Since I have a son with Down Syndrome, I was especially interested when I was pointed to a post by Julana at Life in the Slow Lane on when she found out she was pregnant with a Down Syndrome son. It’s beautifully written. Check it out.

(HT - Charlie @ AnotherThink)

Sam,
The world’s ugliest dog for three years running and about whom my brother blogged about here, died this Friday. Moment of silence please! (Now what category shall I put this under?)
Steve
HT to Glen at Agorophilia

click above (turn on audio)

I have often wondered if I experienced an all-consuming, heart-breaking tragedy, such as the loss of a child, if I could have the response of Job?

Then Job arose and tore his robe and shaved his head and fell on the ground and worshiped. And he said, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return. The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD. In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrong. ”

I think this answer is absolutely not, and if it turns out I was wrong then it would totally and completely be all of grace.

Challies has posted a story of a family in Chattanooga that has suffered horrible tragedies and yet their response is one of utter faithfulness. Please read this story and don’t forget to pray for this family.

Scott

I know I am a day late and a dollar short in all this but I didn’t read my aggregator for most of last week and when I finally did last night I realized I had missed another God-blog controversy wherein Michael Spencer was taken to the woodshed by Frank Turk. I then wrote the piece below initially as an email to Mr. Turk but have decided to post it here instead.
————–
Mr. Turk,

Let me first say that I was not very familiar with your blog before all this, having only visited it a few times, but now I have added it to my aggregator and hope to read it more regularly in the future. I like humor. I also want to confess that I am a regular and avid reader of iMonk and the BHT (just so you know where I am coming from.) I also don’t give him a pass on everything he says and writes.

I just finished reading your post and all the comments regarding Michael Spencer and I have a some thoughts and questions:

1)You said “we should not allow emotionally unstable people to speak on behalf of Christianity in any respect.” If I understand it right, one of your main points is that Michael Spencer is emotionally unstable and as such is not “credible” and is “a fraud” when giving opinions about the the Christian faith and ministry. I disagree with you on two levels.

First, I think that to call him emotionally unstable is a bit much. I guess it depends on how you define “emotionally unstable”. If you meant he is pathological or psychotic in some way such that nothing he says could be construed as reliable or trustworthy, then I have to disagree with you, fervently. Is he given to melancholy? (yes by his own admission). Does he have a lot (too much) invested emotionally in his writing and in his popularity as a blogger. I think he does. But those and his many other sins are not, in my opinion, enough to label him as “emotionally unstable” as I defined it above.

Second, I think your statement as a blanket generalization is, in fact, not true. Especially since it adds, “in any respect”. There’s no wiggle room there. Heck, I am emotionally unstable. When I go to a chick flick with my wife, I am the one who cries. I cry at those stupid Kodak commercials on TV. When we have an argument , I cry first (ok thats an old Bill Cosby joke). In a Myers-Briggs profile, I am an ENFP. More touchy-feely and wishy-washy. There is a whole story I could tell of going to seminary (no I am not in the ministry nor have I ever been) and learning lots of facts about the faith and knowing systematic theology and Greek and Hebrew and church history. And how after all that my heart was hard as stone. Only many many years after the fact did God bring me to repentance and brokenness. Therein He caused me to see the importance of the heart and affections and LOVE in such a way as to move me to a greater love for the scriptures and the gospel and HIM. But I won’t tell that story (haha). All that is to say that I know why I love Michael Spencer and what he writes. He writes from a place of brokenness and contrition and humility. No one else that I know of is writing like that on the internet. No one is that open about their struggles and sin. I can relate to him. Bloggers who: 1) have their act together or 2) who have all their propositions in a row or 3) think that exegesis and systematics is an exact science or 4) truly sound from their writing as if sin is not really a struggle for them — don’t appeal to me. Of course, I am sure that they don’t care that they don’t appeal to me since I am emotionally unstable.

Of course, many people who have spoken on behalf of Christianity in God-glorifying ways were “emotionally unstable”. William Cowper was brought forth several times in the comments on your first post and you never even responded. He was “emotionally unstable”. He spoke on behalf of Chrsitianity. He wrote in “God Moves in a Mysterious Way” -

Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,
But trust Him for His grace;
Behind a frowning providence
He hides a smiling face.

