What to do? The gag about how you’d welcome a little Global Warming just about now has been done to death, but honestly, remind me again why marginally warmer winters would be a bad thing?

We had global warming back during the Viking Age, and that worked out pretty well, you know. If it hadn’t been for Global Warming, Erik the Red and his son Leif would have frozen to death on a glacier in Greenland, and then Leif would never have gone on to discover America, and we wouldn’t be speaking Norwegian today.



I had a thought while reading my Bible today. I’m not sure whether it’s a good one or not. Let me run it by you.

In Philippians 1:12-18, the Apostle Paul tells his readers that they shouldn’t be troubled by the fact that he’s been imprisoned by the Romans. “Now I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel,” he says (NIV). Then he explains that some people are preaching Christ out of goodwill, but others are preaching Christ out of “envy and rivalry… supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I am in chains.” But, he says, “the important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached.”

I’ve never been sure who these people were who were preaching Christ out of envy and rivalry toward Paul, and what sort of preaching they must have been doing. As best I can understand, scholars aren’t entirely sure whom he was talking about either.

But this seems like a likely scenario to me—I’d guess there’s a good chance the rival preachers were members of the Circumcision party, people who preached salvation through Christ plus the law. We know they were constant opponents of Paul’s everywhere else he went.

Paul opposed their legalism, and could be pretty cutting in talking about them in his letters. Yet his attitude here seems (to me) to be, “Even if their preaching is in error, the very fact that they’re talking about Jesus is a good thing in itself.” Maybe he’s saying, “I don’t really care what anyone says about Jesus, as long as they talk about Him. Because just talking and thinking about Him gives an opening to the Holy Spirit.”

And that leads me to the idea that maybe we shouldn’t be so quick to get upset over things like “The Last Temptation of Christ” and “The Da Vinci Code.” Maybe (I could be wrong) the proper attitude is that we should just be glad that people are thinking about Jesus at all, and trust to the power of His name to turn their hearts the right way.

Or maybe I’m reading too much into it. Let me know what you think.

Frank Wilson notes that Philip Pullman was right about C.S. Lewis. He links to an article in the Canadian press by author Michael Coren who says the attacks against Christianity encouraged him to trust Jesus Christ.

What became apparent to me was that the opposition to faith was as unappealing and bland as faith was appealing and thrilling. I read, prayed and thought myself into faith more than 20 years ago. It was gradual but inevitable. Miracles occurred but they need not have. I do not need a miracle to remind me that water quenches my thirst. Christ was there in my life, with me and in me and around me. Atheists showed me the way. God bless the little devils.

Here’s an inspiring article on a church in Chagrin Falls, Ohio, who took up their pastor’s challenge to turn $50 into $100 for their missions funding.

“Sheer madness,” sniffed retired accountant Wayne Albers, 85, to his wife, Marnie, who hushed him as he whispered loudly. “Why can’t the church just collect money the old-fashioned way?”

Because this isn’t about collecting money.

Some of us were sick this morning, and others of us were up all night, so we didn’t make it to the worship service or Sunday School. I hope your last service before Christmas was wonderful and nurturing.

Anyone planning to read the Bible through next year? I often plan and fail because it’s hard for me to trot over the words at the needed pace without stopping to stare at some of the diamonds and gold along the path. Still, I may try it again this year.

Andree Seu has a beautiful article on faith in the Lord in the latest World Magazine. She writes,

In October I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Vern Poythress of Westminster Seminary. He gave me two delicious hours and we ended up talking about the Holy Spirit. I was sharing with him a wonderful insight of women’s Bible teacher Beth Moore, in which she compared the work of the Spirit in us—His “resonating” with our spirit (Romans 8:16; 1 Corinthians 2)—to the resonating of all the “C” strings of a piano when middle “C” is struck.

“Many times the resonance of the Spirit is thought of as being passive,” said Dr. Poythress, “but He calls on us to be creative because He is sovereign. . . . A trust in God says, ‘I’m going to venture on this. I know my motives are not perfect but I’m going to try it because I know God loves me.'” The Spirit in us gives us “freedom of exploration.”

Non-subscribers may find the link through this post will reveal the whole article.

So let me ask a political question, the same question twice over. Is it right to vote against Mitt Romney because he’s a Mormon?

Is it right to vote for Mike Huckabee because he’s a Christian?

By way of Powerline: A splendid piece in the Chicago Tribune, by Barbara Oakley (an agnostic and author of a book on Evil Genes). Looks like evidence of Original Sin to me.

More coming tomorrow. Snow, I mean. My old bones tell me we’re getting an inch or two more snow.



That’s a lie, by the way. My bones are indeed old, but they’re as surprised by the weather as I am most of the time. I get my weather off the radio and the internet these days, and those portents agree that it’ll probably snow tomorrow.

