Minor Thoughts from me to you

Above: New GOP logo.

Although the Bush Administration has quite typically failed to capitalize on it politically, all Americans are this week definitely enjoying the benefits of Republican-birthed legislation: additional sunlight.

According to FOX News,

"If you turned your clocks back one hour Sunday morning thinking it was the annual move back to Standard Time, all you succeeded in doing was moving into a new time zone... President Bush in 2005 signed the Energy Conservation Act, which pushed back the time change in an effort to squeeze just a little more daylight — and a bit of energy savings [And let's not forget sleep - Adam] — into the daily lives of Americans."

Yes, it's certainly a public relations coup ("GOP '08: A Little Ray of Sunshine In Your Life"). However, those of us of a more theological bent perhaps cannot help but wonder: could this be one more ominous example of Big Government extending its influence into spheres best left inviolate? Is an inept bureaucracy really capable of deciding better than ourselves and God just how much daylight we should all get?

I do not think I am jumping at shadows (of which I notice there are now fewer). There are already worrisome reports by refugees from that most confused of government powers, North Korea - apparently on Sunday morning it became March. The American state of Georgia, still experiencing a severe drought, must now contend with an extra 1% of scorching rays from Father Sol. And questions are already being raised as to just how deep in bed our elected officials are with Big SPF.

Add to all of this a horrifying experience I had once with a tanning salon (I literally spent three days naked as a result) and - well, I guess I'm just afraid of your average, low-income American getting burned by The Man again. Let's be careful out there.

From the New York Times, this is kind of innovative idea that gets me excited:

Mr. Agassi is not planning to make cars, but instead wants to deploy an infrastructure of battery-charging stations in the United States, Europe and the developing world.

The new system will sell electric fuel on a subscription basis and will subsidize vehicle costs through leases and credits.

"We're basically saying this is just like the cellular phone model," he said. "If you think of Tesla as the iPhone, we're AT&T.;"

He said his approach was a radical departure from other electric-car ventures that relied on advances in battery technology, which have come slowly.

Instead, he plans to extend the existing electric-power grids with a wide network of intelligent recharging stations in urban areas and supplementing it with a smaller number of automated battery-replacement stations.

The economics will be more compelling in Europe, where gasoline is roughly twice as expensive as in the United States, he said. Assuming a life span of 1,500 battery recharges, he said that the energy cost of all-electric cars would be about 7 cents a mile. That would be less than a third of the cost of driving a gasoline-powered car today.

"It's much easier to transport electrons than octane molecules," he said. "We've already got a grid that goes around the entire world; all we have to do is extend it."

Mr. Agassi envisions tens of thousands of recharging spots that will adjust for both cost and use patterns. For example, a group of parking-lot chargers at a workplace might recharge a visitor's car before a regular employee's car parked for the entire day.

The system will also supplement recharging stations that require about one minute of recharge time for every minute of driving, with a smaller number of car-wash-style stations for swapping batteries. This would make it possible for a driver to go to a station rather than wait to recharge a battery, he said.

I have no idea if this will work out or not. Still, I pay around $250 month for gasoline, so I wouldn't be opposed to paying a monthly subscription fee if it came out the same, or less, per month. It's an intriguing idea and I do so like seeing ideas that are "outside the box".

Why do we from the U.S. sometimes call people "Indian givers"? Is it because a generation's worth of experience with the cutthroat prices of 7-11 and the Holiday Inn have convinced us the term is an oxymoron?

As it turns out, no; in fact, it doesn't even have anything to do with India. According to our totally anonymous but still surely trustworthy friends at Wikipedia,

"The expression 'Indian giver' is based on the belief that Native Americans would lend items to the settlers, in other words, let them borrow necessities. The settlers thought that this was a gift from the Native Americans; hence, they were shocked when the Native Americans asked for their items back."

Which, you have to admit, explains a lot - like, for instance, why after the Native-Americans gave Native America to us walking ghosts over a hundred years ago, some of them have had the temerity to ask for it back. Or, even more brazenly, to be paid for it. I mean, yeah right. As if we didn't do them a favor by taking all that tobacco off their hands; every time the Surgeon General wins a lawsuit, our cigarette companies should counter-sue the whole Cherokee nation.

Sheesh. No wonder the Mormons decided these people are Jews. You're feeling all buddy-buddy and then: ka-ching! Your bill, Sir!

But wait: _The Phrase Finder _ suggests that everything isn't so cut-and-dried as we might like to believe.

"It is more likely that the settlers wrongly interpreted the Indians' loans to them as gifts."

Uh... Hm.

Well-

OK. Let's face it, that's possible. Seriously, raise your hand if that hasn't happened to you, y'know? An honest mistake. And it does explain why a race so ostensibly into borrowing didn't invent the library before we did; I was all set to accuse Benjamin Franklin of intellectual theft.

Indeed: if this is the sort of miscommunication that's been going on all these years, I can start to see where some of this Native-American hostility toward us honkies is coming from. How long have we White people just been taking their stuff on the assumption that it's all a gift? How many of those "Take One Free" tables I keep running across on reservations might really just be good old-fashioned tourist traps? Good grief, they probably have an arrest warrant out on me by now.

Fellow members of the Master Race, we need to make this right somehow. There's a lot of healing that needs to go on here, and it's probably going to take us a while to figure how to really iron it all out. In the meantime I suggest we start with small tokens of affection.

Maybe we can name our favorite sports teams in their honor.

Wisconsin Congressman David Obey wants to pass a war tax. I realize it's more of a political stunt, but I discovered that I'm not entirely opposed to the idea.

Noting that "we need to stop pretending that this war doesn't cost anything," Obey also announced that Murtha, McGovern and he will be introducing a bill to create a war surtax to pay for operations in Iraq instead of passing those costs on to future generations as the President has requested.

