A Boomer in the Pew

Boomer in the Pew's Statistics for 2009

Each year, it is kind of fun to glance back at my Google Analytics to see what I can glean from my statistics.

These numbers are minuscule as compared to some of the highly trafficked blogs, but I suppose in the world of blogs I continue to show growth.

It should be noted also, that I really don't do much to grow traffic here, it really has been fairly organic thus far.

Here are a few highlights:

• we had visitors from 170 countries.
• we had 72,621 visits/198.96 visits per day
• we had 109,983 pages read during the year/1.51 pages per visit
• 1,331 individuals visited over 200 times during the year.  Other than people who visited three times or less, the 200+ crowd was my largest group.  That means that I have real daily readers.  I am thankful for that.
• 47% of my readers us the Firefox browser.
• I had 354 visits from iPhones.  This will likely continue to grow as a percentage.
• 47% of my readers were referred from other sites.  StumbleUpon was #1.
• the #1 most widely read post was when we gave away a $250 ESV Study Bible on our 1st birthday.  Over 7,400 people visited that post.  People love to win free stuff.
• I have written over 900 posts since launching in February of 2008.
• We earned a Google Page Rank #4 this year. 

I have greatly enjoyed this journey thus far, and I am looking forward to seeing where 2010 leads.

To those of you who are loyal readers, thank you very much, I hope to continue enjoying your trust, and pray that this year we might see a great crowd reading the Bible together,  in our year-long ESV Study Bible series.

“Tweet” 2009 Word of the Year, “Google” Word of the Decade, as voted by American Dialect Society

In its 20th annual words of the year vote, the American Dialect Society voted “tweet” (noun, a short message sent via the Twitter.com service, and verb, the act of sending such a message) as the word of the year and “google” (a generic form of “Google,” meaning “to search the Internet) as its word of the decade.

Click the link above and you can read about the other words considered, such as:  fail, H1N1, public option, Dracula sneeze, blog, rogue, teabagger, pants bomber, and the most euphemistic:  hike the Appalachian Trail, named such for South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford.

Contemplating the Roman Catholic Rite of Confirmation and my Role as a Protestant Godfather

First of all, let me say that it is not my desire that this post turn into a theological diatribe between Protestants and Papists.

We can talk about such things another day.  Fair enough?

One of my best friends is a Roman Catholic.  He harbors deep distrust for the "organized church", but nonetheless has raised his beautiful children in the Roman Catholic Church.

When their first child was born, a most beautiful girl, we were asked to be her Godparents.

When I was asked what that meant, in the Roman Catholic tradition, I was told something to the effect that this tends to be an individual(s) chosen by the parents to take an interest in the child's upbringing and personal development.

I was certainly happy, and honored to step into that role.

Fast forward 14 years, and we now find our Goddaughter about to receive the Roman Catholic Church's rite of Confirmation.

Here is this from the Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church:

"The sacraments of Christian initiation — Baptism, Confirmation, and the Eucharist — lay the foundations of every Christian life. 'The sharing in the divine nature given to men through the grace of Christ bears a certain likeness to the origin, development, and nourishing of natural life. The faithful are born anew by Baptism, strengthened by the sacrament of Confirmation, and receive in the Eucharist the food of eternal life. By means of these sacraments of Christian initiation, they thus receive in increasing measure the treasures of the divine life and advance toward the perfection of charity.' (Catechism of the Catholic Church #1212)"

So, it seems the Roman Catholic believes that new life (regeneration) begins at Baptism.  Then, once the age of understanding is reached, the Confirmation (receiving the Holy Spirit) occurs to provide the strength to bear your witness, with the Eucharist being the weekly food of eternal life.

In preparation for this upcoming February event, we have been asked by our dear friends to write "an encouraging letter that our Goddaughter can open during her Confirmation Retreat".

I am most certainly going to do this.  What to write her?  This my current quandary.

