…Conservative Christians like to talk as if they are the only real Christians, which of course is simply bull hockey. There are many different Christian denominations, and many different interpretations of the Bible. Some, for example, put no more stock into the anti-homosexual prohibitions of Leviticus than into the anti-shellfish prohibitions of that same Book. Conservative Christians do a lot of biblical cherry-picking that has absolutely no justification in fact or reason, just pure anti-gay animus. The younger generations are abandoning it because they see it as promoting ignorant bigotry. (emphasis mine)

Such assertions encourage the thinking that Christianity is whatever you want it to be. It can be everything we demand of it and probably more. No lines of definition exist that rule out certain doctrinal claims while affirming others according to the teachings of scripture. There is little or no acknowledgment that there is one intended meaning of the scriptures for us to learn through the illuminating power of the Holy Spirit, but rather a positive appeal to a plurality of interpretations, as if it was God’s desire to be unclear and confusing in his self-disclosure as his means to cause us to desire community. As if truth could not do that. I Christianity can be everything, Christianity truly is no more because its grounding has moved from the firm foundation of scripture to the subjectivity of individuals and subcultures. All meaning is lost.

Of course, evangelicals don’t believe they are the only Christians within the boundaries of orthodoxy, but the orthodox boundaries are precisely the point. They don’t seem to matter because they have been relegated to irrelevance by this strengthening postmodern culture that has infected the church. The expectation is that we keep talking around these boundaries as if they should not exist. The postmodern “conversation” seems to never end and fails to make any moral proclamations except that we ought to adopt a universalism rooted in their understanding and application of the unconditional love of Jesus, making doctrinal boundaries obsolete–at least in their mind. I use to believe the postmodern goal in the church was to stretch the doctrinal boundaries out further–a little like the elastic waist pants worn by Uncle Bob to accommodate Thanksgiving dinner–but it seems what they really want is to tear down all doctrinal walls, bullying evangelicals with erroneous arguments and fallacious reasoning. These pomo’s demand truth claims conform to the wants of those who haven’t got the sense to see the difference between biblical neighbor love and the embrace of every theological view, and if we don’t embrace alternative views, we are unloving know-it-alls who couldn’t possibly be guided by the Holy Spirit, but by our own pick-and-choose mentality. For them, it is insufficient for the church to stand on message of scripture that believes God “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim 2:4) and also, per Jesus’ own words, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matt 4:17). It isn’t enough for our pastors and pews to be welcoming of everyone while unaccommodating to the sin of no one.

As an evangelical, I have had numerous conversations with homosexual students who have asked genuine questions about my beliefs. After explaining that the breaking of one of God’s laws entails the breaking of the whole law (James 2:10) and, thus, needing the redemption through the blood of Jesus, they have come to realize that evangelicals aren’t in general elevating one sin over another. And I’m not seen by them as unloving or unkind for believing what scripture says of any kind of sin, including homosexuality. Of course, plenty of people in many corridors of Christianity are often ignorant and unkind, but that’s another distinction–and a SEPARATE CONVERSATION–that deserves to be noted and addressed on all sides.

I don’t really believe “Christianity is No More,” but I do take responsibility for God’s call on the life of all believers to make disciples, and that means having the ability to teach accurately the teachings of scripture. Scripture is adamant that we not conform to the ways of the world (Romans 12:2). I’d love to have a conversation about what that means to the postmodern.

The last few weeks have been quite the challenge. You may be aware that a health crisis overtook our home, but things appear to be stabilizing and I’ve chosen the path of trusting God today and tomorrow, giving all of our worries to him. Needless to say, I’ve had a number of things preventing me from regularly writing, though I’ll be jumping back in soon. In the meantime, I hope you’ll take the opportunity to listen to my new program, Faith in Culture Radio. The show premiered this week and will regularly air on Monday evenings at 7 pm. Eventually we’ll move to a daily broadcast so I hope you’ll begin to listen and even submit topics for future discussions! Click here to check out the first episode.

Don’t forget the the summer women’s theology conference, Belief 2012, is coming up on July 28th. If you aren’t registered go to www.belief2012.com to sign up. It’s going to be a tremendous event, equipping every woman on the meaning and application of the Image of God. Speakers include Kathy Barnette of Judson University, Frederica Mathewes-Green who is a reknown author and speaker, Kelly Monroe Kullberg of the Veritas Forum, Jennifer Lahl of The Center for Bioethics & Culture, and Colleen Gallagher from the Charles Simeon Trust (Colleen is also speaking at a workship at the summer Gospel Coalition women’s conference). We hope to see you there!

