Month: November 2009

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Don’t Waste Your Life Watching Television and Surfing The Internet

I’ve just got back from a Schoolies trip to Vanuatu with Scripture Union. It was an incredible time. Stay tuned for a bunch of blog posts with some reflections. The topic was “Don’t Waste Your Life”, I spoke from Ephesians about God’s purposes for his people. While reading Don’t Waste Your Life, by John Piper (available for free), I was challenged to think about the time I waste on the Internet. We don’t have a television, but it’s very easy to waste precious hours on the internet that then nullifies the decision to not have a TV. It was liberating to not go online while in Vanuatu!

vila vanuatu mural t-shirt

Here’s a snippet from Piper (p. 120-121 DWYL):

Television is one of the greatest life-wasters of the modern age. And, of course, the Internet is running to catch up, and may have caught up. You can be more selective on the Internet, but you can also select worse things with only the Judge of the universe watching. TV still reigns as the great life-waster. The main problem with TV is not how much smut is available, though that is a problem. Just the ads are enough to sow fertile seeds of greed and lust, no matter what program you’re watching. The greater problem is banality. A mind fed daily on TV diminishes. Your mind was made to know and love God. Its facility for this great calling is ruined by excessive TV. The content is so trivial and so shallow that the capacity of the mind to think worthy thoughts withers, and the capacity of the heart to feel deep emotions shrivels. Neil Postman shows why.

What is happening in America is that television is transforming all serious public business into junk. . . . Television disdains exposition, which is serious, sequential, rational, and complex. It offers instead a mode of discourse in which everything is accessible, simplistic, concrete, and above all, entertaining. As a result, America is the world’s first culture in jeopardy of amusing itself to death.

Postman’s cultural critique, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business, is brilliant. Go here to download Piper’s book.

Stay tuned for more Vanuatu posts!!

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The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism

Guest Post. The following is a brief review by Martin Shadwick. Martin is an uber-smart guy who works with AFES on the main campus at Newcastle Uni. He’s also my brother-in-law.

the reason for God by timothy keller

The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism by Tim Keller. This is now my default book to give to university students who want to find out about Christianity.

The first half thoughtfully answers the standard objections people have to Christianity (e.g. how could a God allow suffering? hasn’t science disproved Christianity? isn’t Christianity a straitjacket?). The second half explains what Christians believe and offers reasons for faith.

Keller’s style is engaging, humble, and sympathetic to the sceptic. His apologetic approach is largely (although not entirely) presuppositional – that is, Keller suggests that Christian presuppositions actually provide the best explanation for our experience of the world. He does not shy away from difficult subjects, showing, for example, how the doctrine of the Trinity makes sense of our experience of relationships, and how the Trinitarian God invites us a true life centred on other people, not ourselves.

There are perhaps a few too many C. S. Lewis quotes, but Keller is quick to acknowledge his debt to Lewis’ thought.

I am thankful to Keller (and God!) that he wrote this book. It has filled a much needed place as a contemporary, readable, sensitive book to give the thoughtful enquirer.

Find out more about Martin’s ministry here.

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We’re related to Lady Jane Grey

Kinda. Well maybe not. It’s either Lady Jane Grey or Jane Seymour (King Henry VIII’s 3rd wife and the mother of King Edward VI). If you trace back in Rowena’s (David I’s only wife and the mother of Samuel I) family tree you’ll find that she is actually related to one of Lady Jane Grey or Jane Seymour’s “ladies-in-waiting“. I can’t remember which one. But anyway Rowena is related to the Royal Family!! Kinda.

this is a famous painting of her execution in 1554

Why am I sharing all this??? Well, being reasonably familiar with these characters in English history, I was really glad to have the Proclamation of Lady Jane Grey as Queen in 1553 as the document in today’s Church History exam! Yessss. She was only Queen for 9 days until Queen Mary I assumed the throne. Although not directly involved, Jane was implicated in some riots in January 1554, and was subsequently executed. She lived a tragically short life, however from the things I’ve read, I’m encouraged that Lady Jane Grey seemed to be a genuine Christian.

We’re going to watch the movie when Row gets home from Bible study.

ps – the document we were given spelt her surname with an ‘a’. it should have been an ‘e’

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Listen to Church History Lectures at Double Speed

Check out this post from May. It links to some great resources available via iTunes U. In particular there is a course on Reformation Church History – MP3’s and full manuscript.

thomas cranmer

If you happen to be studying for an exam for tomorrow they could be worth a look. To maximise your time, play them back at twice the normal speed. Two ways to do this:

  1. If you have an iPhone – there is a double/half playback feature when listening to Podcasts. Double it up!!
  2. VLC player. It’s the bomb. Download it. Install it. Then once you’ve opened the file click on “playback” in the menu and you can make it go as fast as your ears can handle!! (VLC is available for MAC and PC)

Warm fuzzy for the name of the English Reformer (above) martyred in 1556.

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Deliberately Lame (can) = Cool Marketing

Sometimes being deliberately lame is just lame. But sometimes when someone is deliberately lame – it only adds to their rating on the coolnessometer. Dunlop Volleys have nailed it with their website Dunlop Valley Warehouse (their main site is good too) and their viral videos. I like Volleys – I’ve been a long time wearer. Check out their lame campaign. What do you think? Follow them on Twitter. Here’s the GIG VIEWER video:

See below for 3 more vids.

Continue reading “Deliberately Lame (can) = Cool Marketing”

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Structure of 1 Corinthians

I’ve got an exam on 1 Corinthians on Monday. Here is a PDF of Ciampa & Rosner’s structure for 1 Corinthians (from a forthcoming commentary). It’s in the shape of a cross, not aiming to be tacky, just memorable. Hopefully some will find it helpful.

pic from http://www.sxc.hu/photo/629715

Not one of my class mates? Not really interested in the structure of 1 Corinthians? Start reading it here and/or check out the following sermons on the book: