January 2017

Patriarchal homeschooling enclaves are dogged by rebellion against authority. Ask me. Ask your pastor. Ask anyone.

How does it happen that a movement promoting the authority of the father of the household also ends up promoting rebellion against the authorities God has ordained outside the home?

First, the children of patriarchal homeschooling families grow up being taught not to trust...

You might think I'm crazy, but as a pastor there's no service I'd rather lead than a wedding. Even when things go wrong there's always lots to love. You may not know you should think I'm crazy for feeling this way.

Many pastors dread weddings. For starters, they're one of the higher-pressure services we lead. The pastor gets caught between the wedding coordinator, the bride, and the mother of the bride. And if that weren't enough, the bridal party underestimates the importance of the rehearsal, the ushers rarely buy into the importance of their job, and musicians often want to wing things, so the stress really amps up and it's square on your shoulders. So why are weddings my favorite?

Maybe it's that I've officiated at enough weddings by now that I'm more comfortable with them. Having spent a decade or so in college ministry in a college community, weddings are a constant for us. Maybe also because I've managed to miss the most difficult weddings. For one reason or another, they were passed on to other pastors in our church.

But this past weekend I was honored with the privilege of officiating the wedding ceremony of...

The king’s wrath is like the roaring of a lion, But his favor is like dew on the grass. (Proverbs 19:12)

The Trump haters are in high dudgeon and they may just succeed in giving us one of the best presidents we've had in decades. Years ago, a friend said it's more important you have the right enemies than the right friends. Trump seems almost a genius in choosing his enemies. The pretty girls and boys of Hollywood. The drug-addled, sexually debauched music stars. The intellectually debauched talking heads of the media. All the Demoncrats united in their three-legged platform of grand theft from future generations, sodomy, and the slaughter of one-quarter of our nation's babies. Some gang, huh? 

So I think we've hit the Thomas principle. You remember what they tried to do to Clarence Thomas during his confirmation hearings? Attack a man relentlessly, trying to keep him out of office, and if he gets the position, you've succeeded in making him your implacable foe. It's bad enough when he becomes a sitting and sitting and sitting and sitting justice of the Supreme Court, but watch out when he's inaugurated the forty-fifth president of these United States...

We're turning off comments. We've allowed them for over twelve years now, so we have a proven track record of allowing both the friendly and the godless to disagree with us—and responding with equanimity. No one who knows the history of comments on Baylyblog can honestly accuse us of squelching disagreement. We don't even delete vicious slander!

But time. It's so time-consuming to respond, and generally speaking those who come here to scoff, preen, and parade their godlessness still must be responded to if we're to protect God's sheep.

It's also true that the Reformed celebrities never allow comments; and the few who do almost never deign to respond to criticisms or requests for clarifications themselves. The absence of comments on famous Reformed men's marketing sites is a big part of the reason we never...

Bloomberg reports:

The incoming Trump administration is considering moving White House press briefings out of the West Wing to accommodate more than the “Washington media elite,” President-elect Donald Trump’s press secretary said.

“This is about greater accessibility, more people in the process,” Sean Spicer said Sunday on Fox News Channel’s “Media Buzz.” Involving more people, including bloggers and others who aren’t from the mainstream media, “should be seen as a welcome change,” he said.

Bravo! I'm so tired of listening to mainstream media—including mainstream Christian media such as "World," "Gospel Coalition," "Desiring God," and "Christianity Today"—whine about blogs. I've seen these guys from the inside, working with and against them on national stories where I am in a position to know how and why they censor voices they don't like while promoting other voices that give them money.

Truth be told, "World" and "Christianity Today" need competition just as much as the "New York Times," the "Chicago Tribune," and Fox News.

After Trump's press conference this past week, I listened as Fox News's talking heads lamented having to keep tack of...