I recently received and read a new book from Thomas Nelson Publishers. This book is called “The Well-Behaved Child: Discipline That Really Works.” The book is written by John Rosemond, a noted parenting author.  There are a LOT of parenting books available, and they all come from different point of views.

John’s basic point of view is that we should be parenting like our parents did and we should be “meanies.” Say what we mean and mean what we say. He talks about general principles of parenting and discipline and then gives some specific examples and steps on how to deal with some of the biggest parenting issues.

John starts from the premise that ALL kids misbehave because all kids are…well, bad.  We should admit that and the parent must deal more  from a  position of punishing the bad than from that of rewarding the good.

To me, I thought John came off as though any parenting experts that don’t agree with him are dumb.  Parenting and discipline are so complex and varied, that I’m not sure that is the best view of things.

One of the main negatives in the book for me was about “explaining” to kids. John says that some of the best words parents can use are, “Because I said so.” This has always been something I personally thought was a big problem with parenting and it always seemed to me that parents should (in many cases, but not all) explain their reasoning so children can understand that parents are not just being “mean” but have good reasons. This seems especially true when dealing with matters of safety and security.

I did not find John’s arguments against “explaining” to be very persuasive. In fact, it seems like John is okay with parents being almost jerks to their kids simply because they have the authority to do so.

The book is pretty well written, a little cheesy in the writing, substantive and practical. It’s up to you if you agree with it or not.

I have decided not to play church softball this year. Now, to some of you this is equivalent to turning my back on Christ or becoming an atheist or, even worse, going to a seeker-sensitive megachurch.

I really just had no desire to play this year.  It’s not like a bunch of people are becoming followers of Christ because of the church softball league. In fact, I have found it tends to bring people’s salvation into question more than anything else (that is if you believe you can lose your salvation by cussing).

In addition, all the stupid rules tend to frustrate me (i.e, you must attend one church service a week even if your only motive for doing so is to play softball). It’s probably just a bad attitude, but I didn’t want to play.

It turns out that our church had to switch leagues but our other league only had something like two or three teams on it. We ended up joining the softball leagues of the much more conservative churches (I think they call it the 1611 KJV league).

I had decided not to play this year before we made the switch. Recently, I received an e-mail from our coach that included the rules for the leagues. One of the rules caught the eye of several players, including myself.  As I said, the rules are one of the reasons I didn’t want to play. The rules of the new league have confirmed my decision. Well, it’s really just one rule in particular:

a neat, clean Christian appearance must be kept at all times.

Yes, that is a quote. Yes, it makes me not want to play. Yes, it makes me wish Jesus was still here and still had his whip he took into the temple when he removed the money changers.

Here’s another quote: “The Lord does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart,” (1 Samuel 16:7).

I am still trying to determine what constitutes as a “Christian appearance.” Does that mean no tattoos, no piercings, no shorts, no mandals? What exactly does that mean?

What does a Christian look like? Are they implying that a Christian should look a certain way? Who makes that decision?

It seems to me that part of the reason Jesus came and died was to destroy the idea of judging or labeling someone based on what is on the outside. Anything else is just religious crap.

I recently became part of the ultra-cool Thomas Nelson blogger book review team.

The first book I requested to review was “Everyday Greatness” by Stephen Covey. At least, I thought it was by Stephen Covey. That’s really the negative part of this review.

The book isn’t really by Stephen Covey. It’s a collection of stories from Reader’s Digest with “insights and commentary by” Stephen Covey. I was expecting a sort of followup to “7 Habits of Highly Effective People“.  This may simply be a complete oversight on my part when I saw the book, but somehow the cover itself seems a little misleading.

The book take takes seven principles of what Covey considers everyday greatness and then breaks each principle down into three characteristics that help to achieve that principle. The seven principles and twenty-one characteristics are great to outline and can be used very well to evaluate yourself and your own “everyday greatness.”

Each of the twenty-one characteristics is a chapter in the book and has several stories from issues of Reader’s Digest.  The stories range from the incredible to the light-hearted.

Personally, I enjoy books that build on a particular theme from chapter to chapter. In that sense, this book is a little scattered. Most of the stories are interesting, although a few I found to be…well…dumb.  The overall idea of the book is a good one and the traits it brings out are great (I found myself needing to improve in some of the areas), but I did not like this particular format and would have preferred a book about these traits written entirely by Stephen Covey. I would give it two out of five stars.

