On Sep. 16 I asked for prayer for Louis who blogs at Baker Book House.

He has received very bad news. Information can be found at his blog and at in Christ Jesus.

Using a quote like this:

Never memorize what you can look up in books.

–attributed to Albert Einstein

It has been the presumption of some, and especially of youths who profess to have dedicated themselves to this study but who have hardly gone further in evangelical studies than the reading of three or four volumes, to behave as if they alone were experts, and to consider that they are deserving of a glorious reputation among the great scholars. Such arrogance! Better it would be if such Suffenuses did not also go on to despise those who are truly endowed with the wisdom that they so foolishly boast of having attained to (emphasis mine).

–John Owen, Theologoumena, Book VI, Ch. 1, p. 1. / Biblical Theology, 591.

From: Thomas Goodwin

Also see if you dare:
A Warning from Owen to Students at Meet the Puritans

Joel at The Church of Jesus Christ is offering a chance to win an NLT Mosaic Bible.

The rules are simple:

• Write a blog post for me to use on the 22nd.
• It could be anything from a blog post you have already done (in which I will post a link and the first paragraph or so) to your favorite NLT passage to your thoughts about issues concerning the NLT (this means, you don’t have to be a blogger. Just email me your thoughts.)
• It must be NLT centered

It would be nice if you had an Amazon wishlist (if you don’t you can get one for free. Once you have it, put the Mosaic on your wishlist.) THIS IS NOT A REQUIREMENT.

Tyndale has sent me a certificate (which saves shipping costs!) for a free NLT Mosaic.

• You have a a shot at two entries here – comment on this post and give me a reason why you want it and/or mention this post on your blog.

See his blog for more details.

One of the things that pains me greatly is how so many men let their wives run all over them. I’m not saying they should discipline them or “put them in their place”. They should “make allowance for each other’s faults” (Colossians 3:13) and love them (Ephesians 5:25) but not just roll over and put up with it.

It’s popular now for husbands to say the wife is “the boss”. (Although she may be for any number of things that she’s more in touch with than him.) Meaning she’s bossy and that’s the way it is. One message board I participate in uses the acronym SHMBO (She Who Must Be Obeyed). And they let themselves be emasculated. Is this ever part of sacrificial love?

This is exacerbated by TV shows and commercials portraying the husband as the dumb klutz and the wife as the smart one constantly rolling her eyes at him.

I will say that I see this a whole lot less in Christian marriages than outside. But the yeast of the world pervades.

Thankfully I’m blessed with a wife who isn’t like this. But if there were ever times in the past when things might get close to this, I don’t take it seriously and I communicate about it (not that I’m the greatest with communication) as I expect her to do. I wish she would have done more of it when I was too bossy early in our marriage.

What would Paul say now?

How should husbands handle it? My answer would be to not take it too seriously and communicate about it on a short term basis. On a longer term basis, love them and pray for them and try to win them over just as the wife would the husband as the passage below says. There should never be coercion, disciplining (that’s for kids), berating etc. And this from a complementarian, which I may write about in the future if I get brave enough. This post is probably beyond my potential controversy quotient the way it is.

1 Peter 3:1-4
In the same way, you wives must accept the authority of your husbands. Then, even if some refuse to obey the Good News, your godly lives will speak to them without any words. They will be won over by observing your pure and reverent lives.

Details can be found on this blog post. Louis has been writing a lot of good posts at that blog that I’ve been enjoying very much and I’ve read many good things about him as a Christian.

Matthew stands as a continual reminder that being a “New Testament Christian” is not enough. The Hebrew Bible remains the Word of God for the churches. Our appreciation of the message and significance of Jesus, of God’s standards and desires for God’s people and God’s world, and of our place in the larger plan of God are all enhanced as we continue in Matthew’s tradition of anchoring the New Testament message (and our churches) in the earlier oracles of God. Matthew reminds us that the New Testament has value as the revelation that stands in continuity with the Old Testament, not as its replacement.

David deSilva, An Introduction to the New Testament, 290

This is one of the great paradoxes of suffering. Those who don’t suffer much think suffering should keep people from God, while many who suffer a great deal turn to God, not from him.

–Randy Alcorn, If God Is Good

Unfortunately and fortunately I know the latter from experience and find it impossible to explain to non-Christian friends and family. People always want to ‘fix’ me, despite my constant researching and gaining knowledge on my conditions beyond what they have, because they can’t understand that there is unexplainable suffering in the world.

