Pick yourself up off the floor now.

Yes, seriously.

Here’s how it came to be:

Em didn’t score “at grade level” for both of her tests. What that means is the girls go to public school. Keith sent the girls’ mom an email after we got the test results telling her we enforcing having them placed in school. Then we got serious about talking to each other – and more importantly, God, about it.

We had been talking about how cheesy the “WWJD” bracelets and marketing campaign was but that in all reality, it is a good way to end your life – asking yourself “What would Jesus do in this situation?” Even for a non-Christian who maintains that Jesus was simply a nice guy, they can follow this. Well, I asked Keith to apply the WWJD school of thought to the girls’ education. He warned me if we did that, we might not like the outcome.

Know that we have been pushing to have the girls placed in school for six years now. For six years they have not succeeded in the homeschooling environment with their mother. For six years, we have been kept our of their education. Unfortuantely, for six years, there has been hostility between the girls’ mother and ourselves over education and the girls have picked up on it.

So I asked Keith to think about it: would Jesus put the girls in school?
*They are so far behind, could a teacher who has 25-30 students feasibly catch them up?
*They have been involved in church and a very small homeschool co-op and that’s all for socialization for six years. I love the girls to death, but they are not socially mature. They would get severly made fun of and would not make friends very easily.
*Quite honestly, what good was our education? What have we used of our public school education? Our algebra? What about our essay writing skills?
*Other than learning how to be promiscious, try drinking and drugs, be materialistic, be rude, be disrespectful, be greedy and be shallow what did we learn?

So, we have decided to let them stay in the homeschool environment – with a few changes:

*The girls will be involved in another, academic based co-op. The one they are in now is a socialization co-op. They need one that does learning together.
*The curriculum has to change. The curriculum they have been using is obviously not working. We have to get something new.
* The girls have to be involved in two extra-curriculars at a time. I know that sounds like a lot to some of you, but when you are done with school at 2PM, its not hard to get them to an art lesson or ballet recital. And no, girl scouts at home does not count.
* Oh, the big one? I get to co-teach. I can’t tell you how excited I am. And I know most of you are used to my sarcasm. This isn’t sarcasm. This is legit.

This decision is definitely the right one. I feel complete peace about it.
I cannot wait for the next school year to begin. Or rather, the summer to begin since we will be doing catch-up work over the summer!

If you have any great homeschooling resources, send em my way! And wish us luck, we have a meeting tomorrow to talk to the girls’ mother about everything.

Don’t worry – things are really good.

But I need to be more me.

I haven’t been blogging as much because of that nagging need to be careful and I am going to let go of that restraint.

So back to the blogging world.

That first year we planned and planned. We schemed and each of us tried to outdo the other with the best gifts and tokens of love. We made plans to spend the whole weekend together – alone – without kids. We packed up our things and headed over to the Hilton for the weekend. Or I guess I should say Keith did. I was at work. He set everything up at the hotel, candles, wine, etc. and made everything as romantic as possible. We had a jacuzzi tub – one of those heart ones I think. We ate dinner in the hotel and then opened the gifts that we had worked so hard to impress each other with: I bought Keith Danzig tickets and made him a three disc compilation CD set of unlikely love songs that I still play to this day featuring songs like The Dead Milkmen’s Punk Rock Girl, Sean Connery crooning In My Life, The Ramones’ I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend, stuff like that. I received some really cool retro pinup girl artwork that is hanging in our bedroom still and a piercing gun – that, you guessed it, gets used to this day (we really did pick out good gifts that year now that I think about it!). After that? I fell asleep. I think we got in the jacuzzi at some point (I have a vague recollection of that) but sleep is what I did all weekend. Keith watched TV. I must have been tired.

We have celebrated six Annivalmases since that first one. Thankfully they have improved in quality since that first one. We have headed to Atlanta, we have stayed in Chattanooga. We have handmade gifts, we have went all out and bought gifts we really couldn’t afford. But the main point of Annivalmas is to show each other as much love as we possibly can in one weekend. And they have all been love-filled – sleep-filled or not.

Since the inception of Annivalmas, we have added a couple of more holidays to the celebration: our birthdays. At first it was Keith’s because his birthday is so close to Christmas. Then it was mine because we began recently celebrating Annivalmas so late in the year and it’s only fair to add mine to the mix too. And Christmas. Now, I know… Christmas was originally on the list! BUT we still got presents at Christmas just not as many. Now its down to three – under $20 and we only do that because of the kids and extended family. I don’t think the kids would understand why Santa ignored us when we, obviously, haven’t been bad.

