An Open Letter to the Sports Media:

Apparently, Steroid Boy hit #715 yesterday. I’ll take the rest of this week off from listening to sports radio and watching ESPN. You guys can wet yourself all you want, pretend that not being the best at something is to be raucously celebrated, build your altars, pray 5 times a day while facing San Francisco, and whatever else you feel you need to do in order to pledge your undying allegiance to Balco’s poster boy.

Then I don’t want to hear another word about it until the juice (or lack thereof) forces him to retire or kills him.

Usually when you say “nothin’ you can do about it”, it’s directed at someone on the other side of the philosophical fence. Oddly, this time, it’s directed at those that are, theoretically, on the same side of the fence as I am.

A few days ago, I pointed out an excellent post by Dan Edelen over at Cerulean Sanctum in which he decried the excess of heretic hunters in the Godblogosphere, and a lack of graciousness, logic, and overall Scriptural-ality among a vast majority of them.

In a move about as surprising as heat in Atlanta in late May, he got nailed for it. To his great credit, Dan said:

Jim’s a good guy and I like his blog because he contends for the Gospel …

Contending for the Gospel gets outweighed by personal attacks, in my book. I told him in the comment section, “You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din”.

The thrust of the attack on Dan centered around — another big surprise — Arminianism vs Calvinism. Dan agrees with a lot of the tenets of Calvinism, but does not classify himself as a full-blown Calvinist, believing that there is some middle ground between Arminianism and Calvinism. (For what it’s worth, I agree with Dan on the existence of the middle ground. I just don’t find myself there, as he does.)

But from the attack on Dan and other posts around the Calvinist side of the Godblogosphere, here is what I have “learned” (with massive apologies to Jeff Foxworthy):

1. If you think that there’s any middle ground between Arminianism and Calvinism, you might be are definitely an Arminian.
2. If you aren’t willing to fight — viciously — for Calvinism, you might be are definitely an Arminian.
3. If you ever question anything about Calvinism, you might be are definitely an Arminian.
4. If your allegiance to Calvinism isn’t second only to your allegiance to Christianity, you might be are definitely an Arminian.
5. If you don’t totally believe every tenet of Calvinism (particularly the “5 points”), you might be are definitely an Arminian.

I’m “guilty” of #1. I’m “guilty” of #2 (and hope that I am until the day I die). I have been “guilty” of #3. I’m “guilty” of #4 (and hope that I am until the day I die).

So, I’m looking at that list last night, seeing my score of 20%, and figuring that I must be an Arminian after all. But then I remembered something that I wrote some time ago:

… I left that church with the distinct feeling that some Arminians can be very nasty. Then I hit the blogosphere, and found out that they didn’t have the corner on nastiness. In fact, such was the vehemence on the part of some of those that identified themselves as Calvinists, that I totally forgot the anger which we had faced before, and began to question my belief in the tenets of Calvinism.

Those that know my background know that I grew up around a lot of legalism. One thing that God showed me in that experience (and bringing me through it) is that just because people who claim Him can be phenomenally stupid, doesn’t mean that His character changes any or that anything that He says is untrue. Had I not learned that lesson already, I have to seriously wonder if I wouldn’t have abandoned my faith in God entirely as a result of the anger I have viewed.

And so I realized that, despite having failed that “test” miserably, I’m still a Calvinist. (Not that I care that much, but I am.)

And to those others who claim to be Calvinists and yet believe that “test” to be accurate, there’s nothin’ you can do about it.

UPDATE: Apparently, I was too limiting in referring to the “Calvinist side of the Godblogosphere”. Nice to know that some Arminians are also wanting to divide the body.

This, in my opinion is somewhere between weird and hilarious (which are often synonymous in my book). In this video, the Ukelele Orchestra of Great Britain performs Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit”.

I found this funny for a number of reasons:

1. The Brits do weird-funny better than anyone, hands-down.
2. I don’t know if I’ll ever get over the offense of being told that someone who purposefully left his father childless and his wife widowed was “the voice of [my] generation”. Of course, then again, if I had been married to Courtney Love …
3. The whole grunge scene was so pretentious about its non-pretentiousness, and I can think of nothing better to burst that bubble than a ukelele string.

If you haven’t been to Purgatorio before, what are you waiting for?

Marc (no, that’s not him in the middle of that pic), the proud proprietor of Purgatorio, examines Christian culture through pictures and other visuals. Sometimes it’s very thoughtful, often very funny, and sometimes it’s both (see also “Taylor-esque”).

My favorite topic is “Divine Vinyl”, in which he reproduces pictures of covers of old Christian records.* Often, there’s opportunity to laugh at old clothes/hair styles. Sometimes, there’s a funny cultural difference between when the record was made and today. And sometimes, they even manage to cram some bad theology into the album title. Here’s the latest entry.

One of the many things that I like about Marc is that he’s a lot like Johnny Carson.** Carson always let his guests be funny, rather than trying to get the biggest laugh himself. He reasoned that the next morning, people would be talking about the show in general anyway, and he was the permanent fixture, so it reflected well on him. In much the same way — especially on Divine Vinyl — Marc gives his commenters free rein to be funny, and the results are that you go away from Purgatorio laughing.

So be sure to check out the comments, especially on Divine Vinyl, and especially mine.

* For you younger readers, “records” are really big CDs.

** For you younger readers, Johnny Carson preceded Jay Leno on The Tonight Show. If you like Leno, Carson was much better. If you don’t like Leno, Carson was much better.