I am currently leaning towards something to the effect:  be strong, the world will challenge your faith, your friends may desire to pull you down imprudent paths, and know that we are always here to help and guide. Above all, know God, and make your life's most important mission to get your name in the Lamb's Book of Life.

Thoughts?

ESV Study Bible Series: Why our Question of Suffering is Perhaps Even Larger Than Job's

This post is part of a year-long series where we are reading chronologically through the ESV Study Bible.  Click here to learn more.  You are most welcome to join along at any time.

Today's text from the ESV Study Bible: Job 21-23

We are now in what theologians call the third cycle of arguments as Job's friends continue to argue that these problems are brought on by Job's sin, and vehemently urge him to repent.

From our view, we know that Job is a righteous man, and that Job's friends are barking up the wrong tree.

Nonetheless, we are beginning to see cracks in Job's character as he seeks to defend himself, and desperately searches for the answer as to why this has happened to him.

The other great challenge to our view is that we read the introductory chapters.  We know that God proclaimed Job a righteous man, but yet God has had this conversation with Satan, and permits this horrific treatment to Job.  We can probably assume that Satan is also involved in the inspiration of the mockery that we spoke of in my last post.

Therefore, our question why is perhaps even bigger than Job's.  How do you think Job would be responding if he knew that God gave permission to Satan to do this?  What a scene this is!  Do we not cry even more along with Job?  Why God, why?

We must diligently fight the urge to merely read the words of this text.  There is much for us to learn here of God, and within that learning, if we are searching, will come a great deal of wrestling with God of our own.

Infinitely remarkable however, God himself is going to come into the narrative and address us all. 

I can hardly wait.

ESV Study Bible Series: Man Moons Job but he Clings to Hope in God

This post is part of a year-long series where we are reading chronologically through the ESV Study Bible.  Click here to learn more.  You are most welcome to join along at any time.

Today's text from the ESV Study Bible: Job 17-20

One of the things that I learned from my first tour of the Bible is that it is brutally honest. 

If you hang with me all year, you are going to read things that will shock you to the very core.  You will find  yourself saying: "this is in the Bible?"

I think that Leonaert Bramer's composition here forces us to consider how Job's plight continues to get worse with each given day.

Not only has Job lost everything, but his friend's sympathy has now turned to scorn, and he has become a laughingstock in his community.

People are spitting on him, children are pointing, he has become a mockery.

To  understand the vileness of Job's situation, consider this sketch.  Job is laying there in what appears to be a light from heaven, someone has their pants down mocking him, another person is jeeringly pointing at him, and a demon of some sort is lashing him with a whip.

Job's situation has turned from horrific to vulgar.  Do you see it in our text from today?  It is very painful to consider.

God has allowed Satan to absolutely crush Job.  Furthermore, absolutely everyone in Job's life has turned against him.  Further still, he is sitting in ashes with painful, oozing boils from head to toe.

It seems to me that Satan has brought the full force of hell upon this man.  Is there anything more that could possibly be stripped from Job?  There is nothing left.  Job wishes that he had never been born.

It is important, I think, that we understand the complete and utter horror of this scene.

Yet, what blow my socks off is that amidst all this, Job says, "Who will see my hope?"  "God", Job says, "will vindicate me".  "For I know that my Redeemer lives", says Job.

I don't know about you, but his faith brings tears to my eyes.  As difficult as this whole scene is to comprehend, yet there is Job placing his hope in God.

Go back and consider where we have so far tread.  This is all mind bending.  Right? 

Don't allow yourself to skip across the top of this narrative.  It is horribly ugly.  Yet, in the midst of all this evil, even with a few dashes of Job's own sinful presumption upon God, he yet has hope.

There is much for us to wrestle with in these verses.  But today, I think it is important that we learn, in spite of life's circumstances, to place our hope in Yahweh.  God desires that we know that he is completely worthy, and a safe haven to place our trust.

Job's faith amazes me. 

Oh my soul, cry to God for a fuller measure of faith and hope.

