Wednesday, October 27
Tuesday, October 26
Monday, October 18
200! 30! 12! 2! 1!
We really are going to do it! Soon! On the first weekend in November, we are going to run 200 miles, in about 30 hours, with 12 friends, accompanied by 2 support vans, all for 1 great cause!
The Great Ragnar Race is an organized run across Tennessee from Chattanooga to Nashville. Our team will be running in an effort to raise funds and awareness for the worthy and needy recipients of Chalmers Fund scholarships--particularly at Franklin Classical School and New College Franklin.
We believe that what we are called to do and what we are called to be ought not be hampered by financial limitations. Thus, the Chalmers Fund of the King's Meadow Study Center has been established to support substantive Christian discipleship and education though endowments, scholarships, and resource development from Franklin to the uttermost parts of the earth.
Won't you support our efforts? Visit our Sum Ergo Zoom project site to donate or help us fundraise today! And please do pass the word! There is a method in our madness! Really, I promise!
The Great Ragnar Race is an organized run across Tennessee from Chattanooga to Nashville. Our team will be running in an effort to raise funds and awareness for the worthy and needy recipients of Chalmers Fund scholarships--particularly at Franklin Classical School and New College Franklin.
We believe that what we are called to do and what we are called to be ought not be hampered by financial limitations. Thus, the Chalmers Fund of the King's Meadow Study Center has been established to support substantive Christian discipleship and education though endowments, scholarships, and resource development from Franklin to the uttermost parts of the earth.
Won't you support our efforts? Visit our Sum Ergo Zoom project site to donate or help us fundraise today! And please do pass the word! There is a method in our madness! Really, I promise!
Mildred Jefferson: Pro-Life Stalwart
Mildred Jefferson, pioneer physician, teacher, reformer, mentor, and friend to an entire generation of pro-life leaders has gone home to be with the Lord at age 84.Born in Pittsburg, Texas, in 1926, the daughter of a schoolteacher and a Methodist pastor, she was raised in the beautiful East Texas town of Carthage and graduated from Texas College in Tyler. She earned a master’s degree from Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts. Then, she went on to become the first African-American woman to graduate from Harvard Medical School and the first woman to be a surgical intern at Boston City Hospital.
Dr. Jefferson gained renown as a clinical professor of surgery at Boston University Medical School--and over the years was awarded honorary degrees by 28 colleges and universities.
She was one of the early, visionary founders of the modern pro-life movement. A tireless servant-leader, she helped to establish more than 30 pro-life organizations, boards, and committees including the National Right to Life Committee--of which she remained the at-large director to the day she died.
Her credo was unequivocal, "I am at once a physician, a citizen, and a woman, and I am not willing to stand aside and allow this concept of expendable human lives to turn this great land of ours into just another exclusive reservation where only the perfect, the privileged, and the planned have the right to live."
Dr. Jefferson was a dear and gracious friend to me, a ready counselor during the days when I first was researching and writing Grand Illusions: The Legacy of Planned Parenthood, and a faithful supporter of LifeNet, the organization we established together to stem the rising tide of RU-486 and other pharmaceutical abortifacients.
Though we mourn the loss of one of America's greatest heroes, we rejoice that Dr. Jefferson is now in the presence of her Savior, beholding the glory of the risen Christ.
Saturday, October 16
"Autumn Poem" by Ben House
The jaded first look revealed that summer might stay.
Only the second glance revealed a changing leaf,
Casting an autumnal pall over a late day,
When so slight an orange tint could tinge weak belief.
In autumn I see the empiric decline,
When leaves are surrendered to the barbaric wind,
Leaving unshorn limbs’ barren skeletal design
As before scourging, they, their colored garments rend.
When like Persephone’s tears, hope turns to dark gloom,
With only fading memory of that last day,
And with the fade of petals, the sad droop of bloom,
Dusk covers the season with darkened sky of gray
And yet, that momentary discontent of loss
Is halted in shock of color of fallen days,
When from that foliate descent to bare limbed cross
Glimpses of life even in death breach through the haze.
Only the second glance revealed a changing leaf,
Casting an autumnal pall over a late day,
When so slight an orange tint could tinge weak belief.