Brad Abare has a post at Church Marketing Sucks about a church who reminded people of how they should play nice with their community. I found it….refreshing. Read it here. I also posted below:

I saw this over the weekend from a church in Eagle Rock, Calif., about eight miles outside of downtown Los Angeles. Christian Assembly has been in Eagle Rock for decades and although the size of the church community has grown substantially, they refuse to move or expand their current “campus” (if that’s what you call a cluster of rag-tag houses, mobile dwellings and offices crammed into a corner lot, steps away from a busy street). The sanctuary looks the same today as it probably did 30 years ago, including the carpet and pews. Love it.

In their weekly bulletin, which includes announcements, a ministry spotlight, sermon notes, a financial summary and core values, there was a section titled “How we play nice at [Christian Assembly].”

How we play nice at Christian Assembly
• 1. We park at the mall because we don’t want to upset our neighbors by blocking driveways or crowding streets.
• 2. We are a big family so we wear name tags.
• 3. We give up any saved seats at the greeting time because admit it, they aren’t coming.
• 4. We reserve the last two rows of the section in front of the upper room for parents accompanied by small children… they might need a quick exit.
• 5. In our church family everybody serves in some way.

I’m drawn to this simple approach to remind people about how to behave. It may be a little juvenile to some, but I think it has an appropriate dose of pant-kicking persuasion.

Don Miller has a great satirical post about his plumber. It is a must read. Click here. I have also posted it below:

Recently I purchased a new garbage disposal for my kitchen sink as the old one sounded like I’d dropped a watch in it. I got a referral from a friend for a good plumber, a man who happened to be a Christian, and I called him for an estimate. I called around and his price seemed fair so I made an appointment. The plumber, I will call him Judas, came over with the new disposal and installed it in under an hour. As far as plumbing goes, he was a master craftsman. I was very pleased with his work. And he was polite and kind and even made good conversation, explaining to me how my pipes worked. But here is why I was upset with my plumber:

He did not share the gospel of Jesus with me.

He was a Christian plumber posing as a non-christian plumber. Perhaps he was trying to be “relevant” or something, I don’t know.

So I confronted him. I opened my checkbook but didn’t write the check. I asked him how, as a Christian, he could leave the gospel out of his work? He made some excuse about being a plumber, about being a craftsman and having a job to do, and doing it well, fulfilling his responsibility. And then he had the nerve to say to me that, as a writer, my primary job wasn’t to share the gospel, it was to write a good book. Can you believe he said that to me? I accused him of being emergent.

He tried to calm me down, as by this time I had closed my checkbook. He said to me, look, you know, if somebody writes a cook book, they are just doing a service, they are sharing recipes. No Christian would judge the author of a cookbook for not putting the gospel of Jesus in it, would they? Or a novel, for that matter, or a self-help book that helped people organize their time? Those are utilitarian, right? He was trying to confuse me with his mystical thinking, his new-age, left leaning theological wish wash. I accused him of not loving Jesus, and of completely abandoning scripture in his work life.

Judas then said to me that he often shares the gospel, and he makes no rules about when he will or when he won’t. He said he hadn’t even thought about it that day. I pointed at him and said “aha!” and he kind of rolled his eyes.

He kept talking but I had my fingers in my ears so I don’t know what else he said.

Anyway, I just needed to get that off my chest. It was a frustrating day. Tomorrow I’m having a guy come over to take the disposal out.

Best,

Don

P.S. Apparently more than a few people took this post seriously. Heavens. It’s a satirical commentary on criticism of Christian artists for “crossing over.” But I love your purity of heart. Seriously, though, do you really think I’d stand in the kitchen with my plumber and put my fingers in my ears? Don’t answer that.

I have just finished reading “New Testament History” by F.F. Bruce. A friend of mine was getting rid of some books and it was one of his textbooks in college. I really like history and I read the New Testament pretty much every day, so I thought I would try it. It was a long book (over 400 pages and really small type size) and I figured it would be a boring, but thought it might be good to have around.

I actually found it to be pretty interesting. It was a long book and at times felt  long, and sometimes got  technical, but over all I enjoyed it.

It reminded me how important it is (especially for Bible teachers) to understand the cultural and political context of the Scriptures.  Understanding what was going on in Jerusalem, Judea and the surrounding areas sheds a new light on much of Scripture.  Knowing that the people of first century Jerusalem  were living in a land occupied by Italians who weren’t too crazy about the indigenous people brings new meaning to many things Jesus and Paul said.

