Have you browsed his latest book, The Evolution of God  (Little, Brown and Company, 2009) and noticed what he said about Mormonism?

“It may sound cynical to explain the growth of a religion, especially a religion of love, in crass commercial terms, as though religions were mere networking services.  But such practical functions play some role in the power of religion even today.  The Mormon church, whose growth role has been compared to that of early Christianity, is a smooth conduit of commercial contact.”

(1) Wright uses Stark, who is over the top,  for LDS growth role comparison to the early Christianity.  (2)  Do many other religious scholars think that Mormonism is a commercial networking service?  (3)  Do you agree with Wright’s beliefs about the evolution of God(s)?

BYU shares the news.

HT: Thomas

That is quite an LDS scholarly achievement.  I remember listening to Don lecture on the Dead Sea Scrolls  at a local Methodist church here in Idaho Falls.  I noted some of his biases in the thread following the report on his lecture.  And I would assume that his biases are probably right within the main consensus of the scholars working on the new BHQ.

1.  My sister wrote a small post on our father, and she included a nice pic.  A Christian father is a wonderful gift from heaven.

2.  My wife and four children spoiled me this weekend.

3.  Also this weekend, I watched The Elizabeth Smart Story (Echo Bridge Home Entertainment, 2008).  It helped me imagine a little more what this LDS father went through.  As I watched this portrayal, I don’t think I would have been as kind to the Salt Lake City police.

Jesus obeyed completely the will of His Father.  He taught only what His Father wanted Him to teach.  The record of John’s Gospel is clear and beautiful on the perfect, sinless example of the Son.

This Son was not equal with His Father for only a mortal time in the work of His salvific subordination.  But make no mistake about this on Father’s Day:  The Son is equal to the Father.

And of course, we are never an equal to the Son.  I am made a friend to Jesus Christ.  This is amazing grace.  But I will never be an equal to the Son.  He always gives the commands.  John’s Gospel also makes this very clear.

And with tomorrow soon to be . . .

Happy Father’s Day to all.

Did all you guys catch the John Calvin “Christ Alone” article in Christianity Today (June 2009)?

“We see that our whole salvation and all its parts are comprehended in Christ.  We should therefore take care not to derive the least portion of it from anywhere else.  If we seek salvation, we are taught by the very name of Jesus that it is “of him.”  If we seek any other gifts of the Spirit, they will be found in his anointing.  If we seek strength, it lies in his dominion; if purity, in his conception; if gentleness, it appears in his birth.  For by his birth he was made like us in all respects that he might learn to feel our pain.  If we seek redemption, it lies in his passion; if acquittal, in his condemnation; if remission of the curse, in his cross; if satisfaction, in his sacrifice; if purification, in his blood; if reconciliation, in his descent into hell; if mortification of the flesh, in his tomb; if newness of life, in his resurrection; if immortality, in the same; if inheritance of all blessings, in his kingdom; if untroubled expectation of judgment, in the power given to him to judge.  In short, since a rich store of every kind of good abounds in him, let us drink our fill from this fountain, and from no other.” (emphasis mine)

I have the 2009 Church Almanac.

In the Fifth Quorum of the Seventy, there are these six names for the Idaho Area:

Robert E. Chambers, Kim B. Clark, Ronald J. Hammond, K. Brett Nattress, Brent H. Nielson, Gary W. Walker

So these six are under the First Quorum of the Seventy, who are under the Presidency of the Seventy, who are under the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, who are under the First Presidency?  So these are the six men who provide the head oversight over the 400,000 LDS members in Southern Idaho?

“Is discipleship a commitment to doctrinal beliefs concerning God and Jesus?  Is it a way of life, a way of ‘love’ perhaps, that sets disciples apart from the world?  Or is it an experience, a mystical spiritual encounter that transforms?”

I asked our church family a couple weeks ago, “How long have we been in John’s Gospel on Sunday mornings?”

One of the sisters had it marked in her Bible.  We started on August 20, 2006.  The prologue of John’s Gospel is what got me excited about starting a blog, too.

We are meditating on the rich, opening metaphor of John 15.  May the juice of Jesus, our only hope, flow through us. 

Consider the sober words of Augustine:  aut vitis, aut ignis.

Google the phrase.  The pope back in 2000 arrives at the top of my search list.

Jonathan Edwards wrote,

The world is ready to wonder what strange principle it is that influences Christians to expose themselves to so great sufferings and who forsake the things that are seen and renounce what is dear and pleasant to their senses.  They seem to men of the world to be beside themselves and almost act as if they hated themselves.

Charles Spurgeon penned,

We love our dear ones on the earth, but we love the Lord more than all of them put together.

How many “Christians” have you met like this in the I-15 Corridor?

Let’s jump back in time to Gregory Nazianzen’s musings:

If I have any possessions, health, credit, learning, this is all the contentment I have of them, that I have somewhat I may despise for Christ, who is totus desiderabilis, et totum desiderabile (the all-desirable, the every thing desirable).

I just got back from a scouting camp-out (still going on over at Warm River).  And I have been thinking . . .

Do you have love for Jesus Christ?

This is the sure mark of a Christian.