Wow! Great Review of "The Unforseen". Variety, no less! Earlier posts here and here.

Pangas in the Classroom. Mary posts on a well-armed student.

A couple of thoughts.

1) Can you imagine what the reaction would have been in an American public high school class with such a display?

2) If I were Mary, I would ask all the boys to bring a couple of pangas with them. Just keep them sheathed and out of sight.

(Apropos of my second point.)

The American Iraq. Brilliant op-ed piece from the WSJ. (The link is to OpinionJournal, whch means one does not need to have a subscription to the WSJ.)

Answering my father's call

1) What's the most fun work you've ever done and why?

During Super Bowl XXX, the last time the game was in Miami, I hobnobbed with the Super Bowl corporate sponsers at their private reception. The Dolphins cheerleaders and I circulated through the room, and I would take Polaroids of CEOs posing with hall of famers and/or my cheeleader crew. The Kodak guy didn't appreciate my work. Why was that the most fun ever? I spell it o-n-e-h-u-n-d-r-e-d-d-o-l-l-a-s.

2) What's one thing you did in the past that you no longer do but wish you did?

I drank egg nog during christmas. I had a protein shake tonight, but it wasn't the same. It was more chunky.

3) Name one thing that you've always wanted to do but keep putting it off?

I would like to write one letter a day. I'm 0 for 30 so far, but I've got a good feeling about this year.

4) What are two things you would like to learn or be better at and why?

I would like to learn Russian and be better at guitar. Then I would audition for Gorky Park. Bang!

4b) Take a class from someone, learn etc

I'm losing steam here...letters to write and such...how about Paul Brand - I'd learn how to be a doctor.

5) Three words friends would use to describe you

beets, tenacious, metal

5b) Two more words you wished described you

Zakk Wylde

6) Top three passions

The three things that I suffer over? learning, fulfilling commitments, being prepared for whatever comes.

7) Why do you roll so hard?

So I can make the meal, yo.

how's about the mom and little joint answer next.

Six Questions.

I was one of three people that Sean tagged to answer this list of questions.

1) What is the most fun work you've ever done, and why?

The summer between my junior and senior year at college, I worked as a research assistant for a history professor who was writing a book on Southern Christianity before the Civil War. I stayed in Durham for that summer. Why was it so much fun? I was very, very interested in that subject, and the professor and his wife, who was also a history professor, were young and fun to be with, and they liked the work I did and we had great talks about the subject. And I was nowhere near the girlfriends who kept my life in such turmoil during my years at college before I met Carol. (I met her at the end of the first semester of my senior year.)


2A) Name one thing you did in the past that you no longer do but wish you did?

Sing in a very good choir, with a fine director and equally fine choral music, and get a chance to solo now and then.

2B) Name one thing you've always wanted to do but keep putting it off?

Get the sort of sailboat that trailors easily, that is seaworthy, that will sleep two comfortably, and can sail right up onto a beach. Trailer it up the coast of Florida, Georgia and South Carolina and, from time to time, put it into the water and sail around for a few days. Then sail it back, trailer it again, and move up the coast to another inviting spot. I know the sail boat I would want for this, a Rhodes 22.

3A) What two things would you most like to learn or be better at, and why?

Hebrew. Greek. So I could read the Bible in the original texts.

3B) If you could take a class/workshop/apprentice from anyone in the world living or dead, who would it be and what would you hope to learn?

Wow, this is a hard one, because there are so many people I would want to choose. I mean, you would have to say Jesus first, and then St. Paul, and then St. Augustine, Calvin, Martin Luther, George Washington, Teddy Roosevelt, the first Duke of Marlborough, Shakespeare, Wellington, Michelangelo. The list would go on and on.

4A) What three words might your best friends or family use to describe you?

A little self-centered, funny sometimes, moody sometimes.

4B) Now list two more words you wish described you.

Entirely competent. Christlike.

5) What are your top three passions? (can be current or past, work, hobbies, or causes)

Carol, then the rest of my family, and thirdly my law practice.

6) Write and answer one more question that YOU would ask someone.

"Why do you think God put you here at this time and place?"

