Wanted to let you know that I haven’t forgotten nor completed the discussion on men, women, and church leadership. But it will probably be after the first of the year before we continue down that trail.
I don’t promise to post regularly during the holidays. That should come as no surprise, since I gave up on posting regularly a long time ago! I’ll do my best to keep the links coming and offer up a holiday thought or two.
¡Felices Fiestas!
OK, an extra post today. Things are not always what they seem. Seems I’ve been had, deceived by some people who feel that the New Covenant allows us to use lies and deceit in our dealings with one another. Interesting, to say the least.
Had a new commenter come in and begin commenting on an old post. Someone else jumped in claiming “I have been a member of the Church of Christ for many years, but have never heard of this kind of teaching.” This person would ask questions, encouraging the other commenter and keeping the thread alive. The “seeker” spoke of how convincing the first man’s arguments were and how wrong I was.
And I fell for it. Sigh…
The one who had “never heard this kind of teaching” is Daniel Ross, who has long maintained websites promoting the teachings of Dan Billingsly. (Some will know that name) Had he participated honestly in the thread, I would have had no problem with it. But coming in deceitfully and lying about being new to these ideas… well, that’s just not right.
You see, “Albert,” the one who had never heard this teaching before and was being convinced of its truth, uses the same IP address as Daniel. That can occur when two people are on the same network, but it does reduce the likeliness that “Albert” and Daniel don’t know each other. However, in creating the lie, Daniel made the mistake of using one of his own e-mail addresses for the fictitious Albert. Is it possible that someone gave up an e-mail address and someone else now uses it? Yes. But to have the IP address and the e-mail coincide… that’s too much.
I’m hoping that Mickey and Daniel don’t know each other, though if they do, I hope they’ll be honest enough to come clean.
I’m guessing that when some discuss the Bible verses that have nothing to say to Christians, they must include these as well:
“But have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully; but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.” (2 Corinthians 4:2)
“For our exhortation was not of deceit, nor of uncleanness, nor in guile:” (1 Thessalonians 2:3)
OK, let me state the obvious: I’m not going to be posting regularly to this blog during the summer. Too many trips. Too many distractions. Too many other things going on.
Slow down. Take a deep breath. You’ll get through this somehow.
Thanks for reading! I’ll get back into a regular routine in a few weeks.
I love it when people help me find good things to read. The Internet has made that infinitely easier; sharing articles, photos, and videos is an intricate part of what we do. That’s one of the main things I look for on Twitter, and my principal activity on Twitter is sharing links.
David Smith regularly shares his “this went thru my mind,” a collection of links on subjects of interest to him. Ed Stetzer does something similar with his “Morning Roundup.” I want to begin to do the same in The Kitchen.
I principally read in these areas:
There are other blogs and things I find interesting along the way, like the work of the Pew Research Center, Seth Godin’s blog, and some of the unusual or funny news stories. Those are the sorts of things I would share. I’ll probably limit some of the things (like Spurs stories) that I find mainly of interest to me.
Some questions for you:
Thanks for reading and for sharing your thoughts!
I’m not usually a big fan of people publishing their “top posts from the past year.” However, this past week I found several excellent posts that I had missed during the year, finding them through yearly summaries the authors put on their blog.
So, on the outside chance that you find something worth reading, here goes last year’s most read posts:
Barhopping in the Kitchen — That’s right… the most read post was a bunch of bad jokes.
Audio from Ray Vander Laan — I’m glad that people are accessing this material. I actually posted this two years ago, but it continues to get lots of views.
Ecclesiastes: Money is the answer for everything! — This post is even older, yet garners a lot of interest. Either people are intrigued by that verse from Ecclesiastes or they’re hoping that money really is the answer for everything.
Mark Driscoll on the Regulative and Normative Principles of Worship — I’m guessing that Google was my friend on this one; people that want to know what Driscoll has to say were finding out through my blog.
“My Word will not return unto me void” — Another older post that still generates traffic. It’s actually on the blog twice; both posts still get a lot of reads.
The Decline of Pacifism in Churches of Christ — I’m glad people are interested in this topic. So many people don’t realize how the churches of Christ in general have changed their position over the years. (And yes, this is a 2011 post)
Bilingual church vs. bilingual ministry — Lots of people are interested in this topic; glad that this post from 2009 can be a good resource for them.
Tempocentrism — Look, it’s a post from 2012! Written on January 3, this post had a lot of time to gather views. And I think it says some good things.
Lament — This post was fairly recent, so it’s traffic numbers are significant. However… some of the traffic is due to the graphic I used from Richard Beck’s blog.
OK, so there you have it. As a blogger, it’s interesting to see that much of what gathered interest on my blog was the work of other people. Not necessarily a bad thing, as I see it.
Now I’ll have to find some new things to share with you.