An excellent summary of a more disturbing trend over at www.christianitytoday.com

It has not been that long ago since the online editor was praising her nightly ritual of watching sitcoms and going to bed with Jay and Dave in her editorial section at the start of the weekly Christianity Today updates. I wrote a nice email asking if she was serious or just being hyperbolous for effect. I am still waiting on a reply.

Click below and see the excellent synopsis.

Sex and the CT « The Shepherd’s Scrapbook

Sex and the CT

Here’s an update on the Sex and the City and Christianity Today movie review ordeal…

Sex and the City was an HBO television series (1998-2004) that won 7 Emmy Awards.

The SATC movie (rated R) was released on May 30 with more of the same, what the Chicago Tribune labels “outré fashion, casual sex and dubious cocktails” and “plenty of eye candy for the ladies (think naked men and haute couture).” Not your typical Christian movie.

However, Christianity Today’s Camerin Courtney wrote a fairly explicit and positive review, giving SATC 3 stars (CT gave Prince Caspian 2.5 stars).

People criticized CT for positively reviewing a “pornographic movie.”

Carolyn McCulley (a CT contributor herself) writes an exceptional response to the CT review: “the pot with the proverbial frog has boiled over. The changes that have come about with the introduction of ’sex positive’ or ‘porn positive’ third-wave feminism, beginning in the early 1990s, have now so thoroughly permeated our culture that even evangelicals fail to see the trend or the danger.”

CT responded to the swarm of criticism by defending the original review.

Then yesterday Ted Slater of Boundless called CT to *repent* over the review (and the defense of the review) in an article simply titled “Christianity Today Relishes Sexual Perversion.”

TOP 10 THINGS YOU’LL NEVER HEAR A DAD SAY via preaching.com

10. I guess I’m lost! Looks like we’ll have to stop and ask for directions.

9. You know, honey, now that you’re 13, you’ll be ready for unchaperoned car dates. Won’t that be fun?

8. I noticed all your friends have a certain hostile attitude. I like that.

7. Here’s a credit card and the keys to my new car. Go have fun!

6. What do you mean you want to play football? Figure skating’s not good enough for you, Son?

5. Your mother and I are going away for the weekend. You might want to consider throwing a party.

4. Well, I don’t know what’s wrong with your car. Probably one of those doo-hickey thingies that makes it run or something. Just have it towed to a mechanic and pay whatever he asks.

3. No son of mine is going to live under this roof without an earring. Now quit your belly-aching, and let’s go to the mall.

2. Why do you want to go and get a job? I make plenty of money for you to spend.

1. What do I want for my birthday? Oh, don’t worry about that. It’s no big deal. (Okay, they might say it, but they don’t mean it.)

(from The Daily Dilly)

No One Changes God’s Law

I delight to do thy will, O my God; yea, thy law is within my heart. (Psalm 40:8)

Because we live in a period known as the age of God’s grace, it has become a popular thing to declare that the Ten Commandments are no longer valid, no longer relevant in our society.

With that context, it has become apparent that Christian churches are not paying attention to the Ten Commandments.

But Dwight L. Moody preached often in the commandments. John Wesley said he preached the commands of the Law to prepare the way for the gospel. R. A. Torrey told ministers if they did not preach the Law they would have no response to the preaching of the gospel. It is the Law that shows us our need for the gospel of salvation and forgiveness!

It is accurate to say that our binding obligation is not to the Old Testament Law. As sincere Christians we are under Christ’s higher law—that which is represented in His love and grace. But everything that is morally commanded in the Ten Commandments still comprises the moral principles that are the will of God for His people. God’s basic moral will for His people has not changed!

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Baptist Press - Prof withdraws from ethics society for its ‘honoring sin’
Prof withdraws from ethics society for its ‘honoring sin’

Posted on Jun 18, 2008 | by Lauren Crane

WAKE FOREST, N.C. (BP)–Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary ethics professor Daniel Heimbach has withdrawn his membership from the Society of Christian Ethics after the group took a stand in what he calls “honoring sin over Scripture” regarding homosexuality.

Heimbach said new guidelines soon to be adopted by the society will make it impossible for any member to remain in good standing who does not affirm homosexuality. After 24 years of membership in the Society of Christian Ethics, Heimbach said the group has now gone so far in its view and defense of homosexuality as to disqualify members who defend and apply biblical morality.

The membership of the group now totals more than 1,000 people from the United States, Canada and Europe. According to its website, the group aims to “promote scholarly work in Christian ethics and in the relation of Christian ethics to other traditions of ethics … and to provide a community of discourse and debate for those engaged professionally within these general fields.”

While Heimbach said he has remained a member of the group to be a “beacon in the darkening circumstances,” the time has come for him to withdraw his membership.

“The reason I am withdrawing now, and not before, is that only now is the SCE adopting ’standards of professional conduct’ that go so far as to disqualify membership based on defending and applying biblical morality,” Heimbach said, in reference to the amendments made to the Standards of Professional Conduct. They will be voted on in January 2009.

“It is ironic that, having assiduously avoided favoring any one moral understanding over others for nearly 50 years, the SCE should now see no problem with enforcing one view over others by conditioning membership on presuming to accept the moral legitimacy (requiring all to actually ‘respect’ and ‘honor’) of self-justified character and behavior God declares to be categorically wicked,” Heimbach said.
Technorati Tags: homosexuality sbc ethics

I just finished Feminists Say the Darndest Things by the venerable Mike Adams.  I would commend it to you.

Some eclectic blog posts and videos:

мебели

SermonCentral.com: Free Sermons, Illustrations and Outlines

“Them’s fighting words!” …Seven sentences that should make every Christian cringe

Greg Stier
Dare2Share

How many times have you been in your church’s foyer when a member of your congregation said something so unbiblical that you literally cringed? Or maybe it was in a Sunday school class when that one person (you know who I’m talking about) raises his/her hand and waxes eloquent in an assertion that is so jacked-up theologically that you don’t even know how to begin to respond.  

An Evangelical Response to “An Evangelical Manifesto”

An Evangelical Response to “An Evangelical Manifesto”

Posted: Monday, May 12, 2008 at 6:35 am ET

Who are the Evangelicals? The issue of Evangelical identity and definition has been central to the Evangelical project from its very beginning in America. Given the nature of the movement, definition is elusive and constantly contested.

The release of “An Evangelical Manifesto” on May 7 caught the attention of the national media, and thus it represents yet another opportunity for evangelical definition. The document, released May 7, also represents a challenge, for its framers hope to redefine the movement in the context of our unsettled times.

The Manifesto, released at a press conference at the National Press Club, represents an agenda. The press release offered by the organizers makes that clear: