I stumbled onto this link somewhere, and... well, I don't normally do things like this, but after my eschatology post last week, I thought maybe I should stick with something more on my level. Anyway, it was kind of fun for about five minutes, and it turned out about how I expected.

I don't know where the 10% Yankee comes from. It must have been that weekend I spent in New Hampshire & Massachusetts a few years ago, although the pastor of the church we visited was from Minnesota.

I'm especially proud of that 0% Dixie. Sorry, Phillip, Jason & Scott, Steve, and Jeremy. I still like listening to your sermons. Substance over style, you know. I wonder who else I've offended? Probably Jonathan, but I've never actually heard his voice, so I'm just guessing.

My apologies as well to all you blokes and blokettes (or whatever the proper vernacular is) that are no doubt feeling quite left out. The quiz just wasn't multi-cultural enough, was it?*

What, me, a king? Well, actually, yes. Even before Tim Challies, Pope of Christian Blogdom, crowned me King for a Week, I was predestined to the throne. Consider these facts:

In the French deck of cards, the Kings, Queens, and Jacks have names. The King of Hearts is “Charles,” probably after Charles the Great (Charlemagne), or possibly King Charles VII of France. The King of Diamonds is “César,” probably after Julius Cæsar. The King of Clubs is “Alexandre,” probably after Alexander the Great. The King of Spades, which you see here, is none other than {insert trumpet fanfare here} “David,” most likely after the King of Israel.

You will also notice that the French card has “R” for “Roi” where we are accustomed to seeing “K” for “King.” My middle name is “Leroy,” derived from the French “le roi.” From the day of my birth, I have been David the King.

I am told that “David” means “beloved,” which has nothing to do with any of this. It just adds a bit of warm fuzziness to this otherwise emotionless post.

So, welcome to my kingdom. Wipe your feet on the rug and come on in. We have a couple of small feasts planned for this week, but as usual, the best we have is plundered from neighboring castles. See the sidebar, under On the Web, for the freshest victuals.

Tomorrow, we have a very distinguished guest blogger lined up. See you then, and thanks for visiting.

Matthew Sims, one of the eminent writers at The World from our Window and proprietor of Under Sovereign Grace has offered a collection of John Piper sermons on CD for free. All I have to do is post a link his websites and to my favorite John Piper book, and a top ten list of my favorite theologians and books. So here you go, in no particular order:

Books
The Gospel According to Jesus by John MacArthur
Our Sufficiency in Christ by John MacArthur
Reckless Faith by John MacArthur
Ashamed of the Gospel by John MacArthur
The Psalms and Hymns of Isaac Watts by Isaac Watts
The Bondage of the Will by Martin Luther
Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan
Not a Chance by R.C. Sproul
The Treasury of David by Charles Spurgeon
The Westminster Pulpit by G. Campbell Morgan

Theologians
Matthew Sims (sucking up can’t hurt)
John MacArthur
R.C. Sproul
John Bunyan
John Calvin
Martin Luther
Isaac Watts
Francis Schaffer
Charles Spurgeon
Michael Beasley

Once again I am reminded of my own mortality. I guess I should have expected it, but when my "King for a Week" status stretched out to a fortnight, I suppose I began to settle into the throne a bit too comfortably. I began wondering what I had done to deserve my removal, but then I remembered that I hadn't done anything to deserve the crown in the first place, so I guess it's all fair. It should remind us all, though, that we can't put our trust in earthly kingdoms.

But seriously, I am thankful for the honor. Readership of this humble blog more than doubled for those two weeks. Maybe some of those readers will stay. Thanks to all of you who flatter me by reading my unoriginal, inconsistant postings. I hope you get something worthwhile out of your time here.

My successor to the throne is New Attitude. Long live the King! For a week or so, anyway.

Bloggers who have nothing to say write about their cats. At least that is what I have observed. Today I am writing about my cat. Draw your conclusions as you will.

When we lived in the country, we always had cats. We had to. It was either cats or mice, and we chose cats. Those cats were not pets, they were livestock—not like cattle, because we didn’t eat them, but like horses, because they had a job to do. When we moved to town, we didn’t bring any cats with us.

