Laudable Linkage

Posted on June 4, 2022 by Barbara Harper

Here’s the latest thought-provoking reads seen around the Web lately.

Our Hope In the Ascension, HT to Challies. “Of all the aspects of Christ’s work in his state of exaltation, the Ascension is one of the most overlooked.”

God Matures Us Through Suffering, not Miracles, HT to Challies. “Suffering, not miraculous deliverance, is the primary way God matures his children. A supernatural event can encourage us, of course, but it doesn’t mature us. Maturity comes through trusting God when things are really hard, even seemingly unbearable. Will we trust God when the miracles don’t happen?”

A Letter to All the Marthas. “It struck me that Jesus hadn’t written Martha off. He saw her faith and hard work as well as her weaknesses. And he loved Martha just as much as Mary. I began to view Jesus’ words through a lens of love.”

Why You Should Stop Being Responsible and Start Being Faithful. “Losing my mother as a teenager accompanied by my father’s paralyzing grief amped my firstborn sense of responsibility. I equated being responsible with being dependable. But when being responsible means depending on myself and my resources instead of relying on God it’s unhealthy and ungodly.”

Are Cuss Words Sinful? HT to Challies. “You hear them in movies, television series, and in actual conversations. To some, these words sound cool, and they have made them part of their lives. Yet when you learn their meaning, cuss words will make you cringe.”

The Sugar Coating, HT to Challies. “I have some authority to say that self-pity doesn’t get you anywhere. Trust me, I’ve tried it. Even on those occasions when people who really ought to know better don’t recognise the sheer weight of the scars you bear, and you feel like you must delve into the pools of pity to shake them out of their repose—it still isn’t worth it.”

4 Guidelines for Dating Without Regrets. “Somewhere between my generation and the current one, dating became difficult—far more difficult than it had once been. I am sure the so-called “purity movement” bears at least some of the responsibility as does the modern-day hookup culture. So, too, do the ubiquity of pornography and the rise of social media and dating apps. What was once relatively straightforward seems to have become strangely complicated.”

Adventures in Aging. Melanie writes about a change of heart from being depressed about age to embracing new possibilities.

Dementia’s Drowning Caregiver. Lots of good tips.

How to Think Wisely About Becoming a Social Media Celebrity, HT to Challies. In these days when we’re told we have to have a big enough “platform” before an agent or publisher will even consider looking at our manuscripts, we need to keep grounded in God’s truth of who we are in Him.

Laudable Linkage

Posted on August 1, 2020 by Barbara Harper

Here are some of the latest good reads I’ve come across. This also might be a good time to remind that linking doesn’t imply 100% agreement. In some cases, I have never before read the writer, but I followed a link someone else provided. In some cases, I might agree with the majority of the article, but the small thing I have a difference with isn’t worth mentioning.

Counseling Children Who Have Professed Faith in Christ. “Like many children who’ve grown up in a Christian home, Clara professed faith in Christ at an early age. But, like so many other young people who professed faith early, she struggles with doubts.”

No One Shared the Gospel with Me, HT to Challies. “Rather than hate that lost person because he or she is doing what any biblically informed Christian should expect a totally depraved sinner to do, namely sin, we should pray for them. Show them the compassion and love of Christ. Tell them that life is not meaningless. Tell them that with Christ, there is light at the end of the tunnel, eternal light. We cannot simply assume that a lost person is a lost cause.”

Love is Inconvenient, HT to Challies. “Love is inconvenient. It actually has the audacity to ask us to drop what we’re doing in order to attend to the needs of another.”

How to Respond to Social Media Enemies.

The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters. “Shrier writes as one who is sympathetic to people who have diagnosable gender dysphoria and for such people she affirms their decision to transition. But she is dismayed that ideologues have made transgenderism a valid and desirable option to those who are not truly diagnosable. She laments the way it has spread among young women as a kind of social contagion. She fears that many of them will go on to have regrets but be left with permanently damaged bodies.”

Not White Fragility—Mutual Responsibility, HT to Challies. This makes better sense to me than anything else I’ve read on race relations. “The concept of white fragility is an academic way to tell white people to be quiet and listen. Bottling up the expressions of white people, though, is not the path to addressing our society’s racial alienation. Indeed, it’s a path that will continue to frustrate attempts at correcting racism’s genuine effects.”

It’s Alright To Just Be Pals, HT to Challies. “They wanted to formalise something that, as far as I was concerned, didn’t need formalising. They wanted to stick a label on something . . . that we were essentially already doing as mates.” Yes! I agree that we don’t have to formalize and label relationships in order for them to be beneficial.