ESV Study Bible Series: Job's Unwitting, and Longing cry for Messiah?

This post is part of a year-long series where we are reading chronologically through the ESV Study Bible.  Click here to learn more.  You are most welcome to join along at any time.

Today's text from the ESV Study Bible: Job 14-16

One of the things that readers of the Old Testament will learn is that our idea of who God is will likely be greatly challenged.

For example, post-moderns really have no concept for the holiness of God, and what Solomon's prescribed "fear of God" is.  These are foreign concepts to many in the post-modern church.

As we journey through the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit is going to see to it that you are confronted with these things, face to face.  Once this occurs, you can begin to get a sense of the extreme longing these folks had for Messiah.

Even here, way back perhaps before Abraham fathered the nation of Israel, I can hear Job crying for Messiah.

Job clearly understands that he can't exist before the holiness of God:

“Man who is born of a woman
is few of days and full of trouble.
 2 He comes out like a flower and withers;
he flees like a shadow and continues not.
 3 And do you open your eyes on such a one
and bring me into judgment with you?
 4 Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?
There is not one.
 5 Since his days are determined,
and the number of his months is with you,
and you have appointed his limits that he cannot pass,
 6 look away from him and leave him alone,
that he may enjoy, like a hired hand, his day. (Job 14:1-6)

But look here:

You would call, and I would answer you;
you would long for the work of your hands.
16 For then you would number my steps;
you would not keep watch over my sin;
17 my transgression would be sealed up in a bag,
and you would cover over my iniquity. (Job 14:15-17)

and here:

Even now, behold, my witness is in heaven,
and he who testifies for me is on high.
20 My friends scorn me;
my eye pours out tears to God,
21 that he would argue the case of a man with God,
as a son of man does with his neighbor. (Job 16:19-22)

First we must say that God is infinitely merciful, we shall see that displayed over, and over, in the Old Testament.  But here we learn also, that fallen man is doomed before holy God.  We are fallen, and pure holiness is a destroyer of evil.  Thus Job's lament.

Another thing that we are going to learn, in our journey through the Old Testament, is that the whole thing, every single word ultimately points to Messiah. 

Listen to Job's words:

• you would call me - the effectual call?
• I would answer - salvation?  regeneration?
• then you would number my steps - a father watching over his own?  a shepherd his sheep?
• you would not keep watch over my sin, my transgressions would be sealed up in a bag - is this not Christ's justification?

When I read these words, I hear Job crying for an arbitrator, a Messiah.  Do you hear it?

ESV Study Bible Series: Job has had it With his friends by Calling Them Worthless Physicians

This post is part of a year-long series where we are reading chronologically through the ESV Study Bible.  Click here to learn more.  You are most welcome to join along at any time.

Today's text from the ESV Study Bible: Job 10-13

In today's reading we are going to see Job nearly blow a gasket in his frustration. 

We must also keep in mind that as his friends turn up the heat, in their sanctimonious drilling of him, Job is still covered from head to toe in painful, oozing boils.  

As Job is trying to process all that has happened to him, he cries, "I loathe my life".  Job understands that if his friends are right, and God does have him in his sights, then he is toast.  On the other hand, Job still fiercely contends for his innocence but is weakened by his suffering, and still wonders, in the back of his mind, if God might have still more suffering in mind for him.

In the 11th chapter Zophar goes on the attack, and tells Job to quit insisting on his innocence and repent.  Zophar, tired of listening to Job's proclaimed innocence, calls Job a fool, and proclaims, "But a stupid man will get understanding when a wild donkey's colt is born a man!"

Job retorts, “No doubt you are the people, and wisdom will die with you.  But I have understanding as well as you; I am not inferior to you. Who does not know such things as these?" Still further Job barks at his friends, "As for you, you whitewash with lies; worthless physicians are you all. Oh that you would keep silent, and it would be your wisdom!"

