Today's Links 24/11/2009

A soul-searching, convicting message by Matt Chandler at the Chapel of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. It is about 40 minutes long, but well worth watching.



(HT: Justin Taylor)

Arpita introduced me to this great blog series by Noel Piper, in which she writes about how she and John Piper adopted their daughter Talitha Ruth. The series begins with this post, and is easy-quick reading. I found it moving, and got quite emotional a few times during this series, as I remembered our own story. I also found a number of issues that the article touched upon quite interesting: How Noel and John worked through an issue they disagreed about, their letters to each other through this process, how the adoption was linked to their pro-life position and their desire to be examples, and so on.

The very interesting story of the Angola Prison in Angola, Louisiana, and the visit of a team from Desiring God Ministries. The prison is described as "the largest maximum-security prison in America. It is one of the most famous prisons in the whole world. It has only murderers, rapists, armed robbers and habitual felons. The average sentence is 88 years, with 3,200 people in one place serving life sentences. Ninety percent of the inmates will die here. This is a place of hopelessness, so if Angola can change, the rest of the country’s prisons can’t say, “We can’t do this.” I was intrigued by the description of the Bible College within the prison, the six churches, and the missionaries sent out from these churches to other prisons! Here is an interview with the warden Burl Cain (from Decision Magazine in June 2006)

'O Evangelicos', Philip Yancey's final column in Christianity Today, in which he explains his statement "Some of my friends believe we should abandon the word evangelical. I do not. I simply yearn for us to live up to the meaning of our name."

I came across this great picture on one of the blogs I read, and was interested enough to go over to this really LONG article on 'over-parenting' in TIME magazine. (let me also be honest, I didn't have the time to read the entire article) However, I read enough to wonder what we are trying to 'achieve' as parents. Our family mission statement has this to say about our goals in bringing up children:

1. To provide for our children godly roots and wings.
2. To enable them to find love, security and purpose.

'Roots': especially important because our children are adopted. 'Godly roots' because we want them to have a godly heritage, and because we want them to be rooted in God.

'Wings': because we want to be able to help them find their mission and calling, and find the resources and strength to do all that God wants them to. When the time comes, we want them to be arrows: sent out by The Archer to accomplish a specific task.

"Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, So are the children of one's youth.
How blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them; they will not be ashamed When they speak with their enemies in the gate." (Ps 127:4,5)

Interestingly, just last week I came across an invitation to a conference called "Raising Kids to do Hard Things". Sounds like what I would like to do.....

Also read this article on Missional Parenting.

(HT:Z)

And finally, some great pictures from the National Geographic International Photography Contest 2009, and the stories behind the photos.

(HT: Z)