Biblical Parenting by Tedd Trip

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Corrective Discipline

 

The Scoop on Nooma

Reposted from Nine Marks website

The Scoop’a on NOOMA — Part 1 By Greg Gilbert Here’s the scoop on the Rob Bell video series storming through youth rooms and sermon series across the country. Zondervan, $10.98/video Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 This February, Zondervan Publishers released the nineteenth in a series of videos called NOOMA. No series gets to the nineteenth installment unless it is extraordinarily successful, and the NOOMA videos are surely that. In churches and youth groups across the country, they have become something of a phenomenon. All ten to fourteen minutes in length, the NOOMA videos feature Rob Bell, pastor of Michigan’s Mars Hill Church, one of the fastest-growing churches in America, and a leader in the “emergent church.” From a production standpoint, the NOOMA videos are excellent. Exceedingly cool staging, great music, understated but engaging drama, and an easy but earnest style from Bell make them undeniably compelling. But it isn’t just technical merit that has catapulted the NOOMA videos to such popularity. Nor is it simply Bell’s natural ability to communicate and tell a story, though that may be part of it. At the end of the day people are watching these videos because they believe Rob Bell is teaching them about Christianity and the gospel of Jesus Christ. In parts 2 and 3 of my review, I’ll make some comments on each of the videos, and then comment at length on some of the most theologically important ones. But here in part 1, I want to give you the gist. Watching eighteen of these videos in quick succession gives one a good idea of what Bell and NOOMA are trying to communicate overall. And, popularity aside, the result is not particularly encouraging. I have reviewed some of Rob Bell’s work on this site already, and the weaknesses in his understanding of the gospel noted in those reviews trouble these NOOMA videos as well. GIVING CREDIT WHERE IT’S DUE First, though, we should give credit where it’s due: Bell is an extraordinarily gifted communicator. The NOOMA marketing campaign bills him as a “storyteller,” and that is a spot-on characterization. But he’s not merely a storyteller. He teaches too, and in a way that is far from boring. There’s a reason people fill up stadiums across the nation to hear him speak. On top of that, the videos are pitch-perfect in their production, from camera angles to music to lighting. Part of their appeal is the way the content is woven together with the setting. In one video or another, Bell speaks to his audience from a park bench, a diner booth, an airport waiting area, a concert hall, his own living room—you name it. Every now and then he has to pause for the environment to intrude—a waitress brings coffee, a large group walks for an uncomfortably long time in between him and the camera, a plane screams as it takes off. I’m sure every second of that is scripted, but it’s effective scripting. It makes you want to shoo the large group out of the way so you can hear what Bell has to say next. SUNDAY SCHOOL WITH A DOSE OF COOL Maybe the first thing you’ll notice beyond their technical excellence is that the NOOMA videos are not highly theological. Every now and again, there is one that delves into something that approaches theology proper, but on the whole the messages are relatively simple—Sunday School lessons with an extra dose of cool. There’s a video on how to deal with an anger problem; another expounding on the true meaning of sex; another explaining that God wants our hearts and not just our religion; another telling us why God doesn’t always give us everything we ask for; another explaining that grief over a loved one’s death is not wrong and should point us to hope in God’s plan to restore the world. All this is fine, and will no doubt be helpful to many people. PREACHING THE GOSPEL But Bell intends to do something more in NOOMA than provide “life lessons.” He intends to preach the gospel. In fact, he says so repeatedly, with statements that run something like, “That’s the gospel, that’s the good news that Jesus brought us.” And that’s where these videos become more significant than cool youth Sunday School lessons. They become dangerous. The gospel as Bell communicates it in NOOMA runs something like this: All of us are broken, sinful, selfish, and prideful people. We carry around the baggage of our hurts, our resentments, and our jealousies. As a result we are just a shell of the kind of people God intends us to be. But our God is a loving God who accepts us and loves us just as we are. He can comfort us, heal us, and make us whole, real, authentic, living, laughing people. Not only that, but Jesus came to show us how to live revolutionary lives of love, compassion, and acceptance. By learning from his teachings and following him, we can live the full and complete lives that God intended. And that’s about it. That’s not just the introduction that leads to an explanation of the cross, atonement, the resurrection and salvation, either. So far, at least, that’s what NOOMA holds out as “The