Read Alouds--Kildee House

The last book we read, Kildee House by Rutheford G. Montgomery, was a great one.  It is the story of Jerome Kildee, a former head stone maker who retires and decides to become a hermit in the California redwood forest.  Relationship finds him though.  First in the raccoons and skunks that come to inhabit his little cabin and then in the person of a neighbor girl.  She is one of my favorite characters in the book.  The relationship that she builds with Jerome is a sweet and tender one.  She is as important to him as he is to her.  She is also a strong, yet feminine character (something most kids stories lack.)  The boys loved this book and I loved reading it to them.

Hymn of the Week--He is Lord

We are back into our Hymn of the Week groove.  This week's hymn is a short one, but a great one straight from Philippians 2. 

Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, ¹⁰so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, ¹¹and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Hymn of the Week
He Is Lord
Words and Music by Unknown

He is Lord, He is Lord
He has risen from the dead
And He is Lord
Every knee shall bow
Every tongue confess
That Jesus Christ is Lord

New Labels

I was talking with Teresa the other night at church about blogging.  I brought up labels and how I felt that I don't do a good job with this.  The label that I think would be most helpful are ones for each kid.  So if you wanted to see all the posts mainly about Benjamin, you could click on the label and there you go.  Or if you wanted to see what I've written lately about Lucy, click the label and wallah!  The only problem that I had with this was one of comparison.  What if I had 50 posts about Caleb and only 49 about Ben?  Would I feel pressure to keep them equal?

Well I've decided to do it.  So you can look on the label cloud (Recurring Themes) to the right and see all of the kids names.  You can also see who has the most.  Ben of course has the most.  He's the oldest and has been with us the longest.  I think it will be a fun way though for me to continue to organize the blog this way.  Any other suggestions for blog maintenance.

Quotes: My sunglasses

Molly is a movie star in the making.

"I need to wear my sunglasses so no one sees my eyes" 

"Evangelical Calvinism", Bethlehem Baptist Church and me

Ever since I began attending Bethlehem Baptist Church three years ago, I have had a nagging question.  "How does Bethlehem's "Reformed Baptist" theology compare to a traditional covenantal Reformed theology?"  It has seemed since the beginning that all of this just doesn't add up.  I'm not sure I would call it "cafeteria style theology" but it has seemed like the parts don't necessarily equal the whole.  I haven't ever really gotten a good answer to this question.  Maybe I haven't been able to articulate it very well.  Maybe it's a question with which people aren't very comfortable.

My thoughts have been like this.  When I was at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, a Christian Reformed college, I didn't always agree with their stance on some theological issues, but the arguments always went back to a traditional Reformed theology.  That theology was consistent across the board from Baptism to the Lord's Supper to their overall hermeneutic.  At Bethlehem, I agree with almost everything, but I can't always trace our stances to a traditional Baptist theology.  It's hard for me to understand where the Baptist ends and the Reformed thought begins.  It doesn't always feel consistent. 

Michael Horton from the White Horse Inn and Westminster Seminary California, just wrote a great blog post articulating this exact question and argument.  Horton encourages people who have become interested in the doctrines of grace and God's sovereignty to call the movement "Evangelical Calvinism."  This makes sense to me.  It's not that I'm Reformed.  I don't agree (yet) with infant baptism or some or the other outgrowths of covenantal theology.  I think I'm a Baptist who is excited about God's sovereignty and is thrilled with the doctrines of grace.  If you go to Bethlehem or if you consider yourself part of the "New Calvinism" movement, I'd love to hear what you think about these comments and Horton's article.

UPDATE:  Here is another very interesting article about the New Calvinism.  My reaction to the article is this.  I continue to hesitate with many of the things articulated in the article that are Reformed.  Therefore, I hesitate to call myself Reformed.  The implications of all that the other things mean, i.e. the cultural mandate and the sacraments, I'm not real comfortable with yet.

Matthew riding his bike

Matthew is really getting good at riding his bike. We went for a walk/bike ride last night and he made it all the way around our neighborhood. He's still got to figure out getting started on his own and breaking. But once he gets going, he does great. Way to go, Matt!

Gammons Dragons

Every family needs a logo, right?  Well that's what Ben and Caleb were thinking this morning when they came up with this one for us.  Maybe there is a graphic design team in our future. Any graphics people out there want to take a stab at refining this?