That dog will hunt. And yet Cowper’s life is described, in John Piper’s sermon on him, as “one long accumulation of pain.” He suffered with severe depression his entire life. By probably anyone’s standard he would be described as “emotionally unstable”. Many other great figures of the faith suffered with darknesses and depressions and “Dark Nights of the Soul”. The Psalmist, Paul, Luther, Spurgeon and many others. Even Jesus struggled with his calling to go to the cross

I think just on the face of it your comment is in error, so here are my questions:

1. What do you mean by emotionally unstable? How do you define it?
2. As has been asked before, does William Cowper “speak on behalf of Christianity”?
3. Is there a place for openness, brokenness, confession and gospel contrition in the christian blogosphere”?
4. Spencer appeals to many readers for many reason. What do you think they are?
5. Is it possible that often what he is says is glorifying to God and edifying to the saints?

I need to end by telling you that from what I have read in your blog, I think you and I would get along swimmingly if we met in real life. You seem to me to be smart, funny and a true lover of the gospel and I really look forward to reading more on your blog.

Scott

I have this memory from my suburban South Carolina childhood. Its so clear that I remember it like it was yesterday.

I am not sure how old I was , but I think I was younger than 10. I remember my dad came home from work and pulled into our driveway in his Pontiac, the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. He called me and my brothers to come see what he had and showed us a crate in the back seat of his Pontiac, he placed the crate on the ground and pulled up the door in the side of the crate and out strutted a large live turkey. My dad announced that he was that very night going to slaughter and pluck that turkey in preparation for our Thanksgiving meal. He was going to do it right there in the backyard of a our suburban neighborhood house.

The Fat Triplets wailed in protest. We begged and pleaded for him to spare the life of this turkey. I remembered my dad was really exasperated, but we prevailed and he said he would let the turkey live overnight in the shed behind the house and he would dispatch him the next day, Thanksgiving eve, which would still be in time to get him ready for Thanksgiving. We were so happy for this stay of execution , but that night was bitterly cold. When we bundled up and checked on the turkey the next day, he was frozen and dead and stiff as a board. Since Mr. Turkey had died of exposure and not been properly slaughtered, my dad instructed us to bury the bird in the backyard, which we did.

******
Fast forward a few decades. A year or so ago, the whole family was gathered together for a Thanksgiving meal (a very rare occasion these days) , which is always loud with laughter, debate and spirited conversation (A subject my wife just blogged on). We were talking and reflecting on our memories from childhood and I recounted my memory of Turkey whom we never got to eat. Everyone at the table was silent and they all were looking at me like I had three heads. One of my brothers (I think it was Steve) said “Scott, that never happened”. Everyone agreed. Without exception. They all said that they didn’t remember this story AT ALL.

I have been forced to accept the possibility that my memory isn’t a memory at all but something else. My theory is that it is a actually a dream that got mis-filed under “memories”. I wonder if I have any memories that have been mis-filed under “dreams”.

Scott

It has been way long since my last post. And in fact 5 days since ANY of us posted. So I thought I would give it a go.

My mind and heart have been occupied of late. I am starting a business. I have given serious thought to starting ANOTHER blog about all that is going on. And I a may yet do that. But until then, if our audience will indulge me a bit I will appreciate it. Blogging is, after all, a kind of public journal and since my heart has BEEN largely occupied with this there is nothing really left to blog about.

A little background. I have been self-employed for 6 years doing computer consulting. I have enjoyed every minute of it. God has prospered me in ways I could not have imagined for myself.

For most of that time I have had a wonderful business partner who has helped me do the right thing and stay on track. I almost called this post “The End of A Good Thing” for this new endeavor has come at the expense of the severing of the old. All very amicable and reasonable. I now have a little cash to live on while I try to get the business set up.

There were basically two catalysts for this.

The first is the limitations of being a computer consultant. Consultants have only one commodity to sell, generally. TIME. It is a limited resource. I have made the same income for 8 years running and it is not a huge income. The only way to add to this commodity is to hire more warm bodies. And then your on the hook. You hit a slump and things can go south quickly.

But the other thing that compels me is THE STRENGTH OF AN IDEA. There are a LOT of questions to ask and a LOT of things to work out. And given that, and my natural aversion to risk, I can say that I would not be going down this path were it not for my belief that I AM REALLY ONTO SOMETHING. Sorry, I can’t tell you about it, at least not right now. (And for those of you who DO know about it — friends and relatives–don’t forget to keep it under your hat.)

Of course, I know a lot of businesses are started by people who believed in an idea. And I know that most of those business fail. (My brother was quick to point out that good ideas are “a dime a dozen”.) But I REALLY think this one is different. In other words, good ideas are a dime a dozen but not all ideas are equally good. Time will tell on this one.

What do I think? I think that it is all in the execution. If I plan well and follow-through and work really hard and hire good people and think–then I will succeed. I have written a 54 page business plan. My thinking has changed and now I need to re-write it. But its a start.

