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by on 12.25.12

a treat for us this Christmas

My sisters found a reel to reel tape in our Drayton Valley, AB home labeled “Grandma Singing”. One of them had the tape transcribed to a CD and I turned the file into mp3s. Here is my dear Irish Grandma singing Irish ballads from memory. I remember helping to record these, it had to be somewhere around 1969/1970 when Grandma was in her late 70s.

I haven’t heard my dear grandma’s voice in nearly 40 years. What a blessing, thanks Maureen for taking the initiative on this.

Alice Doggart

The Dear Little Girl

  • The Dear Little Girl

The Little Irish Colleen with Her Old Plaid Shawl

  • The Little Irish Colleen with Her Old Plaid Shawl

Impudent Barney O’Hay

  • Impudent Barney O’Hay

 

Filed Under: Family, Memories, Personal
by on 12.18.12

everybody’s talking about gun control

Unlike many of my American friends, I have no particular love for guns or for the notion that citizens should have the right to bear arms to protect themselves against government tyranny. For such friends, I remind them that from my perspective, the red coats were the good guys

I say that to establish this point at the outset: I have no particular axe to grind against gun control.

I do have questions about gun control, however. The biggest question is this: will it work?

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Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: ,
by on 12.10.12

Don’t send your kids to Northland

“Thank you Steve for your contributions to the church!” – Matt Olson, sharing a link to this video music presentation on his Facebook page.

Really, in my opinion, you shouldn’t send your kids to Northland International University. The school and its president have taken a strange turn – this is the latest example. Several of Matt’s friends on Facebook, mutual friends of ours, protested at this link in the comments that followed. You won’t find those protests any longer, they’ve been deleted (after Matt responded to one).

The latest comment, “Have you been hacked, Matt?” Alas, if it were only that simple. I’m afraid all of us who once supported Northland have been hacked.

Don’t send your kids there, you will be very disappointed.

don_sig2

Filed Under: Issues, Music, Olson, Separation
by on 12.6.12

interesting hit on P&D today

I noticed a link from DailyKos to Proclaim & Defend in our stats today. I thought… what in the world? How would anyone come to P&D from DailyKos?

Click here for the DailyKos article.

Click here to see where we were linked in a comment.

Not a surprise, but the attitude of many towards Christians is on display.

John 15:19 "If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you.

don_sig2

Filed Under: Blogosphere, General Interest
by on 12.4.12

fundamentalists and ETS

Over at Theologically Driven, John Aloisi makes these remarks:

Trueman believes that the main problem with the “evangelical mind” is not that Christians are absent from the academy, but rather that both within and without the academy “evangelicals” lack any agreed upon gospel.

… In light of where I acquired my copy of this book [the recent meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society], I thought it rather ironic that Trueman singles out the ETS for special criticism in this area. He notes that the society’s innocuous 43-word statement of faith could be affirmed with integrity by conservative Roman Catholics, Anglicans, and Eastern Orthodox people alike. If such is the case, why call it the Evangelical Theological Society?

Exactly.

I have long argued that the ETS is no place for fundamentalists. Trueman’s observation is absolutely correct, the ETS has a very minimalist doctrinal statement that almost any professing Christian, of almost any stripe, could sign without any twinge of conscience.

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Filed Under: ETS, Fundamentalism, Issues, Separation
by on 11.14.12

hear! hear!

Dave Doran on things that annoy him in blogging debates.

Just thought the world should know that I agree with every point in Dave’s post.

don_sig2

Filed Under: Doran, General Interest, Personalities
by on 11.9.12

a few thoughts on the American election

Over at Proclaim & Defend, I linked to this article by a seminary professor from Charlotte. I think it is well worth reading. While it may not be the only explanation for the results of the election, I think Michael Kruger is correct about the spiritual state of the USA. This doesn’t bode well for the politically conservative side in the future. The spiritual state of Canada is much worse, which is why we have NO abortion law and a nation-wide same-sex marriage law – and it is why, despite having a Conservative government with a professing Christian Prime Minister, we are very unlikely to see any change over these social concerns in Canada.

This state of affairs puts an imperative on the Christians of North America. We need to get out of our comfort zone and be concerned with evangelism. The people of our nations are sinking fast. Their only hope is Christ and we should be alarmed about the needs of our friends, neighbours, acquaintances and even our enemies.

On the outlook for the future… many of my friends appear to be well into the doom and gloom camp. As it happened, the Dow Jones average dropped by 2.36% the day after the election. Many cried that the so-called fiscal cliff was at hand. The next day, the DJIA dropped another .94%. The horror! Well, today it went up, by only .03%, but up is up, eh?

The fact is that the stock market does fluctuate every day. A 2 % drop on one day is not a really significant drop.

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Filed Under: General Interest, Politics
by on 10.19.12

a bit of wisdom for a fundamentalist mindset

NAU  Proverbs 28:4 Those who forsake the law praise the wicked, But those who keep the law strive with them.

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Filed Under: Fundamentalism
by on 10.18.12

hoorah, I guess

Something blew by today that makes me wonder. Should I comment? Big announcement, excitement, pleased with accomplishment… I’ve seen some of the work, it’s pretty good, I guess. But…

Does it mean collaboration with Mr. Grace Awakening? It would appear so…

When the word collaboration is used… ok, “collaborated”… with a ministry that is skewed, some say antinomian… one has to wonder at the level of discernment.

It is disheartening. The upcoming musical release will be well done, no doubt. We will have little to criticize about content and style, I am sure.

But man… what are we to make of this level of cooperation?

I hope some of the fellows coming out of fundamentalist institutions are learning what fundamentalism means and why its important. Many of the most noticeable ones just don’t seem to get it.

Still, one of our best and brightest has been noticed by a prominent church with an internationally known pastor and has produced something. Hoorah, I guess.

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Filed Under: Evangelicalism, Fundamentalism, New Evangelicalism, Separation, Worldliness
by on 10.14.12

coming of age

Over at Religious Affections, Jason Parker recommends reading books to children, especially books like Winnie the Pooh. I couldn’t agree more, and have a lot of affection for the fluff-stuffed bear. (The original Winnie was a bear from Canada, by the way – my Canadian insecurities compel me to get that info into the story.)

When we came to the last story of Pooh, where Christopher Robin is growing up and Pooh is destined for the toyshelf, I couldn’t make it through the story. I still am moved emotionally as I recall the experience. My wife asked what was wrong as I struggled to proceed. “It’s a coming of age story,” I replied. She offered to read it herself. As she read and thought of what I said, she, too, was strongly moved. So that reading became a tag-team affair. We each took turns reading as we were overcome by the emotion of the story and our crowd of little ones gathered around us. They, too, were growing up (and are now fully grown, alas!). They looked on at us in amazement.

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Filed Under: Family, General Interest, Personal
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