Timothy's Thoughts

R ecently, a commenter to my blog made the comment. “I don’t believe a LOT of what Paul said.” She further stated, “I cannot believe that Christ treated and felt about women the same way Paul did.” The comment was made after I made a comment after the difference in roles that God gave women and men, and referenced some of what Paul wrote. So is that true? Did Jesus teach something different from Paul? Many people want to look at the teaching of Jesus and focus on the what seems to be the loving nature of him, but because little is said in the gospels about some of the things Paul taught, they assume there is a difference. They compare Jesus to the God of the Old Testament and they see Jesus as being more loving while the God of the Old Testament is more firry. But look at what you see in the book of Revelation. In particular, look at what Jesus said to the church at Thyatira: Notwithstanding, I have a few things against thee, because thou sufferest that woman Jezebel, who calleth h...

T here’s been a lot of discussion concerning freedom of religion recently. To mention a few things, there is the Obama Care issue in which Christians may be forced to purchase insurance that pays for abortions. Then there is the New York schools trying to prevent churches from using their facilities when they are not otherwise used, but allowing other organizations to meet. Most recently, I heard about a couple in Orange County California fined for holding a Bible study in their home. With the first two, it is clear were Christians ought to be standing. The government should not be forcing people to purchase something that violates their beliefs, nor should it exclude a group from meeting just because it is religious. But what about the last one? It sounds terrible, doesn’t it? What right does the government have to tell people they can’t have a Bible study in their own home? And that’s the way people on Facebook were looking at it. They seemed to think this was a violation of freed...

Y ou’ve heard that there is power in the blood. Perhaps you have sung that wonderful old hymn about the wonder working power in the blood. It is fun to sing the words that Lewis E. Jones wrote, but have you stopped to consider why there is power in the blood? If you’ve watched the Indiana Jones movies, you know all about the Holy Grail and its supposed power to heal. I suppose, it there were such a thing as a Holy Grail that was used to collect the blood of Jesus as it drained from his body, then maybe that isn’t so farfetched. The idea that the Holy Grail was used to catch his blood is nothing more than an artist’s conception. Jesus’ blood fell to the ground, beginning at the garden, all the way to the cross, where blood and water came from his side. We talk about the blood being applied to our hearts and it brings to mind images of God using a brush to paint our hearts with the blood of Jesus, much like the blood of the Passover lamb was applied to the doorposts. But that is just...

T he great divide in Christianity today boils down to one thing. What do you believe the Bible is? In a discussion the other day, I used a passage from the Bible to prove a point. The other person in the discussion responded by saying that she didn’t believe that passage means the same today as it did then and more than that, she didn’t thing Jesus would agree with the passage. Then she made the statement, “the Bible contradicts itself.” Compare that to the follow excerpt from the doctrinal statement my church has adopted: The Scriptures are God's inerrant revelation, complete in the Old and New Testaments, written by divinely inspired men as they were moved by the Holy Spirit (II Tim. 3:16; II Peter 1:21). Those men wrote not in words of human wisdom but in words taught by the Holy Spirit (I Cor. 2:13). The Scriptures provide the standard for the believer's faith and practice (II Tim. 3:16, 17), reveal the principles by which God will judge all (Heb. 4:12; John 12:48), and...

I heard a term I’ve never used before, the other day. The term is egalitarian and I heard it used to describe Rachel Held Evans. If you don’t know who she is, she is the self proclaimed “follower of Jesus” who has gathered a following by making fun of the Bible, including doing such things as sitting her roof for 89 minutes because Proverbs 21:9 says, “It is better to dwell in a corner of the housetop than with a brawling woman in a large house.” Proverbs 21:19 is similar, “It is better to dwell in the wilderness than with a contentious and angry woman.” (Which may explain why some men like to go hunting.) But my intention isn’t to talk about her silliness. Instead, I want to talk about the problem of labeling her as an egalitarian . While it may be true that the egalitarian vs. complementarian debate may have been Rachel Held Evans’ motive for her silliness, I don’t want to label her an egalitarian . That’s not to say that she doesn’t hold to the ideas held by egalitarians , I t...

H ave you heard this argument before? In the Bible it says that God told Joshua to kill all of their enemies at Jericho, therefore, the Bible isn’t accurate. I may bore a few people today. I have the urge to talk about logic. Also, I’m a little rusty on that subject. If we can write the statement as: A: God told Joshua to kill all of their enemies at Jericho. B: The Bible says A C: The Bible isn’t accurate. Not(A) And B => C ( Not(A) And B Implies C) This would be the same as saying God didn’t tell Joshua to kill all of their enemies at Jericho but the Bible says it did, so the Bible is inaccurate. We know that B = True. (From reading the book of Joshua.) Not(A) And True = Not(A), meaning Not(A) => C To prove the inaccuracy of the Bible, we must prove A = False, God didn’t tell Joshua to kill their enemies. Herein is a problem. To be able to show that God didn’t do what the Bible says he did, we must have evidence from a source outside of the Bible. Some people answ...

