Stones Cry Out

I love soaring, poetic speeches, and I particularly appreciate beautifully written short speeches that inspire. I blogged on inspiring short speeches in November 2004

I’m thinking today of great speeches I’ve witnessed in person.

The Enduring Revolution

First, a speech by Charles Colson on September 2, 1993 after he was awarded the $1 million Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion, which he donated to the ministry of Prison Fellowship. Now defunct Moody magazine described (Nov. 8, 1993) the setting:

“Prison Fellowship chairman Charles Colson faced a situation that mirrors what the church as a whole faces. People of several faiths, many of whom were attending the Parliament of the World’s Religions, gathered at Rockefeller Chapel on the campus of the University of Chicago to hear an address on religious liberty. What do evangelicals have to say in a pluralistic setting? How do we talk about the cultural role of religion with those who worship other gods? As the winner of the 1993 Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion, Mr. Colson had earned the right to stand on the platform. The speech, titled The Enduring Revolution, is what he said when he got there.

 

An excerpt:

We stand at a pivotal moment in history, when nations around the world are looking westward. In the past five years, the balance of world power shifted dramatically. Suddenly, remarkably, almost inexplicably, one of history’s most sustained assaults on freedom
collapsed before our eyes.

The world was changed, not through the militant dialectic of communism, but through the power of unarmed truth. It found revolution in the highest hopes of common men. Love of liberty steeled under the weight of tyranny; the path of the future was charted in prison cells.

This revolution’s symbolic moment was May Day 1990. Protesters followed the tanks, missiles, and troops rumbling across Red Square. One, a bearded Orthodox monk, darted under the reviewing stand where Gorbachev and other Soviet leaders stood. He thrust a huge crucifix into the air, shouting above the crowd, “Mikhail Sergeyevich! Christ is risen!”

Gorbachev turned and walked off the platform.

Across a continent the signal went. In defiant hope a spell was broken. The lies of decades were exposed. Fear and terror fled. And millions awoke as from a long nightmare.

Their waking dream is a world revolution. Almost overnight the western model of economic, political, and social liberty has captured the imagination of reformers and given hope to the oppressed. We saw it at Tiananmen Square, where a replica of the Statue of Liberty, an icon of western freedom, became a symbol of Chinese hope. We saw it in Czechoslovakia when a worker stood before a desolate factory and read to a crowd, with tears in his eyes, the American Declaration of Independence.

This is one of history’s defining moments. The faults of the West are evident — but equally evident are the extraordinary gifts it has to offer the world. The gift of markets that increase living standards and choices. The gift of political institutions where power flows from the consent of the governed, not the barrel of a gun. The gift of social beliefs that encourage tolerance and individual autonomy.

Free markets. Free governments. Free minds.

Read the full speech, especially the masterful description of the Four Horsemen of the Modern Apocalypse.

A personal note: Jonathan Aitken related in his biography Charles Colson: A Life Redeemed, how I—as Colson’s executive assistant—employed some harmless yet somewhat Colsonian means to fill the Rockefeller Chapel for Chuck’s speech.

The Second Inaugural

The second speech on today’s list is George W. Bush’s 2nd Inaugural Address. My wife and I were on the Capitol lawn, close enough to be part of the event and see the participants, but honestly not close enough to see facial expressions, except on the big screen.

It was, I believe, every bit as masterful and soaring as Kennedy’s famous inaugural. Once people are done hating Bush, his second inaugural will be listed as one of the greatest presidential inaugurals in American history:

Excerpt:

We go forward with complete confidence in the eventual triumph of freedom. Not because history runs on the wheels of inevitability; it is human choices that move events. Not because we consider ourselves a chosen nation; God moves and chooses as He wills. We have confidence because freedom is the permanent hope of mankind, the hunger in dark places, the longing of the soul. When our Founders declared a new order of the ages; when soldiers died in wave upon wave for a union based on liberty; when citizens marched in peaceful outrage under the banner “Freedom Now” – they were acting on an ancient hope that is meant to be fulfilled. History has an ebb and flow of justice, but history also has a visible direction, set by liberty and the Author of Liberty.

Notice how Bush tapped Lincoln’s second inaugural for some language.

(Other than the fact that I heard both of these speeches in person, what do these two speeches have in common? This answer to this question is at the end of the post.)

Edwards/Cuomo

There’s been a lot of talk about the strength of John Edwards’ Two Americas speech (regardless of what you think of encouraging class warfare) But notice how he tapped what many see as one of the finest political speeches of our era, Mario Cuomo’s Two Cities speech at the 1984 Democratic convention.

Excerpt:

Ten days ago, President Reagan admitted that although some people in this country seemed to be doing well nowadays, others were unhappy, even worried, about themselves, their families, and their futures. The President said that he didn’t understand that fear. He said, “Why, this country is a shining city on a hill.” And the President is right. In many ways we are a shining city on a hill.
But the hard truth is that not everyone is sharing in this city’s splendor and glory. A shining city is perhaps all the President sees from the portico of the White House and the veranda of his ranch, where everyone seems to be doing well. But there’s another city; there’s another part to the shining the city; the part where some people can’t pay their mortgages, and most young people can’t afford one; where students can’t afford the education they need, and middle-class parents watch the dreams they hold for their children evaporate.
In this part of the city there are more poor than ever, more families in trouble, more and more people who need help but can’t find it. Even worse: There are elderly people who tremble in the basements of the houses there. And there are people who sleep in the city streets, in the gutter, where the glitter doesn’t show. There are ghettos where thousands of young people, without a job or an education, give their lives away to drug dealers every day. There is despair, Mr. President, in the faces that you don’t see, in the places that you don’t visit in your shining city.

In fact, Mr. President, this is a nation — Mr. President you ought to know that this nation is more a “Tale of Two Cities” than it is just a “Shining City on a Hill.”

The Most Important Forgotten Words of George Washington

The first George W. saved a young nation with the power of his words and his presence prior to the signing of the peace treaty of 1783. Restless American troops, unhappy with Congress, were scheming a military coup. Washington heard the rumors and surprised a room full of gathered officers, striding to the front of the room and speaking to them. The speech was evidently unremarkable, but what happened next was not:

Following his address Washington studied the faces of his audience. He could see that they were still confused, uncertain, not quite appreciating or comprehending what he had tried to impart in his speech. With a sigh, he removed from his pocket a letter and announced it was from a member of Congress, and that he now wished to read it to them. He produced the letter, gazed upon it, manipulated it without speaking. What was wrong, some of the men wondered. Why did he delay? Washington now reached into a pocket and brought out a pair of new reading glasses. Only those nearest to him knew he lately required them, and he had never worn them in public. Then he spoke: “Gentlemen, you will permit me to put on my spectacles, for I have not only grown gray but almost blind in the service of my country.” This simple act and statement by their venerated commander, coupled with remembrances of battles and privations shared together with him, and their sense of shame at their present approach to the threshold of treason, was more effective than the most eloquent oratory. As he read the letter to their unlistening ears, many were in tears from the recollections and emotions which flooded their memories. As Maj. Samuel Shaw, who was present, put it in his journal, ” There was something so natural, so unaffected in this appeal as rendered it superior to the most studied oratory. It forced its way to the heart, and you might see sensibility moisten every eye.”

Finishing, Washington carefully and deliberately folded the letter, took off his glasses, and exited briskly from the hall. Immediately, Knox and others faithful to Washington offered resolutions affirming their appreciation for their commander in chief, and pledging their patriotism and loyalty to the Congress, deploring and regretting those threats and actions which had been uttered and suggested. What support Gates and his group may have enjoyed at the outset of the meeting now completely disintegrated, and the Newburgh conspiracy collapsed.

American Rhetoric has its ranking of the Top 100 American speeches

Answer to the earlier question about Colson’s Templeton Address and Bush’s Second Inaugural: Both speeches were drafted by speechwriter Michael Gerson, who began his career as a writer for Colson immediately following his graduation from Wheaton College, and went on to write for the president. Any question about who wrote much of the tremendous, spiritually rich prose for Bush will be put to rest if you read The Enduring Revolution.

1. Of multiple “validities.”
2. For the liberals reading this, are these “two cherished axioms” accurate? And if so, what does it then mean to discuss matters with conservatives in good faith?
3. Not unrelated .. uhm, that’s not what any conservatives I know think of liberal ideas.
4. Alas, one of the best ways to “double exports” is kill the value of the dollar.
5. Fannie, Freddie and the bear.
6. On Ms Palin.
7. Life and regret.
8. Fasting and the Christian life.
9. Chicago elections.
10. One way to put it, the conflict is between rationing by the arrogant technocrats and ignorant consumers.
11. We’ll have to see if this one has legs.

[I am working on a project that may become a book on the most influential evangelicals leaders of our generation, since 1976, and the impact they’ve had on the church and their times. I will introduce them briefly on this blog from time to time.]

# 4 Ted W. Engstrom. Executive Leadership 1916-2006

The strength and breadth of today’s evangelical movement—the evangelical part of the Christian church—is due in large part to the foundations started in the 1950s and built over the last generation. Among these foundations are the organizations, associations, and businesses that many call the para-church. These groups, focused on a specific part of the church’s overall work, complemented the ministry of the churches, but they also clearly transcended the churches in public perception and effectiveness on many tasks. This may be because of their focus, the attractiveness of these endeavors to entrepreneurs and their ability to attract expertise, absence of geographic boundaries, and the ability to raise funds in new ways.