I feel like I have the opportunity to know God more than those who don’t suffer chronically. But I admit I envy those who do without the extreme suffering part, although we all obviously suffer a great deal at various times in our lives. This is humbling because I’m sure that I wouldn’t have gotten as close to Him without it.

HT: Challies.com – review of this book

Here are some blog posts that I found particularly interesting. I hope I’m not just repeating what you’ve already found.

Monday With Mounce at Koinonia:

I am also starting to write my paper for the national meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society entitled, “Can the ESV and TNIV Co-exist in the same Universe?” This is in response to Mark Strauss’ invitation in his paper last year, “Why the English Standard Version (ESV) should not become the Standard English Version.” So you will understand if my blog posts for some time are comparing the ESV and the TNIV. [emphasis added]

3 Ways to Benefit from “Boring” Passages at Desiring God

Gospel Definitions at Kingdom People

But ask what you can do for your fellow biblioblogger….. at The Church of Jesus Christ

Here is a very nice video. It’s serious and cute and has a nice message.

GoD and DoG video

Disclaimer: I like dogs and cats. They are both God’s creation and those who hate either can take it up with God. Good luck with that.

Psalm 103:8-22 NET
The LORD is compassionate and merciful;
he is patient and demonstrates great loyal love.
9 He does not always accuse,
and does not stay angry.
10 He does not deal with us as our sins deserve;
he does not repay us as our misdeeds deserve.
11 For as the skies are high above the earth,
so his loyal love towers over his faithful followers.
12 As far as the eastern horizon is from the west,
so he removes the guilt of our rebellious actions from us.
13 As a father has compassion on his children,
so the LORD has compassion on his faithful followers.
14 For he knows what we are made of;
he realizes we are made of clay.
15 A person’s life is like grass.
Like a flower in the field it flourishes,
16 but when the hot wind blows by,
it disappears,
and one can no longer even spot the place where it once grew.
17 But the LORD continually shows loyal love to his faithful followers,
and is faithful to their descendants,
18 to those who keep his covenant,
who are careful to obey his commands.
19 The LORD has established his throne in heaven;
his kingdom extends over everything.
20 Praise the LORD, you angels of his,
you powerful warriors who carry out his decrees and obey his orders!
21 Praise the LORD, all you warriors of his,
you servants of his who carry out his desires!
22 Praise the LORD, all that he has made,
in all the regions of his kingdom! Praise the LORD, O my soul!

Photo © Jeff at Scripture Zealot

I’ve often written how people, often athletes, use Philippians 4:13 as their motto and quote it out of context. Tim Tebow, quarterback for the University of Florida Gators says:

A lot of people know Philippians 4:13 — ‘I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me’ — but a lot of people don’t interpret that verse the right way, Tebow says. Most people think it means I can do anything … on the football field, or I can make a lot of money. But that’s not exactly what it’s talking about there. It’s [saying] I can be content with anything. When you’re a Christian, you can [be content] because God has put you where you are. That’s really a different view…. I know that I have Christ in me, so I can do whatever He wants me to do, and that’s how I approach everything.

Tim Tebow: (Super)Man of Faith at Baptist Press Sports

The untitled blog written by Kevin is giving away Jesus and “This Generation” by E. Lovestam. This book was published in 2004 and belongs to the Coniectanea Biblica New Testament Series.

Rules of the giveaway are simple:

Link to this post on your blog and you will be entered. Also, please just make a quick comment on this post just to be sure that I know you have entered. (I don’t want to accidentally miss out someone who did link to this post)

Shipping to USA addresses only.

The giveaway will be drawn on Friday September 18th.

The cover art looks spectacular.

As the NFL football season is gearing up, here are some links for some perspective:

For all of you NASCAR fans, Football fanatics, Sports crazies… at The Church of Jesus Christ

Are you Convicted When You Watch Football? I am at Irish Calvinist

and especially:

Man with the Golden Mouth
Long before football, Chrysostom fought frivolity.
at Christian History Blog

The world’s idea that everyone, from childhood up, should be able at all times to succeed in measurable ways, and that it is a great disgrace not to, hangs over the Christian community like a pall of acrid smoke.