Pray that God would be honored in all I do. Truly, that is what I want. More on this later.

Seth

Joe Carter over at Evangelical Outpost has posted a great list of “Spiritually Significant Films“. I love the way he qualifies the list and I also love the list. And the comments are utterly fascinating. I left one of my own.

Steve

Last night we were trading insults over dinner as is our want on occasion. David, talking to Emily, said,

Daddy tried to sell you for some magic beans.

Emily said to David,

Well Daddy tried to sell you at the Flea Market for a nickel.

To which I replied to David,

Actually, I did sell you at the Flea Market for a Nickel. But they returned you for a refund!

Steve

My Google personal home page had a Slashdot link to an article about a rogue rootkit that blew me away.

Before I launch into this, let me try to explain what a rootkit is to you non-techie people out there. A rootkit is a program or series of programs that can secretly gets installed on a computer for the purpose gaining access to that computer so it can be used for some evil purpose. There are three ways a rootkit can get installed on your computer.

1. a black hat “cracks” (more popularly known as “hacks”) your computer and installs a rootkit.
2. a virus or “worm” exploits a known security vulnerability on your computer and installs a rootkit
3. You, the user, knowingly install software that you think is not malicious but in fact is.

This story is about the third type of rootkit installation. You normally avoid this problem by practicing safe web-surfing habits and only installing software from reputable sources. But in this case, the evil software company is not”pr0n-R-us”, “10,000 smileys” or “kazaa”, its the Sony Music label. Thats right kids, record labels are getting so obsessive about piracy and Digital Restrictions Management (DRM) that they have stooped to the levels of the script kiddies, hackers and virus writers.

Let me say at the outset that I am all for artists getting paid for the work. (However, a point that is well made at downhillbattle.org is that the labels are much more concerned about increasing profits than truly benefitting artists and consumers). For that reason, and because I wanted to set a good example for my kids, I started buying my music from iTunes last year and have been very happy with the result. In my opinion, iTunes has achieved the sweet spot in price and givees me generous DRM rights.

So back to the story, many of Sony’s recent releases will let you play a CD normally in a player, but REQUIRED you to install their software to listen to the CD on your computer. As it turns out, that software installs a rootkit that bends over backwards and forwards to hide itself from your system and is very difficult to un-install. Mark Russinovich, who has been a mover and shaker geek in the Windows community for years and has developed a ton of great resources and utilities over at his site Sysinternals discovered this rootkit on October 31 and documents in great detail on his blog about how he found and eliminated this rootkit. A firestorm of controversy has erupted and now Sony has been forced to completely back-pedal and has recalled more than 2 million CDs

It is interesting to note that one of my favorite bands, Switchfoot, has this rootkit installer on their newest CD, Nothing is Sound. Of course, since I purchased it on iTunes I avoided Sony’s evil software.

Here is THE LISTof infected CDs.

I won’t bore you with the details, but I would encourage everyone to read the links here and Google words like sony, rootkit, uninstall, drm - to learn more and make sure your machine is not infected.

Scott

I have just spent the last few minutes reading many reviews of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and now I REALLY can’t wait to see it. Both critics and consumer reviews are giving the movie raves.

As for the continued controversy in Christian circles as to the ethics of Christian involvement with the Harry phenomenon, I was really glad to read what my favorite Christian reviewer, Stephen Greydanus at Decent Films said in his review.

In spite of the rising darkness, concerns relating to Harry’s study of magic and the lure of the occult are, arguably, increasingly remote. (For an in-depth discussion of moral issues relating to real-world and imaginary magic, see my booklet-length essay “Harry Potter vs. Gandalf.”)

There’s plenty of fantasy or fairy-tale magic in Goblet of Fire — dragons and winged horses and mermaids, flying broomsticks and magic wands, teleportations and transformations. Yet, interestingly, the only elements that in any way resembles real-world occult practices are unambiguously evil, from the Unforgivable Curses to the quasi-sacrificial ritual used to restore Voldemort. The secret Death-Eater cult, which resembles a satanic coven, is also thoroughly evil; there is no such thing as a “good” coven.

Lawful magic in Goblet of Fire bears no resemblance to so-called “white” magic as practiced by occultists; there is no divination, no invocation of spirits, no summoning of the dead, no reliance on amulets or charms. (The third story, The Prisoner of Azkaban, did feature a class in divination, but largely satirized it, presenting it as uniquely ineffective and unreliable in contrast with the fantasy magic of other disciplines at Hogwarts. This satirization of divination continues into book four, but this doesn’t carry over into the film.)

