Linkathon!
Living in liturgy…an Anglican journey…
Luther’s response to the black plague…
The possible decline of the “nones” isn’t a boost for evangelicals…
What you need to know about the coronavirus…
Christianity is a religion, not just a relationship…
A compelling essay on bs…why Christians have a bs problem…(obvious alert for language)…
Progressive Christianity even shallower than the faith I left…
Catholics take measures against coronavirus while the Greek Orthodox pray…
The Worst Prayer to Pray: The Third Petition of the Lord’s Prayer
Bethel closes healing rooms due to coronavirus…
The Christian case for universal healthcare…
What the 1918 influenza pandemic meant for American churches…
Bethel Church closing healing rooms for the corona virus is a non story. Where it has been reported elsewhere they love to act as if Bethel thinks they heal all diseases FALSE. They love to claim that Bethel blames people for lack of faith if they aren’t healed FALSE. They love to mock a healing ministry for taking this step of closing. Frankly if they didn’t close the healing rooms and someone with a fever came who turned out to be infected the hue and cry would be even worse. MUCH WORSE!.
Damned if You Do Dread
The article about the third petition of the Lord’s Prayer could go even further.
P T Forsyth wrote in The Justification of God;
“There are many unschooled thinkers who say that an awful catastrophe like this European war is enough to un-settle any belief in a God, a Father, a kingdom of heaven Nay, but it is the other way . With such a Europe, with its negligence of God and His righteousness, with the levity even of the religious mind, the unsettling thing would be if there were no catastrophe.
The disquieting thing would be if there were no judgment on materialist civilisations , poor pieties, and shallow politics, and gorgeous getting on , were there no rectification of things by a tremendous surgery, no dreadful excision of the deadly growth tha t gathers within the nations that forget God. It is all the judgment action of that kingdom of grace for which w e pray. By terrible things in righteousnes : dost Thou answer us, 0 God of our salvation. When we pray for the kingdom to come, we know not what we ask .”
The kingdom prayer is a prayer for righteous judgment to bring order to chaos, to bring justice to wickedness and to bring truth to bear on all lies. It is a disquieting prayer.
The Ian Harber post is exactly the kind of article I expected to come forth from the progressive left. it also gives me hope. The progressive agenda once imbibed returns its adherents to the exact place they fled; sureness without kindness, judgment without mercy, mandates without nuance. Neo-pharisaism is not a cure. Thanks for the post.
BD,
The progressives and funds are simply mirror images of the same sicknesses…
I heard a really interesting interview on Catholic Radio today. It was with Dan Lepinski (sp?), who’s a pro-life Democrat from Illinois running for reelection soon.
It was refreshing to hear him talk about having differences even with other legislators
who are Catholic but treating each other with respect. Wowee! He said surveys show that about one-third of Dems are pro-life.
The other interesting thing that he and interviewer agreed on is that if you’re on
board with Catholic social teaching, you can’t check all the boxes for either party.
That was also refreshing to hear! At least to me.
I’ve always felt the RCC is light years ahead of Prots. WRT social teachings. We’re
much too individualistic to even let a denomination advise us on damn near anything!
This comment might be better for Open Blogging, but here I go…
What concerns me both are the undereactions and overreactions to Covid-19. The latter is what we mock: the middle and upper middle class toilet paper hoarders, the Costco Crowd. Personally, if you don’t keep a month’s worth supply of TP and a week’s supply of bottled water living in the Bay Area, you are unwise….
The former is this “Logan’s Run” attitude that if you aren’t at risk, no worries!
Bay Area Universities are shut down: UC Berkeley, Stanford, San Jose State. Maybe Santa Clara University though I didn’t hear about the last one. This suggests that the brick and mortar model might be done. Cull most of the administration and reduce tuition, but that’s another conversation…
Yet community colleges are still open.
We received an email from our VP and site manger today. He said it’s ok to work from home as long as you participate in meetings by WebEx and deadlines are met. I heard that he’s working from home. I can VPN in, but I’m a lab rat. So what about the operators, technicians and engineers who are hands on? We are expected to come to work. Worker-bees can be sacrificed.
