Between Two Worlds

Philosopher William Lane Craig has launched a new website/ministry: www.reasonablefaith.org.

And it looks like J. P. Moreland has done the same.

(HT: STR)

Here's an exciting new work: The Council of Reforming Churches.

Goals
The Council of Reforming Churches (CRC) exists to impact the black church and greater black community with biblical theology which has its fulfillment in the Person and work of Jesus Christ. Our aim is to see reformed theology planted, take root and eventually flourish within and among the black community, for Christ, the Church, and the Truth.

Who They Are
The Council of Reforming Churches is an association of churches subscribing to the historic five solas of the reformation, the core doctrines of grace commonly known as the five points of Calvinism and the system of theology summed up in such catechism/confessions as the historic Baptist Confession of Faith 1689, The Westminster Confession of Faith and Heidelberg Catechism.

Our purpose is to see biblically reformed theology sown, take root in, flourish among and eventually become the dominant theology within the black church and African-American community.

Why They Exist

• CRC exists to fill the vacuum created by the absence of any institution dedicated to the promotion and practice of biblically reformed theology within the African-American community.
• CRC exists in light of the increasing rejection of sound biblical preaching and teaching among a significant number of black churches.
  
• CRC exists to address the black community's need to be instructed properly in the historic truths of reformed theology.
  
• CRC exists to engage the increasing secularization of the black church and subsequent danger to our Christian witness.

There's also a blog: reformingchurches.org/blog, with contributions by Pastors Thabiti Anyabwile, Tony Carter, Michael Leach, Lance Lewis, Eric Redmond.

John Fund: "Accountability for misogynistic and racist remarks should apply equally to Don Imus and Snoop Dogg."

Great advice here: Thabiti's Top Ten Tips for Talking About Race:

1. Don't talk about race.
2. When you do talk about race, don't tell people you're "color blind."
3. When you do talk about race, be sure to empathize wherever you can.
4. When you do talk about race, be sure to call injustice injustice.
5. When you do talk about race, be honest.
6. When you do talk about race, be patient.
7. When you do talk about race, please fight against the tendency to stereotype.
8. When you do talk about race, accept legitimate responsibility but refuse illegitimate guilt.
9. When you do talk about race, go ahead and offend.
10. When you do talk about race, root the conversation in the Gospel.

Read the whole thing.

Lee Irons and Scott Clark remember their former professor.

John Piper on The Beautiful Faith of Fearless Submission.

The latest issue is dedicated to the issue of pacificism vs. just war. Denny Burk has the details.

CT Movies: "It was only a matter of time. The Hollywood Reporter brings the official word that most of the principles from The Da Vinci Code will be returning for the film's prequel, Angels and Demons. Specifically, star Tom Hanks and director Ron Howard are in final talks to join forces once again for the much-buzzed follow-up to one of the most controversial films in recent memory. (Some sources are already calling Hanks' involvement 'official.') Columbia Pictures plans to being filming as early as January 2008, with hopes to release the film on December 19."

Publishers Weekly: New Osteen Book at Three Million by Lynn Garrett. "The next book from megaselling pastor Joel Osteen—Become a Better You: 7 Keys to Improving Your Life—will have a first printing of three million and a one-day laydown on October 15. According to Free Press publisher Martha Levin, the house upped the ante from two million just this week, in response to "the enthusiasm of the accounts," she said. "We've been going at full tilt with this book since January, and in talking to people it became clear that two million wasn't going to be enough." The Osteen first printing is believed to be the highest for a hardcover book in S&S history, said spokesperson Adam Rothberg. Osteen made big news last year (PW Daily, Mar. 15, 2006) when he jumped the Warner ship for Simon & Schuster for a deal worth some $13 million, according to informed sources, though S&S denied that figure. Osteen's first book, Your Best Life Now, was published by Warner Faith (now Hachette's FaithWords division) in 2004 and has sold more than four million copies to date, with a constant presence on the bestsellers lists. S&S will publish Become a Better You simultaneously in Spanish-language and audio editions.

Albert Mohler is beginning to post some lists of recommended reading. Here is his first entry, on
Ten Great Christian Biographies.

sLee Irons:

Today I learned that my favorite seminary professor passed away peacefully last night after a long illness. He taught me much about the covenantal and typological structure of the Scriptures. Most of all I will miss his sweet joy and his childlike trust in the inheritance-earning merit of Christ. It is wonderful to know that his longing to imbibe the glory of God in the New Jerusalem is already beginning to be satisfied. Though now asleep in Jesus, he will rise in the parousia-day of Christ, changed into his indoxated likeness.

(HT: James Grant)

Here is the Theopedia entry on Professor Kline. And here is a page devoted to all of Kline's writings.

From the now-why-didn't-I-think-of-that department.

Jerry Falwell considers so-called "limited atonement" to be a heretical doctrine.