Gospel.” Full stop. THE CROSS? THE RESURRECTION? In the videos I watched, there’s almost no exposition of the cross. I only remember it being mentioned twice, once to say that Caesar killed Jesus and once when Bell says, “The cross is like God saying, ‘I don’t hold your past against you.’” Well, kind of. But that hardly exhausts the meaning of the cross, does it? At the very least, he ought to have continued that sentence by saying something like, “I don’t hold your past against you, because I held it against my Son.” But then I suppose that sort of uncomfortable thought would have destroyed the smoothness of the presentation. Even the resurrection—which usually plays an enormous role in Emergent theology—doesn’t get much emphasis here. NOOMA is all about “Jesus’ teachings,” but only a select few of those. You won’t hear Bell talking about the teachings of Jesus that focus on ransom, blood, new covenants, and rebirth—much less judgment, sheep and goats, and “Depart from me.” For Bell, Jesus’ teachings are apparently limited to his ethics, and Bell’s gospel is evidently limited to a call for people to embrace those ethics and “live like Jesus.” I have a theory about why Emergent church types seem to be able to communicate so well with “our generation,” why they’re able to relate so well to people who have always been hostile to the gospel. You can chalk it up to some kind of “authentic” style if you want, but I’d contend that a big part of their ability to communicate the gospel without offense to people who have always been offended by it is that they leave out all the offensive parts! HEY ROB, TRY THIS There’s no denying that Rob Bell is a tremendous natural speaker and communicator. He’s good at telling stories, using his face to emphasize a point and his eyes to arrest your attention. But before we get too far with the infatuation, somebody should point out that it’s actually relatively easy to “connect” with the world when you’re talking about handling anger, or the true meaning of sex, or how closely God holds you to his chest when you’re facing a storm in life, or how disgusted God must be with that guy preaching the sermon about hell. The harder thing—and the thing that would really test Bell’s mettle as a communicator—would be to make a NOOMA video about substitutionary atonement, for example. Not one that re-thinks it and re-casts it for a generation that doesn’t like that kind of thing, but one that addresses “He was crushed for our iniquities” with the same unflinching “honesty” and “authenticity” as it addresses “Love one another.” Would that installment of NOOMA be received with the same enthusiasm the others have enjoyed? What if he made one about the final judgment, and the fact that “No one comes to the Father but by me?” How well would that be received among the audience Bell has built? I don’t think every ten-minute video needs to contain a crash course in systematic or biblical theology. Christian life and doctrine is a vast and rich universe of truth, and if Rob Bell wants to do ten minutes on sex, ten on anger, ten on this or that, that’s obviously fine. It’s always easy to say by way of critique, “That ten minutes should have said more than it did.” So that’s not where I see a problem with NOOMA. The problem is that in the videos which aim to present the Christian gospel, the gospel presented is woefully incomplete if not outright wrong in places (which we’ll discuss at more length in the second part of this series). Yes, there’s sin and even grace in NOOMA; God loves us as we are, with all our junk, as Bell puts it. But beyond that there’s little to no cross or resurrection, no atonement, no substitution. Once we’re told that God accepts us as we are, all that follows is a call to live as Jesus lived in order to make the world a better place—which if it weren’t so hip would just be called “moralism,” or even “Pelagianism.” WHAT’S MISSING; WHAT’S NEEDED I have said in several places on this site that there is much about the Emergent theological storyline that I find compelling. Who wouldn’t be excited by the idea of God’s people—broken, sinful people accepted by him just as they are—living and working to diffuse God’s grace and love throughout the whole of society? So far as it goes, that’s a great and biblical vision, and there’s a reason it resonates with people. But, in my opinion, where the Emergent church and these videos go wrong is in telling the world that that . . . is . . . the gospel. It’s not. Good as that storyline might be, it is finally too small and too colorless. For God to lovingly accept us as we are no matter how ashamed we might be of ourselves is nice and all, but it’s a pretty pale gray compared to the Bible’s story of a just and loving God sending his Son to take the punishment of a rebellious people so they can live with and for him forever. If you want to engage a “new generation” looking for authenticity, honest answers, and a willingness to look unflinchingly at human sin and suffering, that’s the gospel that will do it. Unfortunately, that’s also the gospel that these NOOMA videos, at least so far, seem unwilling to talk about. Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3

