Cornerstone Blog

http://www.armchair-theology.net/living-the-bible/learning-worship-from-the-idolaters-sports-fanatics/

Very interesting blog I was directed to by Tim Challies (http://www.challies.com).  I wonder which will be the more "worshipful" settings:  Sunday morning church services or Sunday afternoon Superbowl parties?

Dear Cornerstone:

Below is the list of songs we will sing this Sunday.  You can click on the song titles to be taken to another webpage to listen to the songs.  I chose these songs partially in light of the sermon passage (Romans 8:29 ff.) and partially for communion.  Perhaps you could listen to these songs and sing them during family worship in preparation for Sunday.  You may also want to spend some time reading Romans 8:29-39 (although Milton could change directions by Sunday J).

I have also included a few songs we are thinking about introducing over the next few months.  Let me know what you think: mikeb@cornerstonebible.org .

  This Sunday’s Worship Music:

“His Name Is Jesus”

“10,000 Reasons (Bless the Lord)”

Bread:  “Stricken, Smitten, and Afflicted”

Cup: “His Forever”

“We Will Remember”

Offertory:  “Grace Unmeasured”

Possible New Ones:

“Glorious Day”

“Come Praise and Glorify”

“My Hope Is in You”

As 2011 draws to a close I wanted to recall World Magazine's 2011 Books of the Year.  Check out World's full article HERE.

Should Christians Embrace Evolution?  Biblical and Scientific Responses, edited by British medical geneticist Noman Nevin.

God and Evolution, edited by Jay Richards.  You can read  chapter 1 HERE.  See a video intro to the book HERE.

Here are a a few quotes from the World Magazine article:

"The problem, though, is that many theistic evolutionists should rightly be called deistic evolutionists, since they believe that God created the first life-form and then left the rest to standard Darwinian processes. Theoretically a theistic evolutionist could also believe in God's creation of each of the trillions and quadrillions of mutations that led to today's world, but that would also be rewriting the Bible-and we're still left with the issue of Adam and Eve's direct creation. In any event, mathematician Bill Dembski sums up well the standard TE position: 'Theistic evolution takes the Darwinian picture of the biological world and baptizes it.'"

"Should Christians Embrace Evolution? and God and Evolution are both worth reading...they are both at the center of the biggest current battle both among Christians and between Christian and anti-Christian thought. As University of Chicago atheist Jerry Coyne declares, 'to make evolution palatable to Americans, you must show that it is not only consistent with religion, but also no threat to it.' Theistic evolutionists are the pointed end of Darwinians' wedge strategy: By making evolution 'theistic' Darwinians hope to divide Christian against Christian."

This article also draws attention to the fact that much of the funding for TE research is coming from the Templeton Foundation, whose Science for Ministry Initiative “invites organizations to develop programs that will help ministers and the congregations they serve to move away from simplistic ‘solutions’ to the tensions between science and faith.” While the billion-dolloar Tempeton Foundation has been a positive force in many areas, "its grants in religion reflect the theology of its founder, John Tempeton, who tried to meld aspects of Christianity with Eastern religions."  This billion-dollar powerhouse is investing in programs whose purpose is to help churches "move away from simplistic 'solutions." To move away from the simplistic solution of reading Genesis 2 as real history, of Adam as real man created by special creation, etc.    

“Certainly I have not the powers of speech with which to set forth my valuation of the choice blessing which the Lord bestowed upon me in making me the son of one who prayed for me, and prayed with me. How can I ever forget her tearful eye when she warned me to escape from the wrath to come?...How can I ever forget when she bowed her knee, and with her arms about my neck, prayed, 'Oh, that my son might live before Thee!'”

Check out this great overview of "Water and the Blood," an album by Sojourn where they sing 12 Isaac Watts hymns rewritten for today (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pv4BBvVZROk).

“You and I have need of the strongest spell that can be found to wake us from the evil enchantment of worldliness . . . .” (C.S. Lewis)

New live album from Worship God 11 is more than worth the $5 downlaod price:  http://sovereigngracemusic.bandcamp.com/album/the-gathering-live-from-worshipgod11

"The philosopher and the scientist will admit that there is much that they do not know; but that is quite another thing from admitting that there is something which they can never know, which indeed they have no technique for discovering.

To admit that there is One who lies beyond us, who exists outside of all our categories, who will not be dismissed with a name, who will not appear before the bar of our reason, nor submit to our curious inquiries: this requires a great deal of humility, more than most of us possess, so we save face by thinking God down to our level, or at least down to where we can manage Him. Yet how He eludes us! For He is everywhere while He is nowhere, for ”where” has to do with matter and space, and God is independent of both. He is unaffected by time or motion, is wholly self-dependent and owes nothing to the worlds His hands have made." (Read the full chapter here:  http://www.heavendwellers.com/hdt_chapter_5_koh.htm)

http://sojournmusic.bandcamp.com/album/reformation-day-sale-isaac-watts-hymns