Recommended The Paradise War: Song of Albion Book 1 (Song of Albion Trilogy) by Stephen R. Lawhead

I'm not trying to impose anything on anyone; that is, I’m not writing propaganda. On the other hand, it’s my book, so it’s going to come from my point of view. Like any writer, I naturally take up what I know or what I’m interested in. In Hood, for example, I liked exploring the distinction between these highly organised, politicised, corporate-type Norman priests ... and the more disorganized, unsophisticated but often more spiritual Celtic clerics.

CLINTON: So you did Fox's bidding on this show. You did your nice little conservative hit job on me. What I want to know is ...

WALLACE: Well, wait a minute, sir.

CLINTON: No, wait. No, no ...

WALLACE: I want to ask a question. You don't think that's a legitimate question?

CLINTON: It was a perfectly legitimate question, but I want to know how many people in the Bush administration you asked this question of.

I want to know how many people in the Bush administration you asked, “Why didn't you do anything about the Cole?”

I want to know how many you asked, “Why did you fire Dick Clarke?”

I want to know how many people you asked ...

WALLACE: We asked — we asked ...

CLINTON: I don't ...

WALLACE: Do you ever watch “FOX News Sunday,” sir?

CLINTON: I don't believe you asked them that.

WALLACE: We ask plenty of questions of ...

CLINTON: You didn't ask that, did you? Tell the truth, Chris.

WALLACE: About the USS Cole?

CLINTON: Tell the truth, Chris.

WALLACE: With Iraq and Afghanistan, there's plenty of stuff to ask.

CLINTON: Did you ever ask that?

You set this meeting up because you were going to get a lot of criticism from your viewers because Rupert Murdoch's supporting my work on climate change.

And you came here under false pretenses and said that you'd spend half the time talking about — you said you'd spend half the time talking about what we did out there to raise $7-billion-plus in three days from 215 different commitments. And you don't care.

WALLACE: But, President Clinton, if you look at the questions here, you'll see half the questions are about that. I didn't think this was going to set you off on such a tear.

CLINTON: You launched it — it set me off on a tear because you didn't formulate it in an honest way and because you people ask me questions you don't ask the other side.

WALLACE: That's not true. Sir, that is not true.

CLINTON: And Richard Clarke made it clear in his testimony...

WALLACE: Would you like to talk about the Clinton Global Initiative?

CLINTON: No, I want to finish this now.

WALLACE: All right. Well, after you.

A simple Google inquiry is all it took to uncover yet another of Clinton's lies. In a fit of anger, sometimes one does not think about the veracity of accusations one is hurling, but Mr. Clinton should have thought about that before he went on national televison.

Just a simple Google is all it took.

Recommended Pirates of the Caribbean - The Curse of the Black Pearl (Two-Disc Collector's Edition)

John Baur and Mark Summers [. . .] have come up with a concept that is going to make you kick yourself for not thinking of it first: Talk Like a Pirate Day. As the name suggests, this is a day on which everybody would talk like a pirate. Is that a great idea, or what? There are so many practical benefits that I can't even begin to list them all.

Baur and Summers came up with this idea a few years ago. They were playing racquetball, and, as so often happens, they began talking like pirates. And then it struck them: Why not have a day when EVERYBODY talks like a pirate? They decided that the logical day would be Sept. 19, because that — as you are no doubt aware — is Summers' ex-wife's birthday.

Since then, Baur and Summers have made a near-superhuman effort to promote Talk Like a Pirate Day. As Baur puts it: "We've talked like pirates, and encouraged our several friends to, every Sept. 19, except for a couple where we forgot.''

And yet, incredibly, despite this well-orchestrated campaign, the nation has turned a deaf shoulder to Talk Like a Pirate Day. In desperation, Baur and Summers turned to me for help. As an influential newspaper columnist, I have the power to ''make or break'' a national day. You may recall that almost nobody celebrated Thanksgiving until I began writing about it in the 1970s.

I have given Baur's and Summers' idea serious thought, looking for ways to improve it. One variation I considered was Talk Like a Member of the Lollipop Guild Day, on which everybody would talk like the three Munchkins in the film version of The Wizard of Oz who welcome Dorothy to Munchkin Land by singing with one corner of their mouths drooping down, as though they have large invisible dental suction devices hanging from their lips. But I realized that would be stupid.

