Unpop Culture

God hates idolatry. This should be no surprise, since serving anything but God is to show a hatred for God Himself. When I pursue other things in place of Him—when I, in essence, spit in the face of holiness—it is an insult of the grossest kind. In Scripture, God doesn’t mince any words about idolatry. For example… “They provoked Him to jealousy with foreign gods; with abominations they provoked Him to anger.” (Deuteronomy 32:16) “They have provoked Me to jealousy by what is not God; they have moved Me to anger by their foolish idols.” (Deuteronomy 32:21a) “You shall not bow down to [idols] nor serve them. For I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me.” (Exodus 20:5) “(for you shall worship no other god, for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God).” (Exodus 34:14) “I am the LORD, that is My name; and My glory I will not give to another, nor My praise to carved images...

The statement I am about to make isn’t grounded on objective observation (I can’t see into the future), but I’m going to throw caution into the winds of personal feeling and say it anyway: The Lake Hous e is the best movie of 2006. I know, we’re not even halfway through the year yet. I have no right making such a claim. But make it I will. Romances like this simply don’t come along every day…or year…or decade. I’m not a big fan of chick flicks, for two main reasons: (1) typically, they center around immorality, and (2) they are extremely unrealistic. As such, most modern romances could be appropriately filed under the category of “fantasy.” For me, fantasy and romance aren’t usually the best combination. (I have a hard enough time as it is viewing romance from a Biblical perspective without subjecting myself to Dr. Worldly Love’s advice.) The Lake House , interestingly enough, is a fantasy—and yet it reaches heights of relational realism that other films only dream about. Though it isn...

As is true with all television shows, Everwood couldn’t last forever. After four seasons, it has ended. Not only did the show involve splendid writing (in particular, the banter between Doctors Abbot and Brown was priceless) and superb acting (especially by Emily VanCamp), it included a wonderful musical score by Blake Neely . You can listen to the Season 1 main theme here . Great music. (In fact, we used the score from episode 306, “Shoot The Moon,” as a temp track for the documentary A Weakness Worth Boasting .) At the end of the season—and show—finale, we got to see Ephram and Amy together…again…forever…finally. It took them long enough—like, foreverwood. (You might think that’s just a bad pun, but it is actually the title of the final episode. So, it’s a bad pun with thematic significance.)

Cars is the longest Pixar film to date (beating The Incredibles by a scant sixty seconds), with a sometimes-sluggish and less-than-original storyline, a small amount of surprisingly racy humor (pun intended), a mediocre musical score, and less funny/witty moments than are found in typical Pixar fare…and it is still better than anything else recently released by Hollywood. Through a series of unfortunate events, a self-centered racecar, Lightning McQueen, is stranded in a tiny mid-western town on his way to California to compete in a race for the Piston Cup. Through his interaction with the local inhabitants, Lightning learns important lessons about life’s priorities. True to Pixar originality, the climactic sequence ends in a decidedly anti-Hollywood way, giving the film’s somewhat clichéd message a large does of moral potency. There aren’t enough effective adjectives to describe Pixar filmmaking. Compare the “cow tipping” jokes in Cars to those in the Open Season trailer. One makes ...

Through the LORD’s mercies we are not consumed, Because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness. “The LORD is my portion,” says my soul, “Therefore I hope in Him!” Lamentations 3:22-24 I’ve been meditating on Lamentations 3:23 today. In the context of the passage, we see that God’s mercies are new every morning—but not because there’s an automatic “reset” button at the beginning of each day, by which all our previous sins are somehow overlooked. We don’t deserve to start the day with a clean slate simply because it’s a new day. No, “we are not consumed” only because “Great is [the LORD’s] faithfulness.” And what is the cornerstone of God’s faithfulness to sinners who deserve to be consumed by His displeasure? That cornerstone is the cross, where Christ was consumed in our place. Therefore, we are free to say, “The LORD is my portion…Therefore I hope in Him!”