This growing wing of the church was led by a new crop of individuals who at first came from the churches—pastors who had a calling to pursue a specific area of ministry, such as international relief, child evangelism, or radio programming—and over time included more and more management professionals who moved from their secular jobs to lead these Christian organizations.

[As the new para-church flank developed over the last generation, many church insiders—pastors, church staff, denominational executives—naturally began to resent the higher profile of these groups, and especially their ability to raise large budgets, even as individual churches struggled to build a new children’s wing or put in a new furnace.]

One of the early giants was Ted W. Engstrom, a large kindly man with round edges and a hitch in his step who led through spiritual infusion, seasoned wisdom, and a steady hand.

For more than half a century, Engstrom’s colleagues became accustomed to his frequent correspondence (signed with his initials, TWE), which graced the management logs of three of the early giants of the para-church. Engstrom, who graduated from Taylor University, was editorial director and general manager of Zondervan Publishing House, and became president of Youth for Christ International (where some of the crusades featured a young evangelist named Graham) before joining World Vision International in 1963. It was his leadership at these organizations, and then his role as a mentor for scores of up-and-coming executives in the Christian world, that provided a steady hand to the rudder of the growing evangelical movement.

Engstrom’s management advice could apply to many situations we face today: He said:

“We terribly overestimate what we can do in one year and underestimate what we can do in five. Start by realizing that you can’t get out of this mess in one year. But you can lay a foundation that can get you out of this mess in three or five years. By planning now, you can get some control over your time.”

I worked at World Vision during Engstrom’s years as Executive Vice President, and I was his ghost writer for many internal and some external communications. During this years, Engstrom emphasized three things above all:

Evangelism: While many of the projects of groups such as World Vision concentrated on practical problems, Engstrom continued to drive for an evangelistic element in every program.

Time Management: he led Managing Your Time seminars for many years with World Vision colleague Ed Dayton.

Generosity: His motto—“We are in business to give ourselves away.” He recognized that groups such as World Vision were becoming centers of not only funds but also expertise, and he demonstrated his commitment to sharing this with others in the church.

The Christian Leadership Alliance established the Engstrom Institute as a home for their executive leadership training and resources. CLA says that Engstrom “is recognized for making one key contribution to 20th century American evangelical culture: introducing standard business practices and management principles to churches and other faith-based institutions. These often went awry because they paid too little attention to the bottom line.”

The evangelical firmament has relied not only by the brightest stars, but also the gravity that held the constellations together. Ted Engstrom had that gravity—the para-church was his platform and an emerging force in the focused activity of the American church.

In one of the McCain/Obama debates, candidate Obama promised this:

So there are some — some things that we’ve got to do structurally to make sure that we can compete in this global economy. We can’t shortchange those things. We’ve got to eliminate programs that don’t work, and we’ve got to make sure that the programs that we do have are more efficient and cost less.

OK then, how about the Head-Start program?  Does it work?  Not according to HHS.

“Head Start,” the flagship pre-kindergarten program introduced in 1965, has been a $166 billion failure. That’s the upshot of a sophisticated multi-year study just released by the Department of Health and Human Services.

An earlier iteration of the study, published in 2005, had found a few modest improvements in the language skills of participating students while they were enrolled in the program. But by the end of the first grade, even those few effects have disappeared, according to the follow-up released this month. Out of 44 separate cognitive tests given to former Head Start students at the end of the first grade, only two showed even marginally significant effects. The other 42 showed no statistically significant effect at all.

But even that overstates the case for Head Start. That’s because, on each of the 44 separate tests, there is a 1 in 10 chance of a false positive: a test result that appears to show a positive impact but is really just a random fluke. With so many test results, we’d expect to see at least a few false positives. Statisticians have ways to control for this problem, and when the authors themselves applied such a control, they found that the two apparently “significant” effects vanished.

What’s more, this applies to all the non-cognitive tests administered to students as well. After controlling for the likelihood of false positives, the study’s authors found no “socio-emotional” benefits and no “parenting practice” benefits either. No benefits to Head Start of any kind at the end of first grade. None.

Government education programs just give liberals the warm fuzzies, but we’ve spent half a century dumping money down this particular drain and no Democrat worth his NEA card would dare touch it.  Certainly President Obama won’t; he increased funding by more than a full one-third last year, and he shows no sign of stopping.

We’re not getting our money’s worth with Head Start, so how about funding another program that shows demonstrable results?

But President Obama and Congress have already had a golden opportunity to show that they will heed their own scientific evidence, supporting what works and what is efficient: the D.C. private school voucher program. The latest Department of Education study revealed that after attending private schools for three years, voucher-receiving students were reading more than two grade levels ahead of the randomized control group who had remained in public schools. What’s more, the average voucher value was a mere $6,600, compared to D.C. per-pupil education spending of over $28,000.

