Inside the mind of a suicide bomber via Halo 3

Wired columnist Clive Thompson writes about how Suicide Bombing Makes Sick Sense in 'Halo 3', and gives us a better understanding of asymmetric warfare from the side with less power.

Real Men 2008

CCC's Real Men conference for 2008 is titled "Life", it will be on 25th-26th July 2008. Here is the promo for it:

Losing the culture wars?

It seems that Christians are increasingly becoming aware that we are losing the culture wars, beaten back by the sexual revolution, anti-creation science teaching in schools and the post-modern tendency to see everything as relative and DIY mysticism as a healthy spiritual path.

Time magazine has an article about Christianity's Image Problem, Michael Craven questions whether Christians are the problem and the tepid success of Christian movie brand Fox Faith makes some wonder if Christians are even paying attention. I found this comment about Fox Faith's difficulties most interesting:

Media guru Phil Cooke, president of Cooke Pictures, said Fox Faith faces unique challenges from “a branding point of view” due to the diversity of the Christian community.

“While the general culture looks at 'Christians' being a homogenous group of people, we [Christians] track along a wide range of extremes in our thinking, our attitudes toward culture, and our doctrinal perspectives,” Cooke said. “The Passion of The Christ, which pretty much set this 'faith-based' fascination off in the minds of Hollywood, was a traditional story of the Passion, Crucifixion, and Resurrection. It told a story that the main thrust of the Christian community can agree on, and as a result, hit the box office jackpot. But once you drift from that central story that is the core of our faith, all bets are off.”

For me that hits the nail on the head. Christians are losing the culture wars because we are not a simple monolithic block. Different parts of the Christian faith succeed in different areas.

The Catholic church is still very well regarded for its third world missions and charity works, whilst in the first world many look so the Salvation Army or other Christian organisations for hope and mercy. Some Australian denominations like Christian City Church and Hillsong are well known for their emphasis on modern cultural elements in their worship and services, whilst also encouraging their congregation to be involved in the world of media and business. The Anglican church is well regarded for their intellectual rigour and emphasis on academic study, whilst also reaching out to their local communities.

Of course the fact that different groups of Christians have different effects upon the world should not be a surprise to us:

“The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ.”
1 Corinthians 12:12

The culture wars (if you like to see them that way) are really going to be won one fight at a time by the Christians on the ground. One day the church may be “chief among the mountains” (see Michah 4:1) , but that day is not yet come.

World’s Funniest Dad

Via Roy Osherove World’s Funniest Dad comes some great laughter medicine:

Amazing Grace (Movie)

The abolition of legalised slavery in the British Empire in 1807 was one of the great turning points for Western civilization, and was directly because of the powerful conversion of John Newton, a former slaveship master turned Anglican rector, who counselled the British MP William Wilberforce after his own conversion experience to serve God by staying in politics and fighting slavery and general sinfulness.

John Newton is most famously remembered for his heartfelt hymn, Amazing Grace, which captured the essence of his conversion experience.

A new movie called Amazing Grace has been made about William Wilberforce and John Newton and will be released in Australia on 26th July.

Modern Slavery
Unfortunately the abolition of legal slavery in most countries around the world has not stopped the trafficking of human beings. Stop the Traffik is a global organisation setup to help raise awareness of human trafficking and call on the UN and member governments to do more to combat this massive problem. They are using the Amazing Grace film to raise awareness for the plight of people in bondage.


For more good information on this topic check out the Anti-Slavery Project, which is supported by the Community Law Centre at the University of Technology, Sydney, and the BBC UK's Modern Slavery in-depth feature, which provides the following shocking statistics:

Australian Pentecostals < Buddhists

Amongst the various interest census facts reported by the SMH was this one:

“Though Pentecostal churches grew 26 per cent in Australia and 48 per cent in NSW, they remain numerically small, with 219,000 adherents, about half the numbers of Buddhists.”

That is a mixed result, it is brilliant that Pentecostal churches are growing, disheartening that they remain such a small part of the Christian faith in Australia and weird that there are more Buddhists - although given the loose definition of 'Buddhist' (likes Richard Gere, meditates, read a couple of books once, is a vegan), it is perhaps not so surprising.

Mother's Day this Sunday!

Remember your mum this Sunday and bless her with a visit, a phone call, or go overboard and send some flowers:

“Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone. You know the commandments: 'Do not commit adultery, do not murder, do not steal, do not give false testimony, honor your father and mother.'”

“All these I have kept since I was a boy,” he said.

Luke 18:19-21 (NIV)

Do people still get healed?

