for aids orphans.

A few days after this "perceived snub," Wilkinson told staff at his Dream for Africa organization that he was stepping down and leaving Africa, according to a Wall Street Journal article published shortly before Christmas 2005.

For months, Wilkinson had negotiated with the Swazi government for permission to launch his African Dream Center. The center would house, educate, and feed children whose parents had died of AIDS. It would also have a golf course and other tourist attractions. Swaziland, located between Mozambique and South Africa, is one of Africa's smallest nations and has one of the world's highest HIV/AIDS rates. Dream for Africa had hoped to house 10,000 children on a 32,500-acre complex by the end of 2005.

The proposal was outlined in a complex 40-page document that Dream for Africa gave the Swazi government a mere five days to approve, the Journal says. The approval never happened. Then, in September 2005, Wilkinson flew to New York to meet King Mswati III. "The king's chief of staff … agreed to set up the audience, but only at a time that would have required Mr. Wilkinson to wait in New York a few extra days," according to the Journal. Apparently, Wilkinson's schedule did not permit such flexibility...

Wilkinson has a history of dramatic twists and turns. As his books became bestsellers, he stepped down from Walk Thru The Bible, which he founded. He decided to move to Hollywood to make movies, but then backed out. He moved to Johannesburg, but stayed less than two years. He relocated to Swaziland. He remained there about 18 months before returning to Georgia. Wilkinson has also delayed completion of his next book for Multnomah Press. And in late September 2005, he was to launch the Dream Giver Coach Network to be merged with the American Association of Christian Counselors. But he "pulled the plug on the entire venture," a source closely associated with Wilkinson told CT. "Bruce was quite broken at this time. [Dream for Africa] had physically, emotionally, spiritually, and financially taken a serious toll on Bruce."

as i've become increasingly disillusioned with modern worship songs, i've grown to really appreciate what older hymns have to offer. one of my favorite hymns is 'come thou fount of every blessing'. so this article at christianity today caught my eye: 'raising ebenezer', by gary a. parrett, who teaches at gordon-conwell theological seminary. parrett's article is basically a plea to stop updating the words of hymns, using the line 'here i raise my ebenezer' as a test case, and he makes some really good points. i especially appreciate parrett's third point, as biblical illiteracy in the church is another soap box i like to climb up on:

 

"First, I protest on artistic grounds. As a hymn writer myself, I imagine Robinson felt he had found just the right expression to say what needed to be said. His phrasing, in this case, was succinct, biblical, pointed, poignant, and poetic: "Here I raise mine Ebenezer."

Second, the revisions are, at best, inconsistent attempts to be culturally relevant. How can the revisers leave in words like hither and fetter, as they typically do, while Ebenezer is heartlessly expunged?

Third, I protest on biblical grounds. Robinson's choice of Ebenezer (which means "stone of help") is a reference to 1 Samuel 7:12. After the Lord had given a great victory to Israel, "Samuel took a stone and … named it Ebenezer, saying, 'Thus far has the Lord helped us.' "

This single word ushers the worshiper into both the biblical episode and the greater narrative of God's redemptive dealings with his people. It points us, also, to Robinson's dramatic conversion three years before he penned the hymn, inviting us to reflect upon our own stories and to remember God's faithful dealings with us. By removing the word from the hymn, we likely remove it from believers' vocabularies and from our treasury of spiritual resources.

Finally, I protest as a Christian educator. What we have in such revisions is the worst sort of accommodation, even contribution, to biblical illiteracy. Our faith is filled with names and terms that were unfamiliar to us when we joined the family—atonement, propitiation, Sabbath, Passover, Melchizedek. What are we to do with such terms? We teach! How difficult would it be to simply explain the reference to Ebenezer?"

christianity today is reporting that the southern baptist convention is barring new missionary candidates from glossolalia, or speaking in tongues. here's an excerpt:

 

Trustees for the Southern Baptist Convention's (SBC) International Mission Board (IMB) have voted to bar new missionary candidates who practice a "private prayer language" from serving on the mission field...

Candidate guidelines approved by IMB trustees at the meeting state, "In terms of worship practices, the majority of Southern Baptist churches do not practice glossolalia," or tongues. "In terms of general practice, the majority of Southern Baptists do not accept what is referred to as 'private prayer language.' "

Because the ruling is not retroactive, it will not apply to IMB president Jerry Rankin. "I acknowledged even in the discussions that [tongues] has been a continuing practice [of mine] for 30 years," Rankin told CT. The trustees who elected him president in 1993 knew he prays in tongues.

When asked, Rankin told CT, "I am assuming that this does not have anything to do with me, because it was stated that it doesn't."

Trustee Allen McWhite, who opposes the IMB's recent action, told CT, "We have no indication whatsoever that there have been any problems on the mission field" concerning missionaries practicing a private prayer language. The Baptist Faith and Message, the SBC confession of faith revised in 2000, does not address tongues.

for those of you who try to read through the Bible each year and could use a little encouragement, you might like this blog, the one year bible blog. what's nice is that they give you online links for reading each day's texts online, as well as some commentary, historical background, art work and pictures, and other insights about that day's readings. the new year might be a good time to give it a try, and i've added it to my rss feeder, newsgator.

sorry for the lack of posts, but happy new year to all. we've been busy with family get-togethers, shopping, seeing friends, watching football, and even some reading and studying. i had the opportunity to preach at my old church, north ridge church in marshfield wisconsin yesterday, which is always special. now three more days of college football to watch- Georgie is very excited...

geo and i arrived back in wisconsin late last night, where we'll be spending the holidays this year. looking forward to egg nog, lots of christmas candy, and football. there's lots of snow, and it's 0 degrees fahrenheit. for those of you european folks, that's mighty cold - like -18!

