Financial issues are the bane of the seminary student. We just want to study and hang with our families (or look for people to make families with!) and we get saddled with job issues just to get by.
I paid my way through my undergrad program with some help from the follks, but no financial aid or loans. I worked about 30 hrs/wk. while going to school full time. It stunketh. I had to spend most of my weekends and holidays at the job when all my spoiled friends went home or had fun. 
In seminary I worked a full time job, taught at church, taught classes on the side for another school, and took 2-3 grad level classes per semester. Again, no loans. I made it through, and did very well gpa-wise – but it could have been a lot better if I had not had to devote so much time to work (at one point I was driving 10 hrs/wk. to get to my 40 hrs/wk. job!).
LOGOS Bible Software (the absolute best) is trying to alleviate the burden for some lucky students – check it out here. Not only can you get some cash for your studies but you can get a huge discount on this amazing software. I’ve been using LOGOS since the beginning in the 90’s and it is so much better now. Check it out.
For Father’s Day this year I got a new study Bible. Now, the last time I got a “big Bible” was about 18 years ago in college. I got a NASB Inductive Study Bible (wide margins, no distracting notes or headings). It’ s been my main Bible this whole time and I never had reason to get another one.
Then some of my students began showing up with this new ESV study Bible so I checked it out.
Wow.
This hefty Bible is pretty amazing. Lots of Bibles are packed with notes but this is the best one I’ve seen in recent years. Detractors point out that the notes skew to Calvinistic interpretations, and with editors like Wayne Grudem and J. I. Packer that’s no big surprise. But they are fair and the more significant-to-theological-position passages usually have notes that include all the major views.
The ESV Study Bible combines the best and most recent evangelical scholarship with the Bible text, which, as an “essentially literal” translation, is especially suited for Bible study. The result is the most comprehensive study Bible ever published—with completely new notes, maps, illustrations, charts, timelines, articles, and other features. Created by an exceptional team of 95 evangelical Christian scholars and teachers, the ESV Study Bible contains more than 2 million words of Bible text and insightful explanation and teaching—equivalent to a 20-volume Bible resource library.
No kidding. There sections on ethics, theology, cults, and several hundred illustrations, maps, and charts – in color! Plus you can access all these online.
The translation (which is essentially literal) seems great so far and I have seen no major critical issues yet.
It comes with access to the ESV online which is like an entire Bible program online.
Finally, the ESV “TruTone” material covers are great. They are a fake leather that I like better than the real thing and they cost much less. You can get the hard back for about $30, and I found the TruTone for $48 (inc. shipping!) at CBD. Fantastic!
According to several news stories, a San Diego couple has been fined by the county for holding a home Bible study. They were asked specifically religious questions (“Do you say, ‘Amen’?” “Do you say, ‘Praise the Lord’?” etc.) and told that doing so was in violation of zoning laws. Where is their precious separation of church and state now?
Is California so broke they are resorting to mob extortion tactics now? Will they apply this to other activities or only Christian ones? Will poker nights result in gambling establishment violations? Will mothers have to pass state inspections to have the neighborhood kids over for sandwiches?
I can smell the bull refuse from here. I hope liberal-voting Christians can too.
It is amazing to me how many entities become their own caricatures. Well, Elevation “Church” in Charlotte, NC has certainly done it for the “seeker sensitive” movement.
Just in case you weren’t already thoroughly disgusted with seeker churches, listen to this short CLIP of their “pastor” describing his “church” as being not a place for believers and not a place to stuff your face with doctrine. In another video he makes fun of people who want deep teaching and more spiritual food. Nope, it’s all about “blessing someone.” If you disagree you’re a Pharisee. Wow (does the Book of Hebrews exist in his Bible?).
What is the true purpose of church? Instead of ranting off the top of my head, I’ll just quote Acts 2:42 -
They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.
So the purpose of the church gathering is for believers to gather to learn doctrine, have fellowship, take communion, and respond in prayer (see also Romans 12:10; 15:14; Ephesians 4:32; 1 Thessalonians 5:11; 1 John 3:11). If you are not doing these things at church then you’re not at church.
