Your weekly installment of things we’ve been reading (and watching) around the web.
Book Review of the Week
The Bible and Same-Sex Relationships: A Review Article, Tim Keller. Complete disclosure: with Tim Keller as the author, this article could have been titled “How to Tie Your Shoes” and it would have been worth reading. But as it turns out, Keller is addressing something much more pivotal—and volatile. He often gets asked for his response to books and articles arguing that the Bible supports same-sex relationships (as do we). So he decided to tackle the five biggest arguments. And he knocks it out of the park.
Articles of the Week
How to Be a Godly Man, Peter Sholl. As a general rule, I (Chris) am more than a bit skeptical when presented with advice on how to be a “man” or “woman” of God. Call it Wild-At-Heart Syndrome: we tend to read our cultural idea of manhood or womanhood into Scripture, then stamp our cultural preferences with a divine tag and call them biblical. So I’m not sure why I ventured over to Sholl’s article. Call it blind optimism. For once, I was pleasantly surprised.
How Would Your Church Respond to Caitlyn Jenner? Dr. Stephen Grcevich. I recently wrote a piece attempting to help people through the very confusing maze of terminology surrounding transgender discussions (you can find it here). Nothing has changed since then, except that famed Olympian Bruce Jenner—now Caitlyn Jenner—has emerged as the most famous transgender person in the world (for now). Our churches need to be places where the transgendered feel safe. And as Dr. Grcevich points out, we have a lot to learn about what’s going on deep inside them.
Four Reasons Paper Is Still Superior to Reading on a Screen, Michael Hyatt. Yes, yes, we know. This is ironic. But if a guy with a web-based platform is saying that books are superior to blogs, maybe it’s time we listen.
Smartphones, Tablets, & Christian Parents, Russell Moore. There’s no shortage of lunacy these days, but Moore takes on one of the more dramatic instances of idiocy here—the foolish habits of parents who give their kids unrestricted internet access. No, unrestricted web access is not the same as access to television or wandering around the neighborhood unattended. It’s more like sending our teens to a strip club and hoping they just read their Bibles the whole time. Parents of the world, don’t be dumb. Even if your children ask for a “serpent,” you should know better.
On The Lighter Side
How to Pretend to Work at Work, Mr. Forthright. Sometimes avoiding work is much harder than actually working. Mr. Forthright makes slacking off easy…or, at the very least, entertaining.
Wisdom For Your Weekend is presented to you by Chris Pappalardo, with occasional guidance from J.D. Greear. This is our attempt to reflect Proverbs 9:9: “Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be still wiser; teach a righteous man, and he will increase in learning.”
