A Life, in Words and Pictures
Please look around and stay a little while.
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The Fall and Rise of Barbarism Part 7
Posted on September 16th, 2009 No commentsExactly what to expect for America itself in this future, is very difficult to say. Possibilities include a weakened America existing in its same form but having less world influence, to America’s basic destruction by both outside, and internal fighting, or America existing more as a pre-Civil War loose collection of states. There is no way to predict what the American future will look like at this time.
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The Fall and Rise of Barbarism Part 6
Posted on September 13th, 2009 No commentsWe have gone past a point in America where we can turn this clock back. Many experts believe that the American century is over, and the next century most certainly won’t be a repeat. I believe that the evidence backs this up, both historically and in terms of current events. This doesn’t mean we will fall into the sea. It does mean that things will be different. A look at history should shed light on what may be to come.
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The Fall and Rise of Barbarism Part 5
Posted on September 10th, 2009 No commentsThere is another cycle at work within America that we need to be aware of. Just as revivals in the early 1900′s brought about the Pharisee-ism of the early 20′s, which led to crime in the 30′s, we are in a part of our own cycle now. The Bush years seemed to be a revival without revival, and a triumph of moral legalism (at least as far as the mainstream media and far left would have us believe). The public responded with a “Yes we can believe in change.” But now crime is seriously on the rise and healthy society markers are on the decline.
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The Fall and Rise of Barbarism Part 4
Posted on September 7th, 2009 No commentsSo what is next? Are we on the cusp of a new cycle, or are we coming to the poem’s bridge? Maybe we are finally poised to break out of this iambic pentameter, and start a new ee cummings Dadaist phase.
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The Fall and Rise of Barbarism Part 3
Posted on September 4th, 2009 No commentsIt does seem clear that there is a direction in history, with certain undeniable rules: Power always corrupts, always. When Europe unites, there will be a war. When major empires crumble, they leave vacuums of power that create a period of chaos. Scientific advances both tend to extend our lives, but also often ultimately get appropriated into more exciting ways of ending lives. And, as I can’t bring myself to be any form of existentialist, I must assume that these rules somehow relate to a macro being played out that with some eventual finish line. There is an end to the game, somewhere, at some time. Just as the rhyming stanzas of a poem progress the story, and lead to its conclusion, and ultimate point, so does human history.
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The Fall and Rise of Barbarism Part 2
Posted on September 1st, 2009 No commentsIt is our own American meme to believe that ignorant and dangerous ideas will die out as science and enlightenment evangelizes our globe. The problem is that as knowledge moves increasingly faster in this Information Age, it seems that the growth of these intellectual/spiritual/societal landmines is also accelerating. Before I get comments about the state of world education, let me explain myself a bit further.
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The Fall and Rise of Barbarism Part 1
Posted on August 29th, 2009 6 commentsI recently read a Reuters news report of North Koreans who had fleed the North and were living in South Korea. Imagine believing the above things for your whole life, and then suddenly you learn that many fundamental things you had believed your whole life turn out to be nothing but lies. It would take a lifetime just to learn to be “normal.”
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Contextualizing the Gospel -Part 2
Posted on June 28th, 2009 No commentsNeither of these church responses is appropriate, of course. When a missionary takes the message of Jesus into a completely unreached people group, he must find a way to connect that message to their cultural and world viewpoint. This is no easy task for the missionary. Much of the way the life of Christian faith is lived out in a particular culture is not actually essential or biblically derived…
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Contextualizing the Gospel -Part 2
Posted on June 27th, 2009 1 commentNeither of these church responses is appropriate, of course. When a missionary takes the message of Jesus into a completely unreached people group, he must find a way to connect that message to their cultural and world viewpoint. This is no easy task for the missionary. Much of the way the life of Christian faith is lived out in a particular culture is not actually essential or biblically derived…
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Contextualizing the Gospel -Part 1
Posted on June 26th, 2009 No commentsOne of my most-discussed topics on this blog has been the life of faith in a post-Christian America. The most read section of this blog is the Church Tech section, about the use of communications technology within the church. These two topics are not disconnected, though. Any new culture necessitates new ways of communicating the message of Jesus. Radical societal changes create a new culture. Thus, the Christian message must be re-contextualized. In order to understand the methods of communicating that, we must first truly understand the basic reasons behind this…
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