What did Congress do to the program that has proven itself dramatically more effective and many times more efficient than D.C.’s public system? They decided to sunset its funding, effectively killing it. What did President Obama do to save it? Nothing. He let it die despite having previously said that “if there was any argument for vouchers it was, ‘Let’s see if the experiment works.’ And if it does, whatever my preconception, you do what’s best for kids.”

Or not.

Don’t listen to what they say, watch what they do.  Democrats kill education programs that work and pour money into those that don’t.  The voucher program is a classic conservative, free-market approach to education, and it works.  We need more policies like it.

[I am working on a project that may become a book on the most influential evangelicals leaders of our generation, since 1976, and the impact they’ve had on the church and their times. I will introduce them briefly on this blog from time to time.  Who do you think should be on this list?].

Phil Vischer. Cartoonist. b.1966

Primary among the recognized responsibilities of the parents, teachers and, and story tellers of every generation is to educate and socialize their children, and to explain their understanding of the meaning of life, the virtues and truths of their faith, and the principles necessary to thrive in this world and to grasp the hand of the God who transcends time.

Since 1993, one of the principal communicators of religious culture to the children of the nation has not been huge organizations such as Awana Clubs or Child Evangelism Fellowship, the home school movement, or even the Sunday schools, but Bob the Tomato, Larry the Cucumber, and their vegetable cohorts at Veggie Tales—the creations of a bright but quirky Bible college dropout from southeast Iowa, Phil Vischer.

This may seem like an overstatement, but rarely has a line of programs or products dominated a field as thoroughly as Veggie Tales shorts and films (now more than 31) did the children’s religious education/entertainment since 1993.

Christianity Today reported:

“Before the singing vegetables of VeggieTales hit the scene, there had never been a Christian video series that sold 25 million copies. There had never ever been a fully computer-animated feature (Pixar’s Toy Story was still two years away). And there had never ever, ever been Christian-produced entertainment so funny and smart that viewers did not realize they were receiving moral instruction.”

Veggie Tales was introduced to the world as productions of Big Idea, founded in 1989 by Vischer and his college firend, Mike Nawrocki. The company officially launched in 1993 with its first Video, Where’s God When I’m S-Scared?.

Vischer was born and raised in the southeast Iowa rivertown, Muscatine, the second of three children of a prestigious but tormented Christian family. His paternal grandfather was a founder of the Bandag tire company based in Muscatine, and his maternal grandfather the longtime director of the Okoboji Lakes Bible and Missionary Conference (Christian and Missionary Alliance). His mother is a professor at Wheaton College. Phil tells his personal story in Me, Myself & Bob.

I spent my middle and high school years living across the street from the Vischer family, and Phil’s parents were my youth group leaders at Mulford Evangelical Free Church. I remember young Phil, 12 years my junior, as Flip–a longtime nickname he was happy to abandon as he grew older. When Phil began making films, those of us who knew him well were not at all surprised by the off-beat humor or cartoonish voices. They were simply an outgrowth of Phil’s persona. Our only surprise was how rapidly Veggie Tales exploded in the Christian marketplace (not surprised because the products were poor but because, as Jesus found, a prophet is without honor in his hometown).

The discussion of creating culture and penetrating existing cultural forms is often a heady exercise of sociologists and missiologists. But for at least a brief and shining moment, they were led by vegetables named Bob and Larry.

With a danger of oversimplifying, it may be safe to say that Vischer found maintaining a large production company took different skills than creative great stories and characters. In 2005 Big Idea was sold as it faced bankruptcy and a distribution lawsuit. Veggie Tales lives on and Vischer still works with the company on a contract basis, writing scripts and performing many of the voices for new Veggie Tales productions. He has also started a new creative shop called Jellyfish Labs.

1. Bouncing around on a mat.
2. Humility and transformation.
3. Outrage? Well, yes, because it wouldn’t be true.
4. A little word play.
5. On campaign finance, the regulations do the reverse of the intent, which is not an unusual situation I’d offer, e.g., affirmative action.
6. Key matchups for Sunday.
7. A questioned asked, namely “Is it true that the Inquisition was actually less likely to use torture than some secular courts of the time?” which if the answer is yes or “the same” would puncture a lot of preconceptions and stock arguments.
8. Well, I looked but didn’t see either (a) the “filthy and inappropriate” implied joke or to be hones (b) any joke/humor at all.
9. Huh? Again, I don’t get it.
10. Maybe this offers a hint as to why.
11. If Google were government owned …
12. Flowers at the feet of the Virgin.
13. Looking (back) at the Obama/Alito kerfuffle.

