Image Archives

Some of the best from the February Wednesday Link Lists 2013-2016.

Update: Apparently WordPress doesn’t import the links when you use media file images, but I’ll be happy to try to source these if you leave a comment. Some of them I tried and the page no longer exists.

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Morality in the 21st Century

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See the “warning” section for a problem the First Century Church never had: ““This service contains flashing lights which may cause problems for people with photosensitive epilepsy.”

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Missing the Point

 

Wednesday Link List

The Wednesday List Lynx still prowls the office here after dark.

Welcome to this week’s link list to those of you who didn’t already have it automatically download to their phone.

• T.D. Jakes has two syndicated television projects in development, one a daily show, the other a weekly.
• At age 14, she was taken from her family and given to an ISIS commander as a bride. Then she and a friend escaped.
• It’s called Lateral leadership, defined as “leading your peers, those you serve alongside but don’t report to, and they don’t report to you either.”
• Pope Francis shook things up last week by performing weddings for couples who had been previously living together, some of whom had children.
• Hillsong made the New York Times, complete with a quotation from the Rev. Dr. Albert Mohler Jr. that they water down the gospel…
• …But one church planter thinks the move by churches back into cities like NYC is somewhat selective when it comes to neighborhoods.
• A few like-minded linkers this week noted this upcoming theology cruise to the Eastern Carribean. Beats a seminary classroom, I suppose. Maybe you were predestined to see this.
• I hope my editor approves this link: Introducing grassroots pastors, “a growing population of Christians—especially young Christians—called and trained for ministry, but, for one reason or another, not in a formal church role.”
• What if instead of suppressing belief in God, the 1960s had brought God into the foreground?
• The death of controversial pastor turned politician Rev. Ian Paisley elicits stories from The New York Times and UK Christian media.
• Let’s talk about a Rob Bell book before it’s released; nobody’s ever done that before. The book, coauthored by wife Kristen deals with egalitarian marriage.
• Your mileage may vary: See if you agree with this assessment after the lyrics of modern worship songs are placed under the microscope.
• Maintaining a distinct identity: What distinguished the early Christian community from their surrounding neighbors?
• A Georgia pastor who delivered what he considered an ‘educational’ message about the middle east temporarily had his YouTube account suspended.
• Planning weekend services: Living between the tension of following the template or starting from scratch.
• The hometown mainstream media continue their coverage of things at Mars Hill Seattle.
• Church Profile of the Week: A look at Christ Redeemer Episcopal in Milwaukee, where community trumps dogma, and former Evangelicals discover Anglican worship.
• Benjamin Corey responds to the trolls: “…if your goal is to help introduce people to Jesus, you’re actually achieving the opposite of your stated goal. …you’re actively harming the efforts of those of us who are purposeful and attempt to use extreme care with how we communicate the message of Jesus.”…
• …Taking that to the next level, a guide to having crucial conversations.
• You’ve seen books like All the Men of the Bible and All the Miracles of the Bible. This blog post looks at all the suicides of the Bible.
• Patriarchy and clergy libraries: Hey, pastor; take a minute to scan your shelves and compute the male-female balance of writers on your shelves.
• A Brazilian soccer star is trying to bring visibility in that country regarding the plight of Saeed Abedini, imprisoned in Iran for two years.
• Three book reviews, including Marketing Like Jesus and a revival of the True Love Waits movement.
• An atypical story of domestic abuse: When the husband is physically injured.
• Often voiced: Christian Bible study resources for women tend to be too feeling-based.
• Pope Francis has suggested that the conflicts we’re seeing around the world are like puzzle pieces combining to form the picture of a third world war. (My paraphrase.)
• American Pastors looking for a pay raise might want to relocate to The South. (According to the study, they should also avoid Canada.)
• Mathematics Department: Unpacking Baptist attrition rates.
• James MacDonald apologized on the weekend for a church disciplinary action against three former elders that was excessive.
• When Hollywood got it right: Eight reasonably positive portrayals of Christians on broadcast television.
• I think in many respects, the blog platform tumblr is a mission field, so I greatly admire people doing ministry there.
• When it comes to understanding the Christian publishing market in Canada there’s one guy you might want to know.
• Song of the Week: Unspoken’s Start A Fire. (Thanks, Diane.)
• Advertising by a faith-based preschool is refused by Groupon.
• Cartoonist David Hayward’s cartoons can make your head explode.
• Worship Leader Trauma Center: Dealing with your church’s OPH problem.
• After its first hiatus in eleven years, The Drew Marshall Show Canada’s “most listened-to spiritual talk program” returns to the air on Saturday. Join listeners from around the world live between 1:00 and 5:00 EDT.
• Calminianism: Harmonizing predestination and free will with God’s sovereignty.
• A cross symbol on the helmets of a college football team meant to memorialize a former player and a former equipment manager violate the United States Constitution. Excerpt: “These young men were simply trying to do a good deed. They were standing up for their fallen teammates. It’s really too bad the university could not stand up for the team.”
• Journalistic curiosity: Calling last Thursday “9/11’s Bar Mitzvah.”
• Not serious: Peter Enns guests at Huffington with 10 Signs You Take The Bible Too Literally. (And guests at Reddit today (9/17) at 3:00 EST.)
• The Gaithers Claim Another Victim: The founder of the Christian rock band Starfield turns bluegrass.
• Did you get your free U2 album? Did you want to get the new U2 album? Some people were unwilling recipients. At Rolling Stone, a track-by-track guide to all eleven songs.
• Prosperity Gospel? Yes, people still teach that. If I’m not wealthy, I must be doing something wrong.
• Finally, this may or may not be a true story: A church decides to shut down its ministry to focus on the success of its coffee shop. (Website name is a clue.)