Yes, true religion involves helping others (primarily the church) and evangelism. But this is the responsibility of the Church – not the church service. If Elevation wants a tent revival every Sunday that’s fine - but don’t call it church.
(At least his HAIR is relevant!)
I’ve been investigating the claims of Anglicanism recently and am working through a book titled “Liturgical Theology” by Simon Chan. Chan believes that the way we worship can affect what we believe. That sounded odd at first but some examples did come to mind.
It is obvious that Charismatics tend to “act out” much more in their services. There is more “audience participation” and motion, sometimes at the expense of teaching (i.e. “when the Spirit leads”). Contrast this with the more somber expressions of a more conservative denominational church in which laity participation is primarily sitting and listening to the sermon.
Is it a coincidence that so much more false teaching comes from the former’s circles, or that church can become seen as a tedious chore to be abandoned at one’s first opportunity away from home in the latter? Why are there generally more intellectuals in the latter and more emotionally-driven worshipers in the former?
More and more I am coming to believe that the choices of human persons reflect the character of their constitution. Human nature includes intellect and will which bring forth emotions. What we think affects how we choose to act, and those actions in turn can affect how we think. Consider a dance club. People go in ready to cut loose, to throw off daily concerns and just tune out for awhile. The actions they partake of help them to do so (no one goes to a dance club to read and reflect!). The loud music, drinks, lighting, etc. all contribute to a “loose” state of mind. And loose actions often follow.
Is it the same with church? I am starting to think so. The people that go to a typical evangelical church often have very little depth in their understanding of what the church teaches, so the worship format (including the sermon style, if not its content) becomes primary. Those who have strict biblical accuracy as their main concern will probably not choose a church where worship is “free” (as “free” sermons often go along with them). Those who need an emotional shot in the arm every service are probably not going to put up with a half hour expository sermon preceded by a stilted hymn or two.
In time past I would have thought this choice was a no-brainer. I was always willing to sacrifice experience for exposition. Because no evangelical church seemed capable of both orthodox teaching and orthoprax worship, I simply erred on the side of teaching. I still think this was wise, but recently I am wondering if this is really a dilemma. Is there a place for the Christian who wishes to feel that their worship is meaningful and not simply check off correct doctrinal statements (but who refuses to give in to false teaching)?
Chan says this is what liturgy does. It connects Christians to Christ in a real way that is not simply via intellect nor emotion. The Church has historically taught that this occurs in the Eucharist, where we are made into Christ’s body through its consumption (in some sense). The standardized worship service ensures correct practice, and the strict standards for the clergy ensure correct teaching (that’s the theory anyway). Rather than self-styled services that are designed to attract non-believers (i.e., the non-church) to come to worship, the liturgical tradition exists to foster true communion between believers and between believers and Christ. And isn’t this what people of Christ should desire?
I’d love to hear your comments!
I got this in an email today – it’s worth considering.