So, it’s almost Annivalmas time. Next weekend. I just realized that last night. Or was it the night before? Never mind. The point is, I haven’t thought of what to do and we are broke. This is our SIXTH Annivalmas so I have to do something special! I never thought we would make it to our second – never mind our sixth! So for all you creative people out there, what can I cheaply make for Annivalmas that has love written all over it?

But, I happened to stumble upon the Domestic Debacle today and realized that there are women out there who are stay at home moms (Ok, she’s also a part time pre-school teacher) but aren’t amazing housewives. I feel liberated!

Her site is amazing. She seems really cool and I want her to be my new best friend.

Go visit.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Please God, no more killing. Not today. I can’t watch anymore.” That is how the prayer went.

Off in the distance, Allen can hear the screams, the piercing blasts of gunfire, and the panic of sheer terror hits him. He knows all too well the significance of the sounds. How could he ever forget? They were the same sounds the heard right before the soldiers stormed his village and violently abducted his mother and father, brutally beating them to death to intimated and coerce other abductees.

On that horrible day, the rebels did leave Allen behind. But after hiding in the bush for weeks with five other boys, sleeping on the ground with no food or water, the rebels found them. Allen was only ten years old.

From the moment he was abducted, he was beaten two or three times a day and given little food or water. “Get up boy. It’s time to watch your friends die.” the rebel soldier yelled to Allen. He was forced to watch helplessly as the soldiers bludgeoned his friends in the head until they lay motionless in the gruesome pool of their own blood. Under threats of death, the rebels forced him to commit heinous acts of evil as well. He could feel his heart slipping into darkness.

Tonight, when Allen is sent to collect firewood, he plans to run. He will run hard…he’ll run until he collapses if he has to. Freedom is his dream. And maybe if he runs far enough he can live for a day with no killing and perhaps began to heal.

~ The Love Revolution – Joyce Meyer

Statistics say:
The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) abducted over thirty THOUSAND children to serve as soldiers or sex slaves in Uganda. In addition to being beaten, raped, and forced to march until exhausted, abducted children were forced to participate in the killing of other children who attempted to escape.

Child slavery is REAL. Not only are children just like my own being forced into wars, they are being used as sex slaves. EVERY DAY. It could happen to your child. Please take a moment and say a prayer for those in this situation. They desperately need it right now. This is a situation in which we say, What can I do? Its such a huge issue and what can one person do? The first step is to pray.

If this has moved you in the slightest, I ask you to visit Move For Uganda and watch the video. I understand that this walk takes place during church but you can do as Keith and I are doing and support someone who is walking and take place in the festivities at Coolidge Park after church. You may also become a fan of theirs on Facebook

For even more survivor testimonies, visit Polaris Project.

For an amazing 3:05 animated video on sex slavery, please visit Stop Child Slavery

And pray. Please pray for these children.

The girls always choose a theme for their party. This year Katie wants a Coraline party. Coraline. Coraline? Really? Come on. Make it hard on dear ole Stepmom. Last year it was a duck theme. Yellow and ducks. That was pretty simple. (Here is last year’s cupcake creation: ) But Coraline?

So I spent an entire weekend thinking up Coraline thoughts. Here we go: Black and dark purple for the colors. Then I thought, well what am I going to decorate? I mean, its a pool. What do you decorate? No streamers. No balloons. The plates and napkins and cups can be black and purple. The punch will be purple. Check. Then we can play pin the button eye on The Other Mother!!! What a cool game! But wait, the kids are going to be swimming. So no time for games. Uncheck that one.

I made the invitations Saturday:

That’s Coraline’s key for unlocking the door to the other world. We handed out most of the invitations Sunday and Monday.

Then there is the cake. I am making The Other Mother’s Birthday Cake.
I simply cannot wait. You guys know how much I love doing cakes. I was going to make cupcakes and simply put buttons on the top – that was my genius plan at first. But Keith didn’t think that was creative enough.

Abby found this cake:
but there is no way I can do that one.

So I pretty much have it planned out and all should be ok, no?

No.

