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Fiery Trials

Posted on January 28, 2010
Filed Under Marriage & Family, Personal | 132 Comments

The last two weeks have been filled with a lot of issues. I don’t know if they rise to the level of Peter’s “fiery trials” or not (1 Peter 4:12), but they have been close to overwhelming at times.

This is a photo from my recent “hunting” trip to the mountains. I am posting it with this blog because I am longing to turn the clock back and return to that time and experience the great joy and peace I had there.

But, we only live in the present, do we not?

First, my very, very, dear sweet uncle passed away. He was a WWII vet, earned two bronze stars. He adored my Dad who cared for him when they were all abandoned at early ages. My uncle spent the rest of his life singing the praises of my Dad, as we all did. But the reality was that my uncle was one of those rare jewels of a man as well. I will miss him terribly.

Secondly, we have been hit with several family issues: one daughter is facing a very long deployment of her husband and other daughter facing serious issues with their children.

We, personally, are walking through another heart-breaking event with our “prodigal” son—our youngest. I know there are many who struggle with this and I hope that our new TV show, Cross Examine, will deal with it within the first few episodes. There are so many emotional and physical issues associated with a prodigal, some rather severe. There are strong feelings of guilt, bewilderment, frustration, hopelessness, anger, disappointment, sorrow…betrayal. Just when you think you’ve got a handle on it, another event occurs and they all come back. Even when they aren’t triggered by an “event”, your wandering son or daughter is never really far from your thoughts and it can break into your heart and mind and emotions without so much as a warning knock.

They just surge back and hit you like an unexpected ocean wave. Read more

The Million Dollar Parenting Question

Posted on January 13, 2010
Filed Under Marriage & Family, Worldview | 16 Comments

Dr. Juli Slattery called me promptly at 9am. She’s working on a parenting DVD series for Focus on the Family and wanted me to be a part of it. I was delighted with her first question: “When it comes to the very practical issue of raising children, why do you think a biblical worldview is important?” It was a great question and we talked about that for some time, but then she ended with the million-dollar question, as far as I was concerned. It is the critical question that every Christian parent should wrestle with and constantly keep before them as they attempt to raise their children.

It was a natural question, considering the pathway our discussion had taken. Man has a strong tendency to squeeze God out of his life. For the believer, this is still true. We end up compartmentalizing our Christianity into a smaller and smaller slice of life, until it pretty much only applies to the time we spend at church on Sunday mornings. For the extremely faithful, that may also include Sunday and Wednesday evenings, and possibly a morning or evening devotion. But, unfortunately, for much of the Body of Christ today, that is where it ends. Once we leave the “God Zone” of our life, we walk into the rest of the world as if He doesn’t exist or, at least, doesn’t speak or care. This was this conviction that led to the creation of the Truth Project and my burning desire to be a small part of seeing all of that change. The truth of God is not only relevant in every area of life, but it is critical…critical to understand the design of God so that we can walk in accordance with that blueprint; critical so that we can understand why things around us are in a mess or why they are a blessing; critical so that we can be the light and salt in a world that desperately needs the children of God to stand and say either “this is the path of blessing” or “this is the path of tragedy”—in an attractively, winsome way, of course.

If we care about the plight of people, not only eternally, but also caring for them in this world and desiring to see everything glorify the Lord, then we must know how things ought to be or we will never know the right prescription to offer.

So, we were talking about all of this when Juli then asked: “But how does a parent tell truth to their children without coming across as dogmatic or dictatorial?”

The million dollar question. Read more

Compromise or Bribery?

Posted on January 5, 2010
Filed Under The State, Worldview | 16 Comments

When Samuel grew old, he appointed his sons as judges for Israel…But his sons did not walk in his ways. They turned aside after dishonest gain and accepted bribes and perverted justice. 1 Samuel 8:1,3

My old 1828 Webster Dictionary defines the word “bribe” this way:
“A price, reward, gift or favor bestowed or promised with a view to pervert the judgment, or corrupt the conduct of a judge, witness or other person. A bribe is a consideration given or promised to a person to induce him to decide a cause, give testimony, or perform some act contrary to what he knows to be truth, justice or rectitude.”

And the definition for “bribery” is:
“The act or practice of giving or taking rewards for corrupt practices; the act of paying or receiving a reward for a false judgment, or testimony, or for the performance of that which is known to be illegal, or unjust. It is applied both to him who gives, and to him who receives the compensation, but appropriately to the giver.”

One of the big things that caused me nausea when I was in Washington was the “bribery” that went on there—on both sides of the aisle. Cutting “deals”…you vote for my bill and I’ll vote for yours, or putting “pork” in a bill to get someone to vote for it. There are a thousand ways to “bribe” in Washington and it made me ill.