Maher panel blasts ‘cancel culture’: It’s a form of ‘social murder.’ HT to my husband. I don’t follow Fox News (or CNN) and would rarely agree with Maher, but I agree with these concerns. ” If conversation with people that we disagree with becomes impossible, what is the way that we solve conflict?”

Delight in Loveliness for the Glory of God. Productivity is important, but it’s not everything.

And to end with a smile:

Happy Saturday

Laudable Linkage

Posted on July 4, 2020 by Barbara Harper

Here are some of the thought-provoking reads I’ve found over the last couple of weeks:.

Choosing Our Battles Biblically. “This is a time for careful, clear thinking, and not for fed up emotional responses.”

Why You Should Never Take the Mass, HT to Challies.

How to Root Out Apathy with the Power of Habit, HT to Challies. “Practicing spiritual disciplines may feel like work at first. Establishing new habits always presses against our apathy in uncomfortable ways. But one day your heart will catch up to the regimen. One day you’ll look back and see growth.”

When Cancel Culture Comes to Newsrooms, HT to Challies. “We’re cowering under the sick mutation of Andy Warhol’s famed prediction—soon everyone will be canceled for 15 minutes. It’s one thing for cowardly corporations to choose the path of least resistance. But it’s a fresh horror when members of the only profession the Bill of Rights mentions shuck off their solemn responsibility to champion free speech and instead serve silence.”

Why Some Christian Leaders Don’t Post About Current Events on Social Media, HT to Challies. “Our culture appreciates ‘Hot Takes,’ but the Bible values takes that are truthful, thoughtful, helpful, and edifying, all of which cannot happen when you’re not slow to speak (James 1:19).”

Pastors on Social Media, HT to Challies. Though this is written to pastors, the advice is good for us all. Especially the guidelines suggested.

How to View Claims About Dreams and Visions, HT to Challies. “Some seek dreams, visions, and other mystical experiences constantly yet don’t even know their Bible. Others dismiss every supernatural claim and prefer rationalism at all costs; unwilling to even accept any possibility that supernatural experiences could either be demonic or that God could providentially use a very normal dream to move someone into realistic action once they wake up.”

Cheap Knockoffs, HT to Challies. When Christian ideals mix with a pagan worldview, they turn into counterfeits of truth.

Five Lessons I Learned From a COVID-19 Spike at Our Church, HT to Challies. “I’m convinced that one of the reasons the virus hasn’t spread faster and farther is that we have been following procedures designed to isolate sick people and keep everyone else socially distanced. At the same time, we had gotten comfortable, and on a few occasions we were a little lax in those policies. We can trace almost all of the infections back to one of those times.”

4 Reasons to Wear a Mask, Even If You Hate It, HT to Challies. I agree, the science is contradictory. I’ve seen people on both sides of the issue posting opposing data. But these are good reasons to wear one.

Learning From History and Sharing Hospitality. Loved this.

Happy Independence Day!

Laudable Linkage

Posted on June 13, 2020 by Barbara Harper

Here are some thought-provoking reads discovered recently:

How Should Christians Respond to Racism? HT to Challies. “We have so confused Christianity with politics that people often assume Christian equals the stuff political conservatives identify with and non-Christian equals the stuff progressives talk about. And since racial justice often tends to be at the forefront of the discussion in politically progressive circles, we shy away from them because we think that to discuss the evil of racism is to identify with the liberal left. But here’s the thing. When we call out the evil of racism, we’re identifying with the word of Almighty God.” (Update: I removed the link to this one because evidently it was taken down from the Core Christianity site. The quote is included in the show notes of this podcast of the same title. Perhaps what I originally saw was the transcript that was later taken down. That’s too bad—it was a good article. Probably a lot of people who would have read the article would not take the time to listen to a podcast.)

Three Thoughts on Current Events.

Three Tips on Teaching Your Children about Racism, HT to The Story Warren. “Parenting is hard, but learning how to parent as a white mom to black, white, and biracial children and discuss racial issues with them has been quite the journey. They are not naïve to the realities of living in a broken society.”

Canceled: How the Eastern Honor-Shame Mentality Traveled West, HT to Challies. “Today’s cancel culture is the 21st-century Western version of the Eastern honor-shame paradigm.”

How to Walk with Jesus When Your Kids Are Little. This is one of the hardest times to have any time with God. But it doesn’t have to be quiet, solitary, or lengthy.

How to Care for Your Pastor, Part 6: Rewarding. I’ve known people who didn’t believe pastors should be paid by the church, or at least supported full time by the church. But that’s not Biblical, as Dan Olinger shows in this sixth post in a series on caring for one’s pastor.

