Musings (1/23/2023)
This one is well worth your time: Shane Rosenthal on "The Megachurch Century"
The law of unintended consequences strikes again. People who have left their churches when young adults are having trouble coping later in life. Deaths of Despair -- The Consequences of Secularism
Parker and Lucas’s book is important and I highly recommend it (Covenantal and Dispensational Theologies). This review by Dr. Harrison Perkins is also important. Harrison Perkin's "Review" (in 3 parts) of Brent Parker and Richard Lucas' Covenantal and Dispensational Theologies: Four Views on the Continuity of Scripture
Parkinson on The Rationale for Reciting Creeds in Public Worship
Because they would if they could: Army Corps of Engineers releases a 2023 calendar of giant cats attacking infrastructure
California has awful traffic. But I’ve never had to wait for any thing like this. Why did the python cross the road?
More evidence that Columbus was a late comer to North America. "The Blood Run Stone" found in Iowa
I finally watched All Quiet on the Western Front, one of a spate of recent movies on World War One (1917, They Shall Not Grow Old, etc.). The film left me exhausted and asking myself, “why did I watch this?” Going in I knew this was an antiwar film intended to demonstrate the brutality of the Great War. But it was excessively and graphically brutal, far too long, and far too intense to keep me from wanting to turn it off. The Das Boot ending was all too predictable. Yes, this is a well-made film intended to remind us that war is brutal and awful—that it did. But All Quiet also left me worn out—much like the 1993 WW2 film, Stalingrad. I don’t recommend it because going in you already know that war is terrible. So why suffer through this thoroughly depressing film? All Quiet on the Western Front leads in BAFTA nominated.
The old rocker die-off continues. Although I like some of the stuff he did with Byrds and CSNY, I wasn’t much of a fan of David Crosby. But I grew up listening to Jeff Beck from his Yardbirds days. His 1975 album “Blow by Blow” and the 1976 follow-up, “Wired” have played in the background of many of my writing projects. IMHO, “Beck, Bogart, and Appice” (1973) was a very underrated album—I love his cover of Stevie Wonder’s “Superstition.”