The Centrality of the Home in Evangelism and Discipleship

I highly recommend Voddie Baucham's message "The Centrality of the Home in Evangelism and Discipleship". I have listened to it once on my own, and once with Dave.




Voddie Baucham is an African American who was saved out of a very troubled background. It is worth buying the CD just to hear his testimony of a transformed life! One of his major passions is apologetics. He also recognises the absolute necessity of training up generations to follow God. As a Southern Baptist, he challenges the church to consider the fact that current models of discipling young people are not effective and we need to return to biblical priorities.

One of the most striking facts from his talk is that conversions of young people have dropped since youth ministries have been extended. He rightly points out that a young people are meant to be discipled by their parents, and church programs can never take the place of this. He argues that they often aim to substitute for effective parenting. Unless the church returns to a biblical focus, their efforts will continue to produce little fruit. Parents need to be challenged to take up their responsibilities, and the church should not be attempting to fulfill those for them.

Another stiking impression that I gained from this CD is that in God's eyes disobedience to parents is as serious as sins such as homosexuality, and is just as much a sign of a depraved generation. Often Christians express horror at some sins, but ignore those that are rampant in the church. This must be repented of.

You can purchase this CD from vision forum, at this link. Vision Forum provides excellent service to Australia. Even though I always ask for standard shipment, the books and CDs I order usually arrive within a week or two via courier. I have never had any problems at all with receiving what I order, and the staff are always happy to assist and reply to email queries.

Voddie Baucham has recently released a new book, which you can read about in Crystal's post on her week in reading. It is called Family Driven Faith and I am sure if would be an excellent way to extend the understandings gained from the CD "The Centrality of the Home in Evangelism and Discipleship". Crystal is living out the truths in this CD through reading the Bible to her very young children.

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A sneak peak

Today I had a practise with some of the flowers I'll be using for my wedding posy. Here is my gorgeous flower girl holding them . . .

Esther seems to have developed a new habit of putting her fingers in her mouth when a photo is going to be taken! She told me that she will smile sweetly on the wedding day but I don't know if I believe her.

After getting two quotes from florists, both of which seemed very costly ($400 to $480 just for the bridal party), I decided to do the flowers myself with help from friends. One of Dad's friends has done flower arranging courses. A few of my friends are willing to help out as well.

I have chosen chrysanthemums and freesias to buy from a wholesaler. Both flowers are hardy, last well, and do not require wiring. The bridesmaids' freesias will be pink. I also want to include some early daffodils and some jonquils in my posy - the flowers that stand out most from my childhood. The posies will also contain eucalypt, since Dave came to Australia as a result of these trees!

After making a posy today and being content with it, I am confident that I will be able to make my posy on the day before the wedding and place it in water ready for the next day. It is nice to be able to make something myself for the wedding. The flowers may not look as sophisticated, but they will be more special to me. They will not look just like this, as other flowers/foliage will be included and the posy will be larger . . . after all, this post is just a sneak peak!

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Mona Lisa Smile

The parts of this post in italics come from a discussion forum assignment I submitted during the first trimester of my Diploma of Education. We were required to watch and review a film with an educational theme.

I chose the film “Mona Lisa Smile” because I had heard about its theme of women’s choices regarding family and career. I heard that some students in this film told their teacher that they did not want to become career women. Feminism and women’s choices regarding careers, education and family are topics I have been very interested in since I attended the University of Tasmania. In my Bachelor of Arts, feminism was taught in nearly every course. It was presented as providing unmitigated advances for women. Due to this exposure to feminism I have thought and read about it extensively, and concluded that many aspects of this philosophy are not Biblical.

As a cinematic product, it is clear that the film “Mona Lisa Smile” caters for the interests and perspectives of modern viewers. “Mona Lisa Smile” presents premarital sex in a positive or neutral light, through including it in the life Miss Watson who is the hero of the film. This is not presented as having negative consequences or as being wrong. This is in line with the perceptions about sexuality that now dominate in our society.