"I'm tired of seeing that only military families are asked to sacrifice in this war; and they are asked to sacrifice again, and again, and again, so we are putting together this bill in the hope that people will stop ignoring what this war is costing American taxpayers and call the President's bluff on fiscal responsibility," Obey said. "The President is threatening to veto our efforts to provide one-tenth the amount of money that he is spending in Iraq for investments in education, health, medical research, science, law enforcement, and other areas that are crucial to creating a stronger country and more prosperous families. If the President is really serious about combating deficit spending then we'd be happy to help him avoid shoving the costs of the war in Iraq on to our kids by providing for a war surtax."

I want the bill to guarantee that the tax would be gradually phased out as the war is phased out, but I do support paying for the war instead of continually increasing the deficit.

For contact information, please see postscript

This is not the time to be writing a love letter.

Bluntly, I've got snot all over my face. It's pouring both down my throat and out my nose, wherein it joins a non-stop stream of tears that have rendered this screen in front of me all but unreadable. And good grief, my head - o my poor head - my head right now is so foggy that, were ya t'ask me if I'll be going to Heaven tonight 'pon my surely-inevitable death, I'd quite confidently answer you yes - I just probably couldn't explain to you why.

Brilliant bounds for boogying back betwixt the bedsheets, you might say - for instance, if you were yourself the young lady to whom the letter is actually going. But Darlin', it's your birthday, and lemme tell ya something: the world outside our houses may be diving headlong into Winter (a fitting metaphor for my body), but it's been Springtime in my heart '365 since I started courting you.

And by God, you weren't born on the 25th of October, now were you?

According to Facebook, the answer is no, it was definitely the 24th (knew there was a reason I signed up for that), so let's go.

Anna

A best friend of mine once famously yelled, upon being complimented by her boyfriend for the millionth time or so about her physical appearance - not about her mind, not about her spirit, not about her driving record, but about her looks: "Is that all there is?!"

Many a long-form essay has been written to answer exactly that question, but here it's sufficient to point out, if I may plagiarize liberally from Mr. Charles Dickens (yep, I can, he's dead, thanks Chuck!), that Anna was attractive, to begin with. There can be no doubt whatsoever about that. And this must be distinctly understood, or nothing wonderful can come of the story I am going to relate. Just how attractive is she? So attractive that compasses do not function properly within her immediate vicinity. If you were to go hiking in the woods with Anna you would get lost. And if you were a man, you would not care.

I high-light this obvious detail of Anna's character not to elevate it at the expense of other admirable and more important qualities, but to hopefully shed a little light on the position I'm currently in; since the first day I remember meeting her, Anna's always been an object of non-platonic interest to me.* That being the case, I admit to sometimes having difficulty extricating myself from the perspective of the Suitor, which to degrees both wrong-headed and righteous has almost always been my role.

(*I actually suspect Anna doesn't care too much to recall this secret motivation of mine in sharing pre-courtship time with her. Back when we met, the beauty firmly belonged to a school of Christian thought which demands of the meaningful Christian relationship a slow development via at least one year of best-friends-ness, after which both male and female realize that there is something more to their friendship than just platonic interest and weep in their respective beds to the LORD God Almighty for the evil spirits to be cast out of them. This is eventually and grudgingly followed by a second year of companionship, known as "courtship", in which the respective parties involved join each other at their respective family's dinner tables, engaging in wholesome dating activities like passing the biscuits, pouring each other refills, etc. - just so long as their hands never touch. Eventually, this leads to the gentleman caller trying to pass the woman of his dreams a diamond ring, which her mother should smoothly intercept and, if she can get away with it, flush down the commode.

Needless to say, the young lady and I have taken a divergent but equally righteous path, one with which I'm happy to report the gorgeous creature remains perfectly at ease. Yet, I secretly think she still clings to the idea, perhaps just on principle, that there was at least one point in our story in which I did not think to myself, "I must at the very least dance with that exquisite creation, because I'll never forgive myself if I don't."

To my mind, these supposedly base beginnings merely testify to the LORD's humor, and His grand love for subverting all of our expectations. I flatter myself one of God's better jokes on her.)

A birthday tribute is not about celebrating Anna's value to me in particular, however; it is about celebrating Anna's objective value altogether. Or at least, this is how I am feeling about it right now. Joe, if I look like I'm going to get myself into any trouble here, please feel free to edit (Joe: Oh, I'll edit alright. This is the chance I've been looking for since you put up the pizza picture). By teh way, Ana iz also stinki and hr shoes iz bad.

So I switch gears as best I can. I give up the sword and shield of my crusade for her heart for a little while and take up the (party) banner of her life. What is there to say about this woman when I am not in the position of trying to win her?

Summarily: everything I've just said, and far, far more.

That was perhaps never so apparent as over a year ago, when I was hanging out at her house and happened to peruse a couple of her family's picture albums. I got to watch a video or two of her when she was younger, too. The experience was interesting not just because of my curiosity concerning her past, but because of the emotions roused in me by viewing that past. The little girl smiled out from history at me and - she was not yet grown up. O, she was a very pretty child, to be sure, but to my hormones the little one was, of course, a total flop. Her immature body could elicit no interest. And as linked in my mind as this smaller version was to the one I knew... well, neither could Anna herself at that moment.

Point being:

'Pessa, if ever I have seen you with eyes at liberty from those rose-tinted glasses you're always claiming I wear, well, that afternoon was it - and I wanted you more than ever.

But not as a lover - I just wished we'd become friends sooner. I wished I'd known this swiftly-changing girl in the albums and videos; I wished I'd been able to stop in at a much younger Anna's birthday tea party to wish her - in a toff accent of course - the very best birthday she might have. I wish the next day you could've told me what your parents got you. And my heart simply burns with the wish, strange as it may seem, that I myself had gotten you something, on that special day and every one since.

