Movies

Best for Last?

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No spoilers. Yet. I avoided them all, including the trailer, so I won’t ruin your fun, either.

I’m on record that however good the experience of watching Force Awakens was, the movie itself was essentially a remake of New Hope. I watched it again yesterday in anticipation of … well, you know. After a year away from it, the first 50 minutes are really, really good. And then the Death Star 3 shows up and it’s Newer Hope and you remember who directed it. With Force Awakens, what we knew about J.J. Abrams turned out to be true — he knows how to start a great story, but has no idea how to end one.

Movies

La Marseillaise

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My friend William is a great guy. We’ve known their family for fifteen years or more, and he’s the pastor of a great church in Virginia. He wrote a pretty good book on leadership based on the minor prophets, he taught me everything I know about Hebrew (which isn’t a lot, but that’s my fault, not his), he married far above his station, and he and his wife have two awesome daughters.

He also has two great failings.

Family

Faint Moons and Summertime Sun

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Great quote from a piece on This Is Us, last season’s water-cooler show that had one of the most well-constructed and executed pilots in recent memory.

For over a decade I’ve run summer conferences for teenagers in which a good portion of the time is dedicated to discussing and exploring their own lives in and through relationships. For years, I expected that teenagers would care most about dating relationships with an additional emphasis on matters relating to sex (they’re teenagers, after all). I figured friendships would come in second and family relationships would be a tertiary factor, eventually. But with nearly 20,000 teenagers passing through our program across two decades, one of the true constants amid all manner of variations in the lives of teenagers is that familial relationships are their primary focus.

Quote

Don’t Be A Leech

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Teaching does not always feel rewarding. It doesn’t need to be. It is a repayment of something that was done for you. It is not a good thing that you do; it is an obligation that you have. If you are not preserving and expanding your trade, then you are a leech, and you do not deserve to prosper in it.

So…

Whom have you taught, lately?

Church / Justice / Mission

Cornerstone

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We have a long-standing ritual in our house: John Grisham releases a new book, and my wife buys it for me for Valentine’s or our anniversary, depending on the time of year when it comes out. We’ve had this ritual for many years now; Mr. Grisham is sharing space on the bookshelf with some mountaineering books, and the pile of additional Grishams in front of the bookshelf indicates that the mountaineering books need to go elsewhere.

Church / Current Events

Unrepentent Lechers

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From John Piper’s response to Lecrae’s recent interview with Truth’s Table. You should listen to the latter and read the former, in that order.

John Piper and a few million other supposed natives didn’t vote for Donald Trump. We don’t think unrepentant lechers should be president. We don’t think Robert E. Lee is a simple embodiment of nobility. We don’t think the confederate flag can fly with impunity. We don’t think kneeling for justice desecrates the other flag. We are baffled that Philando Castile’s shooter walks free. We are dismayed at the nationwide resurgence of manifest racial antagonism. We don’t think “systemic” is an unintelligible word.