GroshLink

Due to the distance (we're a 2 hour drive as we're with family in Lancaster County) and the complexity of Lucy's transfer of care to Cleveland's Children's Hospital, we did not visit today. Below is a quote from a communication which expresses their confidence in the Lord:

We are excited about the decision, and are very hopeful for the outcome. We want to thank everyone who had been concerned and praying for their family. We trust and have hope in what the Lord will do for us and for Lucy. We trust His love and mercy.

 (More)

Apparently I'm not the only one to receive a mailing from Listingcorp.com, beware . . .

I received a letter the other day from Listingcorp.com. It says that one of my domains has received some search engine listings service and I owe $35. Now, I knew that something couldn’t be right, however this looks exactly like a bill. It tells me the amounts, what they are for, my customer number, notice date and who to make out the check too. However it does say that it is not a bill if you read everything. They just made it to look like a bill to confuse the general public. Not only that, but the domain name on the bill is not for one of my sites, however it’s really close. They put .info instead of .com. At first I didn’t notice that, however they are expecting that you overlook that minor detail. I’m guessing that that is the only site I don’t have privacy protected.

They did a really good job of making this look like a bill and probably will continue to scam money out of people. However, if you get a letter like this please don’t pay them. Con artist shouldn’t be able to get away with it. --

http://www.twistermc.com/blog/2005/03/28/listingcorp-scam

 (More)

This spring, our graduate fellowship wrestled with Philip Jenkins' The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity. Lisa Espineli Chinn, InterVarsity's Director of International Student Ministry, quoted from this piece Wednesday morning at IVCF's Mid-Atlantic Regional Staff Conference. She was considering Philip's interaction w/the Ethiopian Eunuch in Acts 8:

The Ethiopian church is equally ancient, and the Egyptian court official is one of the first Gentile converts identified in the book of Acts. Like the Armenia counterpart, the organized church in Ethiopia is also owed much to Syrian missionaries of the third and fourth centuries. By the time of the first Anglo-Saxons were converted, Ethiopian Christianity was already in its tenth generation.

Later in the morning, I received a cell phone call from an Korean student studying at Pitt reminding me of his recent inquiry regarding this same piece. He was looking for some advise to pass along to his friend who was applying to Emory's Candler School of Theology where the admissions essay asked for a response to an Atlantic monthly article by Jenkins which summarized much of the material of his book.

More on this piece later . . . But if you have not read it, I would highly recommend you do such.

 (More)

Below is the conclusion of a sermon I gave on the Lord's Prayer at First Presbtyerian Church in Castle Shannon on July 31. The piece on Remembering Jesus was inspired by a passage from Don Everts' God in the Flesh (IVP, 2005, p.22).

Take out a piece of paper and write upon it “Remember Jesus” . . . place it somewhere you’ll see it frequently this week. Maybe in your purse or wallet, near your computer or telephone, inside your briefcase or magazine rack. Remind one-another by a phone call, email, or note this week to “Remember Jesus.” This is not naïve, simplistic, or cartoonish, but reality. The fullness of deity dwelt in Him (Col 2:9) and we are to be preoccupied with Christ, to have our eyes focused solidly upon Him for He points us to the Father, extends His Sprit to us. He is our all in all. By living a life that remembers Jesus, we have an ear to listen to those that come across our path and extend responsible, loving action that brings hope, help, healing, and a Word from God. Not just a word for the mind, but a word about and in reality. By “remembering Jesus” we choose to run from sin and to life.

 (More)

On Tuesday morning around 2am, Bo & Steph (recent alum of our ministry in Pittsburgh) received the gift of Lucy Irene from the Lord. She is 6 pounds, 5 ounces. Due to a congenital heart defect, she was rushed from Williamsport Hospital, where Bo serves as a pharmacist, to Geisinger in Wilkes-Barre.

Bo is with Lucy there while Steph recovers from a difficult labor. Her Mom and Aunt will be staying with her in Williamsport. Lucy is scheduled to have a procedure this morning (Wed.) in which a catheter and balloon is inserted to enlarge her pulmonary artery. Please pray for a successful operation and recovery for Lucy, restoration of strength from delivery for Steph, and wisdom for Bo and Steph's decision-making/care. It's understandably difficult for them to be separated from each other and for Steph to be apart from Lucy during this difficult time.They would appreciate a note of encouragement. If you are connected to them, but do not have their new contact information, drop us an email at tom at groshlink dot net and we'll hook you up. Please keep them in your prayers.