“Mona Lisa Smile” perpetrates negative and stereotypical perceptions of 1950s life that are commonly held. It also presents the idea, which is prominent today, that aiming to be solely a mother and wife limits of the potential of a woman’s life. “Mona Lisa Smile” clearly presents the idea that it is wrong to encourage women to be solely wives and mothers. At the same time, it challenges the notion that it being a wife and a mother is necessarily limiting in the stereotypical sense. Joan expresses this when she says of her choice not to become a lawyer: “I know exactly what I’m doing and it doesn’t make me any less smart”. Joan’s challenge to Miss Watson to look past the caricatures of housewives as people with “no depth, no intellect, no interests” and her accusation that “you didn’t come to Wellesley to help people find their way, I think you came to Wellesley to help people find your way” express a frustrated attempt to break through stereotypes to the heart of women’s choice. This presentation of the idea that it is wrong for women’s choices to be limited to either full time homemaking or careers is an expression of the modern conflicts and issues women face. Its exploration of this topic is meaningful in the current context.

I found the scene with Joan and Miss Watson intensely moving. One of my main griefs with regard to modern feminism is its limitation of women's choice in the area of homemaking and motherhood. While it is argued by many that women now have more choice, in reality it is harder for women to choose to prioritise home and family. If it is possible for women to "do it all" and do it well, why would any woman have an "excuse" not to "develop her full potential" in the paid workforce and contribute financially to the household?

Many women who would love to care for their own children at home are now pressured to place them in daycare centres with professional strangers. The cruel irony of this is that many of them end up little better off financially after paying childcare fees and the various other work related expenses, including buying more expensive food because they do not have time to cook. Women who prioritise unpaid work at home often feel as though their work is not valued, or is even despised. As Joan said in the Mona Lisa Smile, she would regret the loss of a happy family life more than she would regret the loss of a career. Joan knew she could not have it all, and her choice to prioritise home and family is one that many women today wish they felt able to make.

Feminism's elevation of paid employment over homemaking is also anti-biblical. The Bible exhorts women to be homemakers, or "keepers at home" (see Titus 2). In 1 Timothy 5:9 - 10 God sets out those lifestyle attributes that indicate that a woman has led a godly life. Amongst them are bringing up children, serving others in the church, and helping the needy. Men are exhorted to provide for their families (1 Tim. 5:8). In all of this, our priority is to please God and live a life that glorifies him. Both paid and unpaid work are valuable, as long as they lead to a lifestyle that reflects God's priorities for family and church life.

A woman's work at home is not only essential to family life, it is also essential to the health of the church and the furtherance of the gospel. A vision that is any narrower than this is not biblical. Women are to be hospitable servants of the church, whose homes are havens for the needy. The stereotype of a 1950s house wife who cares only for gaining the latest appliance, as caricatured in Mona Lisa Smile, is one example of homemaking that is unbiblical and lacking in vision. If women have only this narrow and selfish vision, it is no wonder they are dissatisfied. Women can best fulfill their God-given potential when they prioritise the home and the biblically mandated activities that happen there, and when they do not feel pressured into any paid work that interferes with this. To the extent that feminism advocates that women abandon the roles they will find the most fulfillment and effectiveness in, it is anti-woman and destructive to the kingdom of God.

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Lydia's book review

Lydia has recently posted the final part of her book review of Getting Serious about Getting Married. You can read it here. Thank you, Lydia, for working so hard to explain these important ideas! You will find all five of Lydia's points about the single years helpful. Here are the first two:

1) Pray fervently and without ceasing. Pray for all aspects of your marriage. To whom it will be, the timing of the relationship, the details, your parents involvement, his parents' blessing, etc.

2) Prepare yourself. Think about everything required to be a wife and mother. Work at these with all your heart. Discuss with your parents the areas you need to improve and how to get there.

Visit her blog to read her other excellent thoughts, and to find other blog posts on this topic. As I anticipate becoming a wife in just three weeks, I especially encourage you to consider point 2. When you are as close to marriage as I am, the idea of being a wife (and potentially nine months after that, a mother) begins to feel very daunting! It is very important to work hard to be prepared, and I wish that I'd begun earlier in devoting myself to this. Young ladies, it is never too soon to start getting ready to be the wife and mother God wants you to be! I believe that marriage and motherhood is God's plan for nearly all of his daughters. Even if you are one of the rare cases where he has planned an entire life of singleness, the skills you learn in preparing to be a wife and mother will serve you well in other areas of life.

