The Reason for God

I'm currently reading this fascinating book by Tim Keller that I borrowed from my dad. Keller is the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City. He is a renowned pastor in the PCA denomination and in Reformed Theological circles. I heard him speak about ten years ago when he was a guest preacher at our church. I've always remembered the sermon he gave which was on the parable of the two sons ( or the Prodigal son parable). Incidentally, Keller has also written a book entitled "The Prodigal God" which is based on this parable. I intend to read that book sometime soon. I've never forgotten that sermon in which he said that the main point of the parable was not about the prodigal son (as is most commonly thought), but about the older brother and how he represented the Pharisees and their hypocritical attitudes. Anyway, I'm sure I'll have more thoughts about this when I read that book. I also intend to go hear Keller preach again the next time I am in New York.

In "The Reason for God", Keller intelligently responds to many of the doubts that many people have about the Christian faith. One of the arguments he responds to is the idea that "all major religions are equally valid and basically teach the same thing". He says this is ironic because

"...the insistence that doctrines do not matter is really a doctrine itself. It holds a specific view of God, which is touted as superior and more enlightened than the beliefs of most major religions. So the proponents of this view do the very thing they forbid in others."

Ha! I love that.

He also speaks to the argument that religion would become less and less important as the world became more advanced. He argues against this by quoting statistics about how all the major religions are exploding in growth. So, essentially the opposite of this argument is true. What struck me in these statistics was again the numbers of Christians in other parts of the developing world and how they are far outnumbering the Christians in the United States and the western world. For instance, he says that there are more Presbyterians (not Christians in general) in Ghana than in the United States and Scotland combined. Also, there are six times more Anglicans in Nigeria than in the U.S. I have always had the mentality that the majority of Christians in the world were in our country. This is most definitely not the case.

Emily's Tangerine Tree

One of the joys of living in Florida is being able to have citrus trees in your yard. When Emily was a baby, we planted a tangerine tree for her.

Here is a picture of Emily and the tree in 2003.

Here they are again in December 2008.

Cleaning House

One of my recent priorities has been to declutter our house. It is ridiculous how much stuff we have accumulated. The kids have tons of toys and their closets (especially Emily's and mine) are jam packed with clothes (many of which are rarely worn). Over the past several weeks, I have been doing some sorting and sold many things at a garage sale a few days ago. It felt so good to get rid of them.

What is it with the materialism that is so rampant within our culture? Why do we feel like we have to have way more stuff than we actually need?

Ready to get LOST

My favorite show ever has its season premiere tomorrow night and I am beside myself with excitement. It is because of this show that it is now hard for me to watch a mindless sitcom, reality show or soap opera. I just can't do it. Lost is such a well written, brilliant show. One of the things I love about it( besides the great acting and storytelling, beautiful scenery and music) is that it is filled with literary, philosophical and biblical references as well as great themes and symbolism. After each episode, it takes me forever to go to sleep because my mind is spinning with questions. The day after each episode airs I usually read a few blogs of people who are a lot smarter than I am who can pinpoint and explain these references and what they mean. My favorites are Doc Jensen's column at ew.com and Liz Kelly over at the Washington Post. The producers have determined that there will be only be two more seasons of the show and this helps to keep the plot moving quickly toward its finale. I just don't know what I'm going to watch after the show has ended. (sigh)

Happy Birthday Emily

Our sweet girl celebrated her 6th birthday on the 8th of January. I cannot believe that she is already 6 years old. It seems like just yesterday that we brought her home from the hospital. We celebrated the day of her birthday with a family party at home. Over the weekend, she had a party with her friends at the roller skating rink. What fun!!

Here are some birthday pictures from years past.

3rd birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese

4th birthday

5th birthday with her beloved Ariel at EPCOT

Christmas in Illinois

Okay, I know it's been forever since I've posted anything on here. A certain someone in our house received three webkinz for Christmas and two more for her birthday, so my access to the computer has been greatly inhibited. Here are some pictures from Christmas in Illinois with Matt's family.

"What's that white stuff on the ground? I've never seen that before."

This was the expression on Noah's face every time we took a picture of him.

Making a birthday cake for Jesus.

Decorating gingerbread houses. Noah really got into it. He spent a lot of time on his and sampled quite a bit of it as well.

Christmas Eve

Christmas morning

A pogo stick!

A playstation!

A racetrack!

A Barbie!

A train!

With Matt's grandparents