So, the recent example isn’t new, but it certainly is quite egregious. It has been called the “Nebraska Compromise” and the “Nebraska Kickback”, but it is essentially about a $100 million deal for Nebraska folks at the expense of the other 49 states. The Nebraska senator wasn’t going to support the bill until, well, a deal came along he just couldn’t refuse.

The details really aren’t that important. In reality, the Senate Healthcare legislation includes special goodies for Louisiana, Massachusetts, Vermont, Florida and even Montana. All of these were inserted in order to get the needed 60 votes. One of the key leaders in the Senate, when confronted on all of this stated: “That’s what this legislation’s all about, it’s the art of compromise.”

Well, it is compromise. But when compromise involves “paying or receiving a reward for a false judgment” or “deciding a cause”, my dictionary calls it bribery–regardless of which party is paying or receiving.

It is a stench that should be recognized for what it is and completely and thoroughly scrubbed out of our government. It perverts the judgment and discernment of those in authority and leads to unwise and unjust decisions. Legislation should be passed or killed based upon the merits of the bill itself, not based upon the benefits one receives to support it.

We would prosecute this kind of bribery in any business in the United States. Why not in Congress?

Blessing and Curses: Response to Gus

Posted on December 29, 2009
Filed Under Personal, The State, Worldview | 17 Comments

Gus wrote this:

I am troubled by the premise of your new show that in stories filled with pain and pathology—things just aren’t working very well—it is most likely because of defying God’s design and when things are going well it is most likely because of an alignment “with” God’s design. In my understanding this is not biblical at all. I only have to think of the Biblical account of Job whose life was filled with much pain and yet he did not defy God.? Am I missing something?

I really appreciate the comment and whenever someone says “that’s unbiblical” we need to take it seriously and examine what we’re doing.

So, let’s do that.

It is true that there are times when calamity strikes and it has nothing to do with sin or defying God. Gus rightly points to Job and the situation that he was in. He could have also pointed to the man born blind in John 9, where Jesus said that his blindness was not because of his sin or his parent’s sin, but so “that the works of God might be displayed in him.”

There is another interesting one in Luke 13 where Jesus clearly states that eighteen people, who lost their lives when a tower collapsed, didn’t die because they were greater sinners than anyone else. Jesus then makes the point that we are ALL sinners but not every disaster is the result of that sin.

These passages are ones that should prevent us from arrogantly declaring that a calamity like Katrina was a judgment of God because of Mardi Gras or earthquakes or fires in California are judgments upon Hollywood.

On the other hand, we should not let these passages overshadow the vast majority of the Scripture that tells us there are consequences for our actions. Read more

The Scars of Life

Posted on December 24, 2009
Filed Under Personal | 21 Comments

It wasn’t a very happy Christmas. At least as far as Michael was concerned. How could he be just a teenager and already dread Christmas so much? All of his friends seemed to find this time of year exciting. Mainly, he supposed, because of all the stuff they would find to be theirs on Christmas morning. For him, there wouldn’t be anything. Well, hardly anything. But that wasn’t the real reason. He just dreaded it. Something about Christmas gave him the creeps. Just like the hospital he was now sitting in. The lights seemed way too bright. And everything was just so…clinical. White tiled walls, white tiled floors, stainless steel railings, nurses in white, doctors in white…and the whole atmosphere was just…creepy. He wanted to run away. Maybe that is exactly what he would do. She’s dying anyway, he thought. Who really cares?

But something kept him there.

Michael lived in the city with his mother, a widow. However, there was something horribly different about this widow. She was severely disfigured in the face, arms and hands. Most of her fingers were reduced to one or two joints, or missing entirely. Michael was her only child. Every day, she toiled in a factory to provide the bare necessesities for the two of them. She had difficulty making her daily quotas because of her handicap—especially her hands. But she never complained, in fact she always openly rejoiced that she had such a good job that provided for her son and herself to live. She was a devoted follower of Jesus Christ, an example of unconditional love to everyone. But Michael, as he grew, became more and more ashamed of his mother. He would not bring his friends or his dates home. He did his best to keep her out of his public life. And he totally rejected the faith that she had and the characteristics that she carried.

But she never stopped loving him. In fact, that was why she was working late that Christmas Eve. She had asked, again, for more overtime. If she could just get a few more hours in, then she could make the extra money she needed to pay for the one gift she wanted to give Michael. It wasn’t much, she knew that. But she had been working extra long hours to save enough to make the last payment. The shop was going to close soon, and she was struggling to get this last item assembled. It wasn’t easy, but she was thankful for an employer who allowed her to work, even though it took her much longer to assemble an item compared to the others.

It wasn’t her haste that evening or anything that she did wrong. It just happened. Something in the machine broke and then it seemed everything came undone and metal parts started flying everywhere. The medics, when they arrived, didn’t know which was more horrifying, the fresh wounds or the old ones. By the time they reached the hospital, they were surprised she was still alive. She was moving in and out of consciousness, mumbling weakly to one of the paramedics, “Michael’s present! Michael’s present!” Read more