The global Islamic population is approximately 1,200,000,000, or 20% of the world’s population. They have received the following Nobel Prizes:
Literature:
1988 – Najib MahfooPeace:
1978 – Mohamed Anwar El-Sadat
1994 – Yaser Arafat:
1990 – Elias James Corey
1999 – Ahmed ZewaiMedicine:
1960 – Peter Brian Medawar
1998 – Ferid MouradTOTAL: 7
The global Jewish population is approximately 14,000,000, or about 0.02% of the world’s population. They have received the following Nobel Prizes:
Literature:
1910 – Paul Heyse
1927 – Henri Bergson
1958 – Boris Pa sternak
1966 – Shmuel Yosef Agnon
1966 – Nelly Sachs
1976 – Saul Bellow
1978 – Isaac Bashevis Singer
1981 – Elias Canetti
1987 – Joseph Brodsky
1991 – Nadine Gordimer WorldPeace:
1911 – Alfred Fried
1911 – Tobias Michael Carel Asser
1968 – Rene Cassin
1973 – Henry Kissinger
1978 – Menachem Begin
1986 – Elie Wiesel
1994 – Shimon Peres
1994 – Yitzhak RabinPhysics:
1905 – Adolph Von Baeyer
1906 – Henri Moissan
1907 – Albert Abraham Michelson
1908 – Gabriel Lippmann
1910 – Otto Wallach
1915 – Richard Willstaetter
1918 – Fritz Haber
1921 – Albert Einstein
1922 – Niels Bohr
1925 – James Franck
1925 – Gustav Hertz
1943 – Gustav Stern
1943 – George Charles de Hevesy
1944 – Isid or Issac Rabi
1952 – Felix Bloch
1954 – Max Born
1958 – Igor Tamm
1959 – Emilio Segre
1960 – Don ald A. Glaser
1961 – Robert Hofstadter
1961 – Melvin Calvin
1962 – Lev Davidovich Landau
1962 – Max Ferdinand Perutz
1965 – Richard Phil lips Feynman
1965 – Julian Schwinger
1969 – Murray Gell-Mann
1971 – Dennis Gabor
1972 – William Howard Stein
1973 – Brian David Joseph son
1975 – Benjamin Mottleson
1976 – Burton Richter
1977 – Ilya Prigogine
1978 – Arno Allan Penzias
1978 – Peter L Kapitza
1979 – Stephen Weinberg
1979 – Sheldon Glashow
1979 – Herbert Charles Brown
1980 – Paul Berg
1980 – Walter Gilbert
1981 – Roald Hoffmann
1982 – Aaron Klug
1985 – Albert A. Hauptman
1985 – Jerome Karle
1986 – Dudley R. Herschbach
1988 – Robert Huber
1988 – Leon Lederman
1988 – Melvin Schwartz
1988 – Jack Steinberger
1989 – Sidney Altman
1990 – Jerome Friedman
1992 – Rudolph Marcus
1995 – Martin Perl
2000 – Alan J. HeegerEconomics:
1970 – Paul Anthony Samuelson
1971 – Simon Kuznets
1972 – Kenneth Joseph Arrow
1975 – Leonid Kantorovich
1976 – Mil ton Friedman
1978 – Herb ert A. Simon
1980 – Lawrence Robert Klein
1985 – Franco Modigliani
1987 – Robert M. Solow
1990 – Harry Markowitz
1 990 – Merton Miller
1992 – Gary Becker
1993 – Robert FogelMedicine:
1908 – Elie Metchnikoff
1908 – Paul Erlich
1914 – Robert Barany
1922 – Otto Meyerhof
1930 – Karl Landsteiner
1931 – Otto Warburg
1936 – Otto Loewi
1944 – Joseph Erlanger
1944 – Herb ert Spencer Gasser
1945 – Ernst Boris Chain
1946 – Hermann Joseph Muller
1950 – Tadeus Reichstein
1952 – Selman Abra ham Waksman
1953 – Hans Krebs
1953 – Fritz Albert Lipmann
1958 – Joshua Lederberg
1959 – Arthur Kornberg
1964 – Konrad Bloch
1965 – Francois Jacob
1965 – Andre Lwoff
1967 – George Wald
1968 – Marshall W. Nirenberg
1969 – Salvador Luria
1970 – Julius Axelrod
1970 – Sir Bernard Katz
1972 – Gerald Maurice Ed elman
1975 – Howard Martin Temin
1976 – Baruch S. Blumberg
1977 – Roselyn Sussman Yalow
1978 – Daniel Nathans
1980 – Baruj Benacerraf
1984 – Cesar Milstein
1985 – Michael Stuart Brown
1985 – Joseph L. Goldstein
1986 – Stanley Cohen [& Rita Levi-Montalcini]
1988 – Gertrude Elion
1989 – Harold Varmus
1991 – Erwin Neher
1991 – Bert Sakmann
1993 – Richard J. Roberts
1993 – Phillip Sharp
1994 – Alfred Gilman
1995 – Ed ward B. LewisTOTAL: 129
Perhaps Muslims should consider investing more in education than in overthrowing the world, and stop blaming the Jews for all their problems.
