134. Dumping the Inbox

A number of things have been stacking up in the Inbox, so let's dump it out and do a sort.

Did you see this about Brit Hume? One of the few anchors I actually enjoy listening to on the TV, except we don't get his channel - too bad. Anyway, it appears he knows the Lord and it could be that is why he seems like a decent fellow on the tube.

On Veteran's Day, pastor John Piper observed, "The tensions between being a follower of Jesus as a soldier are essentially the same as the tensions of being a follower of Jesus in all the other authority structures of society that God ordains for the stability of the world (like business, education, government, and family). "

He concludes with gratitude to God for the risk so many are willing to take for the sake of peace. Amen.

Piper's son Abraham blogs at 22 Words and he offered some blogging advice a few days ago. Here's a sample:

- Keep paragraphs 5 lines or shorter. (If this post were a list of one, this would be it.)

- Put either your main point or a story in the first paragraph of posts.

- Interact with readers in your comment section.

And, of course, his list is 22 items long.

Finally, I read an interesting article the other day at the Pyromaniacs web site. It had to do with judgement of God described in the passage from Malachi 3 regarding the fuller. Now, if you are like me, the only thing you know about the fuller is he had a bunch of brushes once upon a time. However, I learned a thing or two about the fuller. Thought you might like this.

The passage:

“Behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare the way before me. And the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple; and the messenger of the covenant in whom you delight, behold, he is coming, says the Lord of hosts. 2 But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner's fire and like fullers' soap. 3 He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, and they will bring offerings in righteousness to the Lord."

One observation from Team Pyro:

So when God says that the Messiah is coming with "fuller's soap", He's not saying, "Jesus will make you wash your hands." he's saying, "you are disgusting and useless unless you are cleaned up by the Messiah."

The whole article is here.