In autumn I see the empiric decline,
When leaves are surrendered to the barbaric wind,
Leaving unshorn limbs’ barren skeletal design
As before scourging, they, their colored garments rend.
When like Persephone’s tears, hope turns to dark gloom,
With only fading memory of that last day,
And with the fade of petals, the sad droop of bloom,
Dusk covers the season with darkened sky of gray
And yet, that momentary discontent of loss
Is halted in shock of color of fallen days,
When from that foliate descent to bare limbed cross
Glimpses of life even in death breach through the haze.
Friday, October 15
"Theme in Yellow" by Carl Sandburg
I spot the hills
With yellow balls in autumn.
I light the prairie cornfields
Orange and tawny gold clusters
And I am called pumpkins.
On the last of October
When dusk is fallen
Children join hands
And circle round me
Singing ghost songs
And love to the harvest moon;
I am a jack-o'-lantern
With terrible teeth
And the children know
I am fooling.
With yellow balls in autumn.
I light the prairie cornfields
Orange and tawny gold clusters
And I am called pumpkins.
On the last of October
When dusk is fallen
Children join hands
And circle round me
Singing ghost songs
And love to the harvest moon;
I am a jack-o'-lantern
With terrible teeth
And the children know
I am fooling.
Tuesday, October 12
Making a Difference
January 22, 2011 marks the 38th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision. On January 3rd, the 112th United States Congress will open with newly elected representatives in the Senate and the House of Representatives joining the incumbents. This is an important opportunity to influence our nation’s leaders on the critical issue of abortion. To coincide with both of these dates, Ligonier Ministries will send R.C. Sproul’s Twentieth Anniversary special edition of Abortion: A Rational Look at an Emotional Issue to every member of Congress. Won't you help? Ligonier's goal is to raise $6,000 to fund this effort. Every $10 donation will send a book to one of our representatives.
May God be pleased to use this resource, along with a letter from R.C. Sproul, to make an impact on the hearts and minds of our representatives in Congress.
Sunday, October 10
"How Can It Be?" by Tristan Gylberd
Guard us Lord, from the Judas kiss;
Keep us Lord, from the way of Cain;
From the error of Balaam; From the rebellion of Korah.
We confess that we are Jezebels at heart, every one of us;
We are Icabods; We are Hamans;
We are Tobiahs and Sanballats;
We are Abimelechs and Absaloms;
We are Chedoloamers and Eglons.
Indeed, we are all Adams.
How can it be?
The seeds of destruction have been sown, even as You have blessed us:
Though You have offered us sweet fountains of life,
We have thirsted for the bitter waters;
Though You have laden high the festal table,
We have hungered for thorns and thistles.
How can it be?
We have become adepts:
In a reverse alchemy,
Turning gold to base,
Turning blessing to cursing.
We are waterless clouds and fruitless trees;
We are wild waves and wandering stars.
Meet us here, Lord:
Give us Gospel sanity,
That we might yet again relent;
That we might yet again repent.
Keep us Lord, from the way of Cain;
From the error of Balaam; From the rebellion of Korah.
We confess that we are Jezebels at heart, every one of us;
We are Icabods; We are Hamans;
We are Tobiahs and Sanballats;
We are Abimelechs and Absaloms;
We are Chedoloamers and Eglons.
Indeed, we are all Adams.
How can it be?
The seeds of destruction have been sown, even as You have blessed us:
Though You have offered us sweet fountains of life,
We have thirsted for the bitter waters;
Though You have laden high the festal table,
We have hungered for thorns and thistles.
How can it be?
We have become adepts:
In a reverse alchemy,
Turning gold to base,
Turning blessing to cursing.
We are waterless clouds and fruitless trees;
We are wild waves and wandering stars.
Meet us here, Lord:
Give us Gospel sanity,
That we might yet again relent;
That we might yet again repent.
Abraham Kuyper
Abraham Kuyper was one of the most remarkable men of the twentieth century. A true poly math, the Dutch statesman made his mark as a pastor, theologian, journalist, educator, orator, publisher, politician, and reformer.