Artwork – Worship Project 2011

The One-Another’s and Each Other’s of the Bible

The One-Another’s and Each-Other’s of the Bible

Leviticus 19:11	“‘Do not steal. “‘Do not lie. “‘Do not deceive one another.
John 13:14	Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet.
John 13:34	“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.
John 13:35	By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
Romans 12:10	Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves.
Romans 12:16	Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position.  Do not be conceited.
Romans 13:8	Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for he who loves his fellowman has fulfilled the law.
Romans 14:13	Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in your brother’s way.
Romans 15:7	Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God.
Romans 15:14	I myself am convinced, my brothers, that you yourselves are full of goodness, complete in knowledge and competent to instruct one another.
Romans 16:16	Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the churches of Christ send greetings.
1 Corinthians 1:10	I appeal to you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another so that there may be no divisions among you and that you may be perfectly united in mind and thought.
Galatians 5:13	You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature;  rather, serve one another in love.
Ephesians 4:2	Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.
Ephesians 4:32	Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.
Ephesians 5:19	Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord,
Ephesians 5:21	Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.
Colossians 3:13	Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.
Colossians 3:16	Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God.
1 Thessalonians 5:11	Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.
Hebrews 3:13	But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.
Hebrews 10:24	And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds.
Hebrews 10:25	Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another– and all the more as you see the Day approaching.
James 4:11	Brothers, do not slander one another. Anyone who speaks against his brother or judges him speaks against the law and judges it. When you judge the law, you are not keeping it, but sitting in judgment on it.
1 Peter 3:8	Finally, all of you, live in harmony with one another; be sympathetic, love as brothers, be compassionate and humble.
1 Peter 4:9	Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling.
1 Peter 5:5	Young men, in the same way be submissive to those who are older. All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another , because, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.”
1 John 1:7	But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all  sin.
1 John 3:11	This is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another.
1 John 3:23	And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us.
1 John 4:7	Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.
1 John 4:11	Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
1 John 4:12	No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
1 Peter 4:8	Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.
James 5:16	Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.
James 5:9	Don’t grumble against each other, brothers, or you will be judged. The Judge is standing at the door!
Hebrews 13:1	Keep on loving each other as brothers.
2 Thessalonians 1:3	We ought always to thank God for you, brothers, and rightly so, because your faith is growing more and more, and the love every one of you has for each other is increasing.
1 Thessalonians 5:15	Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, but always try to be kind to each other and to everyone else.
1 Thessalonians 5:13	Hold them in the highest regard in love because of their work. Live in peace with each other.
1 Thessalonians 5:11	Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.
1 Thessalonians 4:18	Therefore encourage each other with these words.
1 Thessalonians 4:9	Now about brotherly love we do not need to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love each other.
1 Thessalonians 3:12	May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else, just as ours does for you.
Colossians 3:13	Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.
Colossians 3:9	Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices
Philippians 4:2	I plead with Euodia and I plead with Syntyche to agree with each other in the Lord.
Ephesians 4:32	Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.
Galatians 5:26	Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other.
Galatians 6:2	Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.
Corinthians 12:25	so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other.
Galatians 5:15	If you keep on biting and devouring each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.
1 Corinthians 11:33	So then, my brothers, when you come together to eat, wait for each other.
Romans 1:12	that is, that you and I may be mutually encouraged by each other’s faith.
Ephesians 4:16	From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.
Philippians 2:3-5	Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.  Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus.

Give to your community, recieve a better life

The Bible does say that it is better to give than to receive but have  you ever thought about what the giver gets in return?  …maybe without even know it?

Investing deeply in other people’s lives has an enormous benefit for everyone.  Sounds like 1 Corinthians 13 to me… or the opposite result is when people don’t give to community a-la-Larry Crab when he says in his book “Inside Out”, “The sin of self-protection to which I refer occurs when our legitimate thirst for receiving love creates a demand to not be hurt that overrides a commitment to lovingly involve our self with others.”

 

and so read on…

Giving and Your Community Wellbeing

People with thriving well being are often moved by the impact they have had on another person, group, or community

Listen to the PODCAST here

• Wellbeing
• Workplace

by Tom Rath and James K. Harter, Ph.D.

Adapted from Wellbeing: The Five Essential Elements (Gallup Press)

Gallup research has discovered that people with thriving wellbeing are often moved by the impact they have had on another person, group, or community. The authors of Wellbeing: The Five Essential Elements explain the positive effects of giving.

Global Practice Leader Tom Rath is the author of the bestsellers How Full Is Your Bucket?, StrengthsFinder 2.0, Strengths Based Leadership, and Wellbeing: The Five Essential Elements.

