Matt Jones likes his music squeaky clean.
"I feel like we could go spend $200, buy a guitar and never tune it, and then play it and release a record and try to get a buzz on it, because it's like something new and something different," Jones said. "But it wouldn't be what we were doing, and it wouldn't be real as far as we're concerned."
The Real Matt Jones released the album Passerby on Tuesday. Jones and bass player Lance Kelly will perform at a release party Saturday at Ralli's Fourth Street Pub and Grill, at 109 Fourth St. N.W.
Lawmakers hope the rebates and business incentives will spur consumer and corporate spending and keep the economy from dipping into a recession before the November presidential and congressional election.
“What we (Christians) have to offer, I contend, is a missional hermeneutic of the Bible. The Bible got there before postmodernity was dreamed of- the Bible which glories in diversity and celebrates multiple human cultures, the Bible which builds its most elevated theological claims on utterly particular and sometimes very local events, the Bible which sees everything in relational, not abstract, terms, and the Bible which does the bulk of its works through the medium of stories.
All of these features of the Bible-cultural, local, relational, narrative-are welcome to the postmodern mind. Where the missional hermeneutic will part company with radical postmodernity, is in its insistence that through all this variety, locality, particularity and diversity, the Bible is nevertheless actually the story. This is the way it is. This is the grand narrative that constitutes truth for all. And within this story, as narrated or anticipated by the Bible, there is at work the God whose mission is evident from creation to new creation. This is the story of God’s mission. It is a coherent story with a universal claim. But it is also a story that affirms humanity in all its particular cultural variety. This is the universal story that gives a place in the sun to all the little stories.” (p. 47, The Mission of God, by Christopher Wright)
The picture is of a family burned to death in Kenya over the recent political unrest, do we get this reality in our suburban 4 bedroom houses?? Here is a great quote from Jenni's blog "So...":"i know we have a slew of problems in our country. and honestly, i wonder if some day we will end up with rebellions and overthrow of the government based on political and social prejudice - if our constitution will no longer be a set-in-stone law of the land. i actually think the problems that face the u.s. and europe are possibly as severe as third-world countries; but, they are the opposite problems. instead of too little, we have too much. instead of diseases without vaccines and medical care, we have too much ethically-compromised options (cloning, micro-chips, un-ending life support). instead of obvious safety concerns that bring noticed chaos and violence, we have an delusioned hope of creating a safe-zone utopia which breeds judgment and blame for all kinds of things that are just natural parts of life. instead of obvious prejudices, we live in the cover of judgment and condemnation of people that we wouldn’t ever admit exists (toward different races, people with sexual struggles, immigrants, etc) - under an illusion of love and grace. instead of abject poverty and starvation, we exist in a world of encouraged gluttony and materialism. and on and on.
it’s just that….we have more ability to change this, i think. in some ways maybe we know better. we have so much stuff and money. but, we could be more giving. we could change that. we could stop our gluttony. whereas, over there, there just isn’t food - they can’t really stop their hunger. here, we have experience freedom and a democratic process; we have grown in our understanding of people’s racial and ethnic difference. but there, an attempt at a democratic process has been forced onto tribal people groups who are yet to grasp western living and politics. (the similarities between the rez here and stuff there is stunning!!! i could go on and on about it!)
and mostly, we can fellowship with people who follow christ. we can walk into a building and connect with a church family. we can get a bible. we have the answers to the problems. only, we don’t access it. we don’t let it change us often times. granted, ppl in africa very well might not access it either, if they had it more. they might not change either. but, at least we have the chance. "
I really encourage to read this whole blog very good, very convicting, very encouraging. With all this going on in Africa and even here in the USA what does it mean to be a Christ follower, to be a doer of the Word not just a hearer of the Word?
"Imagine most of baseball's Latin American sluggers returning home en masse to miss a full month of games midway through a regular season, and you'll get some idea of what European pro soccer is currently experiencing. Depleted squads; the general level of play noticeably weakened; and standings shaken up as teams surge or falter as a result of the exodus of so many star performers. The cause of the exodus? The African Cup of Nations, a biennial tournament that pitches the continent's 16 top national teams against one another in a mini-World Cup whose quality now rivals the regional competitions of South America and Europe."