To properly study the Bible, we have to ask ourselves some questions:

1)      Who is writing this?

2)      Who are they writing to?

3)      Why are they writing it?

4)      What are the circumstances going on at that time?

These questions are important, because they help to guide in a proper understanding of the Bible. Otherwise, we apply our own meaning or own cultural nuances to the passage.  This can not only be misleading, but can be dangerous.

Once we understand the answers to the above questions, we can take the meaning of the passage and find out how that principal or meaning applies to our lives and our time now.

For me, this has brought on great meaning to difficult parts of the bible and has helped to apply the Scripture more effectively in my life.

For a great book on this, I would highly recommend “The Blue Parakeet” by Scot McKnight.

“Most people would like to be delivered from temptation but would like it to keep in touch.” – Robert Orben

Here are some notes from a lesson I taught on Hebrews 1:1-2:

*Book begins with God (just like everything)

- Everything comes from God

- Without God there is nothing

- God is the creator, still creating and is making new creations out of us.

*God spoke and is still speaking

- It is an honor that God would speak to us

- It is difficult to build a relationship without speaking

- God desires to speak to us (Zephaniah 3:17)

- God spoke the world into existence (Genesis 1)

- God spoke to the prophets in different way and different times

Polumeros – portions

Polutropos – ways

*Ways God has spoken

-Creation (God speaking) Ex Nihilo

-Ten Commandments (ten words in Hebrew)

- Leaders and prophets

Abraham – Audibly (face to face)

Isaac, Jacob, Noah

Moses – burning bush (Exodus 3:2)

Prophets

Donkey – Balaam (Numbers 22:21-23)

400 silent years (Jews are scattered, synagogue setup, Septuagint (greek ot) is written)

New Testament (Joseph, Wise Men, Paul, Peter – mostly dreams)

*Now God speaks through Jesus (in these last days)

- Parable of the wine press (Matt. 21:33-39)

- A son has more authority to speak for his father than anyone else.

- John 1:1 (The Word became flesh)

Word- Greek word is “logos”. Greek for an actual work is “lexis.” This word includes the thought behind the speaking. Speaking on the grounds of belief or action. Speaking with meaning.

- 1 Peter 1:10-12, 22-25 (Prophets wondered about it, it is good news preached to us)

-Jesus is the walking, speaking, moving voice of God

-All other words spoken are incomplete until now.

- Jesus speaks a better word

- Jesus speaks the final word

- No other word about you matters but the word Jesus speaks about you

- Jesus speaks life, light and love

- Jesus is speaking for God and He’s speaking for you.

I thought I would post my notes from my lesson in my Life Group on Sunday Night. We have been going through the book of Hebrews. We talked about the phrase in Hebrews 1:3 that say “by whom he made the worlds.”

1) God created everything. (Genesis 1:1; Col. 1:16-17; John 1:3)

-          Everything belongs to him

-          Jesus is co-creator with God

-          We are stewards of it (dominion)

2) Creation is made to worship the Creator. (Psalm 19:1-2; Acts 17:24-28)

-          It’s God’s universe and God’s way. Now, you might have a better way but you don’t have a universe                (J. Vernon Mcgee)

-          We have to know our place in Creation so worship can be placed properly

3) Worship misplaced is idolatry. (John 1:10; Romans 1:20-25)

-          Idolatry is making a good thing a God thing – Mark Driscoll

-          What other than God are we worshipping?

4) God is still creating. (Eph. 4:24; 2 Cor. 5:17; Gal. 6:15)

-          God is still working and moving in creation.

-          We have to believe that  God can re-create any person or any situation.

5) We are to work with God in redeeming creation. (Gen. 1:26-30; Gen. 2:15; Eph. 2:10)

-          People need to know the real Creator

Questions To think about:

-          What is our attitude toward creation?

-          What are we doing to redeem creation?

-           What creation are we worshipping?

The Atlanta Journal Constitution has a fantastic article that brings hope to a lot of people, including me. A church in Atlanta is selling it’s church building and property and using the money to help people in the community. What a great idea!

This story is great. My favorite quote:

“I’m afraid if we become a church of bricks and mortar, we’ll cease to be a church of flesh and blood.”

Read the article here. If you’re a pastor, maybe you should pray about doing the same thing.