Which MUPPET are you?

I'm Scooter...pretty funny if you ask me! :)

Brainy and knowledgable, you are the perfect sidekick.You're always willing to lend a helping hand.In any big event or party, you're the one who keeps things going."15 seconds to showtime!"

The Muppet Personality Test

A bunch of news (and some olds)

Electrical Inspection-
We got approval on our rough electrical inspection on the very first try a few weeks ago. This is a very big deal that I sense many of you had been praying for. I had intended to post a picture of the signed permit, but I'm a slacker and never did download the pics. Our good friend Buddy Hines did a great job getting us ready for that, so big thanks to him.

Plumbing Progress-
The plumbing effort continues.

Dad and Mr. Jerry have been here again since last Friday and left for home today. We worked through last weekend and got the remaining attic items pretty much wrapped up. The gas lines were tested earlier this week and withstood the pressure so that is very good news. The remaining rough plumbing will hopefully get wrapped up early next week so we can get to sheetrock. We still will need a permit and official inspection approval on this work as well, so please be praying that both would be provided. Also, please pray that the remaining work would proceed swiftly so that Dad and Jerry can get back to their normal lives. Also, big, big thanks to their families for allowing them to be away to help get us over this hurdle.

Mortgage payoff-
I wrote here last week that we had received the checks from the insurance company that would payoff our debt on our previous mortgage. We FedExed the checks and appropriate documentation on Friday. We got confirmation on Monday that Chase had received the package and got word yesterday that everything had been processed and that we no longer have debt on the old place. So, the deal is done. We own that piece of dirt, steps and debris outright now. WOO HOO! (that is real excitement, not sarcasm in case anyone is wondering)

Leave of Absence-
Next to the mortgage payoff, this is really some of the biggest news for us of late. We have been praying and thinking for a while now about me taking some time off from my consulting work with The Structure Group. The people at TSG are fantastic and everyone there has been beyond flexible, very understanding and remarkably generous with Holly and I as we seek to put our life back together. But with the renovation ongoing and all the challenges of life after Katrina, I have been sensing a need/calling to take some time off. This hopefully will allow us to make some significant progress on the house (i.e. get it liveable and us moved in) and to do some real soul-searching and reflection on what our vocational calling is and where that might take us (or leave us). My leave starts today (I am currently at the airport waiting for my last flight home for a while) and will continue for a few months (at least).

So please pray that we would be refreshed by this time off from weekly travel, that Holly and I would grow more and more unified to one another in Christ, that the renovations would be completed very quickly and that God would grant us clarity and wisdom as to what sort of work we will return to once this time is over. Despite how generously God has provided for us thus far, we still have some trepidations about the financial implications of me not working (well not having an income) for a while. So please pray that God would continue to provide and that He would extinguish our doubt and give us peace and confidence in His provision.

Thanks.

B

Schaeffer on the church and Armstrong on the PCA

A friend sent me this article tonight by John Armstrong in which he conveys his concern for the Presbyterian Church in America. It articulates well some concerns/sentiments that have been bouncing around in my own mind in recent months (maybe even years). Here is an excerpt from that article (emphasis mine):

I also have a growing concern for the PCA. This is a conflicted denomination. This conflict does not come from the Left at all, like it does in so many of the older fellowships in America. This denomination is not fighting about homosexual ordination or the adoption of anti-Semitic overtures with regard to the state of Israel. This conflict, and the spirit that energizes it, comes from the far Right. You see, the PCA has a very vocal minority of folks who just can’t stop arguing. They seem to thrive on polemics. Every controversy known to conservative Christianity seems to eventually find its way into the PCA. I have been reminded of this again over the last few weeks. One theological overture after another keeps surfacing and making its way into the bloodstream of the PCA, poisoning the missional good of this fellowship over and over again. I do not know how long this group can sustain this kind of hostility.

How long can we sustain this kind of hostility?

I'm not sure, but on a related note, I finished up Francis Schaeffer's True Spirituality last week. I was struck by the clarity of his thoughts on prayer and characteristics which the church ought to exhibit and how we as Christians are to work to make it so. On page 146, Schaeffer speaks of how we as the church (Christians) are to live in relationship with each other and the subsequent changes that are (or should be?) wrought in us as we are continually conformed more and more to the image of Christ.

Frankly, in many ways the church, or at least cultural-Christianity/American-evangelicalism (and I am afraid maybe even much of the PCA), has lost sight of the communal aspect of our calling. We have made church into a building or a denomination or a system of narrowly defined doctrines or a place you go on Sundays (and sometimes Wednesdays) and have forgotten that we are commanded to "Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another. "

In response to this lack of community and un-love we are tempted to respond just as unbiblically, often by using the world's methods or worse by completely disengaging, throwing up our hands and walking away. And sadly, by so doing, we engage in the very action we deplore; we don't want to love people who are hard to love. We want everybody to conform to our own wishes and do things our way. Schaeffer proposes that we pray and goes on to write:

The Armstrong article and the Schaeffer ideas intersect where the church has forgotten: that it is for Christ.

We have instead become hypnotized by what we are against. We pledge fierce loyalty to personalities and parties and organizations and doctrines and forget the centrality of Christ crucified. There must be a way to preserve Biblical fidelity without succumbing to this exponential fragmentation. The party spirit is alive and well.

What's your slogan?

Here's a little mindless entertainment for you...check out this link. Put in your name and it will give you some suggested advertising slogans using your name. Thanks for Virginia for the link.

Here are a couple of mine:

The Holly Effect.
A Day Without Holly is Like a Day Without Sunshine.

What about some for Batch?? I was pretty sure my husband would not appreciate my posting the ones it generated for him...not to mention they didn't make any sense. Oh well, Happy Saturday!