More than 860 people have been killed and more than 200,000 displaced in the turmoil, the Red Cross said. The Red Cross has put the number at 863. There was no fresh violence reported in Kenya Wednesday.
Former UNM goalkeeper Mike Graczyk will get the chance to shut down professional offenses.
Graczyk - one of the most successful Lobos in program history - was drafted in Thursday's MLS Supplemental Draft by the Colorado Rapids. He was the 19th overall pick, taken by Colorado in the second round.
The standout goalie put together an impressive career while at UNM. He owns the program record for shutouts, with 30. His .64 goals against average is the best in school history.
Graczyk was a critical part of a Lobo team that won three-straight Mountain Pacific Sports Federation titles. He earned two shutouts in the 2005 NCAA Tournament, which landed him on the College Cup All-Tournament Team.
But those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith, and pierced themselves with many a pang. But flee from these things, you man of God; and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, perseverance and gentleness. 1 Tim 6: 9-11
In these first two weeks, we sang a lot about Jesus and talked a lot about Jesus. That sounds pretty good. Numerically, we had more people than we were expecting…by quite a bit. In our leadership meetings we were guessing between 150-350 people at the beginning. But no one was expecting 510 and 470 on the first two weeks. People are inviting their friends and we have all kinds of people getting to know us and each other. We have some people that are checking out this whole Christianity thing and others who have been out of meaningful church involvement for a while.
Picture taken outside Covenant's Library, yep that is John Calvin!!
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| You scored as Karl Barth The daddy of 20th Century theology. You perceive liberal theology to be a disaster and so you insist that the revelation of Christ, not human experience, should be the starting point for all theology.
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As she turned and began to walk toward home she felt clean—cleaner than she could ever remember. How could that be? She hadn’t done anything to deserve to be clean. There hadn’t even been a ritual sacrifice or water cleansing according to the law yet. That rabbi had simply declared her guilt-free, and it was so. No one ever spoke like this man. She heard God when he spoke.
But after a few minutes of walking it hit her: “I have to go home.” Fear shot through her. She wanted to bolt. The rabbi had forgiven her. But waiting at home was her betrayed husband. And her children. And her parents. And his parents. She had shamed the entire family. Her life was like a broken pot; shards all over the floor. Because of her sin. She almost longed to be buried by the stones.
But she still felt clean
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Track and field’s world governing body ruled on Monday that Oscar Pistorius, a double-amputee sprinter from South Africa, is not be eligible to compete in Olympic qualifying events. The International Association of Athletics Federations explained in a statement that, after an independent scientific study, it deemed Pistorius’s state-of-the-art carbon fiber prosthetics “should be considered as technical aids which give him an advantage over other athletes not using them.”
To get people to attend his new church campus, Robbie McLaughlin is sending his message out to where the people are.
Next Friday, staffers from Next Level Church of Matthews will go to bars in the Ballantyne area of Charlotte to hand out shot glasses which ask patrons to "give us a shot" and bear the slogan, "Real church for real people."
The idea is to draw people to the Ballantyne campus, which opens next month.
McLaughlin is the pastor, and said he is confident that it will be controversial, but he said the goal is not necessarily to impress people who already go to church. He said it's to impress people who don't.
Next Level is a nontraditional church that encourages members to dress casually and snack on coffee and doughnuts during services.
McLaughlin said the idea has caught on, and in two years, the church has grown from a handful of members to more than 700.
I do not have a problem with this approach, although the truth is this is not really missional, although I am not sure that was their intent. It is a "come and see" approach, shot glass instead of Thomas Kinkade (Sp?) Calendar.
