Various

I’m in a lot of pain today, so this is a strange blog entry. But I made myself a promise, so here goes nothing. (Sorry, S&F, I know you hate lists….)

• Watched Schindler’s List this weekend. Man, that movie is depressing.
• I’m now in love with “Property Virgins” on HGTV. After watching all of these remodeling shows where people flip houses for millions of dollars, it’s nice to see a “property expert” educate real first time buyers on the reality of the market and purchasing a first home.
• The latest issue of Christianity Today has a blurb about the growing interest in Reformed theology (i.e. Calvinism) in the Southern Baptist church. As a Mennonite who is a member of a local SBC church I can attest not only to the growing interest Baptists have in Calvinism, but to the various problems that arise when Calvinism is misunderstood. I’m not at all a Calvinist. I think my Dad is, though. He believes in election of saints (“For those He foreknew he also predestined…”) I tend to place more of an emphasis on the “foreknew” in that verse. God knows all that has transpired and WILL transpire because God exists outside the temporal realm of humanity. Therefore God has knowledge of events we cannot see. In that way the Mystery of God is perfected outside our knowledge. I say all of this because I was present at a church seminar a couple of years ago that dealt with Calvinism. It was clear there, as it was in the CT article, that there is some feuding going on between the Arminian and Reformed camps. It’s also clear to me that many people don’t realise that the Anabaptist way (the mother church of both Mennonism and the Baptists) is a THIRD way, apart from both Arminism and Calvinism. I worry about Anabaptism being overlooked because it’s not as hotbloodedly sexy a doctrinal belief as the other two. However, I (as a very biased and outspoken practitioner of Anabaptism and Mysticism) believe very firmly that Anabaptism hews more closely to First Century faith practice than the others. Which is ironic, as the very same issue of CT deals with Christians looking to First Century models to reform their faith practices.
• My friends had a baby. They named him Adam. Unfortunately, they haven’t made a blog entry that says “Madam, I’m Adam”, thus ruining one of the greatest palindromic opportunities of all time.