You are a life very much worth celebrating, Anna. I am so very glad you were born!

May God [have blessed] you with a day to equal the joy He, even more than I, takes in you.

And sweet dreams.

Adam

PS: I cannot fairly deny my fellow males the opportunity to take their own shots at the most beautiful woman I know. It is not for me to influence who's affections she will accept. So, if you would like to write your own love letter to Anna, her mailing address is provided below.

Anna Fraijo-Ruiz #X10882

PO Box 1508

Chowchilla, CA 93610-1508 USA

5000 years of religion in 90 seconds, that is. This is pretty cool.

How has the geography of religion evolved over the centuries, and where has it sparked wars? Our map gives us a brief history of the world's most well-known religions: Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Judaism. Selected periods of inter-religious bloodshed are also highlighted. Want to see 5,000 years of religion in 90 seconds? Ready, Set, Go!

Yesterday, Rudy Giuliani spoke at the FRC Values Voters Summit, attempting to sell evangelicals on his qualifications. Most commentators agree that he hit a "solid double" and may have softened some of the opposition to his candidacy. Several hours after the event, his campaign posted the video of his speech.

I just finished watching it. Here are my rough (really rough!) notes from the speech.

Will always be honest -- even when people disagree with him and his goals are unpopular. Will not govern by polls or by holding his finger in the wind. George Will called his mayoralty "the best conservative governance in the nation in the past 50 years". Lowered NYC crime rate. Cleaned up Times Square.

Chased pornographers out of the city. Took on the New York Museum of Art, after Virgin Mary, with dung painting. People of faith need to be free to express their faith, in public. Need to defend traditional expressions of faith, in public. "Freedom of religion is not freedom from religion"

Next President needs to restore the idea that "for every right there's a responsibility, for every benefit, there's an obligation that goes along with it". Turned welfare agencies into job centers -- changed the name on the door and the mission of the organization. Largest welfare reform, happened before federal legislation. Newt called it "revolutionary". 640,000 fewer New Yorkers on welfare. Returned the work ethic back to the center of city life and people thrive when you give them some control over their lives.

Strong supporter of school choice. Product of parochial schools -- all the way up to NYU law school. Every parent in America should have the right to send their kids to the school of their choice -- even home school, if that's what they want. It takes a family -- not a village -- to raise a child. Education opportunity is the civil rights issue for the 21st century

Sign on his desk at City Hall, "I'm responsible", to remind him that accountability goes both ways. Committment to shared values can help us achieve shared goals. Committment to decrease abortions and increase adoptions. Worked hard to increase adoption in NYC -- increased by 133% over eight years before he came into office. Abortions came down 18% during that same period. A country without abortion, achieved by changing the hearts and minds of people. Will veto any reduction in the Hyde amendent or other options to provide public support for abortions. Will support any reasonable suggestion that promises to reduce abortions: parental notifications, partial birth abortions. Will remove bureacratic red tape that makes adoption so expensive.

Supreme Court judges will be most important decision. Judges must be conscientous in their role of interpreting the law, not creating the law. Will appointment judges that understand what people meant when the wrote the law or Constitution. Advisor Board: Chair - Ted Olsen, Larry Thompson, Miguel Estrada, Attorney-General Designate. In the mold of Scalia, Thomas, Alito, Roberts.

There's something both precious and painful about evenings out with my fellow teachers at school. All of us so clearly desire, and desire badly, to be friends, because we are all living in a foreign country far from home's shores, and we consequently know that the immediately available pool of English-speaking Christians from which we might draw fellowship is limited to -... uh, well, us.

But, we are a motley crew. Thus we are having some trouble clicking. Our only extrovert finds himself faced with the horrifying understanding (perhaps not yet dawned 'pon him; I am unsure) that these people by whom he is surrounded will likely not kick it with him on the weekends, at least to his standards. His two fellow men are introverted bookworms. They quietly wait on the sidelines of table conversation like players in a game to which they do not know the rules. And beside them sits a beautiful and intelligent young, ethnically Korean woman about their age, who - being a fresh graduate of hallowed Bob Jones University on her way to law school - is probably not up for dating, along with a woman (a) easily old enough to be all of their mothers and (b) way cooler than all of them, being a field-hardened missionary to Uganda.

Summarily, this is not the kind of group for which you want to pick a movie.

And then there are our theological differences, which really the LORD Jesus must be praised for, as they're the only reliable topic of conversation upon which we've yet stumbled.

The very fact that we all work for our school means we're each classifiable as Protestant, of course, but whereas the beliefs of the good Catholic are well-defined, "Protestant" is a widely-cast label - nearly as widely-cast as the word "Christian" itself. We run the gamut. The older woman who serves in Uganda is Charismatic. The gentleman hailing from North Carolina is, needless to say, not. Cue fun discussions of whether the Church is still given the gift of speaking in holy tongues or the gift of prophecy, etcetera.

Wherein I occasionally hear something interesting like this:

"Satan can't understand what you're saying to God when you speak in tongues. That's because tongues are of the Spirit and he (Satan) is darkness."

Now I first heard this tidbit of spiritual strategy, actually, from a Filipino teacher who doesn't usually eat out with us - and to be honest, my snooty reaction was to off-handedly dismiss it as a bit of quaint Third World tradition which had somehow latched itself to Christian doctrine. Y'know: "Oh, those backward Filipinos."

So to hear it from a missionary raised in California quite surprised me (less surprising was to hear within the same conversation her confident assertion that Satan, the Prince of Darkness, is a fallen angel - a plausible possibility, but simply not so settled a fact as most Christians seem to believe). What surprises me leads to research. What I research leads to this blog.

QED.

The Devil We Know, The Devil We Don't

To begin with, let's deal with the question of whether the Adversary can understand prayers spoken in tongues: the answer is "Perhaps!", with an understanding that leaning towards "Yes, he can!" is probably the safer bet. No Bible verse concretely addresses the question, which means, to quote my Old Testament professor Dr. Wallace: "We really only know two things: We know I don't know and we know you don't know."

