:: in a mirror dimly :: A theology and culture blog with the Bible in one tab and a news feed in the other.

We drove down to Gloucester, MA yesterday. 3.5 hours down and 3.5 hours back. In the snow by the way.

My brother-in-law and sister-in-law are up from Arkansas and they wanted to return to their old stomping grounds in the north shore area. My wife went to college at Gordon and my other brother-in-law lived in that area for a few months, so they all had some ties to the area.

Of all days it snowed. It snowed quite a bit actually. We took a great walk on the beach in Gloucester, but became completely soaked after a short while. My jeans were really, really wet. And don’t even mention my feet.

After chilling and soaking ourselves, we drove on over to a Thai restaurant in Beverly, MA. I drank Thai tea by the gallon and munched on spring rolls. Good times.

It was kind of a crazy trip, but we had a great time catching up and enjoying the beach. Now that I’m warm and dry, it seems like a splendid idea. Here are a few pictures by the way:

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Some random facts to bring in the new year:

200 million people have already stopped writing their blogs.

More than one in eight adults in the US show signs of being addicted to the internet, a study has shown.

Iceland is most web-savvy country, with a study showing it has the highest concentration of broadband users.

Physically, mentally, and spiritually there is a need for space. Creating time for this space is quite difficult, when I run from one activity to another.

If only for a few days, I have been able to settle down a little bit. I find that I can think more clearly and simply relax.

I knew I needed this time because I only wanted to read my Edward Rutherford books: Princes of Ireland, Rebels of Ireland, and now London. It’s recreational reading, light historical fiction that helps me unwind. At least I think it may. It’s better than TV for sure.

Now I’m crawling back to NT Wright’s Evil and the Justice of God and The Shaping of Things to Come. Also my moleskine journal is starting to fill up with more writing lately. All of these are good signs.

Sometimes “staying busy” becomes an end in itself. It feels right, but then I stop and realize how empty I am, how little I have prayed, and how neglected my mind has become. And that’s why vacations are so important.

I tried lowering my expectations this year for Christmas. Instead of seeking out a profound, life-changing religious experience, I tried to approach this holy day like any other.

For example, I usually pray at irregular times and just try to hear God. Whatever he wants to say, I try to be available to hear. Sometimes it works, sometimes not so much.

On Christmas I read my Bible as usual and prayed as usual, doing nothing too far from the ordinary and not expecting to have my life changed. And I heard something.

“Be a temple,” is what I heard. There God goes again using three words at a time. Apparently that’s all I can handle. But isn’t that an interesting message for Christmas?

In the grand picture of salvation history, God was essentially making the old temple system of Israel obsolete. The watershed moment was the arrival of his Son and the eventual imparting of the Holy Spirit.

Being a temple of the Lord carries many ramifications. There is a call to be holy, pure, and set apart. God is able to meet us at any time or place. And these wonderful circumstances are all made possible by the coming of Jesus.

And that’s about it for Christmas. We exchanged gifts, ate a lot, and watched football. I had some time to catch up with family. Not a bad time. Not a major life-changing event, but I don’t think it has to be. I think that was enough.

Another holiday means another time to reflect on driving in New Jersey, THE **cough, cough** GARDEN STATE. While driving just about the length of this densely populated state, I had a few thoughts.

1. Can we find a new slogan for NJ??? There are not all that many farms. What if they took the vanity plate that says, “Shore to Please” and made that the slogan? That’s at least a touch more accurate, and the shore is what people typically associate with NJ (that is in a positive sense).

Of course we could play with Garden State too. “Former Garden State,” “Garden State . . . NOT,” and so forth, but I prefer a new slogan. This doesn’t have to be a loss either. This could be win win.

Sure the farms and gardens are covered in concrete, cement, and asphalt, but NJ now has a chance to reinvent itself so to speak. Find a new niche and made a big public relations thing out of it.

2. Defensive driving brings its own punishment, aggressive driving brings its own rewards. For some reason it’s just much easier and enjoyable to drive aggressively in NJ. A safe following distance only means that people will cut in front of you and put you in just as much danger if not more if you were close to the car in front of you.