One of the key tenets of the pentecostal branch of the Christian faith, is a sure belief that God's miracles are just as relevant and available for us now as they were during the lives of the first apostles. Here is a short testimony from a member of our church who was healed recently through the ministry of Pastor Theo Wolmarans:

The power of positive confession

We had Pastor Theo Wolmarans at our church this weekend, bringing what seems to be a fairly effective healing ministry and some great teaching on matters of faith and positive confession. 'Positive confession' is a bit of Christianese for describing the attitude that no matter what situations life throws at you, you will take a positive attitude towards them and speak positively about the results you expect from them. An example would be speaking confidently of God healing your leg, even though it might currently be crippled. Ps Theo pointed out that the Bible teaches us that faith and speaking go hand in hand, neither has power without the other.

Some people take exception to this, and in the absence of good doctrine you can have all sorts of weird things you might have 'faith' for - but really you can only have faith for what God has promised you, and the Bible is the ultimate record of God's promises. If you can find a good scriptural basis for your faith, and you feel convinced that God will bring something about, then speaking that out aloud (confessing it) is the next step to seeing it come to pass.

Our church's senior pastor, Phil Pringle, teaches on these points regularly, but Ps Theo went through quite a few scriptures and brought out some interesting points about them I had not noticed before.

Luke 17:5-6
The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!”
He replied, “If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, 'Be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it will obey you.”

…as small as a mustard seed…
Not many seeds, but one single, small seed - one scrap of scripture, of God’s truth. A single rhema is all that is required.

…you can say…
Faith is put into action by speaking, both need each other, faith without speaking is powerless as is speaking without faith.

Mark 11:22-25
“Have faith in God,” Jesus answered. “I tell you the truth, if anyone says to this mountain, 'Go, throw yourself into the sea,' and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins.”

…I tell you the truth…
Jesus is really emphasising this – it must be important! Ps Thoe pointed out that when you come across a lion in the bush, he doesn't need to roar for you to take him seriously, and similarly Jesus didn't need to emphasise his teaching for his disciples, so this is an unusual statement.

…if anyone says …
Believers and unbelievers alike prosper when they match an internal faith with their external confession (or fail, if that is their confession + faith, see Job).

Luke 8:18
“Therefore consider carefully how you listen. Whoever has will be given more; whoever does not have, even what he thinks he has will be taken from him.”

…how you listen…
It is important that we listen with the right attitude, carefully and with discernment. It is important that we pay attention to what we are listening to.

Mark 4:24-25
“Consider carefully what you hear,” he continued. “With the measure you use, it will be measured to you—and even more. Whoever has will be given more; whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him.”

…what you hear…
It is important that what we allow ourselves to listen to is the right stuff, bad reports and negative thinking will at best hamper our internal faith, and at worst strangle it.

Romans 10:8-10
But what does it say? “The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart,” that is, the word of faith we are proclaiming: That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.

…believe and are justified…
Internal faith is part of how we are made right with God.

…confess and are saved…
But it must be accompanied by confession of that faith if we are to be truly saved.

Proverbs 22:17-18 (Amplified Bible)
Listen (consent and submit) to the words of the wise, and apply your mind to my knowledge;
For it will be pleasant if you keep them in your mind [believing them]; your lips will be accustomed to [confessing] them.

…keep them in your mind…
We need to keep reminding ourselves of our mustard seed, our rhema.

…your lips will be accustomed to confessing them…
Reminding ourselves of God’s truth also involves speaking that truth to ourselves and to others.

Creation Science Wiki

CreationWiki is an interesting attempt to harness Web 2.0 for the benefit of creation science:

“The CreationWiki is a free encyclopedia of creation science being assembled by the international creationist community. We encourage all creationists to get involved with the development of this valuable resource.”

The nice thing about this resource is it places in one place on the internet a lot of very helpful creation science information, including competing views and theories and alternatives to many of the consensus views in secular science that might cause Christians to doubt the literal truth of the bible. Whilst the articles are reasonably well fleshed out, some of the real benefit are the links to outside resources and papers that allow users to delve much deeper into the science if they need to.

Urban Freeflow helping British city kids

Urban Freeflow are a parkour/freerunning promotion group in the UK. In the BBC2 clip below they demonstrate how they have partnered with a local council to help London kids find something to do in the urban wasteland that is fun, demanding and affirming.

Roleplaying for Christ

Sydney Anglicans have an interesting article up called Roleplaying for Christ:

“How then do we play a MMORPG in the name of Jesus? I offer a simple list of strategies which I have found helpful based on personal experience.”

The article avoids discussing whether fantasy roleplaying is a worthwhile endeavor in itself, and concentrates on establishing a list of rules to keep you sane and your life balanced whilst still enjoying the online gameworld of your choice.

They are good ones to follow, and not particularly onerous. Many of them are good advice for any hobby or fun pursuit.