This post is Marc’s fault. In a recent post, I decried fear-based obedience. Marc asked:

What part does fear play Brendt? The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom? or fear not for I am with you. Maybe the subject of another post?

Here’s that other post.

Just to start with, here are the two verses that Marc is quoting (well, maybe not the exact two verses, as several verses say similar things):

Psalm 111:10 — The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom; a good understanding have all those who do His commandments. His praise endures forever.

Isaiah 41:10 — Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.

So, at first blush there seems to be a contradiction. The first verse implies that fear is good, but the second verse (and my earlier post) say that fear is bad. But I believe there are two issues that address this seeming contradiction.

The first is in the meaning of the word. I have always understood the word “fear” as used in that Psalms verse to be interpreted as “honor” or “reverence”, rather than something akin to terror. I’m having trouble finding references/explanations either way to confirm or deny this idea. If there’s a Hebrew scholar in the house, please pipe up.

The other issue, though, works even if the only interpretation of “fear” is akin to terror. The object of the fear is what is at stake. The first verse refers to the “fear of the Lord” while the second verse is refering to fear of other things (the world, tribulation, enemies, etc).

But what is most striking to me is that the fear-based obedience that I referenced before is a fear of God’s wrath. But Jesus bore the full weight of God’s wrath on the cross. So if we claim to be Christians, and yet obey on the basis of fear, we are really saying that Christ’s work was insufficient. And ultimately, if Christ’s work was insufficient, then it was absolutely pointless.

I’m guessing that’s not how you want to live.

This is what happens when you aren’t at your computer.

Over the Hedge
(2006 — voices of Bruce Willis, Gary Shandling, Steve Carell, Wanda Sykes)

OK, if you like silly, this movie was quite enjoyable. Based on characters from the comic strip of the same name, it pokes a lot of fun at the over-consumption rampant in American suburbia, but doesn’t get preachy at all. Like I said, it pokes fun.

RJ the Racoon gets caught stealing food from a hibernating bear. All the food gets destroyed, and RJ has one week to replace it all before the bear takes it out on him. Wise to the ways of suburbia, he heads to a nearby subdivision to get everything. But he needs help, so he enlists the aid of Verne the Turtle and his “family” of other hibernating animals who have just awakened to find half the forest gone (to the new subdivision), and with it, a lot of their foraging prospects.

RJ, the impulsive one, takes over leadership of the family from Verne, who is cautious. RJ sees suburbia as key to happiness (via endless food) and manages to convince the rest of the animals (except usually Verne) to help him in retrieving the food. They think that he’s just joining in on their foraging and preparation for the next winter, but his sole purpose is to gather the food for the bear to save his own hide.

Of course, by the end of the movie, he sees the error of his ways. But not before a lot of goofiness ensues, much exacted by the animals, but also by a domineering woman who is “president of the home-owners’ association” and the Verminator she hires to get rid of the animals when she first encounters them. As with any animated feature, there are plenty of sight gags, but they’re often played three or four steps over-the-top, taking a slightly amusing concept and turning it into something very funny.

The family of animals are good, in and of themselves too. There is a family of porcupines who talk like they’re from the upper mid-west (doncha know), an absolutely manic squirrel, a skunk with a major attitude, and a possum and his teenage daughter. The father possum is voiced by William Shatner, who even takes a few jabs at himself and his halting speech … when … acting.

Granted, in specific detail, this movie doesn’t have much in common with the comic strip. In fact, one might even consider it to be a prequel to the strip since RJ is first coming to the family in this movie. But it definitely honors the feel of the strip.

So, is this movie for kids? Well, this 39-year-old kid loved it. I won’t say definitively if you should take your child. There are some scary parts that probably wouldn’t be appropriate for little kids. There’s some crude humor — belching, skunk spraying — and a lot of cartoon mischief and mild cartoon violence. Language is limited to “dang” and “shoot”. And there’s a double-entendre in which a squirrel speaks multiple times of finding his nuts. (We eventually see the actual nuts, as if the movie scolds us for thinking about anything else.) All in all, it’s less objectionable than the Shrek movies, if that’s any indication to you.

If you aren’t hip to it already, there’s a great review site out there called ScreenIt. It does often contain spoilers, as the reviewers get very specific about potentially objectionable material. But, at least for the review for this movie, you can read through the “Our Word to Parents” section (and everything before it) without fear of spoilers. Beyond that, you’re on your own.

It’s bad enough that employees have been further dehumanized and renamed to “resources”. (Remember the Dilbert cartoon where the company determined that employees were the 9th-most important resource, right after carbon paper?) But in the great corporate tradition of turning every word into a verb, now I’m sitting on a conference call with a woman who repeatedly refers to “resourcing” a project.

With all due respect to my uncle, whose name I bear as my middle name, I really think I’m going to have to change my middle name to “I AM NOT A RESOURCE“.

Dan Edelen over at Cerulean Sanctum did it again. An idea that I had written about (but he probably hadn’t seen on my blog), he wrote about, too. Only he did a better job, which one would expect from a freelance writer. If you haven’t followed that last link yet, here’s a quote from his post that sums things up pretty well.

Old timers here know that I’ve discussed the Godblogosphere’s explosion of heretic hunters and taken a middle-of-the-road approach: We need to root out heresy, but we also need to do it soberly and with care.

At leat this time, I wrote mine first.