But when "the devil can cite scripture for his purpose," as the Bard once put it (in an allusion to Satan's tempting of Jesus), when he can presumably understand every other language in the world, and when at least one book of the Bible finds him freely conversing with the LORD Himself in Heaven (Job 1-2), it's certainly not unreasonable to suggest he can hear Spirit-breathed language - especially if, as so many would claim, the Devil is a fallen angel, one of a host quite likely knowledgeable concerning any holy tongue. On what Biblical basis are contrary claims made by those who say the holiest of tongues lies on a devil-jamming frequency?

At least the popular concept of Satan as a rebel angel has (ahem) wings. In the Gospel of Luke we are told that our Lord "beheld Satan fall like lightning from heaven." Reference to "angels who sinned" can be found in 2nd Peter 2:4. Jude 1:6, too. And if you Protestants out there are willing to peer outside the canon a bit, you'll find reference to a fallen prince of angels named Satanael in the Slavonic Book of Enoch.

But the most popular passages of Scripture cited as proof of Satan's former archangelic status are useful only when displaced from their contexts. As Wikipedia's entry on "Lucifer" notes:

"Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28 are directly concerned with the temporal rulers of Babylon and Tyre, rather than a supernatural being; allegorical readings of these and other passages were typical of medieval scholarship but are usually not considered legitimate in modern critical scholarship. Accordingly, in most modern English versions of the Bible (including the NIV, NRSV, NASB and ESV) the proper noun "Lucifer" is not found; the Hebrew word is rendered "day star", "morning star" or something similar."

It's worth noting, too, that Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28:11-19 never refer to anyone as an archangel; if the latter passage was for some reason truly talking about Satan, then the Lord of Darkness would be a cherub.

Bereft of those sources, though, we are left without any canonical origin for the Adversary. In fact, all the Bible is willing to tell us is, ironically enough, that Satan definitely was never a good guy. Note 1 John 3:8, in which it is said that "the devil has been sinning from the beginning," and John 8:44, in which it is said that Satan "was a murderer from the beginning."

1 John 3:8: "He who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work."

John 8:44: "You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father's desire. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies."

I won't suggest the above verses preclude a fall from Heaven. Revelation 12:9 clearly states otherwise:

"The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him."

So possibly Satan was tossed to Earth prior to "the beginning", as the phrase "the beginning" could just as easily refer only to Man's start rather than Satan's. Maybe it's even just a phrase (how often have we heard someone accused of being "against us from the start"?).

Regardless, here we've come to the Bible's last mention of angels in conjunction with "that ancient serpent". The phrasing might understandably get any member of the Satan As Ex-Angel camp excited; after all, there it is, in black and white. Satan has angels. Michael has angels. They're fighting. Even though the text does not clearly stipulate Satan to be an angel, one can put two-and-two together without a long leap, right?

Well, before we get too carried away, let's remind ourselves what the word "angel" means in both Hebrew and Greek: "messenger". The word implies status rather than race, much like the word "god" itself (a general term we Christians use pretty much exclusively for the LORD of Israel because we don't consider any other being truly worthy of the title, but don't forget that even Moses was once described as "god" to Pharoah). If Satan can be described as "god of this world" (2 Corinthians 4:4), why might his disciples not be described as his own "messengers"? And if the "messengers" herein are indeed fallen servants of the one, true God, does it still necessarily follow that Satan is an angel?

Logically, the answer is "no" - but, of course, that doesn't mean Satan isn't a fallen angel.

It's frustrating, not knowing the answers to the maddening mysteries the Bible often presents us; as unexpected and seemingly contradictory as his presence is in a universe ruled by our Creator, Satan is one of the most tempting targets for which to contrive an explanation. We should never the less resist the urge. False information represented as true is, after all, a lie - and we can be sure that the father of lies will not hesitate to turn new ones about himself to his advantage.

It turns out that a privately owned bridge is responsible for "carrying one-third of all road trade -- or more than $122 billion in goods a year" between the U.S. and Canada.

In a remarkable arrangement for a crossing so major, Manuel J. Moroun, a reclusive billionaire from Detroit's suburbs who oversees a trucking empire, owns the bridge, one of only two privately owned bridges along the entire northern border of the United States and by far the most economically significant privately owned bridge in the nation.

Now, with so much commerce depending on a single structure, people have begun to wonder what would happen if a terrorist were to attack it or if the Ambassador Bridge, approaching 80 years old, were to fail.

And so a race is on to build a new $1 billion crossing here.

Of course, the local politicians want it to be a publicly owned bridge this time. They don't trust private ownership, of course.

Supporters of a publicly owned span here say it is the only wise plan, the only one that offers needed public oversight and regulation. They have deep concerns, they say, about allowing a single man to continue his decades-long reign over such a vital connector of nations.

"This man is making billions of dollars on that bridge." said Raymond E. Basham, a Michigan state senator and a Democrat, who said that only a public bridge could ensure the structural inspections and domestic security needed. "When it comes to dollars and cents, there is every incentive for him not to tell us if something is wrong. We have an obligation for the safety of people."

Really, I don't know how to respond to Senator Brasham. The flaws in his argument are so gapingly huge that I feel ludicrous having to actually point them out. But somebody's gotta do it and it might as well be me.

First of all, Mr. Moroun has at least 100 million reasons a year to keep his bridge well maintained and protected. I'd say that's one humdinger of an incentive right there. If there are any fears about the bridge's safety, that traffic could all disappear -- it's in his best interests to make sure that no one ever has any reason to fear for the bridge's safety. That, naturally, means more disclosure -- not less.

Here's how the Detroit International Bridge Company has protected their investment.

