Postmodern Renaissance Culture Revolutionary

Fun stuff from xkcd .

This session covers the introduction to the material of the Book of Revelation. This covers apocalyptic literature in general as well as examining the author, date of writing, and the 4 major methods of interpretation. You can download it here, but it is a large (50 mb) file. Introductory Material to Revelation

Here is my first attempt at podcasting the Revelation Bible Study. You can listen to it here or download it here: Bible Study Introduction

I am beginning to teach a Bible study here in Turpin. After a survey of the congregation, I decided to go ahead and teach Revelation. This will the fourth time through for me. As an offering to the congregation, I will be posting my notes on a weekly basis (or as we get to them in class). This is quite an undertaking. My class on Revelation is almost a year long (at 1 1/2 hours once a week). It is also as close to a college level class as you can find. Before I begin each class, I share some of my methodology and rules for the class. I will post those here to begin. This would be comparable to a syllabus. Most of the material will be in outline form. If you feel the need to take this material, please contact me and let me know you will be using it. Class Rules for Revelation Bible Study Methodology This is the 4 th time I have taught this level of class on Revelation. I have devoted, and will continue to devote, 6-12 hours of study on each lesson. Each previous class I have ...

As I was perusing the headlines from NewsOk.com, I found this article: College presidents seek to lower drinking age to 18 By Justin Pope Associated Press Writer College presidents from about 100 of the nation's best-known universities, including Duke, Dartmouth and Ohio State , are calling on lawmakers to consider lowering the drinking age from 21 to 18, saying current laws actually encourage dangerous binge drinking on campus. The movement called the Amethyst Initiative began quietly recruiting presidents more than a year ago to provoke national debate about the drinking age. "This is a law that is routinely evaded," said John McCardell , former president of Middlebury College in Vermont who started the organization. "It is a law that the people at whom it is directed believe is unjust and unfair and discriminatory." Other prominent schools in the group include Syracuse, Tufts , Colgate , Kenyon and Morehouse . That next to the last paragraph made me cho...

Last night was the first class of EMT-Basic. I'm going through the training to be an EMT once again. I let my certification go during my last appointment. My time was required in other pursuits. But because I did not file for a special status, I have to go through the entire course again. Why would I put myself through it again? I have professional and personal reasons. 1.) It is, in my mind, a more practical experience in clinical pastoral education. In many cases EMT's are called in when trauma is involved. I would not dream of providing anything less than professional care as a medical professional. But there are opportunities for ministry even in the midst of caring for physical, medical needs. There are also emotional and spiritual opportunities in these cases. 2.) It is a great way to get connected to the community. Here in Turpin, there is not an ambulance service. But there is a volunteer fire department. I am already a member of that. But since I have the ability to do...

The headline of the last issue of The United Methodist Reporter was "Does Satan Really Exist?" I began to read the article to see where this was going to fall. I know that there are plenty of modern, scientifically minded people who cannot integrate a spiritual being who embodies evil into their worldview. Satan has become a literary figure, a metaphor, a symbol, or a fantasy figure to individuals who believe that evil arises out of human motivation. Satan, as an actual being at the heart of evil, has been reserved for those who are not as sophisticated or who have not had the appropriate education into human motivation. I think Satan left the building because of Enlightenment, modernist rational thinking patterns and that evil is a manifestation of social problems or mental/emotional dissociative disorders. Basically when science began to rule the roost, Satan no longer had a nest to hatch in. I'm not one to lay too much power or authority into Satan's account. Sata...

Our household is filled with Disney fandom. So when a new movie comes out, especially an animated film, we are pretty quick to go see it. Wall-E came out this last week. And if you haven't been touched by the Disney propaganda machine, then I will provide a brief plot summary. Wall-E is apparently the last working robot left on Earth to clean up the mess that consumerist Earthlings (Stuff-ans) have made while the Stuff-ans have launched themselves into space aboard a trans-galactic luxury liner. Wall-E scrounges around the urban landscape compacting the leftovers of human civilzation. He encounters the humans when he hitchhikes aboard a probe ship and causes havok among the "civilized" robots and humans. There were a lot of themes followed in this movie. Environmentalism and consumerism were the most obvious with their most catastrophic ends being protrayed. But for me, the real movement of the movie came through in the idea of becoming more than what your "directi...

We have moved into our new appointment. Thus the delay in posting. Plus a week at camp. But mostly an overwhelming sense of being displaced. I'm not sure where it is coming from. It's really a feeling of disassociation with what is going on around me. I normally feel fairly secure in any environment or setting. But I have really been struggling with a mental "wall" around me. It's not really anything to do with the new churches. We have been warmly welcomed and received by everyone that we have met. The men of the church were there to help us move in. The new house is having the finishing touches put on. The worship services are not too stressful. This is really a sense of feeling like, "I'm not really here." It could be a very mild form of depression or grieving our last appointment. But I am very excited about what can happen in this appointment. So I have been pushing myself out of my routine and beyond my personality limits to meet and connect wi...

If you saw the new movie list, you know that the second installment of The Chronicles of Narnia, Prince Caspian, came out this last weekend. Seeing as our boys loved The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, we made an opening weekend screening part of our plans. I didn't mess with reading any pre-reviews. I also didn't bother to read the book. The first was probably not a big issue. The second one was a mistake. I should have refreshed my memory of the original story. The foreboding doom of that last statement should not in any way reflect on the movie itself. It was a great movie. The quality of the acting was a little better. The scenery was, of course, beautiful. The story moved along at a good enough pace. And the action. Oh the bloodless violent action. For all the hacking and slashing that happened in the movie, it was truly amazing that bloodshed was kept at a minimum. Unrealistically so. But its a kids movie. Thankfully the blood was at a minimum. You have to realize ...

I picked up a copy of Why Men Hate Going to Church by David Murrow. Like many others in the church, I have noticed the growing absence of men in the church as a whole. Women are taking the majority of leadership positions, leading mission outreach activities, and showing up without their husbands. Murrow began to study the statistics and talk to men and women about this phenomenon. His answer can be summed up as: the church as it is in today's culture is a feminine haven where masculinity is shunned, retrained, or demonized. As I have been reading, I can see places where Murrow's argument is sound. He makes some very good points. And there are some times when I just cringe at what he says. One thing that really almost set me off of the entire book was in saying the men who are active in church are more feminine in characteristics than masculine. Basically he was saying that men who enjoy being in church fit a more feminine stereotype than masculine. And while that may strike...

I just finished reading a sermon that, for some, it was powerful and meaningful. General Conference is happening right now. Every 4 years United Methodists and affiliates gather from around the world to discuss, debate, and elect the path of the UMC for the coming 4 years. Interspersed among the issues of "how then shall we live" are sermons. Bishops, clergy, and laity provide the message of the Gospel to those in attendance. But the sermon I read was not from General Conference. No, it was a Sunday morning sermon. In fact, it was a sermon preached on the Third Sunday of Lent. And the congregation hearing the sermon had to have been engrossed in the words of the minister. Because I was hanging on every word, waiting to hear the Gospel. The sermon was entitled, "A Sermon on Werewolves". Yep, werewolves. And the sermon was about....werewolves. Granted, the sermon was preached in 1508 in Strasbourg, Germany. The context of the sermon needs to be considered. 16th Centur...