Theoblogy
I just bought my Christmas gift for myself. I suppose it’s far too brazen for me to pimp my Wish List, so I won’t. 🙂 What are you hoping for this year? Read more
I just bought my Christmas gift for myself. I suppose it’s far too brazen for me to pimp my Wish List, so I won’t. 🙂 What are you hoping for this year? Read more
I was outside the other day, chucking the tennis ball to Albert, and I thought to myself, “This ChuckIt is the best fifteen bucks I ever spent!” Why? Well, watch the video to see. What’s the best $15 you’ve ever spent? Read more
Two of my closest friends got reviewed in PW this week. I’ve only read Jay’s, and I really, really liked it. Both books come out in January, so get ready to use those Amazon gift cards! Here are the reviews: One.Life: Jesus Calls, We Answer Scot McKnight. Zondervan, $14.99 trade paper (204p) ISBN 978-0-310-27766-8 In his latest book, McKnight, a professor of religious studies at North Park University in Chicago and the author of the acclaimed Jesus Creed, argues against... Read more
When my parents retired, they didn’t throw in the towel. Instead, they took in a underprivileged African-American boy to live with them. Over the past few years, CJ has become part of our family. My parents, in their late-60s, now spend many evenings at high school sporting events and parent-teacher conferences, surrounded by parents who are the age of my brothers and me. This week, our local paper — possibly with visions of The Blind Side — ran a story... Read more
And so we read the end of my Wordle Wednesday experiment. I’d say that by far the most written word in all my books together is “God,” followed by “Jesus,” “Christian,” and “church.” Make of that what you will. The final installment is the Wordle of The Teaching of the Twelve: Believing and Practicing the Primitive Christianity of the Ancient Didache Community. (The DVD for this book is coming soon!) Read more
I try to read something Christmasy every year during Advent. Last year it was the wicked funny (and also sensitive and poignant), Tinsel: A Search for America’s Christmas Present, by Hank Steuver, the pop culture writer for the Washington Post. (Truth is, I’ll dip back into Tinsel for some levity over coming weeks.) My Christmas reading for this Christmas is Christmas: Festival of Incarnation by Donald Heinz. From the dust jacket: Donald Heinz brilliantly unearths the social practices and broader... Read more
Over at The Hardest Question, a lectionary preaching blog curated by the mischievous, Russell Rathbun, is asking what I think is an important and difficult question. This Sunday marks the beginning of Year A in the The Revised Common Lectionary. So here we go again. We get texts from Isaiah and the Gospels, about John the Baptist and the Second Coming. And once again we’ve got to preach the immanent advent of the Christ. “He’s Coming!” we preach, pray, and... Read more
Robert Putnam and David Campbell sum up the findings of their new book, American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us, in the LA Times: Just as this generation moved to the left on most social issues — above all, homosexuality — many prominent religious leaders moved to the right, using the issue of same-sex marriage to mobilize electoral support for conservative Republicans. In the short run, this tactic worked to increase GOP turnout, but the subsequent backlash undermined sympathy... Read more
I’m going to Wild Goose because I hope and believe that it will be just like those gatherings of a decade-and-a-half ago, only writ large. I think Wild Goose is the next domino to fall in the movement that is reshaping the church and society….but, more importantly, reshaping me. via Why I’m Going to Wild Goose – Tony Jones :: WildGoose Festival 2011. Read more
In 1994, I drove a rusty old van from Minneapolis to Chicago for Youth Specialties’s National Youth Workers Convention. I was an exhibitor for a little start-up mission organization called, YouthWorks. I had purchased a used display, blown up some photos of our mission trips, and put velcro on the back to hang on the display. I’d also made up a brochure on my Mac Powerbook 100 and printed 1,000 copies on some leftover paper in the office that we’d... Read more
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