Then, last week, a kitten walked into the house and decided to stay. This one, I guess, is a pet. Her name is Dagmar. She hasn’t done a lick of work since she arrived, and I doubt she ever will. She sleeps a lot. When she wakes up, two little girls harass her until she makes a break for my office, where she climbs up my leg and promptly falls asleep on my lap. Sometimes she climbs across my keyboard, typing in tongues. I will be reading Charismatic Chaos to her soon. At least she meows in English.

So, now I have blogged about my cat. Can I sink much lower? Well, yes, I suppose I could have posted pictures, but then I would never be able to look in the mirror again, regardless of how devastatingly handsome I am. Here is a cat picture for anyone who cares to see one. It’s not our cat—I wish it was.

I wonder if this is what they call jumping the shark.

Steve Weaver has listed the books he read in 2006 (Shocking discovery: the Bible is not on the list!). Steve’s list got me thinking about my own reading, and the reading plan that I’ve been planning to plan for 2007, but have not yet planned; but I’m still planning on it.

I will be reading through the Bible in this nifty new 1599 Geneva Bible with updated spelling.

I want to read fewer contemporary works and more dead theologians this year. This is where you, dear reader, can help me. I’m looking for your recommendations of specific works in the following categories:

Church fathers
Reformers
Puritans

I am also hoping to read more church history. I have Schaff’s History of the Christian Church and D’Aubigne’s History of the Reformation in the Sixteenth Century. What are your favorite church history books? Do you know of a good single volume church history?

Tell me: what should I read in 2007?

Recommendations so far (that I don't already have):

Augustine, The City of God and The Trinity

John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion

Jonathan Edwards, The Religious Affections and Charity and its Fruits
Nathanael Ranew, Solitude Improved by Divine Meditation
Thomas Vincent, The True Christian's Love to the Unseen Christ
Thomas Watson, All Things for Good and The Art of Divine Contentment
John Owen, The Death of Death in the Death of Christ
Jeremiah Burroughs, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment
William Gurnell, The Christian In Complete Armor
J.C. Ryle, Warnings to the Churches

A.M. Renwick, The Story of the Church
Roland Bainton, Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther
Alister McGrath, A Life of John Calvin: A Study in the Shaping of Western Culture
Iain Murray, Jonathan Edwards: A new biography
Arnold Dallimore, George Whitefield: The Life and Times of the Great Evangelist of the Eighteenth Century

Loki will not be bringing us a Saturday Stupidity post today. I could make excuses for him, such as that he has been very busy while on sabbatical in Iceland working on his Doctoral dissertation (Pickled Herring in Nordic Theology), but the fact is that he is growing tired of it. He has suggested that I fill in for him, but I am really not that funny. We might revive regular Saturday Stupidity posts sometime in the future, but for now Loki might just pop in occasionally on a Saturday, we might fill in with something else at times, or we might just let the blog sleep.

Have a nice weekend.

I'm sitting at my wife's computer, cursing technology--or, rather, my dependence on technology that fails. After six years of mostly faithful service, my computer has crashed. Hopefully, I'll get it fixed fairly soon, but until then, I'll be mostly off-line. While I'm gone, take a look at The World from Our Window. Ken Fields is working on a sidebar links thingy similiar to my On the Web links.

Note to Jonathan Moorhead: Stop gloating. I will not be getting a Mac.

I've been working for the past 2+ weeks on my wife's computer, which, in technological terms, can best be described as a Girl's Computer®. It serves its function quite well, but it is definitely a weaker vessel compared to my Manly Machine®. Worse than the absent muscle is the desk setup, which is very uncomfortable for me. Anyway, I've been putting off fixing mine for reasons of time and economics. I have been busy trying to get some home remodeling done prior to the fast-approaching graduation shindig for my eldest daughter. That should explain both the time and economic constraints.

I've decided to come back, at least in a limited capacity, in spite of the present difficulties, because an amazing number of you keep coming even when I post nothing at all. Why do you do that? Is it the handsome picture at the head of the blog? Whatever it is, here I am, at your service. I spent the day going through my Bloglines, which I had not looked at since the crash, and I have posted one big Bucket O' Links. You may have already read many of them, but there they are.

I also want to direct you to some other good sources you can glean links from. First, as you likely already know, Challies A La Carte brings some great links that I never would come across in my reading. Then, of course, there is the King of linkage, Justin Taylor at Between Two Worlds. More recently, Ken Fields has installed a copycat to my On the Web blog. He does such a good job that I'm considering plugging it into my sidebar and hoping no one notices. Not really--his colors wouldn't match.

I'll post something more substantive soon, at least by next Lord's Day. Thanks for hanging in there with me.

I’m going to kill two birds with one 12-gauge light target load. First, Jen posted a quote from G.K. Chesterton that highlights a sad literary truth: “The poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of cheese.” Hard to believe, isn’t it? Sure, there may be a verse or two on cheese hidden away somewhere in a Shel Silverstein book, but I’m afraid this beautiful gift has been almost entirely, inexplicably, overlooked by the poets. I aim to rectify that.

Second, Brian, the sheepish one, has tagged me with one of those meme things. I reserve the right to arbitrarily choose to participate or not in any meme. Participation in this meme does not obligate me participate in any others. So there. So, here you go: cheese (or cheesy) poetry and 7 things that others may not know about me.

Cheese Couplets

Colby is fine, but what I like better
Is the lovely bouquet of extra-sharp cheddar.

For a good, tasty snack that will never miss,
Try a nice dunkel bier and a platter of Swiss.

My lips smack
When I eat Pepper Jack.

Grab a sheep and pull and squeeze—
That’s what it takes to make Bleu cheese.

Though Muenster cheese may sound quite German,
It’s American, like Munster (Herman).

Feta is a royal treat,
Although it smells a lot like feet.

When cheese smells bad, it means that it’s good—
I’d say that of my verses, if only I could.

7 Things about Me that You Might not Know

1. I scored high on my driver’s license and hunter’s safety tests. The rest of my academic record is a wreck. In spite of my lack of formal education, I am a grammar tyrant. If you use the word “like” improperly, I might correct you — even if you’re in the middle of a sermon. I even appreciate it when others correct my grammar, spelling, & punctuation. I also love math. I admire those guys who memorize π to a bunch of decimal places. Off-hand, I can do 3.141592. I’m such a nerd that I actually use all those digits when I do geometry.
2. Six of my eight children were born at home. I delivered four of them myself. My wife helped a little. She came in pretty handy.
3. I have worked with dairy, swine, and beef. Pigs are smarter than cows. Cows are smarter than sheep. Sheep are smarter than Democrats. Democrats are smarter than straw bales. I have also worked in construction. Straw bales are smarter than drywall hangers.
4. I‘ve been busted for drag racing on the highway. When I told my story — “We weren’t racing, I was just passing” — the judge laughed out loud. I was passing. Unfortunately, I was in the right lane.
5. I’ve only been kissed by two women other than my wife. The first was my boss’s wife at a New Year’s Eve party. I never saw it coming. The second was a girl in a bar in Glasgow, Montana, who found out it was my birthday. I’m pretty sure she had thrown up recently. My kissing experiences after that have been much better.
6. Andrea Bocelli is my favorite tenor. Christopher Parkening is my favorite guitarist. Yet I have a few Hank Williams tracks on my computer.
7. My rugged good looks are only rivaled by my poetic skill.

There you go. Am I not a wonder to behold?

In the interest of promoting Christian education, and to expand my practice of promoting other people’s work, I’ve decided to do a periodic book give-away. I haven’t decide how often, but I am tentatively thinking it will be quarterly, or monthly, at most. Now, I need your input. I will probably begin with a simple drawing, but I would like to try something more creative, like a contest. However, I want it to be fair, and I haven’t thought of a contest that I could judge fairly. I would appreciate any clever ideas you might have.

Don't be alarmed. It's just a picture. The actual book I'm giving away is much better. Well, the cover art is not as good, but the content will be much more satisfying. Here is how this will work this time. You email me by clicking here. Say whatever you want in the email, like maybe how brilliant, handsome, and charming I am, or make suggestions and offer constructive criticism, or say nothing at all if you prefer. Just include your name and make sure the subject line says "Book Give-away I," and you'll be entered in a drawing which will take place the first week in July. I am opening this first give-away to all who wish to enter. In the future, I may limit it to residents of the U.S. if shipping costs get out of hand.

And now, the book. I will be sending the lucky winner a book that I have recently finished (a new copy, not mine) and enjoyed very much. You may have read excerpts here, here, here, here, and here. It is Iain Murray's Revival & Revivalism: The Making and Marring of American Evangelicalism, 1750–1858. This is a good history of that era in America, and while more detail would have been nice at times, it could hardly be expected in only 480 pages covering over a century and the lives of dozens of significant men. At any rate, it is an excellent place to start and quite an engaging and easy read.

