violent thoughts

I have them every time I see Bob Stoops on TV.

3...it's a magic number

I have three followers now...awesome.

Late Links

This past weekend was pretty crazy, Coldplay on Friday night, crying myself to sleep on Saturday night because of those stupid Sooners.

So anyway, here are the links to the 1st and 2nd installment of Zak White's thoughts on debt...Tuesdays are crazy so I plan to comment and give my thoughts tomorrow...as well as a review of the Colplay concert and how I eneded up being in arms length of Coldplay.


Zak - Debt #1 - You Need A Plan

Zak Debt #2 - Tax On The Poor

I will probably only discuss the first blog since the second one is an article from Dave Ramsey. Plus the article from Dave makes me terrified of snakes, bees, and electric chairs.

Don't play the lottery...if God wants you to win then a winning ticket will blow through your opend car window while driving.

That is how i I do it. I don't buy tickets...I just drive with the windows down.

P.S.-Be praying for Zak's brother in law...he was involved in an accident and his arm was crushed in some far equipment.

Debt and piggybacking

My church, New Life EFC, has been very outward focused in a lot of the ministries that we run. It is something that we all as a staff have been very passionate about.

With the state of the economy and the fact that there are credit card commercials saying that we are a "nation of consumers" and that there is "nothing wrong with that", our church has been very focused on sharing true biblical principles about debt. I have loved it. We have offered a variety of programs to help people to get rid of their debt (not manage it...but kill it).

I have never been a fan of debt, even though we have plenty. Now that we are looking to get our first house I see the importance of getting out of debt quickly. Although out debt is unavoidable (student loans) we are still wanting to get it taken care of quickly.

Not all debt is "bad, immoral debt" but it is never good to live under debt.

With thinking about this topic I decided to piggy back and to post links throughout the week to my good friend Zak White's blog. He is going to be spending his week talking about debt, and he has some great thoughts on the subject.

I do believe that a lot of debt is more than just a finanical issue, or a way to pave the road to happiness and more possessions later in life, but it is a theological issue. So anyway, here is Zak's first blog introducing the subject: Zak White - Debt Kills

Enjoy!

Death By Love

I just got through reading Mark Driscoll's new book "Death By Love." This books is a collection of letters written to individual people and explores a situation in their lives and then applies the work of Christ on the cross to their lives.

I found this book to be very creative and well written. I think everyone knows at least one person who is going through some of the events mentioned in this book.

If you know anyone who has ever been, abused, raped, has a loved one who has cancer, addicted to pornography, been angry with someone, addicted to drugs, is not a Christian, is searching for God, hurts themselves, or is the son of a pastor then you will find that this book has some great theological ideas that can be shared with those individuals.

At times I did find this book to be a little repetitive. I know that these letters are supposed to stand on their own, but I think that putting the same ideas, stories, illustrations, and scripture in several chapters can be quite boring.

I am not sure I would recommend this book to read cover to cover, but I would highly recommend it to pastors and counselors who would like a great, biblical, resource to take people to who deal with any of the above problems. In addition to some great thoughts and truths from scripture, the book also contains some very cool artwork to introduce each chapter...just check out these samples...

These letters are written with a lot of love and a lot of truth, which is how I hope my ministry is seen by those I talk to. I could see myself writing letters very similar to these to a multitude of people over my future years of ministry. Although, I am not sure that I would write a letter to my two year old son that weighs the options of limited atonement, unlimited atonement, and unlimited limited atonement.

So if you have the means, and would enjoy this resource then you should definitely look into it. If you are interested in learning more about this book on Amazon just click the book cover at the top of this post.

There are no words...

Saturday

The big Tech vs. OU game is coming up on Saturday.

It is a big day for the Red Raiders and all of the fans that have not jumped ship for UT, USC, LSU, or any other school that has had recent success. And yes I do cheer for UT but not at the expense of my Raiders.

I will be cheering hard from CO.