Last night on a new program called Deep End, the attorneys conspired to have Congress pass a law for one individual–the Chinese widow of a American soldier killed in Afghanistan. My wife Debbie, who worked for some time for Congressman John Linder of Georgia, recalled that they dealt with these kinds of requests–and advanced them–from time to time.

That got us March 2005 there was high drama when the lights of the Capitol were on past midnight Sunday for the Congress to pass a bill and the President returned to Washington to sign it at 2 a.m., allowing the federal courts to consider the Schiavo case.

I was involved in a similar action in 1989: the Elizabeth Morgan case.

I was working at the time as chief of staff for Chuck Colson at Prison Fellowship Ministries. Our staff working at the District of Columbia jail had met a woman there who stood out in a number of ways. Dr. Elizabeth Morgan was a tall, white, affluent plastic surgeon from northwest DC in a jail full of almost entirely poor black women from east of the river.

She was already a heroine in the jail. She has been there for nearly two years for contempt of court because she refused to allow her six-year-old daughter to go on court-ordered overnight visits to her ex-husband. She accused her husband of sexual abuse of the child, hidden the child, and went to jail rather than tell the court where the child was.

The imprisoned women, the large majority of whom had been abused (you find this in most women’s prisons in the country), loved Morgan for her courage in protecting her daughter from abuse.

Judge Dixon of the District court could not be persuaded that Morgan’s ex-husband, Virginia oral surgeon Eric Foretich, had been abusive. He would not budge, he cited Morgan for contempt, sent her to jail—-and left her there.

When Morgan and this case came to our attention, we were amazed by her fortitude and by length of time an unconvicted individual had spent in prison. When we studied the evidence, it, and the witness of Morgan’s action, persuaded us that there had been sexual abuse.

Colson wrote an article calling for Morgan’s release, for which he was condemned and praised. Interestingly, it was our natural allies, the conservative Christians, who were outraged, and our usual adversaries, the liberals and women’s rights activists, who were supportive.

(Both Morgan and Foretich were professed Christians, but he was of the more conservative variety and a member of a prominent northern Virginia evangelical church).

We began lobbying our conservative Christian brethren. I went to visit with James Dobson and presented our large file of evidence. He agreed to have Colson on the Focus on the Family radio program. Our campaign picked up steam.

At the same time, we talked with our local Virginia congressman, Frank Wolf, about the case, as well as a few Senators. I remember one strategic lunch in the Senate Dining Room with a Senator from Tennessee, whose influence was necessary to create and move a piece of legislation to free Dr. Morgan.

Within a couple of months, our efforts were successful. The U.S. Congress passed a bill specifically for the release of Dr. Elizabeth Morgan. She was freed from prison after serving the longest detention for civil contempt in American history–25 months.

In February 1990, the daughter was discovered living in New Zealand with her maternal grandparents. A New Zealand court gave Morgan sole custody, but the visitation requirement by the U.S. court remained in effect, meaning that if Morgan returned to America with her daughter she would still have to allow her ex-husband to see their daughter. That wasn’t going to happen. Morgan remained in New Zealand with her daughter.

In 2003, a federal appeals court ruled that the law passed by Congress to help the mother was unconstitutional because it applied to one person. By that time, the daughter was 21 and safe from the harm which a mother spent two years in jail to protect her.

Eighteen years ago, a bright and confident young woman in Evansville, Indiana, discovered a personal issue that would cause her high school education to be disrupted and would result in her mother kicking her out of the house. She’d made some bad choices, and she was pregnant. She had one more choice to make, and she wasn’t sure what to do. Should she quietly have an abortion and get on with life quickly, or go through the ridicule and embarrassment of her classmates, the scorn of her mother, the hard months of pregnancy, and the pains of child birth?

To my great joy, this young woman had lunch with a friend of her friend who worked at a local church’s adoption program, and after many hours of talking and crying and hand-wringing, she decided to bear the beautiful little baby girl who would become a member of our family through adoption. It wasn’t easy or convenient, but through the love and counsel of this new Christian friend, a fine teenager made the right choice. She chose life.

Although my oldest daughter will not win the Heisman Trophy, she is bright, confident, and beautiful in her own right. As the country agues over the propriety of the Focus on the Family Super Bowl ad featuring Tim Tebow, I think about that Evansville teenager who choose life, as well as another young woman three years later who made the same choice and gave birth to my oldest son, who we adopted through the same agency.

Thousands upon thousands of women make the same choice that Pam Tebow and these teenagers made, facing a battery of conflicting counsel, hardships, pains and dashed dreams.

I don’t believe the legality of abortion is an issue of choice but of the strongest moral necessity, but this Super Bowl ad (from what we’ve heard), and my own experience is not about the legality of having a choice, but the morality and ultimate joy of making the right choice.

[I am working on a project that may become a book on the most influential evangelicals leaders of our generation, since 1976, and the impact they’ve had on the church and their times. I will introduce them briefly on this blog from time to time.  Who do you think should be on the list?].