... the bridge company had hired private security guards to watch the bridge in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11.

Mr. Stamper [the president of the company] also said that the Ambassador Bridge received structural inspections every year from private firms and that the results of those inspections were made available to Michigan and Canadian transportation authorities, though not to the public.

Secondly, it's preposterous to suggest that the government will be on top of maintenance and repairs. The most glaring example is the collapse of the I-35 bridge in Minnesota, two months ago. In the aftermath of that disaster, all 50 states suddenly realized that they were way behind on their own bridge maintenance. The levies that collapsed in New Orleans? Also publicly owned and maintained.

I'd far rather trust my life to private ownership and maintenance than public ownership and maintenance. A private owner stands to lose millions of dollars in business if his infrastructure collapses. A politician who underfunds maintenance earns an opportunity to blame someone else for skimping on safety and a chance get on TV, by promising to do better. That's definitely not an incentive for pro-active safety.

I've made no secret of the fact that Mark Driscoll, pastor of Mars Hill Church Seattle is one of my favorite people to listen to. I've learned a fantastic amount through his sermons and the Holy Spirit has really used him to clarify a lot of ideas for me.

That's why I'm so interested in hearing his upcoming sermon series, tentatively titled "Ask Anything".

Last year, as I was preaching through the book of 1 Corinthians, I was struck by the fact that Paul's letter was in large part a series of answers to various questions he received from the church.

Members of the church at Corinth were so distressed about various factions, controversies, and false doctrines in the church that they visited Paul to seek his counsel (Acts 16:17; 1 Cor. 1:11; 8:1; 11:18). The Corinthian church also sent Paul a letter with a number of questions that they wanted his opinion on. The situation at Corinth escalated so greatly that Paul had Timothy deliver his letter of responses on his behalf (1 Cor. 4:17; 16:10).

Throughout the letter, Paul frequently quotes directly from the letter he received from the Corinthians (e.g., 6:12, 6:13, 8:5, 10:23). He also notifies the reader of when he is transitioning from answering one question to another with the simple phrase "now" (e.g., 7:1, 7:8, 7:25, 8:1, 12:1, 16:1, 16:12).

Paul's example got me to consider what it would be like to do something similar. The result is the upcoming preaching series with the working title Ask Anything. I invite you to get involved and also get the word out by visiting http://askanything.marshillchurch.org/about.

Here are the details:

1. Ask a question about anything you want. There is a 200-character limit for each question, but you can ask as many as you want.
2. Vote for your favorites. You are limited to ten votes per day (which can be given to ten different questions, a single question, or anything in between).
3. Repeat steps 1 and 2 until November 1st at 5 PM, PST. At the conclusion of the preliminary stage, no more questions can be submitted; the fifty highest vote-getting questions will then move on to the final stage of voting and carry with them the amount of votes received during preliminary voting.
4. Vote for the top nine questions you want answered. All voting concludes December 14th at 5 PM, PST, and the top nine questions will be confirmed.
5. Come to a Mars Hill campus beginning in January 2008. I will answer the top nine questions in the form of a sermon series: one sermon per question. (sermons will be available for free via podcast, vodcast, and download at www.marshillchurch.org).
6. The questions and answers will also eventually be published as a book I will write for Crossway.

My opinion on American education is simple: it's outdated. We haven't changed the way we've done school in over 100 years. Society, technology, and knowledge have all changed considerably during that time. I think it's time that we took education apart, reexamined it closely, and figured out how to educate a new generation of children. We should use everything we've learned in the past 100 years about the science of education, about science itself, and about the value of technology to rethink how we teach.

Of course, that's made more difficult by attitudes likes these.

Hot classrooms, some infested with wasps; sections of the three-level school unreachable by elevator; a roof in need of replacing.

Some look at the Primary Center here -- built in 1918 -- and see a deteriorating school building that is expensive to maintain. Others see an irreplaceable example of Wisconsin Prairie School architecture that should be preserved.

The building is a community asset -- whether it is used as village offices, a community space or housing, said Kurt Nowka, a Mount Horeb resident who describes himself as a preservationist. "People have come to Mount Horeb because of (its) character."

One of the teachers, at least, has some common sense.

"My thought is that it is not an appropriate place to teach," said Colleen Mize, who has taught first and second graders at the Primary Center for about six years. "It's so old, it's hard to keep up."

She also points to deteriorating carpet, classroom temperatures that can stay in the 90s and wasps in some of the classrooms.

"Research shows that children do better in an environment that is nicer," Mize said. "I just think something needs to be done. I don't care what they do, but I don't think it's a proper place to house little children."

She's absolutely right. But as long as people who have no stake in education -- preservationists, for instance, can wield political power over a school, who cares about the children? They should be honored to be learning in such a historic location!

When I said, above, that "it's time that we took education apart" what I really meant was that "it's time that we let education entrepreneurs take education apart". No referendum or school board will ever come up with the right way to teach children. But entrepreneurs might. A more market oriented school system would allow parents to pick and choose where their children attend school, how they're taught, and who their teachers are.

Wouldn't that be better than leaving the decision up to Kurt Nowka?

Governor Jim Doyle is once again threatening to shut down the Wisconsin government. He's so desperate to pass a budget, he's trying to scare us with stories of shut down prisons and canceled university classes.

"In order to fund essential services that are needed to protect the health and safety of Wisconsin residents, a partial shutdown may well be necessary. The Legislature's failure has left the state with no other option but to plan for the disaster they have caused."

For instance, the Department of Corrections and the UW System are expected to run out of money in April, he said.

Doyle said he needs to find significant cost savings in Corrections by then to keep running the prisons. That might mean canceling contracts with county jails that house some prisoners and furloughing workers, he said.

For the System's 13 four-year universities and 13 two-year colleges, the governor said it would be irresponsible to open the campuses for the second semester in January if they would have to close their doors in April.