Monday afternoon I received a call from the Rec Center. At first they told me that they had accidentally booked the party during swim lesson time and it wouldn’t work. I was fine with changing the time. A little miffed that they hadn’t told me that when I booked it, but fine with it. Then they said they made the mistake of booking it over Easter because none of the lifeguards wanted to work Easter weekend anyway so they couldn’t do it Easter weekend.

So I rescheduled for the next weekend Katie would be with us. The 17th. Then Keith told me later the girls have a dress rehearsal for ballet class that day. So I called back and re-rescheduled for the 10th. Come to find out, I have a church outreach that day. I am not rescheduling again.

Why can’t birthday parties be simple?

Next year really won’t be simple. Next year? Sweet Sixteen.

I don’t remember anything about the Environmental Club other than that one field trip. Hopefully our teacher doesn’t read my blog. See, I don’t even remember who the teacher was or I would have said “Hopefully Mrs. So-and-so doesn’t read my blog.” But no, Environmental club wasn’t that memorable.

All that to say, whoever the teacher was, she (it was a female) would be thrilled to see my garden plans this year. For two years now I have had a little mini garden. Or two little mini gardens. They are on the side of the back porch. Probably eight by four if I had to guess. Not big at all. Just a few plants: tomatoes, squash, cucumbers, lettuce, etc. This year I am planting a Garden. Notice the capital G?

I even created a spreadsheet for my garden. Alas, the spreadsheet was created on a borrowed laptop that has since been lost but I created it nonetheless. And I will recreate it sometime this weekend, hopefully. The spreadsheet listed every plant I am planning to plant, how many plants of each plant I am planting, when I am planting each, what plants go well with other plants, what plants don’t go with other plants and when each plants should be ready for harvesting.

Yesterday, I sat down with my favorite seed catalog. It’s from The Cook’s Garden and they have all kinds of wonderful yumminess waiting on me and my debit card. Now just to convince Keith that I need to hurry up and order. (Honey, if you are reading this, don’t you think it’s time? Pretty please?)

Seven Passages on Social Justice (3)

Posted By Kevin DeYoung On March 11, 2010 @ 6:03 am In Uncategorized | 18 Comments

Today I return to my series on social justice. As we look at the third of the seven passages we’ll see once again the Bible says more and less about social justice than we think. More, because God definitely and clearly commands his people to do justice. But less, because what the Bible means by doing justice is not always equivalent to contemporary notions of social justice.

Jeremiah 22

The basic command for this unit is given in verse 3: “Do justice and righteousness.” So there it is: God’s people (technically the kings in this verse) are commanded to do justice. We cannot obey God and ignore the divine call to justice.

In fact, the Lord tells the kings of Judah that judging the cause of the poor and needy (rightly) is to know him (15-16). It didn’t matter their titles, their wealth, or their religious observance, if the kings oppressed the poor instead of treating them fairly and mercifully, they proved their own ignorance of God. And if they continued in such flagrant disobedience, the kings and their kingdom would be wiped away (24-30).

So doing justice is hugely important. But what does it mean? Thankfully Jeremiah 22 gives us some answers.

Luxury by Tyranny

Jeremiah 21-22 were not addressed to anyone and everyone (though the chapters apply in various ways to all). These were words directly for the kings of Judah (21:3; 22:1, 11, 18). Ancient kings had tremendous power to do good or evil. To put it anachronistically, they wielded, all by themselves, executive, legislative, and judicial authority. They tried cases, made decrees, and enforced laws, just or unjust.

Tragically, in the waning years of Judah’s sovereignty, the kings acted unjustly on all three accounts. Their one overarching vice, what Phil Ryken calls “luxury by tyranny,” took many forms.

• The kings did not defend the oppressed against their oppressors (3a).

• They wronged the weak, even to the point of murder, shedding innocent blood for dishonest gain (3b, 17).

• They built their lavish houses by unrighteousness. This was not an instance of the rich getting richer as the poor also get richer. These kings, in an effort to live like the opulent kings of the other nations, conscripted forced labor and cheated the workers of their wages (13-16). They lived in luxury on the backs of the poor. The rich got richer because they made the poor poorer.

