Fred Barnes, executive editor of The Weekly Standard, has written an incisive, penetrating essay called Is the Mainstream Media Fair and Balanced? in the August, 2006 issue of Imprimis, a monthly digest of Hillsdale College. His thesis: My topic today is how the mainstream media—meaning nationally influential newspapers like the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and USA Today; influential regional papers like the Miami Herald, the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times; the broadcast networks and cable news stations like CNN; and the wire services, which now … [Read more...] about Mainstream media – Fair and Balanced?
Andreas Köstenberger on the gift of singleness
Dr. Andreas Kostenberger weighs in on the gift of singleness. He offers a somewhat more nuanced view on the gift, particularly the benefits of singleness for the kingdom of God, than he attributes to Debbie Maken. Though I've read articles by Debbie Maken and reviews of her book, I regret that I have not yet had a chance to read the entire book. My wife Marni did read it cover-to-cover. Perhaps Marni or Mrs. Maken herself would like to comment? (Our family is moving next month, so Marni probably won't have time!) My blog post below is an introduction to Maken's overarching thesis. It is … [Read more...] about Andreas Köstenberger on the gift of singleness
Getting Serious about Getting Married
Debbie Maken has written a book called Getting Serious about Getting Married. It is a strong critical response to the somewhat widespread view that to be single is to have "the gift of singleness." Many in the church advise singles to merely be content with their singleness. “Just think how effective you can be in serving Christ because you aren’t distracted by a husband and children!” “Just be content; Jesus is all you need.” “It’s God’s will for you to be single now; maybe He has some lessons He wants you to learn, first.” Such thoughts have the appearance of wisdom, because we know that … [Read more...] about Getting Serious about Getting Married
SBC and church membership
Pastor, author, and blogger Mark Dever writes about a serious mistake made at the most recent Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) meeting. (HT: Justin Taylor) One corollary question might be: what (if anything) should be done about regular attenders who, lacking a biblically defensible explanation, are unwilling to become members of a particular church after a significant period of evaluation? … [Read more...] about SBC and church membership
Review of With One Voice by Josh Riley
Josh Riley of worship.com has written a very gracious and detailed review of With One Voice, written by my wife and yours truly. An Excerpt: There's no shortage of relationship books on the market, to be sure. But some discount the Christian perspective to the point that they offer little hope, or encouragement, to the Christian striving to live lives pleasing to God. And some Christian books on the subject tends toward checklists and "principles," some of which are helpful but focus too much on the goal of marriage and too little on the process of living a life of ministry and service in … [Read more...] about Review of With One Voice by Josh Riley
Evangelical Feminism and Liberalism
On this weblog, I have posted several times on my concern that the evangelical church, on a whole, seems to be losing its moorings on central issues such as God's design for men and women. Some churches move towards egalitarian positions on matters such as women in leadership in the name of cultural progress, following arguments such as those developed by William J. Webb. Others, such as City Church in San Francisco, CA, are moved more by more traditional evangelical feminist arguments. An example of an articulate scholar of this persuasion is Dr. Ben Witherington. Wayne Grudem, whom … [Read more...] about Evangelical Feminism and Liberalism