Learn More >>

Jim Harter, Ph.D., is Chief Scientist, Workplace Management and Wellbeing for Gallup’s workplace management practice. He is coauthor of the New York Times bestsellers 12: The Elements of Great Managing and Wellbeing: The Five Essential Elements.

http://gmj.gallup.com/content/127217/Giving-Community-Wellbeing.aspx

Community Group and Happiness Connection!

Yet more evidence of the connection between those who are committed to a religious community and their well-being.…

Very Religious Americans Lead Healthier Lives

Relationship holds when controlling for key demographics

by Frank Newport, Sangeeta Agrawal, and Dan Witters

This is the third article in a special multipart series on religiosity and wellbeing in America. The first article explored the relationship between religiosity and wellbeing across the Well-Being Index and sub-indexes. The second article examined religiosity and emotional health. This piece explores specific components within the Healthy Behavior Index.

PRINCETON, NJ — Very religious Americans are more likely to practice healthy behaviors than those who are moderately religious or nonreligious. The most religious Americans score a 66.3 on the Gallup-Healthways Healthy Behavior Index compared with 60.6 among those who are moderately religious and 58.3 for the nonreligious. This relationship, based on an analysis of more than 550,000 interviews, is statistically significant after controlling for major demographic and regional variables.

For the purposes of this analysis, an American’s relative degree of religiousness is based on responses to two questions asking about the importance of religion and church attendance, yielding three specific groups:

• Very religious — Religion is an important part of daily life and church/synagogue/mosque attendance occurs at least every week or almost every week. This group constitutes 43.7% of the adult population.
• Moderately religious — All others who do not fall into the very religious or nonreligious groups but who gave valid responses on both religion questions. This group constitutes 26.6% of the adult population.
• Nonreligious — Religion is not an important part of daily life and church/synagogue/mosque attendance occurs seldom or never. This group constitutes 29.7% of the adult population.

Previous research has shown that religiosity, defined either as church attendance or self-reported importance of religion, is related to age, gender, race and ethnicity, region and state of the country, socioeconomic status, marital status, and child-bearing status. Because wellbeing is also related to these variables, this analysis statistically controls for all of these characteristics.

Very Religious Smoke Less, Exercise More, and Eat Healthier

Very religious Americans make healthier choices than their moderately religious and nonreligious counterparts across all four of the Healthy Behavior Index metrics, including smoking, healthy eating, and regular exercise. Smoking is one area of particular differentiation between the very religious and less religious Americans, with the nonreligious 85% more likely to be smokers than those who are very religious.

Very religious Americans also outperform the moderately religious and nonreligious in terms of eating healthy and getting frequent exercise.

Implications

There are a number of factors that could contribute to very religious Americans’ healthier lifestyle choices. Some of these factors are likely overt products of religious doctrine itself, including rules related to smoking and substance abuse. Seventh-Day Adventists, for example, strictly adhere to vegetarian lifestyles free of alcohol and smoking, while orthodox Mormons and Muslims do not drink alcohol. In some Christian denominations, gluttony and sloth are considered two of the seven deadly sins, and many evangelical faiths frown on drinking and smoking. The Bible indicates that one’s body is the “temple of God,” which could in turn help explain the relationship between religious orthodoxy and exercise and certain types of food consumption.

It is possible, of course, that the noted relationship between health and religiosity could go in the other direction — that people who are healthier are the most likely to make the decision to be religious. This could be particularly relevant in terms of church attendance, one of the constituent components of Gallup’s definition of religiousness. Healthier people may be more likely and able to attend religious services than those who are less healthy.

It may also be possible that certain types of individuals are more likely to make healthy lifestyle choices and more likely to choose to be highly religious. The most parsimonious explanation, however, may be the most intuitive: Those who capitalize on the social and moral outcomes of religious norms and acts are more likely to lead lives filled with healthier choices.

Gallup will continue to explore the relationship between wellbeing and religion in future articles.

About the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index

The Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index tracks U.S. wellbeing and provides best-in-class solutions for a healthier world. To learn more, please visit well-beingindex.com.

Survey MethodsResults are based on telephone interviews conducted as part of the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index survey Jan. 2-July 28, 2010, with a random sample of 554,066 adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia, selected using random-digit-dial sampling. Of this sample, very religious respondents comprised the plurality (43.2%), with slightly more than one-quarter each for moderately religious and nonreligious respondents.

For results based on the religiosity groups of national adults, one can say with 95% confidence that the maximum margin of sampling error is ±0.5 percentage point for each group.

