Cleveland Clinic: We all know  that eating well and exercising consistently can help us achieve the best health possible now. But exercise at mid-life might result in more than bigger biceps — it could mean maintaining our brain size as we age. A recent study published online in the journal Neurology shows a link between physical fitness levels in middle-aged adults and brain size later in life. As we age, certain parts of the brain shrink, especially the prefrontal cortex (an area... Read more

Miracle of Sight, by John Frye — whom I want to thank publicly for this series on Mark. An unusual miracle is reported by Mark (8:2-26) just before Jesus leads his disciples to Caesarea Philippi and asks the burning question of Mark’s Gospel: “Who is Jesus of Nazareth?” (8:27-30). Ben Witherington III writes, “Very clearly, the miracle recorded in 8:22-26 is meant to be seen in light of the spiritual blindness of the disciples just mentioned. Jesus is the one... Read more

Klein’s Conclusions and Questions on Election, by Chad Thornhill In The New Chosen People, William Klein challenges the view that “election” in the NT (or in the OT, or in Judaism) was about the selecting of certain individuals for salvation. In my previous posts I looked at Klein’s sketch of election in the Old Testament and Judaism and in the New Testament. Now we turn to Klein’s conclusions and discussion of major questions relevant to the topic. Klein summarizes his... Read more

Source: Kevin Geary, parenting guru, teacher, and author of Revolutionary Parent, a site dedicated to raising physically and psychologically healthy kids, argues that shoes are actually quite bad for children. Shoes destroy feet, preventing proper toe spread, which interferes with the foot’s ability to function properly, and prevent proper movement development, which can make children be more susceptible to foot and lower leg injury. The benefits of going barefoot, however, are plentiful. One major benefit of allowing a child to... Read more

A Wrath-less God Has Victims Like many upper middle class mainline Protestants, which is to say white Christians, I’ve long taken issue with the concept of divine wrath, believing it to conflict with the God whose most determinative attribute is Goodness itself. Whenever I’ve pondered the possibility of God’s anger I’ve invariably thought about it directed at me. I’m no saint, sure, but I’m no great sinner either. The notion that God’s wrath could be fixed upon me made God... Read more

From my article, appearing today at Today’s Christian Woman: Read more

Source: VIKEN, Sweden (AP) — It was a chaotic, late-night scramble to buy baby food with a screaming toddler in the backseat that gave Robert Ilijason the idea to open Sweden’s first unstaffed convenience store. Home alone with his hungry son, Ilijason had dropped the last baby food jar on the floor, and had to drive 20 minutes from the small town of Viken in southern Sweden to find a supermarket that was open. Now the 39-year-old IT specialist runs... Read more

How the Church Should Deal with a Fame-Focused World, by Jason Locke, preaching pastor at College Church of Christ, Fresno CA. “I want to be famous.” This off-handed quote from a young person might seem innocuous. Who doesn’t have some youthful dream of glory? Who doesn’t have a fleeting desire to be famous? This sentiment, however, is a bit more troubling than you might think. It’s not bothersome because of its seeming naïveté. Rather, it reveals a deep, unhealthy trend... Read more

I don’t know how to describe Ruth Tucker’s new book, Black and White Bible, Black and Blue Wife, without calling it what this post is called: it’s a very important book about an awful subject. The title makes it as clear as possible: Ruth Tucker knows her Bible and her ex-husband was a pastor and that Bible was read with exquisite simplicity and alongside that Bible world and church world in the heart of American evangelicalism, Ruth’s husband was physically abusive... Read more