Mission Potpourri

Time for a little Mission Potpourri. Every so often I’ll give you a few quick takes on what has been on my mind. Enjoy. Sports. As you know, my son is a student at Auburn University in Alabama. I watched the game against LSU Saturday and regardless of your view on a disputed pass interference call, it was a classic game. Maybe one of the top five I have ever watched. Smash mouth football at its best! It’ll be interesting to see if Tiger Woods will have a positive impact impact on our Ryder Cup team. That's a golf tournament for the uninitiated. I believe his consistency is better suited over a four day tournament, as opposed to match play, but we’ll see. Since Tiger came along, we’ve been paper tigers against the Europeans. Life. Came across a great article on immigration today. Click here to check it out. It is the kind of article I expect people who want to comment intelligently on immigration to read. I am not being an apologist for either side; I just hope people will look at the entire issue before making their judgment. I am listening to a little Dean Martin music right now. I am not sure when I got into the “crooners” as I call them, but it was fairly recently. This guy’s voice sure was pure. Good stuff. Politics. In case you did not know, I love politics. But I have a hard and fast rule, you don’t vote, keep quiet. It’s like commenting on a party you did not attend. I mean, the cost of admission here is pretty cheap. A few minutes every year or so. And it is good for our country. I love “Meet the Press.” For the uninitiated, it is one of those Sunday morning political interview shows. It is hosted by Tim Russert, a great interviewer who is generally tough, but fair. I’ll usually get up early on Sunday mornings before church to get ready so I can watch it. This Sunday he had the candidates for Senate from Virginia. Without giving you all of the gory details, I’ll just say the Republicans have a problem with George Allen. From what I saw, former Republican, Secretary of the Navy, and Vietnam War hero James Webb looks like a real winner against Allen. I am not sure the Dems win the Senate, but I think they win the House in November. Click here and follow the links to watch it the show. God. Have you been in a “Christian Book Store” lately? Am I missing something or what? Where are the books? If you took out the music and Christian knick knacks, the stores would be empty. I was in a store recently and you know what greeted me? A life size cardboard Joel Osteen. Smiling and looking like he was no older than about 15. Does this guy shave yet? For the uninitiated, Mr. Osteen belongs to the prosperity doctrine/christian lite side of the ledger. How come they never have cardboard pictures of serious theologians? No J.I. Packer. No Matthew Henry. No Kierkegaard. No Barth. Just people like Osteen, Lucado, and Joyce Meyer. Maybe it's the pipe... or the robe. Or, could it be that the serious guys don't have gold circles around their pictures? I wonder what this says about us? Finally, Sunday I had an opportunity to preach at a multilingual church in West Los Angeles. Many of the people there speak Spanish, English and/or Zapotec, an indigenous language from Oaxaca, Mexico. It was a great Sunday. Rarely have I felt as much at home as I did Sunday. I am always thankful to God for times like yesterday. Blessings to all. We’ll be back Wednesday with this weeks college football rankings.