Steven Curtis Chapman. Lyricist and Musician b.1962

If anyone in Christian music could accurately say “I wrote the songs” it would be Steven Curtis Chapman, the most honored songwriter and one of a handful of the genre’s dominant performers in the last 20 years.

Chapman received Christian music’s Dove Award for Songwriter of the Year every year from 1989-1995, and again in 1997 and 1998. He was also honored as Male Vocalist of the Year in 1990, 91, 95, 97, 98, 2000, and 2001; and Artist of the Year in 90, 91, 93, 95, 97, 2000, and again last year, 2009.

In fact, Michael W. Smith and Steven Curtis Chapman are the most honored artists in Dove Awards history.

I met Steven Curtis Chapman on the way to prison. In 1994 I had negotiated an agreement with Chapman’s representatives for Prison Fellowship Ministries to be main sponsor of his “Heaven in the Real World” national concert tour. [Heaven in the Real World was one of two albums to go platinum (sold more than a million copies) for SCC.]

Steven had become interested in Chuck Colson and his prison ministry work and call to faithfulness, and had included a Colson voice over on the album Heaven in the Real World’s title song. As part of the sponsorship agreement, Steven would perform in several Prison Fellowship in-prison outreach programs, PF would gather names of mostly young people at concerts and get promotional space in the CDs, a concert hand-out and other places, and the SCC team would receive a sizeable amount of sponsorship money—six figures—from PF.

It was fairly revolutionary for a conservative organization such as PF, and although it was difficult to measure the impact on the organization, it was probably helpful all around—particularly providing more youthful names for the organization’s aging donor list.

It was on the way to one of the prison programs that I met Steven, flying to the area together, sharing a van. It was the first of many visits with a young musician who seemed to get younger with every passing year to stay popular with young audiences.

While stardom has had a bad influence on numerous Christian music stars, Chapman has always impressed with his authentic and consistent life and work. I found that to be true as he sang and spoke with energy and compassion to both arena crowds of tens of thousands adoring fans and to a few hundred often-stone-faced prison inmates—some of whom shared the faith and others who were just looking for a few hours outside their cell blocks.

It was a trip into the belly of one of the nation’s prison beasts—I believe it was in Indiana—that led to Chapman’s striking and inspirational song: “Free.”

Back in the news in the last year with the tragic death of his youngest child, who was hit by the family car in their driveway. He’s handled it was characteristic honesty and class, and some of the passion of the time is evident in his new album, Beauty Will Rise. He spoke about the tragedy and the album recently on Good Morning America.

1. Advice for prayer.
2. The seen and unseen.
3. Fiscal policy in a nutshell.
4. I hadn’t parsed this quote … but prompted to take a second look, why didn’t his head explode (or at least the audience break into laughter).
5. Labor relations nominee.
6. Well, at least somebody still has a fine sense of humor. I wonder what search terms find stuff like that.
7. Cap and trade … one of those broken campaign promises (that would be not raising taxes on the middle and lower classes)?
8. Speaking of taxes “fighting for jobs” by forcing companies out? Don’t worry, “blame corporate greed” will resurface soon.
9. The elder and the pornographer.
10. The left wing points to democrat intransigence on the healthcare matter.
11. AIG bailout broke laws?
12. A question on economic policy.

What if I told you that we’re spending as much on defense now as we were when Jimmy Carter was President?  Yeah, I’d laugh, too.  But the Cato Institute notes that, as a percentage of the gross domestic product, defense spending is indeed at late-1970s levels.

What’s also interesting to see is that non-defense spending, by the same measure, having stayed at about the same percentage of GDP for 30 years or so, has skyrocketed under Obama.

(Click on the image for the accompanying article.)

Defense spending, a constitutional role of government, is really not the problem when it comes to our national debt.  Just an FYI.

Democrats carped over the big spending of the Bush administration.  (True conservatives did, too, by the way.)  But when they got the reins, both the White House and Congress, Democrats made Republican spending look positively thrifty.

When they have lots of money, Democrats spend money on all sorts of government programs.  And when we have less money, as in this recession, Democrats spend money on all sorts of government programs.

Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.), the House majority whip, said that trying to find greater savings in the budget, which was released by President Barack Obama this morning, wouldn’t help alleviate the recession.
“We’ve got to make some decisions here as to what’s in the best interests of our country going forward,” Clyburn said during an appearance on Fox News. “And I think the best interest is to invest in education, control these deficits, while at the same time trying to get people back to work.”

“We’re not going to save our way out of this recession,” the majority whip added. “We’ve got to spend our way out of this recession, and I think most economists know that.”

But Chuck Bentley, CEO of Crown Financial Ministries, has a different take on the issue.