Let me just get this out of the way. I’m talking about all the excitement here, celebrating the inclusion of the term vagina in a book to be released this Fall written by Rachel Held Evans (RHE) and published by Thomas Nelson (TN). The book is A Year of Biblical Womanhood (YBW), and if you know anything about RHE, this book will not be defending the complementarian view of church and family (see her post from May 2). Since I’ve received emails asking for my take on this very strange discourse, I thought it would be helpful to provide a brief history of the vagina-gate scandal along with my own reflections.

In early February, RHE began sharing on Twitter that her publisher wanted her to remove several words from the YBW because of the concern that Christian bookstores may not want to stock it. (This concern is obviously related to the question of profitability.)

Clearly, RHE is going with a tone to the book that requires “edgy” language. What follows is the original context of the term vagina in YBW as she shared it on her blog. The first apparently was passed by her editors as it was detailing the horrific, true story of a young Congolese girl:

1. “the men shoved a large stick through Dina’s vagina, creating a debilitating  fistula—a common ailment among rural African women who have been raped or who suffered through traumatic childbirth without medical attention.”

The second instance, however, was a problem for the publisher–understandably so.

2. “I signed my first abstinence pledge when I was just fifteen. I’d been invited by some friends to a fall youth rally at the First Baptist Church, and in the fellowship hall one night, the youth leader passed around neon blue and pink postcards that included a form letter to God promising to remain sexually abstinent until marriage. We had only a few minutes to add our signatures, and all my friends were signing theirs, so I used the back of my metal chair to scribble my name across the dotted line before marching to the front of the room to pin my promise to God and to my vagina onto a giant corkboard for all to see. The youth leader said he planned to hang the corkboard in the hallway outside the sanctuary so that parents could marvel at the seventy-five abstinence pledges he’d collected that night. It was a pretty cheap way to treat both our bodies and God, come to think of it.”

When I first read these statements from the book, I thought RHE’s use of the term vagina actually took away from her retelling of her signing of the abstinence pledge. Her brief argument as shared on the blog seemed to have merit because there is a sense in which some in the abstinence pledge movement may be trivializing the commitment to remain sexually pure. Discussions on abstinence and god-honoring sexuality are an aspect of discipling young people, teaching them how to think Christianly about modesty and relationships and other areas of life. So there’s probably a better way for churches to educate young people on abstinence without encouraging an unthinking herd mentality as she described in the paragraph above (though I’m sure there was much more to it). But RHE’s use of the term vagina in this context is gratuitous and, thus, overshadows what I think is a valid concern. Maybe she develops the argument further in the book, but in this context I’m not persuaded that book stores would be wrong for rejecting it. What’s most interesting to me is that her concern for the trivialization of abstinence teaching becomes a moot point due to her own effort to be edgy.

Prior to her producing the original context for her readers on March 23rd, the issue was creating quite a stir among her Twitter followers and prompting much discussion. On March 14th, RHE makes this comment in a blog post:

But I soon forget the conversation because I’m too busy arguing with my publisher. They won’t let me use the word “vagina” in my book because we have to sell it to Christian bookstores, which apparently have a thing against vaginas. I make a big scene about it and say that if Christian bookstores stuck to their own ridiculous standards, they wouldn’t be able carry the freaking Bible.

At the time, I had wondered what her publisher was thinking about this very public lament, though it had already been a matter of public discourse since early February. Was this good press for Thomas Nelson? Is it a truism for Christian publishers that all press is good press? The statement that Christian bookstores “apparently have a thing against vaginas” was a pathetic exaggeration that helped spur the angst of her readers, including some who thought to take it to an Amazon petition. This was an irresponsible example of community organizing because Christian book stores, very truthfully, aren’t misogynistic. They sell books and love to sell books to women. It isn’t my view that they always sell the right books, but so far my interest in YBW as a valuable resource for Christians is on par with my view on anything written by Kenneth Copeland. Dangerous.*

On March 23rd, RHE updates her readers on the status of the use of the term with Thomas Nelson.

I want to make it clear that it is not my editors at Thomas Nelson who are insisting that I take out the word “vagina.” I can stick to my guns, keep “vagina” in, and I suspect Thomas Nelson will still publish the book. The problem, as I understand it, is that Christian bookstores probably won’t carry it, and Thomas Nelson sells a lot of books to Christian bookstores.

