Chapters 2-3 of Instone-Brewer’s Divorce & Remarriage in the Church reviews OT reflections on divorce and remarriage. In the first few pages of chapter 2, the author skips much review of Eden and goes right for the problem in marriages after the Fall. Adam and Eve discover, “the difference between good an devil, and at [...]
Entries from April 2008
April 29, 2008
Bringing light to the porn and prostitution industries
This weekend I started reading Victor Malarek’s book, The Natashas: Inside the New Global Sex Trade. It is about the 4th wave or explosion of trafficked women from Eastern Europe who are enslaved as sex slaves around the world. Not fun reading but necessary for those interested in understanding the extent and effect of sex [...]
April 28, 2008
Practicum Monday: Potentially Harmful Therapies
I was perusing the Journal of Psychology and Christianity (27:1, 2008; pp. 61-65) this morning and saw Siang-Yang Tan’s mini article entitled, “Potentially Harmful Therapies: Psychological Treatments That Can Cause Harm.” He was working of a similarly titled article by the so-called Ralph Nader of Psychology, Scott Lilienfeld of Emory U. (in Perspectives on Psychological [...]
April 25, 2008
Considering sexual identity
Tonight I’m talking to a large group of teens at Monmouth Chinese Christian Church in NJ on the topic of sexual identity. Unlike a good sermon, I have four points: Is sexual identity important? Does God have anything to say about it? How does it get formed and deformed? What can we do to protect [...]
April 24, 2008
Finding the cause of America’s gas problem
Okay, I know yesterday’s post was frivolous but I want to share some funny lines from a brochure found at a gastrointestinal practice, America’s hidden gas problem.
The brochure is entitled: Gas.
Its point is to teach us the many causes. So, lets see what it has to say.
Gas may be caused by excessive swallowing of air…Air [...]
April 23, 2008
Not your grandparents’ country store catalog
Yesterday we received a catalog for a country store. I’m familiar with this country store catalog as it is well-known in New England. So, I flipped through it for old-times sake. Looks like they are selling the same things as when I was a kid. Muumuus of all kinds. Several pages, in fact. Then there [...]
April 23, 2008
Divorce & Remarriage I: Confusion!
What is the right biblical and pastoral answer for those with real questions concerning divorce and remarriage? David Instone-Brewer in Divorce and Remarriage in the Church (IVP, 2003/6) suggests that much of our current advice and interpretation of Scripture on these matters are not clear nor sensible (hence the need for his book [...]
April 22, 2008
Mind the gap
When exiting the train in England, you might hear the conductor telling you to “mind the gap” between the train and the platform. Consider another gap…
One of our pastors preached on Sunday from Hebrews 6:13-20. In this passage the writer of Hebrews reminds us of God’s promises and that they are sure because God does [...]
April 21, 2008
Practicum Monday: Is conflict necessary in therapy?
In the latest edition of the Journal of Counseling Psychology (55:2, 172-184), Nelson, Barnes, Evans, and Triggiano have published an article on the inevitable conflict between supervisor and supervisee–what leads to it, how supervisors react to it as well as supervisor strategies for managing it.
But, these lines about therapy caught my eye:
It is likely that [...]
April 17, 2008
Next Book Review: Instone-Brewer’s Divorce & Remarriage
It is my plan to review each chapter or two of David Instone-Brewer’s 2003/06 IVP book, Divorce and Remarriage in the Church: Biblical Solutions for Pastoral Realities each Wednesday. I saw an excerpt in a recent Christianity Today magazine which made me interested in digging into his arguments a bit deeper. In order to whet [...]