Generalized linear model analysis was used to estimate marginal scores all five reported metrics after controlling for age (in years), gender, race/ethnicity, marital status, education (number of years), log of income, and region of the country.

Interviews are conducted with respondents on landline telephones and cellular phones, with interviews conducted in Spanish for respondents who are primarily Spanish-speaking. Each daily sample includes a minimum quota of 150 cell phone respondents and 850 landline respondents, with additional minimum quotas among landline respondents for gender within region. Landline respondents are chosen at random within each household on the basis of which member had the most recent birthday.

Samples are weighted by gender, age, race, Hispanic ethnicity, education, region, adults in the household, cell phone-only status, cell phone-mostly status, and phone lines. Demographic weighting targets are based on the March 2009 Current Population Survey figures for the aged 18 and older non-institutionalized population living in U.S. telephone households. All reported margins of sampling error include the computed design effects for weighting and sample design.

In addition to sampling error, question wording and practical difficulties in conducting surveys can introduce error or bias into the findings of public opinion polls.

For more details on Gallup’s polling methodology, visit http://www.gallup.com/.

A Prayer written by Nancy Norman

What a beautiful day, Lord, full of opportunity.

You are who you say you are:

The Alpha, the Omega

The First, the Last

The Beginning and the End

The Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace

The Creator, The Redeemer

The Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit

Life, Light and Love

 

Thank you for saving my soul.

It is my desire to live for Him who died for me.

Father, I believe, help thou my unbelief.

And, above all, guard my heart, which is the wellspring of life,

and my tongue, which is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison.

And You are still in control.

Lord, I commit to you my finances

And may i be satisfied with what I have and what I eat.

Lord grant me perspective,

Lord grant me wisdom

Lord, grant me patience

And may I personify your unfailing love to those around me.

 

Lord I commit to you

My work.

My family.

My life.

 

I know who You are,

And I know who I am,

And I will walk in my house with a blameless heart

And love You as best I can.

Lord, please keep me and those near me healthy and safe.    Amen.

How to take a Nap at Work

Ok, so it’s after the holidays, I’m tired and in the office by myself today.  It’s only 10 am and I feel like a nap.  I probably won’t be napping mind you but if I did (and maybe I should and so should you)… here’s some good advice from Outside Magazine.

First off, you’ll need to rid yourself of the stereotype that naps are the routine of lazy people. In just about every possible way, an afternoon doze has been shown to boost performance and health. The majority of the population in the U.S. could use a power nap. In 2001, the National Sleep Foundation found that 63% of adults got less than eight hours of sleep a day and roughly 40% had trouble staying awake. A lack of sleep can lead to increased stress and leave your immune system compromised —allowing sickness to take hold. A good nap can reduce stress, lead to quicker reaction times, and improve overall fitness.

To reap the rewards of a nap, you’ll want to start off the right way. I learned by failing. Here’s everything you need to know to take a nap at work, starting with getting permission.

Asking Your Boss
It bears repeating, naps are good for health and work performance. Taking 20 minutes out for sleep can allow you to pack loads of work into an otherwise waisted, drowsy afternoon. The first thing you’ll want to do before going to El Jefe is to learn the benefits. A 2008 study found that people who took naps performed better on motor skill tasks and memory tests than those that swallowed the caffeine equivalent of a cup of coffee. A February study the same year reinforced the findings on memory for nappers versus non-nappers. And the benefits extend on—a 2007 study showed that nappers performed better on memory tests the day after. A 2010 study showed that nappers increased their ability to take in new material—siestas help clear storage space in the brain. And then there’s this, people who took naps were 40% less likely to die from heart disease than those who didn’t. Still worried about what your boss might come back with? Read this debate about the benefit of naps in The New York Times. Consider all the of the situations below so your ready to handle any retort.

Find a Place to Sleep
If you can’t go home, you’ll want a place at the office that’s quiet, dark, and comfortable. Avoid any place with heavy traffic or that will have chatter outside of the door. I slept between storage shelves in the basement. An empty office will work just as well. Don’t sleep in a chair. The awkward sleeping positions can make falling alseep work, and can lead to weird kinks and cramps. Bring something familiar from home that will ignite your rest—a comfortable pillow or blanket. Think about setting up the space as a communcal place where others can nap. Both Nike and Google have designated nap rooms for employees. Having coworkers in on an office sleep regimen can help drum up support. Set up a sign up sheet with times for the month.