But then she then reveals why it is so important for this book to be sold in Christian book stores, a mission Thomas Nelson is now complicit in:

My goal, from the start of the project, has been to encourage readers to rethink some of our assumptions about “biblical womanhood,” and the group that will perhaps benefit the most from this analysis is evangelical Christians…a group that shops at Christian bookstores. *

Interesting. No need to wait til its release to know that she’s targeting the minds of evangelical women, to “encourage them to rethink” their views on biblical womanhood. So much for “wait to read the book.” I suppose that this is the goal of every book written by an egalitarian on the topic of biblical womanhood, but none I have read presents itself with a bait-and-switch tactic. How many evangelical women will pick up this book, deceived by its title, only to find out later its not what she thought it was? While this may not be the intent of the title, A Year of Biblical Womanhood, it certainly is the motive of RHE to undermine complementarian thinking among evangelical woman.

But back to vagina-gate. In that same post on March 23, RHE points to the double-standard she’s uncovered in Christian publishing, where male authors including Ian Cron and Donald Miller have utilized mentions of male anatomy in similar contexts. Here, she seems to be equating the issue to essentially a war on women.

So why is it that “testicles” and “penis” are okay but “vagina” is off limits? How is it that naming a part of the female anatomy falls into the same category as swearing?  How can Christian bookstores carry the Bible—particularly Song of Songs—if they’ve got something against vaginas? Is it any wonder that people view Christians as sheltered and out-of-touch when a sentence like this is considered vulgar? And why, oh why, does the evangelical establishment seem so threatened by women?  (underlining emphasis mine)

So a big part of me wants to keep “vagina” on principle because I’m tired of getting pushed around by evangelical culture simply because I happen to have one.

No one should be pushed around, but I don’t think she’s experiencing this “push” because of her femaleness, but because of her stated beliefs. If you haven’t read her first book, “Evolving in Monkey Town,” I recommend you start with my review of it first. You may also want to hear her statements on hell and salvation at minute 16:00 in her interview with Dean Nelson at Point Loma Nazarene University. Here she communicates a clear departure from orthodox Christianity:

“I realized in that moment that everything I had been taught growing up, uh, assured me that that woman would spend eternity in hell and I just couldn’t accept that. I just couldn’t anymore and at that moment I just started deconstructing and rethinking everything I had been taught growing up about my faith, about heaven and hell, about Christ, and it was a difficult time of doubt, a dark time of doubt for me. But it started a process of evolution that’s made me the Christian I am today, the follower of Christ I am today which is a little less certain about everything but a lot more faith filled.”

You can see the whole interview here:

On April 11th, RHE updates her readers “Based on reader response, I have asked Thomas Nelson to put the word “vagina” back in, so we can see how Lifeway and other Christian bookstores respond to it” and then on May 1st declares victory: “The word “vagina” is back in the book.”

I’m not sure what she has actually accomplished in all this other than a clear opportunity to be crass, to organize her readers to have further disdain for evangelicalism, to wear a Team Vagina t-shirt, or misrepresent biblical womanhood to unsuspecting readers.  Until the book comes out, she hasn’t accomplished all this yet but RHE’s goals are well underway to to meet her desired end.

If Origen asserts that the Holy Spirit was co-worker with the Evangelists in the composition of the Gospel, and that, therefore, lapse of memory, error or falsehood was impossible to them, and if Irenaeus, the pupil of Polycarp, claims for Christians a clear knowledge that “the Scriptures are perfect, seeing that they are spoken by God’s Word and his Spirit”; no less does Polycarp, the pupil of John, consider the Scriptures the very voice of the Most High, and pronounce him the first-born of Satan, “whosoever perverts these oracles of the Lord.” Nor do the later Fathers know a different doctrine. Augustine, for example, affirms that he defers to the canonical Scriptures alone among books with such reverence and honor that he most “firmly believes that no one of their authors has erred in anything, in writing.” To precisely the same effect did the Reformers believe and teach. Luther adopts these words of Augstine’s as his own, and declares that the whole of the Scriptures are to be ascribed to the Holy Ghost, and therefore cannot err. Calvin demands that whatever is propounded in Scripture, “without exception,” shall be humbly received by us, that the Scriptures as a whole shall be received by us with the same reverence which we give to God, “because they have emanated from him alone, and are mixed with nothing human.” The saintly Rutherford, who speaks of the Scriptures as a more sure word than a direct oracle from heaven, and Baxter, who affirms that “all the holy writers have recorded is true (and no falsehood in the Scriptures but what is from the errors of scribes and translators),” hand down this supreme trust in the Scripture word to our own day–to our own Charles Hodge and Henry B. Smith, the one of whom asserts that the Bible “gives us truth without error,” and the other, that “all the books of the Scripture are equally inspired;…all alike are infallible in what they teach;…their assertions must be free from error.” Such testimonies are simply the formulation by the theologians of each age of the constant faith of Christians throughout the ages.