My wife makes these. I didn’t have a closing photo this week, so I thought you’d enjoy seeing the puppets in an international mood.

Paul Wilkinson failed to find a suitable Christian media link related to tomorrow’s historic separation vote in Scotland, but you can read him the rest of the week at Thinking Out Loud or devotionally at Christianity 201.

Wednesday Link List

I’m writing this assuming everyone survived the prophetic implications of the blood moon, but maybe the April 15 income tax deadline is a form of judgment. 

As we do each Wednesday, clicking anything below will take you to PARSE where the links are live.

• With the movie version set to release, a now 14-year-old Colton Burpo affirms the story on which Heaven is for Real is based.
• Jamie Wright notes correctly that the many Mommy Bloggers are really moms to young children and that mothers of teens seem to share fewer stories.
• For I know the verse I have for you! Why the context for Jeremiah 29:11 isn’t what a majority think it is.
• Is the gigantic cultural shift brought by technology responsible for the growth of “the nones?”
• Another U.S. arena tour of Jesus Christ Superstar is planned for the summer, this time with The Sex Pistol’s Johnny Rotten as King Herod.
• Scot McKnight is one of many asking what might be expected when a person of faith hosts The Late Show on CBS…
• …Speaking of whom, articles by Scot and others are part of a wealth of Biblical Studies resources that are free from now to the end of the week from Oxford University Press. (Try off-peak hours if the site is being swamped.)
• In Canada’s most populous province, Ontario, one religion’s schools enjoy full funding while the others get nothing. A new push is on to end the favoritism.
• Gospel Light Publishing has entered into an agreement to sell Regal Books to Baker Book Group. Regal publishes current authors Dennis Rainey and Gene Getz, and classic writers Henrietta Mears and A.W. Tozer.
• Bible translations are often updated shortly after publication. The team at The Voice Bible already have that day in view.
• Here’s the first in a series of four blog posts worth reading and recommending: Jesus’ Baptism and Ours.
• Essay of the Week: Micha Boyett on what turning to God looks like when it involves multiple turnings.
• Devotional of the Week: A former pastor who spends much time barefoot on a Florida beach looks at Jesus washing his disciples’ feet.
• The announcement that Benny Hinn was offering Liberty University diplomas was shocking enough, but then it dredged up other weird associations in Liberty’s past.
• What if the greatest threats to the church are not the things everybody else is talking about, but rather cultural norms that mitigate against the Kingdom?
• This week two writers looked at our obsession with church metrics. Dan White introduces an entirely different ministry paradigm…
• …While Tim Challies has some suggested answers when people ask you how big your church is.
• At my own blog this week, as an outsider, I peek behind the Reformed curtain into the Together for the Gospel conference.
• Despite some objections, a Christian university in Vancouver, Canada has had the main hurdle cleared for opening a school of law.
• This week I caught up with veteran Christian cartoonist and illustrator Kevin Frank. When you visit his recently updated website, check out “Heaven’s Love Thrift Shop,” my favorite among his comic series.
• I’m not sure if this article about 5 things we can learn about love from our kids is here because I enjoyed it (which I did) or because I was just intrigued by a blog titled Psychosermons.
• NSFCO (Not Safe for Church Office): Are we seeing an increase in Occultic themes in the broader entertainment world?
• An excerpt from ExPastors.com founder Bo Lane’s book, Why Pastors Quit.
• Work in progress, even as you read this: An entire denomination’s commitment to read the entire New Testament in eight weeks.
• On Grief: Each loss is different, each involves different amounts of time, but with the hope we have, death slowly loses its sting.
• This ain’t The PTL Club: A detailed analysis of the theological claims in Jay Bakker’s latest book.
• Increasingly, we substitute more visitor-friendly terminology for words like “Christian” or “church,” but eventually, we have to call it like it is.
• While another aspect of the Vatican Radio broadcast grabbed headlines, Pope Francis affirmed the reality of Satan last week.
• Talk about a home field advantage… PARSE inteviews Skye Jethani.
• Missed this one last month. The Inquisition is alive and well; one in ten countries have police who enforce religious norms.
• Spiritual Health Checklist: See how you measure up to these spiritual life standards from the 18th Century.
• Women in ministry, 20 years from now: This nine-year old wants to be a pastor.
• CCM Music Video of the Week: He’s not exactly new, but a lot of people are discovering the music of John Mark McMillan and songs like Love at the End of the World.
• Worship Video of the Season: It’s not new, but I’ve just really come to love this song as we head into Good Friday and Easter. Stuart Townend’s The Power of the Cross.
• Christian music veteran John Fischer brings back memories of Christian music veterans, LoveSong. (But what’s the album cover? I thought I had all their stuff.)
• No crazy news story to end with this week, just my sincere wish that as another Good Friday and Easter pass before us, we see something we’ve previously missed, and find our hearts drawn closer to the wonder of Amazing Love.