So I have decided to throw my full support behind Talk Like a Pirate Day, to be observed this Sept. 19. To help promote this important cause, I have decided to seek the endorsement of famous celebrities, and I am pleased to report that, as of today, Tom Cruise, Julia Roberts, Britney Spears, Brad Pitt, Oprah Winfrey, the Osbournes, Tiger Woods, Ted Koppel, the Sopranos, Puff Doody and the late Elvis Presley are all people who I hope will read this column and become big supporters. I see no need to recruit President Bush, because he already talks like a pirate, as we can see from this transcript of a recent White House press conference:

REPORTER: Could you please explain either your foreign or your domestic policy?

PRESIDENT BUSH: Arrrrr.

Anyhoo, now ye be understandin' the origin. But other websites and peoples all over the world, not just in America, arrr, are celebratin' the occasion too. The whole thing has 'specially proven quite popular, it has, with Australians and the British!

What do we do, Cap'n Ransom? ye be askin'.

And the answer is simple: Ye talk like a pirate, ye scurvy dogs!

Why? ye may be askin' further.

Because if not, ye'll be walkin' the plank! But an even better answer, says I, would be this: Why not?

Say somethin' piratey, ye hearties, and have fun with it. Websites all over be presentin' their own ideas for what pirates would say in landlubber places like yer work office, eatin' out, goin' to school, or e'en at the movies. Ah, but the sea — that be whar the best of phrases be risin' up from the depths of Davy Jones' Locker.

(But watch what websites ye be keelhaulin' from the depths fer lookin' at, mates. Not all of 'em're havin' things for polite pirates to say.)

So begin preparin' for Sept. 19, ye swabs, in the week we have until then!

And whate'er happens, me hearties, never forget to clean yer (s)words.

Arrrrr.

- (Cap'n) Dr.Elwin Ransom
Buckler of Swashes
Chief Engineer
Starfleet Admiral
Captain of the Pirate Frigate U.S.S. Jack Sparrow

Recommended Your Best Life Now: 7 Steps to Living at Your Full Potential by Joel Osteen

In three of the Gospels, Jesus warns that each of his disciples may have to “deny himself” and even “take up his Cross.” In support of this alarming prediction, he forcefully contrasts the fleeting pleasures of today with the promise of eternity: “For what profit is it to a man,” he asks, “if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?” It is one of the New Testament's hardest teachings, yet generations of churchgoers have understood that being Christian, on some level, means being ready to sacrifice--money, autonomy or even their lives.

But for a growing number of Christians [. . .] the question is better restated, “Why not gain the whole world plus my soul?”

[. . . In Joel Osteen's Your Best Life Now,] Jesus is front and center but not his Crucifixion, Resurrection or Atonement.

[. . .]

[Christian c]ritics see it as treating God as a celestial ATM. “God becomes a means to an end, not the end in himself,” says Southwestern Baptist's [theology Professor Ben] Phillips. Others are more upset about what it de-emphasizes. “[Prosperity] wants the positive but not the negative,” says another Southern Baptist, Alan Branch of Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City, Mo. “Problem is, we live on this side of Eden. We're fallen.” That is, Prosperity soft-pedals the consequences of Adam's fall--sin, pain and death--and their New Testament antidote: Jesus' atoning sacrifice and the importance of repentance.

Just a few examples of the two authors' solid understanding of real Biblical theology — much more deep than their media counterparts, and far deeper than that of the your-best-life-now types they discuss.

And say what you will about Rick Warren's supposed shallownesses — this subject is not among them:

Fellow megapastor Rick Warren, whose book The Purpose Driven Life has outsold Osteen's by a ratio of 7 to 1, finds the very basis of Prosperity laughable. “This idea that God wants everybody to be wealthy?”, he snorts. “There is a word for that: baloney. It's creating a false idol. You don't measure your self-worth by your net worth. I can show you millions of faithful followers of Christ who live in poverty. Why isn't everyone in the church a millionaire?”

[. . .]