Consider a Time and Duration
Think about when you get tired in the afternoon and make a conscious effort to nap at that time everyday. When do your eyelids normally get heavy? When do you go for an afternoon cup of joe?

“For many it might be right after lunch or at 3:00 in the afternoon,” says Stanford’s Dr. William Dement, the father of modern sleep medicine.

If you go to sleep early or wake up early, a time after lunch might work best. If you stay up past midnight, 3:00 may be the time. Avoid napping too close to dinner as it will likely affect your night’s sleep. To get some benefits from your nap, you should sleep for at least 20 minutes, but not longer than 90 minutes. (If you only have two 15-minutes breaks at work, consider combining them for one break in the afternoon so you can take a 30-minute nap.) Longer naps can put you in a state of drowsiness. “If you under or oversleep, there is a chance that you can wake up within delta brain waves, which is better known as Slow Wave Sleep,” says Nick Winkelman, a fitness expert at Athletes’ Performance in Phoenix. “Waking up in this stage can feel like what is known as “sleep inertia” and you will feel a resistance to waking up.”

If you do feel drowsy, splash some cold water on your face for a wake-up. Set a timer so you don’t stress out about oversleeping.

Kick the Afternoon Caffeine
Try to limit coffee to just one cup early in the morning. The effects should wear off after lunch.

Count Sheep
As hokey as it sounds, it helps to have something to think about besides work, at work. I put on Etta James or Sam Cooke. Counting sheep, the sound of waves, or waterfall background noise might do the same. For many, a simple breathing exercise can do the trick.

Stick To Your Routine
For someone with a quiver of unpredictable tasks, this will be the hardest part. Setting other people or chores aside may lead to feelings of guilt or laziness, but it has to be done. If you start off wavering on your commitment, your body will have a harder time slowing itself down in a routine manner. Keep a nap log everyday after you rest. That way, if you do have trouble, you can look back and figure out what things to adjust for success.

Need to know more? Check out the sleep section at coreperformance.com. It has everything you need to know, from the latest sleep research to tips for daily napping.

–Joe Spring

Why I don’t tell people what I do… at least at first… (and why ministry is important)

I’m re-posting this from “Oversight of Souls” with good reason.  Marilynne’s quote accurately describes what I’ve experienced many times.  It’s an oddity but none-the-less you get used to this sometimes weird interaction.  It is true that at first or down the road, when a person understands that you’re not much different than they are and it’s really all about God and His Word, not about some kind of clergy status – real community grows and many times a pastor has the thrill of seeing how God is working and many times the heart ache of desperation.

 

How People Commonly Relate to Pastors

10 December 2010, 6:35 pm

I noticed this paragraph in Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead which accurately describes a very common element of life as a pastor.

“That’s the strangest thing about this life, about being in the ministry. People change the subject when they see you coming. And then sometimes those very same people come into your study and tell you the most remarkable things. There’s a lot under the surface of life, everyone knows that. A lot of malice and dread and guilt, and so much loneliness, where you wouldn’t really expect to find it, either.” (p. 6)

In my current setting the “subject changing” is less true as a significant depth of community has been achieved. Nonetheless, this is very typical and I have experienced it often. Anyone aspiring to the pastorate ought to be aware of it so as not to be surprised or bothered by it

Looking for a Bible for Christmas? Look for the ESV Study Bible

The ESV hardbound study bible is the Bible of choice.  Although I preach out of the NIV because that is what most people carry with them to church, you will find the transition to the ESV easy and helpful in your study of the Bible.

The ESV Study Bible, the English Standard Version Study Bible, includes more than 20,000 notes, written specifically for the ESV Study Bible. These notes focus especially on understanding the meaning of the text, giving answers to frequently raised questions, and providing theological, historical, and archaeological background-all for the purpose of helping readers to understand the Bible in a deeper way.

What’s wrong with the ESV Bible? Not much, if anything. The ESV Study Bible provides a wealth of additional resources. Thus the introductions to each book include essential information about the author, date, and place of writing; an extensive chart of key themes; a summary of how the book fits in with the rest of the biblical storyline; a description of literary features; an outline of the book; and a large full-color map showing the setting of the book. Another unique feature is the inclusion of over 50 helpful articles on topics such as the authority and truthfulness of the Bible, reading the Bible for application, the Bible in worship and prayer, the reliability of the biblical manuscripts, the relationship between archaeology and the Bible, an overview of biblical theology, and many more. Other key resources include a system of 80,000 cross references and a concordance (which together facilitate easy location of important words, passages, and biblical themes). In addition, over 200 color charts, located throughout the Bible, provide clear, concise presentations of essential information.