Paul Wilkinson writes the rest of the week at Thinking Out Loud, and edits the daily devotional Christianity 201 page.

Reconnecting With Cartoonist Kevin Frank

Early in 2009, we introduced some of you to veteran Christian cartoonist Kevin Frank as he launched the book Balaam’s Chicken. Then last year, we showed you just a portion of larger illustration of the Cornerstone Festival. (In an earlier lifetime, Kevin appeared regularly in Cornerstone Magazine.)

But this week, we heard from Kevin, and on the occasion of his website makeover, he allowed us to splash some new panels on the wall here at Thinking Out Loud.  So we’ll definitely do one on next Wednesday’s link list, but I thought we’d also do something today.

When you arrive at the site you have eight choices, but my favorites are True North (a somewhat autobiographical story about an American transplanted in Canada that appears in Canadian newspapers) and Heaven’s Love Thrift Shop, a story about a… well, you get it. That’s where the one below is from, but honestly, there were so many to choose from.  (If you’re in children’s ministry, this one was my runner up.)

 

Wednesday Link List

I couldn’t decide whether my intro should tie in with Halloween or All Saints Day, so I decided to play it safe and just get to this week’s links…These links don’t actually link to anything other than today’s Out of Ur version of the list!

• The UK has become Biblically illiterate to the point where while watching the Monty Python movie, Life of Brian, viewers no longer get the humor.
• The Liberty Convocation videos on YouTube are a Who’s Who of Christians thinkers and leaders. Last week they welcomed National Community Church pastor Mark Batterson.
• Essay of the Week: This one will leave you speechless. A writer shares her heart in the middle of a marriage that seems like a giant mistake.
• Analogy Avenue: One more response to John MacArthur’s conference, this one invoking transportation (trains and the lunar rover) from author Mark Rutland.
• So here is possibly the last word on that kid who was given the name Messiah, and the challenges that could create.
• After Natalie Grant and Wow 2014, the number 3 position on the Billboard Christian music chart goes to Bryan and Katie Torwalt. “Who,” you ask? They’re part of Jesus Culture, and sound like this.
• Randy Alcorn engages the subject of pro-life organizations that use explicit photographs to reinforce their anti-abortion message.
• The authors of the non-Canonical gospel texts hoped that they would be taken seriously. It’s our job, however, to eliminate the late stories and isolate the early eyewitness accounts, even though we’re tempted to do otherwise.
• The only thing noteworthy about an article that advocates for Christians to enjoy dancing, is when you find it at the website of Associated Baptist Press.
• When your kids have a question, do they ask you, or do they automatically take all their questions to a search engine?
• If you get struck by lightning twice in the same day, you may be correct in assuming that God is trying to get your attention.
• When you read the Bible, do you follow the Flyover Route, the Direct Route, or the Scenic Route? David Kenney reviews a new NLT edition I’ve had my eye on for awhile: The Wayfinding Bible. (Tyndale Publishing, you have my address!)
• Resource of the Week: You’ll want to bookmark (or share) Sam Storms’ eleven factors that can destroy objectivity in Bible hermeneutics, along with his basic rules for Bible interpretation.
• Passionate Teaching: I always love it when Wheaton College’s Dr. Gary Burge drops in for a midweek service at Willow.
• In Detroit a female Bishop in a Baptist denomination informed her congregation that for more than six months she has been married to another woman. And then she resigned.
• After a week of focus on Steven Furtick’s house and John MacArthur’s conference, who would guess our attention on the weekend would be on Mark Driscoll, as evidenced here, here and here?
• Meanwhile, Furtick debriefed his church on all the attention they’ve been getting.
• Here’s another article suggesting you take an Internet hiatus. What makes this different is that it spells out exactly how to keep important messages coming. (Don’t all of you do this however, or nobody will be here next week!)
• Here’s a link that gets you eight more links…to eight short newsletter articles the National Association of Evangelicals published on the subject of Holy Humor. (Includes some writers you know well.)
• …And speaking of links to other links, here’s what an Academic edition of the Wednesday Link List might look like. (Brian LePort publishes one of these each week.)
• 48% of teenagers have received a sexually explicit message on their smartphones. A mobile monitoring system offers some advice applicable to youth workers.
• Get Religion is a media analysis site which last week looked at the coverage of the baptism of England’s Prince George from two different perspectives on what wasn’t mentioned.
• Got 3 minutes? Turns out Eric Niequist, the brother of Willow Creek’s Aaron Niequist has a film company which recently completed this very short film.
• That wraps up this week’s list. If we could end with a cartoon, it would be this one.