"...There are around a billion people in the world who don't have clean drinking water, and 46 million Americans don't have health care. That means if they get sick, they don't have anywhere to go. Half of the world, 3 billion people, live on less than two American dollars a day, so the world is an emergency. It's on fire. It's drowning. It's an absolute crisis, and when followers of Jesus can think of nothing better to do with their time than to pick apart and shred to pieces the work of other followers of Jesus who are trying to do something about the world, that's tragic, and I don't owe these people anything. The would is desperately in need of people who will break themselves open and pour themselves out for the reconciliation of all things. When a Christian can find nothing better to do with their time in the face of this much pain and heartbreak, you start realizing that some Christians need to be saved. How a person would have energy to take shots at other Christians is just mind-boggling. You have to be totally disconnected from the pain of the world to think that blogging is somehow redemptive use of your time. I guess I have some strong thoughts on that." Rob Bell
"To be part of this fellowship is to know the sufferings of Christ and to be conformed to him in contrast to the surrounding culture, to be comforted and empowered by the Spirit, and to have the hope that the God of Israel, who is the Father of the Lord Jesus, will complete the new creation that has already begun. The church is the fellowship that speaks and lives that personal, communal and cosmic story." Apostle of the Crucified Lord: A Theological Introduction to Paul and His Letters, by Michael Gorman
"Love has a very specific meaning for Paul-conformity to the pattern of Christ's self-giving, sacrafical love on the cross.
...In fact, the love which he speaks overlaps with the Hebrew Scriptures' notion of justice: special, concrete attention to the weaker or needier members of the local or wider community. Furthermore, the love of God in Christ does not neglect outsiders and even enemies. After all, Christ's death was God's gift for those at enmity with God."
1. Spend less time writing sermons, more time listening
2. Spend less time reading-writing on leadership and more time walking with/mentoring young leaders
3. Spend less time planning the worship gathering - more time in silence before God
4. Spend more time with the children, less time programming "entertainment with pizza.
5. Spend less time in meetings, more time in the neighborhood.
6. Spend less time in meetings figuring out details to make things work better, and more time in meetings where we ask "what is God doing?
7. Spend less time trying to please Christians
8 Spend less time answering bizarre twisted questions about outlier doctrines
9 Spend less time worrying about numbers
10. Spend less time frantically trying to catch up with all the words I have to write
"the bulk of Jesus' might works, could be seen as the restoration to the membership in Israel of those who, through sickness or whatever, had been excluded as ritually unclean. The healings thus function in exact parallel with the welcome of sinners, and this, we may quite sure, was what Jesus himself intended. He never performed mighty works simply to impress. He saw them as part of the inauguration of the sovereign and healing rul of Israel's covenant god." (Wright, Jesus and the Victory of God")
"(The gospel creates) a community where no one gets to brag, but where everyone is broken but being healed"
“We read [scripture], naturally, as part of our real history, secular history, the history of which we are a part. What other history is there? There are not different histories, but there are different ways of understanding history…it is clearly an illusion to imagine that there are two kinds of history - sacred and profane, salvation history and secular history.”
- Lesslie Newbigin in Foolishness to the Greeks
The rhetoric of the race -- and the rhetoric of many evangelicals -- is disturbing. This race is important and necessarily so. We are talking about the next President of the United States, after all. But evangelicals have invested far too much hope in the political process. No government can make people good, transform humanity, or eliminate sin. The political sphere is important, but never ultimate. Jesus Christ is Lord -- and He will be Lord regardless of who sits in the Oval Office.
"One can imagine the stirring of hearts an quickening of pulses in Jewish homes and communities when, into this mixture of aspirations and hopes dropped the message of John the Baptist, and then of Jesus himself-
The time is fulfilled!(what you have been waiting for as something future is now here and present); the kingdom of God is at hand! (God is now acting to establish his reign in the midst of you); so repent and believe the good news (urgent action is required of you now)."
"When Matthew announces Jesus as the Messiah, the son of Abraham, then, it means not only that he belongs to that particular people ( a real Jew, as we have just seen), but that he belongs to a people whose very reason for existence was to bring blessing to the rest of humanity. He shared that mission, and indeed, as the Messiah, he had come to make it a possibility and a reality at last. A particular man, but with a universal significance."
"But probably more significant is the other thing they (the women of Jesus' genealogy in Matthew) all have in common. They were all, from a Jewish point of view, foreigners."
"The implication of Jesus being the heir of Abraham and his universal promise is underlined: Jesus the Jew, and the Jewish Messiah, had Gentile blood!"