A recent Sunday at Lakewood gives some idea of the emphasis on worldly gain that disturbs Warren. Several hundred stage lights flash on, and Osteen, his gigawatt smile matching them, strides onto the stage of what used to be the Compaq Center sports arena but is now his church. “Let's just celebrate the goodness of the Lord!” Osteen yells. His wife Victoria says, “Our Daddy God is the strongest! He's the mightiest!”

And so it goes, before 14,000 attendees, a nonstop declaration of God's love and his intent to show it in the here and now, sometimes verging on the language of an annual report. During prayer, Osteen thanks God for “your unprecedented favor. We believe that 2006 will be our best year so far. We declare it by faith.” Today's sermon is about how gratitude can “save a marriage, save your job [and] get you a promotion.”

Anyone who's ever watched this man on TV can identify: Osteen is quite the showman. Just the sort to proclaim loudly unsound teachings for “itching ears” (2 Timothy 3:4) and rehashed versions of old you-can-do-it “irreverent, silly myths” (1 Timothy 4:7).

Little Joel himself — they did interview him — “osteens” his way past the writers' question. (“To osteen,” a la “to bork“: New Verb Alert!)

“Does God want us to be rich?” he asks. “When I hear that word rich, I think people say, 'Well, he's preaching that everybody's going to be a millionaire.' I don't think that's it.” Rather, he explains, “I preach that anybody can improve their lives. I think God wants us to be prosperous. I think he wants us to be happy. To me, you need to have money to pay your bills. I think God wants us to send our kids to college. I think he wants us to be a blessing to other people. But I don't think I'd say God wants us to be rich. It's all relative, isn't it?”

Oh, yes — and then immediately Time's writers get him good:

The room's warm lamplight reflects softly off his crocodile shoes.

Ooooh! Look out for that razor-sharp wit, folks — it bites.

Albert Mohler on Wednesday gave his own excerpts and additional thoughts.

The problem with prosperity theology is not that it promises too much, but that it promises so little — and promises that so falsely.

And indeed, the very title of Joel Osteen's book offers one of the most pathetic “promises” imaginable. Your Best Life Now?! How about Your Best Life Later, in the World to Come — when all turns to silver glass, and the Creator remakes His universe, merging the New Heavens with the New Earth? How much more incredible a promise is this!

Recommended The Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis

“My name is Legion, for we are many.”

Matthew 5:9 (ESV)

I don't recall if I/we managed to cast them out of the book (a book? ). But at that moment, in dream-time, I was struck with a clear realization. Some of this, actually, I had written about after viewing the film Star Trek: First Contact several weeks ago.

To us [the devil Screwtape, writing on behalf of all demons] a human is primarily good; our aim is the absorption of its will into ours, the increase of our own area of selfhood at its expense. But the obedience which the Enemy demands of men is quite a different thing. One must face the fact that all the talk about His love for men, and His service being perfect freedom, is not (as one would gladly believe) mere propaganda, but an appalling truth. He really does want to fill the universe with a lot of loathsome little replicas of Himself—creatures, whose life, on its miniature scale, will be qualitatively like His own, not because He has absorbed them but because their wills freely conform to His. We want cattle who can finally become food; He wants servants who can finally become sons. We want to suck in, He wants to give out. We are empty and would be filled; He is full and flows over. Our war aim is a world in which Our Father Below has drawn all other beings into himself: the Enemy wants a world full of beings united to Him but still distinct.

[. . .]

Merely to over-ride a human will (as His felt presence in any but the faintest and most mitigated degree would certainly do) would be for Him useless. He cannot ravish. He can only woo. For His ignoble idea is to eat the cake and have it; the creatures are to be one with Him, but yet themselves; merely to cancel them, or assimilate them, will not serve.

-- C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

Note the word assimilate. Meanwhile, consider the Borg, introduced in Star Trek: The Next Generation's second season and one of the primary villains of the Star Trek universe.

They are a race of creatures, at first diverse, and then forced to become part of a collective consciousness and will by the most horrifying cybernetic implants and mind-brainwashing methods imaginable. They do not defeat their enemies by use of force. Rather, those who oppose them meet with the chilling and rather famous admonition:

“Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated. Your life as it has been, is over. From this time forward, your culture will adapt to service us. We are the Borg.”