This is in spite of the fact that Greydanus in the past has never given JKR and Potter a pass. I would encourage you to read his other material on the use of magic in fiction and fantasy.
Harry Potter vs. Gandalf
His other Harry Potter articles and reviews

Scott

Joe Carter over at the Evangelical Outpost has written a post on Darwinism, Eugenics and selective abortion of people with Down Syndrome. I am the father of a boy with Down Syndrome and after reading all the comments over there I have to say I didn’t realize we had so many Nazis around.

Scott

I have to admit. I am not up on LOTR trivia so I had to guess on some of them.

Entish

To which race of Middle Earth do you belong?
brought to you by Quizilla

Numenorean

To which race of Middle Earth do you belong?
brought to you by Quizilla

Here is a bold and audacious opinion of mine: the 1995, BBC production of Pride and Prejudice ,with Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy and Jennifer Ehle as Elizabeth Bennet, is the best story ever set to celluloid. Ever. Bar none. It is 270 minutes long and is almost all dialogue which is why so many men have little patience for it. It originally aired on Sunday nights on BBC One in the UK from September 24, 1995 to October 29, 1995. My wife has watched it at least a dozen times. Do the math. That’s 54 hours.

So with my biases clearly in the open, I now broach the topic of the version P & P now in limited release in the United States starring Keira Knightley as Elizabeth Bennet and some other guy I never heard of playing Mr. Darcy. Keira Knightley? Seriously, I am not kidding. My initial reaction is that there is no way I am going to see an actress as one dimensional as KK playing the beloved Lizzy. But the movie is getting surprisingly strong critical reviews. Ebert gave it 4 stars. So does Claudia Puig, movie reviewer for USA Today. There is apparently some controversy about a steamy kiss at the end of the US version that was edited out of the UK version. It takes place after Lizzy becomes Mrs. Darcy. I’ll go see the film but I am rather determined not to like it.

The BBC version starts off slow. Each episode builds on the previous one. By the end of the second episode, you’re hooked. Here are some of my favorite scenes from the series:

Mr. Darcy: In vain have I struggled, it will not do. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.

These lines begin my favorite scene in which Darcy proposes to Lizzy and manages to add insult to previous injury. The entire proposal scene from the book can be found here.

Charlotte Lucas: Mr Collins tends the gardens himself and spends a good part of every day in them.
Elizabeth Bennet: The exercise must be beneficial.
Charlotte Lucas: Indeed it is. I encourage him to be in his garden as often as possible. Then he has to walk to Rosings nearly every day
Elizabeth Bennet: So often? Is that necessary?
Charlotte Lucas: Perhaps not, but I admit I encourage him in that also. And when he is in the house, he is mostly in his book room which affords a good view of the road whenever Lady Catherine’s carriage should drive by.
Elizabeth Bennet: And you prefer to sit in this parlor.
Charlotte Lucas: Yes. So you see, it often happens that a whole day passes in which we have not spent more than a few minutes in each other’s company. I find that I can bear the solitude very cheerfully. I find myself… quite content with my situation Lizzy.

The character of Mr. Collins is one of the funniest and most “reprehensible” and “odious” in English literature. He is obseqious, self-righteous, superior and class conscience all at the same time and a cleric to boot. He also had previously proposed to Lizzy and, despite her inferior station, she had flatly refused. Her mother, insistent that Lizzy should marry him, implores Mr. Bennett to “make her marry him”. Which leads to what may be the funniest line of dialogue in the entire film. But you’ll have to watch to know what the line is.

Mr. Darcy: I shall conquer this, I shall.

These words begin what is my second favorite scene, or series of scenes, in which Lizzy indvertantly runs into Mr. Darcy at Pemberly. The scales fall off of Lizzie’s eyes while Mr. Darcy has clearly taken to heart the rebuke offered at his proposal. After the declaration above, he rides to Pemberley one day early, after the assurances of the housekeeper that Mr. Darcy is not due to arrive until the following day, while Lizzie and the Gardiners tour the estate. They stumble into one another, Mr. Darcy soaking wet after a dip in a pond to clear his agitated mind, and Lizzie horrified at her appearance after she has spoken so harshly to him when he proposed. She begs the Gardiners to leave right away but Mr. Darcy catches them as they are stepping into their carriage and is extraordinarily kind, generous and gregarious in his manners. This scene, and those that follow, are magical.

What are your favorite scenes from Pride and Prejudice? I would love to have a dialogue with our readers so please leave a comment.

Steve