$23.99 on Amazon.com

Technology has it’s limitations – a word to the wise!

“It will change your life”, is the promise of new gadgetry with instant communication.  The reality is it will but not exactly as promised.  Tech always has it’s limitations and buyer or user beware!

A good communicator understands the message but also the vehicle that delivers the message.  It may affect the outcome and such is the labyrinth of email.

Listen and learn!

 

Thanks James and CJ!

Training our kids for violent acts?

Family Worship

Matthew Henry:

If therefore our houses be houses of the Lord, we shall for that reason love home, reckoning our daily devotion the sweetest of our daily delights; and our family-worship the most valuable of our family-comforts…A church in the house will be a good legacy, nay, it will be a good inheritance, to be left to your children after you.

From Donald Whitney’s book Family Worship.

5 Reasons Books Are Better Than E-Books by Tim Challies

From Tim Challies

Original post here – http://www.challies.com/articles/5-reasons-books-are-better-than-e-books

I am often asked about my reading habits and, in particular, whether I now prefer to read e-books or plain, old-fashioned “real” books (of the printed variety). For a time I went back-and-forth on this question, sometimes preferirng to read on a device and sometimes preferring to read a book. But at this point my mind is largely made up. Today I want to share 5 ways in which books are better than e-books, 5 ways in which I’ll transition from paper to pixels only with a lot of kicking and screaming.

Now this may mark me as a Ludditte and I may eventually look silly. I’m sure there were people who said, “I’ll never give up cassettes in favor of CDs” but, of course, they had no choice; eventually cassettes disappeared and everyone had to migrate to digital music. And it is likely that eventually the same will be true with books. It won’t be anytime soon, but the day will come. But for now, here are my reasons for loving real books so much more.

1. I Can Truly Own a Book

Mortimer Adler points out that there are two ways of owning a book. “The first is the property right you establish by paying for it, just as you pay for clothes and furniture. But this act of purchase is only the prelude to possession. Full ownership comes only when you have made it a part of yourself, and the best way to make yourself a part of it is by writing in it.” E-books allow you to have some kind of a property right, though this is still a very different kind of property right from owning a book (it’s more like owning insurance than owning furniture). In one case the ownership is virtual and even revocable. In the other case the ownership is physical and irrevocable. You can own an e-book, but it is a lesser form of ownership than owning a book (as Kindle users discovered when one day their copies of 1984 suddenly disappeared). Owning the rights to read the contents of a digital file is far, far different than owning the book that sits on the desk beside me.

The second type of ownership is where I find e-books even more underwhelming. Adler says that full ownership comes only as you make the book a part of yourself and this is done by interacting and engaging with it. You will know a book that is truly owned because it will be “dog-eared and dilapidated, shaken and loosened by continual use, marked and scribbled in from front to back.” If I look at your e-book copy of The Holiness of God I will not know whether you have read it once or 1,000 times. If you look at my physical copy, you will know immediately. You will know because of the bent pages, the highlighted sections, the notes, the scribbles, the circles. The spine is loose, the pages are dog-eared. It shows all the marks of age and use. You will know that i have read the book, you will know what it has meant to me, you will know that it has impacted my life. Very little of this can be communicated in an e-book. If I am left with a lesser kind of ownership, won’t I then also be left with a lesser kind of ownership of the book’s contents, of its ideas?

E-readers are beginning to allow some interactivity, but it is of a very different order. Taking a note in an e-book or making a highlight in it is independent of the book; all of that information is stored apart from the book in a file or a database. Send the book to another person and you’ll find that all of the notes and highlights are gone. They belong to you or your device, not to your book.

There remains a vast difference between owning a physical book and owning an e-book. My brain may some day adapt (evolve?) to the point where I can believe that a file on an iPad is in some way equal to a physical book sitting on my bookshelf, but for the time being, I just cannot equate the two. And perhaps the time will come when I can interact better with an e-book than with a physical book. But until that day, I cannot give up those books. I cannot give up the way I can own them.

A quick story before I move on: Some time ago I was at a library where I saw a book written by an old, old author. That book had been owned by two great theologians, first by one and then by another (who had purchased much of that first man’s library). Contained in the book were notes and remarks by those theologians, one remarking on the work itself and the other reflecting both on the work and on the other theologian’s notations. It was fascinating to see how different people had experienced that book, how it had become interactive in its own way. That is not easily reproduced in an e-book format.