So after numerous cars swiftly buzzed in front of me and led to a slamming of the brakes, I decided to harden my heart. Screw ‘em. I didn’t let anyone in front of me. If they sped up along my side, I boxed them in by equaling their speed. And somehow, I felt nicer and more at peace. Ah the paradox of driving in NJ.

And that’s really about it. We didn’t drive too much in NJ this trip and rarely ever left the main road. Phew.

I found this blog post about the threat to Santa Claus posed by Google Earth. It’s not going to be a jolly year for the big man.

It looks like technology has finally caught up with us. Children have more resources than their parents and are now able test anything they deem suspicious.

Sure you can pick up a coffee mug, tie, or box of chocolates for that special someone, but let’s face it, some people really defy neat and clean gift categories. Finding such people a gift can be time-consuming and frustrating.

But what if this impasse became an opportunity to give a truly unique and meaningful gift? Here are some ideas for some really unusual gifts that may be a great fit for the right person:

Link Up with Pastor Bill
I knew Pastor Bill back in my Doylestown, PA days. He’s a nice guy with lots of experience with counseling and grief issues. He’s started his own web site dealing with the issue of forgiveness that provides a number of resources and posts that anyone in a tough time will find helpful. At least that’s what I think . . .

A Web Site by Todd
Some people need to take their act onto the internet, but setting up a web site can be daunting for the uninitiated. That’s where Todd comes in. He made the cool site you just visited for Pastor Bill, and he’s gaining momentum as a top-notch web designer.

Computer Maintenance
This may be a hard one to quantify as a gift, but think about this. There are thousands of computers pining away in the homes of people who aren’t quite sure what to do with them. What if a computer-savvy family member dropped in to clean things up, deleted unnecessary files, and set up Firefox, Gmail, and some ad-ware programs?

In addition, you could also set this relative up with a few of the open source programs available these days. By the time you’re done, you could set up this relative to keep in touch via the computer because this is the only way some of us will ever write someone a note.

Time Magazine reports on the shift away from religious fundamentalism and the power of religion in politics. This sounds like good news for Christianity at least, since Christianity thrives better on the margins than in the halls of power.

Regarding Evangelicals, the article states:

“Evangelicalism also saw the beginnings of a political divide. A new head of the Christian Coalition was forced to resign after he wanted to expand the group’s mission from abortion, marriage and stem cells to poverty and the environment. David Kuo, a former Bush Administration insider who helped run the faith-based social program, wrote a book decrying the cynical use of Evangelicals for political gain and regretting his enmeshment with the religious right. He called for devout Christians to take a two-year fast from politics. And in a remarkable sign of a new era, the orthodox Evangelical Rick Warren invited Democratic Senator Barack Obama to address a conference on AIDS. What was once a seemingly rigid and monolithic group was revealed to be actually more diverse, nuanced and open to debate than once seemed possible.”

Read the rest.

The thing I love about Firefox is the plentiful supply of tools you can add right to the web browser. For example, I have Cocoments built in to my browsing screen so I can track all of the comments I have left on blogs. If anything, it has encouraged me to leave more comments and then follow up on the conversation.

My latest addition is Cooliris. Cooliris is also built in to Firefox and creates a little box to the right of every link your pointer passes over. It works with most browsers, but of course Firefox is one of the best.

When the pointer is brought on top of the box, a screen appears that provides a preview of link’s destination page. It’s quite handy when performing a google search and in many other scenarios where one is uncertain of a page’s content.

Take Cooliris for a test drive. Maybe it’s practical for some and not others. So far I enjoy using it.

Our alarm clock is set to NPR, so when Julie’s alarm went off this morning and stayed on and on and on, I heard the strangest report. It was the BBC show, which I love because the host is so abrasive to his guests. If you haven’t heard it, you need to. It’s especially gut-wrenching when the interviewee has broken English.

Guest: “And the eh Americans eh, eh”
BBC: “But Sir, you can’t possibly be making such a ludicrous point!”
Guest: “Oh, but I eh, eh”
BBC: “Well that’s preposterous!”

The poor guy is hardly out of the gate by the time the BBC host walls him in. Anyway, back to the strange report I heard. I couldn’t dig it up this morning. If anyone finds the audio clip or transcript, please drop it in the comments. So here’s my summary:

Somebody is very concerned that “fundamentalist evangelical Christians” are infiltrating the Pentagon and the US military. He said this group poses the same kind of threat as Al Qaida and other terrorist groups because of their apocalyptic view of human history that sends them marching towards Armageddon.

