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B90X, the New Testament, and a Few Blogs Along the Way
Read the entire New Testament this summer!
Last year I laid before our students, and our church, an interesting challenge.
To read the entire bible in 90 days.
Many students gave it a good attempt. A few completely finished it. Many of our adults and parents jumped on the challenge as well. And though not all finished it, their attempt was a success for me. We found that the bible is approachable, readable, and, as always, relevant.
I’m beginning that challenge again, this year, with a couple of caveats. For starters, the challenge is to just read the New Testament. Second, I’m going to be blogging my own thoughts through the summer. (Read my thoughts on last summer’s reading challenge here.)
The challenge, though, has gotten a bit more complicated for me. To blog at least two times a week, and more, if time allows, will be a bit difficult. But I think it’s a good thing to help gauge accountability, and to get my own thoughts into a sharable format.
A word, too, about the blog posts. They will be real-time posts, as the Spirit moves me during the reading. I don’t anticipate doing much research over various passages, unless it’s necessary. But as I read the entire Word in its context, there are obvious things that just move me. I also don’t want to begin controversial discussions, but, honestly, when the Spirit moves us, and purges from our lives the messes we make, it generates conversations that can impress us in all sorts of ways. I hope you’ll be moved as I am. I’m excited to see where God takes me.
You’ll find all posts here, on my blog. The address is kylestrickland.com, in case you’re reading this through a different format.
The journey this summer, then, through the New Testament begins Friday, June 1. And it is called B90X.
If you want to read with us, regardless of where you are in the world, you can access our reading schedule by clicking here. Or, you can just read three chapters a day, beginning June 1, and you’ll finish in 90 days. And, if you’re Twitter-savvy, the reading schedule will be posted every day on @mygrouponline.
Like this:
The Millennial Teenager :: True Digital Natives
For me, this infographic spells relational trouble, even while it speaks truth of the current culture we’re giving to teenagers.
(You can find the full graphic, and article at onlineschools.com, and the full graphic can be found at http://www.onlineschools.com/in-focus/millennial-teenager.)
We’ve given teenagers incredible ways to connect, but, according to the last statistic, at the very bottom, we’ve not succeeded in helping them navigate face-to-face relationships.
I’m sure there are more observations, and I would love to hear yours. Nevertheless, behold their world, and expect it to change as soon as you finish reading. And for more, just click the graphic.
Two Years Without Cable TV
I cancelled my cable service two years ago.
And it still has been one of the best decisions I, and my family, have ever made.
Last year I wrote four posts to describe the process. They were great journeys in writing for me. They are raw, I think, but certainly were written out of passion and intensity. They are a little bit funny, a little bit satirical, and a whole lot serious. And last fall, I wrote one addendum on how my views were tested, and my failure of that test.
Here they are, again, for you. May they inspire you a bit today to think about what you allow your eyes to see.
Television and Life: The Beginning of the End of My Cable Subscription
Television and Life: The Philosophical Reasons We Cancelled Our Television Subscription
Television and Life: My TV, My Movies, and Jesus
Name
“‘You will know that I am the Lord, when I deal with you for my name’s sake and not according to your evil ways and your corrupt practices, O house of Israel, declares the Sovereign Lord.’” (Ezekiel 20:44)
I must begin by making a confession.
After what I believed to be a bit of careful research, I decided to watch the movie Inception. The reviews were startling. Great suspense, mind-tripping story, great effects. Those initial film reviews hooked me, and I thought that perhaps this is a movie I could watch, without blurring my own standards of film-watching.
So, to Google I went, undergoing a bit of research, perusing through “parental reviews” and such, wanting to find anything that would disclose any unwanted behaviors or conversations. To be honest to you, too, dear reader, I found nothing like that. It seemed like an intense movie with great suspense, and that sort of storytelling warranted the rating.
I watched it. And I was as surprised by what I heard, as by how I reacted.
DiCaprio’s character has a serious mishap of some sort, and a certain word slipped from his mouth. I was a bit perplexed at first, and perplexed at the choice of the word. And then a rather silly truth dawned on me.
In films, words do not slip. They are intentional, written on a script, rehearsed by paid actors.
The word he spoke was a flippant use of God’s name, with an attached curse to it. It is a word common in most movies.
But uncommon to me. I have not watched a PG-13 movie in almost two years. It has been a long, long time since I had heard any word quite like that.
And, in all of the reviews I could find, I never once found a review that mentioned the use of that certain word.
In the meantime, then, God has convicted me. I have apologized for the time I spent watching that film. The story was fine. But it was overshadowed by the chosen phrase, and I could not escape that in my own mind. I kept hearing it in my own memory, and realized that I had traveled a road I left long ago.
I am not holy, though, and I am certainly not holier than you. I am only writing this here because of what God has revealed to me in my own study time. Let me explain.
For the better part of a month, now, I have read, and re-read, the book of Ezekiel. Each chapter drips with story and purpose and holiness, and, as it is, I can only digest two or three chapters on any given day. What God has revealed to me, through those pages, plays on a loop in my thoughts.
One of the pervasive truths to me, in that book, is how God reacts to the apostasy of his people. They are in breach of contract, and God, as author and enforcer of that contract, must not break His word. There will be punishment.
But there will also be blessing. Grace, even. He will restore them. That is the common theme of the prophets.
He does all of this – all of His holy action – on behalf of His name.
He does not bring punishment because they deserve it.
Nor does He bring blessing because of their merit.
He does both because He will not allow a different story to be told. He will not allow the world to know Him as an incomplete and incompetent God.
God places a high value on His name.
If that is true, then how can we engage in anything that intentionally devalues the name of God?
If all He does is for the sake of His own name, and if His name is His chiefest value, then we must value His name above all else. And if that means forsaking films which denigrate His name, then so be it.
Ah, but grace. Grace is powerful. It is “a thought that changed the world.” And it also leads to a tremendous amount of abuse.
It should not ever be used to cover intentional sin. Romans 6 attests to that. Once we leave a life of destructive decisions, we should never want to go back. Grace not only covers our mistakes, but should make us not want to commit those same mistakes twice. It is a thought that should change your world.
We’ve been seduced into thinking that a little bit of sin in an otherwise moral film is acceptable. We disregard words for the sake of relevancy. But should we? If God’s name is not valued, then what else is left? What else can we claim as right? As holy?
Please see God’s name as holy. See it as the standard for all He does. Hear it, and hear the word of real salvation. And let it bother you when it is misused. Let it bother you greatly.
