Okay, in a follow up post. Print in red if you would like to. But just remember to also print Acts in all red, Romans in all red, I and II Corinthians in all red. After all, if they are plenary inspired by the Holy Spirit, aka the Spirit of Christ, which NT words are not Christ’s words?

Oh yes, better stock up on red ink because you’ll be needing to crank out Genesis - Malachi in all red as well.

I will absent from blogging for a few days. I’ll be here…I’ll eat some Pho for you.

I hear it all the time, “These are the words that Jesus said” as if they are more important than the rest of the Bible. It is a battle cry of many in the emergent movement who seem a little adverse to Paul. It is a battle cry of those who want to return to a very minimal, simplistic fate. It is the battle cry of ethicists and moralists who only want to believe that Jesus was a sage or guru offering us moral platitudes. I vote to BAN all red letter Bibles.

Questions to my Red Letter Friends:

• -What is your view of inspiration? Are the Epistles inspired to a lesser degree? Did the Holy Spirit only go, say, 80% on those writings? No, they are fully and equally inspired.
• 
  
• -Are the Epistle’s only a reaction to the Gospels? As far as date goes no. Several of the Epistles pre-date the writing of the Gospels. If you want some of Christianity’s earliest recorded thoughts you have to go to Galatians and both Thessalonians. Most of the other Epistle’s were written concurrently with the Gospels. However, arguments of date become irrelevant if you believe the Holy Spirit, not constrained by time, was inspiring writers.

As believers, we are to live out of the whole canon of Scripture–not just the Gospels, not just the Epistles, and certainly not just the Old Testament. (As to the Apocrypha, another fight for another day.) Let’s stop excluding texts. To my “ultra-evangelical get ‘em to say the prayer and they are okay” friends, read the Gospels to the see life of the Kingdom. To my “communal ethicist friends”, read the Epistle’s to understand the function of the Gospel worked out in our lives and churches. Everyone read the OT more to see how it points to Christ. Let’s be balanced.

(Disclaimer: I don’t literally hate the Bible, I hate its misuse.) 

We shouldn’t be trendchasers, but we should understand how the culture is functioning. Get it free here.

As previously mentioned, I am working through Jonathan Edwards Religious Affections modernizing it paragraph by paragraph to saturate my mind in its richness. I thought I would make the first modernized part available for free to any takers. It is very practical and accessible. I feel it is  a must read for any worship leader. We are tasked with taking people’s affections to God. A great tool.

religious-affections-part-1-modernized.pdf

Here is the message that sprung from the overflow of saturating in it:

crave3.mp3

Feel free to share the audio file with your worship team members or whomever.

Check this out…very very kewl!

Meaning #1-a popular trend that attracts growing support
Meaning #2- a large ornate wagon for carrying a musical band

Bandwagon people drive me nuts! For a fasinating history of the term, read here and another view here.

To all you people who started wearing all your Longhorn gear AFTER they beat OU, I am calling you out. Where were all of you when we were mediocore in the late 80’s and early 90’s? I have the pics on faded Polaroids in my mom’s house to prove long term loyalty even during the bad years. (An even greater test is that I still love my Texas Rangers even though they stink like a bottomless pit…haha!)

Deep Jack Handy thought of the day:

Sometimes people treat Jesus like their Longhorn gear, they put Him on only when He’s in vogue.

My friend and CP Kevin has a great post on what God measures as Kingdom activity (it ain’t attendance or giving only). A nice follow up to this 5 Graphs on a Desert Island.

I mostly read dead guys. My newest method involves modernizing the text. It makes me slow down and savor their thoughts. Why do I mostly read dead guys:

• 1. Time has a way of filtering out what is valuable and lasting from what is peripheral. Only the richest of works will still be around to be read while the more temporal ones will fade into obscurity.
• 2. Their life left a legacy. With living writers, you always have to wonder if they will finish well or if they might crash and burn (which if I was more jaded, I might called “pulling a Guglielmucci.”) With a dead guy, you see the entire trajectory of a life lived well. You already know if they finished well.

• 3. Their work left a legacy. The impact of their work in the lives of others can be seen in the course of history. The influence of a Religious Affections or City of God can be measured. Newer works have not been proven in the crucible of time.

So keep reading all your new fangled stuff if you’d like.  Sure, someone is writing tomorrow’s The Cost of Discipleship today, but you’ll never be able to fully know that. Just remember to pull a dead guy off the shelf every once in a while.

Chris stayed up really, really late on Saturday night to have this ready the day after the project ended. Here it is…

Northwood Home Makeover ‘08 from Chris Johns on Vimeo.

We are in a series called Crave. I wrote a song and Brent helped me polish it up the last bit. It landed really, really well Sunday when Brent led it. Here it is for completely free as a board mix from our service Sunday…

you-satisfy.mp3

you-satisfy-b.pdf

(We will have it CCLI listed in a couple of weeks so you can actually report its usage. Enjoy and may God richly use it among you).

Each year our church heads about 10 miles south with 800 volunteers to totally makeover the homes of 4 economically challenged families in Haltom City. The families all have children in The Academy of West Birdville, the school we have a long-term relationship with.

The stories are powerful. This year, one family has a son who is requiring a bone marrow transplant just a few days after we makeover his home. The makeover will allow him to come home to a house that is clean and will lessen the risk of infection. Please pray for us this weekend. We have tons of work to do and only 24 hours to do it. Here is our highlight video from last year:

Northwood Home Makeover 07 from Chris Johns on Vimeo.

Coach Vince Lombardi had a sign made up for the Green Bay Packers that read,
“Fatigue makes cowards of us all.”

Fatigue also turns us introspective and negative.
Fatigue makes us question and doubt ourselves in areas in which we are very confident when rested.
Tasks that seem easy when we are rested seem almost impossible when we are fatigued.

Try to avoid making any major decision when you are feeling fatigued.
Fatigue can be emotional weariness as well as physical weariness.
Either way, before natural confidence returns, what is needed is deep rest.

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