Odds & Ends

• Blue skies. Warm weather. Yup, things turned nice, just in time for the beginning of school.

• I am puzzled by this week's Sabbath School lesson on Romans 8. A chapter about God's grace in the face of human suffering has become a pep talk -- one that says little more than "Jesus will help us try harder." Just as a suggestion, try including verses 18ff in this week's discussion; they add a lot (even though the quarterly did not think them worth mentioning).

• I love what Eugene Peterson says about the Psalms of Ascent in his book, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction. Unfortunately, I'm not finding anything in this book that I can use in a sermon . . . so I guess I'll just have to read it for my own benefit. (Sigh.)

• I don't know anything that causes more headaches (and heartaches) than our local church's Student Assistance Fund (i.e. the program that grants scholarships to our local SDA school). I guess it's one of those things where you do it, not because it makes you feel good, but because it's the right thing to do.

• Interesting article on the purchase of the University Baptist Church in Seattle by the Mars Hill Church. It would be easy to read this as "mainline vs. evangelical" or "traditional vs. contemporary" -- but I suspect the real story is "what happens when a pastor betrays a church's trust."

• And I'll close with this quote from the United States Marine Corps: "If you want it bad, then you get it bad."