Even in the dream, this resulted in this realization (or re-realization):

The Devil and his minions oppose individuality. They cannot understand the seeming paradox of the Creator wanting to bring people to Himself and also allow them to retain their separate personalities; they dismiss this as “an ignoble idea.”

Satan is the great Assimilator. He wants all things to become part of a collective consciousness, to eventually be absorbed into himself.

Might it be true that some authors', including Frank Peretti's, depictions of demons as separate personalities who even sometimes have conflicts with each other, are incorrect? Though they may hope to absorb each other with a survival-of-the-fittest mindset, as Screwtape wants for Wormwood, perhaps they more share the same “mind” as their father the Devil than we may think. Might they be locked into a collective consciousness with the master Demon of all?

This idea doesn't seem to be anti-Biblical, but it is extra-Biblical ... just as are some of Peretti's fictionalizing of the spiritual dimensions.

My Tuesday class ran from 9 a.m. to 10:15 a.m. Upon exiting and walking down the hallway, I ran into a commotion near one of the computer rooms. Employees were pushing a TV into the area and soon had it turned to a very grainy CBS local affiliate.

I saw one of the World Trade Center towers, smoke billowing upward as if sourced by brimstone.

The thought was horrible: Weren't there two of those?

I asked a student what was happening.

“We're being attacked,” he answered grimly.

Chills overwhelmed me.

I called home. My mother was tearful. My brother was in the background, passing along information from Fox News. I wandered into the building foyer, theorizing. Terrorists, obviously. Perhaps masterminded by Usama bin Laden.

My brother began shouting in the background. Something about it going down.

I returned to the TV room. The image was projected on a screen.

Even more smoke rose. And the second of the two towers had already crumbled.

Students whispered. Completely confused, in the first stages of grief.

One young man was at a computer, already writing something about the experience. An email, perhaps. No ... a journal entry, I recall. I should have spoken with him. He evidently wrote his innermost thoughts, easily readable to me standing nearby. Something like, I want to do something. I want to understand this, and then I want to make the attackers pay.

My, how it all comes back.



Classes were not cancelled. They should have been.

I skipped my math class — one of the few class sessions I ever intentionally passed up.

Reactions were nearly universal. In those days, solidarity existed. People were unified in grief, and some anger.

Only later did I learn about the Pentagon crash, Flight 93 and its incredible story, and the exact nature of the attacks. Air Force One was diverted. The Capitol evacuated. Unconfirmed reports: plane hits the Capitol, plane on its way to the White House, president in D.C., president not in D.C. ...

The deaths of firefighters and New York City officers. Ash and smoke, like a volcanic avalanche, flooding through the streets. People's bodies and hair bleached with the fallout, staggering like zombies ...

I'm tearing up, now. Thought I would. Perhaps it's time to end.

Indeed ... never forget. Just because it's been half a decade doesn't mean the impact should fade.

Being poor usually means having a bad education and living in bad and dangerous parts of town with only very, very few having any chance of escape.

So they need all the help we can give.

Recommended Your Best Life Now: 7 Steps to Living at Your Full Potential by Joel Osteen

5. Joel Osteen examines the role of suffering in the Christian life.

Let me give you a little brief background. Jacob’s been in this church many years. There are people here this morning who are here as Christians because Jacob Moore spoke the truth of the Gospel to them. He’s been involved in mission projects; he’s been involved in serving and leading and teaching and all kinds of different ministries in the life of this church.

And yet he’s here today to tell us that though he was rigorously active in the life of this congregation — that he had never genuinely believed the Gospel.

And what I’m overjoyed about today is that his testimony is not that he realized he wasn’t doing this, that or the other, and so he could not be a Christian.

But his testimony is: When I really saw how good the Gospel really is, I knew that I never really trusted in that.

The goodness of the Gospel captures another heart.

And sometimes it’s hard for us to have a category for that; those of us who’ve been around a while, well: if there’s anybody we know who’s a Christian, it’s Jacob Moore! —

Now.

So it’s with great joy that I invite our brother in Christ to come share his heart this morning.

The following is the Jacob's unabridged testimony. I’ve transcribed his entire message, truncating only to account for false starts, ums, rare grammar errors and such. Since then, Jacob has become absolutely certain of his true redemption, and has continued his mission work out of love for Christ and His glory — not to add points to his own scorecard of spirituality.