He then proceeded to string together a collection barely related circumstances that were supposed to be convincing and ended by comparing “fundamentalist evangelicals” with Nazi fascists.

Does that sound a little inflammatory to anyone???? Sheesh.

I don’t even know if dialogue is possible with such a person who relies on rhetoric and sensationalism to grind his ax. But I’ll at least pose some counterpoints.

1. Most evangelicals are not fundamentalists and many evangelicals are not longing for Armageddon and rivers of blood (this guy actually made Christians sound blood-thirsty!). Even the weirdest fundamentalist (who are not quite the same as more moderate evangelicals) are not willing to kill innocent people or wage war, they simply want God to return . . . and the problem is they believe that God is going to kill LOTS of people. I don’t believe that, but there you have it.

2. There is a place for legitimate concern when American nationalism becomes the Christian thing to do. Christians have a place serving in every area of America, but not as state sanctioned officials. America is not a Christian nation. There is not a consensus among Evangelicals on this one, but there is a very strong movement in the church that aims to separate the church from its privileged place in society. No religion should receive special treatment by the government.

3. One of the points this guy brought up was the mission statement of one Christian ministry among the US military. The statement was something like this:

“A spiritually transformed military, with ambassadors for Christ in uniform, empowered by the Holy Spirit, living with a passion for God and compassion for the entire military society. The essence of the OCF Vision and Purpose can be communicated succinctly by the following slogan:

Christian Officers Exercising Biblical Leadership to Raise up a Godly Military”

He emphasized the “ambassadors” word and the “empowered” word when he read it. He then jumped in the Nazi/fascist comparison.

Now I’m not terribly familiar with these groups, but I’ll bet their focus, based on their materials and knowing a bit about Christians, is on cultivating a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. That’s really the core of evangelicalism. We also believe in sharing this with others, but how one goes about this can be debated and is not agreed on across the evangelical board.

I don’t think there’s anything to worry about in this statement. This group is not trying to harness the power of the US and it’s military in order to bring about Armageddon. The goal is to point soldiers toward God, which can only mean good things for our military: a strong moral compass and the inner peace of God’s Spirit. The empowerment of the Holy Spirit should bring about peace and wisdom, that’s part of the Spirit’s role.

I’ve said enough. I hope to someday find a link to this report because I believe it is based on misunderstandings and inflammatory rhetoric. Now that we’ve silenced that critic, let’s all start campaigning for the Republicans for ‘08 in order to start more wars and bring the world to an end . . .

The New Yorker has an article about the waste of Christmas spending:

“Waldfogel’s main finding is that, in general, people spend a lot more on presents than they’re worth to those who receive them, a phenomenon that he calls ‘the deadweight loss of Christmas.’”

The solution? Go small and thoughtful. Buy a gift card. Keep it simple.

That’s about a week too late for me, I suppose. Maybe I can put a link to this article into my Google calendar and set a reminder for next November.

HT: Jordon

While singing O’ Little Town of Bethlehem this Christmas, we should first think of Jesus and tumultuous world he was soon thrust into. But a second thought is of the actual town of Bethlehem today.

Now that brings up a whole host of issues. Bethlehem is in the West Bank, an area occupied by Israel after the Six Day War. It’s a town populated by Palestinians who have had a rough lot in life.

My own perspective on Israel and the Palestinians has been informed of late by a book caled Leap of Faith, the memoir of Queen Noor of Jordan. First of all, King Hussein sounds like he was a real character with an ever present sense of humor. Secondly though, Noor shares the Arab perspective on the Palestinian conflict.

First of all I’d like to toss in my own two cents. While I have sympathy for the loss of the Palestinians and their true lack of a leadership committed to a peaceful resolution for much of their history (let’s not forget that Arafat was a terrorist first), my view for a while went something like this: the Arabs started a war . . . they lost . . . that’s all there is to it. Of course Israel has done plenty to start wars, such as the Six Day War and even the recent conflict with lebanon, but the 1948 war always seemed fairly cut and dry to myself.