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Tupperware galore

My mother gave me a Tupperware party as a Bridal Shower. Initially I was not very enthusiastic, but the results speak for themselves . . .


I already had some pantry containers, but most of these came from the party. I was totally amazed at how much I received thanks to the generosity of my guests . . . I also received some additional kitchen items. I don't think I have ever seen a pantry so well equipped with "Modular Mates" as Tupperware calls them . . . my sister says it looks like an add for Tupperware!

Most of the containers are empty in this picture, taken last week, but only three are empty now! It is fantastic to be able to have such a neat pantry where it is so easy to find things. I know that many women do quite well without any Tupperware but it is very nice to have!

I feel so incredibly blessed . . . I not only have plenty of food, I also have containers to keep it in!

I look forward to moving into my new home and cooking lots of things :). I have already cooked several meals, as Dave is already living there and we have had guests over for lunch.

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Marriage ceremony

Dave and I have been working on the form we would like our marriage ceremony to take. We have decided to use most of this Christian Reformed Church marriage ceremony with additions from the Presbyterian service. We really like the prayer at the end, and have added to it a bit. We also like the description of the purposes of marriage and roles within it. I really like the role differences in the vows, as I am uncomfortable with identical vows like those in the sample Presbyterian service we were given. We have also added to the vows. We want the traditional "for richer, for poorer" etc. included, and we also want to promise to raise any children God gives us to love and serve our Saviour. We will probably make more additions and deletions in the three weeks before our wedding day.

We chose our hymns about two months ago. We are planning to have "Holy, Holy, Holy", "Amazing Grace", "Oh Perfect Love" and another title I can't quite remember right now - something like "Happy the Home". I think we need to practise all these before hand so we can sing with great enthusiasm :).

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Redecorating chairs

Here is one of Great-Grandma Ida's chairs, in the form in which I received it . . .


My Grandad recovered these chairs when he inherited them. I am sure the covers are very sophisticated, but they are not really our style! They would perhaps suit a formal sitting room.

So we decided to re-do the chairs with throw blankets and cushions . . .



I had originally thought of making fitted covers, but decided it was foolish to add another time consuming thing to my list of "things to do before the wedding". I am really happy with the results of our shopping trip. The chairs now look more inviting and casual, and their backs show up better (I am not sure what the effect on the back of the chairs is called, but I like it!). They are also more comfortable. Oh, and they no longer clash with the purple living room wall in the house we are renting! Perhaps best of all, this option is much cheaper than having the chairs recovered or buying new chairs. We love our "antique" chairs - they make us feel sophisticated :). It is nice to have them fixed up before Dave's many international guests arrive to stay with him before the wedding.

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Feeling overwhelmed?

Crystal Payne has written a good post titled Help for the overwhelmed. Crystal suggests several reasons why we can feel overwhelmed, and offers solutions.

In regard to time managment, I have listened to the CD "24 Hours is All You Get" which Crystal recommends. This CD offers many good thoughts about prioritising and scheduling. Susan Bradrick encourages listeners to decide on those things that are truly God's priorities for your family at this time, and ensure that you put them into your schedule first. She also argues that many things we do are not God's priorities, and we need to leave those out of our schedules unless everything important is being done consistently. It is inspiring to think that one really could fit all the truly important things into life! However, it is very hard to set up a regular schedule unless life is very stable. At the moment, what I need to do is changing from week to week.

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Good traditions

Carmon has written a post about Traditions, pointing out that "For many Christians, “tradition” is a four-letter word". Carmon goes onto note that everyone has traditions, whether they acknowledge it or not. Pentecostal or contemporary churches have their own rituals. Carmon also has some sweet thoughts about wedding traditions.

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One Flesh: a practical guide to honeymoon sex and beyond

Despite the risk that Net Nanny will block my website indefinitely after this, I am going to review the book One Flesh: a practical guide to honeymoon sex and beyond by Greg and Amelia Clarke. I am reviewing One Flesh because many people at my church highly recommend it for pre-marital reading. I cannot offer the One Flesh the same commendation. Before stating my reasons for this, I’d like to draw your attention to the book’s many good points:

The authors . . .