As we watch the unfolding drama between Job, and his friends, we must begin to ask ourselves a very important question:  Do righteous people suffer, and if so, is this suffering at the hand of God?  And further, why would God want his righteous children to suffer?

Job tells us straight out that his suffering is at the hand of God, and furthermore Job boldly proclaims, "Though he slay me, I will hope in him; yet I will argue my ways to his face."

Interesting.  God, you may kill me for this, I deeply believe in you, I place all my hope in you, but I am going to argue my ways to your face.

What a scene!  Can you see them all sitting around the tormented Job?

At this point, Job is sick and tired of his friends badgering, and has his fist in the air towards God.

Have you ever been at this point? 

I know I have, but I wouldn't go so far as to call myself a righteous man as I was enduring my suffering.  We might remember, Job was righteous because God called him that in the very first chapter.

We still have much to learn from this book of Job, but before us to consider is the sovereignty of God, and God's willingness to bringing suffering upon his righteous.

We are clearly in the deep end of the theological pool folks!

ESV Study Bible Series: Job Suffered Because of his Sin? Nope. The Book of Job Doesn't let us off That Easy.

This post is part of a year-long series where we are reading chronologically through the ESV Study Bible.  Click here to learn more.  You are most welcome to join along at any time.

Today's text from the ESV Study Bible: Job 6-9

Before we consider today's reading, I think it is important to remember a few things from the previous day's reading:

• Job, according to God's own lips, is "a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil".
• With God's approval, Satan has just destroyed Job's worldly possessions.  Satan destroyed Job's business, and killed his seven sons and three daughters.  To top this all off, Satan then, with further approval from God, affects Job's health by covering him from head to toe with painful, oozing boils.
• When Job's friends first saw him, they didn't even recognize him.  Job was completely broken financially, physically, and his wife is encouraging him to curse God.

This was such an awful scene that when his friends saw him they couldn't even speak.  Job, and his friends, sat silent for seven days!

Get the scene?  Horrible!

In fact, things were so horrible to Job that in chapter three he laments that he was even born.

After this most harsh blow begins to settle in, then Job must go to work to settle the question of questions:  why has this happened to me?

Then Job's friends begin to put in their two cents.  Eliphaz starts in at Job proclaiming that this must be happening because you have done wrong in the eyes of God:

“Remember: who that was innocent ever perished?
Or where were the upright cut off?
 8 As I have seen, those who plow iniquity
and sow trouble reap the same.

And then Job's friend Bildad chimes in trumpeting that Job must repent:

If you will seek God
and plead with the Almighty for mercy,
 6 if you are pure and upright,
surely then he will rouse himself for you
and restore your rightful habitation.

The thing that you and I know, along with God and Job, is that he was a blameless and upright man.  There may be some truth in what Eliphaz and Bildad are saying, but they don't really settle the issue for us here.

Furthermore, I think God intends that you and I, as 21st century readers, understand that these horrible things are not easily swept under the rug because of Job's sin, and unrepentant heart.  There seems to be something perhaps bigger that God desires to teach us.

Job knows his own heart, Job knows his standing with God, and as he listens to his friends attack his character, Job lashes out at the true source of his woe.  Job knows where this has come from, but not why.  Look at his lament towards God.  I almost felt like ducking as I read this:

“Therefore I will not restrain my mouth;
I will speak in the anguish of my spirit;
I will complain in the bitterness of my soul.
12 Am I the sea, or a sea monster,
that you set a guard over me?
13 When I say, ‘My bed will comfort me,
my couch will ease my complaint,’
14 then you scare me with dreams
and terrify me with visions,
15 so that I would choose strangling
and death rather than my bones.
16 I loathe my life; I would not live forever.
Leave me alone, for my days are a breath.
17 What is man, that you make so much of him,
and that you set your heart on him,
18 visit him every morning
and test him every moment?
19 How long will you not look away from me,
nor leave me alone till I swallow my spit?
20 If I sin, what do I do to you, you watcher of mankind? [Wow!  Job is upset!]
Why have you made me your mark?
Why have I become a burden to you?
21 Why do you not pardon my transgression
and take away my iniquity?
For now I shall lie in the earth;
you will seek me, but I shall not be.” (Job 7:11-21)

So, for us the mystery continues.  Why on earth would God allow Satan to bring this misery on Job?  In our quest, we continue reading tomorrow.