In Scripture and Truth (Carson/Woodbridge, 1992), Dr. Carson writes:

…questions concerning the unity and diversity of the New Testament affect both biblical theology and systematic theology. For example, if it be argued that a particular writer or book is inconsistent…then it is impossible to develop a biblical theology for that corpus. At most one could practice the discipline of biblical theology and demonstrate thereby that the corpus in question embraces divergent biblical theologies. Similarly, the possibility of developing a systematic theology turns on finding that none of the books of the New Testament are inconsistent…If there is insurmountable inconsistency, then the discipline of systematic theology may remain, but no single systematic theology…would be possible. The individual systematician would become free to pick and choose whatever elements of the biblical data as nothing more than disparate building blocks.

In other words, if the Bible is perceived to be inconsistent in what it says, it is not possible to discover a coherent system of thought. The discipline of systematic theology may be pursued but no single system can possibly be discovered where incoherence dominates. Cognitive dissonance will result from attempts to harmonize the content and the process of systematization will come to a screeching halt. The interpreter is left to pick and choose whatever she wishes to embrace and apply, discarding what remains and relegating it to the trash bin of error and irrelevancy.

This is a sad state, for it will enable no person to discover with confidence the truths assumed to be buried somewhere among the verses, chapters, books and testaments. Objective knowledge of God would be untenable and any interaction with scripture pointless–who decides what is inconsistent? What is true? If what we are left with is a situation where each can pick and choose toward the development of a fictitious system of thought, the truth of Christianity would be replaced with nothing more than a fairy tale….or actually, many fairy tales. If this view of scripture is preferable because of the interpretative pluralism that exists now, you can be guaranteed that a promotion of an errant, inconsistent Bible will yield more pluralism, not less. Ultimately, nothing good is accomplished or resolved by undermining the inerrancy and authority of scripture.

This section of Scripture and Truth offers an important realization for me, helping me to pull together some of my own thoughts on theological progressives who insist that all any Christian does is pick and choose what they want to accept as true from the Bible and that this is really the best any of us can do. Some have suggested that if these theological progressives just read more systematic theology they might repair some of their doctrinal positions or general views of the Bible. But systematic theology is a product of how we read scripture, it’s not where we start. Very simply, we study scripture and discern the meaning of words and how they function within their given context. From there, we harmonize the passages and find ways to express what the Bible teaches in Christology, ecclesiology, soteriology and more. Our theologies are the result of interpretation, not the starting point.

Our understanding and assimilation to God’s word happens as a result of our new life in Christ and we see and understand with spiritual eyes once when we are transformed from natural man to spiritual man (1 Cor 2:14). As believers, scripture serves as the locus for knowing God’s nature and character and gaining an understanding of man’s sin and need for redemption. Scripture is an all or nothing project because authority cannot rest with the reader, only the author. And if the content of scripture does require something from us to validate its authenticity on any level, then none of it can be trusted as God’s word.

My friend Joe Torres posted this helpful definition of heresy on his blog today:

True heresy presents a roadblock to the gospel. If one truly embraces a heretical doctrine of God, Christ, or the gospel they are shut out from fellowship with God. A false God, a false Christ, or a false gospel cannot save, not matter how desperately and sincerely one may embrace it.

Any  conscious, studied rejection of inerrancy presents a roadblock to the gospel because there is no longer any good news to discern if scripture cannot be trusted. An errant view of scripture wipes the slate clean of all Christian doctrine because, obviously, without scripture there is no Christian doctrine. If scripture contains meaningful errors (apart from the articles of a, and & the and similar transcriptional mistakes), we cannot commit ourselves to any theological stance whether we’re discussing baptism, sin, or even Jesus’ command to love our neighbor. Without the ability to view Jesus’ words as objectively authoritative, our opinions–whether they agree or not–are equal in validity. An errant view of scripture means we can’t embrace the red letters over the black ones because Jesus’ words are equally vulnerable to human manipulation as are the words of King David or the apostle Paul. If scripture contains error, we are left in a state of hopelessness. Authority goes out the window immediate after inerrancy.