Update: new, improved explanation.

I'm no computer tech nerd. My web skills are really quite basic, gained largely through trial & error and by clicking "view page source" on web pages with interesting features. But I'm a fiddler and a tinkerer, so I can seldom just leave a newly-discovered function alone without customizing it. That's not always a good thing. I've messed up a lot of perfectly good code by trying just one more modification. Sometimes though, I have a genuine "Eureka!" moment when I figure out something really good. Today, I want to share one of those "Eureka!" moments. The techies out there will be mostly unimpressed, but perhaps some of you will find this useful.

I don't like sending readers to sites with questionable content. For that reason, I prefer to embed YouTube videos rather than link to YouTube. However, embedded videos are one of the things that can cause your page to load slowly. Also, they clutter up the appearance of the page. I therefore wanted to make the video open alone in a popup window.

First, I scavenged the code frome a page containing a popup image. In this case, it was from my own site. (Movable Type allows you to choose "popup" or "embedded" when uploading a file, and writes the code for you, so yes, I had done it before without knowing how.) Then I trimmed out the attributes I didn't need, such as scrollbars and the like. I then simply replaced the file URL with the YouTube video URL. This will not be the URL found in the address bar or to the right of the video on the YouTube page. It will be the URL found in the "embed" code directly below that, highlighted in red in this image. YouTube will not let you copy just the URL out of the "embed" code, so you will have to copy & paste the entire "embed" code and then copy the URL into your popup code. Just right-click on the "embed" code and click "copy." Then paste it into your blog post or any document. It will look like this:

<object width="425" height="350"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/yBsGFAXw6d4"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/yBsGFAXw6d4" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="350"></embed></object>

The URL is the part in red type, and is the only part you will keep. Delete the rest. The code you need, with the URL copied from the code above, looks like this:

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/yBsGFAXw6d4" onclick="window.open('http://www.youtube.com/v/yBsGFAXw6d4','popup', 'width=425, height=350'); return false">Where I learned My Computer Skills</a>

. . . and here's how it works:

Where I learned My Computer Skills

Now, here's another trick to give you further control over your content, this one thanks to the Desiring God blog. YouTube videos are automatically followed by a menu of related videos that you may or may not want appearing on your site. You can eliminate them by simply adding &rel=0 to the URL, like this:

http://www.youtube.com/v/yBsGFAXw6d4&rel=0

Finally, you can adjust the size of the video display by changing the width & height attributes, or go to full screen by simply omitting them. However, most YouTube videos are not of high enough resolution to display at full screen.

As I said, techies will be generally unimpressed with this, but my little brain thinks this is very cool. I hope someone finds it useful.

. . . but I'm blogspotting this guy because he says I should, and because he apparently considers Chevy aficionados to be "misguided." He obviously has the gift of discernment. Also, because it's the weekend and I've got nothing else anyway. So go visit Chez Kneel. He's presently recycling posts on Leviticus, which is more interesting than you might expect.

As promised, the winnerof Iain Muray's Revival & Revivalism: The Making and Marring of American Evangelicalism, 1750–1858 was drawn yesterday morning by an entirely impartial set of seven-year-old fingers. The winner is:

Shannon Jordan.

Congratulations; I hope you enjoy the book. To the rest of you, better luck next time. I encourage you to buy the book yourselves, which you can do in a couple of ways. You can buy it from Amazon by clicking this link, which would send a few nickels my way and help pay for these drawings, or, what would please me even more, you can buy it here from Monergism.com, and support one of the most useful online Christian ministries.

Thanks to all for reading and entering.

Jonathan Moorhead has tagged me to identify my worst and best post, a post on which I have changed my mind, and my most-commented-on post. So here they are:

Thirsty Theologian Worst post: I wrote a short post quite a while back on limited atonement that I disliked so much that I unpublished it. It was actually not a bad post. It was very Biblical, logical, and made its point quite well. Unfortunately, the point it made so well was not the point it claimed to make concerning the doctrine of limited atonement. In fact, according to its stated purpose, it was quite lame. I might, one day, republish it with a new title and introduction. Then it will be as brilliant as I originally thought it was.

