"One thing must be emphatically stated.

The New Testament books did not become authoritative for the Church because they were formally included in a canonical list; on the contrary, the Church included them in her canon because she already regarded them as divinely inspired, recognizing their innate worth and generally apostolic authority, direct or indirect. The first ecclesiastical councils to classify the canonical books were both held in North Africa-at Hippo Regius in 393 and at Carthage in 397-but what these councils did was not to impose something new upon the Christian communities but to codify what was already the general practice of those communities."

~FF Bruce, The Reliability of NT documents, Ch 3.

"Sooner or later, Daddy and I will find out..."

This phrase emerged from the archives of my brain tonight. It was often said to us as kids: partly to convince my brother and I to tell our parents the truth, and partly to get us to behave (whether they were looking or not.)

But I made a realization tonight: that's not true. They don't always find out. They don't always know.

And I knew this, of course, but I never really made all of the connections. And part of me was a little sad, to be quite honest. How much better it would be-- I thought-- if they DID know. Then perhaps we'd be compelled to behave...or at least tell the truth. Because our parents would know about it.

And then I realized something:
We do have a Parent who knows what we do. God didn't reveal Himself to us as Father for no reason. He indeed knows all that we do.

And yet...are we any more well-behaved because of it?

A paradox...

Dungeons and Dragons. I've never played it, and honestly don't know much about it. To the best of my knowledge it's an RPG board game. I know people who've played it, I know it's popular, and that most people like it.

I also know that it DID (and perhaps still does in some small circles) have a cult-like following. People, teens especially, I suppose were getting sucked into the game, spending all their time, energy, and money on it. Then if their character died, that which they had built their identity on died as well. And it wouldn't be much of a stretch that several committed suicide over the death of their character.

What's inherently bad: the idolatry of it. If your life cannot go on once a fictional game character has died, it was your functional savior. If you can't see your life without D & D then that's idolatry. And that's a sin.

Fine. Relatively straight-forward.

But then there are other's who take it further than that... Jack Chick for instance. Here he has a tract, in typical Jack Chick fashion, on the "evils" of D & D. He goes so far to say that they actually promote witchcraft, sorcery, and the like.

It that true? Some would say yes. Others would say no.

And then I read a blog post on Challies talking about how Al Mohler, CJ Mahaney, Mark Dever, and John Piper...the head-dudes for Together for the Gospel...play D & D.

And then I get confused...

Especially when at work today I came across a paper for clients to reflect on their histories, to see perhaps why they might be having troubles like they are.
Most of the options were pretty standard: have you or anyone up to 2 generations removed from you...
-participated in the occult?
-been molested? raped? a victim of incest?
-practiced divination? palm reading? Ouija boards?
-attempted suicide? inflicted harm upon yourself?
-been a member of a cult (whole big long list)?
....you know. Pretty standard stuff.

But then there was some other things that threw me off....
-played D & D?
-played Magic-The Gathering?
-played with a magic 8 ball?

It's interesting. B/c at least as far as something like D & D is concerned, it's a big ol' paradox:
-People who like the game say there's no witchcraft/evil inherent in the game
-People against the game will say that there is. (And they either "escaped" from it, in which case they're probably pushing some sort of agenda. Or they've never played it b/c they think it's evil, and therefore will never know.)
-Both sides will think their opponents are blind liars.

Dresses

The first of (perhaps) many rants on wedding dresses:

Just because I want a "modest" wedding dress does NOT mean that I am
1. fat
2. Mormon

That is all. Thank you.