Gospel Coalition Conference

I had never heard of the Gospel Coalition until I read a blog on Desiring God which linked to Mark Driscoll's blog titled "Good Times with Good Men". I am excited to see the outcome of this conference in light of Driscoll's blog. The part that interests me the most is the documents that are being drawn up as a confession. This is REALLY exciting as I believe that there are great things on the way. Here is an excerpt from Mark's post:

"The big task was completing a confession of faith and vision for ministry statement compiled by Dr. D.A. Carson and Dr. Tim Keller with input and edits from dozens of pastors at their theological colloquim which has met annually for the past few years refining the documents. When completed, the documents will be posted at www.thegospelcoalition.org and available for use by churches and organizations. The documents are very encouraging. The doctrinal confession follows the narrative of Scripture more than the systematic theological categories and is richly reformed with enough breadth to include people from a variety of denominational traditions. The vision for ministry is a missiological call for biblically faithful and culturally accessible ministry that a lot of younger reformed pastors will resonate with."

I don't know what will become of all this but these are truly exciting times. I will be following this with great interest and will post further updates as they become available.

Children without Fathers: What should we do?

I feel I need to write about a caller on a radio program that I heard this morning. Before I tell you about her, let me first refer you to Dr. Al Mohler's commentary on his website called "The Disappearing Father".

I read Dr. Mohler's article yesterday and was mildly concerned, but thought it was just another article talking about possible dangers and abuses. This was until I listened to the radio this morning. After discussing the argument on "The View" between Rosie O'Donnell and Elizabeth Hasselbeck, a caller phoned in to express her support for Rosie. After a brief discussion, the caller revealed that she was a lesbian which caused the subject of the conversation to quickly change after a baby was heard in the background. The Morning show host remarked to the caller that "you were at least heterosexual once" to which she responded by sharing about how she was impregnated by in vitro through an anonymous sperm donor.

Suddenly, Dr. Mohler's concerns became very real to me,which led me to ponder much about this throughout the day. At first I was outraged, but quickly realized that it would not solve anything by just being outraged. I then tried to see it from their point of view, but I kept being constrained by God's Word that these things ought not to be. I seem to be at a loss for how to be Biblical about these issues without being a smug, self-righteous, stereotypical Christian.

So, here we are! How should we respond, because, as a follower of God's Word we must respond.I think we should respond, first of all, in light of the gospel of God's grace towards us. For, without God's grace changing our hearts and desires, we could be on the other side of this issue and she could be the outraged Christian. With that in mind, I believe that we need to address the issue in love. Laws may need to be passed, clear positions may need to be drawn on the issues, but in the end it is Christ that changes hearts not new laws and not picket signs.

This lady, her partner, and son need to be presented with the good news of God's transforming grace as well as to have Christians demonstrate love even to those who may be enemies of our values and our King.

May we demonstrate in the way we love others-while still being staunchly opposed to their sin- the love of God and freedom that comes through forgiveness of sin, by living in a way that pleases the Father and brings us all-satisfying joy.

My First Blog!

Here I am listening to Counting Crows, eating pizza and typing my first blog in the darkness of my office. "This is fun", is my first impression, now that I have a title for my blog. I chose "Where's my Hasenpfeffer" because I am a big Looney Toons fan and my friends and I have turned Hasenpfeffer into a slang word which can mean anything, like hooah. So I have a personal affinity for, as well as, the novelty and intrinsic coolness of the word itself. It also gives me the flexibility to write about anything that I would like, since everything has to do with God then all things are at their root theological, whether it is talking about your favorite show (right now mine is Heroes) or deep Biblical and Theological ideologies and anything in between.

This Blog is essentially for me to help me think through my own thoughts and to develop habits of writing them down. I hope that my friends will frequent this page and provide me with feedback and comments that will help me stretch in all areas of life.

Well I think I will keep my first post short but I would like feedback on the title of my blog,as well as, suggestions for topics that would be of interest to you.

-Jeremiah