–J.I. Packer, A Passion for Faithfulness: Wisdom From the Book of Nehemiah, p. 206.

HT: Between Two Worlds

We hear over and over again things like, “You can do whatever you put your mind to.” Or, “If you can see it, you can do it.” Or Philippians 4:13 is quoted within the Christian ranks, without quoting Philippians 4:11-12. These are most often quoted either by parents to their kids who want to see them succeed so they can be proud of them or by people who are already highly “successful”.

We can see the negative results of this on many levels. Anyone watching the XXXX Idol shows can see that many people who audition truly think they have a lot of talent because after all, they’ve put their mind to it and worked really hard (or not) and they don’t understand that it takes God given talent, the right circumstances, God’s providence (even for non-Christians, I believe) etc.

We can make good decisions and work hard to try to do well at what we enjoy as a vocation but we can’t control our own fate.

Jeremiah 10:23 NET
LORD, we know that people do not control their own destiny. It is not in their power to determine what will happen to them.

Christians are quick to spread glory stories, but disappointments tend to be brushed under the carpet because we don’t want to discourage anyone at church or be a bad commercial at work. But God isn’t like us. He doesn’t get insecure about His performance, and He never asks us to cover up for Him.

–Pete Greig, God on Mute: Engaging the Silence of Unanswered Prayer

I believe success is: spiritual maturity. Working out our own salvation by God’s grace.

This is about as off topic as I get. But it’s relevant because so many of the names we type have accents and we often like to type characters that aren’t on our keyboard whether in email or blog posts. This site provides you with information on how to type the character into a document or email message, or HTML (which is what you’d use for blog posts in the HTML mode of your editor).

How To Type.net

Edit: As of now, 9/18/09, the sale price is no longer 71% off.

Christianbook.com has the TNIV True Identity: The Bible for Women, hardcover on sale for $9.99 plus shipping. Since the TNIV is planned to be discontinued (or updated and renamed to NIV) in 2011, they may be letting go of some of them at big discounts. The page linked to has a description, reviews and samples. Be sure the see the samples–it looks like it has blue text, which I don’t like but a lot of people do since they change their text from black to blue in message board posts.

If anyone is looking for more blogs to read and aren’t familiar with these I thought I would list them:

• Aberration blog
• Apprentice2Jesus
• beauty of the bible
• Jack Of All Trades
• Kingdom People
• Meet The Puritans

I don’t think I’ve ever felt like a kid in a candy store in looking through a book as much as I have in looking through An Introduction to the New Testament by David deSilva.

Right now I’m using it for the portion on Matthew because the commentary I’m going through by R.T. France doesn’t have much of an introduction. He wrote a previous book and expects you to buy that. Instead of doing that I wanted something with more bang for the buck.

In looking through it I was so interested in all the stuff it has in it I took quite a while before I got to the point of reading the portion on Matthew. I think it’s very good although I’ll have to forgive him for thinking Q is legitimate.

My library is sorely lacking in reference material and this is a great addition.

I’ve been using Croy’s A Primer of Biblical Greek. Partly because it was suggested along with Black’s by Mike Aubrey and partly because it includes passages from the LXX in the exercises and maybe a couple of other reasons I can’t remember.

I’m a NetGalley reviewer and I requested Black’s new 3rd edition of Learn to Read New Testament Greek. After I requested it they said they’d be asking for my class size and where I teach. Ha. So I wouldn’t be getting that one. But then a week later I found it in the mail along with the workbook too! I feel guilty but I’m going to do a good review for them especially since I bought Mounce’s also.

In looking through Black’s book I like it better. It’s more efficient but at the same time explains terms that Croy’s doesn’t. As an example, in an exercise in Croy’s book, I didn’t understand how someone could be taught by the word if ‘word’ is a dative. But in Black’s book it explains that it’s an instrumental dative. However Black’s will leave out things that aren’t as important like rules of accenting which are put in an appendix.

I find myself learning more in less space in this book. It’s probably a little less comprehensive so when I’m done I’ll go to Croy and Mounce.

I got Mounce just to get a really rounded education and to do a good comparative review of Black’s and it’s very good of course but there’s just a little too much stuff going on compared to Black. I like how Mounce as the Exegetical Insight at the beginning of each chapter which I’ll be reading. Black also helps more with exegetical skills.

Look for a review in the future.