Sunday, January 31, 2010

January Reading List

1. The Path of Celtic Prayer (hc), by Calvin Miller
2. Adobe Photoshop and Photoshop Elements for Teens (pb), by Marc Campbell
3. Purgatory (ua), by Tim Dodge
4. A Quarter for a Kiss (ua), by Mindy Starns Clark
5. Power Through Prayer (pb), by E. M. Bounds
6. The Language of Bees (ua), by Laurie R. King

Sunday, January 24, 2010

Sola Scriptura?

I appreciate the sentiment of Sola Scriptura, that we will base our theology totally on the Bible, and on nothing else. It sounds good, it's a nice slogan in a debate. I suppose it even makes a bit of sense, but it's not realistic.

None of us are Sola Scriptura believers.

We are all believers in Scriptura-plus. Plus our pastor, or plus our denomination, or plus how we were raised, or plus Beth Moore, or plus Oswald Chambers, or plus TULIP, or plus the Wesleyan Quadrangle, or plus Augustine, or plus The Shack, or plus Left Behind, or plus the Creation Museum. Even if we would check the "Sola Scriptura" box, most of us really aren't, way deep down.

But don't misunderstand. I think this is a good thing. When we enter into relationship with Christ, we don't need to begin with a blank slate. We jump into the middle of a great story, join a "great cloud of witnesses," who have wrestled over the hard issues, maybe 18 or 19 centuries ago. What a font of wisdom we have to tap into. We should not cut ourselves off from this great resource.

Thursday, January 14, 2010

On keeping regular devotion

A Welsh poem:

God shall not
refuse or reject
whoever strives to praise Him
at the beginning and end
of the day.

Friday, January 08, 2010

Book Review

The Path of Celtic prayer, by Calvin Miller

In this thin book, Miller describes 5 specific types of Celtic prayer, and encourages us to make these ancient practices part of our regular prayer routine.

Miller cites numerous examples of these types of prayer, both in our Celtic heritage and other parts of our Christian past. Examples of the five types of prayer -- trinity prayer, scripture prayer, long wandering prayer, nature prayer, lorica prayer, and confessional prayer -- are described and explained, and each chapter gives the reader the chance to compose their own prayers along the lines of those described.

The book is custom-made for someone like me, interested both in the ancient-future movement and Celtic Christianity. This is an excellent volums for anyone else interested in this subject matter.

Sunday, January 03, 2010

2009 Reading Summary

I have been keeping track of my annual reading for about 5 years now (thank you, LibraryThing). In 2009, I read 80 books. This is down from 110 last year, and around 140-150 the years before that. This is because I listen to an absolute ton of podcasts. I have always been a fan of audio, and 48 of the 80 books I read this year were via unabridged audio.

The 58 novels I read break down as follows: (note that the total exceeds 58, as many books fit into more than one category)
Fantasy/SF -- 34
Thriller/Adventure -- 13
YA -- 13
Mystery -- 10
Christian -- 8


The 22 non-fiction works I read break down as follows:
Christian/Theology -- 10
Business/Technology -- 4
Reading and Writing -- 4
TV/Entertainment -- 3
Biography -- 1