this morning was our 2nd annual christmas extravaganza at the anderson flat. gingerbread men, sugar cookies, popcorn strings, a trip to the beach...a great time was had by all! our numbers were down a little this year as Harry Walsh came down with the chicken pox this week. here are a few pics of those that were there...

essential @ christchurch, a multi-media christmas service, was held last night. we had a nice time. great job by Greg and the team from 3Rock youth putting it all together.  Matt has posted some nice pictures of it here.

check out this song and video, it's great: the JCB song.

darn it, my first earthquake, and i didn't even know it:

 

SEISMIC ALERT: IRISH SEA 14 DECEMBER 2005 03:30 UTC 2.8 ML

BGS have detected an earthquake at 03:30 UTC this morning in the Irish Sea. The event has been reported felt from Greystones in County Wicklow, Ireland. The report described, "we were awoken from sleep", "the whole house rattled" and "pictures moved and lights swayed" indicating an intensity of 4 EMS.

 

Info here.

this may be the best christmas gift of the year...someone has posted (apparently) previously unreleased christmas tracks by sufjan stevens. i just had a listen to them, and they're great. HT to jonny baker.

* 'Mercy Me', an advent reflection from Kathleen Norris at The Christian Century.

 

* 'Fired by the Spirit', by Cormac Murphy-O'Connor at The Tablet. The Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster is convinced that small groups hold the key to parish renewal. Interesting to hear this from a Catholic voice.

 

* 'The Covenant With Israel', by Avery Cardinal Dulles at First Things. Interesting because Dulles gives a Catholic approach to the issue of Jewish-Christian relations, and also because i've been reading lots on the idea of 'covenant' for my research.

 

* 'Voice of God Revealed to be Cheney on Intercom' at The Onion.

The US has once again done their best to not engage global environmental issues. having refused to ratify the kyoto protocol, the bush administration seems unwilling to even discuss the issue with europe, japan, and much of the rest of the world who are attempting to do something constructive with the issue. instead, the SUVs keep rolling of the assembly lines with gas mileage that is embarrassing. more on the kyoto protocol can be found on wikipedia.

As one would expect in our pluralistic milieu, there seem to be new theological ideas and directions put forward on a seemingly continual basis. It can be hard to keep up with them all, even if you want to (and not everyone wants to!). One conversation I have been intrigued by the last few years is 'radical orthodoxy', a group of primarily British scholars who are trying to map a post-secular, theological framework for living in today's world. I had heard the term 'radical orthodoxy' bantered about a few times, and then Graham Ward of Manchester came and read a paper at a seminar while I was in Durham, most of which was way beyond me. All I remember is thinking, 'I didn't understand very much; he's very smart; I think I like what he said'.

 

So I've been wanting for a few months now to pick up a book by a Calvin prof named James K.A. Smith (his website is here, his blog is here) that introduces Radical Orthodoxy. I've been reading through it, and although even as an introduction it can be hard to follow at times, I'm really enjoying it. (Christianity today did a review of the book and the topic here.)

 

I don't want to get into the details of Radical Orthodoxy here - it is simply too complex for me to blog about, at least at this stage. But what did catch my eye was that in a footnote I saw that Smith wrote an article a few years ago in Pneuma, a Pentecostal journal, looking at what Pentecostalism and Radical Orthodoxy might be able to learn from one another. After a bit of digging it turns out that Smith has been a part of several A/G churches in his time, and he's obviously still concerned with Pentecostal issues, to some extent.

 

Which brings me to his article, entitled, 'What Hath Cambridge to do with Azusa Street? Radical Orthodoxy and Pentecostal Theology in Conversation'. (This is, by the way, a conversation I never thought would happen in a million years.) His thesis is very interesting - but what I really liked about the article was his handling of Pentecostalism. Smith rethinks and resituates what it means to be Pentecostal in what I think is a much needed way.  He writes the following:

 

'I would propose five key elements of a Pentecostal worldview and theology: (1) a positioning of radical openness to God, and in particular, God doing something differently or new. I take the central point of the narrative of Acts 2 to be Peter's courage and willingness to recognize in these "strange" phenomena the operation of the Spirit and declare it to be a work of God. To declare "this is that" (Acts 2:16) was to be open to God working in unexpected ways. In postmodern terms, we might describe this as an openness to alterity or otherness. (2) Because of this, Pentecostal communities emphasize the continued ministry of the Spirit, including continuing revelation, prophecy, and the centrality of charismatic giftings in the ecclesial community. (3) Included in this ministry of the Spirit is a distinctive belief in the healing of the body as a central aspect of the Atonement. This central belief is an indication of a Pentecostal deconstruction of fundamentalist dualisms. (4) Because of an emphasis on the role of experience, and in contrast to rationalistic Evangelical theology, Pentecostal theology is rooted in an affective epistemology - undoing just the kind of dualisms that [Radical Orthodoxy] seeks to deconstruct. And finally, (5) contrary to common assumptions about the "otherworldliness" of Pentecostals, the movement is characterized by a central commitment to empowerment and social justice, with a certain "preferential option for the marginalized" tracing back to its roots at Azusa Street as a kind of paradigm of marginalization - a revival in an abandon stable, led by an African-American preacher."

 

What I like about Smith's analysis is that he's able to see in Pentecostalism a critique of modernity, and in doing so, opens a way for Pentecostals to have a voice in a postmodern context. The problem may lie in the fact that Pentecostals are a strange mix of being both progressive (women's issues, etc) and fundamentalism (biblical literalism, etc). Regardless, it's encouraging that their are voices like Smith's out there; let's hope that these voices can be taken seriously and that Pentecostalism can have a constructive voice in the postmodern discussion.