From ThinkChristian.net:

Google has teamed up with the US Holocaust Memorial Museum to highlight the Darfus crisis using Google Earth:

Google Earth has added a Global Awareness layer to its maps program that lets you learn about the crisis in Darfur. By selecting the Global Awareness layer (in the lower left-hand corner of Google Earth) you can fly over enhanced satellite images of the war-torn region. Sprinkled over the map are icons that link to photographs, data, videos, and narratives of eyewitnesses to the genocide.

What an excellent use of internet technology to educate users about a crisis that many people probably don’t fully understand. Grab a copy of Google Earth and read more about the project at the Holocaust Memorial Museum website. I’m eager to see what other educational uses will be found for Google Earth and similar tools in the future.

A number of bloggers post photos on Friday. Here's one my wife recently snapped of our kids:

The ESV blog has an announcement about the forthcoming Literary Study Bible (edited by Leland Ryken and Philip Ryken), about which I'm quite excited!

Edward Gilbreath on Our "Don Imus" Moment.

Some challenging thoughts here by Carl Trueman on paternalism and imperialism:

With the great demographic shift to the southern hemisphere in terms of evangelical Christianity, the issue of listening to the voices of brothers and sisters from these newly significant areas is a pressing one. But I want to raise some concerns.

1. Culture and geography are only two ways of dividing up the world and the church -- ways that are arguably increasingly arbitrary; and their very trendiness makes them attractive at this point in history. Yet class would seem to be just as significant. Calls for us to listen to voices from other parts of the world should not be used to crowd out the voices of the poor and the working class in the West.

2. The demographic shift may be to the south, but the economic power of Christianity lies stubbornly in America. This is significant for several reasons:

• it means that theological education, for better or worse, is likely to remain controlled by America (institutions, books, journals, magazines all require money -- and if you don't have the capital, sheer numbers of people are less relevant).

• it means there is a very great danger of the old imperialism and paternalism of previous generations simply co-opting the language of cultural sensitivity while continuing with business as usual. Cultural sensitivity, like all cultural phenomena, can easily be processed through the three c's of the modern West: commercialisation, commodification, and consumerism. When it does this, it ceases to be a critical force and becomes simply one more product in the cultural marketplace, internalised and emasculated. Thus, putting "Worldwide" or "International" in the title of an organisation which is funded by Americans and basically run by Westerners does not make the organisation truly international or worldwide. There seems to be a problem when church leaders give lectures on listening to brothers and sisters from the Third World when said leaders have never taken the time or had the courtesy to learn the languages of those to whom they claim to be listening, and who assume that this "listening" should self-evidently go on in organisations founded by -- you guessed it -- Westerners, funded by Westerners, and run by Westerners. There is a real danger here of paternalism: yes, we want to listen to you; but you first have to learn to speak our language and come to our conferences.

The answer? Well, I'm a Reformation academic. I could not credibly be so without being able to operate in four or five different modern European languages (not well, but well enough) and a few ancient ones. It would be absurd for me to lecture my students on listening to, say, German scholars, if I could not read some German. I also have to attend, on occasion, meeting where the medium language is not English, and which are run by, say, the Dutch, the French, or the Germans. Those church leaders who are rightly called to lead us in listening to our Third World brothers and sisters but who wish to avoid looking like old-style imperialists need to show their commitment and integrity by backing this up with a few linguistic skills in the appropriate areas, and perhaps by surrendering their organisations and their status to these brothers and sisters. Only when such leaders learn a few relevant languages and sit humbly and quietly at conferences organised by "the Other" will their words begin to possess that most elusive quality: authenticity.

Tony Reinke has written a helpful review Turretin's Elenctic Theology.

(HT: Conventicle)

Colin Adams interviews Phil Ryken on expository preaching.

Kathleen Parker in The Washington Post:

On any given day, one isn't likely to find common cause with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He's a dangerous, lying, Holocaust- denying, Jew-hating cutthroat thug -- not to put too fine a point on it.

But he was dead-on when he wondered why a once-great power such as Britain sends mothers of toddlers to fight its battles.

. . .Why the West has seen it necessary to diminish motherhood so that women can pretend to be men remains a mystery to sane adults. It should be unnecessary to say that the military is not a proper vehicle for social experimentation but is a machine dedicated to fighting and, if necessary, killing.

For more on this, see Albert Mohler's commentary.

Those in the Alabama area may be interested in this conference on The Miracle of Conversion. Speakers include Voddie Baucham and Russell Moore.

John Lanchester, writing in the UK Guardian, pens a long and interesting article about copyright law, the future of books, and Google Book Search.

Richard Ovenden, the keeper of special collections at The Bodleian in Oxford (a copyright library, and considered one of the greatest libraries in the world), says, "I think in the 21st century Google Book Search will be regarded as one of the great historical enterprises. It's not the only one, but it's up there."

John Fund has a good article here in affirmative action and how its gradual demise at the collegiate-application level is helping minorities.