Sunday, October 07, 2007

Redd Remembers Years In Sidney, Discusses NCTC Role

(Sidney) -- It was a rememorable weekend of one of Sidney's favorite sons. Dedication ceremonies were held Friday for the Admiral John "Scott" Redd Highway--otherwise know as the Highway 2 bypass project winding its way around Sidney. Redd tells KMA News the naming of the highway in his honor brings his career full circle--from growing up in Southwest Iowa, to his career with the U-S Navy. In addition to the dedication ceremonies, Redd also spoke to Sidney's seventh through 12th grade students Friday afternoon. Redd's main message involves something he calls the "VECTOR" principles--vision, excellence, character, being a team player, understanding your organization, and respecting others. Presently, Redd serves as director of the National Counterterrorism Center. Redd's responsibilities are two-fold. First, he coordinates all intelligence activities regarding counterterrorism activities. Secondly, Redd is in charge of strategic operation planning involving all elements of the national war on terror. Redd believes the U-S has made progress in the war on terror, in that the U-S hasn't been attacked in the six years since 9/11. In addition, Redd says the nation is better prepared to guard against terrorism. Redd, however, says terrorists are dangerous, determined and patient. Redd warns the existing war on terror will continue for many years--he hopes it's over by the time his grandchildren become adults.

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Clarence Thomas: The Justice Nobody Knows

60 Minutes interview transcript
Rush Limbaugh

Clarence Thomas

After 16 years of relative silence on the subject, Justice Clarence Thomas is publishing an autobiography that addresses what he has called a "high-tech" lynching -- the confirmation process that followed his nomination to the Supreme Court by President George Herbert Walker Bush.

ABC Supreme Court correspondent Jan Crawford Greenburg conducted a series of wide-ranging interviews with Justice Thomas and his wife, Virginia.

Click on the links below for Greenburg's in-depth report on her interviews with the justice.

Part I: My Grandfather's Son
"These people who claim to be progressive … have been far more vicious to me than any southerner," Thomas says, "and it is purely ideological."

Part II: The Integrator
He is part of another great generation -- a generation of blacks who integrated a racist society, whose entry into those hostile white worlds was, in many ways, no less courageous than the bravery of the men who stormed the beaches of Normandy.

Part III: Going North
"I didn't have this view that I was going to go North. Ideologically, I wanted to be like the Northern kids who were no longer submissive. They were fighting back on the racial issues," Thomas says. "But I didn't want to go North. That was not a part of it. But it was the only option I had after I got kicked out of the house."

Part IV: A Conservative in Washington -- and the Personal Struggles
"I drank more heavily than ever before, and though I was careful not to let my drinking interfere with my work, I knew I was on the road to trouble," Thomas writes.

Part V: Finding Peace
"I sometimes wonder how I got through the summer of 1983 without falling apart," he wrote. "I was lower than a snake's belly ... and the mad thought of taking my own life fleetingly crossed my mind."

Part VI: Becoming a Judge
"That's a job for old people," Thomas wrote that he replied. "I can't see myself spending the rest of my life as a judge."

Part VII: 'Traitorous' Adversaries: Anita Hill and the Senate Democrats
Thomas wrote that he paced around the house "like a caged animal," not knowing what to expect but fearing the worst.

Part VIII: Rebuilding a Life
"Thanks to God's direct intervention, I had risen phoenix-like from the ashes of self-pity and despair, and though my wounds were still raw, I trusted that in time they, too, would heal," he wrote.

Video Highlights

Click on the links below to watch highlights from Greenburg's series of interviews with Thomas.

TOPIC: Justice Clarence Thomas shares his inner thoughts on the 1991 confirmation hearings, calling the experience "the most inhuman thing that has ever happened to me."

TOPIC: Justice Clarence Thomas talks about his methodology on the Supreme Court and why he asks so few questions during oral arguments.

TOPIC: Justice Clarence Thomas' wife, Virginia Thomas, describes her reaction to Anita Hill's charges against her husband and says she's still holding out hope for an apology.

TOPIC: Justice Clarence Thomas describes his upbringing by his maternal grandfather, who was the inspiration behind the title of his book "My Grandfather's Son."