Doing Justice

Doing justice, against this backdrop of crimes, was not terribly complicated. It meant the kings would do the following: judge the poor fairly instead of exploiting them, stop cheating the poor and lining their own pockets through oppression, and quit snuffing out the weak in order to get their land or the stuff. No king, or any Israelite for that matter, guilty of these sins could possibly know, in a covenantal sense, the God of Israel. To know God was to obey him.

So here’s my unsexy, but hopefully exegetically faithful conclusion to this passage and others like it: Christians who do not cheat, swindle, rob, murder, accept bribes, defraud, and hold back agreed upon wages are probably doing justice. Christians guilty of these things are probably not Christians at all.

URL to article: http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/kevindeyoung/2010/03/11/seven-passages-on-social-justice-3/

Seven Passages on Social Justice (2)

Posted By Kevin DeYoung On March 3, 2010 @ 6:06 am In Uncategorized | 14 Comments

Isaiah 58 is the more famous cousin of Isaiah 1 [1], but they both deal with the same theme: God is not impressed with fastidious religious observance when the daily lives of his people are filled with negligence and oppression. God says, in effect, “Your fasting and sackcloth are meaningless to me so long as you continue in rank disobedience to more important commands.”

How were the Israelites sinful? They oppressed their workers, which usually meant defrauding them of agreed upon wages (v. 3; James 5:4). They quarreled and “hit with a wicked fist” (4). They conducted business and sought their own pleasure on the Sabbath (13).

What should God’s people have done? They should have loosed the bonds of injustice and let the oppressed go free (6). They should have shared bread with the hungry, clothed the naked, and welcomed in the homeless poor (7). God promised “your light [shall] break forth like the dawn and your healing shall spring up speedily” but only when the Israelites acted righteously and poured themselves out for the hungry and the afflicted (8-10).

Clearly, caring for the poor, the hungry, the afflicted is not a liberal thing to do. It is a biblical thing to do. We must allow this uncomfortable chapter to discomfort us a bit. Those of us in conservative circles can get all sorts of religious ritual right, but it counts for nothing and less than nothing if we do not love our neighbors as ourselves.

Calvin summarizes:

Uprightness and righteousness are divided into two parts; first, that we should injure nobody; and secondly, that we should bestow our wealth and abundance on the poor and needy. And these two ought to be joined together; for it is not enough to abstain from acts of injustice, if thou refuse thy assistance to the needy; nor will it be of much avail to render thine aid to the needy, if at the same time thou rob some of that which thou bestowest on others….These two parts, therefore, must be held together, provided only that we have our love of our neighbour approved and accepted by God (Commentary on Isaiah).

The implications of Isaiah 58 are straightforward: God’s people should hate oppression and love to help the poor.

Without wanting to mitigate this conclusion, let me offer two other comments.

1. Even though I’ve labeled this series with familiar phrase “social justice,” I don’t think that is best way to describe helping the poor. As I’ve pointed out before, “social justice” in its historical origins suggests a certain view of the world where disparity in wealth is considered de facto injustice. Therefore helping the poor is not a matter of kindness or mercy but a matter of justice. Everyone deserves their “fair share” of the society’s resources. Anything less is oppression.

But we see in Isaiah 58 that letting the oppressed go free is not the same as sharing your bread with the hungry. Granted, it could be. Perhaps the same people oppressing their workers were now being told to help them instead of harm them. But by definition, I would argue that pouring yourself out for the hungry is a matter of compassion for your fellow human being, not necessarily a matter of remedying an injustice.

2. While general principle–help the poor don’t harm them–is abundantly and repeatedly clear in Scripture, the application of this principle is less so. For example, does a passage like Isaiah 58 support state-sponsored redistribution efforts? Christians can and do argue for this, but this text certainly doesn’t require this solution to poverty.

And what should our priorities be in helping the poor? Are Christians responsible for everyone in the world? Everyone in society? I would argue there is an obligation first to our family (1 Tim. 5:8) and then to our brothers in the church (1 John 3:17; Gal. 6:10). Also, we should respond to urgent needs right in front of us when our assistance will be helpful (Luke 10:29-37). Finally, we should do good to everyone as we have opportunity as shaped by our vocation and calling (Gal. 6:10).

Other questions of application might include: What is the best way to help the poor in modern society? What about the poor overseas? To what degree is all of this the mission of the church and to what extent is this work simply the outgrowth of godly living in the world? Isaiah 58 doesn’t answer these and other questions. But it does lay the groundwork for caring about these questions and, more importantly, caring about the real people for whom questions about poverty and justice are not blog fodder but matters of life and death.