• Love God
• Aim to base their thinking upon his Word
• Aim is to help Christians to have godly and happy honeymoons and marriages

The book . . .

• Encourages couples to communicate about their expectations for their honeymoon and their sexual relationship in general
• Encourages couples to communicate about contraception and to do their own research.
• Could help readers to understanding the differences between men and women, and communicate openly about these.
• Promotes the importance of expressing love rather than achieving the “ultimate” sex life. Describes problems that can occur and offers ideas for solutions.
• Points out that sexual behaviour includes activities such as passionate kissing and even, in some situations, holding hands.

My central reason for offering a cautionary word about One Flesh is that it goes into explicit detail about sexual positions. This may be helpful after marriage, but it is the opposite of helpful beforehand. As one of my engaged friends said “I don’t want to spend the next five months thinking about sex”. I cannot speak for anyone else, but I know that reading explicit information about sexual enjoyment makes me even more prone to have lustful thoughts. I need to kill those, not give them more to dwell upon. If you are going to read One Flesh before marriage, and you struggle with your thought life already, I recommend that you stop before the chapter about the first year of marriage. I completely disagree with the authors’ belief that it is helpful to discuss these things in detail prior to marriage. Isn’t there enough time for that afterwards?? Personally, I deeply regret reading this book and I would not want anyone else to have to deal with similar consequences.

I also have problems with One Flesh because it contains at least two serious factual errors. Firstly, the book indicates that the Bible’s first mention of sex is Genesis 2:24 “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh”. In fact, the Bible first mentions sex in Genesis 1:28 “Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion”. I don’t see how this could be talking about anything but sex, since prior to IVF there was no other way to be fruitful and multiply. Reproduction means sex unless, as Dave pointed out to me, you are an amoeba. The authors’ minimisation of the importance of procreation as well as pleasure in the marriage union may be a result of the fact that they ignore this passage.

The second error relates to the combined Pill. The authors recommend it and state that if conception occurs no harm will be done to a developing child. I currently have two secular books on birth control on my shelf which state that the combined Pill acts partly as an abortifacient. This information is widely available. Since one of the authors is a doctor, there is no excuse for the statement that if conception occurs on the Pill "implantation in the uterus will occur normally". I have written to the authors about this, but they have not provided any scientific evidence for their statement. It is a very unfortunate case of misinformation in a generally good section on contraception.

These two errors alone would not stop me from recommending One Flesh. If I thought the rest of the information in the book was essential, I could simply tell people about the errors and offer my wholehearted endorsement to the rest of it. However, overall I think the book is more unhelpful than helpful for pre-marital reading material. I would rather simply encourage other engaged couples to talk about their expectations and about the Bible's teaching. After marriage, if couples are looking for "manuals" on the bedroom, there are other books on the market at Christian bookstores that would probably be more appropriate for their needs.

Soon, I'll post on some pre-marital reading material that I do recommend.

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Sleep

When I consider the future, one of the things that I want most is to have time to do simple things like harvest the things I grow in the garden, have people over for dinner, and teach my own children. Choosing a lifestyle that allows enough time for sleep also sounds like a good idea! Perhaps if I have young children who keep me awake at night it would be a good idea to try to have a nap when they do, so that I don't struggle as much to be self controlled during the evening. When I am very overtired, it is so much easier to cry or get angry! Pop over to Felicity's blog for a great reminder of the importance of sleep. As Felicity says, sleep is God's gift to us. Even though the Bible warns against slothfulness, we should never feel guilty for making the time to get an appropriate amount of rest that enables us to give our best to God's Kingdom when we are busy and active.

Psalm 127 indicates that sleeping may be related to our trust in God:

"Unless the LORD builds the house
They labour in vain who build it,
Unless the LORD guards the city,
The watchmen stay awake in vain.

It is vain to rise up early,
To stay up late,
To eat the bread of sorrows,
For so he gives his beloved sleep."

If we trust that God is taking care of the world, we should be able to sleep peacefully.

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Profile photos

For a long time my blogger profile has not allowed me to update the photo. I have tried to update it through the means I used to use: putting the photo into a post and then taking the url from that. Does anyone know how to update profile photos with the new version of blogger?