‘If the Arabs put down their weapons today, there would be no more violence. If the Jews put down their weapons today, there would be no more Israel.’ – Benjamin Netanyahu
Think Planned Parenthood is just looking out for the best interests of young women?
Lila Rose, a history major at UCLA has been recording herself posing as an abortion-seeking 13 year old impregnated by a much older man at Planned Parenthood clinics across America. The resulting videos are posted on Rose’s website, LiveAction.org, and YouTube. What the tapes show are Planned Parenthood workers actually coaching her on how to lie so that the authorities (and her parents) won’t have to be informed. Lila calls this the Mona Lisa Project. She has since been interviewed by Bill O’Reilly, Hannity and Colmes, Laura Ingraham, and Glenn Beck.
Apparently Planned Parenthood is more concerned about promoting abortion than reporting statutory rapes. This, in essence, aids sexual predators by counseling pregnant minors to lie about the ages of their adult partners. I guess abortionists would rather sweep rape (and RACISM) under the carpet than give up their prized ability to murder babies.
IT’S NOT ABOUT PROTECTING WOMEN.
While this may be difficult for some to believe, there are people who teach that if God did not grant humans free will that God would be a “divine rapist.” I have read or heard this quip enough times now that I just can’t stand it anymore.
This sick sentiment is usually brought up in discussions concerning salvation or the problem of evil (often from an anti-Calvinist position). When it is asked why God couldn’t just create people who loved Him, or who at least never did evil, instead of giving them the power of free will, the response is often that love requires free will. This is not so bad. But then sometimes the coup de grâce is delivered: Without free will people would be forced to love God, and (as we all know), forced love is rape. And God is no divine rapist!
Gag. For those lacking the moral/logical/theological intuition to balk at such a crass response and think a bit more clearly about it, let me spell out the problem:
- Rape is violent sex (emphasis on violent). Violence is obviously not part of love, and sex does not equate to love either. Even romantic love, which sometimes involves sex, does not always equate to love (unless someone thinks the greatest commandment, “Love Thy God,” is to have sex with God, there should be no disagreement with this position). So neither violence nor sex can be equated to love.
- Love can be defined as the willing of the good of another and a desire for unity with another (unless someone thinks that God’s love for His creation means He wants to date it, there should be no disagreement with this either). So love cannot be equated to rape.
- Therefore love (“forced” or not) isn’t rape – period.
God’s sovereignty encompasses human free will actions, yet most agree that this does not ential forced actions. We may deal with this difficult doctrine how we will, but let’s eschew perverse parodies of orthodox positions whether we agree with such positions or not!
Religious discussions today often center around worldviews and culture . . . and nothing affects the worldviews of today’s culture more than movies! |
The Message Behind the Movie: How to Engage With a Film Without Disengaging Your Faith – a unique book on movies written from a Christian perspective – NOW AVAILABLE from Moody Publishers (keep reading for a free offer).
Most Christian books on movies discuss some of Hollywood’s messages but fail to equip believers to evaluate them, or how to turn those messages into opportunities for discussing the faith. The Message Behind the Movie teaches the basics of objective movie interpretation, and message evaluation in light of the Christian worldview. This unique book will be especially helpful for those fearful of evangelism or who simply would like a more casual means of getting into the truths of the gospel with friends, co-workers, family, etc. The book gives a simple outline for understanding and evaluating movies:
ACT ONE deals with how movies communicate messages with a focus in on how style and background elements contribute to the message of the movie.
ACT TWO concerns evaluation of movie messages concerning religion, truth, God, and the Bible. Sample dialogues are included to show how these messages can be used in conversations when defining or defending the faith.
ACT THREE wraps it all up with biblical principles of discernment concerning film viewing.
The book is available from Moody Publishers, Amazon.Com, BarnesandNoble.Com, and Christian Book.Com.
I am also available to speak on the subject at conferences, church events, etc. Click here for speaking info.