Doyle said he doesn't have a date to put the plans in place and he would like "to put that off as long as possible."

Owen Robinson points out that the State has plenty of money to keep things running.

The state of Wisconsin is currently operating under the previous budget. Because of the natural increase in tax revenues from a growing economy, Wisconsin's government will actually take in about a billion MORE dollars even without any tax increases. Also, the budget included COL and other built in increases. So if a budget is not passed, Wisconsin can and will spend more money than it did last year.

If Doyle chooses to shut down government services even though they are getting as much or more tax dollars than last year, then he can have at it. It would show his utter weakness as an executive to manage the state. A manager from Best Buy could keep the store open without a budget increase. I would think that the governor could do at least that.

Once again, our governor is looking increasingly inept, incompetent, and powerless. Good. That's exactly how I like the executive branch to look. We don't NEED to pass a budget in order to keep the state safe and secure. Therefore, I don't think we should pass a budget until we get the right one. Right?

Last night, the State Assembly voted on Governor Doyle's new "compromise" budget. (The Democrat controlled Senate had passed it earlier in the day.) Thankfully, it went down in flames.

The path ahead for the stalled state budget was left in the dark Monday night as two Democrats and all but one Republican in the state Assembly voted to reject a compromise proposal by Gov. Jim Doyle, defeating the plan on a 53-44 vote.

A third Democrat who did not vote formally signaled he also opposed the proposal.

And in the wake of the defeat of the plan -- which earlier Monday was approved on a straight party line vote in the Democrat-led Senate -- neither side in the budget stalemate said they had any immediate new offer to put forward to end the impasse.

I bet you're wondering who that Republican quisling was. I was disappointed to learn that it was no other than my own representative, Brett Davis.

I've learned that when you're working on a nearly $58 billion budget bill with 132 other elected officials with strong opinions, you are not always going to get your way. It doesn't mean you have to give in, but there is a place for true compromise and it's time. Not just by the leadership of both political parties, but by every legislator that has a vote. This action must happen soon or state residents will soon see the dramatic impact of not having a budget. To me, no state budget is an unacceptable answer. I'm calling on my fellow legislators to join me. We must move the state forward.

Here's my response.

Dear Representative Davis,

I was disappointed to read of your vote in favor of Governor Doyle's budget, on Monday evening. I moved into your district in August of last year. Throughout the past 14 months, I've been watching your actions in the Assembly with great interest. I happily voted for your reelection last November and was pleased to see that you won reelection, in spite of a close race and a big effort from the Democrats. I looked forward to your continuing efforts on behalf of your constituents.

Today, I feel that you've let us all down. Governor Doyle's "compromise" budget was nothing of the sort. It still included an 8.3% hike in state spending -- at a time when the state still faces structural deficits. The budget also included unacceptable new taxes, for a state that's already one of the highest taxed in the nation.

Like many of your constituents, I believe that education and health care are important. However, I think we are smart enough to recognize that we must spend money in a responsible manner. Supporting Governor Doyle's goofy raise hospital taxes to lower hospital costs proposal is not responsible. Nor is supporting a $1.25 per pack increase in the cigarette tax.

You will be up for reelection in just 13 short months. If you had voted for a fiscally responsible budget, I'd have been willing to help explain to my fellow voters why your vote was the right one. If you had voted for a fiscally responsible budget, I'd have been willing to explain how the Democrats played politics with the budget in an effort to force Republicans into voting for an irresponsible budget. But, you voted for an irresponsible budget.

Fortunately, the budget failed. You have another chance. I'll be watching your upcoming votes. Are you willing to do the right thing? I hope so.

Sincerely,

Joseph A. Martin

Ever wondered how private roads might work? Drew Carey explains -- and it really would be better than you think.

See?

A hypothetical: a friend of yours asks you for relationship advice.

See, he and the gay lover for whom he abandoned his pregnant, live-in girlfriend can't agree on which window treatment they prefer for their new apartment, and despite all the other personal differences they've managed to amicably settle - like your friend's being an Anglican Christian and his lover being a warlock in the First Order of the Antichrist - the issue is threatening to drive a wedge between them, just (this is eerie) as it drove a wedge between your friend's father and his father's own gay lover over thirty years ago.

Now, seeing as how you're a man of God, he says, surely you can give him good advice on how to properly and lovingly resolve the question. Should he (A) compromise on the window treatment issue (even though his lover picked a really icky color) or (B) stand firm, because this is important?

Well? How do you answer?

Believe it or not, the above scenario isn't too dissimilar from some questions I truly have been asked "as a man of God" - although in the worst situation I've ever been presented, the friend asking me for advice was a registered sex offender who quite literally believed himself to be a werewolf and (again, I am not making this up) now found himself blackmailed into a homosexual relationship with a Catholic missionary to Mexico.

In such situations, the base problem is the same: namely, is even bothering to answer at all a good idea? After all, the real problem here obviously isn't your friend's ridiculously petty feelings about household decoration; that's just the smallest symptom of the many, many totally selfish, wrong moves he's been making, each and every one of which dwarfs in importance the issue at hand. He shouldn't be dating someone who doesn't believe in the Christ Jesus. He shouldn't be in any homosexual relationship. He certainly shouldn't abandon the future mother of his child to start one. And he never should have had sexual relations with her in the first place, seeing as how she was not his wife. And - well, let's see here. Anything else?

Oh yeah, wait: and the reason all of this happened in the first place is because despite your friend's declarations to the contrary, he obviously doesn't care what the Christ Jesus thinks of his life.

Well, if you're like me, you tell your friend that the drapes have received way too much attention already and you're not going to give them yours too. Maybe your friend doesn't like this very much, says "If you were really concerned about me, you'd help me", but you answer that if he really wants help, you're perfectly willing to provide it; you'll help him move his furniture out of the apartment, play the part of Best Man at his wedding to the chick, and drive him to church every Sunday. But playing into his delusions won't help him out a bit, so as his friend, you won't do it.

