Mark E. Joubert

Friends, if you have a moment, please pray for our friend Henry and his family (who we came to know during our time with Gus): after 1044 days of waiting, Henry's team has accepted a heart. By now surgery has begun. Behind the scenes a team has accepted and recovered the heart. Lord have mercy on this family, and be glorified in their circumstances. We know what it's like to be here and to have to wait. It is going to be a long night for them. As my wife said about this, he is "safe in God's care no matter what."

Thanks for the childhood memories!

Saddened to hear of the passing of Sir Patrick Stewart. As a kid, I watched episodes of Next Generation religiously. Stewart was a great actor, classically trained, he brought gravitas to the show. I started listening to classical music because of his character, Captain Picard.

Christianity contained the seeds of religious liberty, which long before and much more than an Enlightenment ideal, is a biblical idea. Especially for early Baptists in America, religious liberty was a launching point for domestic and foreign missions.

Samuel Sey's circumstances seem to be drawing out some mixed reactions based on his own commitments and convictions. Progressive anarchists: "hOw doEs hE liKe ICE nOw?" Postliberal ethnonationaists: "Yay! Send him back to Africa!" Disgusting behavior all around. 🤔

Interesting how X fed me this summary about Samuel Sey: "conservative Christian reactions split between celebration and calls for prayer and family reunion." From the things I've seen, it's not a split between "conservative Christian reactions." Let the reader understand.

A historic speech.

Recently put on Ben Hur (1959) and was reminded that Overtures were awesome. Miklós Rózsa composed over two and a half hours of symphonic music for Ben Hur, and won an Academy Award for Best Original Score for it.

A cause worth supporting:

The Baptist pastor Amos Wood (1758-1798) preached the election sermon before Gilman the same year. While he believed religious "law establishments" were "despotic," and that punishing men for what they believe "upon candid reflection" was "cruel and oppressive," he still affirmed the role of the magistrate in promoting religion "by public disapprobation of vice and immorality," asserting that "Magistrates derive peculiar respectability, in the performance of the duties, relative to their office, by a public declaration of their esteem and reverence for the christian religion." That this did not refer to the use of the arm of the state to promote Christianity is quite clear from the rest of the text, especially given that the very next paragraph anticipates the objection one might raise if they expected more from the magistrate. Countering the concern that religious liberty could lead to a "deluge of errors, absurdities and enthusiasm," he suggested that "we may with safety conclude, that religious tyranny has been the occasion of more hypocrisy, error and enthusiasm, than religious freedom ever was, or possibly can be." Punishing men for embracing "erroneous opinions," he averred, "is the most ready way to propagate them." "Of all human rights," he concluded, "those of private judgment in matters of religion seem most unalienable." Wood's views could be compared to those of the Baptist Oliver Hart, who likewise suggested that, as a Christian, a magistrate's relationship to the church was limited to positive example and personal piety—but not explicit legal enactments that favored a particular religious sect. Hart suggested Christian magistrates had "no authority to enact laws to bind the consciences of men," "compel men to be of this, that, or the other religion," or "impose taxes...for the support of religion." However, he did urge that they should "protect and defend" the church "with all other citizens of the state," "attend to the service of the church," "contribute cheerfully and liberally towards defraying the expenses of the church," and "pay a suitable regard to the ministers of the church."

Tragic. Thankfully, it appears @LMPD apprehended the perpetrator.

Robertson was a humble scholar captivated by the glory of God as it is revealed in the Word of God. Take this excerpt from his lectures on Philippians: "Modern critics fail to understand Paul because of failure to know Jesus as Paul knew Him by rich experience of heart and soul. I confess to a feeling of reverent hesitation as I venture to enter afresh this Holy of Holies of Paul's Life in Christ. Here [in the book of Philippians] we see in clear outline, not only Paul's Joy in Life, but his Joy in Death, a message sorely needed by many stricken hearts during these dreadful days of war [he wrote this in 1917, during WWI]. Paul was able to see the Face of Christ in Death since Death brought Christ in all His fullness." Here he added a poignant footnote at publication, having recently lost his daughter Charlotte, only 17, to typhoid: "Once more, as I read the proof of this page, I am called upon to find Christ in Death, in the going of my young daughter, Charlotte, who loved Jesus utterly." This is what Christian scholarship should look like.

Talarico using Christianity. It's not surprising, heretic pastor or otherwise. The 2024 DNC, for those who recall, was very religious. In fact, including Warnock's political 'sermon', it might have been more explicitly 'Christian' overall than the RNC. Both sides use religion.

Baptist maxxing.