Ahh the heretic.

Calvin on Lifting the Eyes

I'm beginning to study John 17's account of Jesus' High Priestly Prayer. Here's a gem of a quote from Calvin on Jesus lifting his eyes to heaven to pray.

"Yet if we desire to actually imitate Christ, we must take care that outward gestures do not express more than is in our mind, but that the inward feeling shall direct the eyes, the hands, the tongue, and everything about us."

- John Calvin



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Location:Basic Impact World Headquarters St. Andrews Mount Pleasant SC

From my friends Facebook...

Steve Wood
Capitalism at its best: An atheist is offering pet care for Christians who anticipate being raptured tomorrow. The guy is charging $150 up front to ensure ongoing care of your animals. So far, 500+ people have paid for his services. Wished I'd have thought of that one - dang.



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Keeping with this weeks video series...

enjoy

I welcome the rants....

Thoughts??

"Have you just lied to me?"

This was posted over at Ed Stezer's blog... 

These lists are from Cultivating a Life for God (Church Smart Resources 1999 pp.125-131).
Typically, these questions are asked in groups of 2-3, are specific to men or women, meets regularly, and hold each other accountable.
John Wesley's Small Group Questions:

1. Am I consciously or unconsciously creating the impression that I am better than I am? In other words, am I a hypocrite?
2. Am I honest in all my acts and words, or do I exaggerate?
3. Do I confidentially pass onto another what was told me in confidence?
4. Am I a slave to dress, friends, work , or habits?
5. Am I self-conscious, self-pitying, or self-justifying?
6. Did the Bible live in me today?
7. Do I give it time to speak to me everyday?
8. Am I enjoying prayer?
9. When did I last speak to someone about my faith?
10. Do I pray about the money I spend?
11. Do I get to bed on time and get up on time?
12. Do I disobey God in anything?
13. Do I insist upon doing something about which my conscience is uneasy?
14. Am I defeated in any part of my life?
15. Am I jealous, impure, critical, irritable, touchy or distrustful?
16. How do I spend my spare time?
17. Am I proud?
18. Do I thank God that I am not as other people, especially as the Pharisee who despised the publican?
19. Is there anyone whom I fear, dislike, disown, criticize, hold resentment toward or disregard? If so, what am I going to do about it?
20. Do I grumble and complain constantly?
21. Is Christ real to me?

Wesley's Band Meeting Questions:

1. What known sins have you committed since our last meeting?
2. What temptations have you met with?
3. How were you delivered?
4. What have you thought, said, or done, of which you doubt whether it be sin or not?
5. Have you nothing you desire to keep secret?

Reference: John Wesley's Class Meetings: a Model for Making Disciples, by D. Michael Henderson, Evangel Publishing House, 1997, pp. 118-9

Chuck Swindoll's Pastoral Accountability Questions:
In his book, The Body, Chuck Colson lists the questions used by Chuck Swindoll.

1. Have you been with a woman anywhere this past week that might be seen as compromising?
2. Have any of your financial dealings lacked integrity?
3. Have you exposed yourself to any sexually explicit material?
4. Have you spent adequate time in Bible study and prayer?
5. Have you given priority time to your family?
6. Have you fulfilled the mandates of your calling?
7. Have you just lied to me?

Neil Cole:
1. What is the condition of your soul?
2. What sin do you need to confess?
3. What have you held back from God that you need to surrender?
4. Is there anything that has dampened your zeal for Christ?
5. Who have you talked with about Christ this week?
HT: Journey
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The questions I use are from these cards from Church Multiplication Associates. I keep one in my Bible.
The ten questions are as follows:

1. Have you been a testimony this week to the greatness of Jesus Christ with both your words and actions?
2. Have you been exposed to sexually alluring material or allowed your mind to entertain inappropriate thoughts about someone who is not your spouse this week?
3. Have you lacked any integrity in your financial dealings this week, or coveted something that does not belong to you?
4. Have you been honoring, understanding and generous in your important relationships this past week?
5. Have you damaged another person by your words, either behind their back or face-to-face?
6. Have you given in to an addictive behavior this week? Explain.
7. Have you continued to remain angry toward another?
8. Have you secretly wished for another's misfortune so that you might excel?
9. Did you finish your reading this week and hear from the Lord? What are you going to do about it?
10. Have you been completely honest with me?

I'm still alive

Wow. So, it's been awhile. Just about everyone else responded to the roll call except me. So let me get that out of the way so that I can't be accused of "ventur[ing] into namby pamby lameward land" as Dave put it.

Name: Chris Martin

What's good:

• Marriage is awesome. Best decision ever. I love spending time with Lexie and it's been getting even better every day.
• I've made a pretty big life decision over the last few months. This could probably go under "good" and "hard". I think most y'all know that Lexie and I had been talking about maybe interning on a farm or trying to get into that lifestyle. Well, as I thought about it more I thought that even though I could probably be good at it, I don't know that it actually plays to any of my natural strengths. So I started trying to think about what I should do with my life. After talking about it with Lexie and a couple other people, I decided to look into advertising, copywriting specifically. Copywriters are the idea guys behind advertising. I have a Christian friend who's a copywriter so I talked to him about it and he said he thought I'd be good at it. So I applied to two advertising grad schools. One is at VCU in Richmond and it's the top program and my top choice, but the acceptance rate is only 15% so it's kind of a stretch. The other is in Atlanta and it's called Creative Circus. It's probably the third best program and it's where my friend went to school. I should hear back from them by the end of March and then we'll have some decisions to make.

What's bad:

• Not too much is "bad". Mainly just hard, so we'll move on.

What's hard:

• The decision about ad school is really hard. On the one hand, the creative side of it is really appealing to me. Even just working on the applications has been a blast. For one application I had to write an editorial, a short story, list my five creative inspirations, my favorite music and lit, the most courageous thing I've ever done, have a 10-minute talk with a stranger, and create 10 ads. It was tough but really fulfilling to have that creative outlet. On the other hand, it's advertising. I have a pretty huge problem with consumerism and it's hard to tell if going into advertising is something I can do with a clean conscience. To that end, I've been reading some Wendell Berry and plan to talk to my pastor (who used to work for Redeemer in NYC and so has some experience with Christians in advertising). I could really use prayer for discernment. I want to be moving in some sort of direction and not just going from unfulfilling job to unfulfilling job. But I really don't want to have another false start like I did at seminary.

Create: Today I'm going to take apart, sand down, paint, and reassemble a child's wooden table and chair that Lexie found on the side of the road. We're going to give it to our niece as a gift.

Before I end this post, I need to tell all of you that I miss you. It's been too long since we've hung out. I'm not sure when I'll be in Conway next. It would be great if we could plan something for this summer. Maybe camping. Who knows. I'll be quitting my job at the end of June assuming I get accepted to one of these schools and decide to go.

Let's at least kick around some ideas.

Northern Exposure

I'm sorry you guys haven't heard from me recently; I've been too busy mentoring young people to post on the internet. I couldn't let this pass without making you aware of it though.




Let me share some pictures of cutting edge youth ministry with you. This is just a small taste of our Steel City Slaughter (Force Edition), which we held to celebrate MLK Day. If someone puts up even radder pictures, I'll be sure to send them along.

Doing All the Heavy Lifting,

James

Council Reunion

Dave and I are calling any guys who are free for an overnight Council Reunion Friday, March 4th at either his place or mine. Our wives are travelling together that weekend. So, we will be hanging out that night and would love for anyone who is free to join us.

Email or call either of us for info.


PS- Martin, I have now made two posts since you have posted anything.

Matt Chandler - De-churched