Walking away from an event with my Law Christian Fellowship group at the University of Virginia the other night, a t-shirt caught my eye.  At UVa it's common to wear a t-shirt with a big, orange V on the back and have your school or discipline written accross the V.  "Engineering."  "Law." "Medicine."  But this one had the word:  Diversity.

Diversity is good.  But it gave me pause to see it declared so singularly--as an absolute value.  As if to say, the one thing I want to declare is that I go to UVa and...DIVERSITY!  Read more

One of the greatest feelings in the world is to be spent at the end of the day, knowing that all your energy has gone to serve the Lord! 

This picture has stuck in my head for a long time. 
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Does a true Christian watch TV?  I'm hit with the question once again.  Intersecting with all the hubbub about the LOST series and its deeper meaning is the question some of us still raise, and one I haven't answered:  are we supposed to watch this stuff or not?

I was looking at Marva Dawn's book, Keeping the Sabbath Wholly, last week while preparing for a sermon and was reminded that she doesn't watch TV.  I also read John Piper's reasoning behind rejecting TV: "Why I Don't Have a Television." 

When I was in seminary, my wife and I rejected TV one year for Lent.  It was the year that X-Files was at its peak, and was a favorite of ours.  We had decided we wouldn't watch TV, but we did allow ourselves to rent movies.  So here's how we did it...Read more

Grace is funny.  She draws fire from all sides, yet she always prevails.
 
She offends some because when she shows up, she points out the sin she intends to heal and redeem.  She offends others because she gives herself so freely—she really ought to be earned.
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Blogging is not the format for careful arguments and developed strategies.  It's more for letting thoughts drop out of your head and seeing how God uses it all.  But this is something I've thought about for quite some time, so here's hoping it comes out clear...and begins a conversation.
 
My ministry is marked by two poles of emphasis.  First is a faith that Jesus Christ is indeed Lord and Savior of an invisible church, unhindered by worldly boundaries.  My days with YoungLife, FOCUS, the Army Chaplaincy, and even now at the Center for Christian Study have been about finding ways to realize this secret and shadowy countryside where anyone who follows Jesus is a brother and a sister.  Some cringe when I call this work 'ecumenical', but I still see it as an evangelical ecumenism, an apostolic catholicity.  The church of which Christ is the Lord is one church, even if we can't see that from where we sit. 
 
The second emphasis is a desire to see the visible church in our times have the greatest possible impact on the culture, the common way of life, of our nation and community.  For a number of reasons, I believe this includes Christ's deployment of the old mainline.  They may be tired, lapsed, sleeping or dead, but they still have that huge sanctuary on the corner of First and Main with a steeple whose shadow tickles the courthouse steps. 
 
So then, Five Principles for Mainline Resurgence...Read more

  Also from the Charlottesville Christian music scene this Advent comes the latest from Read more

One of the first great acts of Christian ministry in my life was for YoungLife.  Well, Wildlife to be exact--the junior high version of YoungLife.  I was in the ninth grade, and I was a student leader for the 7th and 8th grade meetings.  Me and three other guys dressed in full drag and did a lipsync'd song and dance of Aretha Franklin's "RESPECT"!

I was told it was important to be a fool for Christ!  You know what?  They were right.  It was important!  Kids laughed.  They knew we had done it for them.  And they listened openly and easily when the leader presented the gospel later on in the night.

I'm still a fool for Christ in many ways (I hope).  One of them you see in this picture!  Who dresses like that?!!

It's a picture of me in front of Providence Presbyterian Church, Gum Spring, Virginia.  I've been there to preach four times now, and I usually wear the collar and tabs.  Why?  Well, just off my chin you see a couple of memorial stones.  One of them is to Rev. Samuel Davies.  Read more

  Catherine Claire Larson, As We Forgive: Stories of ReconciliatioRead more

Fr. Richard John Neuhaus passed away this morning around 10 a.m.  Editor of the journal, First Things, Neuhaus has been a voice for the unborn, an advocate for the Christian intellectual tradition, and a brilliant ambassor of Christ an of His Church.Read more

My doctoral supervisor, Robert Wilken, is fond of calling the Bible "a carried book."  It never just sits there in a vacuum, he says, it is always handed to you by someone.  And as they hand it to you, some claim, some context, some tradition, is handed down along with it.  Of course, Prof. Wilken is talking about grand claims in historical theology.  But the universal is also particular--the grand claims also play out in our lives.  I like the image, and it made me think of all of those people who have handed the Bible down to me over the years.  All the pastors, all the Young Life and FOCUS leaders, all the Bible study leaders, friends and relatives, who have at one point or another handed me a bit of Scripture, some little fragment of light from the Word of God, and said, Here, I think this applies.

This morning, the Scriptures were handed to me by a student at Darden School of Business here at the University of Virginia.  Apparently it's the greatest business school in the world (that's what I hear from the students anyway).  I support the Christian Fellowship there, and we had an early morning Bible Study.  So much of the Christian life is about learning to read the Bible right where we are.  Read the Bible in the hospital.  Read the Bible in the living room.  Read the Bible in Darden.  He carried in a little bit of Nehemiah, and we all read it.  He handed it to us and said, here, I think this applies.

Darden students are busy people.  I think it's how they prepare them for the pace of American business.  They've learned to cram a lot into their day.  And the most important thing to cram in is just a few minutes of Scripture to remind them of the far country to which they belong, the Kingdom of God, and to remind them of the language that is spoken there. Read more