P eople have a tendency to pick and choose the things they want to believe in the Bible. Some people are blatant about it, while others of us may do it without realizing that we’re doing it. Martin Luther thought that the book of James conflicted with his theology and wanted to edit it out of the Bible. Thomas Jefferson thought it was a good idea to rewrite the Bible with the references to angels, the genealogy of Jesus, the prophecy of his birth. He also wanted to remove miracles, the divinity of Jesus, and Jesus’ resurrection. All he had left were 46 pages that he thought were “pure and unsophisticated doctrines.” Recently, one commenter to this blog told me that she disagrees with a lot of what Paul wrote. She didn’t like what he said about women being submissive to their husbands and about women not teaching men in church. But how often have we simply not read a passage because we didn’t think it had anything interesting? Or how often do we look for verses about a particular subjec...

I ’m amazed at what some people think is keeping up with the latest technology. They’ve all got to have the latest phone, the latest handheld device, and they’ve got to be a member of the latest social media website. Rachelle Gardner recently suggested that staying current on these things would help stave off dementia or help you maintain marketable skills. That’s a nice thought, but really, do you think knowing how to use Facebook, or Twitter, or now Pinterest is going to do all of that? Other than the fact that there are some people who are convinced that the latest technology is too hard to try, many of the things that people think are new technology are old technology with new packaging. The social media networks are driven by fads. But given the number of people who are using them, you can be sure that it’s okay to skip the latest thing. You don’t have to sign up for the latest social media website. You don’t have to have the latest handheld device. If at some point you see a r...

D o you give create where credit is due? The other day, I happened across a blog and the author quoted me, without stating my name. While I don’t believe that is illegal, or even plagiarism, since she didn’t claim the statement as her own, it would've been nice to have my name next to the quote, even nicer if there were a link back to the statement I made. (Or course, you realize I’m mentioning what she did without providing a name or a link.) My thought is this: if you use something someone has said as the basis for an argument or a point of disagreement, it is important to cite your source. If you are giving an example of something someone has done, but you believe it is representative of what many people do, it isn’t so important to cite them, especially when it may place them in a bad light. From doing research papers, you know the importance of citing your sources so that people can verify your work. When it comes to online stuff, one of the reasons I think it is important...

O kay, Wow! One of my books is available for free right now on Amazon.com. I knew it was going to happen, but I had let it slip my mind. But I didn’t see any harm in it. After all, the whole point is to encourage a broader audience to take a chance on it. Apparently, hundreds of people decided to do just that. It makes my sales numbers look good, even though I’m not making a red cent from any of them.

S ee if you can answer the following true or false questions without looking them up. Before his death, Barnabas looked up and saw Jesus standing at the right hand of the Father. Saul, later called Paul, held the coats of those who stoned him. One night, Peter preached for so long that a young man went to sleep and fell out of a window to his death. David had a one night stand with Bathsheba while his army was off in battle. As a result, their first son, Solomon was born. The Lord told Hosea to buy Gomer, a prostitute, and marry her. King Saul consulted with a witch and asked her to bring Isaiah back from the dead. Think you know the answers? Compare your answers with those at the end of this post. Did you get them right? The point of this exercise is to highlight the existence of Bible illiteracy . Many people go to church and they claim to believe the Bible and yet they don’t know what the Bible says. Some churches don’t bother teaching from the Old Testament these days. I don’...

I ’ve already said more about autographs than I intended to and probably so much that some of you are tired of hearing about them, but I’d like to say one more thing. Aside from the increased value an autograph gives a book and the personal connection that exists when we meet a favorite author and ask them to sign a book, why do we ask authors to sign books? Forget the famous authors, what about those who aren’t so well known? I have purchased a few self-published books that haven’t sold very well. I won’t mention the names of the authors because you wouldn’t know them anyway. But if I were to meet these authors, I would ask them to sign their books. Why? Asking an author to sign his book is a way of recognizing him for the work he has put into the book. Maybe the book is poorly written. Maybe we couldn’t get past the first page. That doesn’t matter. We want to show the author that we appreciate him, whether we think much of his book or not.

