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April 16, 2018  David Murray   2 comments

Blogs

This Week, Speak the Name of Andrew Brunson, A Persecuted Brother in Turkey
The most important post of the week. “Please join us in standing with Brunson’s family and home church in lifting the name of Andrew Brunson to the God he serves.”

Social Media and Sin
“Theology recognizes that human hearts are curved inward, inclined to boast, and always looking for opportunities to prove their own self-righteousness. Human-computer interaction, UX, and user-centered design recognize that social media platforms should be designed to meet the wants and needs of real human users. Putting these two concepts in conversation with one another reveals why Facebook can be so dangerous. Facebook’s technology is designed to accommodate, encourage, and exploit human depravity. The “Like” button on Facebook is not there by chance; the “Like” button was created to satisfy our deep longing to be liked by others, lauded for our accomplishments, and acknowledged for our righteousness.”

I Used This Simple Chart To Prioritize My Crazy Busy Work Life
“This former media executive hated saying “no,” so she created a system that forced her to set boundaries.”

What Happens to Your Body on No Sleep
“In short, nothing good—and just one bad night can trigger a cascade of scary side effects.”

Mariah Carey Beat Stigma. You Can Too
Not recommending Mariah Carey as a model in anything other than her openness about mental illness.

“This week, singing star Mariah Carey made an announcement that was a long time in the making: back in 2001, she was diagnosed with bipolar II disorder. She has recently made the decision to treat it and to share her story. Carey is not the first celebrity to acknowledge a struggle with mental illness, but she is one of the most high-profile people to do so. And she has struck a major blow in the fight against the crippling stigma that keeps so many people trapped behind fences of shame, fear, and isolating silence.”

Starting from zero
“Iraq’s Nineveh churches are retaking their towns from years of ISIS control, without guarantees of money, safety, or a future.

Steve Lawson on Preaching Without Notes

Kindle Books

Do More Better: A Practical Guide to Productivity by Tim Challies $2.99.

Exploring Grace Together: 40 Devotionals for the Family by Jessica Thompson $2.99.

  • Dan Phillips

    Preaching without notes. Scary thought. I think that I’d feel I’d not done my work, and was being lazy or slapdash. Perhaps that’s because my earliest experience as a Christian was under a beloved, well-trained man who would indeed preach straight from the Greek NT, without notes, looking to the Spirit’s leading — and it was an absolute mess of free-association that very seldom had anything to do with the text.

    That said, I love occasions where providence thrusts on me the need to preach without notes. Hard to describe in terms that any but another preacher would understand, but there is an immediacy in doing that, and a sense that this shows what I’ve actually got on the shelf, so to speak, without the benefit of careful work and reworking and massaging.

  • http://atheistcards.com Andy Stout

    “Preaching without notes”??? How about preaching without brains! And what entitles this self-proclaimed “preacher” to preach? He worships a magic genie that was conceived by goat herders back in the Bronze Age, who scribbled their superstitious beliefs on goat skins that were hidden in dusty caves for centuries—which became known as the “Holy Bible”. I wonder if I were to hide a Harry Potter book in a cave: Maybe it would be discovered and taken seriously be humans living 2000 years from now. (We humans are pretty dumb, aren’t we?)