Thirsty Theologian Best post: Saddam and I: Equally Unrighteous. See me in a rare moment of humility.

Thirsty Theologian Changed His Mind Post: None that I can recall. Yes, I am set in my ways. I have changed my mind on a few things since I began blogging, just not anything I’ve spouted off on here. One would be Modalism. I used to believe that Modalists were simply in error, but still genuine believers. I no longer believe that. Sorry, Bishop Jakes. Repent and believe, for the remission of your sins!

Thirsty Theologian Most Comments Post: I don’t know. Probably one in the God Gave C₂H₆O series. Controversy sells—better than beer.

“Tagged for humiliation” (Jonathan’s phrase):
• James White (because I would love to know if he’s ever changed his mind)
• Jason Robertson (because he needs another chance to rant about eschatology)
• Tim Challies (because he has never, ever, responded to a tag and I want to see if I can break his iron will)
• Brian Thornton (because he tagged me once, and it’s payback time)

This is one of those blog posts about blogging that I rarely read when others post them. Your time would be better spent clicking through.

Are they gone yet? OK, those of you who have nothing better to do and are still sitting in your parent's basement reading this, maybe you can answer a question. How does this Truth Laid Bear thing work? Does anyone know?

Back when I started blogging (May 2005), I was as much of a stats nerd as anyone. I registered my blog at truthlaidbear.com and joined the Blogdom of God (a title that seems hopelessly crass now) and the League of Reformed Bloggers. I watched my status—I think I acheived "Maurading Marsupial"—and got excited whenever I jumped a level. However, by the time I moved from thethirstytheologian.blogspot.com to thirstytheologian.com, I no longer cared. I didn't update my URL on any of those aggregators (I can't even remember my log-in at TTLB if I wanted to).

Yesterday, on a whim, I went to TTLB to check my status. I'm at 7698, right in the middle of the "Slithering Reptiles," in the neighborhood of, and even above, a couple of very fine blogs that I can't match for quality now, and certainly never did at that URL. 7698 out of 100,000+ blogs.

Folks, in case you've missed this point, this is not thirstytheologian.com I'm talking about. This is my abandoned blogspot blog. I am mystified. I know they haven't followed me here (could they do that?) because I get two to three times the traffic here that I ever got there, and about five times as many blogs link here, so whatever they go by, that doesn't fit.

I don't get it. Is TTLB as meaningless and useless as I think it is?

How many of you remember entering a book drawing at the beginning of last month? Well, on Sunday, at about 7:30 PM, deep in bowels of the Thirsty Theologian Complex, behind closed doors, amid hushed whispers and anxious nerves, two winners were selected to receive a copy of Assured by God: Living in the Fullness of God’s Grace. They are:

Bob Hayton

Bo Snagley

Congratulations, gentlemen. Now if you would just email me your mailing address, I'll get those out to you toute suite.

Uptate: The link above goes to Amazon. Monergism has it at a much better price.

A comment apparently left by the Russian mafia:

If you want do delete your site from our spam bases - just email us with domain of your site:

abuse-here@inbox.ru

thank you!

I ain't no fool. I wasn't born yesterday. I also didn't just fall off the turnip truck. That happened years ago.

On the odd chance that anyone has noticed, I have not been posting much in the last couple of weeks. I've been occupied with a few other things, one of which your tired eyes might appreciate. I'm working on a new template for the blog. I've gone through several ideas and discarded them, but I think I've settled on one that I will actually complete. It's going to be an entirely new theme, trimmed down and prettier. After 2½ years, it will be the first total makeover I've done. So look for The Thirsty Theologian 2.0, coming soon (soon being a relative term).

I've been working, little by little, on the new layout that I promised "soon" some time ago. Amateur that I am, I need to launch the home page to get a better idea of what I'm up to. So, if you're still out there, hang on. There may be some bumps ahead, and some features will be incomplete and others non-functioning. Firefox and Safari users will have the least trouble. Older versions of Internet Explorer will (I think) work better than IE 7.0. The trouble spots will be the nifty drop-down menus that I am just learning. At least I hope those are the only trouble spots. We'll see.

Addendum: You can help! Just tell me which of these fonts you are seeing in the header. Thank you very much.