The Wednesday Link List is produced in our studios just east of Toronto, Canada where, for the record, we don’t have snow yet. Any rebroadcast, retransmission, or account of this link list, without the express written consent of Major League Baseball, is prohibited.

Today’s graphics were located at Matthew Paul Turner’s blog.

Edgy Christian Comic: Insert Image

Insert Image is the continuing story of Miles and JP from Paper City Church, as created by Wes Molebash. There’s a new comic panel every Monday.

having trouble viewing the complete image? Click here.

Best of Thinking Out Loud — Microblog Edition — September 2008

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Another brilliant post from the UK website ASBO Jesus.

The problem in the church isn’t to be found studying the churches that are seeker sensitive; the problem is dealing with the churches that are seeker hostile.~ source unknown

How God Made the Clouds

Summing it all up, friends, I’d say you’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse. Put into practice what you learned from me, what you heard and saw and realized. Do that, and God, who makes everything work together, will work you into his most excellent harmonies.

~ Phil 4:8 & 9 – The Message

Wednesday Link List

Copyright © 2011 The Zondervan Corporation

Wednesday List Lynx — two, actually

Time for another round of Christian blog and news links for the whole family. In the past we would often begin and end here with cartoons, but the whole question of fair use gets muddy sometimes, especially when humor meets illustration. I’ve studied the permissions statements of some of these and can’t reconcile what I read with what seems to be ubiquitous online. So we decided to run one, since it’s been awhile. Click the image to visit Reverend Run’s site.

• The question many reading this may face: Should a Christian go for counseling with a secular therapist?
• Essay of the week: The New Music Business, or Why I am No Longer Friends With Derek Webb.  No, it’s not what you think.
• Social justice and religious freedom: The ten worst countries in the world when it comes to persecuted for Christian belief. The list and a video.
• Meanwhile in the relative Christian security of the U.S., lists are published of the top five churches using social media best. 
• A ministry leader affirms all the good things he learned from Willow Creek, while at the same time confessing to the sin of methodolatry.
  
• What to say when someone is suffering. Your theodicy is probably determined by your theology. And that affects how you answer the “why” questions that will never fully go away.
• At the risk of continuing yesterday’s theme here ad infinitum check out Wade Burleson’s How To Kiss Calvinism Goodbye.
• Most of us have heard of Mormon baptisms for the dead, but in the first half of LDS history, baptisms for health were more common.
  
• Looking to give a book to a non-Christian friend, neighbor, relative or co-worker, but sure which one to give? Lots of good ideas can be found at Books for Evangelism.
• Lest someone think we have a vendetta against James MacDonald, we’ll bury this story in the middle of the link list: A popular teacher is dismissed from a Harvest day school for questioning the authenticity of church camp conversions.
• Taking their cue from U.S. federal politics, the Southern Baptist Convention yesterday re-elected their first black president, Rev. Fred Luter. Church Curmudgeon tweeted: “Houston, it will take much prayer and fasting to cast out this denom.”
  