 (More)

Our marketplace of ideas has become something of a flea market. With the World Wide Web, pretty much anyone can write and upload anything they want and have a few random hits on their site and be seen as clever. Turning a few heads with some thought or idea or teaching is banal. Not a great accomplishment . . .

 (More)

Three quarters of Americans believe the Bible teaches that 'God helps those who help themselves.' That is, three out of four Americans believe that this uber-American idea, a notion at the core of our current individualist politics and culture, which was in fact uttered by Ben Franklin, actually appears in Holy Scripture. The thing is, not only is Franklin's wisdom not biblical; it's counter-biblical. Few ideas could be further from the gospel message, with its radical summons to love of neighbor.

- Author Bill McKibben, in his Harper's magazine essay, "The Christian Paradox"

Source: Harper's Magazine (note: link send you to Sojourner's site w/a full text version)

I recently came across some comments by George Orwell (quoted by Dan Everts, God in the Flesh, IVP: 2005, pp.30-1) regarding how although modern language may strike someone as more impressive, it actually carries less meaning I found this an apt commentary on some of the obtuse conversations that occur in the university. Here is Ecclesiastes 9:11, according to Orwell's modern translation:

Objective consideration of contemporary phenomena compels the conclusion that success or failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be commensurate with innate capacity, but that a considerable element of the unpredictable must invariably be taken into account.

 (More)

Salty dogma: Bono gives an explicit confession of being saved by Grace, not Karma raises not only the question "how do you convince the world one can really be a Christian," but also "how can you convince the religious that you love God?" For me the answer is to keep following and living in Christ, that's expressed by loving our neighbor in thought, word (including the Word of the Gospel), and deed.

 (More)

Just the other day, I was thinking about how Charlie is responsible for the reuniting of Willy Wonka with his father after the candy genius' creativity hits a wall (when Charlie refuses to leave his family for the temptation of a candy empire). Charlie is quite a hero for his family and for Willy.

With this small underdeveloped thought, I found THE CANDY MAN: Why children love Roald Dahl’s stories—and many adults don’t a fascinating as it introduction to Dahl's writing, click more for a particularly thought provoking section regarding Dahl's use of fairy tales.

 (More)

Is this the inspiration for the political elements of Star Wars? I preferred my childhood sci-fi naivete of a galaxy far, far away.

One of the larger issues that surfaced in the telling of Anakin's fall to the dark side and his rise to becoming a corrupt figure was that of the fall of democracy at the hands of the very people who initially fought oppression.

"You have the personal issue of Anakin and his turn to the dark side, but then the children later bring him back to being a human being," Lucas says. "But the larger issue is that you've given up your democracy, and that the bad guys never took it -- it was handed to them. That theme was there 30 years ago which came out of the Vietnam War and Nixon wanting to change the rules so he could get a third term."

 (More)

Jim Wallis, the editor of Sojourners magazine & author of God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It, offers five areas in which the Democrats should change their message and their messaging in a NY Times Op-Ed Piece entitled The Message Thing

An earlier blog touching on Christians which fall outside of the assumed right was Onward Moderate Christian Soliders, a link to a NY Times Op-Ed piece by John Danforth.

 

 

 

Came across this piece on Amos Comenius (1592-1670, painting by Rembrandt), a Moravian bishop often called the Father of Modern Education. I must say that this perspective resonates with me, even though our family moved from Moravianism to Presbyterianism several generations ago: 

Sensitive to the developmental needs of children of various ages, Comenius divided elementary schools by grades. Believing that children must be wooed rather than coerced into learning, he invented the illustrated textbook and made experience and discovery part of the classroom environment. He taught that corporal punishment, if used at all, should be connected only with moral and not intellectual faults. He insisted that girls were as fully capable of learning at the highest levels as boys. And he preached that schools should teach all realms of knowledge, including morals and piety. The Moravian's reforms were both praised and implemented all across Europe, with over half of European schools eventually using his textbooks.

But behind these reforms lay a deeper vision. Comenius belonged to the Unity of the Brethren-a group of Pietist Christians descended from followers of the proto-Reformer Jan Hus. This small group of Czech believers had been persecuted and exiled from their mother country since early in the bloody religious conflicts of the Thirty Years' War. It was this background that birthed a vision in Comenius for a Christ-centered, universal education called "Pansophism." He believed that a broad-based educational program bringing together people of diverse backgrounds in a common understanding could help avert further strife.