First, I am absolutely unique and God wanted someone just like me at this particular point in the space-time continuum to love him and to be loved by him. Second, somewhere in the scheme of things, I fit into a larger plan that is so wonderful and beautiful that I can only dimly and mostly incompletely imagine it. As to my particular part of that plan, it has to do with being the husband to my wife, father to my children, grandfather to my grandchildren, son to my mom, friend to my friends, lawyer to my clients, and a member of the church, visible and invisible, local and globa. - all the things I am doing now. I feel pretty much within God's will presently but with too many major, major exceptions that have to do with my inability always to do the right thing and think rightly.

OK, whom do I tag? I tag the Beetz!!!

Some Really Sad News from Kenya. (Revised) A retired PC(USA) missionary and her daughter were murdered near Nairobi last week.

Our pastor Van went to seminary and is good friends with a missionary in Pakistan, Paul Stock, who is the nephew of the older woman who was killed and the cousin of the younger. At the deacon's meeting at our church last night that Carol attended, Van said that he received an email from Paul Stock telling him of this loss. Paul wrote, among other things, of the great love that the women who were killed had for the Kenyan people. (Van also said that Paul may be visiting our church this summer.)

Mary said that the younger woman was an RVA graduate. We pray for their families, and for the safety of other missionaries.

Jimmy, It's seriously time for you to hang it up. (But thanks for the compliment.) The former President takes a "Presbyterian Christian" for a Jew.

My friend, Sam Ullman, thinks this is a "scary thought".

Just How Far Did that Apple Fall from the Tree? "Friends of God", the younger Pelosi's Documentary on American Christianity. Nancy Pelosi's daughter Alexandra is a documentary filmmaker and her recent documentary on Christians in America is getting a lot of ink. Any guesses on how Nancy Pelosi's daughter would film American Christianity? Here is one answer.

Another take on the film appeared in a WSJ journal article Friday. In this one, the writer admires the spare way in which Alexandra narrates the film, as if a camera without narrative is an objective look at any subject. The article also comments on a portion of the film where Ted Haggard is interviewed. (In a happy coincidence for Alexandra, she filmed her visit to Haggard and his church before the scandal.) According to the WSJ, Alexandra in this segment focuses not only on Haggard's views on homosexuality, she includes interviews with men in his church who comment on how often they have sex with their wives.

Right, we talk about that subject all the time at our Men's Bible Study.

Look for this film to be played up just about everywhere.

The SuperBowl in Miami. Dave Barry comments.

Still More on Mary, the Dinka Woman.

I have been in email touch with Audrey Walters, the Communications Director for Make Way Partners, and I told her about the visit that Carol, my Mary, and I made to Kijabe Hospital with Mark Buhler, the assistant superintendant of RVA, and his daughter April when we met Mary, the Dinka Woman. Audrey sent me a copy of this email that the MWP home office received from Kimberly L. Smith, the WMP executive director, who is presently in Kenya:


I can think of no more joyful news to begin ’07 than the news of remarkable recovery for our Mary in Nyamlell, Sudan. As you know, in partnership with Voice of the Martyrs and Bethany Kids, we were able to medi-vac Mary to Kijabi, Kenya for surgery on her arms. I went to see her in December. The following link includes new photos of her - post surgery: http://www.makewaypartners.org/img_popup.php?gID=13.

James, Stephen (from Voice of the Martyrs) and I rode deep into the Rift Valley winding our way through steep mountain roads on our journey to Kijabi’s hospital to visit Mary. Dr. Dick Bransford of Bethany Kids, had agreed to perform Mary’s surgery without ever having met her. Once Dr. Bransford heard her story and saw her photos, he took her case.

All along the ride to visit Mary, as I took in the breathtaking beauty of God’s handiwork in the Rift Valley of Kenya, I marveled at yet another miracle he had done to get Mary to Kijabi Hospital. Mary has no passport, no birth certificate, and no legal papers of any kind. Stephen confessed how nervous he was putting her on the chartered plane. He had created letters explaining what he was trying to do, but what if the Customs Agent wouldn’t let Mary into Kenya? Stephen knew the Customs Agent well; this agent was a drunkard known to be unreasonable and hot tempered. If there was a problem, Stephen would have to put Mary back on the plane and send her home without an explanation because he couldn’t speak Dinka and Mary couldn’t speak Kiswahili. Stephen prayed the whole way through. This day the Agent offered little resistance, Stephen paid a small fee and Mary was granted a temporary Visa. Praise God!

