Two new sermons have been uploaded. First is a sermon about greed, taken from the occasion of the Ephesian riots instigated by the silversmiths who were angry about the loss of revenue if people became Christians and stopped buying idols of Diana.

Second is a sermon drawn from Paul’s final message to the Ephesian elders, teaching the purpose of the ministry of the word and why it is important. The link is on the sidebar.

Go say goodbye to Rusty, who’s giving up blogging for the time being. I get around the time problem by just being very irregular and lazy about posting. But that doesn’t work for everyone. He’s been a much more dedicated blogger than I, given that he already quit once and was still more regular than I was.

I’ve enjoye your blog, Rusty. Stop in anytime.

In the 24th chapter of Ezekiel, God takes the life of Ezekiel’s wife, and forbids him to mourn her death. This is a sign to the people of Israel, for they will shortly hear of the destruction of Jerusalem and the razing of the temple, and they will be so dumbfounded that they will be unable to mourn.

Could someone go up to Ezekiel’s wife that day and say, “God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life?” In fact, God’s plan was for her to die. Could you make that statement to the thief on the cross, who had no life left to live?

Too much of Christianity today is focused on how to make ourselves happy and have a wonderful life. One of the most popular evangelical tools, the Four Spiritual Laws of Campus Crusade, teach us that this is how it ought to be, and that we should become Christians because of how wonderful our life will be. But God’s plan for us may very well be for our life to end suddenly. If our hope is in this world, we are likely to be disappointed. But if our hope is in what will happen as a consequence of our death, then we can rest assured that our hope will be realized.

Fox News is reporting that some hurricane victims appear to be auctioning off MRE’s on Ebay. This is supposed to be a terrible thing for them to be doing.

But if my roof had been torn off and I had been unable to work for quite a while, cash might come at a higher premium than food. Maybe I have enough food, but need to reshingle my roof. Why is it immoral for me to sell the MRE’s?

If you think it was inefficient for the government to give food to people who don’t need it, you’re right. But this is why the government shouldn’t be in the charity business. If you think that the MRE’s should be given to someone else who needs them, you’re assuming that the sellers haven’t already helped a lot, and that’s a big assumption. You’re assuming that there are people very close to these people, that they’re aware of, who need the food. What are people supposed to do, drive around a three-state area looking for people who need the MRE’s?

Why is it supposed to be moral for people to use the charity for exactly what it’s intended for, but wrong to divert it to another need that they think is more pressing? Why is that a problem?

The root of this is that too many people think profit is inherently bad. It’s an anticapitalist attitude that assumes that anyone making money must be a bad guy. But there’s absolutely no reason I can think of why this should be condemned.

There was some talk in the article that it might be illegal to resell MRE’s like this although there was some uncertainty on this point. If it was illegal, then they shouldn’t do it, but I take this position only out of respect for the law, not because of the intrinsic moral nature of the act.

This is definitely inefficient, but that’s just an argument for private charity, who is always in a much better position to determine real needs, and not waste everyone’s time and money giving people things they don’t need.

Whenever governments arrogate rightfully private functions to itself, it always seeks to restrict the choices of individuals regarding those functions in order to maintain their power monopoly. That’s why they’re upset about this, because people are proving that the market is always a more efficient way to meet these kinds of needs than the government will ever be.

While reading Ryken’s excellent The Word of God in English, something occurred to me about the dynamic translation model. This is the model that seeks to present the Scriptures in language which is in tune with the people it’s being presented to. So, figures of speech and cultural references are often either changed into equivalents in the target culture, or simply dropped altogether. This is the model of translation that versions such as the NIV, TNIV, Good News Bible, the Living Translation (and New Living Translation), and the Message all use.

But it occurs to me that this results in what are essentially disposable translations. It will present itself in terms that are very specific to a particular period, with the result that the Bible will become obsolete. A Bible that is written in the ’70’s will seem very dated by the ’90’s.

At first, I thought that this was a very foolish thing for the translators to do. But then I realized what a lucrative revenue stream this will create for the publishers, as everyone needs to get brand new re-translated copyrighted Bibles every decade or so.

I really hope that’s not the motivation.

Sunday’s sermon was called “Magic Spells”, and it was taken from Acts 19. A lot of Christians worry about Halloween, but the real concern over magic should be focused on a far more pervasive problem, which is an approach to Christianity that basically looks at it as if it were a magic spell. All of the prosperity gospel and “abundant life” stuff falls into this terrible sin.

The sons of Sceva believed that the name of Jesus could be used as a magic spell. They thought they could work Him into their routine, and get a little bit of Paul’s action. This was Simon the Sorcerer’s sin as well, who believed he could buy the gift of the Holy Spirit from Peter.

Magic is the attempt to use some kind of power or knowledge to control or manipulate God to do what you want. It is the belief that the forces that underlie the universe could be bound to our will. And when we approach Christianity with a mind to see what we can get out of it, this is essentially what we are doing. This is a far greater danger to the church than any Harry Potter book, and serious Christians need to sit up and take notice, first looking for this attitude in their own practices, and also in their churches.

If I think that getting baptized or going to church or a mission trip or saying enough prayers forces God to bless me, then I am essentially practicing magic. I am attempting to make God my instrument to accomplish my ends.

Real religion is the opposite- I submit myself to God, and make myself His instrument, to accomplish His ends. In the Bible, the holy men never take hold of God’s power to do what they want. Instead, God works miracles and accomplishes great things, sometimes using holy men as His instrument. It’s all the difference in the world.

