The Margins

Why pay a stranger to meddle in your family affairs? Most simply want support and validation. Some are lured by the miracle cures on “Nanny 911.” Many live far from close family and friends and feel unsure of where to turn for reliable advice…Other parents found that coaches help them filter out conflicting advice they hear on talk shows and read in books and magazines. Pamela Paul, author of “Parenting Inc.” sees coaching as a sign of something more insidious: the professionalization of parenthood. “The parenting industry has convinced parents that they cannot trust their children’s health, happiness and success to themselves,” she writes.

From a Newsweek article on the new trend of “Parent Coaches” titled “When Kids Attack”, by Anna Kuchment

That’s how I learned what a hot-button issue this is: whether good parents ever let their kids out of their sight. But even as the stations (and Web sites and blogs) were having a field day with the story, people kept pulling me aside to say that they had been allowed to get around by themselves as kids, and boy were they glad.

They relished those memories — and thanked their parents! — and then in the next breath, they admitted: They never would let their kids do the same.

Why not? Has the world really become so much more dangerous in just one generation?

From Lenore Skenazy, founder of Free Range Kids (via Ed Gilbreath).

“Who is the focus of the Church? Who is the person we are concerned about? The person we exist to serve? For Jesus there was no question. In the Kingdom, the humble are lifted high and the most vulnerable have pride of place. That is why you cannot ask Jesus into your heart alone. He will ask, ‘Can I bring my friends?’”

From With God in the Crucible, by Peter Storey

Multi-ethnic isn’t the end-all of ministry, but it was one of the most visible (and hard-fought) characteristics of the early church. We lose something when we relegate racial reconciliation to a nice side effect of Christianity that “works for some people.”

From a comment on a recent Out of Ur post on Multi-Ethnic churches

According to Loriene Roy, president of the American Library Association, it’s a matter of principle versus reality—”the philosophy of serving all people,” she says, “and the reality of what happens when we do.”

From a Newsweek article titled Too at Home in the Stacks reporting on the rising trend of homeless individuals spending their days in public libraries.

Where the controversy arises is from the fact that Obama’s narrative (his racial and cultural background, his Christian faith, his intellect, his conciliatory manner) are foreign to most white Americans, especially when it comes to presidential candidates. His story requires white Americans to deviate from the standard script too much. With President Bush, it was enough for us to know that he was a reformed alcoholic who had a Christian conversion late in life. We knew that he came from a wealthy family, and that he is a sporadic churchgoer. We didn’t need to probe too deeply into the specifics of his personal beliefs or obtain transcripts of his pastor’s sermons. What more was there to know? His personal narrative was familiar and safe…

From Edward Gilbreath’s Reconciliation Blog

People who have encountered the cross, people who have carried a small part of it, know something that is the source of incredible joy: that evil is only the second-most powerful force in the universe. Do you know that? That is what the cross tells us—that there is something bigger and wider and deeper than evil, and that is the power of suffering love. Do you believe that?

From “When the Cross Lays Hold on You”, a sermon preached by Peter Storey in Duke chapel from Sermons from Duke Chapel (edited by William Willimon).

When a staff person in a church is approached by a church member with a criticism about another staff person, that staff member should ask four questions:

1. Have you personally talked with the person mentioned?

2. Would you like me to go with you when you do?

3. What is your intention in raising this criticism with me?

4. Do you intend for resolution and reconciliation or just complaining?

What if truth spoken without love
Is the greatest lie of all?
What if certainty offered hatefully
Is quicksand after all?

Did Jesus once dismiss the Bible quoter
As the very devil himself?
Suppose our hearts can twist
Saving truth into a damning words
Even as they leave our mouths.

What if truth spoken without love
is the greatest lie of all?

From John Frye (via Scot McKnight)

I am convinced that the time has come for Christians to develop an exit strategy from the public schools. Some parents made this decision long ago. The Christian school and home school movements are among the most significant cultural developments of the last thirty years. Other parents are not there yet. In any event, an exit strategy should be in place.

Al Mohler, president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in his latest book, Culture Shift: Engaging Current Issues with Timeless Truth. (Via Out of Ur)

“Church becomes a defense against falling into the arms of the living God.”

Will Willimon in a lecture at Fuller Seminary