Sheepish Brian has tagged me with one of those meme things. I’m supposed to tell you “seven things about myself that you don’t know about me.” Number one would be that I absolutely cannot resist pointing out the lousy structure of that phrase, except that I think I’ve already mentioned my grammar correction compulsion. I really couldn’t think of anything interesting, so here are seven mundane things you probably don’t know about me.

1. I eat Cheetos with a fork.
2. I’ve attended Baptist worship services twice in my life. They were two different churches on consecutive Sundays while looking for a new church. I haven’t been in a Baptist church since.
3. My favorite chip & dip combination is Pringles Jalapeño with plain sour cream. You can‘t eat Pringles with a fork, or I would.
4. I write two or three articles for every original one I actually post. I abandon two or three for every one I finish. Some frequently-posting bloggers affirm my feeling that this is a good thing.
5. I don’t shave my legs. I don’t actually understand why anyone does.
6. I’ve been to both coasts and two Canadian provinces, but I’ve never been south of Waterloo, Iowa.
7. I’m more handsome than I appear.

There you go: seven things you probably didn’t know about me — like you care.

Dear fdsfds,

Sometime after midnight on Sunday, February 17th — or 10:00 PM on Saturday where you are in the vicinity of Astoria, Oregon — you ran a Google search for “thirstytheologian.” At 12:43:57, you entered my site, spent 34 minutes and 19 seconds here, and left without commenting. Then you went to another blog and left an obscene and particularly juvenile comment.

I don’t know if you’ll ever come back here. I don’t know why you would, if you really think I “[obscene verb] [direct object].” But you did come intentionally looking for me, so maybe you will.

What were you thinking? That it would bother me that someone out there doesn’t like me? That you used childish, obscene language against me? Am I supposed to be offended? Angry? What?

I’ll tell you what I do feel. I feel sorry that you have not matured beyond playground insults. I feel sorry that you can’t express yourself as an intelligent adult. I feel sorry that you don’t have the courage to address me directly, which you could certainly do. I feel sorry that you are so threatened by something I have written that you feel the need to strike back.

Most of all, though, I am sorry that you don’t know, as I do, the forgiveness of sins that you can have through faith in Jesus Christ. You see, I’m not angry with you, because I was born in the same sinful condition as you. I’ve done and said far worse things than you wrote in your little comment. I deserve the eternal condemnation of God just as you do. But I have no fear of God’s wrath because Christ has taken my sin to the cross and borne it upon himself, and his perfect righteousness has been credited to me — which is good, because I had absolutely nothing to offer for myself, and no hope.

So rather than being angry with you, I pray that God will soften your heart, that you may humble yourself under his mighty hand, and trust in him for your eternal salvation. I pray that you will receive the same mercy and grace that I have. If you’d like to know more about salvation in Jesus Christ, feel free to email me (find the Contact link in the sidebar). I would welcome the opportunity to share my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, with you.

Updated

Don't expect to see much action here for a while. I've come down with a nasty bug that isn't quite threatening to kill me, but it's making me wish it would. I won't be posting the next Calvinism article until I can breathe again (I think it's influenza). I'll be back as soon as I can, unless this does kill me. Then, I guess I won't dfbvgbgfrbnmhgm, nbmhh hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

These are just a few bloggy notes.

1. Blogging will probably be as thin as usual this week, and next week there will be none at all*, not even linkage. The reason for this, as you may know, is that I will be traveling to Louisville KY for the 2008 Together for the Gospel Conference.
   • Please pray for all those who will be traveling†, for the speakers, and for all those involved in the considerable task of organizing and making it happen.
   • Pray that there will be no strife, particularly between me and this guy who called me weird, and this other guy who, on at least two occasions, hurt my feeling severely by resorting to cruel name-calling. I’m still bitter.
2. While I’m away, listen to these sermons:
   • Jonathan Moorhead’s sermon on 2 Timothy 2:1-6, A Biblical Philosophy of Missions.
   • Daniel’s sermon on Hebrews 12:1 (Part 1, Part 2). Turn the volume up. The audio is poor, but the preaching is excellent.
   There will be a test.
3. I’ve added a couple of categories to the sidebar, Shop here & Buy these. As noted at the bottom, any link marked with an asterisk is one that,if you use it, will send a few cents my way. I know such crass commercialization will offend some, but I have no apologies. First, I have never made any serious effort to make money off of this site, and I’m not starting now. I’m not linking to anything that I don’t whole-heartedly endorse (with the exception of the Amazon search box, of course). Second, if I was aggressively trying to produce revenue, I still would have no apologies. I am a committed capitalist, and do not hesitate for one moment to say that Jesus is, too. So use the links or don’t, just don’t bother me with your objections.‡
4. I might get another Calvinism post out before I go, or I might not.