The people of Ephesus recognized the difference. When they saw the failure of the sons of Sceva, they all brought their spell books to be burned. Our spell books are not Harry Potter or the Lord of the Rings- our spell books are the latest fads on how to use God to get rich, be happy, and accomplish your goals.

The whole sermon is on the sidebar link.

I’m currently reading two books about English Bible versions and translation and textual issues. One of them is Leland Ryken’s The Word of God in English. This is an excellent book, and makes a wonderful case for formal translations, instead of dynamic translations like the NIV or The Message.

Ryken was on the translation committee for the ESV, and that’s one of the annoyances about the book- it reads like an advertisement for that version. But interestingly, if you reject his argument (or really just assertions) about the Textus Receptus being unscholarly and obsolete, the book is really a very effective argument for the King James Version.

Tune in later for more about this, and the second book I’m reading on this subject.

Andy at Dead Mens’ Voices has a beautiful post written on the deference that men used to show women in our society. We lost much when we left our traditional ways, I think.

It brings up another subject I’ve been meaning to write about, though I will fail to do so in Andy’s eloquent fashion. I wrote here about one aspect of the economic value of women staying at home and raising kids. My point there was simply that children are an economic good, and remain so today, even if they are not as immediately an obvious benefit as they used to be in agrarian societies, which is probably why so many today forego those long-term benefits and opt for the immediate benefit of a salary.

But another aspect of the benefit of stay-at-home moms is the quality of life benefit. This is a major benefit to me. I have higher-quality meals; a cleaner house; someone taking care of the kids; someone bringing me my coffee in the morning. All of this is not an insignificant benefit. You might say that yes, there’s that benefit, but that’s an intangible, non-economic benefit. And my answer to that is, how much would I have to pay someone (or several someones, likely) to do all of the things that my wife does for me and my family?

Now this is especially relevant in my line of work. I’m a pastor. And a pastor needs to have people in his home a lot. Because I have a stay-at-home wife, I can feel comfortable inviting people to stop by pretty much any time, and I know that while the house isn’t perfect on a moment’s notice, it’s never a disaster, or something I’m embarrassed of.

But everyone, not just pastors, pays a lot of money for a lot of things that have to do with quality of life, and are not strictly related to need. You buy a bigger house. Get a nicer car. Go on a vacation. Go out to eat. How much money do people spend on these things? And it was my experience, when Andrea was working, that we spent a lot more on those things. Partly because we had it to spend, but I think a big reason was also because we felt the need to get away more. It was harder work to keep the house clean, and we didn’t even have kids then. Andrea didn’t want to work all day and then come home and cook too. And I don’t blame her.

One of the things I’ve learned from Getting Things Done is how much value there is to reducing the “stuff” in your life. “Stuff”, according to Allen, is anything that’s not in its place. And he makes no distinction in this regard between business and personal stuff, because all of it competes for the same mindspace. The same brain that worries about the new restructuring plan or the problem with the accounting department also worries about the carpets that need cleaned at home. Having a stay-at-home mom greatly reduces the amount of stuff in my life. I don’t have to worry about the kids in day-care or whether the cleaning lady is stealing the good silver.

Having a stay-at-home wife is worth so much to me. I’d be hard-pressed to put a price tag on it, but I know I’d need to hire a full-time live-in person to bring me the value that my wife brings. And there are lots of truly intangible benefits that the live-in person could not provide (like getting a kiss when I get my morning coffee!).

People often say that they could not afford to live on one salary any more. I say they’re often not looking at the whole picture. It’s certainly true sometimes. But a lot of times it’s just short-sighted; not looking at the whole picture. The wife in Proverbs 31 had created a worry-free environment that allowed her husband to pursue lots of other interests, including politics. Maybe we don’t have a lot of cash to take fancy vacations. But I love my home. I don’t feel that big a need to get away from it. And my wife is the reason that I love my home.

Just out of curiousity, I did a Google on “Limon Colorado blog”. Almost every relevant result was someone blogging a trip in which they drove through Limon.

We’re the hub city. Everyone’s been through Limon.

I have recently become a David Allen fan. This happened mostly thorugh the instigation of Merlin at 43 Folders, whose list of 5ives I’d been reading a while, but only discovered the main site fairly recently. David Allen is the author of a book called Getting Things Done, a book I just can’t recommend enough if you’re looking to become more productive.

I did it all- I did the personal review, I set up a tickler file, I reorganized my whole workspace and re-processed all my “stuff”. I now live by next actions. I even duplicated the workflow chart and printed it out and taped it up in front of my workspeace.

Forgetting things used to be just part of my modus operandi. I thought of it as part of my inimitable charm. But there’s really nothing very charming about it, and sometimes you really need to retire the personal cliches. I still forget things, but I feel like I’ve really made progress in that regard.

I haven’t gone as far as the Hipster PDA, though. I’d just bought a new Palm Tungsten to replace my HP Ipaq H1910 (broken by lifting a heavy object against it inadvertently- the danger of the belt clip) and I love it. Palm always had a certain elegance that PocketPC lacked. PocketPC feels too much like someone trying to cram Windows onto a 3 inch screen, whereas Palm OS always felt more like it was actually designed with a PDA in mind. I started with a Palm IIIx way back in the day, but went to Ipaqs when I worked for Compaq (and then HP, inadvertently). I won one in a contest and got a good deal on another, and Andrea and I both used them. But when it was time to replace it, I just felt like there was a lot more bang for the buck in the Palm OS, and I haven’t been disappointed.

So to sum up, David Allen knows his stuff. Check it out if you feel like you could use a little (or a lot, as was my case) more organization in your life.