What It’s Like to Get Doxed for Taking a Bike Ride. This is scary. A man was misidentified as someone who was racist and assaulted someone. The Twitter mob turned on him, threatening him, with someone even publishing his address. “We must align in the fight for justice and equality — but not at the cost of due process and the right to privacy and safety.”

This is an engaging video explaining the concept of peace, or shalom in Hebrew. As often as I have heard this word, I don’t think I have heard it explained this way. HT to The Story Warren.

Laudable Linkage

Posted on March 30, 2019 by Barbara Harper

Here are a few interesting reads found on the web lately:

Next in the Sexual Revolution: Children. HT to Proclaim and Defend. “They claim children are sexual beings too and who are we to deny a consenting child that right?” Scary and appalling.

Matthew 18 is Not Instructive for Book Reviews, But Much of the New Testament Is, HT to Challies. “‘Did you contact the author privately before you posted the review?’ . . . The question invokes the well-known, but oft-misunderstood, church discipline passage in Matthew 18:15-20.”

The Miracle That Can Happen When You’re Tired. “They were tired. They were overworked. They were hungry. Which just so happens to be the perfect time for God to display His power.”

Who Says Social Media Can’t Make You Wise? HT to True Woman. “Ten years of social media has shown me the wisdom of being slow to speak, how comparison kills joy, how in-person friendship knows no substitute. But it has also taught me the sweetness of the well-timed word of encouragement, of shared celebrations and shared losses. Used wisely, a virtual platform can actually minister. For those indwelt by the Spirit, wisdom can be unearthed from even such common soil as social media.”

14 Stunning Illustrations That Perfectly Capture the Introverts Love of Books, HT to Linda

The $8,000 Mistake All Bloggers Should Beware. I forget where I saw this one. “Copyright laws have created and enabled an industry of predatory lawyers – also known as copyright trolls. These attorneys take advantage of photographers and artists who make their images available online, as well as the bloggers who don’t know any better and post the wrong content to their sites.” Apparently they don’t have to warn you first and give you a chance to take it down. We all know (or should) that just because a photo is on the Internet doesn’t mean we can use it. But apparently some of the instances we thought were ok, like a link back to the original site, don’t justify the use of the photo.

You’re Using a Cutting Board Incorrectly, HT to Challies. I never knew! But it makes sense!

And, finally, someone on Facebook posted this video of a baby trying chocolate milk for the first time. Adorable!

Happy Saturday!

Laudable Linkage

Posted on October 20, 2018 by Barbara Harper

Welcome to my latest round-up of noteworthy reads around the web:

Please Do and Don’t Assume Motives. This would solve so much. It doesn’t mean being naive.

Are You Becoming More or Less of an Encourager? HT to Challies. “The church must be an oasis for the true Christian! You must be such a great encouragement that you become a breath of fresh air for those who speak to you. Of course, we should confront sin and push people towards holiness, but when people talk to us they should feel like we care about them and, more importantly, their soul. Sadly, as life goes on and as time goes on, we can tend to become crankier and less thankful for our salvation, but the writer of Hebrews calls us to be different.”

We Don’t Need to Go Back to the Early Church, HT to Challies. I’ve heard off and on throughout my Christian life that we need to “do church” like the early church of the first century. But if you read the NT epistles, those churches were rife with problems that the NT writers had to correct.

How Can You Show Radical Hospitality as an Introvert? by Rosaria Butterfield, HT to Challies. “We need the people who are quietly listening and praying as other people are talking, discerning about things.”

Home Libraries Confer Long-term Benefits. “Home libraries are strongly linked to children’s academic achievement.”

Is Turning Off Your Notifications the Ultimate Productivity Hack? HT to Challies. Excess notifications are one of my biggest pet peeves, and I turned off most of them long ago. Especially anything that makes noise. Interesting note here that it takes “on average, 23 minutes and 15 seconds to get back to the task at hand after a distraction.”

And, finally, someone shared this on Facebook. Pretty cute.

Happy Saturday!

Laudable Linkage

Posted on August 18, 2018 by Barbara Harper

I’ve been mostly absent from the blog this week. It’s rare for me not to do a Friday’s Fave Five, even if I don’t post anything else. But it has been a busy week: card-making and present-shopping and wrapping for a baby shower and my oldest son’s upcoming birthday, house-cleaning for my son’s visit from out of state, buying tons of food for family get-togethers, etc, etc. It’s amazing what you can done when you’re not blogging! 🙂 I am not sure how much I will be online the next week. My oldest son is here, my husband is off, we’ll have more time with the whole family. But, in the past when I have thought I would not be posting much, I have been surprised. Our whole family likes our computer time, so we’ll see.