Numbers — we all say we don’t care about them, some of us really mean it, but most, I think, can’t resist checking them from time to time. The numbers, we might think, tell us if we are as brilliant, profound, insightful, witty, and most of all, popular as we hope we are. The numbers I refer to are, of course, blog statistics. Our stats tell us, “Wow, people actually read my stuff!” or, that hardly anyone does.

Stats can either build our egos, or crush them. Most of us, no matter how small our numbers, can probably find some cause for pride in our stats. I recently did a little analysis to see what the numbers mean. I’m not sure I got it right, but if I did, my conclusion is that I have far less to be proud of than a superficial reading of the numbers indicates. Sure, I have x page loads, y unique visitors, and z returning visitors; but z is the only number that really means “I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and doggone it, people like me!” And that number is considerably smaller than x. So, here are my stats, in percent rather than numbers to avoid [ahem] boasting.

71% of you stay for less than 5 seconds. By “you,” of course, I mean “them,” because if you’re reading this, you’re not one of “them.” These are probably the folks who came here by way of a Google search for “asparagus and a theologian” and ended up here.

2% of you are also probably not reading this. You (they) check out in 30 seconds or less.

The remaining 27% of you are actually reading something. 10% stay for at least 30 seconds, but less than 5 minutes. That may not sound like much, but you can actually read quite a bit in 30 seconds. 4 minutes and 59 seconds is far more than I spend on almost any blog I read.

17% stick around a while and probably deserve some kind of award. 6% are here for 5 minutes to an hour (1% for 20 minutes or more). An amazing 11% stay for an hour or more. An hour? Here? These readers are most likely incarcerated somewhere, or they are Norwegian*, but not both; Norwegians never get incarcerated.

So, looking more closely at my stats was a rather humbling experience. But I’ve saved the worst for last: of the 573 posts on this site, the most popular is a guest post by an eighteen-year-old girl†. It’s a good thing I don’t care about the numbers.   . . . and [David] went and hanged himself.

As you may know, my wife and I attended the 2008 Together for the Gospel Conference. You may also know that they sent each of us home with a load of excellent books. That means that we came home with two of everything. Rather than drawing a name, as I have in the past, I’ve been trying to think of clever ways to give them away. A couple of weeks ago, I gave one to a reader who posted a comment that caught my attention. This time, I’m going to post a quote, and send a prize to the first two commenters who identify the writer.

What is the prize? Choose one book from the list below:

• Christ is All: The Piety of Horatius Bonar ed. by Michael Haykin and Darrin Brooker
• The Mortification of Sin by John Owen (Puritan Paperbacks, Abridged)
• Walking as He Walked by Joel Beeke
• reThink by Steve Wright
• Young, Restless, Reformed by Collin Hansen
• The Faithful Preacher by Thabiti Anyabwile
• In My Place Condemned He Stood by J. I. Packer and Mark Dever
• The Future of Justification by John Piper
• Pierced for Our Transgressions by Steve Jeffery, Michael Ovey, and Andrew Sach

Because I’m offering two prizes, you will have to email your answer to me here. Make sure the subject line says “Book Give-away III.” I’m closing the comments on this post until the winners are identified. Also, if I saw you at Together for the Gospel, consider yourself disqualified!

Now, name this writer:

Next to the perusal of the Scriptures, which I earnestly inculcate, I exhort my pupils to peruse Calvin’s commentaries, which I extol in loftier terms than Helmich himself; for I affirm that he excels beyond comparison in the interpretation of Scripture, and that his commentaries ought to be more highly valued than all that is handed down to us by the Library of the Fathers; so that I acknowledge him to have possessed above most others, or rather above all other men, what may be called an eminent gift of prophecy.

I will update this post as soon as we have a winner, so check back here for that announcement.

Update: I have two winners:

1. A. Jones
2. Lisa Bailes

Congratulations, and thanks for playing. Just email me once more with your mailing address and book choice, and I’ll send them right out. (If you are the number 2 winner, include a second choice in case you both choose the same book.)

