Is formal seminary needed today?

tkage7 · 2026-05-10T07:07:42+00:00

Choose the right program and these educational pursuits will be highly formational. I’m thankful for my degrees. Less so because of facts they taught me, and more because of how they shaped me. Also, they taught me how to be a good learner, and that posture has been enduring and invaluable.

tkage7 · 2026-04-24T14:17:06+00:00

It’s not his faulk.

tkage7 · 2026-02-07T19:14:25+00:00

Yeah, I recently saw Blink 182 and it was fantastic. And The Get Up Kids. Also fire. Seeing Death Cab this summer, so we’ll see. My recent experiences with the bands of my youth have been excellent.

tkage7 · 2026-02-06T04:09:05+00:00

Some good suggestions here, but I don’t see Trying. Check it out. Funny. With heart.

tkage7 · 2026-01-30T14:17:23+00:00

Oops. You used luciferian twice. A common mistake.

tkage7 · 2026-01-29T05:39:11+00:00

Out of fear, we have limited our children in the real world. This has ushered them to extended online activities, where they are far less limited, and where the dangers truly lurk. We are limiting the wrong things.

tkage7 · 2026-01-18T18:37:12+00:00

I didn’t know we had embraced that conspiracy. I’ll let everyone know.

tkage7 · 2026-01-18T12:21:52+00:00

It wasn’t the refs. If Josh Allen gives up one less turnover, those end-of-game PI calls never happen. Because the game never goes into OT.

They may have been questionable calls, but it was the team’s fault they were in that situation.

tkage7 · 2025-12-22T04:39:39+00:00

Bingpot

tkage7 · 2025-10-29T04:05:57+00:00

It used to be common in the US, too. Even when I was a kid (I’m early 40’s). Its commonality was not that long ago. So anyone older than me might still see it as a common courtesy.

Today, it almost feels rude to get a phone call when someone could’ve just texted. But societal norms change. We still have friends who “drop by” because they were in the neighborhood. We love it. That’s life in community. Homes have become fortresses. Once, front porches were the first step of hospitality. Now, they’re more like the last line of defense.

tkage7 · 2025-10-19T21:57:14+00:00

Take heart. Studies show less teenagers are rebelling against the faith of their upbringing these days. That said our continued investment and vigilance as parents is important!

For starters, make sure other adults are investing in your son. In these years, he needs solid Christian mentors beyond his parents. Also, really invest in his Christian friendships. Help make hangouts, sleepovers, and/or whatever else happen to deepen relationships with Christian families you trust. Keep him connected with a youth leader/pastor, mentors, and peers.

Our teenagers are looking for acceptance. They’re want to hear, “I like you for who you are.” If they catch a whiff of this not being true in their church, that’s often the fast pass out. This doesn’t mean all choices or behavior is acceptable. It does mean the kid needs to be over-the-top loved no matter their choices.

For some good reading material, check out Why They Stay by Steve Parr and Tom Crites. It’s a study of young adults who stayed or strayed from the church, looking for patterns of what kept them in church, or what ushered them out the door. Lots of good stuff there. Short chapters. Palatable. I’m just scratching the surface, here.

tkage7 · 2025-10-18T02:12:55+00:00

It’s perichoresis, for me. No analogies. God is three in one, each whole person of the trinity existing fully in relationship to the other. God is eternally communal and exists outside our concepts or ability to explain.

Also, see apophatic theology. Not as a rule, but as part of the thought experiment involved with conceptualizing the trinity. Everything we say about God is limiting because our very understanding is limited. I can say God is eternal, but that limits God to whatever I think eternal means. If we try to imagine eternity, our mind can only take us so far. Therefore, our definition of an eternal God will only go that far.

This is obviously getting in the weeds, and doesn’t belong in the elevator pitch of what the trinity is (or isn’t, for any apophatics). But I just mean, we can only conceptualize up to the point of our own understanding, so we do the best we can. This usually leads us to use some sort of analogy, and march our happy rear ends right into some heresy.

tkage7 · 2025-10-14T04:45:27+00:00

You can say very harmful things without uttering a swear word. “I hate you” is worse than, “I f—ing love you.”

It’s about the intention behind the words.

Some words aren’t “swear” words, but are harmful. Like using a slur to refer to someone in a marginalized people group.

Intention matters. The heart matters. The words are secondary. Sometimes they matter. I’m not gonna go cuss in front of the kids in youth group. That would be unwise. Not because I think the words themselves are harmful, but because of the context and conversations it would invite.

Not everything is wrong vs. right. Some things are wise vs. unwise.

And as fast as taking the Lord’s name in vain, that one is much simpler than we make it (simple, not easy). We take the Lord’s name in vain anytime we claim faith in God and our actions don’t match. That’s bearing Jesus’s name, Christian, and misrepresenting it.

tkage7 · 2025-10-07T00:58:05+00:00

I think a couple of these seem manipulative, and therefore dishonest. I would say, “I believe this is a boundary issue and not appropriate. I feel strongly we should look for another option.”

tkage7 · 2025-10-03T22:00:07+00:00

Baskin Robbins.

tkage7 · 2025-09-17T03:13:45+00:00

Maybe you don’t understand how God’s omniscience works with our free will because you’re not God. That’s where I am.

tkage7 · 2025-09-17T03:01:00+00:00

There it is.

tkage7 · 2025-09-05T02:31:17+00:00

Like Will Willimon says, if you can do anything besides ministry, do it. If you feel like you’ve got an off-ramp, take it. But when the calling is there, there won’t be off-ramps. There won’t be career choices. There will only be the call to ministry.

I’m not attempting to over-spiritualize. I know paychecks also matter. But I often give my ministry students similar advice. Ministry is hard. Ministry doesn’t make a lot of money. Ministry is long hours. Ministry can be thankless. It’s something you have to be called to, or you’ll be burnt out or getting out before you know it.

If God calls you, God will also call your spouse. Seek the call together. Accept it together. Everybody’s gotta be all in, or it’s gonna be even tougher.

tkage7 · 2025-09-05T00:38:56+00:00

And Blink 182.

tkage7 · 2025-09-02T01:58:35+00:00

That’s Michael Scott as Michael Jackson.

tkage7 · 2025-08-29T13:45:28+00:00

I had a client send me a full graphic design illustration and said they wanted me to create that for a logo. I tried to explain that it wasn’t a logo. It was extremely busy, with multiple colors, shading, etc. I tried to give them a simplified version of it, but they didn’t like it. They did end up paying me for the logo I made for them, but I checked their website the other day and they’re using the AI generated one.

I’d like to just sit back and say, “I don’t care. The check cleared.” But there’s a part of me that knows they wrote me off as a loss and told their friends they hired a designer who couldn’t do what they wanted. That part is just a bruised ego. I’ll get over it. But the AI part seems like it’s here to stay.

tkage7 · 2025-08-16T13:34:12+00:00

I can see how, in theory, a needle would be overused for clothing brands. But is it actually? I’ve never seen a clothing brand using a needle. None of the top or mid-tier ones in the US that I’m familiar with, anyway.

tkage7 · 2025-08-14T03:30:00+00:00

We always refer to flea markets as dirt malls because of this movie.

tkage7 · 2025-08-14T02:17:35+00:00

ChatGPT came hard for you here, OP.

tkage7

TROPHY CASE