W hen I was a kid there were a few books that I would read, reach the end of the book, and immediately flip back to the beginning and start reading again. I don’t remember the name of the book, but there was one such book Mom gave me for Valentine’s day. It was about a kid who was on a trip with his uncle. His uncle was some kind of spy. You know, the James Bond type spy, not The Spy Who Came in From the Cold type spy. Anyway, there were these guys after them and his Uncle had this special kind of watch with a type of keypad on it. At the time, that was amazing stuff. These days, that is old technology. But I remember reading that book, being disappointed because I had reached the end of it, then turning to the beginning to read it again. What I wonder is why I don’t do that as an adult. Part of it is that adult books are longer. That book was probably a hundred pages long, if that long and the text was probably slightly larger than most adult books, so it wouldn’t have taken me lo...

E van Jacobs, the creator of Kindlegraph recently posted the following on a blog: In my opinion, [it is] the connection between authors and readers that is the important thing and the signed book is simply a memento of that connection. The move toward digital books doesn’t [mean] that these connections will no longer exist or no longer be important. On the contrary, I believe that authors and readers have even more opportunities to connect. I created Kindlegraph as an acknowledgment of the power of personal connections even while people become more anonymous because of technology It is interesting to see his perspective, even though I still remain critical of Kindlegraph . For those who are uninformed, Kindlegraph is a means by which Kindle readers can request a personalized inscription for e-books. The concept is that an author will fill out a form and the software will generate a file that can be stored on the reader’s device. But what the reader actually receives is a message wr...

W hy do people like getting books signed? If it is a popular author, a signature can raise the value of the book. That is as long as it isn’t made out to anyone in particular. I suppose it would raise it even more if it were made out to an equally wellknown person, but for most of us, having our name on a book we didn’t write will lower the value of the book. But what is it about signatures that make them desirable? What it really comes down to is that personal connection. In a world in which so many things are mass-produced, an item autographed by its maker is a rare thing. I think people like having a book that they know the author held in his hands and signed. That may mean they have to meet the author and ask him to sign the book. That experience in itself makes it even more meaningful, but the signature alone makes the book unique. Some people question what will happen to autographed books since it seems that books are going to the eBook format. If anything, I think this will ...

T here are some things that an author should delay telling the reader for as long as possible. In a whodunit, the author shouldn’t tell the reader who committed the crime until late in the book, but that’s not what I’m talking about. As I was watching a video the other day, I found that I was enjoying the video, but in the back of my mind I kept asking, “what’s the point?” I was sure the creator of the video was going somewhere with it, but when I reached the end of the video, I got it. The whole point was to leave a heritage for those who come after us. Once I saw that, I could look back at what I remembered from the video and see how the creator had supported his theme. In a novel, one thing we don’t want to do is to come right out and tell the reader what we want them to learn from the book. If we can do that, we should be writing non-fiction. Fiction deals with topics that aren’t easy to talk about. You don’t just say, “leave something behind for the people who come after you.” I...

A s you are aware, in the aftermath of the Susan G. Komen for the Cure / Planned Parenthood debacle, Karen Handel submitted her letter of resignation . The text leaves us with as many questions as it does answers. Did she leave because she felt she was no longer valued as an employee? Does the offer of severance pay imply that Nancy Brinker requested that she resign? Did she leave because Susan G. Komen for the Cure allowed it to be manipulated by the Democrats while Karen Handel is a card carrying Republican? I’m sure we could brainstorm motivation all day and still not know anything. What I do know is that Karen Handel looks like the hero in this mess. It is certain that the Susan G. Komen for the Cure organization has made a bad decision by reinstating abortion provide Planned Parenthood . It is certain that Karen Handel left the organization because of that decision. For that, she should be applauded. My prayer is that others in that organization will follow her example and ca...

A ll stories are retold, over and over, but some are better than others. One of my favorites is that of a boy who begins in a position of weakness and ignorance. A person of wisdom comes along and instructs the boy in how to develop strength and wisdom. The mentor dies, leaving the boy to wonder how he can possibly go on without his teacher to guide him. Meanwhile, the enemy begins his attack. Seeing that all is lost if no one counters the attack, the boy rises up out of his grief and leads his men into battle. We see this story in so many different places and yet it never grows old. Star Wars followed this plot very literally. We also see it in The Neverending Story . The book Holes follows this plot, somewhat, though that book is as much about the character finding an appreciation for his family name. I think this plot was more popular when I was a kid than it is now. That could explain why I like it so much. Maybe I’m trying to relive my childhood. Maybe it’s just a guy thing....