It looks very much as if our White Christmas is secure for 2007. Or “White Holiday,” as they say nowadays. I suppose singers make it, “White Season,” so it’ll scan. Anything to avoid the embarrassing, shocking word, “Christmas,” containing, as it does, the foul, profane syllable, “cris,” which must be kept at all costs from the ears of our children. (Or your children, anyway. I’ve done my bit for carbon neutrality and the maintenance of the gene pool by keeping my DNA to myself. No need to thank me. Just send a present.)

I’ve noticed there’s been some uproar from Christian groups over the Christmas advertising of the Kohl’s department store chain. The Kohl’s commercials (which star a very attractive woman who’s got a sort of Terri Hatcher thing going, I couldn’t help noticing) feature trappings and symbols that look Christmas-y in a generic, non-sectarian sort of way, but the music they use (to one’s amazement once one realizes it) is Cole Porter’s “De-Lovely,” hitherto never considered a trademark of the season.

All in all I disapprove. But I can’t help noting a certain irony in the situation.

Because I’m old, as mentioned above, and I can remember back in the 50s and 60s, when all the stores had Christmas sales, and Christmas decorations, and they played Christmas carols over the loudspeakers—and some of them even had crèches in their display windows.

And you know what? Christian leaders hated it. You’d hear it in their sermons, and read it in their letters to the editor. “Christmas is a holy festival of the Faith!” they’d say. “How dare these merchandisers hijack this blessed season for sordid gain!”

Which should be a lesson to all of us to be careful what we ask for.

Because the merchandisers have now done just what we wanted them to. They divorced their business entirely from our religious festival.

And we’re not happy at all with the result.

I nearly hit a deer tonight, while driving home from work.

It should be noted that my commute is not a rural one. It’s not even outer-ring suburb country, with lots of big, wooded lots. I drive from one inner-ring suburb to another inner-ring suburb, with one or two inner-ring suburbs in between. This deer jumped from behind a wooden fence at the edge of a tiny little park along 42nd Ave. in New Hope. Fortunately, my tiger-like reflexes allowed me to jam on the brakes before I hit it, and the driver behind me’s tiger-like reflexes allowed him to avoid rear-ending me.

I think maybe we need to re-think this whole business about restricting deer hunting to a limited season. I say we’ve got plenty of deer, and people who need cheap protein should be able to shoot ‘em any time they like.

I hasten to add that I don’t think we should be allowed to take our hunting rifles to urban deer, such as the one who touched my life this afternoon. Those stray bullets are made of a toxic substance, you know, and might be bad for the environment.

We might give bowhunters a shot, at them, though.

Speaking of mayhem (and that’s an unusually labored transition, even for me) I have a thought about mysteries and solutions tonight.

I’ve gotten into the habit of watching CBS’s “48 Hours Mystery,” which runs on Saturday nights, often after a re-run of “CSI.” The juxtaposition of the two shows intrigues me, mostly because of the differences between the fictional mysteries and the real ones.

What strikes me about the real mysteries covered on “48 Hours Mystery” is that they generally lack a really satisfactory resolution. In a fictional mystery, you almost always end with a solid solution to the problem. The detective brings out his damning evidence, and the accused can do nothing but hang his head and say, “Yes, I did it and I’m glad. She made my life a living heck” (or something equivalent).

But in real life, to judge from “48 Hours,” that scene almost never happens. The detectives gather evidence that they consider conclusive, and they arrest the suspect, who generally says nothing except to ask to call his lawyer. As the court proceedings go on, every piece of evidence is contested by the defense, and plausible explanations are put forward. The evidence against the accused may be strong, but it’s almost never absolutely, 100% definitive.

So in the end, the jury is left with a judgment call. Has the prosecution proven guilt beyond a reasonable doubt? In real life, it seems there’s always some room for doubt. Often it comes down in part to a subjective impression—“I just didn’t trust him.” “He gave me the creeps.” And you’re always left with a nagging doubt. “Maybe we condemned an innocent man.” Or, “Maybe we let a guilty man loose to kill again.”

You know what? That’s life. It’s very, very rare that you get to make a choice where you have absolute, 100% proof of the right way to go. (If you did, would it really be a choice?)

I think that goes for matters of faith too. Don’t misunderstand me. I don’t think truth is relative, or that the Bible isn’t God’s revealed truth.

But those who look for 100% certainty—an argument that will answer all objections and silence all doubts—will hover forever at the crossroads.

Choices—including the choice to believe—ultimately come down to a conviction in one’s soul; “the testimony of the Holy Spirit.” Perhaps that’s another name for what’s theologically called Election.

And even then, don’t expect all doubts to disappear. They won’t.

We see through a glass, darkly.