But we need to be careful. No one should be branded a heretic if what the beliefs they are embracing and maybe even promoting are rooted in ignorance. By ignorance, I mean they have not yet encountered the truth or they have not yet been effectively discipled. There is a significant difference between those who are learning and those who have been taught and rejected truth. But even among those who have been taught and rejected, its possible they may have not been taught well. It may still be heresy they are espousing, but they may not be heretics. In other words, one can get the facts wrong as part of their spiritual journey, but it isn’t until they hear the truth, can re-articulate the truth, and then reject it that anyone ought to be branded a heretic.

Why does any of this matter? The church today is losing what distinguishes it from the culture at large, and this is the doctrine of God. Culture believes we can and do make God in man’s own image…if we choose to believe in a god at all. But there are factions within the church today that insist the only thing we can do is make God in our own image, revisitng Satan’s deceptive engagement with Eve that we can be like God (Gen 3:1-7). This is accomplished through the demolition of scripture and then by co-opting the person and work of Jesus to make him more palatable to the masses. When image bearers make themselves their own ultimate authority, they no longer function as image bearers but as the Original.

After serving time in prison for his role in the country’s worst political scandal (Watergate) and as President Nixon’s Special Counsel, Colson continued his work as a prominent public voice for Christianity with a heart and misson for prison ministry.

My first encounter with Chuck Colson was in his book co-written by Nancy Pearcey, How Now Then Shall We Live? In it, they write

Understanding Christianity as a worldview is important not only for fulfilling the great commission but also for fulfilling the cultural commission–the call to create a culture under the lordship of Christ. God cares not only about redeeming souls but also about restoring his creation. He calls us to be agents not only of his saving grace but also of his common grace. Our job is not only to build up the church but also to build a society to the glory of God. (p. 33)

Due to the tremendous influence of Colson and Pearcey, I launched into the world of worldview education, encouraging women to think Christianly about all areas of living, from home to work to church. I’m thankful for the legacy of Chuck Colson, for his work in prison ministry, bringing the gospel to those who need it brought to them, as well as  the many voices inspired to continue the work and ministry of Christian worldview education.

On my book shelves are collections of great writings from early and contemporary Reformed theologians, books on women’s ministry, great biblical expositions, bioethics texts….and then there are the feminist writers. These are books I studied while in seminary, primarily for the purpose of completing my master’s thesis, though eventually I chose a different topic related to bioethics and presuppositional apologetics. (I feel like I have to explain why I have them!) But last week I decided to see if I could learn something about come present conversations from the writings of some of these clearly liberal feminist thinkers. Enter Carter Heyward.

At the time her book “Saving Jesus from Those Who are Right” (SJTWR) was published, Carter Heyward was a professor of theology at Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 1974, she was one of 11 women whose ordinations eventually paved the way for the recognition of women as priests in the Episcopal Church in 1976 ( “The Women Priests”. Time Magazine. August 26, 1974). She retired in 2006.

Aspects of her writing strike in me an odd familiarity:

“In this study, I am especially attentive to the theological claims of ‘those who are right’ and to presenting an alternative way of thinking about what it means to be a Christian” (p 1).

“…Christians who are right often imagine that Jesus is an authoritarian Lord…In this book, I offer alternative images…I suggest that mutuality, passion, compassion, and forgiveness are more genuinely moral relational possibilities for our life together” (p 1).

“We are drawn selectively to certain images and stories of Jesus (and ourselves) on the basis of our cultures and communities, faith journeys, personal needs, and political commitments. The Jesus images in this book reflect such a selective process” (p 3-4).

But do I assume that “my” Jesus is the only true Jesus? I do not make such a claim…I can only tell you what I believe and am thinking about Jesus these days and invite you to think with me” (p 4)

Throughout her writings, it becomes clear that she has a view of God and scripture that doesn’t exactly cohere with a historical-grammatical reading of the Bible. In her work, God is defined as our power in mutual relation. In SJTWR, Heyward writes

Lifting Jesus up above us, giving him authority over us that he didn’t ask for and cannot bear, we miss the point of his life, of our lives and of the life of God.

Am I denying the divinity of Jesus? No I am denying the singularity of his status as Son of God. I am affirming the presence of divinity in him and moving through him…I have no doubt that you and I are as much God’s daughters and sons as Jesus was and, moreover, that this has been true not only human beings but of other creatures too, from the beginning.

Clearly problematic is her conception of God’s nature and being. Heyward may believe she retains Jesus’ divinity in her theological framework, but by elevating fallen humanity and “other creatures” to equality with Jesus when she writes “you and I are as much…as Jesus was…” we have a significant problem. You can’t escape Heywards problem with authority through the pages of SJTWR and that it serves as the basis for undermining the authority of scripture and the status of the second person of the Trinity.

