Andy Naselli

Thoughts on Theology

humor

Please No Explanations inside the Church

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Those words appear behind me in this picture:

That picture is about a week old. Rick Segal took it while we were visiting Israel. It made us laugh because directly behind me is a Catholic church building in Jerusalem. You can navigate 360 degrees on Google maps and see that in the above picture my back is to the building’s entrance while I am directly facing the temple mount’s eastern wall.

The authorial intent of the words on the sign are probably to request that tour guides not talk openly inside the church building. But the words made me laugh because in some ways they encapsulate why Protestants are celebrating the 500th anniversary of the Reformation today.

Happy Reformation Day!

Related:

  1. 20 Resources on the Protestant Reformation
  2. “Here I Stand”: Elsa (from Frozen’s “Let It Go”) vs. Luther (at the Diet of Worms)
  3. Reeves Recommends Reformation Reading

Mohler before He Became President of Southern: “I Intend to Age”

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mohlerAlbert Mohler became president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in February 1993 when he was 33 years old.

To understand how unusual that is and what sort of challenges Mohler faced, listen to how he told the story ten years later in 2003 at a Sovereign Grace leadership conference: Part 1 | Part 2.

(See also my review of Gregory A. Wills, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 1859–2009, Themelios 34 [2009]: 403–5.)

[Read more…] about Mohler before He Became President of Southern: “I Intend to Age”

A Funny Footnote

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This is probably the most entertaining grammar I’ve read. (It’s lightweight intermediate Greek.)

David Alan Black. It’s Still Greek to Me: An Easy-to-Understand Guide to Intermediate Greek. Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1998.

The book ends with a funny footnote (p. 157):

Black

It may appear a bit self-serving to list here so many of my own writings on New Testament studies, but I assure you, dear reader, that all royalties I receive go directly to needy children.

[Footnote] My own.

A Funny Parenting Book by @HonestToddler (33 Excerpts)

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HonestToddlerThis book releases today:

Bunmi Laditan. The Honest Toddler: A Child’s Guide to Parenting. New York: Scribner, 2013.

I follow @HonestToddler on Twitter because it’s so entertaining, especially since my wife and I care for three little children.

HT

The central theme in all the tweets and throughout the book is that [Read more…] about A Funny Parenting Book by @HonestToddler (33 Excerpts)

So What Do Profs Like Doug Moo and Grant Osborne Talk about When They Carpool?

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The opening of Doug Moo’s chapter in Grant Osborne’s Festschrift made me smile:

I consider it a great privilege to be able to contribute an essay to this volume honoring a good friend and, for many years, colleague, Grant Osborne. We served together at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School for over twenty years, years that cemented our relationship not only professionally but personally. We lived in the same neighborhood as the Osbornes for many years, and our families grew up together. Seared in my memory especially are times spent with Grant and other Trinity colleagues in an automobile, as we car-pooled together back and forth to Trinity. Students sometimes wondered at the deep theological discussions we profs must have been having during those rides; but I am afraid that our topics of conversation more often focused on the Chicago Bears or Bulls than on millennialism or supra-lapsarianism!

-Douglas J. Moo, “Translation in New Testament Commentaries,” On the Writing of New Testament Commentaries: Festschrift for Grant R. Osborne on the Occasion of His 70th Birthday (ed. Stanley E. Porter and Eckhard J. Schnabel; Texts and Editions for New Testament Study 8; Leiden: Brill, 2013), 57.

Fifteen Favorite Christmas Songs

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Here are fifteen of my favorite Christmas songs:

  1. “The 12 Days of Christmas” (live; studio) | Straight No Chaser | Holiday Spirits | video
  2. “Angels’ Carol” | John Rutter, the Cambridge Singers | Christmas with the Cambridge Singers | video
  3. “The Christmas Can-Can” | Straight No Chaser | Christmas Cheers | video
  4. “Christmas Fantasy for Orchestra” | Dan and Heidi Goeller | The Word Became Flesh
  5. “Everlasting Life” | The Rushingbrook Children’s Choir | The Most Wonderful Birthday of All
  6. “Infant Holy, Infant Lowly” | Dan Forrest | Prepare Him Room
  7. “Joy to the World” | Empire Brass | Joy to the World
  8. “Linus & Lucy” | Vince Guaraldi Trio | A Charlie Brown Christmas
  9. “A Little Christmas Music: Medley a la Mozart” | The King’s Singers, Kiri Te Kanawa | A Little Christmas Music
  10. “Lo! How a Rose” | SMS Men’s Chorus | King of Glory
  11. “Magnificat” | Keith and Kristyn Getty | An Irish Christmas
  12. “Mary, Did You Know?” | Kathleen Battle, accompanied by Christopher Parkening | Angel’s Glory | lyrics
  13. “Sleep, Jesus, Sleep” | Shannon Harris | Savior: Celebrating the Mystery of God Become Man
  14. “Somewhere in My Memory” | John Williams, the Boston Pops Orchestra | Joy to the World
  15. “Suo Gan,” the instrumental part from 1:11 to 2:19 | Irish Tenors | Home for Christmas

What are some of your favorite songs?

Update in December 2016: I recently discovered another one. Our girls love The Nutcracker. We’ve probably played it hundreds of times for them. So this song by Straight No Chaser makes me laugh.