What are your thoughts of this Book of Job so far?

Dr. Wayne Grudem Series: The Critical Importance of a Proper Christian Worldview

This post is part of a series of posts taken from Dr. Wayne Grudem's Sunday school class at Scottsdale Bible Church.  In this class, Dr. Grudem is taking us through his forthcoming book: Politics: According to the Bible. I have created a category link here, which will allow you to scroll through all of the upcoming posts.

Note:  audio of our class is found at the bottom of this post.

Today's Sunday school class with Wayne Grudem brings us to the fourth chapter of his upcoming treatise:  Basic Components of a Biblical Worldview.

Dr. Grudem started out the class by proclaiming that "this chapter may be the most decisive set of ideas that he will talk about during the whole series."

He goes on to argue that our worldview shapes everything, and when we enter the world of political discussion we bring this worldview with us to the conversation.

Dr. Grudem gave us six (6) components of a Biblical worldview, and then described the implications of possessing these views.

Six Components of a Biblical Worldview:

1. God created everything.
2. God reveals himself and his moral standards clearly in the Bible.
3. The original creation was "very good".
4. Because Adam and Eve sinned, there is moral evil (sin) in the heart of every human being.
5. Because Adam and Eve sinned, God placed a curse on the entire natural world.
6. God wants human beings to develop the earth's resources and to use the wisely and joyfully.

Here are just a few of the topics covered as we discussed these six components:

• God as creator, the most fundamental of facts, is excluded from our public schools.
• God's moral standards are not just for the church, they are for every person.
• God says that murder is wrong, if this applies to the unborn, or the seriously ill, then this should affect our view.
• God's law view homosexual conduct as wrong.  If so, then this should affect our view on homosexual "marriage".
• There is irrational, violent evil in the world that must be confronted with superior force.
• Human nature is not basically good.
• There are moral standards that exist external to the human race.

There was so much more.  I highly recommend you take 52 minutes and listen this recording of our class:

Download ChristianWorldviewNotes

ESV Study Bible Series: Satan Allowed by God to Torment Job, What's With That?

This post is part of a year-long series where we are reading chronologically through the ESV Study Bible.  Click here to learn more.  You are most welcome to join along at any time.

Today's text from the ESV Study Bible: Job 1-5

As we have just completed the first eleven chapters of Genesis, we find, in our chronological reading of the ESV Study Bible, that we are suddenly in the Book of Job!

This is because, as our theologian guides Kenneth Laing Harris, and August Konkel share with us in their introduction to Job, it is held that Job is one of the oldest books of the Bible, and was written somewhere around the time of Abram.

The book of Job, for the first time reader, is likely to shock you to your core.  Here we find a very wealthy, and godly man stripped of his family, his business, laying naked on the ground covered from head to toe with painful oozing boils.

As it turns out, this was all brought about by Satan proclaiming to God that the only reason Job loves you is because you have blessed him so well.  "Let me", requests Satan, "strip him of all his blessings, and he will curse you."

Most surprisingly, Job begins this difficult journey proclaiming, “Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” But as we shall soon see, by chapter three Job is saying, “Let the day perish on which I was born..."

The book of Job teaches us about suffering, and the sovereignty of God.  The lessons contained in these chapters are difficult, and likely foreign to the modern reader.  I can certainly attest that I struggled as I began to grapple with these issues.  In fact, here and here are a few posts from days gone by as I was studying this chapter.  I can also highly recommend Dr. John Piper's series on When the Righteous Suffer.

So, as we begin this book, what do you make of Satan asking God to let him torment poor Job?