And, if you're like me, you feel pretty much the same way about our country's problems.

Here's a confession for you: I don't like reading blogs.

I don't even like thinking of my posts on Minor Thoughts as part of a blog, even though they quite clearly are. Why I don't isn't the point of today's entry, but I touched on it once when I explained why despite my living in South Korea, Minor Thoughts never analyzed the Korean hostage situation in Afghanistan.

"During such crises, there’s very little one lone lil’ blogger can say that isn’t being said everywhere else. The very point of the blog-o-sphere (that’s still what the kids are calling it these days, right? I told you I’m out of touch) is, after all, the opportunity it presents to receive alternative perspectives generally unavailable from the mass media - that is, we no longer need to be told by news corporations what your typical man on the street thinks, because the man on the street is basically running his own newspaper, and what he thinks is sometimes far more interesting than previously reported, even if his presentation is inferior. Republican radio shows in the U.S. became popular for the same reason.

It should go without saying, of course, that if a blog is not providing content substantially different from what we can all get from the pros, then there's no compelling reason for anyone else to check the site - but no: it turns out a high number of people have apparently missed this point, leading to the creation of a seemingly infinitely-expanding cyber-world of political commentary sites even more vitriolic, less in-depth, and as devoid of logic and principle as the pundits for whom people pay.

Now I'm not an elitist in any meaningful sense; I'm perfectly happy that anybody who lives in a Western country can, by this point, throw up a blog about how much they hate someone in office. It's not their freedom which I disdain. It's not even their use of it. It's just most their product. Which is par for the course, I know, concerning any liberalized field - it's in the nature of the free market to produce the greatest number of misfires as well as the greatest number of successes.

Now with all that said, there is one blog I do check daily, and I'm going to recommend it to you. It's called Functional Ambivalent.

The tag line of Functional Ambivalent is "Politics. Culture. Pointless rudeness.", but the ideas on the site concerning the first two are predictably ignorable, interesting only for the webmaster's apparent political schizophrenia. One day Tom (that's his name) will post a perfectly reasonable assessment of why Hillary Clinton's idea of a national baby bond program is insane. The next, he'll turn his energies toward universal health care and deliver a typical you-just-don't-care-if-all-the-babies-in-the-world-DIE-you-monsters type screed. 'Tis strange.

It's the "Pointless rudeness" which makes Functional Ambivalent a site worth subscribing to. Whatever the quality of his logic, Tom is an undeniably gifted writer, and when he's writing to amuse us (as is generally the case), he's consistently far funnier than Dave Barry has been in over a decade. Trust Tom to not only uncover the most bizarre stuff online and bring it to your attention, but to do so with a headline and bite of commentary that doubles your laughs.

He's also both willing to play and donate to worthy causes. A wine connoisseur, Tom has started a pool amongst _Functional Ambivalent's _ visitors, in which one of them can win a bottle from his collection if that person most correctly predicts when Fidel Castro will die.

Where Tom's website shines, though, is in its longer, more personal posts, the product of those times when Tom sits down, shrugs the Great Democrat Chip from his shoulder, and just writes for a while. His most recent such post is typical of him: "Because Baseball Is A Game Fathers and Sons Can Enjoy Together" chronicles his pitched battle with his oldest son to come out the winner in a fantasy baseball league. It's good material, not just grammatically correct but actually well-presented.

And it still pales in comparison to almost any one of his "Sex Day" columns, which unfortunately he doesn't do nearly so many of anymore (they used to be weekly). Yes, it's probably telling that such features on the site are always the longest and most carefully written of F/A's content, but when reading them, you won't care. You'll just be laughing at his apology for writing only a short article about premature ejaculation ("I'm sorry, really. That's never happened before. I usually last a good 3,000 words."). Those who know me understand that I'm not easy to please when it comes to sexual humor, anymore than I am when it comes to toilet humor or Bush humor; I consider them all typically low-brow and unamusing. But Tom manages it (WARNING: That does not necessarily mean he can do it to you. Your preference may skew to the more conservative, in which case I suggest this blog here).

In a society slowly rendering one-man business all but obsolete, Humor is still very much a product capable of being generated only by individuals' personalities. I'd argue that makes it an all but tailor-made export for blogs. Functional Ambivalent is the best one I've seen at it. Please, give it a look.

About two dozen Madison high school students courageously stood up for the right yesterday. They protested the Iraq war and President Bush in a city and county that have both overwhelmingly voted to impeach the president. What courage! What intestinal fortitude! What lack of concern for self and popularity!

Yawn. Give me a call when Madison high school students rally in support of free trade, in support of the rights of the unborn, in support of lower taxes and fewer government handouts, in opposition to "An Inconvenient Truth", or anything else that might actually hurt their popularity.

My coverage of several extremely important news stories has prevented me until now from replying to the recent posts of my friend and webmaster Joe - but much like my standing up for terrorists' rights earlier this week, I now find myself wishing I'd acted far more quickly. Perhaps I could have saved Joe some embarrassment.

Embarrassment like this picture.

Or the substantially different but equal embarrassment of my correcting him when he declares, in reaction to news that America's Christian conservatives are considering forming a new party, that

"I’d love to see legitimate competitors to the Democrats and Republicans. Unfortunately, that would take an election cycle or two to fully emerge. Until then, the only thing a new party would do is pull votes away from Republicans and towards Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama... [and] the next election could have big consequences... Right now, I’ll take a candidate who merely promises to appoint originalist justices to the Supreme Court."

Alas.