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9/7/07

Last year on this date I wrote 9/7/99 in the providence of God. This year, on the eight anniversary of my car accident, I am also grateful. This time, I am especially thankful that God spared my life. He has enabled me to live to . . .

Attend my brother's engagement party and look forward to his wedding to the lovely Jen in November . . .



Watch my friends Christina and Peirce practise for having fun with their hypothetical 12 children, and look forward to being a bridesmaid at their wedding in December . . .


Hug my mother, and pray with her . . .


Enjoy my twin nephews and their sister, develop a stronger relationship with my sister Janelle and her husband Lyndon, and attend the dedication of the twins on June 30. . .


I am also grateful that God answered the prayers that I was praying as a result of the feelings I described in my post On marriage less than a year ago. In that post I described how I was less than content with singleness, and shared my ideas about courship and marriage. I am now willing to acknowledge that my struggle was partly because I already had strong feelings for Dave! I am amazed at the way God enabled Dave and I to live out so many of the principles I described in that post . . . and the way he proved it is most definitely not impossible for him to provide a husband for someone as weird as me! In less than six weeks we will be married, and it is a great blessing that God spared my life so that this could occur.

Last week one of my school friends lost her sister in a car accident. I cannot imagine how agonising this would be. So even as I am thankful today for my life, I am also praying for those who mourn. I have suffered a little, but it has never been so enourmously shattering. May God truly comfort the family, and help them to mourn fully for the one he has taken to be with him in heaven.

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Convictions

Beliefs about how to live, examined or unexamined, are inevitable.
People either choose to examine their beliefs and base them on the Bible,
or they make decisions on the basis of unexamined beliefs.

I have spoken with people who believe it is best not to have “convictions” about things related to the Christian life, such as schooling or courtship. They believe that these convictions lead to pride. Usually, they are referring specifically to more conservative convictions that can lead to attitudes of superiority toward those who choose a different course. For example, a family that home schools for biblical reasons may look down on those that choose to send their children to public schools. Or a family that believes that the Bible’s teaching on children means that it is a good idea to have lots of them may look down on those who choose to have two children.

I agree that convictions can be an excuse for pride. It is also true that some people think that more conservative = better and holier. However, my observation is that avoiding conservative views is not a guard against judgmental, prideful attitudes. In fact, “conservative” is usually quite radical. Therefore, many Christians are very judgemental about conservative views because they go against the status quo. For example, this morning I heard several people discussing large families. One woman announced that her friends had eight children because they thought “God told them to have a lot of children”. She went on to give the opinion that “God wants them to use their brains”. This woman made the assumption that it requires more thought to hold to the status quo of two or three children per family than it does to rethink those commonly held beliefs and make decisions that are frowned upon. She also displayed a contemptuous attitude to people who thought differently.

People are perhaps most in danger of being judgemental when they simply assume their views are right, without giving them much thought. They have never been through a process of considering the reasons for the views of others, so they cannot appreciate why others choose differently. Beliefs about how to live, examined or unexamined, are inevitable. People either choose to examine their beliefs and base them on the Bible, or they make decisions on the basis of unexamined beliefs. The solution to judgemental attitudes is not to abandon the process of thinking about topics and coming to convictions. Rather, it is to draw everything back into a full-orbed Christian worldview. If people truly understand God’s word, they will take seriously what it teaches about pride as well as about children or education.

If Christians have a sense of proportion, they will realise that an understanding of the gospel is the most important conviction we can have! Therefore, they will not elevate other matters to a level that is disproportionate. Douglas Wilson has said that if the first thing you want to know about someone is whether or not they agree with you about a certain issue, whether it be dress standards or rock music or natural birth, you are making that issue into an idol. The first thing we should want to know about another professing believer is whether or not they truly love Jesus Christ and have a passion for the gospel. The death and resurrection of Christ, which paid the penalty of our sin, is a humbling and awing reality. The internalisation of these truths, and the power of the Holy Spirit, is all that will be effective in putting pride to death and giving us a true love for other Christians. Thoughtlessness and following the Christian status quo will not help.

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