My interest was especially piqued in terms of the influence of theological feminism in evangelical circles when I stumbled upon this in SJTWR:

We must give authority to our experiences as relational beings who share this planet as home. It is hard for most Christian readers to take human experience seriously as sacred source because our religious tradition has promulgated a strange notion that God and Jesus Christ are “above” or otherwise “outside” of human experience, life, history. We have learned that God and Jesus Christ have spiritual authority “over” us, as if they are Persons to whom we must look not only “outside” our bodyselves but over and against us in order to know what is right or wrong and even to know what or who we are. For us to be in right relation to such a God or His Son is to put our experiences, our lives and history, under His rule and will, subject to His authority.

For this reason, “good Christians” in general and good Christian women in particular have not on the whole experienced our bodyselves as bearing our own spiritual truths. Yet we do bear our own spiritual truths to the extent that our spiritualities are truly of the God whom Jesus loved. (SJTWR, p 34)

So what exactly does this mean? This implications are serious. Spiritual authority of God and Jesus over humanity in general is problemantic the Heywards pardigm given that spiritual authority resides at least in equal proportion to the authority of God or Jesus, and she continues “good Christian women in particular” have been deprived “considerable spiritual authority.”

If you were to continue reading, Heyward disputes the notion that sacred truth is universally applicable, “as if theology can be carried around and imposed on others, irrespective of their embodied cultures, experiences, lives, and histories…” She says this is “intellectual arrogance and theological stupidity.” It does not matter whether you are a Christian, atheist, “prince nor homeless mother,”

None of us…knows what is absolutely true about him or herself, much less about God, Jesus, or the rest of us. There is a way to know and love ourselves, the world, and God: We can truly know only that which we are not afraid to love, and we can truly love only that which we are not afraid to see. Only in relation to one another can we know and love what is true. (emphasis hers) (SJTWR, p 35)

The Body of Christ cannot fulfill its gospel-centered mission to make disciples if God’s authority is challenged by the authority of human experience, if truth isn’t universally applicable, and if we can make no claims to knowledge about God or anything else. Without knowledge, human existence is hampered, and in this case, its hampered by an epistemological generosity that wants to embrace its own selectivity while encouraging the same in others. The desire to ‘save Jesus from those who are right’ is a mission that continues within the boundaries of evangelicalism and at some point someone needs to step up under the authority of scripture and say no more. Saving Jesus from those who are right means, for Heyward and others of a similar mindset, that no one is right…or at least we simply cannot know. This is not a faith that can be lived out in any meaningful sense. It is a faith that’s a fraud.

2. For those of us who couldn’t be there, audios are now available for Together for the Gospel (Twitter hashtag #T4G12, in case you wondered what it was). Based on the tweets this year, I hope to be there at the next one. These are biennial conferences for pastors and church leaders.

3. Kevin DeYoung on The Anatomy of Holiness.

4. Take your organization to the next level. ChurchMarketingSucks.com has a great post on the value of style guides for churches. Consistency is a valuable tool in marketing and promotions.

5. Anonymous Fathers Day has gone international, “…has now sold in nearly a dozen countries. I suppose this isn’t surprising given the international scope of anonymous sperm donation.” If you haven’t heard what my friends are doing at The Center for Bioethics & Culture, you need to see all their documentaries: Lines that Divide: The Great Stem Cell Divide, Eggsploitation, and now Anonymous Father’s Day.

6. My new friend and ministry colleague, Patty Houser, has a thought provoking piece on the importance of celebrating milestones of our sanctification journey. She writes, “I strongly believe that celebrating spiritual milestones is important. It is important because if we don’t celebrate the milestones in our walk with Christ, then we stop seeing what God is doing in our lives. Dare I say we might even start taking Him for granted? Dare I say that we even might begin attributing our successes to ourselves instead of to where it rightfully belongs – God?”

7. Are you one of the 5 Types of Church Critics in this piece? Thanks Margaret Feinberg!

8. Does Philosophy of Science Matter? “In a recent comment made on the blog of a mathematician it was asserted that philosophy of science is to science what ornithology is to birds.  That is, the scientists care about the philosophy as much as birds care about being studied.  In other words, none. It sounds good on the surface…”

9. Biblical Womanhood….RHOC husband Jim Bellino reflects on marriage, family, work and balance.

10. Amy Simpson on women, Disrespecting Ourselves.

What have you read this week of interest? Join the conversation and share your links here!