The government is almost insolvent already because it borrows more money than it takes in. The government is trying to spend its way out of economic trouble.

Washington is not spending cash reserves, its spending borrowed money. We’re borrowing money to solve a problem caused by borrowing too much money. We’re borrowing from foreign sources. Spending is out of control. The only way to fund it is to raise taxes, borrow, or print money. None of those strategies will lead to economic health.

The Democrats are looking at the ends and forgetting all about the means they’re using to achieve them.  Indeed, Obama’s new budget spends a record $3.8 trillion dollars.

The spending blueprint for next year calls for tax cuts for workers and business and more aid for cash-starved state governments as well as the unemployed. The jobs initiative largely mirrors last year’s stimulus bill, but is about one-third its size. The president is asking for nearly $300 billion for recession relief and job stimulus.

The budget paints a remarkably dire picture of a federal government that will have to borrow one-third of what it spends next year as it runs a deficit that still would total some $1.3 trillion.

This from the guy who says he’s trying to reduce deficits.  

Please read all of Chuck Bentley’s article.  He goes over his 5 predicted trends for 2009 (which were all very much on the money, so to speak), and he goes over his 5 trend predictions for 2010.  It’s very likely we’re not out of the woods yet, and government isn’t really helping.

Chuck’s advice to Americans, and America’s government, is the same; get your financial house in order first.  Maxing out your credit cards when you’re already deeply in debt, on the assumption that things are going to get better, is a risky bet.  Just ask banks that bought those (now) toxic home mortgage securities.  Here’s his #5 trend prediction:

The mid-term elections will be a pivotal moment for the economic direction of our country. I don’t want to get into politics, but the problem is the U.S. is increasing its debt while people are trying to get out of debt. There are big differences in what people see as the solution. The population is trying to get its house in order while the government tries to spend its way out of trouble. The U.S. dollar has lost value because of government’s fiscal irresponsibility. The government can only get money by taxing, borrowing, and printing money. More programs mean more money is needed to fund them. That means government will print more money and further devalue the dollar. You can’t become prosperous through government spending. Elected officials from both parties treat the dollar as if it were Monopoly money. When taxing and borrowing isn’t bringing in enough money, government will print it. That will lower the value of the dollar, and devalue your savings. Our elected leaders are living foolishly. We should vote for those seeking office who pledge to be good stewards of the money the people supply the government through taxes. They should act as trustees that are committed to protect the people by making sure the government lives within its means. Work with all your power to get the government to live within its means. The mid-term elections will indicate the direction of the country. If we’re not successful in electing good stewards, a very painful correction is coming.

If that correction comes, be sure government will misread the reasons.  Just get educated yourself.

Well, I didn’t get up early enough to write (or post links) and slept in a bit. So … links with comments this morning.

1. Mr Greenwald asks a question of the left. This might be were one would put a hope/change sort of dig … but I won’t go there (oops). This item will be referred to below, btw.
2. The left takes on “corporatism” here and here, and ignores the elephant in the room. That’s right when you compare the power and ability of corporations to do ill with that of government clearly corporations are the greater evil … if of course you are severely brain damaged. How one can escape the 20th century and not realize that Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Mao, and the Khmer Rouge were not all leaders of mega-corps unleashing their corporate stooges but … wait for it … government leaders using government forces. The answer to counter corporate malfeasance is not increased government power and oversight (see item #1 above). It takes something more like, well, this. Tea parties (the original more than the latter) come to mind.
3. A chart, which in turn demonstrates the gullibility of Democrats (and political junkies) who believe the results of about any damn poll. More seriously instead of reading tea leaves for your opinion of the other side, try getting to know some.
4. An interesting painting.
5. Two useful criteria when defining religion.
6. Mr Obama does something which makes the right applaud.  Now we will have to wait for the left to figure out that means that its those evil corporations are pushing into space. Of course the right isn’t universally happy about everything Mr Obama does. But that goes without saying. Here’s something else to applaud (on the right), and it doesn’t hurt that in doing so he breaks a campaign promise.
7. TARP and incentives. Oops. And other ways in which the administration sneaks government growth under the radar.
8. Mr O’Keefe (consider the Ukraine link above in #2 above).
9. On that film Avatar. Heh.
10. 1984 and Mr Obama.
11. A DADT compromise suggested. Comments?
12. An Orthodox hymn.
13. Watching economists dicker.

[I am working on a project that may become a book on the most influential evangelicals leaders of our generation, since 1976, and the impact they’ve had on the church and their times. I will introduce them briefly on this blog from time to time.  Who should be on the list?].

Bill Bright. Evangelist (1921-2003)

The call came into the public relations firm late one afternoon in early 1999, and although Campus Crusade was not my account, the account executive wasn’t in, and I was the ranking executive on duty, so I took the “important call from Crusade.” The director of communications, our contact, was on the line; he breathlessly asked me to hold for Dr. Bright.