• What if you have a calling to local church ministry, but also an understanding that you’re not quite ready? Here are eight tips on what to do in the meantime.
  
• Your Bible translation dollars at work: A Bible for Texans. “Don’t y’all not know that y’all are the temple of God?” 
• But in North Texas, another high school graduation speech is cut short for its references to God and faith.
  
• Okay, serious translation issues: How the ESV managed to change two words to singular case while every other translation had the words plural.
• The Christian Reformed Church and the Reformed Church of America have jointly produced Lift Up Your Hearts,  a brand new hymnbook with over 800 entries. Wait a minute; what’s a hymnbook?
• I’ll let this one introduce itself: “I love Al Mohler. I love 99% of his articles. I didn’t love his 2013 Summer Reading List. What a litany of bloodshed, suffering, death, and destruction! I’d hate to see the Winter Reading List.” Then he offers some alternatives.
  
• Here’s some reading for any woman considering the transition from SAHM to working mother. It’s sometimes a decision of career vs. tentmaking.
• And now Queen Elizabeth is being dragged into the gay marriage debate.
  
• Enough with the Sunday morning announcements already: Here are seven alternatives for your church to consider. Some people won’t like #5, though.
• For the church webmaster — and everyone else — to consider: Is your church website attractional or missional? This article could revolutionize your online presence.
• From our Folk Theology corner: Twenty theological urban legends. You may be guilty of accepting a few of these yourself.
• Sometimes worship leaders find themselves faced with a very popular worship song that people want to sing that they happen not to personally like.
  
• Don’t like the priest or rector touching the communion bread or wafer? Maybe he should get a Purity Communion Solutions Host Dispenser. And yes, it’s an older video, but the item is still available.
• One year after we first mentioned it, Cardiphonia is still offering entire album downloads for $1, or even less.
  
• Just in time for summer at a church near you: Why VBS Scarred Me As a Kid.  Is that scarred or scared? Guess it’s all the same.

Don’t forget to get your link suggestions in by 6:00 PM, Mondays, EST; and as always, for breaking links, you can follow me on Twitter. Look for @PaulW1lk1nson (change the letter i to a number 1).

Friday Link List

Yesterday we celebrated my birthday, though thankfully not one of those of ‘0’ or ‘5’ birthdays that make you feel old, today I simply feel older. Summer is much shorter here in the frozen north, but I was able to take a brief swim in two different lakes, though it would be tough to call those short dips swimming. I also spent about six hours of my birthday in the car, though thankfully I didn’t have to drive a single mile of it.  Helps having three licensed drivers in the family, even if two of them are only semi-licensed.

So nothing original today, you’ll have to settle for a few links:

• In just ten months, the United States managed to transform an 82 year-old Catholic nun and two pacifists from non-violent anti-nuclear peace protestors accused of misdemeanor trespassing into federal felons convicted of violent crimes of terrorism who are now in jail awaiting sentencing for their acts.
• Rob Bell is opening up 100 spots in his mini-conference series in mid-September and mid-October to people who want to get to know his creative process.  One of the topics: Where does the Bible fit in 2013?
• A book being advertised as authored by N. T. Wright is a book that the distinguished theologian said he had no knowledge of.  Furthermore, he has no memory of meeting his alleged co-author.
• Texas lawmakers have just made it politically correct for teachers to say Merry Christmas in the classroom.
• So no, the Drew Marshall who is a radio show host in Canada is not the same Drew Marshall who blogs at 88 Miles Per Hour and wrote today’s guest post at Stuff Christians Like.
• Not one, but two pastors of a Richmond, Virginia megachurch have been forced to step down to deal with pending criminal charges.
• A recent study is showing the benefits your monthly donations are having on the third-world children who are the recipients of child sponsorship.
• Another thoughtful post — first in months — from the mysterious blogger known as Flagrant Regard, who calls himself an abuser of grace.
• Meanwhile, another blogger suggests that the application of grace in the local church is at best somewhat selective.
• If you’re going to a blog called Journal of Faith, this certainly is the blog layout you want.

That will have to satisfy for today, and I hope you don’t mind some repeat cartoons.  Incidentally, you may note that some of the blogspot links here are blogspot.ca not blogspot.com; if your blog is one of them, yes you have a different address in Canada, though we’re not sure why; nobody else does this. But then, can anyone fathom anything Google does?  Let me know if ever any of those links don’t work. Also don’t forget, there’s always more happening on my Twitter page.