The coordinator of Eden's care at Children's gave us a call and preferred to postpone Eden's MRI until September b/c of the overall improvement in her condition. She is moving in a very positive direction with weekly physical and vision therapy (at home). Today's visit to the Ear-Nose-Throat (ENT) specialist confirmed that her hearing loss is entirely related to the vascular malformation impinging on her left auditory nerve. He'll see her again when she's 9 months old to take another look and administer a different type of hearing test. He assured us that hearing loss in 1 ear will not affect her speech/language development or her vestibular function.

We rejoice in your prayers as they have moved the hand of God in healing Eden with continued improvement through the means of medical professionals and by His very touch. Please pass this praise along to those in your prayer network who have been holding us up to the Lord in prayer. In Christ, Tom

"In the beginning of life, when we are infants, we need others to survive, right? And at the end of life, when you get like me, you need others to survive, right?"

His voice dropped to a whisper. "But here's the secret: in between, we need others as well" (pp.156-7).

Theresa picked up Tuesdays With Morrie at the library, when looking for a book on tape for our summer road trips. This proved to be quite a good choice, subsequently recommended to us by the Barnes & Nobles Summer Reading Table and my sister, who came across a copy at her work's lending library. Asking around, a number of people have read this piece and also have picked up Albom's recent 5 People You'll Meet in Heaven.

What is the attraction of Tuesdays With Morrie?

 (More)

Here's an interview of Anna Popplewell, the actress who plays Susan in the soon to be released Narnia film. Below is an excerpt, where she addresses the question, "For Christians, Aslan represents Jesus in many ways. Do you ever think of it that way?"

For me, I read the books as simply stories. I think what they represent about human relationships can be interpreted in any way, in the same way that any book is a piece of literature and is open to other interpretations. The film is an adaptation of that piece of literature and will still be open to interpretation. I think in the same way that people may read the book in different ways, people will interpret the film in different ways. For those who look for the Christian symbolism in it, it will be there. And for those who don't wish to be confronted with it, they won't be confronted with it. But for me it's really a story about human relationships.

Came across this short piece on raising special needs children and found that it rang true as we've faced various difficulties, not just w/children but in general:

Could it be that the special-needs, "imperfect" people have that balancing effect on society as a whole? How would love and compassion develop among people who were only surrounded by the lovely and intelligent? My children treasure nothing more than a smile or kiss, sometimes just eye contact, from their little brother. My nephew, who is a year younger than Michael, loves to help at his school with the class of students with special need -- or as he puts it, "the class like Michael." I see my husband kiss our son's often expressionless, crooked little face, and my heart nearly bursts with a love and joy that I can hardly contain.

 (More)

"Hope and Healing: Painting in Italy in a Time of Plague, 1500-1800," at the Worcester Art Museum looks fabulous. I am particularly attracted to its attempt to

present mainstream Christian "high art," church art, in terms of function rather than form. The 35 paintings included are considered as devotional icons rather than as old master monuments. They are viewed from an existential rather than a doctrinal or sociopolitical perspective; through the eyes of a believer for whom a picture of the Virgin is a moral lesson and an emotional encounter before it is a Tiepolo or a Tintoretto.

But I can't help but come away with the question as to whether those visit the exhibition. . .

 (More)

Thought you'd appreciate Growing up w/a dose of magic . . . a NY-Times Op-Ed extolling Harry Potter, epitomizing the urgency of finding out what happens in a new piece or one you've just come across & don't know what's inside (I have this problem a number of books like Philip Jenkins' Next Christendom, Robert Wuthnow's Loose Connections, Rodney Stark's One True God, Ralph Winter's Perfecting Ourselves to Death), having a series in progress, and growing w/a character (I remember the days of Luke and the original Star Wars, although not as much content as Harry Potter).

An interesting response to the pressures of researching and reporting on Scientology can be found in this Sunday's Opinion section of the Post-Gazette

Brief thoughts on and link to original articles

How's this for a Christmas gift?  Well, I guess its better than the Darth Tater :-)

Here's a piece regarding the Unchained Faith of Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, and John Bunyan, where internment has been God's agent for redemption and a stirring source of literary inspiration (below is the section on Dostoyevsky).

 (More)