But here’s the thing that Noor points out, before there was a war, there was a declaration that the West dropped on the Middle East. It’s called the Balfour Declaration. Here’s the Wikipedia article: The letter stated that the British government “view[ed] with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country”.

In other words, the West dropped this conflict right into the Middle East. A European problem became a Middle Eastern problem simply because the West held the power. And that right there is where the Palestinian problem begins. It’s not just the 1948 War, it’s the series of political decisions leading up to the war that must be considered even today as we confront the plight of the Palestinians. The Palestinians’ land was essentially given to another people by foreign nations.

And so the little town of Bethlehem has had a rough century. We should pray for the people of Bethlehem who have yet to know the peace that Christians hope for under the coming reign of the Lord. We should also pray for the Christians of this town, as their lot is particularly difficult. They belong to a race that is under the threat of Israeli attack and a religion that separates them from their muslim neighbors.

Jesus is going to have some pretty tough competition in the cities of Philadelphia and Dallas on December 25th. It’s all because of what happened Sunday night.

On Sunday night the Philadelphia Eagles, my hometown football team, defeated the New York Giants, giving the birds an 8-6 record. Yet this victory is not so amazing. What’s amazing is that I suddenly care about how the Eagles are doing after they seemed to self-destruct in the middle of the season. Even Julie is shocked by my sudden turn around.

As a result of this win, the 8-6 Eagles play the 9-5 Cowboys who are in the same division. A win for the Eagles puts them in a tie for first place and a good chance at making the play offs (not that they’ll do a whole lot in the play offs), while a win for Dallas basically gives them the division title. And this game, this game that will be watched by so many, is happening on Christmas Day.

But I didn’t mean to blabber about football, I want to talk about Christmas. And surely this football game is just a sideshow for the main the event, the reason why we gather together: swapping presents . . . I mean celebrating the birth of Jesus.

Let’s cut to the chase here. Christmas is not just about the birth of Jesus. If only it were. It’s become a commercialized adaptation of a pagan holiday with some Christianity sprinkled in. It’s about time off from work, getting together with family, swapping gifts, and going to church if that’s your thing.

So what should we do about this mess? We typically try to fight the tide by trying to have a really spiritual, meaningful Christmas. We focus really, really hard on Jesus. We sing songs, clutch candles, hear the stories, all the while our voice mails are filled with calls from relatives, gifts are hidden in our cars, and we keep thinking about all of the cooking and cleaning we have to do.

Of course singing Silent Night by candle light doesn’t always create the mystical experience we crave. We often leave church or walk away from our times of meditation feeling just as empty and hurried as we began them, albeit, a few hours behind. Where do we find meaning in Christmas?

One thought: plant something. Instead of looking for Christmas to be this amazing time where God swoops down from heaven, bops you on the head, and you consequently lay on the floor convulsing from the amazing revelation, ask God to begin something in you that can take root and then grow over this coming year.

Silence, solitude, generosity, patience, gentleness, etc. These are all very simple things. Ask God where he wants to work on you and make that one thing your seed. Let’s open our hearts to the Lord and allow him to sow his life into us.

Expecting something small may even require more faith than it takes to expect something large and amazing. This is faith for the long haul.

The prophets anticipated the coming of God’s rule among his people. The exile ended, the restoration began, the Greeks invaded, apocalyptic literature was written to encourage the people, the Jews fought for and won independence, and then the unexpected happened.

When the Israelites expected God to bring his kingdom to earth and the reign of his messiah, the Romans invaded and took things over. And despite this devastating turn in events, there were still glimmers of hope expressed in the same manner as the prophets and intertestamental writings.

Take a look at Luke 1:1-25 for instance. A man has a vision, an angel promises a child to his barren wife, and then his wife conceives and sets herself apart to the Lord. The promise of deliverance remains:

1:16[John] He will turn many of the people of Israel to the Lord their God.
1:17 And he will go as forerunner before the Lord in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers back to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready for the Lord a people prepared for him.”

Things are not looking great at the moment, but God’s promises remain.

In preparation for Christmas I have spent a good deal of time in the prophets, looking at the people of Israel during the time of anticipation before the coming of Christ. The chapter I can’t escape is Zechariah 7. That led to some thoughts on giving late one night and I scribbled them down.

I hammered it out the next day and shipped it off to the Ooze. You can read it here.