Pop Culture Roundup

By
I'm the type of pastor who starts anticipating the season of Advent in September. I always look for a new resource for that season; a way to express the familiar themes in new ways. I don't do this with any other season...there's just something about Advent that inspires me to do extra planning. Anyway, the resource I picked up this year is The Journey by Adam Hamilton. Hamilton attempts to retrace the steps of the various characters by traveling to Israel and visiting the holy sites commemorating each stop. The book is pretty good: his insights into the geography are interesting. I didn't find a whole lot new regarding the stories themselves, though.

I haven't seen any new Boardwalk Empire episodes yet. I have no real excuse. I am ashamed.

Being a fan of WWE, I see a lot of video game commercials during their TV shows. I saw one the other week that had me thinking, "What was that song playing the background?" A quick Google search showed that it was "My World" by Transmissions:



Here's an instrumental I randomly found by David Tolk called "In Reverence;"

Order my books!

Sign up for my author newsletter!




powered by TinyLetter

Popular posts from this blog

Looking for a Scapegoat

By
Image
A few years ago, my pastoral colleagues passed around a picture on social media of a person crying with the caption, “When I was a kid, I thought everyone in the church got along.” Identifying the source of the conflict in a church can be tricky, because what people are really upset about isn’t necessarily what they say they’re upset about. Have you ever witnessed or been a part of a church argument that, after the fact, seemed strange? Fights over not having enough tablecloths to use during a dinner. What the pastor wears on Sunday morning. A stain on the youth room carpet. Seemingly small conflicts have real potential to divide a congregation, but may also not really be what the people involved are upset about. One of my favorite sayings in ministry is, “this is not about that.” That is, whatever the presenting issue is (such as a complaint about tablecloths), is really about something else that won’t be as apparent (worries over finances that have resulted in no tablecloths). People deci…
Read more

Book Review: Outside the Lines by Mihee Kim-Kort

By
Image
Queerness transgresses boundaries and allows us to simply be, without label or category, specifically around gender and sexuality, Queer is at odds with the normal, the legitimate, the dominant. It is particular and expansive. It's less definitive; it does not point to you or me and say, "You are queer,," but instead makes a wide-open space for all people to find footing in relation to one another and their own lives. - Mihee Kim-Kort, Outside the Lines

Like many who perhaps are of a certain generation and older, "queer" was not something that you wanted to be called. It was used as a playground insult at my elementary school; an insult rooted in homophobia meant to sting the person at whom it was hurled. Whether one actually identified as LGBTQ or not, kids (particularly boys) tried their best to avoid being called queer.

As a derogatory term, of course, the word has been used in much more harmful ways at those who do identify in non-hetero terms. It is a labe…
Read more