Sexual temptation

David Cook did a guest lecture about sexual temptation in church leadership. I took notes (which is after all the point).

Ten reasons for vulnerability:

1. Your office is in an isolated location.
2. You have a close relationship with people.
3. You have access to peoples' bedrooms when they are sick. (The only other profession that has this privilege is medicine).
4. You may be subject to stimulating conversation (eg by people telling about
   their sexual past because they mistakenly believe that you're not subject to sexual temptation).
5. You're eager to please.
6. You're susceptible to criticism (and so seek affection and support in its wake).
7. You (and those around you) suffer from the myth of invulnerability.
8. You may have weakened relationships with your family.
9. You may have had inadequate training about sexual temptation.
10. Your leadership status may turn you into a sex object.

His suggestions for prevention were to:

1. Have a public office and be careful to use appropriate touch;
2. Remember your secure standing in the Lord;
3. Spend quality time with your family;
4. Know yourself;
5. Be professional (eg leave your office door open, limit conversations, don't
   give assurance of confidentiality, always be able to share things with your
   spouse);
6. Take responsibility (like King David did);
7. Be accountable to someone (end by asking each other if you've lied in the conversation).

Bold compassion

Ash explains why Christian social ethics can be championed in a spirit of love rather than panic:

No institution that is part of the created order can be destroyed by human disobedience. Human nonconformity leads not to the destruction of the order, but to judgment on human beings. No Christian movement needs to defend marriage: rather we seek to protect human beings against the damage done to them by cutting across the grain of the order of marriage.

Ibid, 82.

Changed

It's dangerous and fruitless to be more enamoured with searching than with finding. Ash says it well:

[H]ermeneutics is more than simple open-mindedness. It has been said that the purpose of opening the mind, as of opening the mouth at a meal, is in order to close it on something. So Thiselton adds the perceptive observation of Paul Ricoeur that hermeneutics must involve a double dynamic: on the one hand, the interpreter must be inherently suspicious, particularly of himself and his presuppositions, but on the other, he must be willing to listen to the text and to obey as he understands . . . . To sit under the text of Scripture is to be uncomfortable; we ought to be suspicious of any hermeneutic which renders us more comfortable. The command to repent and believe is fundamental to the gospel and we never move beyond its stringent discipline.

C Ash, Marriage: Sex in the Service of God (Vancouver: Regent College Publishing, 2003), 79.

It's like . . .

Over the last few weeks I've preached the same sermon three times. David Cook said it would be a good idea. I was worried about losing my mojo, but he turned out to be right. The first time was in the midst of college madness and I didn't have time to think of any illustrations. Everyone commented on the clarity of my logic and structure. The second time I hardly changed a thing other than including some illustrations, and suddenly everyone was saying that my structure could be clearer. I guess this is because when you give an illustration everyone 'gets off the bus', and needs to be reminded where they were when they get back on again.

Classic Mikey treaties

Here's some Mikey gold for the two of you who didn't get here via his blog:

The value of working really hard

The value of careful planning [a real life example]

A critique of the house church movement [be sure to read all four parts!]

Cool conferences

SMBC is quietly putting on three ripper conferences in August and September. The first is a series of talks held over six Tuesday evenings (from the 3rd August to the 21st September) at which Ray Galea, Leon Stead, John Chapman, Simon Manchester and Grant Thorp will be speaking. It's to celebrate David Cook's 25th anniversary as principal of SMBC. The format's the really exciting thing - first the speaker will talk about the sort of preaching that's needed today, then they'll give their sermon, and then the speaker and David Cook will discuss how the sermon was prepared.

The second conference is from the 7th-9th September and it's on Communicating Isaiah. The exciting thing about this one is the speakers - our own Kirk Patston who teaches Isaiah and has just written a commentary and who I can't recommend enough; Paul House, the man who wrote that Old Testament Theology; and the lovely Ray Galea.

The last conference is on the 11 September and it's about Preaching the Old Testament with Integrity. Kirk and Paul will be speaking at that one too.

Language immersion from the comfort of home

If you want to learn another language and memorising vocabulary isn't your thing, here's what you should do. You should switch your gmail and facebook accounts over to that language: then everytime you go online you will have a small immersion experience. If you don't know what something says you can always use an online translator. To my delight, the internet today conspired to amplify the experience. Now, whenever I hover my cursor over a word on the internet, a pop-up window gives me a list of Spanish equivalents. ¡Eso!