One Little Word Newsletter - April 4, 2022
Paul Miller event, Christians engaging the world, and other news
Hello friends (in Jim Nance voice),
It's been a busy week. We had an offer accepted on a house in Fort Worth. We are about to close on our house in Nashville, we've had folks in our house sick, and we bought a minivan (to replace the one that was hit three weeks ago). Oh and I'm heading down the home stretch with my book on unity from Zondervan. It looks like we have a title, but I can't tell you what it is.
We've also been making a lot of progress at the Land Center for Cultural Engagement. We are close to having the website and socials launched. And also looking forward to hosting a few events in the upcoming months, including this one next week with Paul Miller on Christians and the War in Ukraine. If you are in the DFW area, please join us. There is free Chick-Fil-A, but you have to register.
As for The Way Home Podcast, we’ve begun scheduling guests and plan to relaunch this month.
I had a chance to speak with some folks this week:
I had a conversation with my good friend Jason Romano on callin.com where we talked Final Four, NFL off season, and Christians in Professional sports: https://callin.com/link/ZuEWLrJgmA
I also got to discuss with Jennifer Rash and Margaret Colson from TAB Media Group ways in which Christians can think through, talk about, and be involved with engaging the world:
Here are a few interesting things I read this week:
This article by Chris Gehrz does well in explaining the strong connection evangelicals have with Ukraine and why their support is so strong. I also found this report by Jayson Caspar at CT on the way Ukrainian Christian women are holding things together for their families.
Josh Howerton’s tweet sparked a thought I had about Peter:
Katelyn Walls Shelton shares an insightful piece about discernment in our news consumption, especially for Christians, and includes tips and resources for doing so. This passage stuck out in particular:
“As Christians, we’re called to be wise as serpents and innocent as doves. While it’s tempting to think that misinformation and disinformation are unavoidable, Christians are a people of truth. We believe that truth is knowable and that Christ, Truth incarnate, gave us His Spirit to help us be wise and discerning.”
I loved this clip of Nathan Lorick, executive director of the Southern Baptists of Texas, from a chapel message at Southwestern Seminary about walking in humility and allowing God to shape them into better leaders:
If some of you didn’t feel old yet, 30 years ago, Scandal of the Evangelical Mind by Mark A. Noll was released, and The Gospel Coalition wrote a powerful tribute to the book including reflections from various scholars: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/reviews/scandal-evangelical-mind-symposium/ I especially like this quote from Tommy Kidd:
“Frankly, there’s not much hope for reforming evangelicalism by those scholars who don’t like typical evangelicals very much. Lobbing bombs over a virtual fence into enemy camps doesn’t effect change, it just elicits more bomb-throwing (this seems to represent the majority of traffic on Twitter, especially about evangelicals). Normal evangelicals are not interested in listening to wounded haters, nor should they be. They might accept insights from wounded lovers.”
Peggy Noonan had an interesting reflection about a time when Richard Nixon could have challenged the results of a presidential election--in 1960--and chose not to and how important that was to put the needs of the country above his own.
Lastly, not sure if you caught this excerpt from The Characters of Easter I posted here on Friday. It's about Johns' transformation from a Son of Thunder to an Apostle of love.
And here's what I'm reading this week. Still making my way through Allan Guelzo's Fateful Lightening. I also am almost finished with In the Name of God by O.S. Hawkins. It's an interesting look at the rivalry and ministries of two prominent Baptist pastors in Texas in the 20th century, George Truett and J. Frank Norris.
I pray you are enjoying a wonderful Easter season.