Meanwhile, I have collected in odd moments online the last week some thought-provoking, helpful reads I wanted to share with you.

Poor Interpretation Lets Us “Believe” the Bible While Denying What It Actually Say, HT to Challies. “Historically, theological liberals denied Scripture, and everyone knew where they stood. But today many so-called evangelicals affirm their belief in Scripture, while attributing meanings to biblical texts that in fact deny what Scripture really says. Hence they ‘believe every word of the Bible’ while actually embracing (and teaching) beliefs that utterly contradict it.”

Grace Comes With Refills.

Love Is Not a Feeling.

Praying the Words of Jesus for Your Teen.

Pants on Fire. The folly of the “I don’t know whether this is true or not; but I just wanted to get it out there” type of post.

Are We All “Harmless Torturers” Now? HT to Challies. “When we think of the savagery of social media, we often think of awful individual behavior…Harmless Torturers never go that far; we just like, retweet and add the occasional clever remark. But there are millions of us, and we’re all turning the dial.”

Why Getting Lost in a Book is So Good for You, HT to Linda.

Finally, you might be blessed by this video even if you don’t know Ron and Shelly Hamilton (of Majesty Music, aka Patch the Pirate and Sissy Seagull) and Shelly’s parents, Frank and Flora Jean Garlock. I had no idea the Garlocks were in this situation or that Ron had been diagnosed with dementia. This is not only an update of how they are doing, but a sweet testimony of a man caring for his wife.

Laudable Linkage

Posted on May 12, 2018 by Barbara Harper

Here’s my latest roundup of noteworthy reads online:

“These Bombs Led Me to Christ,” testimony of the “Napalm girl” from the famous picture. HT to Challies.

God Understands Hard, Thankless Parenting, HT to True Woman. “For those of us who feel undone by the various losses of motherhood, we take comfort in a God who grieves with us and for us. Scripture gives us vivid pictures of how God understands the brokenhearted parent.”

When Mommy Grows Up, HT to Challies.

“Mom, I’m Such a Sinner!” HT to Challies. “God’s grace brings moments into our children’s lives, as He does in ours, when they feel just how bad sin is. It’s never pretty. A wise parent works with the Holy Spirit’s conviction without minimizing the sting of its pain. As we guide our children’s spiritual development, we agree with truth while bringing balance to emotion.”

50 Good Mental Health Habits, HT to Challies.

Jesus and Joysticks: What the Church Should Stop Making Fun of Video Gamers. HT to Challies.

The Oldest, Most Ignored Social Media Command, HT to Challies.

Have a Heart on Social Media. HT to True Woman. “When you log onto social media and see your favorite tribe picking up pitchforks over the latest cause for offense… pause before you join in. Consider that, as rewarding as it feels to be part of a mob, your goal should be to build up — not one up — your brothers and sisters in the Lord.”

The Perennial Gen, a blog for mid-lifers, is focused on caregiving and the “sandwich generation” this month. They’ve had some great posts so far that I can solidly identify with.

I’ve seen a lot of online friends talk about opening their windows this time of year. I’ve thought, either they don’t have allergies or they don’t have much pollen where they live. A friend here opened her windows one night and then had to wipe yellow pollen dust off every surface in her home the next day. Someone posted this on Twitter, and it makes me sneezy just to watch it.

Happy Saturday!

Laudable Linkage

Posted on February 10, 2018 by Barbara Harper

I found a lot of good reads the last week or so:

On Blind Faith and God.

Why You Desperately Need the Holy Spirit , HT to Challies.

The Power of De-Conversion Stories: How Jen Hatmaker is Trying to Change Minds About the Bible, HT to Challies.

Who Is the God of Mormonism?, HT to Challies.“One thing you’ll discover as you’re talking with your Mormon (LDS) friends is that though we use the same terms, we often mean very different things. Mormons have different definitions of Gospel, repentance, salvation, grace, Hell, and nearly every term you’ll be using in your conversation.”

5 Things That People Who Are Dying Want You to Know, by Kerry Egan, HT to Lisa.

How to Choose Worship Songs. Yes, to all the points mentioned here.

My Son, Withhold Judgment, HT to Challies.There are some times we need to act quickly; there are other times to realize we don’t know all the facts and need to wait.

How Do I Fight Pride When Competing in School, Business, and Sports? HT to True Woman. “If we are better in some subject than someone else, God made us better. And his reasons for doing so are not pride and boasting and elitism. His reason for doing so is that we might use our competencies for the good of others.”

If God Doesn’t Heal You, HT to True Woman. “Although God can heal us, we must never presume that he must.”

The Why of Encouragement.

Why Do I Believe in Credobaptism, HT to Challies.

