Riverwood Presbyterian Church

Christian Chaff

When a Pharisee Invites Some Phollowers to the Lincoln Memorial

by Tim Lien

Show up. Make sure you are two steps down from where MLK spoke.

Keep emphasizing personal responsibility to regain lost virtue, kindness, and nobility. Mention all manners of worthwhile exertion. Repeat. Use different words. Wait for cheers. Wait for huzzahs. Affirm every quality that no one is really against. Espouse firm-sounding convictions. Wait for sage nodding of heads. Emblazon noble traits on banners, posters. Indicate that the future is tenuous, uncertain, even horrifying. Appeal to future correction based on the sudden awakening of plucky, noble ingenuity of the American. In fact: Git back to being good, America.

To prove that it’s about bein’ good, invite a whole gaggle of pastors and religious leaders. Say that God is all of the answer, but not all of God. Not God’s boy, Heysoos. And not that weird Spirit thinga-ma-Ghost. Just God the distant grandfather who loves Capitalism and early-bird specials. Just Pappy. The one who stays away. Far away. The one who is busy minding his bird-feeder, and washes his antique T-Bird lovingly every week in the driveway. The one who puts it on our shoulders and lets us figger it all out—because he is counting on us to finally see our intrinsic value. The one who sends us positive postcards of encouragement to “do the right thing.”

Gather together religious leaders who want to play in the sandbox of Notoriety. Or just on the stairs of a Memorial. Get all the religious leaders who cannot be troubled with the work of Jesus. Hold a lecture on Moralism 101: Sell personal virtue without having to kill the zombie within. Offer personally achieved goodness. But do not look to Another to do this. Do it your d@mn self. And success will be sure to follow.

Faith and Science

When pharisees study science?

by Peggy Drinkard

Stephen Hawking says universe not created by God…..Read it here http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/usbritainhawking. Oh good. That settles it.

Christian Chaff

When A Pharisee Does the Dishes

by Tim Lien

I am doing these dishes because it means that I cannot be inconvenienced in any other way. Do not ask me to do anything else; I am doing the dishes, can’t you see? I am doing these dishes because it means that I now have the right to selfishly indulge myself at a later time with uninterrupted “me-time.” It will not matter if that selfishness is counter-productive to family peace or maintenance. Because I earned this window of self-absorbed reclining. The clean kitchen has a value and now you must do something that is equivalent to this value, before I can be energized to do another big service. This clean kitchen means that you cannot gently point out my beastly idols of self. This clean kitchen gives me a self-protective bubble where I cannot be criticized. Doing these dishes means that I must be recognized for it. It means I need a “thank you.” That way it lets me seem magnanimous when I say “No problem; my pleasure.”

I will consult my Order of Pharisees (OOP) manual to see how I can disguise all of these things, instead of crying for real heart change.

Pharisees, pharisees, everywhere!

by Peggy Drinkard

Seems certain Muslim men in Afganistan have gone above and beyond the Koran’s requirement to abstain from sexual relations with their wives during unclean periods each month by considering their wives unclean all the time. But of course, this presents a dilema. The solution? Young boys. (see article here) http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=%2Fc%2Fa%2F2010%2F08%2F28%2FINF21F2Q9H.DTL. But wait! Doesn’t the Koran forbid homosexuality? Well, see, it’s not homosexuality because, according to one of said gentlemen, “we don’t LOVE the boys.”

Christian Chaff

When Pharisees Are Happy

by Tim Lien

Adorable Pharisee: Can I play Wii?

Adorable Pharisee: No. I’m only happy when people let me do what I want to do.

Another reason why Jesus and his work enough: my joy is not conditioned upon what other people do or say to me…and I still wish I wasn’t such a Pharisee.

[used with permission]

Christian Chaff

When Pharisees Are Cool

by Tim Lien

The problem with Pharisees is that everybody thinks they are probably the joy-sucking goody-two-shoes who are just asking for a wedgie. But what happens when the Pharisees start listening to awesome indie music, wear thrift-store t-shirts with nonchalance, and mutter ironic, witty references to pop-culture?

The Order of Pharisees(OOP) decided they needed to be re-branded and recast. Somehow they were not communicating their timeless message to the youth of today. They needed a new logo, an ad campaign, and a slogan: “Because deep down, I think I’m better than you.” ™ Enter the Hipster Christian®— not your daddy’s mint-and-cumin-tithing-white washed-tomb.

Brett McCracken explores this in a new book: article here.

Education

D-Dub Tattoos and Videos

by Tim Lien

When historians discuss “the mark stamped on the American evangelical landscape,” by pastor-theologian-rabble-rouser Douglas Wilson, they will inevitably stumble across the current, trending oddity of his most ardent fans: Douglas Wilson tattoos. Apparently, “D-Dub” tattoos are cropping up in Pullman and Orlando— and all points in between.

Robert Cahill, a BestBuy sales associate in Toledo, OH (“and professional blogger”), explains: “I mean, sure, they must know I dig his stuff because I’m on Credenda’s mailing list. But anybody can get Credenda—even Ligon Duncan has it discreetly sent to a P.O. box. I wanted something to prove it. You know, let everybody know I’m getting the sub-text, too. I think I’m the only one who gets his jokes around here.”

But not all are so enthusiastic.