2. I Can Loan a Book

One of the most disappointing aspects of e-books is that they cannot be loaned out. Most have some kind of digital rights management which ties a book to a particular owner. When I buy a Kindle book, I may have a copy of that book on up to 5 of my devices, but they must be devices tied to my Amazon account. I cannot loan my book to you; I cannot even loan it to my wife if she has a Kindle of her own. Of course that’s not strictly true—I can loan you my book by loaning you my reading device, but that’s like giving you access to one of my books by loaning you my entire library, book cases and all.

Even if an e-book does not have any kind of digital rights management, “loaning” you my e-book is a very different thing. I would be making you a copy of a file and allowing you to open it on your device. In this case I am not really loaning it at all; I am duplicating it. This is far different from having me loan you a printed book in which you can see what I have read, you can see how I have interacted with the book, and you can know that I am loaning you something that belongs to me. By handing you my book I am saying “You can experience this book and learn about my experience of this book.” There is a level of trust, a level of intimacy and shared experience in loaning books that cannot be duplicated with electronic books.

3. A Book Offers an Experience

Books are a tactile experience. An e-book reduces books to merely words; a printed book maintains that a book is far more than words—it is an experience and an object. Books can be touched, they can be held, they can be smelled (particularly if they are old!). A book includes a cover, a binding, a slip cover, the texture of words or images impressed upon that cover, the pages, the deckled edges, the weight of the paper, the feel of turning a page. All of these elements combine to make a book what it is. They tell you a lot about the book, about its value, its uniqueness, its importance.

As devices go, a book is unique—there is nothing else quite like it. An e-book reduces a book to just its words, it strips out any sort of tactile experience, and makes turning a page that same experience as playing a video game or shuffling music. It makes a book a whole lot less than it ought to be.

4. A Book Is a Single-Tasking Device

A book is inherently opposed to multi-tasking. There is very little that can be done while reading a book (apart from the act of reading itself) and the book never seeks to distract its reader. The book is a single-function device, a technology crafted and honed in order to provide the best possible reading experience. If we wanted to create a technology that would do reading well and do nothing else, I don’t know that we could do better than the book.

The e-book on the other hand, tends toward distraction. The devices we use to read our e-books are rarely single-function or, perhaps more correctly, are tending away from single-function. They are created to do many things well, which means that the focus is not only on the reading experience but on gaming, browsing, searching. The iPad has reading as just one of many functions and a relatively minor one at that. Meanwhile e-books tend to be interactive, to have built-in dictionary searches, hyperlinks and other ways of drawing attention away from the text at-hand. In all these things the devices and the books tend to distract, to offer far more than just the reading experience. They beep, they buzz, they disengage in a thousand ways.

5. I Can Buy a Used Book

I don’t ever anticipate searching quiet side streets in old towns hoping to find used e-book stores. That’s because there is no such thing as a used e-book. E-books are never used, even when they have been read. They are still just files, as unblemished after ten years as they were the day they were duplicated. They will never go down in price, they will never suddenly appear as hidden treasures, dug out of a box in an old, rundown book store. They can never be loaned out and they can never be resold. They are forever new, forever fresh, forever unused and unstained. There will be no rare first editions, no beautiful special editions to be searched for decades from now. The used book will become a vestige of the past.

To Be Fair…

As I look over this list I think of the ways that music has changed in a digital era. Albums are no longer albums. Because songs can be purchased as singles through iTunes and Amazon, we now have albums that are simply a collection of singles. People buy the songs that most appeal to them and leave the rest. And so music has changed so that artists now have to regard their albums as a collection of singles, not an experience that moves from song 1 to song 12, sometimes swelling and sometimes settling back. Music is different today than it was in an era of compact discs—it has been forever transformed by the changed medium. I think we would do well to consider how books will change as they become electronic. What are the ideologies carried by the digital media and how will these begin to transform books? And how will that in turn shape us? These are things worth thinking about.

But the news is not all bad and I want to be fair. I cannot deny that e-books have some clear advantages over their printed counterparts. Stay tuned tomorrow to read 5 ways in which e-books are better than printed books.

 

 

Northbridge Mid Summer Cookout!

It was a warm summer evening with great food and a fantastic time for to share as friends!

…looking forward to the next one!