Sunday, September 30, 2007

The Supremacy of Christ and Joy in a Postmodern World

In a postmodern society where “absolute truth” is a foreign concept and religion is without morals, Christians often wonder, “How can I share the love, joy, and truth of Christ with a hurting world?”

Six of today’s leading pastor-theologians—John Piper, Voddie Baucham, D. A. Carson, Tim Keller, Mark Driscoll, and David Wells—joined together at the 2006 Desiring God Conference to offer Christians a practical, biblical vision of Christ’s supremacy so that they will be better prepared to present the undeniable truth to a searching society. After grounding listeners in the important truths of Christ’s deity and the gospel, The Supremacy of Christ in a Postmodern World strives to help believers understand how to share these truths in a postmodern society.

Are Religious People Happier?

Onward Christian Scholars

EVERY FRIDAY AFTERNOON in Moscow, Idaho, a strange commotion overruns Main Street. A stream of young men and women parade down the sidewalk, wearing black academic gowns that billow and flap as they walk. Some pore over Latin textbooks or thumb flashcards of ancient Greek vocabulary, nearly tripping at the curb. They are students at New St. Andrews College on their way to disputatio, a weekly assembly held in a movie theater downtown. The college itself has no room large enough to accommodate all 150 students at once: it occupies a single unassuming brick building a few blocks away, one that a stranger might mistake for the refurbished husk of an old savings and loan. Passers-by on their way to the Pita Pit or Hodgins Drug barely give the students a second glance. Not a few residents, however, have fought hard to keep them out of downtown. Founded in 1994 by the elders of a fast-growing and radically conservative church, New St. Andrews represents a new philosophy of evangelical education — one that has inspired a national movement and makes local liberals nervous.

The students and teachers call what they are doing “classical Christian education.” They believe it’s much more than memorizing Latin declensions and Aristotle’s principles of rhetoric, though they do plenty of that. Doug Wilson, 54, the pastor who spearheaded New St. Andrews’ founding, puts the college’s purpose simply: “We are trying to save civilization.”

Tuesday, September 25, 2007

Suffering and the Sovereignty of God

Table of Contents

Contributors
Introduction
Justin Taylor

Part 1. The Sovereignty of God in Suffering
1. Suffering and the Sovereignty of God: Ten Aspects of God's Sovereignty Over Suffering and Satan's Hand in It
John Piper

2. "All the Good That Is Ours in Christ": Seeing God's Gracious Hand in the Hurts Others Do to Us
Mark R. Talbot

Part 2. The Purposes of God in Suffering
3. The Suffering of Christ and the Sovereignty of God
John Piper

4. Why God Appoints Suffering for His Servants
John Piper

5. Sovereignty, Suffering, and the Work of Missions
Stephen F. Saint

6. The Sovereignty of God and Ethnic-Based Suffering
Carl F. Ellis, Jr.

Part 3. The Grace of God in Suffering
7. God's Grace and Your Sufferings
David Powlison

8. Waiting for the Morning during the Long Night of Weeping
Dustin Shramek

9. Hope . . . the Best of Things
Joni Eareckson Tada

Appendices
Don't Waste Your Cancer
John Piper and David Powlison

An Interview with John Piper
John Piper and Justin Taylor

Subject Index
Person Index
Scripture Index
Desiring God: Note on Resources



Interview with John Piper
2005 Desiring God National Conference
October 7, 2005
John Piper with Justin Taylor

The Suffering of Christ and the Sovereignty of God
2005 Desiring God National Conference
October 9, 2005
John Piper
Excerpts: Listen

The Sovereignty of God and Ethnic-Based Suffering
2005 Desiring God National Conference
October 8, 2005
Carl Ellis

Christ's Grace and Your Sufferings
2005 Desiring God National Conference
October 8, 2005
David Powlison

Suffering for the Sake Of...
2005 Desiring God National Conference
October 8, 2005
Joni Eareckson Tada

Sovereignty, Suffering, and the Work of Missions
2005 Desiring God National Conference
October 8, 2005
Steve Saint

All the Good that Is Ours in Christ: Seeing God's Gracious Hand in the Hurts Others Do to Us
2005 Desiring God National Conference
October 8, 2005
Mark Talbot

Ten Aspects of God's Sovereignty Over Suffering and Satan's Hand in It
2005 Desiring God National Conference
October 7, 2005
John Piper
Excerpts: Listen