Campus Crusade founder and president Bill Bright was on a mission. As the end of the millennium loomed, he was increasingly burdened with the challenge to bring millions more people to faith in Christ. While it seemed as though every church and Christian group in the world had a campaign to fulfill the Great Commission before 2000, Bright also had a personal plan.

“Let’s find Noah’s Ark,” Bright said, and I stammered some agreeable words, uncertain of what he actually meant. He meant just that. His conviction was that the people in the villages of Turkey knew the whereabouts of the remnants of the ark; all we needed to do what make it worth it to them to tell us. Bright had decided that we’d run ads in the major newspapers of Turkey and offer $1 million to the person who would provide us with inconvertible evidence of the ark’s location and remnants.

Bright had the same reason for this long shot scheme that compelled him through decades as head of Campus Crusade—to provide evidence that would bring millions of people to faith in Jesus Christ. He figured that if we could provide failsafe modern evidence of one of the Bible’s best know stories, it would convince skeptics around the world that the Bible is an accurate historical record. And that would result in their trust of Scripture and their commitment to the biblical Jesus.

And so we did. Our PR firm was the only contact because Bill Bright and Campus Crusade were to remain anonymous. We wrote and designed a compelling ad with the help of our friends at The Puckett Group, who found a Turkish translator and tapped into the international advertising services necessary to place ads in the newspapers of Turkey.

This earnest effort brought drawers full of packages with long descriptions of places and proofs, with grainy pictures and even video. We couldn’t produce any more certainty than many other teams of filmmakers and authors and researchers could throughout the centuries. The project deadline arrived without conclusive evidence and all that remained to be done was to continue writing polite responses to dozens of wishful treasure hunters in Turkish villages for months that followed.

Perhaps the best result was another glimpse into the hopeful and sincere heart of one of evangelicalism’s most energetic and respected champions of mass evangelism. Bill Bright introduced not only the massive college evangelism effort, Campus Crusade, but also tools and campaigns that—although sometimes derided as simplistic and incomplete—nonetheless brought millions of people to Christ. These campaigns became pervasive symbols of evangelical marketing of the time—such as the Four Spiritual Laws (1965), the I Found It campaign (1976), and The Jesus Film (1979).

Bright, born in Coweta, Oklahoma, described himself as being a “happy pagan” in his youth. He graduated from Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, Oklahoma with an economics degree. In 1944, while attending the First Presbyterian Church, Hollywood, Bright became a Christian. He immediately began intensive biblical studies which led him to graduate studies at Princeton and Fuller Theological Seminaries. It was while he was a student at Fuller that he felt what he regarded as the call of God to help fulfill Christ’s Great Commission (Matthew 28:19) by sharing his faith, beginning with students at UCLA. This gave birth to the Campus Crusade for Christ movement.

During the decades to follow, Bill Bright and his wife, Vonette, remained faithful to this work, and the ministry expanded greatly. Campus Crusade now has more than 27,000 full-time staff and over 225,000 trained volunteer staff in 190 countries.

I’m pro-choice, and Tebow clearly is not. But based on what I’ve heard in the past week, I’ll take his side against the group-think, elitism and condescension of the “National Organization of Fewer and Fewer Women All The Time.” For one thing, Tebow seems smarter than they do.

Tebow’s 30-second ad hasn’t even run yet, but it already has provoked “The National Organization for Women Who Only Think Like Us” to reveal something
important about themselves: They aren’t actually “pro-choice” so much as they are pro-abortion. Pam Tebow has a genuine pro-choice story to tell. She got pregnant in 1987, post-Roe v. Wade, and while on a Christian mission in the Philippines, she contracted a tropical ailment. Doctors advised her the pregnancy could be dangerous, but she exercised her freedom of choice and now, 20-some years later, the outcome of that choice is her beauteous Heisman Trophy winner son, a chaste, proselytizing evangelical.

Pam Tebow and her son feel good enough about that choice to want to tell people about it. Only, NOW says they shouldn’t be allowed to. Apparently NOW feels this commercial is an inappropriate message for America to see for 30 seconds, but women in bikinis selling beer is the right one. I would like to meet the genius at NOW who made that decision. On second thought, no, I wouldn’t.

There’s not enough space in the sports pages for the serious weighing of values that constitutes this debate, but surely everyone in both camps, pro-choice or pro-life, wishes the “need” for abortions wasn’t so great. Which is precisely why NOW is so wrong to take aim at Tebow’s ad.

Be sure to read the whole thing. Hats off to Ms. Jenkins for calling out the intolerant critics on the Left who wish to demonize the Tebows. Though we may not agree on whether abortion is wrong we can at least agree that we can respectfully disagree with each other.