WRITING WRITING WRITING WRITING
Spent another 9 hours or so yesterday and ended up with a 29 page rough draft. Not bad. Now, before Friday AM, I must edit this puppy, write five 2-pagers (three of which are basically done), and format the whole thing Turabian style. Good thing I love school!
Bad news is I'M GETTING A COLD... sorry for yelling, but I vehemently dislike being sick! My nose hurts. My cheeks hurt. My throat feels funny. And there's not much hope for good sleep...
Tuesday, December 09, 2003
New P.O.D. album rejected by Christian bookstores
I'll admit, I don't currently own any P.O.D. albums, but I may go buy this one just to support good cover art. According to the mtv article, the album cover...
depicts a naked woman with butterfly wings, her arms crossed over her breasts and a banner with the word "Sanctus" (a Latin word for the sung part of the preface in Mass) across her nether region.
Before you get your panties in a bunch, it's basically a painting--medieval style--of a woman, not a photo or anything. Seems quite tasteful and beautiful to me.
I'll admit, I don't currently own any P.O.D. albums, but I may go buy this one just to support good cover art. According to the mtv article, the album cover...
depicts a naked woman with butterfly wings, her arms crossed over her breasts and a banner with the word "Sanctus" (a Latin word for the sung part of the preface in Mass) across her nether region.
Before you get your panties in a bunch, it's basically a painting--medieval style--of a woman, not a photo or anything. Seems quite tasteful and beautiful to me.
Sunday, December 07, 2003
Well, the Friday night writing extravaganza just didn't happen. Apparently the old brain/body complex needed sleep more than study. I did spend about 10 hours on Saturday, though--and got a ton done. Still more to do though, so tomorrow will be a vacation day--a homework vacation day.
Writing this paper is making me think a lot--this is a good thing... my profs would be proud! The more I look at the biblical portrayal of church, the more I realize how far we are. I'm seeing that much of what we do is cultural, but we have made it "scriptural." Our view of the right way to do things--the godly way to do things--shows we have more in common with the Pharisees and Sadducees than we care to admit. Shame on us.
Now I'm not saying real church doesn't happen. It happens all the time. But the opposite happens too. We think we are a church, but our programs and our stuff is the focus, and God gets lost in the details. Our preferred "worship style" or "preaching style" or "communion style" or whatever becomes the RIGHT way, when in fact, the very act of focusing on ourselves is the absolute WRONG way. Not that contextualization isn't important. In fact it's crucial. But we don't really do contextualization--God forbid we should translate God's truth into the language of the people--whatever that language is.
There are some constants in the definition of church. So far, though, it is a very small list: gathering, baptizing, preaching, and just enough structure to obey the Great Commandment and the Great Commission. Everything else seems to be frosting.
Nuff for now.
Writing this paper is making me think a lot--this is a good thing... my profs would be proud! The more I look at the biblical portrayal of church, the more I realize how far we are. I'm seeing that much of what we do is cultural, but we have made it "scriptural." Our view of the right way to do things--the godly way to do things--shows we have more in common with the Pharisees and Sadducees than we care to admit. Shame on us.
Now I'm not saying real church doesn't happen. It happens all the time. But the opposite happens too. We think we are a church, but our programs and our stuff is the focus, and God gets lost in the details. Our preferred "worship style" or "preaching style" or "communion style" or whatever becomes the RIGHT way, when in fact, the very act of focusing on ourselves is the absolute WRONG way. Not that contextualization isn't important. In fact it's crucial. But we don't really do contextualization--God forbid we should translate God's truth into the language of the people--whatever that language is.
There are some constants in the definition of church. So far, though, it is a very small list: gathering, baptizing, preaching, and just enough structure to obey the Great Commandment and the Great Commission. Everything else seems to be frosting.
Nuff for now.
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