Christian Carnival CCCXXV

Hey all! It's time once again for the Christian Carnival! I'm excited that KBT has the honor of hosting this week. The Carnival, for anyone who doesn't know, is a hosting-rotated blog carnival open to Christians of Protestant, Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox persuasions. If you want to learn more about the Carnival you can go here. If you want to submit an article you can do so here.

Also, dude, this edition of the Christian Carnival also holds the distinction of being KBT's 100th post ever. Rock on. I was going to try and organize this week's posts into overly broad categories but most posts didn't fit so neatly in my neat little boxes, so I gave up on that. (There are three money-related posts this week, which makes me wonder if maybe God's trying to tell me something.)

There's lots of awesome stuff this week. I don't necessarily endorse every word of the posts below, but I found it to be all edifying overall, and challenging in those few places I disagreed. (However, I really hated that jerk Dan Lower. He never knows what he's talking about.) Twenty-five submissions in all this week! Special thanks to Jeremy Pierce of Parableman for being patient with my questions about hosting.

The Banditts
kilama gives us "The Death of a Nation," a piece on abortion in America with some interesting facts.

The Bible Archive
Rey Reynoso presents "Ethics Beyond Duty (1 of 4)" which is "guestblogger Xulon writ[ing] about ethics beyond duty." Lots of fun Scriptural-ethical connections here.

Boston Bible Geeks
danny presents "What Happened to Onesimus?" Some thoughts about the fate of the New Testament runaway slave. danny comments: "Philemon is an often overlooked book, could that be because we don't know how the story ends? This post looks for clues to tell us what happened to Onesimus."

A Christian Mommy
Siobhan McGirr gives us "Sleep Well, Christian Moms!" Siobhan reflects on the value of sleep.

Church Bible
Chad Maslak presents "Christian Praise and Worship," which contains some good thoughts on worship and praise.

Crossroads: Where Faith and Inquiry Meet
Diane R writes "Working with Generations in the Church," noting "here is a primer on what is really going on generationally." Diane definitely made a connection I had not been so aware of before.

The Dating Divas
Tara presents "Let's Grow Old Together....", saying "I think that the sacredness of marriage is getting thrown out the window! I think that our journey though life should #1 - be focused on the Lord and #2 - be WITH our best friend! My friends and I started up a blog on which we post (weekly) creative and fun dates that we have taken our husbands on. This is to encourage us (...and to help out with the 'What Should We Do?' part...) to continue dating our spouses even AFTER we are married. My husband and I have been having SO much fun dating each other lately that it really bothered me lately when I heard some co-workers complaining about their husbands. I decided to write a post about my thoughts...thus the article: 'Let's Grow Old Together...' Enjoy!"

Doug Boude (rhymes with 'loud')
Doug Boude gives his "Top 20 Life Lessons for Husbands and Fathers." Doug's summary: "In this post, I've compiled what I consider to be the top 20 things that I believe, when implemented and adopted, maximize the success of a husband and/or father in his role in his household. Being a father of 8 children, 4 step children, and 2 grand children, I kinda feel like I'm speaking from experience here :)" Doug is also asking for ideas in comments if you've got them.

Free Money Finance
Free Money Finance's "The Bible on Money" offering this week is "The Bible on Debt". FMF's summary: "The Bible doesn't have a positive perspective on debt." No it does not.

Heart, Mind, Soul, and Strength
Weekend Fisher presents "Silencing Iago," which is "about politics, people who sow discord among brothers, and becoming peacemakers." WF makes some interesting connections.

IN HIM WE LIVE AND MOVE AND HAVE OUR BEING
NCSue presents "Mom and the doctor giveth, then mom and the doctor take away." The story Sue tells here is truly heartbreaking and raises lots of moral questions.

Journey Across the Sky
Allen Scott gives us "Gov. Regulation Fails to Regulate Bad Behavior." Allen's summary: "The sound of the word REGULATION gives a sense of safety. It makes people think there are people paid to keep an eye on certain industries and practices to make sure they operate within the law. But it turns out that those who are paid to keep watch are watching something else.These are hired hands, employees paid to be there, they have no vested interest in the people nor the families they are supposed to be looking out for. They are merely getting paid to do a job and when something bad happens they are quick to push the blame elsewhere. They have no concern over the well being of someone living hundreds or perhaps thousands of miles away. The halls of the government are cold and hollow."  If Allen's right about regulation, something has gone seriously wrong.

keyboard theologians
I (Dan Lower) humbly offer "In the Meantime," a brief reflection on single-hood and discernment.

Mike Austin's Blog
Michael W. Austin reviews J.P. Moreland's The Recalcitrant Imago Dei: Human Persons and the Failure of Naturalism. Mike also gives some samples of ideas from Moreland's book.

Old Testament and Ecology
Justin Allison presents "God who brings rain in Zechariah | Old Testament Creation Theology," which he calls "part of my study on Creation theology in Zechariah."

Open My Ears, Lord
Janis Van Keuren writes "A Fragrant Praise to the Creator", noting, "the fragrant orange blossoms and the bee buzzing between flowers lift praise to God simply by existing." Wonderful reflection.

Other Food: daily devo's
Violet N. presents "Erecting memorials on our knees." Violet gives a touching reflection here. She remarks that "it’s comforting to think of petitions uttered on behalf of friends, kids, family members, communities, countries, leaders, even the world as little crosses beside the streets of heaven..."

Personal Finance By The Book
Joe Plemon writes about "Why to Build Wealth…Five Wrong Reasons and One Right One," with the teaser: "Is the phrase "wealthy Christian" an oxymoron? It all depends on the motives for building wealth."

Pillar on the Rock
Chris Krycho reflects on how God uses bad things that happen in life for the Good in "How Dirt Makes Us Clean."

Redeeming Riches
Jason asks the question of "How Much Should a Christian Give?" Jason summarizes: "Why is tithing such a polarizing topic!? Find out how much a Christian should be giving!" This is the first in a three-part series, and raises lots of questions--not all money related.

Rely on God in your personal development.
bewisest.com presents "Do your work with faith." The post has some good thoughts on faith in God and getting work done.

Taste{Full}
Tiffany DeLangie presents "Need a Little Inspiration?" Tiffany looks at some recent CCM CDs.

Thinking in Christ
Russ White gives us "Und Now, You Vill Be Healthy." Russ's comments: "The government is moving to regulate our salt intake with the explicit goal of 'changing our taste,' over time. What will be declared 'unhealthy' next?" This is a disturbing trend.

who am i?
Barry Wallace gives us "John Piper and Rick Warren." Barry's description: "Here are a few links to articles addressing the recent John Piper / Rick Warren controversy." It's well worth checking these links out. I'd heard a little about this controversy but they served as a good introduction to the issues at hand.

You Can't Mean That!
Steven Demmler presents "Karl Barth on Openness and Growth." Steven notes, "I let Karl Barth speak for himself on the topic of theological openness and growth."

I was glad for the opportunity to host this week. It was really interesting to read all the different submissions and immerse myself in the issues they raised. I should note that a guy named Dan presented "Jewish Chat and Israel Chat," but Dan and his blog are Jewish, so I couldn't include it in the Christian Carnival proper, but I figured I'd throw out the link in case anyone wanted to see it.

If you want to submit a post to next week's carnival, please follow this link. Again, the Carnival is open to the Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholics and Protestants. Posts submitted need not be directly about faith or theology (e.g., they could be, among other things, about politics, homemaking, teaching, or underwater basket-weaving) but posts should proceed from a Christian world-view.