G irl Power movies or stories are “about a female character who starts off without any acceptance—be it social, intellectual, physical, economic, romantic or political—and spends the rest of the movie gaining it.” [1] It would seem that we don’t have boy power stories. Girl Power stories often make the claim that girls, at least the girl in the story, can do whatever the boys can do, only better because she can do it with makeup on. I don’t imagine there would be much interest in a story that showed a boy doing girl stuff. This is partly because guys already believe they could do the girl stuff, if they really wanted to, so they don’t need a story to tell them they can. The male counterpart to the Girl Power story is the Coming of Age story. Remember Karate Kid ? Of course we remember great lines like “wax on, wax off”, but when we look at the journey of the character, it is not one of gaining acceptance but gaining strength. In a Girl Power story, the female character already...

G od, is he male or female? If you read the Bible, all references to God are in the masculine form. Some have argued that this has more to do with the male chauvinism the time when it was written than an indication of what God is. Some people have attempted to rewrite the Bible in gender-neutral form. Some have even decided that God is a woman, as the author of The Shack did. The argument of some people is that since there is only one God, it doesn’t make sense to say whether he is male or female. And they have a point, if we look at gender as merely the two parts of the reproductive puzzle. Before we decide whether God is male or female, let’s consider what it means to be male or female. Forget about the reproductive organs and the differences in appearance for a moment. Forget about the typically stronger nature of the male and the nurturing nature of the female. Let’s imagine that we have two beings that are blank slates. Essentially, they are equal in every way. Imagine that we...

M any of you have heard by now heard about the Susan G. Komen for the Cure organization first indicating that they would no longer be providing Planned Parenthood with grants and then reversing their decision and offering an apology. The apparent reason for Susan G. Komen for the Cure cutting funding was that Planned Parenthood is under investigation. It should also be noted that Planned Parenthood doesn’t provide mammograms, which is a very important service in the fight against breast cancer. So, abortions or no abortions, it makes sense that Susan G. Komen for the Cure would spend their money elsewhere. So why then did they first say that Planned Parenthood would not be funded and now they are saying it is a mistake. The answer seems clear. This is an abortion issue, not a breast cancer issue. Susan G. Komen for the Cure was receiving a lot of flak about supporting the primary abortion provide Planned Parenthood . The policy that cut funding to organizations that don’t prov...

A ngels have wings. Some do anyway. We all know what they look like because we’ve seen so many pictures of angels. They always have these big wings sticking out of from their shoulders that are covered with feathers. How different that is from the image of the seraphims we see in Isaiah 6:2. They have six wings. Two are to cover their face. Two are to cover their feet. Two are for flying. Perhaps all could be used for flying, if they weren’t in the presence of God. What I really find interesting is that the word used for this six winged creature is also used for a venomous serpent. It is sometimes translated as dragon. How very different that seems than a beautiful woman with dove’s wings strapped to her back. I suspect that these creatures look more like a flying reptile than they do the images of angels we see. But some angels have the appearance of men. I don’t know that these have the ability to fly. Why would they need to climb Jacob’s ladder if they could fly? I suspect they ...

W hat is Christian Fiction ? There is a genre called Christian Fiction and it has several sub-genres, including romance, historical, women’s fiction, speculative fiction, etc. so it seems like it would be easy to define what is and is not Christian Fiction . Some people (including Christians) avoid Christian Fiction because of certain beliefs they have about the books in the genre, but Christian Fiction isn’t easy to define. But I can understand the reluctance of some people because most of what I see in Christian Fiction these days are either women’s fiction (including romance) or super dark stories about the end of the world. This is very different from the Christian Fiction of yesteryear that included such classic novels as The Pilgrim’s Progress , The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe , Not My Will , and In His Steps . In part, the change may be because traditional Christian publishers and authors were more interested in the message than the money. Modern publishers of Christia...

“ G ood protagonists come from morally neutral places and move toward relatable goals, not agendas. That is why the best stories appeal to large groups of people across many beliefs, faiths and moral codes.” I saw the statement above in the comments of a blog. It’s quite the statement. I’m having a hard enough time figuring out what it means and a harder time figuring out if I agree. I think I don’t. First, I’m not sure what is meant by “morally neutral”. I suppose that means the protagonist doesn’t know what he believes. Morals are essentially the collective beliefs of society concerning what is right and wrong. On any moral issue, there are extremes on either side and almost no one who is neutral, but the statement above implies that our protagonist should be one of those people. Next, the comment mentions “relatable goals, not agendas”. I don’t see any reason why a protagonist can’t have an agenda. For that matter, I don’t see why an author can’t have an agenda. Where it becomes...