URL to article: http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/kevindeyoung/2010/03/03/seven-passages-on-social-justice-2/

Seven Passages on Social Justice (1)

Posted By Kevin DeYoung On February 25, 2010 @ 6:11 am In Uncategorized | 23 Comments

It’s no secret that social justice is a hot topic in evangelicalism, a popular pursuit and also controversial. Some see the renewed emphasis on the poor as nothing less than a rediscovery of a whole gospel. Others worry that an emphasis on social justice distracts the church from the primary role of evangelism. I’m not going to propose a third way between these two poles. I think a concern for the poor is essential to Christianity. And I think saving people from eternal suffering is more important than saving people from temporal suffering. That’s where I stand (and most evangelicals, I believe; the disagreement is in the details).

But I don’t want to settle disputes, real or imaginary. Instead, I want to examine seven major “social justice” passages over the next few weeks. (I’ll try to be concise so you will actually read the posts.) My contention is that these passages say more and less than we think, more about God’s heart for justice than some realize, and less about contemporary “social justice” than many imagine.

The seven passages are: Isaiah 1; Isaiah 58; Jeremiah 22; Amos 5; Micah 6:8; Luke 4/Isaiah 61; and Matthew 25. I know this leaves a lot out, but these seem to be the most commonly referenced sections. If you want my take on Leviticus 19 [1], Leviticus 25 [2], the concept of moral proximity [3], and the term “social justice” [4] follow the links in this sentence.

Isaiah 1

The first chapter of Isaiah begins with the Lord’s stinging rebuke of Judah and Jerusalem (1). They are rebellious children (2), lacking in understanding (3). Judah is a “sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity” (4). Because of their rebellion, God’s people have been struck down, bruised, bloodied, and besieged (5-8). Of course, God offers the hope of forgiveness and cleansing (10), but the dominant theme in the chapter is one of disappointment. God’s people have been wicked.

How so?

Well, their failure was not for lack of religious observance. They were meeting together for worship and keeping the festivals of the Lord. But the Lord was not impressed. He could no longer endure their iniquity and solemn assembly (13). He had come to hate their feasts and was burdened with their perfunctory obedience (14). The Lord would not even listen to their prayers (15).

Their problem was one that recurs often in prophetic literature: they were getting the details of religion right but not the heart of it. Outside of “church” the Israelites were doing evil, not good (16-17). In particular, they were guilty of injustice toward the fatherless and the widow, the basic categories in the Bible for the helpless and vulnerable (17).

What was the injustice? “Your princes are rebels and companions of thieves. Everyone loves a bribe and runs after gifts. They do not bring justice to the fatherless, and the widow’s cause does not come to them” (23). It seems the Lord was angry with his people because the leaders were oppressing the weak, taking bribes to side with the rich and powerful instead of treating fairly the orphan and the widow.

As we’ll see in most of these passages, Isaiah 1 is a great example of the Bible saying more and less about social justice than we think.

On the “more” side we see that Jerusalem is called a “whore” because of her injustice (21). Oppressing the poor and the helpless is not a negligible offense. In fact, it renders all their religious obedience null and void. Until they “seek justice” and “correct oppression” God promises that Judah will be “eaten by the sword” (17, 20).

But on the “less” side: notice that the oppression here is not a disparity between rich and poor or even that the poor in society are not taken care of. There are other biblical passages that require the covenant community to take care of the poor in their midst (which may not be identical to taking care of the poor in the entire “mixed” society), but this passage is about oppression, a term not to be equated with poverty.

The injustice was not that there were poor people in society. God’s people were guilty of injustice because they were defrauding the weak and helpless in order to line their own pockets. Specifically, God was angry with the kings because “in the ancient Near East, the concerns for justice, oppression, and the helpless were the special province of the king” (John Oswalt [5], 99). So God’s desire in Isaiah 1 related to social justice is for Judah’s king (and any other pertinent officials) to stop taking bribes and defend the just cause of the helpless instead of exploiting them. The prophetic rebuke of Isaiah 1 belongs on the men and women guilty of these crimes, but not on every individual, let alone every church, living in a city with poor people.

URL to article: http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/kevindeyoung/2010/02/25/seven-passages-on-social-justice-1/