Many of us have been praying for Mary’s recovery for sometime now. As I rode to Kijabi, I wondered how getting on a plane for the first time, riding on paved roads for the first time, being in a hospital for the first time, and the doctor not being able to explain to her what he was about to do or what she could expect would affect her.

Once in Kijabi, as Mary saw me coming toward her, she jumped up and ran to me raising her arms high into the air. For the first time, Mary was able to truly embrace me; we both cried. She was like a child excited with a long-awaited toy, wasting no time to show me how she could pump her arms up and down and stretch them nearly straight out. With rapid succession, Mary would alternately hug me then raise her arms in joy only to firmly hug me once again.

Finally we sat to talk. She was desperate for news of her children. We assured her that they were doing well in school and were being well cared for. The news was visibly comforting to her.

Through conversation about Mary’s return to Sudan, I asked her what she or her children might need. I wondered if she would ask for clothing or some essential item for her children; they have only one set of rags which they wear every day.

Mary said, "I don’t have a Bible. I couldn’t read it even if I did since I don’t know how to read. Still, I know Jesus has been with me all the way! But I want to know more about Him. Please teach me and the other women more about Jesus."

Mary has become a leader to Christians, Muslims and women who have lost all hope in any religion through this unholy ‘holy war’. Her desire is to start a Bible study with these women.

When I return to Sudan in a couple of weeks, helping Mary to deepen her ministry to the Christians, Muslims and former slave women in her community is one of my goals. You can make a donation for this specific purpose at: https://www.makewaypartners.org/index.php

Lastly, thanks to your generous yearend giving, the dormitory construction will continue. Our goal is to have Phase I complete by April and the first children will begin moving in. However, much work is ahead of us and the children need your continued support. Please continue to tell everyone you know how they can help these precious children through Make Way Partners.

Kimberly L.Smith

Executive Director

Update: I fixed the links, but I cannot get the photos on the link to the photo gallery to load on my computer. Maybe they will work for you.

More News on Laura and her film. Here. (Bringing you up to date on my earlier post.)

More on Mary, the Dinka Woman. When I was blogging from Kenya, I posted about a visit to the Kijabe Hospital and described meeting Mary, a young woman from the Sudan who was a patient there. My Mary (Mary Stokes) told me that the Mary we met at the hospital is from the Dinka tribe, and so I will refer to the Mary we met as "Mary, the Dinka woman."

I have told the story of meeting Mary, the Dinka woman, to a number of people since Carol and I returned. Many of them were as moved as Carol and I were at this woman's story of faithfulness in the midst of profound terror and persecution. Because I was simply repeating the story as I had heard it second or third hand (I did not hear it directly from Mary, the Dinka woman), I asked my Mary if she would get me more details on the story. She researched the issue and was referred to an article about Mary, the Dinka woman, in a publication of the Christian organization that was involved in her rescue. The organization is Make Way Partners Corporation. The article appears in the organization's June 2006 newsletter, beginning on page six.

As you will read, the story ends before the funds are collected to send Mary, the Dinka woman, to Kijabe Hospital. So we have "the rest of the story", at least in part.

My Mary tells me that Mary, the Dinka woman, has been discharged from Kijabe Hosptial, but she does not know where she has gone. But Mary says she will try to find out, and when she does we will let you know.

Turn-around in Baghdad? I doubt we'll hear about this on NPR.

Jesus Presented in the Temple.

Last Wednesday our Men’s Bible Study at church recommenced after several weeks off for the holidays, and we picked up again with Luke. We read the Christmas story, which was interesting in light of the holiday just having passed and everyone sort of picking up the pieces. (My life flies apart between Thanksgiving and New Year’s. It’s a time of high stress, lots of great experiences, but over-all exhausting. I think we need more balance, more Sabbath time during that period, but it is very difficult to find it. For me, it seems to be more difficult each year.) I’m not sure that we achieved any fresh insight as we considered Luke 2: 1 through 20, but we enjoyed the irony of reading how Caesar Augustus (meaning Caesar the Exalted One) and his census pushed Mary and Joseph into Bethlehem for the birth, thus fulfilling one of the Messianic prophecies in the OT.

One of the points often made about the story is that God chose poor people to be the parents of Jesus and chose mere shepherds, rather than high priests and the other ruling elites, to whom to make the angelic announcement. In other words, the point is made that God bypassed the religious structures and went right to the people with this Savior.