Today we learned that a colleague was told to stay home. Yesterday, she looked ok, but a few people saw her coughing. She called in at 6AM to our boss, sounding horrible. He told her not to come back until Monday, only when she’s better. The rest of us were asking if she had a fever. We went around disinfecting the lab. I hope she’s ok, but she really shouldn’t have come into work sick.
International travel is suspended. Domestic travel is all but suspended. My kids’ school solicited volunteers to assemble home learning packets just in case.
One of the side effects of the over-reaction is people are buying up the kinds of cleaning and medical supplies that short things for the elderly and sick and disabled who need that stuff. One of my disabled friends who’s in the Puget Sound area was sharing that this is part of the trouble–people have been buying up stuff that’s cut into the supply lines for hospice, elderly and disabled care.
New Victor
If universities are dead they earned it by fattening tuition to fatten bureaucracy while burdening students with debt that nullifies the value of the education. They earned it by a system that rewards conformity to a viewpoint They earned it by illiberal techniques. They earned it by debasing the youth and postponing adulthood. They earned it by tenure and unaccountability.
They are one more institution made redundant by the internet. Ciao.
‘Why Did Jesus Walk on Water’
The title clicked baited me and before I began reading was expecting another one of those typically silly self promoting pontification articles. What I found was an actually well thought out and written pieces on how to approach the divinity of Jesus.
In spite of these times, there will always be these times, focusing on the greatness of God and a walk with Him will bring comfort, purpose and love.
Good link!
MM
I agree
I saw the walk on water link and thought, because He could and he’d have looked silly swimming out to the boat – dismissed it, now i’ll go read it
Providential read as we are in some deep water at our house right now – the hospital is asking my daughter to spend 4 + hourse closed up in a 10×12 room with the Coronavirus patients administering treatment with no protection but a surgical mask! Only Gods intervention will keep her from catching the virus
Nurses are expendable?
Em,
That’s insane!
We’ll be praying here…
Thank you, Michael…. Praying you stay safe, also…
Lots of insanity now it seems… I don’t like to be formulaic in my petitions to the Father, but these days i have to slowly and thoughtfully begin with the Lords Prayer just to gain perspective and focus
God keeo
I’d appreciate prayer for a friend, a local missionary who just left yesterday with his family to travel to Europe to reach Iranian students studying there. He left right before Trump’s announcement.
Many where I minister are palpably afraid.
The Luther article helps.
Can anyone think of others who ministered to the sick or dying? Any place, any period of time. Links appreciated.
JtK
https://socialwelfare.library.vcu.edu/religious/constance-and-her-companions/
I see the article about Bethel healing rooms has changed a great deal. Apparently, the need to shade things in ways that makes Bethel look bad is boundless. That by the way is the nature of how secular press looks at our faith entirely if pushed. I do appreciate this line from the latest iteration of Bethel banter, “For skeptics of faith healing, Bethel probably would have been criticized no matter what it did in response to the virus.”
So I had a sit down with 14 Bethel students Wednesday – they all said the healing rooms did not close because of corona virus and were incredulous at the nonsensical idea. Rather they said once a year Bethel has a ‘family weekend’ with activities for the whole church where they do not invite the general public; It was last weekend.
I raised the matter with Bill Johnson himself “Hey Bill did you guys close the healing rooms because of the coronavirus last week” he looked puzzled that the question was raised noting that the church closes many things “once a year for an unannounced family weekend” He noted again that they do it for the church family and do not publicize it to the public. He laughed at the idea they would do that.
However, in response to the governor’s call to desist meetings over 250 ppl
https://www.redding.com/story/news/local/2020/03/12/coronavirus-bethel-redding-cancel-in-person-services-mission-trips/5037232002/
I expect this to be met with askance but those are the facts. Every person from Bethel that I asked about this was shocked that the accusation was even out there. Of course they get so much criticism they seldom bother with it.