Sorry, all you who guessed Spurgeon (and there were many). The Author was Arminius.

Watch this video of James White refuting Norman Geisler, especially if you are an Arminian (or one of those mythical “neither Calvinist nor Arminian” creatures). The first person to point out the glaring inconsistency — on Dr. White’s part, not Geisler’s — will receive a free copy of The Potter’s Freedom, compliments of the Thirsty Theologian.

Matt Gumm has condescended to enlighten us to how he writes, and has asked us to reciprocate. These are the questions he asks, and, for what they’re worth, my answers:

1. What blogging tools do you use?
   
   I type anything of any length in Word, because I’m fussy about stuff like smart quotes, and Word is the most convenient way to get that formatting. If I want to save a document to somewhere other than the blog, I use Google Docs. That way, I can access it from any computer. I don’t use Google Docs to edit html (though that would be very easy and convenient), because it adds a bunch of it’s own code that means nothing to me, and I must micromanage every jot and tittle. Anyway, the special formatting I do is easy enough to type in myself, or add in the blog editor (Movable Type).
   
   
2. How do you post?
   
   After #1 above, I select “Published” and click “Save.” Duh.
   
   
3. How do you get your ideas?
   
   Sporadically. Most of my posts are just bits of “what I’m reading.” Whenever I have an original thought(!), I write about it. Most of these are discarded as lame or useless. Sometimes, like now, I write in reaction to someone else; but I generally avoid doing so.
   
   
4. Who is your target audience?
   
   Me. That is, everything I post is the product of whatever I’ve taken in for my own benefit. I just post whatever is on my mind (see #3), and hope others will be edified thereby. Just lately I’ve begun using the blog as a discipline, à la Challies. I’ve blogged every day since June 1st. Forcing myself to put something out each day requires me to put something in first.
   
   
5. What do you hope to say or accomplish with your blog?
   
   Good question. I’m not really sure why I started blogging. I love to read, and I’m happy to take in all that I can even if I’m the only one who benefits from it; but if I can pass it along to others, that’s even better. If I have one goal, it might be that I’d like to be one small voice, tugging Christians away from all that is new, and back to the ancient truths of the Christian faith. Rather grandiose, I suppose, but I that’s my burden.

As regular readers may easily observe, this blog has become little more than a journal of “What I’m Reading Now.” I don’t really know why I started blogging, but it has become for me a stimulus to thought, and for the last six months, as I’ve posted every day, a means of disciplining myself to continue regular reading. I think this is a good purpose, and one I’d like to refine a bit.

Rather than simply rambling through one book after another, with no apparent rhyme or reason, I’m thinking of devoting each weekday to a theme. For example, I have several books I want to read on such subjects as the Canon of Scripture, textual criticism, hermeneutics, etc, so one day could be devoted to Bibliology. Church history could be one, and current issues another (for example, I still need to finish The Courage to be Protestant).

This is where you, gentle reader, come in. I will entertain your suggestions of possible categories or themes. What topics interest you? Leave your suggestions in the comments or email me here. Your input is appreciated.

Last Monday, I wrote a little about my intentions for the future of this blog. You offered some suggestions in the comments and via email, which I have considered, and I have decided on a schedule that I hope to stick to, more or less, for as long as it works. (How’s that for commitment?)

For a while now, I have been reserving Mondays for posting my own thoughts on whatever has been on my mind, or blog notes (such as this post). That will continue. I may take up the challenge to write a series on “How to Be a Christian.” Hopefully, I can come up with a less scary title.

Tuesday will be for Theology Proper, continuing with Knowing God for now.

Wednesday, I’ll tackle Bibliology, beginning, I think, with The Canon of Scripture by F. F. Bruce.

Thursday will Church History Day. I’ve got a couple church history sets I’d like to get into, as well as a few biographies and Iain Murray titles lined up, so we’ll have no shortage of material there.

Following the suggestion of “Good Fridays,” I’m going to dedicate Fridays to Gospel-centered material. Now, at least, I know what soteriology is.

Saturdays have been mostly frivolous to this point, and probably will still be at times, but I hope to give Saturdays to a mixture of other topics, such as current issues, and Church and Christian life.

Thanks for your input. It is, as always, welcome and appreciated. Now, I’ve got some reading to do.