SPECIAL OFFER: The first 50 Bloggers to visit www.TheMessageBehindTheMovie.com and send in a Special Offer request (through CONTACTS) will receive a complimentary copy of the book directly from Moody Publishers provided that they will post a review of the book on their BLOG (and Amazon.Com, BarnesandNoble.Com, Christian Book.Com would be appreciated too!). Make sure to indicate “Blogger Book Review Offer” and your BLOG web address (URL) in the message.
Categorical logic, that formalized by Aristotle and generally considered useful for about 25 centuries, is basically a method of placing or removing things to or from categories. It does so by the use of four categorical statements referred to by the letters A,E,I,O [taken from the vowels in the Latin words affirms (I affirm) and nego (I deny)]:
• A (universal affirmatives): All S is/are P.
• E (universal negations): No S is/are P.
• I (particular affirmatives): Some S is/are P.
• O (particular negations): Some S is/are not P.
Modern logic has an issue concerning the handling of “empty categories” – categories including non-existent things (e.g., unicorns), once they are subjected to the rules of categorical logic by placing them on the standard square of opposition.
Suppose that ‘S’ (the subject) is an empty term – it is true of nothing. Then ‘Some S is P’ is false. But then its contradictory ‘No S is P’ must be true. But then ‘Some S is not P’ must be true. But that is wrong, since there aren’t any S’s.
Most contemporary logic texts have taken to assigning A and E form statements no “existential import” (not predicating actual existence) and I and O statements as having existential import (predicating actual existence). The modern categorical forms are now symbolized as follows (note conversion to predicate logic):
• A: ∀x(Sx → Px) [“For all X’s if S is an X then P is an X.”]
• E: ∀x(Sx → ¬Px) [“For all X’s if S is an X then P is not an X.”]
• I: ∃x(Sx & Px) [“For every X there exists an X that is S and an X that is P.”]
• O: ∃x(Sx & ¬Px) [“For every X there exists an X that is S and an X that is not P.”]
Note that in this schema universal statements are now conditionals and particular statements are conjunctions. I’ll tell you why I think this is below, but for now simply notice how it works. The propositions “All unicorns have horns” (A) and “No unicorns have horns” (E) are both regarded as true even though unicorns do not actually exist (since A and O propositions are not said to predicate existence), while “Some unicorns have horns” (I) and “Some unicorns do not have horns” (O) are both regarded as false (because I and O propositions are said to predicate existence and no unicorns actually exist). So we can say goodbye to contrary, subcontrary, and subalternate relations for without the supposition that all categories have at least one member, then only the contradictory relations remain.
This is where thing get weird.
In this system ‘Every S is P’ (A) is true even when there are no S’s. So the result is that while the proposition “All unicorns have horns” has no existential import, “Some unicorns have horns” does! Further, the truth of “All unicorns have horns” does not imply the truth of “Some unicorns have horns.” How is this not absurd?
The answer, I think, is that modern philosophy’s denial of natures makes universal statements problematic. I can’t say “All elephants are gray” is true unless I have experienced all elephants. But I can say that “Some elephants are gray” because I have experienced a few of them. Thus, existence can only be predicated of particular things and we are not allowed to universalize them (which I could if things were in certain categories by nature).
This is one problem, More confusion is caused by a failure to recognize the distinction between essence and existence. Because essence and existence are distinct, a proposition can be true formally (according to the essence or definition of the term), while being false materially (according to the extra-mental reality of the terms referent). This is why we distinguish between formal and material fallacies in logic. So we can say that the proposition “All unicorns have horns” is true by definition (formally) whether or not any unicorns exist materially. If this were not true - if we did not really know what unicorns are – how could we know whether unicorns existed or not?
Logic, like math, properly deals with form – not matter (1 unicorn + 1 unicorn = 2 unicorns because 1+1=2, not because there are any unicorns). Categorical propositions were never meant to imply existential import. However, in order for the formal rules to work it must be initially assumed that there are, theoretically, no empty categories (and this is why modern Venn Diagrams do not track the same validity patterns as do Aristotle’s rules). But this assumption is not problematic if we remember that we are speaking of formal definitions (and natures) and not necessarily material existences (and particulars).
Long live Aristotle!