He was born in 1837, just seven years after Belgium and the Netherlands separated. Though his pious family background, quiet rural community, and meager local schooling combined to afford him only very humble resources, he was a bright student and was early on marked out for great things. He attended the university at Leiden and quickly demonstrated an aptitude for serious scholastic work. Following his postgraduate work, he pastored a succession of churches—first in Beesd, then in Utrect, and finally in Amsterdam. He became the leader of the theological conservatives who were working hard to hold at bay the encroachments of modernists and liberals.
By 1872, he had begun publishing a daily newspaper, De Standaard. He was already the editor of the inspirational monthly magazine, De Heraut. In addition, he had founded a new legal organization to protect the concerns of private Christian schools and had spearheaded the reorganization of the political conservatives into the Anti-Revolutionary Party. He was elected to the lower assembly and quickly became the leading exponent and spokesman for spiritual orthodoxy, fiscal restraint, and judicial tradition.
As if all these activities were not enough, he continued the serious academic research he had begun at the university, he wrote a flurry of books, pamphlets, and broadsides, and he managed a heavy speaking schedule at home and abroad. In later years he would also establish the Free University of Amsterdam, give vision and direction to the new Dutch Reformed Church, and lead a coalition government as the Prime Minister. He was a genuine renaissance man in every respect.
He first entered politics as a member of the lower chamber of the Dutch legislature, at the head of a new Conservative and Christian coalition party. After breaking with the national church and forming the Free Reformed Church in 1886, he united the Calvinist and Catholic parties and in 1901 formed a reformed Christian Conservative ministry, serving as minister of the interior until 1905 and Prime Minister until 1907. He served in the upper house of the legislature from 1913 to 1920.
Beginning on this day in 1898, he gave an influential series of lectures at Princeton University in New Jersey in which he developed the idea of a comprehensive and universal Christian woldview—rooted in the Reformation doctrines of Calvinism. Before his death in 1920, he was able to successfully mobilize the ordinary citizens of the great Dutch nation to do the difficult work of societal transformation—through the consistent application of the Christian worldview he so articulately espoused.
He was born in 1837, just seven years after Belgium and the Netherlands separated. Though his pious family background, quiet rural community, and meager local schooling combined to afford him only very humble resources, he was a bright student and was early on marked out for great things. He attended the university at Leiden and quickly demonstrated an aptitude for serious scholastic work. Following his postgraduate work, he pastored a succession of churches—first in Beesd, then in Utrect, and finally in Amsterdam. He became the leader of the theological conservatives who were working hard to hold at bay the encroachments of modernists and liberals.
By 1872, he had begun publishing a daily newspaper, De Standaard. He was already the editor of the inspirational monthly magazine, De Heraut. In addition, he had founded a new legal organization to protect the concerns of private Christian schools and had spearheaded the reorganization of the political conservatives into the Anti-Revolutionary Party. He was elected to the lower assembly and quickly became the leading exponent and spokesman for spiritual orthodoxy, fiscal restraint, and judicial tradition.
As if all these activities were not enough, he continued the serious academic research he had begun at the university, he wrote a flurry of books, pamphlets, and broadsides, and he managed a heavy speaking schedule at home and abroad. In later years he would also establish the Free University of Amsterdam, give vision and direction to the new Dutch Reformed Church, and lead a coalition government as the Prime Minister. He was a genuine renaissance man in every respect.
He first entered politics as a member of the lower chamber of the Dutch legislature, at the head of a new Conservative and Christian coalition party. After breaking with the national church and forming the Free Reformed Church in 1886, he united the Calvinist and Catholic parties and in 1901 formed a reformed Christian Conservative ministry, serving as minister of the interior until 1905 and Prime Minister until 1907. He served in the upper house of the legislature from 1913 to 1920.
Beginning on this day in 1898, he gave an influential series of lectures at Princeton University in New Jersey in which he developed the idea of a comprehensive and universal Christian woldview—rooted in the Reformation doctrines of Calvinism. Before his death in 1920, he was able to successfully mobilize the ordinary citizens of the great Dutch nation to do the difficult work of societal transformation—through the consistent application of the Christian worldview he so articulately espoused.
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