November 06, 2006 Listening Matter

I downloaded the bulk of the lectures on Worship at the SBTS Mp3 site for consumption as I drive around in my lil' Saturn. Lots of good content here for anyone involved in leading worship.

Mo audio

Pastor Rob is in my cohort, and I have enjoyed listening to a couple of messages from Apex Community Church in Dayton. I've downladed more to listen to as well...warning- the site requires an up to date browser.

The Victory Lord raise up Your suffering servant Lord raise up Your Royal Son, Lord raise up Your lamb from death's dark tomb To show that Your victory's won. Lord raise up Your Mighty Warrior The Conqueror who does Your Will Ascending higher than the heavens All the universe to fill! Throughout history God has the victory It is won by the blood of the Lamb and His One sacrifice Throughout history Winning the victory Is accomplished alone through the finished work of our Christ Lord raise up the Captain of Heaven Lord raise up Your Breaker-King Lord raise up the Mighty Deliverer And righteousness that His reign brings

His name is above every name Exalted because of His shame He paid the cost, he bore the cross The joy of His throne we now claim! Throughout history God has the victory It is won by the blood of the Lamb and His One sacrifice Throughout history Winning the victory Is accomplished alone through the finished work of our Christ Anthony Foster November 5, 2005 Written at Highview during worship. the sermon was on "What Side are you On?"

We were able to attend Highview yesterday and were blessed by a bunch
af warm, genuine Christians in the Bible Study Fellowship. We look
forward to settleing in as time progresses.

Are you ready to VOTE?.  We've been tracking with the issues in spite of  all that is going on. Bullitt County has, I would estimate, more political endorsement signs  per capita than any town I have ever seen. These folks love their local politics. Earnie is in her element on that count.

I have a real sense of accomplishment as my garage now has a place for everything (except my Saturn); the Saturn paid the ultimate price- it gave up it's cozy spot for two bookshelves to take residence. I can actually access the books, though the commentaries are on the back part of the shelves with the other stuff in front of them. 4 new cherry-finished bookshelves from Sam's Club for inside the home made a place for the most used books.

I will be speaking on Learning Design at an Online Learning Summit at the Chicago Marriott in December. I knew this was coming but had no hard dates until now.

Follow up- The Integration of Psycholgy, Personality Theory with Christianity

I overstated the Nouthetic "near aversion to science", as I perceive someone like Powlison is far less strident than I always perceived Jay Adams to be. In fact Adams didn't disdain science either, he just asserted that psychiatry had largely abandoned science for "humanistic philosophy and gross speculation." Can't argue with that. I hope to see how the Biblical/Nouthetic camp addresses integration, as I have said, my exposure to the issues has been in fairly disparate contexts and I struggle to make sense of how the "christian" approaches can be reconciled. Adams was pretty strong in his sentiments towards Collins' views as I recall.


When speaking of integration, I think it is necessary to begin with the presupposition of the authority of inerrant Scripture, not merely consult it as the “final authority”. The Bible has a clear cut anthropology by which all other data must be measured. Typically, I think the hard sciences are more readily measured by this rod of God, and areas of study like Psychology, which is not purely empirical in nature require even more scrutiny before they can be integrated into a Christian world view. So I think our major emphasis should first and foremost upon mastery of the Word of God. Without this basis, the pitfalls of integration can become pits of destruction.

With personality theory in particular, basic assumptions in several areas will yield very different conclusions. First, is the personality static and unalterable, genetically defined and determined or can and does it change? The Biblical witness is that the new creation makes all things new and yet the old man is continually removed and the new man put on. This is not merely referring to behavioral patterns, it is the now and not yet reality of sanctification. Whether one believes that personality can or cannot change is a fair predictor of whether the hard work of working out what Christ works in will occur, or if one will live beneath their privilege of being transformed into the likeness of the Son of God. Are we unique or is personality more universal in nature? The Biblical witness is that fallen man at best follows a both/and construct. We are wise and/or we are fools. We are humble and/or we are proud, greedy and/or generous, industrious or/or slothful, etc. Most Biblical personalities seem to exhibit mixtures of multiple traits. We are both proactive and reactive in our actions.

A major challenge is the reality that among various camps of personality thories, there is great diversity within those camps, and there is considerable lack of purity of contentions. Is man basically good and his nature something to be improved upon? Rogerians would say yes. Are trait theories viable? Most Jungians would likely say yes. Those who think so should be careful of superficially categorizing and worse, diagnosing humans based on those characterizations. Some Freudians would assert that early childhood experiences are more (or less) deterministic in how one’s adult personality is formed based on their focus. Bandura, Horney, Maslow, and even Skinner all had contributions which are syncretistic in nature, but some parts of their theories are viable if filtered through a thoroughly Biblical grid. The question is whether this exercise is worth the trouble, or if there is a better way. At best there are possible takeaways that remain when the theory is gutted of its presuppositions.

An example of a truth that might be appropriated from a secular theory is Bandura’s observation that man is formed by and in return form our environment reciprocally.We can at least take away the notion that we are not merely victims of our environments, but we have a role in defining it. To a greater or lesser degree, this can apply to the lost and to the regenerate who are acting unregenerate as well.

So we should all flee the temptation of beating up on Bobo clowns. I don’t even allow them in my home:-) Sorry I couldn't resist.

I Pity the Fool is now on TV Land...'80s icon Mr. T takes on the role of motivational guru and offers up advice to fans in need of a change. "You pity the fool because you don't want to beat up a fool," Mr. T explained. "You know, pity is between sorry and mercy. See, if you pity him, you know, you won't have to beat him up. A fool can't help it." Mr. T is a born again Christian and a cancer survivor.

Speaking of Celebrity Christians,(we were weren't we?) So how come Jesus didn't make these lists?

http://www.adherents.com/largecom/fam_christian.html

http://www.djchuang.com/on/celebs/

http://www.secretsofsuccess.com/

Always colorful, sometimes controversial, (especially the part about ministers' wives letting themselves go...), often right:

Marc Driscoll on fidelity and sin

 

 

http://www.christianitytoday.com/dispatch.html?code=headline&url=/ct/2006/novemberweb-only/144-58.0.html