Why Young Christians Need Old Books, HT to True Woman.

In Defense of Evangelicals Who Support Trump, HT to Proclaim and Defend. Interesting, whichever side you’re on. Not written by an evangelical but by a Jew who acknowledges that “It is usually easier for an outsider to defend a person or a group that is attacked than for the person or group.” As he also says, “Character is a complex issue.” I’m not willing to say it’s not a factor at all – far from it, and I don’t think he’s saying that, either – but it’s true that some people with awful personal lives can be good leaders. But if we acknowledge that on one side of the ballot, we need to concede it for the other as well.

Growing Old Graciously, HT to Challies.”I don’t know everything, but what I do know, I can share.”

The Benefits of Listening to the Elderly, HT to Challies. “Why might the Lord, in his grace, cause the aged to repeat themselves as they do? What is the Lord showing us through it? Rather than rolling our eyes or thinking ‘Here goes Grandma again,’ what can be gained from these times?”

When I Give a Book.

On Writing Books and Getting Published, HT to Challies.

The Incredible “Mehness” Of Social Media, HT to Challies. An aspect we don’t often think of. Even if much of what we do there is harmless or even interesting, how does that impact our everyday lives and responsibilities? Do those things impact those with whom we have to do or take our attention away from them?

Ideas For Things to Do On a Snow Day, HT to Story Warren.

And in the “Seriously?” category: There’s a Reason using a Period In a Text Makes You Sound Angry, HT to Lisa. I never knew this was an issue – and it shouldn’t be. A period is just the end of a sentence, not the end of a conversation or an indicator of anger, disinterest, or insincerity.

Hope you have a fine Saturday!

(Links do not imply 100% endorsement.)

Laudable Linkage

Posted on September 23, 2017 by Barbara Harper

It’s been a little longer than usual since I’ve had the opportunity to share some noteworthy reads discovered online the last few weeks, so here goes:

What Does It Mean to Abide in Christ?

3 Tests God Ordains for His Children, HT to Challies.

Self-examination Speaks a Thousand Lies. “God calls us to examine ourselves (2 Corinthians 13:5; Lamentations 3:40), but healthy self-examination is a difficult and dangerous duty….when that introspection makes us self-absorbed instead of Christ-absorbed, we undermine our faith.” “God knows the worst about you and loves you still.”

Don’t Speak Up: On the Spiritual Discipline of Silence, HT to Challies. “As evangelicals, we often feel guilty for not evangelizing more, or not speaking a word of correction to a friend in sin. And sometimes that sense of guilt is correct! But here, Jesus identifies another way we can err: speaking up wrongly, at the wrong times, and to the wrong person.”

Remembering My Friend, Nabeel Qureshi, HT to Challies. I was heartbroken to hear of Nabeel’s passing, though happy that he is no longer in pain and with the Lord. I loved his book Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus and respected his integrity and determination to go where the truth led him, no matter the cost. I have to admit I wondered why God would take someone so young who was doing so much to bring people to Himself. But after a while I thought the better way of thinking would be that we all have a given number of days, not guaranteed to be 80+: are we making the most of them like he did?

Embodying Masculinity in a World That Rejects It. “If I thoroughly study the ‘man’ passages and never work through the ‘all believers’ passages (the rest of the NT), I will completely fail in both.”

Have We Christians Made Marriage Too Complicated? HT to Challies.

God Didn’t Write a Book. “It took the printing press to make the Bible a book, but it didn’t take the printing press to make the Bible the Bible…the Bible is not essentially a book. It is essentially God’s recorded words to humanity, and those words transcend any single medium.”

Modern Media Is a DoS Attack on Your Free Will, HT to Challies. Lots to ponder in this one, but one statement stood out to me: “Democracy assumes a set of capacities: the capacity for deliberation, understanding different ideas, reasoned discourse. This grounds government authority, the will of the people.” And these are largely absent from most social media exchanges.

The Wrong Donations: Some Tough Words on Disaster Relief.

Ten Unfair Expectations of Pastor’s Wives, HT to Challies.

Why I signed the Nashville Statement, HT to Challies. Particularly poignant since Rosaria was once a lesbian feminist.

A Real Life Fall Home Tour. I loved this! Laura Ingalls Gunn (yes, related to that Laura Ingalls!) writes about home decor and posts Pinterest-worthy photos, but this time she showed “real life” scenarios – shoes and “stuff” out, etc. I am tempted to do a similar post, even though I don’t usually write about home decor. I think as homemakers we often strive for that balance between wanting things to look aesthetically pleasing and yet wanting the people who live there to feel comfortable and at home.

Happy Saturday!

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