People Like Me

 My church is composed of people like me.

I help make it what it is.

It will be friendly, if I am.

Its pews will be filled, if I help fill them.

It will do great work, if I work.

It will make generous gifts to worth causes,

If I am a generous giver.

It will bring other people into its worship,

If I invite and bring them.

It will be a church of loyalty and love,

Of fearlessness and faith and a church

With a noble spirit if I am a filled with these same things.

Therefore, with the help of God,

I will dedicate myself to the task of being

All the things that I want my church to be.

Mony Market Troubles Abound

The problems with our national fiances are hitting every where. I received word today that the Seminary where I earned my doctorate has lost almost half the value of its endowments and is forced to cut staff.

It is so sad that the greed of the mortgage market has created so much havoc in so many places.

Committee Decisions

A certain congregation was about to erect a new church building. The building committee, in consecutive meetings passed the following resolutions:

1.      We shall build a new church.

2.      The new building is to be located on the site of the old one.

3.      The material in the old building is to be used in the new one.

4.      We shall continue to use the old building until the new one is completed.

 

Every day we are called on to make decisions that affect the future. Decisions are made in many  congregations by the committee process and that process sometimes results in interesting developments. Even our personal decision making can lead us in a circle.

 

Word Varification

I like the security thing here of "Word Verification" that keeps the spam out. I get a chuckle out of some of the words that I am asked to verify. This morning I was leaving a comment and the word to verify was "gasiious" and I cracked up. Some of the nonsence words are a hoot!

Getting use to blooger was a bit of a pain but it is growing on me and it interconnects with my google account and gmail so it is getting easier to work with. I think I am going to be looking forward to the unusual words to verify and I need to keep a list of the ones that make me laugh.

The Eighth Day Of Creation

The book of Genesis tells us that God created the heavens and earth in six days and rested on the seventh.

Now comes the eighth day and we say what happened next? At that point the book begins to tell about human activity but we also learn that God was still busy overseeing creation perhaps even adjusting things a bit here and there.

Astronomy tells us that new stars are constantly being created so one might conclude that God is still working on creation even now. One would not want to limit God's activity so we can not say that God has stopped creating. This of course brings up the idea that perhaps God has created other beings in other places in God's image like us.  They may not look like us but still have the spirit with in them. We have to say we don't know but that it is a possibility.

 SO:

What do you think???

Choosing A Study Bible

Unless you are competent in reading Hebrew and Greek you need to choose a good study bible in your native language. Choosing one is not as easy as it sounds. We need to realize that EVERY translation is the translators’ opinion of the meaning. You just have to look at the variety of English translations to know the truth of that statement. So how do we know which translation will be best for us to use?

 First is it a direct translation from the Hebrew and Greek? Some bibles are translations from translations in other languages or versions of the same language.  There are also paraphrase versions like “The Living Bible” that are meant for easy reading not study.

 Second is it a translation by a committee or by one person. A single translator can not help but provide you with that person’s opinion. Translations done by committees have the added values of all their opinions being discussed and consensus being reached. It is still opinion but the chances of the opinion being a better choice is greater.

 

Third is what year was the translation completed? This is more important than you might think. What year was YOUR language skill set? For High School graduates it is the year of your graduation. For University graduates you choose that year of graduation. Then choose a translation done close to that year for the language YOU best understand.

 NOTE about margin notes: Information in margins and footnotes are OPINIONS! That doesn’t mean they are wrong but they could be so check them out. We all have opinions and I believe mine are correct or I would not hold them. 

JS Friends are the BEST

For this retired Pastor who loved JS trying to figure out differnet bolgs systems has been an experience. I had a journal for my area church on JS as well as my two personal  journals and it went the same way they did.

I set up the new church journal on wordpress and as you see with my last post getting wp to post an immage was not working. I put out a call for help to Dorrie and Summerwind and they both came through for me. JS friends are the BEST thank you both.

The jouranl if you are intersted is kdf2.wordpress.com and is a communications tool for my post as communications moderator for the Kentuckiana Disciples Fellowship.