The next section of Luke, "Jesus Presented in the Temple", makes me think that we make too much of that point. Because in verses 22 through 39, we see Mary and Joseph carefully observe the rituals that attend the birth of a child, the circumcision on the eighth day thereafter, the "purification" of Mary from her being ritually unclean as a result of childbirth and, finally, when she and her family are appropriately prepared, the "presentation of the first-born" several weeks later at the Temple.

We could argue that no Jewish child is really a complete "person" until the circumcision, because it is only then that he becomes part of the covenant community. In fact, we read that Jesus doesn’t even have a name until that ceremony, because only then is the name of a Jewish child conferred. So we could say that Jesus really does not come into the Jewish world until his parents appropirately prepare him and themselves and then bring their newly named, first born son to the Temple, there to comply with the rule that the first-born male must be presented to God, that is "consecrated." in remembrance of the grace of Passover and in obedience to God's command in respect of first-born males in Exodus 1:2.

So the events in verses 22 constitute a sort of Second Nativity, and it is profoundly Jewish and profoundly respectful of the Law. And, after all, the Gospel is for the Jew first, then to the Gentile. (Rom. 1:16)

There is great irony in Jesus being presented at the Temple, because the event goes largely unnoticed, except for a couple of old people to whom no one apparently pays a great deal of attention, except the parents themselves. This is where I think one of the lessons lies.

Here we have the Temple, with all its bureaucracy and ritual, one of the avowed purposes of which is to await the Messiah. And then, with two exceptions, they completely miss him. It makes me wonder what I am missing. What is going on in God’s economy, right in front of my eyes, that I am completely missing because I am so busy doing life? What is First Presbyterian of Miami Springs missing that is going on in our town, because its people are busy doing church? What is the Western Church itself missing?

Simeon and Anna give us a clue about how not to miss what is there for us to see. Each had committed himself or herself to a life in which they waited upon God. When God's good time came, he sent them spiritual gifts so that they could see who this child before them really was. The passage expressly states that the Holy Spirit caused Simeon to recognize Jesus. And it describes Anna as a prophetess. Here is man waiting patiently, and God finally revealing and equipping. May all of us be able so to wait and, when the time comes, be so blessed by God.

"The Unforseen". Laura's film at Sundance. Good luck, Laura!

Map of the Historical Spread of World Religions. Clever graphics.

Deep Religious Truths.

According to one of my Jewish friends and brothers:

In these serious times of this world, it is important for all of us of all faiths to recognize these Four Deep Religious Truths...............

1. Muslims do not recognize Jews as God's chosen people.

2. Jews do not recognize Jesus as the Messiah.

3. Protestants do not recognize the Pope as the leader of the Christian World.

4. Baptists do not recognize each other at Hooters

(Sorry.)

I wish this would be the speech
GWB would give:
"The State of the Union is a disaster."

This is a war, not a police action. C'mon all you classics majors out there! :-) Doesn't this go all the way back to Thermopalye? To (side) arms, citizens.

Also, required reading: the bio of Winston Churchill during the inter-war years. He was one of the very few who declared the Nazis to be the true threat that they were, and was outcast for it.

"Mutually assured destruction is not a deterrent to Ahmadinejad, but an inducement."

So says Bernard Lewis at a conference in Israel that he and James Woolsey, the former CIA Director, recently attended. Woolsey also spoke. Read further about what they said here.

More on Balancing our Freedoms with the Matter of Dealing with Terrorism. There are some interesting comments on the Gingrich post below. (I never know what will provoke discussion, and it's interesting to see what does.)

The discussion reminds me of what my criminal law professor, Norval Morris, said about the crime rate. He said that the optimum crime rate is not zero. He said that to get to zero, one would need a police state.

Would he say, then, that the optimum terrorism rate is not zero? If it is not zero, then what is it? A 9/11 every so often? Is the terrorism rate in Baghdad not optimal, but the terrorism rate in London about right?

Many would answer the Morris proposition by pointing out that we are not dealing with criminal activity. We are dealing, rather, with a sort of warfare. We have always suspended civil liberties to one extent or another during war. Then we win the war and, thereafter, restore those liberties, and luxuriate in regret.