Priscilla Pockwell, president of the Pockwell Family Institute and mother of one, suggests that this new trend only reiterates the fact that Mr. Wilson’s message is subversive, destructive, and possibly even interesting. “Leviticus 19. There. Quote me. Quote Leviticus.”

Although three burly guards denied us access to the Wilson compound, Nancy Wilson’s bullet-proofed Suburban breezed by the front gate, paused momentarily, and then the window lowered half-way. A shout came from within: “Mine says D-Dubby!” and then we were left amidst vapors of high-octane exhaust.

Faced with a new litmus test for D-Dub support, followers have begun to question their own commitment that they had assumed was complete and wholesome. To get the tattoo or not get the tattoo?

Sensing the impending crisis, Canon Press offers an alternative: CanonWired. Here in bite-sized videos, followers can inject D-Dub directly into their veins—with no headache or Panama-City-license-plate as a souvenir. Check it out. Seriously, check out the CanonWired.

[Author’s note: the preceding is a parody. Therefore, consistent with the genre, all events and names are complete fabrications. The CanonWired part is real— and very good, for that matter. I hope this clears things up.]

General Theology

Three Bucks of Grace

by Tim Lien

My wife regularly shoots me encouragements from IrishCalvinist (Erik Raymond) Just another guy who has happy-conniption fits over the Gospel of Jesus Christ. In other words, my kind of guy. He recently posted this little gem from D.A. Carson:

I would like to buy about three dollars worth of gospel, please. Not too much—just enough to make me happy, but not so much that I get addicted. I don’t want so much gospel that I learn to really hate covetousness and lust. I certainly don’t want so much that I start to love my enemies, cherish self-denial, and contemplate missionary service in some alien culture. I want ecstasy, not repentance; I want transcendence, not transformation. I would like to be cherished by some nice, forgiving, broad-minded people, but I myself don’t want to love those from different races—especially if they smell. I would like enough gospel to make my family secure and my children well behaved, but not so much that I find my ambitions redirected or my giving too greatly enlarged. I would like about three dollars worth of gospel please.

(D.A. Carson, Basics for Believers, an exposition of Philippians), pp.12-13

Humor

Measuring Your Drink’s Manliness

by Clay Staggs

The site askmen.com has developed a handy graph to help you understand your drink of choice’s manliness (or lack thereof). The vertical axis measures the “hair-on-your-chest” factor, while the horizontal axis show the level of sophistication. Here goes:

I probably shouldn’t confess this, but I had to google who Brody Jenner even was. Also, I’m not so sure Keith Richards is the height of “hair-on-your-chest”, either.

Nonetheless, this begs a couple of questions about who made this up.

1. Am I to believe that peach scnapps is more likely to put hair on your chest than Guinness? Absurd. All peach schnapps is good for is opening the vault.
2. Grappa is Cary Grant-level sophisticated? Really?
3. Tequila is more sophisticated than Bourbon? No way.

For more (NSFW) comments, check out the site.

Church and Worship

“The president is obviously a Christian. He prays everyday.”

by Clay Staggs

So says presidential spokesman Bill Burton, in response to a question from a reporter today relating to a recent poll where nearly one in four people surveyed expressed the opinion that Obama is a Muslim.

It never ceases to amaze me how ignorant some people are about religion. Burton’s statement here is particularly laughable. He’s trying to say something that will cause people to believe that Obama is a Christian. So what he chooses is to say that Obama prays daily. I don’t know whether Obama does or not, but that’s really beside the point, isn’t it?

Burton is trying to combat the perception that the president is a Muslim by pointing to his frequent prayer. But Don’t Muslims pray too? In fact, aren’t they required to pray 5 times a day, facing Mecca? Actually, Jews pray too. So do Mormons. Lots and lots of religions require or encourage prayer. Daily prayer no more makes him a Christian than it does a Jew. In other words, the mere fact that Obama might pray daily does nothing to identify the precise religion to which the president adheres.

For an administration so intent on tolerance and diversity, and so insistent on the equality of all religions, their insistence on Obama’s Christianity reminds me of the Seinfeld episode where an NYU student thought that Jerry and George were gay. They strenuously insisted to her they were not gay, but every time they did, they’d catch themselves and add, “not that there’s anything wrong with that.”

I would offer the president’s team a suggestion if they want to combat the perception that he’s not a Christian or that he is a Muslim. Here goes: quit letting him say things that Christians (and probably Muslims) would recognize are demonstrably false when he talks about religion. [Note: this will probably require the input of someone who has some knowledge of scripture and history, admittedly a tough act these days.]

Case in point: at the end of the Iftar dinner where Obama stirred up the hornets’ nest about the Ground Zero Mosque, Obama said the following:

For in the end, we remain “one nation, under God, indivisible.” And we can only achieve “liberty and justice for all” if we live by that one rule at the heart of every great religion, including Islam —- that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us.

In which religion was the golden rule announced? I don’t think it was Islam, or Hinduism or Buddhism. Christians are well aware of this, because they know that this standard of conduct for the Christian is different from that of all other religions (some of which seem to be really OK with smiting infidels, or treating them as second class citizens). Moreover, Christians know how dismally they fail to live up to this standard, which teaches them their need for Christ.

Islam has no such teaching, and recognizes no such need for salvation. Neither does any other religion.

Perhaps Obama’s failure to speak, and, by extension, to think, like a Christian, makes people wonder whether he may be a Muslim.