Monday's happenings

An interesting new title from Zondervan:

Sing and Learn New Testament Greek
Includes 1 Audio CD and a 36-Page Guide
by Kenneth Berding
Zondervan Publishing Company, Forthcoming May 2008
Compact Disc (audio)
ISBN: 9780310280996
List Price: $14.99
Your Price: $12.74
www.eisenbrauns.com/wconnect/wc.dll?ebGate~EIS~~I~CDSINGAN

For those of you who haven't totally lost interest in the Talpiot Tomb media circus, some of the scholars involved in the recent conference have issued a healthy corrective here The final paragraph:

To conclude, we wish to protest the misrepresentation of the conference proceedings in the media, and make it clear that the majority of scholars in attendance – including all of the archaeologists and epigraphers who presented papers relating to the tomb - either reject the identification of the Talpiot tomb as belonging to Jesus’ family or find this claim highly unlikely.

Indeed!

More on Pagan Christianity at The Heresy, and a follow-up thought here

Sometimes you have to tell people the unvarnished truth regardless of how many people you tick off. I was thinking about this today as I pondered Frank Viola’s less than irenic spirit in Pagan Christianity. For years I’ve challenged people I’ve known personally in conventional Christian ministry. I’ve done my level best to be charitable, respectful and sensitive. After years of trying the net impact is still pretty much zero. If the issues you challenge people on go too deep they just ignore them no matter how constructive you are.

Again, indeed!

And how about efficiency versus acting as Jesus would? That's the question that Ted asked the other day:

I was raised in a strong work ethic inherited from parents who experienced the hard times of the American Great Depression. And probably influenced somehow by the strong Protestant work ethic, which in its place is good. On top of all of this is at least the factor of an efficient American way of activity in getting the most bang for buck. And with all this, even for me as a Christian, one can fail to really follow Jesus.

So as I stood there in our work with my younger brother and friend, it was like a revelation hitting me, small as it was, yet large in significance. I had to tell myself to let it go. And instead of making an issue of it, accept the inefficiency. Maybe, in love, there could be a time and place to make a general suggestion. But even in the fast pace of work life, and perhaps especially there, we need to take care that we be followers of our Lord, loving God and loving others over all else.

Amen!