The problem with Joe and The Anchoress's assertion that lack of conservative unity in '08 will lead to the Socialist States of America is one of perspective. Is saving our freedom important? Well, it's certainly not a non-issue, but it was never the primary focus of the Christian as portrayed in the New Testament. Despite living lives far more imperiled by an oppressive (and foreign) government than today's Americans, the Christ of the Gospels and His followers in Acts never bothered to chase the political freedoms for which so many of their fellow Jews longed. Jesus pointedly refuses to get caught up in an ongoing tax debate (Matthew 22:21). And if compelled (likely by Roman soldiers, many scholars say) to accompany a man one mile, Jesus recommends in Matthew 5:21 the faithful go with him two.

Clearly, Jesus and His early disciples placed far greater importance on social change "from the ground up" - fixing people's souls rather than fixing the system under which the people lived. Small wonder, too, if one considers their ministry within the context of the Bible's other teachings on the nature of Man; after all, when God has made clear that men are not capable of saving themselves, how useful can a government system created and run by men really be? When God has made clear that the war for Man's immortal self is an internal struggle, rather than dependent on external factors, why expend our limited resources in ultimately fruitless endeavors to sustain a safe environment in which to live?

And they are fruitless endeavors. We American Protestants probably need to be reminded of that more than anybody. Although we rarely say so anymore, many of us still vaguely believe the U.S.A. to somehow be a holy land - a God-loving, God-blessed sidekick to Israel. Its divinely-inspired protector. Its big, protective buddy in the cell block.

This is why in Christian fiction about the end of the world, such as the Left Behind series, the U.S. is usually defeated by the Antichrist rather than a party - or Heaven forbid, the vehicle - to his ascension. This is also why the U.S.A., in some form or other, always happens to still exist in Christian fiction during the end of the world; few of us consider the likelihood that much like the Romans, we're likely little more, ultimately, than a particularly bright flash in the pan, and one which will grow progressively dimmer as History marches farther and farther - who knows how far, before Judgment Day? - past our crumbling remains.

Because we think we're special, a nation-state worth preserving in God's sight. But we aren't. And if the concept of the U.S.A. isn't worth preserving, then why do we American Christians (not "Christian Americans", note) spend so much of our God-given time and energy trying to preserve it?

The answer is, I am told: so we can defend the Church.

After all, in the United States the Church is currently free from persecution, and capable of supporting other churches in more dangerous countries because of that. Children may be educated about their LORD Jesus without fear; so may adults. Surely, any reasonable person might claim such a state of affairs is worth saving.

Which is why it's a good thing people like me are around to provide an alternative to reasonable people - because sometimes they're wrong. Such a state of affairs is not worth having, at least not unconditionally, as its proponents basically suggest when they present us the false dilemma of choosing 'twixt two evils. It makes no sense to seek protection of our spiritual kingdom at the cost of our spiritual integrity; it makes no sense to gain even the whole world, if we lose our souls (Mark 8:36).

So what must we as followers of the Christ do? Dr. Dobson himself actually put it very well in a recent (albeit sickeningly fluffy) interview on Townhall.com.

"You start with a moral principle. You have to make your decisions about who’s going to lead you not on the basis of pragmatics—not on the basis of who can win or who’s ahead in the polls or who has the most money or who’s the most popular. You begin by saying what are the irreducible minimums that I believe in, that I care about; what are the biblical values I cannot compromise."

After that, you don't let a bunch of Chicken Littles scare you into budging from those values. Should they suggest that if you don't vote Republican, President Hillary Clinton will steal what meager treasure you have amassed here on Earth, you remind them that the only treasure you consider important waits for you in Heaven. Should they suggest that if you don't vote Republican, Democrats will decide how to run your health care, you remind them that government-run health care is scarcely persecution of the saints. Should they suggest that if you don't vote Republican, pro-abortion judges will sit on the Supreme Court, you remind them that what they are asking you to do is consider voting for a pro-abortion candidate.

Because it ultimately doesn't matter if the very fate of America is indeed at stake in 2008. Jesus doubtlessly knew His own chosen people were to be crushed and scattered by Rome within fifty years of His ministry's end. Even faced with that looming darkness, however, He did not sacrifice the purity and focus of His ministry.

He did not, and you will not, because you both know that whatever the situation today, you will scarcely remember it an eternity from now, when you walk in the fields sprung up from an old world's ashes.

Above: Oh yeah, Baby, what a... a... drawing...

We kid you not: in celebration of the release of X-Men 3 this year, entertainment site IGN.com released an article listing the "Top Ten X-Babes" - that is, the ten most physically attractive women featured in X-Men.

Not the women featured in the movies, mind you.

The ones in the comic books.

Jean Grey "burns with more than the Phoenix Force," moans the article's writer, and Storm will "never win a prize for congeniality, but it's impossible to deny her beauty." Psylocke can "stab our psyche anytime."

And IGN.com's number-one choice for hottest X-Babe (oh, you know you were going to ask)?

Emma Frost, the White Queen: "Emma's a hedonist, who wears lingerie to go jogging. And she's a teacher."

Guess there's always a bright side to these sorts of things: if these guys weren't so aroused by artist Jim Lee's pencils, the rest of us could conceivably have more competition for the real women.

(... Nah.)

Who decided that "red states" would be those which vote for Republicans and "blue states" those which vote for Democrats?

Wikipedia even notes:

"This system used in the United States of America is in stark contrast to the color system used in the vast majority of other nations. In most other parts of the world, blue represents right wing and conservative parties, while red represents left wing and socialist parties."

My bet is that's part of the point. Whenever the two colors began to be generally used in American election coverage, liberals probably felt that to have support for them labeled "red" would be rather like handing Edward McCarthy a posthumous victory. The United States spent half a century locked in potentially lethal stand-off with The Reds. Nobody in American politics, not even the Communists themselves, desires association with the color now.

So, when you think about it, it really is only fair: in order not to bias voters against the Democratic Party, best not to identify it with the people who embodied the logical progression of Democrat ideas.